Prospect Heights approves $329K tax break for gas station
Prospect Heights has given the developer of a controversial gas station a $329,000 tax incentive.
Aldermen voted unanimously Monday to grant Thorntons Inc. the tax break to help pay for parts of the gas station at the blighted northwest corner of Rand Road and Thomas Street.
The city will refund half the company's local sales tax revenue for five and a half years or until the rebates pay the company's cost of installing an underground stormwater vault, whichever occurs first. Thorntons told city officials the $4 million development couldn't be built at the site without a tax incentive.
The company has estimated the gas station will make about $9.5 million in sales its first year. Under the city's existing 1.5 percent sales tax, the company would normally pay about $142,000. The city will now receive an estimated $71,000 in sales tax from the development.
Neighboring residents have opposed the gas station, which will sit on a 1.4-acre triangle-shaped site surrounded on three sides by Arlington Heights. They want a business that won't add to the traffic that often backs up from nearby Hersey High School.
Prospect Heights officials predict the gas station with 10 pumps and a 4,400-square-foot convenience store will bring an influx of revenue from a previously blighted corner.