Mon County Commission to request BOE, Westover to return tax dollars related to UTC TIF

MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The Monongalia County Commission hopes to correct remitted tax errors that involve two local levying bodies.

The commission unanimously approved the issuance of letters to the City of Westover and the Monongalia County Board of Education on the need to have approximately $300,000 refunded back to the county due to a TIF district-related error. This includes a total of just over $189,000 that would be requested from the BOE and just over $121,000 from Westover, all of which relate to an incorrect remittance of taxes involving property on the WestRidge Business Park side of the University Town Centre TIF.

“The thought process was that we would ask them before the new budget; one thing led to another, and it just kind of slid off our radar screen,” said Monongalia County Commissioner Sean Sikora. “We’re providing them a letter as they’re going through and planning their budgets to take this into account,” he said.

According to the commission, the error stems from not including adjusted property that is currently occupied by “Menards,” which affected assessed values of the University Town Center TIF. This affected excess tax proceeds that should have stayed in the TIF District in the 2020, 2021, and 2022 fiscal years, all of which were given to both the BOE and the City of Westover in increments of no more than $119,000 over the course of three years. With “Menards” now accounted for and the split assessments on the property itself also included, the commission can now move forward to cover revenues for the UTC TIF that would be used to support development in the growing commercial hub.

“It has to do with the Menards parcel when it was split,” said Sikora. “Essentially what happened during that time, the occurrences were not included in the TIF calculations, so they were remitted to the levying bodies,” he said.

The refunded payments will be used to cover payments of over $420,000 paid for by the county in 2024 to support bond payments by developer WestRidge. This covered not only the money technically allocated to the BOE and the City of Westover at the time, but also the just over $108,000 that was allocated to the county, which they later returned, resulting in discovering the discrepancy. With major bond payments covered and the commission now looking to recoup costs, the hope is to work with both the BOE and the City of Westover to determine the best ways to refund the county.

“Once we verified the amounts, the commission went ahead and made that payment,” said Sikora. “With the understanding that then we would ask the governing bodies, in this case, Westover and the Board of Education, to refund the county for the amount we paid,” he said.

Sikora also emphasized that the county will be negotiable regarding the timeliness of having the just over $300,000 returned to them. This will include opportunities to make allotted payments as well as deductions towards other tax proceeds that are expected by both entities in the coming months. As the commission continues to work through a multi-year mistake, they’re hopeful in finding a solution that will be appropriate for all three parties.

“There’s no timetable for when this money is refunded,” said Sikora. “We can either deduct it from their regular proceeds as they start coming in, in the July-August timeframe, or they can simply, if they want to have a paper trail, they can write us a check,” he said.