Boise to retool 30th Street neighborhood

From Idaho Statesman, Jan 23, 2011

Rarely does a city get a chance to create almost from scratch a new central district within the core of a highly urbanized area.
Boise is getting that chance — and it won’t be just new housing, retail and commercial development. This new district will include the city’s first whitewater park, a new road with Boise’s first major roundabout and two more new parks.
The city hopes this unique combination of amenities will fuel economic development and serve as a catalyst to revitalize the 30th Street neighborhoods.
The city’s goal is to “allow the area to achieve its full potential, particularly in the commercial areas,” spokesman Adam Park said.
The district extends from the Boise River north to Irene, between Veterans Park and 23rd Street. Its central location — abutting Garden City, North Boise and Downtown, with the Bench nearby — make it a regional attraction, not just a neighborhood.
The city’s plan calls for commercial development on the northern and southern edges — the State Street and Main/Fairview corridors — transitioning into high-density residential areas in the core with parks, the river and the Greenbelt along the western edge.
The area has several large vacant properties. The city owns 9-acre and 3-acre undeveloped parcels along Fairview Avenue. The 10-acre former Bob Rice Ford dealership at Main Street and the river recently went on the market.
Three undeveloped parks, the Boise River and the Greenbelt provide existing and future recreational infrastructure.
Linking it all together will be a new five-lane road connecting State Street and Fairview, which provides another north/south transportation corridor and access to the new city parks.
Making this dream come true will take public and private investment. The city is providing parks. Ada County Highway District is putting in the new road.
A team of stakeholders has been assembled to determine how best to fund or encourage other development.
Unlike Bown Crossing or Harris Ranch, conceived by and largely financed by private developers, this neighborhood plan being shepherded by the city still needs a mechanism to get private developers involved.

Check the map.

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Boise to retool 30th Street neighborhood |

Falling home values and rising property taxes

From the Idaho Statesman, Jan 9, 2011:

After another year of falling home values, some Treasure Valley homeowners are again voicing their anger over higher property tax bills. Others, meanwhile, are actually paying less — but at the expense of dramatic decreases in the assessed values of their homes.
“I personally took about 200 calls from people,” said Canyon County Deputy Assessor Joe Cox after residents began receiving notices for the first half payment on their 2010 tax bill, due Dec. 20.
What made the difference? Budget decisions and the not-always-equitable real estate market.
Unlike income and sales taxes, which are collected at set rates, property tax levy rates are determined after budgets are set.
Cities, counties and other local entities decide how much they will spend, and then the burden is spread among all the property owners in their areas — based on assessments that are the county’s best guess as to how much the properties were worth on the previous Jan. 1.
So your final tax bill depends on:
1) Whether homes in your neighborhood lost more or less value than others.
2) How many taxing districts you live in and how much their budgets grew or shrank.
And after values have dropped as much as they have, No. 1 is having a bigger impact than No. 2.
Take the Ada County Highway District’s 2010 property tax budget request of $31.6 million. That’s identical to its 2009 request, but lower housing values required that the district’s levy rate rise by a whopping 16 percent in order to generate the same amount of revenue.
LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION
The median decrease in Ada County housing values for 2010 was 14 percent — but that varied by community, to as high as 18 percent in Eagle. (The median value means half of all homes saw decreases greater than the median decline in their district, and half saw lower decreases.)
A home whose values fell by less than the median decrease was likely to see property tax increases. Homes with higher percentage decreases in their assessments would have a chance of getting a lower tax bill, Ada County Assessor Bob McQuade said.
Plus, there are 38 taxing districts in Ada County, including cities, counties, and school, fire, highway, library, sewer, emergency medical and mosquito abatement districts. In 2010, 25 of those districts increased their budgets.
Of course, those districts have widely different budgets. “Twenty percent of the districts collect about 80 percent of the property taxes,” McQuade said.
The larger the district, the more impact it has on overall property taxes.
For example, the city of Boise increased its budget by more than $4 million in 2010, pushing its levy rate up by 19 percent, according to the assessor’s office.
The result: A home that paid $586.83 on $100,000 in taxable value a year ago received a $13.51 city tax increase — even after its value dropped by the city’s median decrease of 14 percent to $86,000.
City spokesman Adam Park said the council took the full 3 percent property tax increase allowed by law in order to maintain its existing level of services.
“The 2010 Citizen Survey shows almost 70 percent of residents say they are getting their money’s worth in terms of value of city services for taxes paid,” Park said.
Under Idaho law, taxing districts can increase their property tax budgets by 3 percent each year, along with an additional amount for growth and new construction.
However, a provision in the law allows districts that took less than their 3 percent increase in past years to go back and recapture that money in subsequent years.
That’s what Nampa did in 2010.
The city took its 3 percent property tax increase, plus another 2 percent it left on the table a year ago. So the city’s budget increased by $2.9 million and its levy rate rose by 23 percent — more than making up for Canyon County’s median 15 percent decline in housing valuations.
Let’s go back to that hypothetical home, but put it in Nampa. Valued at $100,000 in 2009, it had a city property tax bill of $828.28. The 15 percent median decrease dropped the home’s taxable value to $85,000 — and still the homeowner owes $863.26 to the city for 2010.
And that’s before taxes owed to other entities such as Canyon County, the Canyon County Highway District, the Nampa School District, the Nampa Highway District and the College of Western Idaho.
Cox attributed the jump in overall property taxes to the city’s decision to increase its budget by $2.9 million.
“What the city did was legal; I just don’t know that it was prudent, because it’s putting a heavy burden on taxpayers,” Cox said. “With a lot of people struggling to stay in their homes, it was a bad time to raise taxes.”
Nampa Mayor Tom Dale defended the city’s decision, arguing that it was either increase property taxes or cut police and fire protection.
“These are services that people have come to expect, and which have to be met,” Dale said. “We’ve delayed capital projects, street maintenance and not filled open positions. There was no place left to cut.”

