[Mpls] $30m in TIF funds to be redirected to affordable housing?

[Doug Walter]

The Community Development Committee just withdrew the TIF redirect
proposal from their agenda. The reason being that "staff was not
comfortable bringing it forward at this point."  However, it is not
going away.

Lisa McDonald is correct to point out that the County and School Board
have a stake in this issue. I was remiss in not pointing that out. 

The CPED has earmarked these funds specifically for building
"affordable" rental units. They even lay claim to retroactive profits
from the districts: 

"These revenues will include the recent $320,000 Parcel C replacement
housing payment, plus potential cash flow participation payments and
profit participation payments from the various projects collected
retroactively over the past five years and in to the future through the
term of the TIF districts."

This only furthers the speculation that the Mayor has decided to place
all the City's housing development eggs in one basket--creating new
affordable housing. With increasing rental vacancy rates and
considerably lowered public support for funding new affordable housing
development, the developer-centric "bricks and mortar" approach to
affordability issues makes less sense now than it did even a few years
ago.

Doug Walter
Nokomis East