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An Act To Expand Tax Increment Financing To Include Adult Care Facilities and Services and Certain Child Care Facilities
Be it enacted by the People of the State of Maine as follows:
Sec. 1.  30-A MRSA §5222, sub-§1-B  is enacted to read:
 
1-B.  Adult care facilities.     "Adult care facilities" means entities that offer programs for persons who are 60 years of age or older who need assistance or supervision and that are operated out of nonresidential commercial buildings. The programs offered at adult care facilities include the provision of:
 
A.  Services that allow family members or caregivers to be active in the workforce;
 
B.  Professional and compassionate services for adults in a community and program-based setting; and
 
C.  Social and health services to adults who need supervised care in a safe place outside the home.
Sec. 2.  30-A MRSA §5222, sub-§2-A  is enacted to read:
 
2-A.  Child care facilities.     "Child care facilities" means entities that provide care for at least 10 children who are less than 18 years of age by persons who are not family members, legal guardians or other custodians of the children and that are operated out of nonresidential commercial buildings. To meet this definition, a child care facility must have a full-time director and a sufficient number of staff members whose sole function is to provide necessary child care services. The services offered at child care facilities include the provision of services that allow the children's family members, legal guardians or other custodians the ability to be active in the workforce.
Sec. 3. 30-A MRSA §5225, sub-§1, ¶C, as amended by PL 2019, c. 148, §3 and c. 260, §1, is further amended to read:
 
C. Costs related to economic development, environmental improvements, fisheries and wildlife or marine resources projects, recreational trails, broadband service development, expansion or improvement, including connecting to broadband service outside the tax increment financing district, or employment training or the promotion of workforce development and retention within the municipality or plantation, including, but not limited to:
 
(1) Costs of funding economic development programs or events developed by the municipality or plantation or funding the marketing of the municipality or plantation as a business or arts location;
 
(2) Costs of funding environmental improvement projects developed by the municipality or plantation for commercial or arts district use or related to such activities;
 
(3) Funding to establish permanent economic development revolving loan funds, investment funds and grants;
 
(4) Costs of services and equipment to provide skills development and training, including scholarships to in-state educational institutions or to online learning entities when in-state options are not available, for jobs created or retained in the municipality or plantation. These costs must be designated as training funds in the development program;
 
(5) Quality child care costsCosts associated with child care facilities and adult care facilities and the services provided at those facilities, including finance costs and construction, staffing, training, certification and accreditation costs related to child care and adult care;
 
(6) Costs associated with new or existing recreational trails determined by the department to have significant potential to promote economic development, including, but not limited to, costs for multiple projects and project phases that may include planning, design, construction, maintenance, grooming and improvements with respect to new or existing recreational trails, which may include bridges that are part of the trail corridor, used all or in part for all-terrain vehicles, snowmobiles, hiking, bicycling, cross-country skiing or other related multiple uses;
 
(7) Costs associated with a new or expanded transit service, limited to:
 
(a) Transit service capital costs, including but not limited to: transit vehicles such as buses, ferries, vans, rail conveyances and related equipment; bus shelters and other transit-related structures; and benches, signs and other transit-related infrastructure; and
 
(b) In the case of transit-oriented development districts, ongoing costs of adding to an existing transit system or creating a new transit service and limited strictly to transit operator salaries, transit vehicle fuel and transit vehicle parts replacements;
 
(8) Costs associated with the development of fisheries and wildlife or marine resources projects; and
 
(9) Costs related to the construction or operation of municipal or plantation public safety facilities, the need for which is related to general economic development within the municipality or plantation, not to exceed 15% of the captured assessed value of the development district; and
 
SUMMARY
This bill expands the permitted use of tax increment financing to include costs associated with certain adult care facilities and child care facilities; current law permits such use only for quality child care costs.