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Halifax County adopts Tourism Zone to encourage hotel and restaurant investment
Summary
The Board approved a new Tourism Zone ordinance to incentivize hotel, sit-down restaurant and outfitter development, applying to projects meeting investment thresholds and offering broader geographic flexibility than enterprise zones.
The Halifax County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously May 4 to add a Tourism Zone to the county zoning ordinance to encourage tourism-related commercial investment.
Planning staff said the Tourism Zone is intended to attract new hotels, sit-down restaurants and outfitters by permitting the County to offer incentives for qualifying projects. The Tourism Zone targets investments of $500,000 or more for new construction and $250,000 or more for improvements to existing structures. Staff said the Tourism Zone would allow incentive boundaries that are broader than the county’s existing enterprise zones.
Supervisor Jeff Oakes read the ordinance language into the record and the Board adopted the amendment to Chapter 53 (motion by Jeff Oakes, second by Dennis Witt). County staff will publish the ordinance text and begin coordinating mapping and program details.
County officials said the change is intended to diversify the local tax base and expand options for economic development, but they did not adopt specific incentive packages at the May 4 meeting; those details will be developed by staff and considered in future actions.
Next steps include publishing the ordinance and working with economic-development partners to define incentive terms and eligible areas.
