Pass the Popcorn!

I meant to comment sooner on a story in last week's Cedar Rapids Gazette:

Iowa City seeks answers on tax deal between University of Iowa and Coralville

What it boils down to that the City of Coralville and UI have a Payment in Lieu of Taxes (PILOT) agreement in place for the outpatient clinic at Iowa River Landing site. That agreement pays the Coralville over a million dollars a year. Iowa City gets 1.76 million dollars a year from UI to provide fire coverage to the entirety of campus surrounded by Iowa City. Iowa City officials sound like they are jealous of the agreement Coralville has. 

 

However, since the City of Coralville owned the land that the UI wanted, they were able to negotiate very favorable terms.

Watching this play out could be quite interesting. We'll see how the "cooperation" between the two cities works in sharing information. With UI taking over space near downtown Iowa City, so far they have not acquired any land from the City of Iowa City itself. While IC can claim projects such as the new music building, etc. should require PILOT payments, they don't have the same leverage in negotiations that Coralville has had.