The Collier County Board of County Commissioners established the Bayshore Gateway Triangle CRA in March of 2000. The Board adopted a Resolution finding the existence of blight conditions in the unincorporated area known as the Bayshore Gateway Triangle (BGT) and that the rehabilitation, conservation or redevelopment of the area was necessary in the interest of the public health, safety, morals or welfare of the residents of Collier County. In June of 2000, the County Commission enacted an ordinance that established a redevelopment trust fund, tax increment revenue stream and the base year for purposes of determining assessed values for the Bayshore Gateway Triangle Community Redevelopment Agency.
Community redevelopment agencies are governed by Florida Statutes, Chapter 163. Statutes dictate that there shall be paid into the fund each year by each of the taxing authorities operating within the geographic area of the CRA, unless exempted, a sum equal to ninety-five percent (95%) of the incremental increase in ad valorem taxes levied each year by that taxing authority, over the assessed value determined in the base year established for the CRA. The base year established for the Bayshore Gateway Triangle was 1999, with a base valuation of $288,081,106. The current valuation for the CRA is $1,247,465,721, or over 4.3x the original valuation. The term of the CRA was established at 30 years, and to date Collier County has deposited $36,591,517 in tax increment dollars into the BGT CRA trust fund.
Over the years, these funds have been used for residential and commercial improvements, land purchases, debt service and administrative overhead. One of the largest projects in the BGT is related to the Metropolitan Naples development on Davis Boulevard. The CRA’s involvement began with the purchase of the land referred to as the Bayshore Gateway mini triangle back in 2007. In 2014, the Board of County Commissioners entered into an agreement to sell the property under a redevelopment proposal that was consistent with the Gateway Triangle Mixed Use Overlay’s Mixed Use Sub-District. In 2015, the buyer notified the Board that they would not be able to complete the transaction. Subsequently the Board initiated a procurement process to solicit interest in the purchase of the mini triangle land.
In April of 2016, the Board approved a sales agreement with Real Estate Partners International, LLC for development of the land as a residential and commercial project in keeping with the tenets of the Gateway Triangle Mixed Use Overlay’s Mixed Use Sub-District. A unique feature of the agreement is that the developer is entitled to a rebate of 50% of the annual tax increment derived from the property, upon project completion, over a period of (10) ten years. Several amendments to the original agreement occurred and the property finally closed in November of 2020. The amount of shared tax increment will likely be in the millions of dollars and given the Bayshore Gateway Triangle’s sunset in 2030, the rebate period will extend past the life of the CRA. Our fiscal recommendation would be to reserve sufficient current and future Bayshore Gateway CRA tax increment revenues to meet the rebate requirement. The original December 2015 estimate of the annual tax increment rebate was $593,000, for a total rebate over the (10) ten-year period of $5,930,000.