Efforts to revitalize downtown areas have gained momentum over the past few decades. This article reviews the literature on downtown revitalization, presents a model that illustrates the process of decline and the more recent process of revitalization that has occurred in downtown areas over the past half-century, and discusses local policies that can facilitate the process. Revitalization policies and resulting projects in the cities of Jeffersonville, Indiana, and New Albany, Indiana, are used to illustrate components of the model that deal with the revitalization process. Copyright 2006 by The Policy Studies Organization.
Employment tax credits have become one of the primary tools of state economic development policy. A recurring question is whether these credits create jobs that would not have been created in their absence. This paper provides estimates of the employment impact of such credits by comparing the employment change in eligible firms that participate in employment tax credit programs with eligible firms that do not participate in such programs. Results from a switching regression model indicate that firms taking Georgia's Jobs Tax Credit created 23 to 28 percent more jobs than eligible firms not taking the credit between 1993 and 1995.
Special districts potentially offer a way for local governments to issue more debt than allowed by debt limits. This research examines the relationship between the number of special districts in a county and local government debt levels. Using data from states formed from the Northwest Territory and controlling for other local governments, demographic, and fiscal factors, we find that the number of special districts in a county is positively related to local government debt in four of the five states examined (Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin). The results for Illinois were insignificant.
As more local governments consider consolidation of government functions, officials are concerned about the expected impact on expenditures. Using a treatment group of consolidated city-counties and a control group of city-counties that considered but rejected consolidation through the referendum process, the authors examine differences in per capita local government expenditures. The statistical analysis shows that per capita expenditures in consolidated communities are not statistically different from those that considered and rejected consolidation. These results suggest that consolidation is not likely to decrease expenditures in the typical consolidated local government.
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