MANSFIELD — City council approved the creation and implementation of a job creation tax credit program at its meeting Tuesday night.
According to Tim Bowersock, Mansfield’s economic development director, the program is an incentive to encourage businesses to expand or locate in the city.
He said the city will be able to authorize up to a 50 percent tax credit on income taxes of businesses, either new or existing, for creating new jobs. He said there are criteria the businesses need to meet, including job minimums and average wage requirements.
The program’s guidelines are modeled primarily after what the city of Kent has in place, which are based on the state’s guidelines, Bowersock said. He added the guidelines have been reviewed by the law director’s office and the finance department.
Bowersock said he’s wanted to implement the program in Mansfield for about 18 years. It wasn’t until last year that a provision was included, at the state’s insistence, in the city’s finance legislation that would allow for the program, he said.
“But we’ve never actually had the guidelines and basically a process to go through with it,” he said.
The tax credits would be refunded at the end of the year once the companies have submitted their reconciliations for income tax and shown proof of job creation and payroll associated with those jobs.
“It would be an earned credit,” Bowersock said. “We’re not giving up anything that we already get. It’s giving up a portion of the newly created (income tax) for a term — and that’s a negotiated term — typically it’s going to be somewhere in the three- to seven-year range.”
Applications will be reviewed by Bowersock, as well as the finance department and the law director’s office. Together they would then determine what would be offered in terms of a percentage of tax credit.
Ontario has had an identical program in place since 2010 or 2011, he said.
“It’s one of the few tools that we haven’t had for me to use from an economic development standpoint when I’m meeting with people, but this does come up in just about every project that we’re talking anymore,” he said.
“Right now I can think of three that this is in the mix of what they’d like us to consider, both in looking at Mansfield as either a location for a new venture of theirs or as expansion of an existing facility.”
Economic Development
Council approved the selling of two acres of land at Reid Industrial Park to MightyFruit Trucking. The company intends to develop the property for a business engaged in the trucking business.
Council also approved the selling of seven acres of land on Piper Road, near the Valero gas station, to Rama Tika Retails, LLC.
Bowersock said Rama Tika Retails, the owner of the Valero gas station, intends to expand the gas station’s convenience store and the semi truck parking area at that facility.
Council also approved the selling of property at 17 Willis Avenue to ARSA, LLC, which intends to use the property for future expansion of E.S. Beveridge Associates, Inc.
“They’ve acquired a couple other properties in that area for that purpose,” Bowersock said of ARSA.
Fire department
The Mansfield Fire Department is on track to receive a safety capital grant from the Ohio Development Services in the amount of $66,905.
According to Fire Chief Steve Strickling, the money will be used to purchase an identifying meter for the hazardous materials unit, which will cost about $50,000. The meter will be used to identify unknown solids and liquids.
The money will also be used to purchase seven kits, each costing about $2,500, which will include a radiation detector, fluorine gas detector, pH paper, temperature gun, and an LEL (Lower Explosive Limit) meter.
Richland County Children Services
Safety-Service Director Lori Cope read a proclamation in recognition of Child Abuse Prevention Month.
According to the proclamation, Richland County Children Services assessed over 2,000 allegations and requests for service during 2016.
Carl Hunnell of Richland County Children Services thanked the city for its support. He noted that the costs associated with the placement of children continue to rise for the agency.
“Our placement costs in the last five years have grown 154 percent,” he said. “It’s gone from $567,000 in 2011 to $1.4 million last year.”
He added the number of children in placement has jumped 59 percent, from 16,000 paid days of care in 2011 to almost 29,600 last year.
“This all happens at a time when the state of Ohio continues to lag far behind 49 other states in the amount of funding it provides for child welfare,” he said.
