Carvana representative urges council to seek tax disbursement, not termination, of enterprise-zone agreement

A Carvana representative asked the Trenton City Council at its May 15 work session to seek repayment of previously unpaid taxes tied to the company’s enterprise-zone agreement, rather than terminate the agreement.

At the meeting, Parker K., Representative, Carvana LLC, said the company “deeply value[s] our partnership with Trenton, Butler County, and the state of Ohio” and described missed hiring targets as driven by macroeconomic conditions affecting the used-car industry. She said Carvana has “significantly exceeded our capital investment requirement invested at 49,900,000.0 compared to the 24,000,000 that we originally had committed to” and noted an average hourly wage at the Trenton facility of “about $23 an hour, well above the $16 an hour that we had committed to.”

The representative said the Trenton site employs about 222 full-time equivalents and that the company is recruiting for “over 65 positions.” Parker K. said the company believes it will reach roughly 75% of its employment commitment by the end of 2025 and could reach 400 FTE by 2027, but declined to give a firm date: “I really wanted to walk in here and be like, by this date, I can promise you we’re gonna be at 400. But the business just really isn't in a position to say that.”

A councilmember who spoke in public comment said an employee who moved to a nearby subdivision “works at Kavana, and, he loves intends to stay here in Trenton,” and took that as positive evidence of local employment benefits.

Another councilmember raised a procedural concern about Carvana’s past files submitted to the city finance department, saying the company had “spent several years now having problems with supplying the appropriate financial information to our finance department.” Parker K. apologized for past submission errors and said the company is purchasing custom software to fix file-format issues and has provided PDFs of W-2s for reconciliation.

Vasiscos introduced an amended resolution on the agenda that would ask Butler County commissioners to seek repayment of taxes rather than to terminate the enterprise-zone agreement. Council members present deferred formal action on the item to the regular council meeting for further consideration.

The council did not decide the resolution at the work session; the matter was set aside for the regular meeting, where the council may take formal action.