Historic tax credit lottery for $34.5 million set for Tuesday

PROVIDENCE – The state Division of Taxation has scheduled the drawing to claim the historic preservation tax credits that were re-activated by legislation passed and signed into law by the General Assembly and Gov. Lincoln D. Chafee earlier this year.
The tax credit program, which had been suspended in 2008, will make available $34.5 million in transferable credits, with a maximum $5 million allocated to any one project. The Division of Taxation is holding a drawing because there were applications for project credits totaling $54.5 million, or $20 million more than is available, on the first day that the process was open, Aug. 1. (The amount represents the value of credits that had existed under the earlier version of the program that had been granted (and thus included in the state budget) but abandoned.) An additional $7.45 million worth of tax credits were applied for after Aug. 1, and the agency said that they would be placed at the end of the queue in the order in which they were received.
The drawing will take place Tuesday at 10 a.m. in Conference Room A of the R.I. Department of Administration, across the street from the Statehouse, and will be open to the applicants for the credits as well as the public. Each bid will be given an identification number, which will be placed in a clear drum, from which numbers will be drawn.
The state will place projects in the queue for approval based on their order in the drawing until a sum of $34.5 million worth of credits from the bidders has been reached. All the rest of the projects not approved to move forward with the next step will be placed on the list in the order of their selection, with the addition $7.45 million worth of projects placed at the end of the line in the order in which they were received. Those projects chosen then can proceed with the application process, and if approved will be able to claim the value of their credits. If previously approved projects are dropped, those next in line will be moved forward in the process.
The credits are valued at 20 to 25 percent of the value of the project (depending on the nature of the project) incurred on or after July 3, 2013 for new or existing historic rehabilitation projects. The identity of the applicants will be revealed once they have signed a tax credit contract with the Division of Taxation. Once the tax credit is received, the recipient’s name and other information will be posted publicly by the agency as well.

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