The Moline Council in action

The city made a bit of news by announcing a couple scheme which actually doesn't transfer Moline resident's tax dollars directly into developer's hands.

The Moline City Council voted Tuesday to buy two pieces of land to meet future parking needs in the downtown area.

The land, for which the city is paying $253,125, is broken into two parcels. The first is west of 18th Street and north of the railroad tracks, and the second is at 1708 River Drive.

The money to buy the lots is coming from the city's downtown tax increment financing fund, not the general fund.

In a TIF district, any increase in tax money due to higher property values created by development can be used for public infrastructure or rebates to developers.

In this case, new tax dollars from development in the downtown TIF district are being used to buy the parking lots.

In other business, the committee-of-the-whole heard a proposal to create a special service area for Bass Street Landing.

In a special service area, the property owners agree to be taxed over and above their current property tax rate. In this case, the extra money -- up to $250,000 a year -- will be used to maintain and improve the public and private areas off 17th Street and River Drive.

Creating the special service area will reduce the city's general fund spending by $69,000, money it would have spent for basic maintenance to the area.

The property owners, Kaizen, Bass Street Residential LLC., and Stoney Creek Inn, agreed to the special service area within their development agreements with the city.

On the flip side, the City Engineer explained that the city would need to quadruple the current parking charges to maintain the new city parking ramp.

[The City Engineer gave a report] about how much the city would have to charge for parking to maintain the city's three garages. Since the city has long-time lease holders for Centre Station and the Heritage ramp, it can only control and raise lease prices at the new MidTown ramp. To meet the needed $301,050 to maintain the three ramps, the city would have to charge leasers at the MidTown ramp $108.60 a month. However, aldermen don't expect to raise the lease rate to that amount. The average lease now is $25.25 a month in the MidTown ramp.