Costco Developer Hopes to Change County's Mind on TIF

It's been about a month since the Lehigh County Commissioners stopped the much-talked about Costco project in its tracks, voting down the Tax Increment Financing plan needed to fund the $140-million Hamilton Crossings Shopping Mall in Lower Macungie Township.

At the time of the county vote, Hamilton Crossings developer Jeremy Fogel, executive vice president of The Goldberg Group said the project could not continue without the TIF - a funding mechanism that would have mitigated some of the burden of costly geologic remediation needed on the 63-acre Krocks Road property made necessary by mining activity.

Last week, Fogel told Patch in an emailed statement that he and his team have been working to change the county's mind on its TIF decision.

"The Hamilton Crossings team has been trying to identify the specific objections from the County Commissioners that resulted in the negative vote for the TIF, hoping to see if there is anything we can do to respond to the issues to their satisfaction.  

"As stated, the TIF is critical to our ability to develop the project, so we are evaluating options to see if there is a structure that the County would approve.  Based on some discussions, we thought there was a possibility that the County would reconsider their decision at their last meeting on July 10th – obviously that did not happen. 

"At this time we are still hoping there could be an amended structure that would be amenable to the County and are working towards that goal," Fogel writes.

Under the Tax Increment Financing plan, the government bodies that would have ultimately benefited from the tax revenue generated by Hamilton Crossings –East Penn School District and Lehigh County – needed to agree to give up 50 percent of those tax dollars for a 20-year period to help the developer get the project off the ground. 

In real terms, this would have meant that during those 20 years about $7 million in tax dollars would have been diverted to the developer to cover costs. On the flip side, East Penn would have taken in about $600,000 per year and the county about $135,000 per year on a property currently owned by the Diocese of Allentown that generates very little tax revenue.