Lancaster Businesses Find CRIZ Paperwork Cumbersome, Time-Consuming

Downtown business people say they support Lancaster’s City Revitalization & Improvement Zone, or CRIZ.

But boy, they sure wish the paperwork were less of a hassle.

“The process is very painful,” said David Leaman, senior manager of finance for the Isaac’s restaurant chain, which has its headquarters and one of its restaurants in the CRIZ.

Moirajeanne FitzGerald, who owns Here to Timbuktu on North Prince Street, says, “The CRIZ paperwork is cumbersome. The directions are difficult to understand.”

Read more: http://lancasteronline.com/news/local/city-businesses-find-criz-paperwork-cumbersome-time-consuming/article_f9428c5e-f5cf-11e4-a572-83e1416c6222.html

Tax Baseline Set For Lancaster CRIZ Program

After gathering tax information from business owners this summer, Lancaster now has a starting point for for a program it hopes will jump-start downtown development.

Known as the CRIZ for short, the City Revitalization & Improvement Zone program will allow Lancaster to redirect some state and local tax money toward redevelopment within the zone’s boundaries.

Lancaster identified 736 businesses in its CRIZ. All of them were required to file CRIZ tax reports by June 15.

Just under half did so: 366, to be exact, according to the state Department of Revenue.

Read more: http://lancasteronline.com/news/local/tax-baseline-set-for-lancaster-criz-program/article_adf6ae9c-80c2-11e4-a79f-97b4bba5b725.html