JAMESTOWN – A not-for-profit senior housing organization in Jamestown will be doing its part to help pay for services provided by the city. During Monday night’s Jamestown City Council work session, Jamestown Mayor Sam Teresi announced that Lutheran Social Services will soon be paying full tax equivalent payments to the city.
Teresi introduced the resolution, saying that LSS has already been making payments in lieu of taxes, but now, they will soon be making a contributing that is the full equivalent of a tax payment a private property owners would make.
“We’ve had discussions with [LSS] over the past several months, leading the negotiations to come up with a tax equivalency payment in which they have agreed – for each building in a phased-in effort over a matter of years – to bring each one of those buildings up to full tax equivalency payments to the city what they would pay in private property tax payments, if those building were owned by private investor-owned entity. I think that that’s significant.”
The mayor added that in all, a total of four properties owned by LSS will be making the payments in lieu of taxes. They are located at 145 Chandler St., 830 N. Main St., 8 Crane St. and 9 Crane St. The earliest full payment of taxes will be in 2014. By 2019, all four properties will be making full payments.
Teresi said several city employees should be credited for helping to broker the deal, including development director Steve Centi, city attorney Marilyn Lehman, city comptroller Joe Bellitto, city clerk Jim Olson and Jamestown Urban Renewal Agency attorney Sam Price. In addition, he recognized LSS President Tom Holt for his help in reaching the agreement.
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