FORT WAYNE – The Allen County Council on Thursday approved a tax break for a $3.8 million Parkview Health Systems project that is under way.
The council unanimously approved the seven-year abatement on real estate improvements for expansion of Parkview Health Systems’ building at 11136 Parkview Circle, near Parkview North Hospital near Interstate 69 and Dupont Road.
The building will be leased to the company Ortho NorthEast, also known as ONE.
Tax abatements are used by local government to entice new businesses or to retain existing jobs. They exempt all or a portion of a company’s increased assessed value that comes from new investment from property taxes.
Ortho NorthEast will retain its current staff of 86 with annual salaries of $6.7 million, according to Nicole Liter, an Allen County economic development specialist. It plans to add 18 new employees, including physicians, physician assistants, nurses and medical secretaries, for an additional $1.1 million in salaries.
The company should realize a tax savings of about $442,000, Liter said. Parkview has agreed to contribute 5 percent of the tax savings back to the county for future economic development projects.
The new facility is expected to be completed in May 2013.
Because of the increase in projects like the one at Parkview Health Systems, the county’s building commissioner asked for another inspector, and the council approved the position.
Commercial building permits have more than doubled, and so has the workload for the county’s two inspectors, according to Building Commissioner David Fuller.
January’s numbers have indicated that trend will continue, he said.
From 2003 through 2008, the department averaged 4.5 inspections daily, Fuller said. Last year, they averaged nearly 9.5 daily inspections.
Fuller is concerned that the quality of the inspections may suffer under the time limits imposed on inspectors.
“With residential inspections, we can easily do 10 to 12 a day,” Fuller said. “But it’s not the same process with commercial inspections; they take more time.”
In 2005, the department received 313 commercial building permits with a total project value of $138 million. Last year, the number of permits increased to 1,066 with a total project value of $259 million. Two commercial inspectors conducted 4,565 site inspections last year – 369 at Parkview Health Systems alone – compared with 2,076 in 2005, Fuller said.
One reason the number of permits increased is that many contractors who were having a rough time during the sluggish economy began accepting smaller projects, Fuller said.
“The commercial jobs changed in nature in 2008,” Fuller said. “Many of these guys were taking (smaller jobs) just to stay in business.”
Council members unanimously approved a $39,500 salary and benefit package for a new commercial inspector.