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Comparison of selected property taxes and school districts.

Median home prices up in 2Q in most US cities, but not in Boise

The median sales price for previously occupied homes rose from year-ago levels in 100 out of 155 metropolitan areas.

From the August 11, 2010 Idaho Statesman:

Home prices rose in nearly two-thirds of U.S. cities this spring as buyers took advantage of tax incentives that gave the struggling housing market a temporary jolt.
The median sales price for previously occupied homes rose compared with last year in 100 out of 155 metropolitan areas tracked in the April-to-June quarter, the National Association of Realtors said Wednesday. That compares with 91 out of 152 cities in the January-to-March quarter. Fourteen cities had double-digit price increases.
But the boost to the housing market in the second quarter faded shortly after tax credits expired at the end of April. Home sales fell in June and are expected to plunge further in July. Prices are expected to follow in the second half of the year.
The lowest mortgage rates in decades haven't been enough to energize buyers. Home loan applications were virtually flat last week, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Wednesday.
The national median price in the second quarter was $176,900, up from $174,200 in the same quarter last year and up from $166,400 in the January-to-March period.
The median price is the midpoint, which means half of the homes sold for more and half for less. It typically falls in the winter and rises in the summer months. That's because families with children traditional move during the summer and buy larger homes.
Home sellers, meanwhile, are being forced to cut their asking prices as demand remains weak. Among sellers who listed homes for sale at the start of this month, 25 percent had dropped their prices at least once, according to real estate website Trulia.com, which collects data from around the country.
That percentage had fallen as low as 19 percent in March, when tax credit-fueled sales were booming. The biggest problem, said Pete Flint, CEO of Trulia, is the lack of jobs.
"Until the employment market stabilizes, we don't see stabilization in the housing market," he said.
In the Realtors report, the largest price gain was in Akron, Ohio. Prices there were up 36 percent from a year ago. The San Francisco and San Jose areas, which have mounted a strong rebound from the housing bust, also saw prices rebound by about 25 percent. Prices in the Riverside, Calif. metro area were up 18 percent from a year ago.
The biggest price drops were in Cumberland, Md., Tucson, Ariz., Ocala, Fla. and Beaumont-Port Arthur, Texas. Prices in all of those cities were down at least 13 percent from last year.
If the broader economy sinks back into a recession, things will get a lot worse. Celia Chen, senior director of Moody's Analytics, projects that home prices could drop another 20 percent by early 2012 if there is another recession. If the economic recovery remains on track, she sees prices falling another 5 percent and hitting bottom early next year.

