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Brookfield committee refines economic incentive policy draft, aims for July 28 vote
Summary
Committee reviewed edits to a draft economic incentive policy — adding definitions, eligibility criteria (no defaults), environmental upgrades, and evaluation benchmarks — and asked staff to clarify tax-share language and application routing; board agreed to place the item on the July 28 agenda.
The Village of Brookfield Committee of the Whole continued its review of a draft economic incentive policy on July 14, discussing added definitions, eligibility criteria, environmental enhancements, and administrative review procedures.
Libby summarized red-line edits to the draft, saying the memo added definitions for common terms, a statement that applicants must not have defaults or violations to be eligible, an explanation of tax increment financing as it relates to the comprehensive plan, and language encouraging environmentally sustainable upgrades. Libby also suggested clarifying that eligible costs for certain programs should be directly tied to façade and overall project scope rather than standalone upgrades.
Board members pressed staff to tighten subjective terms such as "public benefit" and "blight," to specify that any reference to tax abatement or rebate is to the village’s portion (staff noted the village share of sales tax is 1% and the village share of property tax rebate is 25% of the village portion), and to clarify how county-administered programs would interact with the village policy (staff said county programs remain subject to county approval and can be referenced as such in the application materials).
Members discussed whether façade and renovation grants (PIP) should remain under the Economic Development Commission or move to Planning & Zoning for design review; a common thread was to keep signage review with the EDC and consider moving higher-dollar façade/renovation grants to the PZC to streamline variance handling and design vetting. Libby said the policy will retain that any substantive changes must come before the board while procedural edits may be made annually by the village manager.
Next steps: Staff will incorporate clarified definitions, add language specifying when the policy refers to the village portion of tax incentives, and present the revised draft for the board to vote on at the July 28, 2025 meeting.
