Greenwood grants tax break for speculative building in growing business park

<p>Another speculative building is coming to a growing Greenwood business park, and the city has agreed to give the Carmel-based developer a more than $1 million tax break.</p><p>Becknell Industrial plans to build a 151,800-square-foot facility and 104-car parking lot off Graham Road, in a complex dubbed Southtech Business Park. It will likely house two or three light manufacturing businesses, said Pat Sherman, a local accountant who is representing Becknell. Another similar building is currently being built in the same business park by the same developer, he said.</p><p>The new facility is expected to bring 15 jobs that pay, on average, $17.50 an hour, according to the company’s property tax abatement application.</p><p>Greenwood’s redevelopment commission on Tuesday unanimously approved the abatement for real property taxes over a 10-year period, a total of about $1.5 million. Becknell won’t pay any real property taxes on the building its first year, but will pay an additional 10 percent each year for 10 years.</p><p>For example, in year 10, the company will pay 90 percent of real property taxes on the facility and then the full amount after that.</p><p>It is an $8.7 million investment for Greenwood, Sherman said, and it will raise the value of the land significantly, to $60,100 per acre from about $1,500 per acre.</p><p>Becknell purchased the land for $450,000 and plans to make about $8.25 million in improvements to it.</p><p>Construction is slated to start no later than June 30 and will be complete the summer of 2020, according to city documents.</p>