Some Wayne County communities withholding zoo and DIA millage money.

**brizee** · January-21-13, 05:29 PM

**jt1** · January-21-13, 05:59 PM

Originally Posted by brizee

I'd be curious to hear the opinion of people with more knowledge on DDAs. It seems to that since this only happening in WC then something shady is afoot.

The communities that are doing this should be ashamed of themselves [[unless they are in some sick way legally bound to do this). This is a big black eye on something that was truly regionally supported.

**jj84** · January-21-13, 06:19 PM

It is illegal what they are doing. Numerous DDA attorneys and the State Attorney General have given opinions that the money should be returned to the Zoo and DIA. All DDA's other than those named return that money to the Zoo currently.

That being said, many DDA do illegal things everyday - buying new firetrucks, building new fire stations, spending money on questionable marketing plans and property purchases.

They must have a plan from when the DDA was formed or updated, in this plan the DDA states what their improvement intent is during the period.

Also if a DDA/TIF was formed prior to 1994 they also capture the school portion of the taxes as well.

**Hermod** · January-21-13, 06:48 PM

Anybody notice that Detroit has been withholding money as well?

**Jimaz** · January-21-13, 07:55 PM

That is one sloppily formatted table in the freep article. They break it up onto two separate pages and tuck the Grand Total alphabetically between Gibralter and Grosse Isle Twp. WTF?

And what's with the smallest amounts? River Rouge diverted $66.09 in 2009? Why would anyone bother to divert such small amounts? That doesn't seem worth the overhead of tracking it.

"But whose responsibility was it to educate the voters?" Lamarand said.

Oh, I see. The voters should have expected that the zoo tax they voted for would be diverted to non-zoo expenses. LOL! Silly voters don't understand that DDAs fit the definition of a zoo.

"A lot of us are actually probably going to court," Romulus Mayor Alan Lambert said. "It's not that we're greedy. It's just that these communities really need this money."

"Look at all this revenue we've lost from taxable values going down," he said....

"Now they want to take even more from us?" he asked.

Wait. Wait. Now who exactly is doing the taking here? Feel "entitled" much? LOL!

I'm not really that passionate about this issue but it's getting really annoying how the will of the electorate is increasingly ignored in this country. [[Thinking of medical marijuana, etc.) That's what really sucks.

**brizee** · January-21-13, 08:07 PM

Even regarding the ambiguous legality, those dollar amounts were weird as hell.

And if it's so on the up and up why weren't all communities doing it?

This also poisons the well for regional cooperation. Good luck getting funding for a large scale mass transit project when this bullshit is going on.

**jj84** · January-21-13, 08:45 PM

I would also like to say that chart is wrong - there are two communities listed that have been sending the money to the zoo. But then again coming from the Wayne County Office it doesn't surprise me.

As for why you see such small numbers, it could be that their DDA/TIF is small and .1 of mill rate doesn't equate to a lot of tax revenue.

As for Taylor they probably over bonded their DDA as property taxes have fallen the revenue from the DDA/TIF isn't enough for the bond payments so rather than use General Fund Dollars they are looking for other revenue streams to prop up the bond and make the payments. [[similar to what wayne county is doing with CDBG Funds) If that is legal or not remains to be seen. If they don't take the Zoo millage they might be short on bond payments.

**poobert** · January-21-13, 11:56 PM

"A lot of us are actually probably going to court," Romulus Mayor Alan Lambert said. "It's not that we're greedy. It's just that these communities really need this money."

I don't know who this hillbilly thinks he is, but that's the equivalent of someone slipping change from the till at work and claiming they really need the money. Maybe they do, but it's still theft. This is grand theft and fraud from the American people.

These explanations are baffling. Either these local elected officials are stuck on stupid, or they think we are. Unacceptable either way.

And what the fuck does the Taylor DDA do with that money? Pay Al Lambert under the table on weekends to powerwash the puke off of the Gibralter Trade Center parking lot? What a fucking racket!

**jj84** · January-26-13, 08:48 PM

I’ll try to explain a bit more – but I’m sure it will be confusing

Where these communities are coming from isn’t focused on the Zoo/DIA millage. It is a very complicated issue.

The fight might be over the .1 Zoo but it has an effect on all millages and that is where the Cities/Townships are concerned as it could end this funding. They have a few names - Tax Incriminate Finance District [[TIF) Downtown Development Authority [[DDA) or Brownfield Zone.

These District’s Capture the increase in tax value for the properties in district and all millages in that district for ALL taxes collected. So the City/Township is keeping the County and City portion of the Tax revenue as well as the School District Portion if the TIF/DDA was in place prior to Proposal A in 1994. [[The state makes up the difference to the local school district if the district included a TIF/DDA/Brownfield) This money captured must be spent in the district on improvements that help make it more business friendly and leads to improvements in property valued. Each one of these districts has a plan and projects that they are going to do over the life of the district. Some cities save money and then spend on projects once they have captured enough, other cities bonded for the assumed tax increase in values once the projects were complete.

Where the whole issue for this comes about it these millages were passed AFTER most TIF/DDA were formed. Before when you formed a TIF/DDA you filed your plan and you were off to capturing that money. Now All taxing jurisdictions can opt out of capture. So if you were to form a TIF/DDA today the County can say we don’t want this TIF/DDA taking our money, Metro Parks can say we don’t want your taking the money etc etc etc.

So the Zoo argument from the Cities point is this – if you pass a millage AFTER the DDA was formed and when the DDA was formed opting out wasn’t an option the capture should go to the DDA as if the millage was in effect at the time the money would have gone to City/Township. Why this is so important is that there are many millages that are put up for renewal that DDA and TIF’s capture. If they can start opting out every time you basically cut the funding options for DDA/TIF.

I can make an argument both ways on this and it needs to be decided by the courts – if the legislature doesn’t like the outcome of the courts they can change the laws to put more clarity in the DDA Act. DDA/TIF in general need more clarity in what they can and can’t do.

If you want some bed time reading material. Below is the DDA Act.

http://www.legislature.mi.gov/%28S%2...ct-197-of-1975

**ismoakrack** · January-27-13, 01:55 PM

And what the fuck does the Taylor DDA do with that money? Pay Al Lambert under the table on weekends to powerwash the puke off of the Gibralter Trade Center parking lot? What a fucking racket!

Ah Poobs, I swear your posts are getting better and better! Lol!