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Committee adopts amendment to clarify reporting deadlines in economic development tax-exemption transparency bill
Summary
House Bill 2,351 A, a committee bill focused on transparency of property tax–related economic development incentives, received an A3 amendment to require Business Oregon to establish a cure process by rule for reporting exceptions; stakeholders said the change prevents inadvertent disqualification for narrow missed deadlines.
The House Committee on Revenue on May 22 adopted the dash A3 amendment to House Bill 2,351 A and moved the bill to the floor with a due-pass recommendation. HB 2,351 A would require information sharing among the Department of Revenue (DOR), Business Oregon, county assessors and enterprise zone sponsors about property-tax-related economic development incentives.
Jeff Newgard of Smart Growth Coalition told the committee the A3 amendment addresses an unintended consequence in the earlier draft: strict literal reading of reporting requirements in section 7 could disqualify a business from exemptions for reasons such as lost mail or brief staff leave. “...there should be a process to be able to correct for those errors,” Newgard said, and described the amendment’s intent to have Business Oregon establish, by rule, a process and time frame (he said he believed it to be 30 days) to cure narrow reporting failures.
Committee members agreed the change provides a narrow, rare remedy for exceptional circumstances and does not broadly relax reporting rules. The bill was described as arising from prior work required by House Bill 2009 and 2023 (enterprise zone transparency study) and aims to improve coordination and reporting among state and local agencies. The committee recorded a disclosure of a potential conflict of interest from a member who said they work for a limited liability company that uses enterprise zone and SIP programs; the member made the disclosure prior to votes on both the amendment and the main motion.
Vice Chair Walters moved the amendment and the main motion; both passed. The committee chair said the bill was a committee bill and indicated willingness to carry it forward.
