NewBo, Czech Village look at special tax district

CEDAR RAPIDS - Not every property owner would choose to tax himself or herself more.

But a majority of property owners in New Bohemia and across the Cedar River in Czech Village are asking the City Council to let them create their own Self-Supporting Municipal Improvement District, a move that would let them increase their own property taxes to generate money for use in the new taxing district.

Under the proposal, the SSMID could raise property taxes there by up to $3 per $1,000 of taxable valuation, which for now would generate about $56,000 extra a year to help beautify and market the district, said Jennifer Pruden, executive director of the Czech Village/New Bohemia Main Street District.

The city has two other SSMIDs - the downtown district, which taxes itself an additional $2.75 per $1,000 of taxable value, and the MedQ district, which has an added levy of $3.75 per $1,000 of taxable valuation.

'We are pretty modest,” Pruden said, comparing the property value of Czech Village and New Bohemia to downtown and MedQ.

'But we are growing,” she said, noting that the property value there doubled in the last year as construction has come on line and new businesses have moved in.

Under the proposal, the new SSMID tax in Czech Village and New Bohemia would be put in place for seven years beginning July 1, 2016. Pruden said the hope is that the extra revenue will allow for some 'visible” changes so property owners would have reason to renew it after the seven years.

State law requires at least 25 percent of the property owners who represent at least 25 percent of the property value in the district support a petition to the city to create or expand an SSMID. According to Pruden and city officials, owners of 60 of the 104 taxable property parcels (57 percent) who represent 62 percent of the assessed property valuation have signed the Czech Village/New Bohemia SSMID petition.

Dale Todd, president of the Southside Investment Board, a group of property owners and businesses in the New Bohemia area, credited Pruden with getting an acceptable level of support in place.

Todd said Southside wanted to make sure more than half of the property owners were behind the idea.

Pruden said the her board of directors at the Main Street District have been discussing the creation of a SSMID for some time. Jim Piersall, a Cedar Rapids lawyer and Southside board member, said his board has been doing the same.

Pruden said the city and the Main Street District have had some level of understanding for a few years that the district would help maintain improvements, such as the streetscaping on Third Street SE, once the improvements were put in place. The SSMID is a way to do that, she said.

Piersall said members of his board support the SSMID, which he said would allow the district to add 'the extra little things” that the downtown and MedQ districts have money to invest in.

Piersall, a member of St. Wenceslaus Catholic Church in New Bohemia, said revenue also would help as 16th Avenue SE is extended toward the church.

'It's not a huge amount of money,” he said. 'But it's a way to demonstrate to the city that we want to do what we can to make things better, too. So it's not that we're just asking for everything from the city. We want to contribute.”

The City Council is setting a public hearing for Oct. 20 on the SSMID creation. This will start a 30-day comment period. If the proposal moves ahead, the council is slated to vote to create the SSMID in mid-December.

Pruden said the Main Street District got the help of University of Iowa graduate planning students, who conducted research on similar districts. She said the tax rate of $3 per $1,000 and its seven-year length are about in the middle of the existing SSMIDs.