Industrial renovation could get nearly $9 million in tax credits
A project to convert a vacant industrial building in the Cobblestone District into offices, apartments and restaurants stands to receive nearly $9 million in federal tax credits under a program to stimulate investment in depressed neighborhoods.
The ongoing $10 million project by developers Sam Savarino and Chris Jacobs to renovate the five-story building at 95 Perry St. won approval Monday from the Erie County Industrial Development Agency for the lion’s share of the nearly $12 million in federal tax credits available locally this year through the federal renewal communities program.
Five projects in Buffalo and Lackawanna were approved to apply for the federal tax credits.
The largest is the project by Michigan Street Development to renovate the 75,000- square-foot building on Perry Street in the Cobblestone District into offices, five upscale apartments, a fitness center and restaurants. The local office of the Empire State Development Corp. is in the building, as well as Watts Architecture and Engineering and software company Win soft. The New York Power Authority recently opened its 1,100-square-foot local office on the building’s fourth floor.
Approved for $880,000 in federal tax credits was the Lackawanna Halal Market, a project to combine a butcher shop, bakery and grocery in the former Bachman Sheet Metal Building at 174 Ridge Road, Lackawanna.
Harmac Medical Products, a Buffalo company that makes single-use medical devices, won approval for $765,721 in federal tax credits for its project to upgrade its offices at 2201 Bailey Ave.
Samco Technologies received approval for $734,500 in federal tax credits associated with its plans to buy and renovate a 100,000-square-foot factory and an attached 16,000- square-foot office building at One River Rock Drive in Buffalo. Samco makes process treatment equipment used to treat wastewater.
Concord Textile Care Products was allocated $522,000 in tax credits to support the development of its proprietary process to replace hazardous dry-cleaning chemicals with other, safer compounds.
The company also plans to set up a training facility at its Buffalo factory at 144 Urban St. to instruct workers from cleaning companies in the use of the new cleaning agents.
The deductions allow developers to accelerate the depreciation on the cost of acquiring, renovating and constructing buildings in those targeted census tracts as an incentive to attract investors, said Geraldine Ford, the coordinator of the Buffalo-Lackawanna Renewal Community.
The building owners can depreciate their property over 10 years, rather than the standard 39 years, or they can deduct half of the project’s expenses from their gross revenues during the first year the building is in use and then depreciate the rest over 38 years.
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