Grafton Village Board passes TID by one vote

The contentious triangle property was eliminated from Grafton’s tax incremental financing district No. 6, but the plan still didn’t sit well with a trio of village trustees.

The Grafton Village Board on Monday voted 4-3 to approve the TID, which is blighted since 60% of the properties are in need of rehabilitation, exceeding the minimum standard of 50%.

The TID will use money from future added tax value from development to pay for home improvement grants, infrastructure, roadwork and developer incentives.

The TID plan was done by Associate Planner Meredith Perks of Vandewalle and Associates of Milwaukee, who said TIDs are Wisconsin municipalities’ “best tool for economic development.”

The estimate is that the TID will bring in $1.78 million in new property value to the village and $9.4 million in tax revenue over its 27-year life, Perks said. All the development is estimated to be done in the first 11 years.

One TID element the trustees agreed on is that the site of the former Goldberg Foundry needs to be addressed. Community Development Director Jessica Wolff called it “no longer a viable structure.”

But the process of remediating the property doesn’t sit well with everyone.

Trustee Andrew Schwartz said the village won’t acquire property, according to the TID document. But it looks like the village has to take over the foundry site.

Trustee Lisa Uribe Harbeck agreed, saying the board has been told the village isn’t supposed to be a landowner.

“Here we are again, we’re going to be a landowner and going to try to remediate it. Hopefully we won’t have to spend more than what’s anticipated but there are too many things outside of our control I don’t agree with,” she said.

Wolff said the goal is to have Ozaukee County take the property via foreclosure and deed it to the village for “a very short time” to remediate it before selling it.

Uribe Harbeck also said she is worried about the village’s legal responsibility and what it  will find when it digs into the property.

Wolff said “significant research” has been done on the site and she is comfortable with the cost estimate to remediate it.

Trustee Jim Miller has opposed the TID since it was brought to the Community Development Authority.

“I like the idea of demolishing the Goldberg foundry. I think that’s very important,” he said. “I think there’s a lot of wants, not needs, in this particular proposal.”

Schwartz said he thinks some of the TID’s revenue projections are too high, and he doesn’t like that the foundry site calls for a “high-density multi-story building” that he said is “not in the flavor of the neighborhood around it.

“I don’t think the people who live around that are going to accept that,” he said.

The TID identifies village projects in a three-tiered priority system that the money it brings in can be used for. Schwartz said he doesn’t agree with some of the TID’s estimated property value or tax revenue projections.

“I just don’t see the increment in this district being enough to pay for some of the stuff,” he said.

Village President Dan Delorit said the village doesn’t have to spend money on any of the projects. The TID’s format is “spend as you go,” he said.

“We’re not going to be spending anything outside of what we have,” he said.

Miller, Schwartz and Uribe Harbeck voted against the TID.