Tooele council hears MIDA plan to add two parcels to project area to enable water financing; vote set for business meeting

Arianna Farber, deputy director of the Military Installation Development Authority (MIDA), told the Tooele City Council at its Dec. 17 work meeting that MIDA seeks to add two parcels adjacent to an existing National Guard project area and to set the project’s tax base year to 2024 so the authority can capture tax increment to finance water infrastructure.

Farber said the arrangement would allow MIDA to use property tax allocation from a more developable northern parcel to bond for water infrastructure that would make development viable on a currently dry southern parcel. "It could represent anywhere from 8 to $10,000,000," Farber said when asked for a rudimentary estimate of the additional tax growth captured by setting the base year earlier.

The request on the city’s agenda is to establish a jurisdictional boundary and a base year; Farber said more detailed agreements — including a tax‑sharing agreement and contracts for water rights and delivery — would follow in the new year. She described the boundary as precautionary if the water financing does not come together, saying the boundary could remain an inactive RDA‑style area until a later resolution authorized tax collection.

Council members pressed for specifics about the water plan, timing and potential loss of tax revenue. One council member said they had a "hard time" approving more without clearer evidence that water could be brought to Tooele; another asked whether MIDA would capture sales tax and how much property‑tax percentage would be used. Farber said MIDA typically captures property tax increment for reinvestment and noted those details would be negotiated in a tax‑sharing agreement. She also said sales tax capture could be part of discussions.

Council members asked about other infrastructure possibilities. A staff speaker identified as John said a rail spur estimate provided by a prospective company was about $2,400,000 and that such infrastructure could be considered in deal negotiations.

Several council members said the resolution’s draft language — which states that MIDA shall not collect property taxes or other taxes from additional property until such collection is authorized by the legislative bodies of each party — made them more comfortable with creating a boundary now while reserving tax collection and final agreements for later approval.

No formal vote on the boundary occurred in the work meeting. The item was scheduled for consideration at the city’s business meeting at 7:00 PM the same day.

The presentation and discussion referenced a privately owned parcel (identified in the meeting as owned by Randy Hunt), the National Guard project area created in 2024, and MIDA’s prior work on projects such as the Falcon Hill/Northrop Grumman campus. Farber said she will return with a draft tax‑sharing agreement and more detailed information after the New Year.

The council’s next procedural step is a scheduled vote on the resolution at the business meeting later that evening.