Arkansas Blog

We'll believe this good news only after the state Supreme Court drives a stake through the heart of unconstitutional TIF legislation, nonetheless here's good news from the Morning News. (and, hey, Mayor Womack, you have a property tax at the city and county level that may be pledged to bond issues for street improvements. That once was a conventional means of building public projects until the city and county lobby came up with a scheme to steal school taxes instead. Would the retail projects happen with or without TIFs? Of course they would in booming cities.)

Plans for a tax increment financing district in Rogers may be over.

Two of five major street projects in Rogers' tax increment financing plan are funded and with little hope of implementing a successful district that won't be challenged in court, the city is likely to drop the idea and look for other financing for the remaining projects, Rogers Mayor Steve Womack said Wednesday.

Benton County Collector Greg Hoggatt would be pleased to hear that. Figuring out the distribution of tax collections for property within the district boundary is so complicated that he sent letters to property owners in the district to say their property tax statements will be late this year.

"We just don't have the information we need to know how the millage should be distributed," Hoggatt said. "It's been a little bit troublesome this year between that and all the annexations."