City hears petition to create Waldron Road Infrastructure Development District; petition projects assessments up to $1,750 per home

Betsy Knotts, the attorney engaged by the city to explain a new Tennessee tool for financing development, told the Board of Mayor and Aldermen that an Infrastructure Development District (IDD) is a limited-duration area in which special assessments may be levied to pay for infrastructure that directly benefits properties in the district.

Knotts said these assessments are not property taxes but special annual charges included on property tax bills. “It’s an annual charge… It’s not a property tax,” she said, and added that the assessment is imposed only on properties within the district that receive a measurable benefit from the infrastructure installed.

Knotts noted the city received a petition for an IDD covering a development located entirely inside city limits, and she outlined the creation steps: a petition, a statutorily required review period, public notice and a public hearing. She said the city’s staff and counsel would place a notice on the city website and that the board will make a decision at the hearing scheduled for May 7. (Presentation began at SEG 664; related petition discussion continued through SEG 1001.)

Dave Pierce of BRS Development, representing Meritage Homes of Tennessee and MI Homes of Nashville, said the petition covers infrastructure work largely focused on sewer upgrades and that TDEC final approval for the project has been obtained. “This project started much smaller and it has grown into a much larger project,” Pierce said, estimating the total infrastructure cost at about $8,000,000.

Pierce said the district as proposed would apply to newly platted or new-phase lots and would not include existing, already-built homes in Woodland Hills; he estimated roughly 335 single-family lots would be in the identified phases. He said the petitioners expect to finance part of the infrastructure with assessment-secured bond proceeds and that not all of the project's infrastructure would be funded by assessments — Knotts said the engineer’s report indicated roughly 50% of off-site improvements were projected to be funded by assessment revenues in the engineer’s example.

Knotts and staff explained the mechanics: bonds are typically issued on behalf of a financing entity and then repaid from annual assessment revenues; the city’s role is to verify statutory requirements and administer notice and hearing steps. She emphasized the assessment maximum in the petition is a projection rather than a guaranteed rate: in this petition the projection was “up to $1,750 per house annually over a 30-year period,” which she described as a maximum projection in the petition documents.

Board members asked practical questions about which parcels would be included, the boundary and parcel lists in the petition, and how assessment collection and enforcement would work. Knotts noted the assessment is typically included on the county tax bill and that the county trustee may need software changes to present the charge; she said assessment administration and delinquency procedures are similar to other special assessments.

Next steps: notice will be posted and the board will hold a public hearing on May 7, at which the board may approve the district, modify its boundaries or assessment terms, or decline to create it. The petitioners and city staff said they will return with more details at that hearing. The board did not take a final vote on the petition at the workshop. (Provenance: topicintro SEG 664; topfinish SEG 1001.)