Port Richey council adopts amended CRA incentive framework with 30% base and new caps

Port Richey officials adopted an amended Community Redevelopment Area incentive framework after a detailed review of payout mechanics, project caps and scoring priorities. The board voted to approve the package as amended by voice vote; the motion carried unanimously.

City staff presented the program’s core features, including a fixed 30% base rebate on the tax increment a qualified project generates and an annual recertification process so the dollar amount paid back adjusts each year with actual taxes. “Your base is 30 throughout any year,” the staff presenter said while walking the board through example calculations.

The framework adds a menu of incentive “points” across three buckets—economic development, environmental and social/community priorities—that can yield up to 20 additional percentage points on top of the 30% base, producing a theoretical 50% maximum annual rebate. Staff said certain add-on items (for example, shared parking or urban canopy) will be confirmed by the responsible city department before being awarded points.

Board members focused on fiscal guardrails: a previously discussed 12% cap by valuation produced a very large theoretical maximum payment and was not favored. Instead, staff recommended and the board accepted a lower project cap and several limits designed to contain long-term liability: a 5% total-project cap (to provide a defined stop-gap for total payout modeling), an annual reimbursement cap of 50% of the increment retained by the city/CRA, and use of the CRA’s actual capture rate (95% in the staff model) when estimating available incremental revenue. Staff emphasized that real payouts will depend on actual tax-bill changes and annual recertification.

As an illustrative case, presenters modeled a hypothetical redevelopment with a post-construction taxable increment that produced roughly $1 million of new annual taxes; under the staff exercise, the CRA portion would reimburse a defined portion of that increment over the life of the CRA and any subsequent city agreement. Staff also showed a scenario in which the CRA’s contribution of roughly $1.662 million in early years would be combined with a city-only reimbursement after CRA sunset to produce a larger, longer-term payment stream in the 10- or 15-year option if the city chose to continue payments.

Board members asked how incentives would fare if a project changed hands. Staff and legal presenters said agreements would include conditions tied to the improvements and that incentive payments would continue only if the new owner honors the original agreement; if a buyer substantially alters the project in ways contrary to the agreement, payments would stop.

A broker in attendance, who identified himself as Ronald McDonald with Coast to Coast Real Estate and as president of the Nature Coast Chamber of Commerce, urged the council to keep incentives that transfer with projects because that continuity helps attract buyers and investors.

After a final pass at category-level percentages (including adjustments to waterfront, workforce housing and public-art incentives and tweaks to low-impact-development and historic-preservation points), a council member moved to approve the package as amended and the motion was seconded. The board voted by voice and the motion carried unanimously; staff were instructed to return a final resolution for formal adoption at the next meeting.

The meeting concluded with brief updates on ordered appraisals, an FDOT drainage submittal for a separate project and property status for a planned plant/well site; the council then took routine roll call and adjourned.