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Happy New Year! A list of annual reminders
As we get to the start of 2024, we offer this list of items to keep in mind as you plan for new capital projects and manage your existing projects. Here are a few things to think about at least once a year: Review compliance with your financing covenants. If you have...
One of our favorite projects – City of Rockingham/Richmond Community College downtown campus
In 2018 the City of Rockingham spearheaded an effort to redevelop underused private property into a new downtown campus for Richmond Community College. The City saw that this project would revitalize the parcel, bring more people to the downtown both day and night and...
Bond referendum transparency, the next chapter
We’ve written earlier (here and here) about legislation entitled “bond referendum transparency” that was working its way through the General Assembly this past session. Although Senate Bill 99 did not pass, key components of the legislation – regarding changes to the...
Using Synthetic TIF for Grant Matching
We’ve previously written about using synthetic tax increment financing (synthetic TIF) to fund economic development, and more precisely to determine if your public investment will have an economic return through an increase in property taxes or other private sector...
So, you added a lane and your traffic didn’t improve….What happened?
It is a truth universally observed that adding road capacity does not, after a dreadfully short transition period, reduce traffic congestion. In its simplest terms, the idea of induced demand is that an increase in the supply of a free good (in this case, un-tolled...
One of our favorite projects – Carrboro’s 203 Project
The Town of Carrboro is collaborating with Orange County on the development of the “203 Project,” which will be a 3-story building in downtown Carrboro that will host a County branch library and a variety Town offices. The project also includes a parking deck with 170...
The continuing crisis in local government finance staffing
We recently reviewed a 2022 GFOA article titled “Meeting Demand for State and Local Public Finance Jobs” that discussed the current difficult environment regarding the local government finance labor market. The difficulty in recruitment and retention for these jobs is...
One of our favorite projects – Chapel Hill’s Rosemary Street Parking Deck
Chapel Hill has an economic development public-private partnership that is increasing private investment in the core downtown, improving the Town’s parking system operations and laying the groundwork for additional private investment. The Town entered into an...
Parking is rarely the answer
We read an article recently (a couple of articles actually) about a local government that has a 1.5-acre lot near the beach that it purchased for $2 million in the last couple of years. Apparently (all we know is what we read in the paper) the Town’s intended use for...
Some Updates
We’ve recently come across some articles that provide some new information about topics we’ve written about before. More evidence of the black tax. There’s more evidence that local government units with more racially and ethnically diverse populations are stuck with...