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The Plainfield Village Board on Monday night approved a redevelopment agreement that will rebate to the developer of The Boulevard a portion of the proposed shopping center’s future property taxes.
The agreement would employ the Route 30 Tax Increment Financing District established by the village in October 2018 to refund to 55/30 Acquisition a portion of the TIF property taxes over a period of 20 years.
Designation of a TIF district freezes the share of property taxes for all its taxing bodies at the start. Additional revenues from property taxes as property values increase with more development can be used for necessary improvements – including infrastructure – in that district.
55/30 owns about 170 acres of property in Plainfield and Joliet. The Boulevard is a proposed pedestrian-friendly shopping center on about 60 acres of that property at the northwest corner of Route 30 and Interstate 55. The plan for the project shows about 500,000 total square feet of retail development that would be anchored by a 150,000-square-foot Costco.
The village approved the Costco plans, including a $2.5 million sales tax rebate in August.
As required by intergovernmental agreements the village has signed with other taxing bodies in the TIF, half of the tax increment generated by the development of the property – as property values go up – would necessarily go to those other taxing bodies. The remaining 50% can be used by the village to help the developer with the costs of infrastructure and site improvements needed to move forward with the large-scale project, economic development manager Jake Melrose said.
According to the terms of the agreement, the largest reimbursement amount – 85% of TIF funds generated – would be given to 55/30 in the first five years of the 20-year agreement. That share would decrease incrementally every five years to 75%, 65% and 50%.
The terms of the agreement “encourage [55/30] to aggressively pursue more development, especially at the front end of the incentive scale,” Melrose said.
Without this incentive, the development of The Boulevard would not move forward, he said.
“It’s a very extensive project, the largest ground up commercial development in Chicagoland – outside of Chicago – in the last 10 years,” Melrose said. “There are a lot of massive improvements that are required.”