Millinocket denies TIF request Rejecting Specialty Minerals a ‘great blow’ to town, councilor says

MILLINOCKET – At Thursday’s Town Council meeting, members turned down a Tax Increment Financing district request from Specialty Minerals Inc.

A TIF is a business development incentive created by state statute that allows a portion of new property taxes to be used for specific commercial growth and development projects.

By adopting a TIF district, the town would be able to keep new tax revenues from affecting the municipality’s share of state funding for education and municipal revenue sharing.

Specialty Minerals Inc. currently is building its business on a 2-acre parcel leased from Great Northern Paper Inc., according to Town Manager Gene Conlogue. The business manufactures precipitated calcium carbonate, which is a fill material used to make specialty paper. Conlogue said the company’s filler material will be used by Great Northern Paper.

The TIF order was offered but councilors would not second it and the motion was denied, Conlogue said Friday.

“I think the council dealt the town of Millinocket a great blow,” council Chairman Gail Fanjoy said Friday. “It sends a strong message to any business that is trying to survive or locate in Millinocket that says we are not interested in giving anyone a break, and that’s a shame given our economic situation.”

Fanjoy said the town has lost 25 percent of its population and is dependent on one industry, Great Northern Paper.

“When opportunities come around to create programs and diversify our tax base, we seem to turn our backs on those opportunities,” she said.

Had the TIF been granted, the town would have benefited by having money to use specifically for economic development, Fanjoy said

Fanjoy said she would have voted in favor of the TIF district had it been seconded and then discussed. She said she did not know why no one seconded it.

“I can’t speak for the other councilors, but they apparently didn’t think the benefit to the town outweighed the benefit to Specialty Mineral,” she said. “They didn’t want to give that company a handout, if you will.”

She said she did not second the order because she knew out of the seven members, only she and one other councilor, Matt Polstein, would vote for it, but she did make her position on the subject known.

“After the meeting, all of the councilors have a chance to say something and I talked in favor of the TIF,” she said.

An agreement was reached to reconsider the issue at the July 26 meeting.

“This will allow them a chance to discuss and debate [the issue] and arrive at an answer,” Conlogue said.

Fanjoy said the July 26 meeting probably won’t change the other members’ minds.

“We have plans to put it on the agenda again and I would like to at least have my fellow councilors debate it,” she said.

Council members opposed to the TIF district could not be reached for comment.