Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credits: Using Tax Incentives to Develop and Inve...
Greg Paxton - On the Path to Community Improvement
1. On the Path to Community
Improvement
GrowSmart Maine Summit
October 23, 2012
Greg Paxton, Maine Preservation
2. What are Maine’s communities’ most
valuable assets?
• Citizens
• Existing Tax Base
3. Managing the Tax Base
Alternate title of the session:
Making Eyesores into Assets.
4. The Problem
Some view vacant buildings as an
unfulfilled promise that needs to be
eliminated.
• An embarrassment
• A failure
• A visible sign of weakness
5. The Solution
• View buildings as opportunities
• Think from the ground up not the sky down
• Inventory your buildings, including condition
• Seek incremental improvement to buildings
• Inventory the community – what needs are
missing?
• Match opportunities to existing spaces
7. Do Another
Get over the fear of historic preservation
• Developed neighborhood rehabilitation
– Charleston, 1955, Providence, Portland, etc.
• Developed downtown revitalization
– Main Street Program: 2,200 cities, 30 in Maine
– Maine Downtown Center, Maine Development Foundation
– “Economic development in the context of
historic preservation”
• Promotes tourism and retirees (2 big imports)
8. Historic preservation is the most catalytic approach
to revitalization in the country.
Except for Las Vegas, experts cannot point to a city
that has revitalized without historic preservation
being a major component.
Historic preservation is a bootstrap method for
revitalization.
The reason it works: When one owner of a historic
building sees another owner fix his/hers up, they
want to know how – and are spurred to imitate.
Community appearance improves from the core out.
9. The Approach
• Either tackle the biggest problem with an all out
concerted effort (requires talent & experience)
• Or begin to make small improvements to build
momentum
• We’ll discuss both today.