Tax Increment Finance Districts

Wisconsin’s Tax Increment Finance (TIF) program has existed with modifications since 1975 and is aimed at eliminating blight, rehabilitating declining property values, and promoting industry and mixed use development. In very general terms, the TIF program accomplishes this by offsetting costs associated with infrastructure improvements, including environmental cleanup, through use of increased real estate taxes. The municipality establishes a baseline value above which increases in real estate value drive additional tax base; this tax base is used to off-set eligible expenses.

In some cases, the municipality acts as the lender to a project by borrowing the money through bonding or using existing capital. In other cases, the TIF is “developer funded,” also known as “Pay as You Go”. In these cases, the developer uses their own funding sources to implement the project and their eligible expenses are reimburses based on a pre-agreed arrangement with the municipality pursuant to an established Developer’s Agreement.

Sigma can play an important role in TIF implementation as a representative to the private developer or municipality by helping to assist with the following:

• Additional financial assistance procurement
• Brownfield development expertise
• Civil / site engineering
• Municipal submittals and meetings attendance
• Performance evaluation
• Project budget
• Project timelines
• Regulatory coordination
• Rezoning and permitting approval implementation
• Surveying
• Work scoping