Montgomery officials OK TIF district study for 260 acre parcel at Orchard Road, Route 30

The Montgomery Village Board has taken another step towards designating a large parcel of undeveloped land west of Orchard Road a TIF (Tax Increment Financing) district.

Board members agreed Monday evening, Nov. 28, to retain Teska Associates, a Plainfield-based consulting firm, at a cost of $13,000 to prepare a TIF plan for the approximate 260 acre parcel at the northwest corner of Route 30 and Orchard Road.

NGH Farms, LLC, property owners, have requested the TIF district designation to help with the development of the property.

In a prior study completed last year, Teska Associates determined the property is eligible under state law for TIF designation “based on chronic flooding of the area due to the wetlands, floodway and floodplain areas on the property,” according to a memo from Sonya Abt, the village’s director of community development.

Since Teska Associates completed their initial study, village staff have negotiated an annexation agreement for the property with the owners.

Under terms of the proposed annexation agreement, sections of the property would be zoned for a mixture of retail businesses and manufacturing uses, including a mining and a redi-mix concrete plant.

The retail areas would be located along Orchard Road on either side of an extension of Aucutt Road across the property, at the southwest corner of the property along Route 30, and at what would be the southeast corner of the Aucutt Road and Griffin Drive when both streets are extended. The other portions of the property located primarily north of the Aucutt Road extension would be zoned for light and general manufacturing, respectively.

Abt said in her memo the extension of Aucutt Road west of Orchard Road crossing the Blackberry Creek and the extension of Griffin Drive north to connect with Aucutt Road extended would be part of the public improvements.

“(Village) Staff believes that these improvements are in the best interest of the village and that the extraordinary expenses related to these road extensions would be TIF eligible expenses should the village adopt a TIF district for the area,” Abt said.

During Monday’s board meeting, Abt noted the proposed road extensions would create a bypass around the already-congested Route 30 and Orchard Road intersection.

If designated as a TIF district, the taxable value of the property would remain at is current level for the 23-year life of the TIF designation and the property owner would continue to pay property taxes to local taxing districts calculated on that base level. However, property tax revenues resulting from the rising value of the land beyond the base value--the tax increment--would be placed in a special fund controlled by the village and used to help pay for public improvements on the property.