NCCo offers $76-million in bonds for recovery effort

New Castle County is offering tax exempt bonds to businesses looking to build or renovate their facilities in specific “recovery zones.”

Earlier this week, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben  Bernanke said the national recession was “probably over.”  He admitted though that pain will persist.  Some of that pain remains in New Castle County, Delaware where there’s still an operating deficit and a significant downturn in plans and permits for new construction.

That’s why the county is now offering $76.3-million in tax exempt bonds for construction or renovation of manufacturing or commercial facilities.  County Executive Chris Coons says the goal is to create jobs in construction and other sectors.  “It’s our hope that we can jump start the local economy, and get some local investment going again in the manufacturing and commercial sectors.”  The bonds are being issued through the county as part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

The bonds are only available for construction work in specified recovery zones.  Those zones have been selected because they have significant unemployment, home foreclosure, or general economic distress.  Coons says, “We tried to make the  recovery zone within New Castle County as broad an area as possible, so that these recovery bonds can go to work wherever we can find an appropriate project that would create new jobs.”  The recovery zones cover much of the county, and only excludes Western Brandywine Hundred, Greenville, Hockessin, some parts of Newark, and portions below the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal.  See the recovery zone map by clicking here.

Companies interested in submitting a project proposal can call the county’s director of redevelopment Karl Kalbacher at 302-395-5959, or visit the county’s website at nccde.org/redevelopment.