VEPC outlines TIF administration role, defends program and requests technical statute fixes

Jessica Hartleben, executive director of the Vermont Economic Progress Council (VEPC), told the House Ways & Means Committee that VEPC is the legislatively created independent council that evaluates, authorizes and oversees statewide tax increment financing districts.

"We are an independent council. We do not market or promote TIF," Hartleben said. She described VEPC’s statutory role to review applications, monitor financing plans and provide annual reports to the legislature, and she said VEPC receives analytic support from the administration’s economist, Jeff Carr.

John Russell, chair of VEPC, told the committee the council acts as a steward of the education fund and enforces the statutory guardrails. Ellie Beckett, VEPC program manager, explained the agency’s day‑to‑day administrative tasks and offered to answer detail questions during follow‑up meetings.

VEPC recommended three technical statutory clarifications. First, VEPC asked that the definition of eligible "improvements" explicitly include brownfield remediation and public or private flood‑resiliency measures, reflecting recent flood damage and project costs. Second, VEPC proposed calculating the original taxable value (OTV) at the time the council establishes the TIF district rather than when a municipal legislative body initially votes, to avoid losing elapsed time between local authorization and VEPC application. Third, VEPC sought clarification about the use of bond anticipation notes, asking that bond anticipation notes be permitted as the final incurrence of debt for up to a six‑month extension where voter bond authorization occurs by March 31 of the district’s final incurrence year.

Hartleben said the council also seeks flexibility to cover up to four years of debt service interest (rather than two years) during initial buildout when supply‑chain, workforce and contingency costs are high. She argued that TIF districts can unlock private investment and grant matches needed for complex downtown redevelopment, citing Rutland and South Burlington as local examples where TIF helped fund environmental cleanup, utility upgrades and site preparation.

Committee members asked about conflict‑of‑interest and legal‑advice procedures after a state auditor’s report raised related questions; Hartleben said VEPC follows open‑meeting, ethics training and conflict‑of‑interest rules, and that the office coordinates with the Attorney General and ACCD counsel when legal opinions are needed.

Hartleben said VEPC will pursue rule updates (ICAR/LCAR) this year and intends to continue oversight and reporting to the legislature. VEPC did not propose specific new appropriations at this hearing; its requests were for statutory clarifications and administrative flexibility to administer existing TIF authority.