Downtown Albuquerque TIF redistributes $$, doesn’t grow the “pie”

A few months ago on the pages of the Albuquerque Journal Doug Peterson and I outlined our concerns about the proposed downtown Tax Increment Financing district. Unfortunately, the Albuquerque City Council recently adopted the TIF which (as the Journal notes) is “an economic development tool used to subsidize redevelopment projects.”

In other words, greater resources will be kept in downtown at the expense of surrounding areas.

But a TIF isn’t going to solve downtown Albuquerque’s issues. Solving crime would help. Bringing new businesses and economic activity to town would help downtown. Rather than redistributing a fixed pie, reducing taxes would grow the pie. Not all of the money would flow downtown, but with a lot of available office space some number of businesses would go downtown. And, of course ALL of Albuquerque and ALL of New Mexico would benefit from tax cuts.

And, of course, New Mexico with its exploding oil and gas revenues can easily afford significant tax reductions.

It is true that the massive surplus is under the State, not local control, but the City of Albuquerque has put together its “requests” for the 2025 legislative session. Sadly but not surprisingly, no tax reform was included in the Mayor’s or Council’s requests.