Albany County Executive Michael Breslin announced last month the state’s approval of additional Empire Zone designations along Railroad Avenue in Guilderland.
To make the new designations happen, nearly 200 acres were taken out of the Empire Zone in areas surrounding the Northeast Industrial Park in Guilderland and distributed throughout the county. According to Sean Maguire, Albany county’s senior economic development planner, 20 to 30 of the acres stayed in Guilderland along Railroad Avenue and the remaining acres were distributed among Colonie, Menands and Cohoes.
Guilderland now has approximately 10 to 15 percent of the 213 acres of the designated Empire Zone surrounding the Railroad Avenue corridor, according to Maguire.
Empire Zones are areas throughout the state that offer special incentives to encourage economic and community development, business investment and job creation. Certified businesses located within an Empire Zone are eligible to receive significant tax credits and benefits.
The loss of Empire Zone acreage from the Northeast Industrial Park shouldn’t negatively affect the town, said Donald Csaposs, Guilderland’s director of economic development.
Csaposs said that despite the fact that Guilderland only has a small portion of the Empire Zone along Railroad Avenue, with Colonie holding the rest, it will benefit both towns.
Anything happening along Railroad Avenue benefits the corridor as a whole, said Csaposs.
The Empire Zone surrounding the Northeast Industrial Park went from 594 acres down to 399.5 acres. Csaposs said that the new Empire Zone designation was now in a more appropriate area of Guilderland.
According to Csaposs, the Empire Zone that was deducted from the area surrounding the Northeast Industrial Park wasn’t suitable for industrial use and, as a result, the Empire Zone status for the unusable acres was being wasted.
The push to get the land designated as an Empire Zone began at the town level, said Csaposs, and lends itself to some of the town’s initiatives found in the comprehensive plan, including revitalizing properties, and increasing tax revenues and employment bases.
Guilderland town supervisor Kenneth Runion said the town board voted last year to allow the removal of some of the Empire Zones by from Northeast Industrial Park.
`The land coming out of the Empire Zone made sense because it didn’t have to the potential to be developed,` said Runion.
`How about let’s take that acreage and take that out of the zone and apply some of that acreage over to Railroad Avenue,` said Csaposs. `The Empire Zone on Railroad Avenue is a potential benefit to Guilderland because, for the most part, the property over there now is kind of beat.`
The area along Railroad Avenue is ideal for Empire Zone status because no zoning changes would be needed, and the buildings there already exist. Csaposs said that by `recycling` the rundown buildings along Railroad Avenue that currently do not generate tax revenue, industry in the area could be revitalized.
In addition to increasing the town’s tax base, the new development and industry would create employment opportunities as well.
`The objective of the program is to get industrial businesses that will create a significant number of jobs in targeted areas,` said Csaposs. Targeted areas include those that have access to water, sewer and high capacity electrical service as well as areas that are already zoned for industrial purposes.
`It has the potential to be a winner all the way around but,` said Csaposs, `you can’t make business come.`
Maguire said that recent redesignation of Empire Zones in Albany County added 29 to 30 acres and that eight different defined areas in the county were reduced to seven `corridors of development.“
