Ruppersberger Aims To Bring Economic Development Incentives To Tradepoint Atlantic
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger will unveil on Tuesday new legislation designed to help bring federal economic development incentives to Baltimore County's Tradepoint Atlantic.
The legislation, known as The Rust to Revitalization Act of 2022, aims to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 so that it includes a special rule for designating former industrial areas that share a border with designated "Opportunity Zones."
Industrial sites like Buick City in Flint, Michigan, and Sparrows Point in Baltimore—home to Tradepoint Atlantic—are economically distressed sites and ideal candidates for the Opportunity Zones program, which was created to revitalize economically distressed areas, according to congressional staff.
Tradepoint Atlantic is a massive logistics center that will eventually employ 21,000 people on Sparrows Point, which is the former home of the now-shuttered Bethlehem Steel mill, congressional staff said.
But old Internal Revenue Code requirements make places like Sparrows Point ineligible for the program.
That is why Ruppersberger is proposing to extend the Opportunity Zone status to zero-population areas.
Some hallmarks of economic distress in zero-population areas include widespread vacancy and industrial abandonment, chemical contamination, and former industrial sites that may or may not be contaminated, known as "brownfield land," according to congressional staff.
And Tradepoint Atlantic sits on brownfield land.
Zero-population areas have the "exceptional potential to become hubs of good and attainable jobs and local economic renewal without any risks of displacing residents," congressional staff said in a one-page description of the legislation.
The Rust to Revitalization Act of 2022 would certify and designate a census area as a qualified Opportunity Zone if it:
1. Has zero population (according to 2010 U.S. Census Bureau Data);
2. Was previously used for industrial purposes and is a brownfield industrial site;
3. Is contiguous to a population census tract on at least 1 side that has been designated as a qualified opportunity zone.
Ruppersberger will discuss the specific parameters of his legislation alongside Heather Gramm, the assistant secretary for the Maryland Department of Commerce, at an 11 a.m. press conference on Sparrows Point.
Baltimore County Department of Economic & Workforce Development Director Leonard Howie, Turner Station community leaders, and Tradepoint Atlantic representatives will join them.
