by Michael R. Allen
Missouri State Senator Yvonne Wilson (D-9th), who represents Kansas City, has filed SB 814, a bill that would decrease the size of a project eligible under Missouri’s Distressed Areas Land Assemblage Tax Credit (DALATC). Wilson’s bill would set the minimum project size at 40 acres, with an applicant required to own only 30 of those acres. The credit now requires projects to be 75 acres and applicants to own a minimum of 50 acres.
While there are numerous structural flaws with DALATC, and while 40 acres is still a fairly disruptive project size for urban areas, Wilson’s proposal is a step in the right direction.
Perhaps not coincidentally, reforming the DALATC is one of the planks in the 2008 Missouri Public Policy Agenda for the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce.