Committee members heard a multi‑part discussion about financing off‑site infrastructure — streets, sewer connections and sidewalks — that panelists said often make small infill projects financially infeasible.

City staff described examples where sewer mains are not located in front of parcels, forcing developers or nonprofits to pay for easements, extended piping or railroad crossings. Presenters used two local examples: a parcel the city earlier offered to Habitat for Humanity where sewer does not front the parcel and would require easements and extended piping; and another site where a railroad separates development from the nearest sewer main and would require under‑rail infrastructure with costs panelists estimated in the hundreds of thousands to millions of dollars.

Architect Ryan Starr summarized a Portland State University capstone that modeled a set of small infill sites (fourplexes and subdividable lots). Students estimated site‑specific infrastructure costs (paving, waterline replacement, alley paving and sidewalks) and compared them with projected property tax increases after redevelopment. Starr said that, under the students’ assumptions, the tax‑revenue “delta” from redevelopment could repay some infrastructure costs in under 9 years on average for the sample set, suggesting a tax‑capture or TIF‑style approach might be feasible for similar lots.

City staff and legal counsel discussed existing municipal tools: system development charges (SDCs) for system‑wide capacity, local improvement districts (LIDs) and reimbursement districts for site‑specific infrastructure, and site‑specific tax increment (TIF) mechanisms. City attorney staff told the group that a reimbursement district is typically private‑led and repaid by benefiting future properties; an LID is city‑led and spreads repayment over time among benefited owners and requires council action. Staff also noted prevailing‑wage and procurement issues if the city performs work directly.

Panelists and committee members discussed program scale and thresholds, including administrative effort and how to prioritize projects (for example, setting minimum project size or required number of units). Several participants suggested focusing city dollars where they would catalyze multiple units (rowhouses or multiple fourplexes) rather than very small single‑lot projects, and recommended testing a pilot that uses tax capture, a limited site‑specific TIF, or a reimbursement district for particularly catalytic parcels.

Committee members asked staff for more detail about timelines and statutory limits; staff said they would return with comparisons of LID, reimbursement district and site‑specific TIF mechanics and thresholds at a future meeting.