Here's a look which cities had the biggest yearly home price gains, and which ones had the largest declines:

BIGGEST INCREASES

1) Akron, Ohio, $119,700, up 36 percent
2) San Jose, Calif. $630,000, up 26 percent
3) San Francisco, Calif. $591,000, up 25 percent
4) Riverside, Calif. $190,200, up 18 percent
5) Elmira, N.Y., $99,200, up 17 percent
6) Lansing, Mich., $99,100, up 13 percent
7) San Diego, Calif., $392,600, up 13 percent
8) Palm Bay, Fla., $117,300, up 13 percent
9) Erie, Pa., $110,200, up 13 percent
10 Cape Coral-Fort Myers, Fla., $94,1000, up 12 percent

BIGGEST DROPS

1) Cumberland, Md., $104,500, down 15 percent.
2) Tucson, Ariz., $150,200, down 14 percent
3) Ocala, Fla., $95,900, down 13 percent
4) Beaumont, Texas., $120,700, down 13 percent
5) Boise City, Idaho., $140,100, down 13 percent
6) Hagerstown, Md., $149,800, down 9.2 percent
7) Jacksonville, Fla., $139,000, down 9 percent
8) Daytona Beach, Fla., $117,000, down 8 percent
9) Salem, Ore., $176,800, down 7.5 percent
10) Biloxi, Miss., $128,500, down 7.4 percent


Read more: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2010/08/11/1299491/a-look-at-home-prices-in-us-cities.html#ixzz0wKXaDUd3

Chip shortage could benefit Micron Technology | Micron Technology | Idaho Statesman

As back to school time sees an increase in demand for electronics such as laptops, flash drives, chip maker Micron could have something to celebrate. But that might not mean anything for Boise.

Read more here.

Idaho has a big labor pool, but a small talent pool |

What I've been saying all along...

Idaho's unemployment is at a record level, yet Clearwater Analytics and other local high-tech companies are having a difficult time finding people for key positions. The area's labor pool may be big, but it lacks depth - experienced or specialized high-tech workers. And that could hinder the state's ability to compete nationally and globally in the high-tech industries.
"Without a doubt the prevailing opinion on the coastal states is you probably cannot grow a tech company very big in the state of Idaho because the talent pool isn't there," said Bob Lokken at a business innovation conference last week. Lokken founded ProClarity, which was acquired by Microsoft; he recently launched WhiteCloud Analytics.

Read full article here.

Idaho in the top 5 in 2009 for number of new startups | Idaho Economy | Idaho Statesman

Hundreds of business start-ups in 2009 put Idaho in the top five states on the Kauffman Index of Entrepreneurial Activity. The index calculated that about 450 out of 100,000 adults in Idaho started businesses each month in 2009.
Idaho also is making high marks on other lists recently. The state jumped to No. 7 from No. 14 on the American Legislative Exchange Council's Best Economic Outlook list. Boise came in at No. 16 on Forbes' America's Most Innovative Cities, which rates patents, funding, jobs and technology. The Economist praised Boise and Idaho's open space as "the final frontier in the Internet age."

Read full article here.

Boise school leaders protest change to school day | Local News | Idaho Statesman

From today's ID Statesman: A real-world look into the complexities of urban public policy, with density issues, service levels and impact areas at the center of the argument. Just like we discuss in class!

While the majority of Boise School District trustees voted to start and end the school day later at nine elementary schools this fall, two trustees lodged protest votes against the state mandate that forced the decision.
"Nobody squawks more about federal mandates and federal control than the Idaho Legislature, but they do the same thing to the School District," said trustee Rory Jones, who voted against changing the school day to 9:15 a.m.-3:45 p.m. The current hours are 8:45 a.m.-3:25 p.m.
If the district did not make the change, the state would have withheld the $385,000 it says the district will save in busing.
"The sad part for me is the burden falls on a limited number of families who don't deserve this," Jones said.
About 20 percent of the kids in the district, or about 2,295 students and their families, will be affected, he said.
In an audit mandated by the state, the district's bus contractor, First Student, said these nine schools were close enough to the ending locations of other bus routes that merging the routes could save miles.
The state pays for the majority of school districts' transportation costs, but so far, the Boise School District has been the only one in the state affected by legislation that triggers an audit when the cost to transport students exceeds a cap set by the state.
"The Legislature wanted to look at districts with high population density to see if they were operating their transportation efficiency," said state Department of Education spokeswoman Melissa McGrath. "When you're saving money on transportation, $400,000 is money that can go in to other education programs."

But the formula the state used to calculate the cap is flawed, said Boise School Board President A.J. Balukoff.
The state used the cost per mile and the cost per rider to calculate efficiency, but 85 percent of transportation costs are fixed, he said.
Many kids in the Boise School District walk to school, and many don't qualify for busing because they live within 1.5 miles of their school, he said.
That makes the cost per rider high because there are fewer riders, he said.
Inner city transportation also has its own hitches. A bus that starts and stops every three blocks is going to have low miles, compared to a bus that goes out to Orchard Ranch and back, which is a 50-mile trip, and will appear to cost less to operate, he said.
"What does that tell you about your efficiency? Nothing," Balukoff said.

Read full article here.