Urban-renewal tax relief for Three Miles, Six Miles
Published:Wednesday | March 16, 2011 | 12:00 AM
The Government will be extending the Urban Renewal Tax Relief Act to cover the old industrial belt between Three Miles and Six Miles in Kingston to spur business activities in that area.
The Urban Renewal Act seeks to encourage the redevelopment of downtown Kingston and other Jamaican towns suffering from urban blight.
Audley Shaw, minister of finance and the public service, said, "It is something that I'm working on to present to Cabinet, so that at least in terms of that special incentive programme it can help to drive back, especially light manufacturing (to that area)," Shaw said. He was addressing a Planning Institute of Jamaica-organised growth-strategy symposium at the Jamaica Conference Centre, downtown Kingston, yesterday.
Shaw was responding to a question from a member of the audience, who had asked what the Government was doing about that area in light of its urban renewal now occurring in downtown Kingston.
"That piece of infrastructural asset is now totally idle and is in ruins, and I'm yet to hear of any plans of how we plan to revitalise those infrastructure," an audience member told Shaw.
The minister said he had discussions with the late managing director of Courts Jamaica, Hayden Singh, who had property in that area and wanted to develop.
"So it is within his name and, of course, in the wisdom of his proposal it is something that I'm working on," he said.
Some of the businesses that formerly operated from that area included Caribbean Casting Company Limited, West Indies Glass and Serv-Wel.
The Urban Renewal Act, which was amended last year, exempted developers from stamp duty and transfer tax on lands acquired for special development. It also allows for a 33.33 per cent tax credit of the capital expenditure relating to improvement works carried out in areas earmarked for special development.
The legislation, at its 1995 launch, covered only downtown Kingston, but was extended to Port Royal a year later, and to Montego Bay in 2000. In 2009, Spanish Town became a designated area for benefits under the programme.