Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Tax Increment Financing topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Emery County CRA reviews and approves GOEO annual reports for Castle and Hunter solar projects
Summary
At its Sept. 4 meeting the Emery County Community Reinvestment Agency accepted the GOEO-format annual reports for Castle Solar and Hunter Solar, discussed whether future battery storage would be eligible for CRA incentives, and voted to approve the reports to meet filing deadlines.
The Emery County Community Reinvestment Agency on Sept. 4 accepted annual reports filed on the state GOEO (Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity) platform for the Castle Solar and Hunter Solar project areas and voted to approve the reports to meet the statutory filing deadline.
Sherry Duran of the Utah Association of Counties, who presented the packet, said the documents in the board packet are a “user friendly version of what is actually on the GOEO site,” noting the state’s portal is hard to search and that GOEO charges jurisdictions a submission fee. “So we kind of created this just to give you a summary of what information is there,” Duran said.
The board briefly discussed whether battery storage additions to solar projects would be treated as part of an existing CRA project area and therefore eligible for tax-increment incentives. Duran explained that current statute ties incentives to the boundaries of a previously created project area and that the state code does not clearly anticipate later, additional investment types such as battery storage. ‘‘Once you’ve created that project area, no matter what goes in there ... there’s no statutory way of dealing with that,’’ she said, adding the county could seek a legislative fix or use boundary exclusions (sometimes called “cherry-stemming”) where appropriate.
Board members also noted that developers have sometimes negotiated participation agreements tied to a single developer; Duran said if a second developer (or different owner) comes into the same project area, the county would negotiate a new participation agreement with that developer or retain all increment if no participation agreement exists.
Following the presentation and questions, a board member moved and a second was given to approve the Castle Solar and Hunter Solar GOEO annual reports; the chair called for the vote and the motion passed.
The board did not adopt new policy at the meeting; members asked staff to review existing participation agreements and conditional-use-permit conditions to clarify whether battery storage additions are captured by existing agreements or require separate negotiation.
The acceptance of the reports was described as a ministerial step to meet the GOEO filing requirement; board members were told the agency may later amend filings if needed.
