Work has started on writing laws to reform Missouri’s tax credit system for economic development and historic preservation. There’s not much disagreement something has to be done. Problems with the Rebuilding Communities Program have focused legisaltive attention on reforming the state’s 54 programs that give tax breaks for various purposes. Econmic Development Director Joe Driskill says his department is investigating whether other tax credit prgorams might be victims of fraud. Driskill says reform proposals have been made in each of the lat two legislative sessions, but they’ve drawn a lot of opposition from groups using those tax breaks. In the past, suspicions of misuse of the tax credit programs, if not outright fraud in them, have not underlined the need for reforms. Driskill says there’s no doubt reforms are needed. How deep those reforms go in the economic development system is the question he and a special legislative committee are trying to determine.
