Community leaders urge state lawmakers to speed up TIF access - KTIV News 4 Sioux City IA: News, Weather and Sports

Community leaders often get excited about "tax increment financing", or TIF. It's a way that the town can take property tax revenue and put it back into the community.

But there has been an issue with some communities in Iowa misusing the funds, so the money isn't making its way through the system as quickly as it used to.

Harold Higman, who's the mayor of Akron, Iowa, speaks glowingly about what TIF has meant to his town.  In the past few years, Akron has added baseball fields, improved their streets, and put in storm sewers.

One of the biggest benefits? Breaking ground on a new senior care center, which was funded in large part by TIF money.

"That means jobs for those people in the community, and you have to appreciate it from the standpoint of the seniors that it's a care facility for them. So, moving forward, it works into all segments of the community," said Higman.

Higman says a greater level of transparency in how those funds are used could go a long way toward bringing in state funds more quickly.