Holyoke City Council considers Rural Jump-Start Program

What can Holyoke do to get more businesses and people to come to town?

And how much is the city willing to do to get them here?

Trisha Herman, executive director of Phillips County Economic Development, was at the Sept. 20 Holyoke City Council meeting to tell the council about Colorado’s Rural Jump-Start Program.

The focus of the program is to incentivize new businesses to start in or move into rural, economically distressed areas and hire new employees.

Among the things required to be eligible, businesses cannot directly compete with the core function of a currently operating Colorado business in an adjacent economically distressed county. For example, a coffee shop would not qualify unless there are no other coffee shops in the county or adjacent county.

Participating businesses in Rural Jump-Start zones can receive up to $20,000 as newly established businesses and up to $2,500 per new hire. 

Tax benefits include relief from state income taxes for the new business, state sales and use tax for the business, 100% of county personal property taxes for the business, municipal personal property taxes for the business in participating municipalities and 100% of state income taxes for the employee.

In an effort to establish Phillips County as a Rural Jump-Start zone, Herman asked council members if they would consider being part of the program by waiving personal property taxes for eight years for businesses that qualify for the Rural Jump-Start Program.

If it brings new businesses and people, it’s worth it, commented council member Brian Akey.

Council member John Schneider said he would prefer to look at it on a case-by-case basis instead of committing future councils to this incentive, especially considering that Holyoke has housing and employee shortages.

City Superintendent Mark Brown said that he would like to check with Phillips County to see if the city would be able to waive the taxes or if it would need to reimburse the county for the taxes.

Herman said she has also presented to the county and to the Haxtun Town Council and was awaiting their decisions.

According to the program’s website, https://oedit.colorado.gov/rural-jump-start-program, there are already 21 Rural Jump-Start Program counties, including Sedgwick and Logan.

Herman pointed out that she’d hate to see a business choose to locate in a different county just because Phillips County and its municipalities have not yet committed to the program and its incentives.

The council decided to table the topic until the next meeting.

Other business

In other business at the Sept. 20 meeting, the council:

— Approved the hiring of Corporal Kory Peterson at $48,000 per year and start on-call pay at $100 per month.

— Approved Ordinance No. 2-2022, following a public hearing, regarding the annexation of a parcel of land owned by Riley and Dee Ann Dubbert just north of Holyoke on Highway 385.

— Approved Resolution 10-2022, a resolution to support a grant application to Colorado Department of Local Affairs Affordable Housing Planning Grant Program requesting funding for strategic housing strategy and action plan and authorizing execution of grant agreement.

— Approved a 2023 property/casualty preliminary contribution quote for Colorado Intergovernmental Risk Sharing Agency.

— Approved a motion to adopt a policy governing fingerprints for liquor license applicants.

— Approved a bid for $19,702.75 for a fire wall in the new Holyoke Volunteer Fire Department building.