Greenfield Redevelopment Commission gathered for its annual discussion of tax increment financing revenues, which offered a glimpse into the funds these districts generate and potential future projects for the city.
Every year, a governmental unit’s redevelopment commission must invite the taxing units overlapping its TIF areas — taxing units affected by this capturing of tax dollars — to a meeting to present information about the TIF districts and the long-term plans for that area. In Greenfield’s case, that includes inviting Greenfield-Central Schools, Hancock County Public Library and Greenfield Fire Territory.
A TIF district allows local units of government to pay for infrastructure intended to promote economic development in the area. These districts capture property tax revenue from new commercial or industrial development, with revenue generated by the added assessed value from the development diverted to repay the bond. (You can learn more about tax increment financing in this online toolkit by the Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs.)
Greenfield has five TIF districts — the Downtown Greenfield Redevelopment Area, the Greenfield North Economic Development Area, the Greenfield Riverfront Allocation Area, the Hancock Village Economic Development Area and the Lilly Legacy Allocation Area. (Find a list of the TIF districts in Greenfield, and all of Hancock County, here.)
The last two were established in the last several months.
Buzz Krohn, Greenfield’s longtime financial adviser, told the commission these districts have been used to fund critical projects as the city has expanded.
“We funded a significant amount of infrastructure … into those industrial parks on the north side,” he said. “It hasn’t all been TIF, but most of it probably has been TIF, but there have been water, sewer extensions and electric extensions.”
Krohn said TIF revenue across the city’s three active districts amounted to $4.6 million, with $4.3 million coming from the North Economic Development Area. In 2026, there is projected to be $5.2 million in TIF funds coming from the allocation areas.
Alongside the creation of the Hancock Village and Lilly Legacy EDAs in recent years, the city also re-established 20 vacant parcels of land into the 2024 North Economic Development Allocation Area.
Since the original north area started collecting TIF funds in 1990, the city has received $60.5 million from TIF funds in the succeeding 35 years; Greenfield’s budget for 2026 was approved to be $39 million.
Krohn said even though the original north area will fully sunset in 2039, the parcels of land that were included in the 2024 north area won’t collect TIF revenue until development happens on that land.
Once that TIF area collects money, a 25-year clock will start for the lifespan of collecting obligations.
“I don’t believe we have any development occurring in that area right now. But should we have some, that would probably not show up on our TIF capture report until 2027,” Krohn said. “But essentially, we’re prolonging the life of these areas that have yet to have been developed … They won’t sunset with everything else, but they won’t start (the clock) until we actually leverage debt against any of those parcels.”
TIF monies will be used to make payments for the bond to build the garage associated with The Yard at Depot Park development. In previous years, TIF bonds have been used to fund road projects, construction of water treatment plants and the Potts Ditch sewer storm drainage project.
Krohn’s presentation stated that over the past 15 years, the property tax in the city has gone down by a fourth, from $2.80 to $2.07. In that same time, the city’s net assessed value has increased by 80%.
Proposed future projects are included in the RDC’s five-year TIF plan, in which the city commits to use 100% of anticipated TIF revenues for these projects.
Some of these potential future projects include roundabouts at Blue and New roads and at Broadway Street and New Road, an interceptor sewer on Davis Road, a corridor study to submit to INDOT and infrastructure on West New Road.
Harold Olin, superintendent of Greenfield-Central Schools, said as a taxpayer, the RDC’s investments into projects around the city has been essential in making Greenfield a better place to live.
“And as a longtime Hancock County resident, I can say that they’re one of the things that are very appealing, that the monies have been used for to make it a better place and keeping rates down,” Olin told the RDC. “That is a wonderful thing.”
However, he said as a public school superintendent, by the time the original North Economic Development Area sunsets, it would have been around for almost a half-century, which is a “ridiculously long period of time” for a TIF period to be active; this was before the state legislature put the current time limits on TIF districts.
But Olin also understands the pressures local units of government will be under as property tax reform radically changes how local units collect money.
“I also understand the hardship that the mayor of the city will have, as all taxing districts do, under SEA 1, in terms of having revenue to do some of the projects we would like to do,” he said.