Cheyenne mayor urges Wyoming to let TIF fund affordable housing without blight finding

Cheyenne Mayor Patrick Collins told legislators on April 22 that his city has used urban renewal authority (URA) TIF dollars to remediate contaminated sites and spur development, and he urged lawmakers to let municipalities use TIF to fund infrastructure for housing projects without first declaring an area "blighted." Collins said Cheyenne’s closed landfill and the Hitching Post site both showed how TIF and URA tools can make otherwise uneconomic projects feasible by financing roads, water and sewer.

The mayor described use of 4% low-income housing tax credits (LIHTC) in other states as a model and said combining those credits with TIF to pay roughly 10–15% of upfront infrastructure costs could bridge the remaining financing gap for larger affordable housing projects. "We need more financial tools to be successful," Collins said, noting the Cheyenne Housing Authority’s wait list has grown from about 1,000 to 2,000 families in recent years.

Department of Revenue property-tax administrator Ken Gill told the committee that Wyoming’s TIF statutes already define a base amount and an increment and that the increment may legally be used for infrastructure and environmental remediation. Gill flagged statutory ambiguities for county assessors and treasurers — particularly how to report and treat parcels that are subdivided after a TIF district is established — and recommended further statutory guidance.

Municipal leaders and the Wyoming Association of Municipalities (WAM) urged the committee to add a second statutory basis for TIF districts such as a ‘‘public benefit’’ finding for affordable housing, rather than relying only on traditional blight definitions. David Frasier of WAM said adding an affordable-housing public-benefit trigger would let cities use a familiar tool in more places.

Lawmakers pressed witnesses on constitutional and fiscal questions, including Article 16, §6 concerns about loan-of-credit prohibitions and the short-term foregone tax revenue for schools and other taxing entities. Witnesses emphasized that TIF captures only the incremental tax revenue above a baseline and that, in example projects, the community eventually receives higher total tax revenue once development is complete.

The committee asked staff to research other states’ definitions and mechanics for TIF districts, including whether jurisdictions allow affordable housing or underdevelopment as alternative eligibility criteria, and to consider drafting statutory language to clarify assessor/treasurer responsibilities.