Voters will have the opportunity to fold the derelict former W.W. Cross building into a downtown revitalization zone, in what Jaffrey Select Board Chair Frank Sterling called a possible “first step” in making the property usable again.

During a public hearing on Monday, Sterling said the town does not have concrete plans to take possession of the property, which is empty and half-destroyed by a fire that occurred in 2020. However, the current owners are tax-delinquent, and taking the property by tax deed is a possibility.

Currently, the town is working with the owners and the state to identify what remediation may need to be done on the soil or property from the fire or the building’s time as an industrial tack factory. The town won’t have those results in hand, or know the possible cost of the remediation, until spring.

The town has put forth a warrant article to be voted on in March at Town Meeting to extend the Downtown Tax Increment Finance District, or TIF district, to include the W.W. Cross building and 11-acre property.

A TIF district designates that when any improvements are made in a specific area of town, the additional increased taxes from the improvements are captured in a fund. Those taxes are not put into the general fund, but can accumulate from year to year. That money then can be used to make improvements in the area designated as a TIF.

Sterling explained that if the town does take possession of the property, the TIF funding could be used on any needed remediation, or removal of the building, to ready the property for developers who could do something productive with the property and get it back on the tax rolls.

Carr said that if there are remediation efforts needed that require long-term monitoring of the soil or water, the TIF funds could also help to defray those costs.

By law, one TIF area cannot be more than 5 percent of the town’s total acreage, and all TIFs together cannot be more than 10 percent. The total assessed value of property in one area cannot exceed 8 percent of the town’s assessed value, or 16 percent for all TIF areas.

The downtown TIF, which is what the W.W. Cross building and land would join,  is currently valued at about 2.8 percent of the town’s total valuation, and makes up less than 0.5 percent of the acreage.

The W.W. Cross parcel is currently valued at $312,000 – although that valuation was conducted pre-fire – and about 11 acres.

Ashley Saari can be reached at 603-924-7172 ext. 244 or asaari@ledgertranscript.com. She’s on Twitter @AshleySaariMLT.

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