§ 135.230 RSMo — Tax credits and exemptions, maximum period granted — calculation formula — employee requirements, waived or reduced, when — motor carrier, tax credits, conditions — expansion of boundaries of enterprise zone — petition for additional period, qualifications

1. The exemption or credit established and allowed by section 135.220 and the credits allowed and established by subdivisions (1), (2), (3) and (4) of subsection 1 of section 135.225 shall be granted with respect to any new business facility located within an enterprise zone for a vested period not to exceed ten years following the date upon which the new business facility commences operation within the enterprise zone and such exemption shall be calculated, for each succeeding year of eligibility, in accordance with the formulas applied in the initial year in which the new business facility is certified as such, subject, however, to the limitation that all such credits allowed in sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the exemption allowed in section 135.220 shall be removed not later than fifteen years after the enterprise zone is designated as such. No credits shall be allowed pursuant to subdivision (1), (2), (3) or (4) of subsection 1 of section 135.225 or section 135.235 and no exemption shall be allowed pursuant to section 135.220 unless the number of new business facility employees engaged or maintained in employment at the new business facility for the taxable year for which the credit is claimed equals or exceeds two or the new business facility is a revenue-producing enterprise as defined in paragraph (d) of subdivision (6) of section 135.200 . In order to qualify for either the exemption pursuant to section 135.220 or the credit pursuant to subdivision (4) of subsection 1 of section 135.225 , or both, it shall be required that at least thirty percent of new business facility employees, as determined by subsection 4 of section 135.110 , meet the criteria established in section 135.240 or are residents of an enterprise zone or some combination thereof, except taxpayers who establish a new business facility by operating a revenue-producing enterprise as defined in paragraph (d) of subdivision (6) of section 135.200 or any taxpayer that is an insurance company that established a new business facility satisfying the requirements of subdivision (8) of section 135.100 located within an enterprise zone after June 30, 1993, and before December 31, 1994, and that employs in excess of three hundred fifty new business facility employees at such facility each tax period for which the credits allowable pursuant to subdivisions (1) to (4) of subsection 1 of section 135.225 are claimed shall not be required to meet such requirement. A new business facility described as SIC 3751 shall be required to employ fifteen percent of such employees instead of the required thirty percent. For the purpose of satisfying the thirty-percent requirement, residents must have lived in the enterprise zone for a period of at least one full calendar month and must have been employed at the new business facility for at least one full calendar month, and persons qualifying because they meet the requirements of section 135.240 must have satisfied such requirement at the time they were employed by the new business facility and must have been employed at the new business facility for at least one full calendar month. The director may temporarily reduce or waive this requirement for any business in an enterprise zone with ten or less full-time employees, and for businesses with eleven to twenty full-time employees this requirement may be temporarily reduced. No reduction or waiver may be granted for more than one tax period and shall not be renewable. The exemptions allowed in sections 135.215 and 135.220 and the credits allowed in sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the refund established and authorized in section 135.245 shall not be allowed to any "public utility", as such term is defined in section 386.020 . For the purposes of achieving the fifteen-percent employment requirement set forth in this subsection, a new business facility described as NAICS 336991 may count employees who were residents of the enterprise zone at the time they were employed by the new business facility and for at least ninety days thereafter, regardless of whether such employees continue to reside in the enterprise zone, so long as the employees remain employed by the new business facility and residents of the state of Missouri.

2. Notwithstanding the provisions of subsection 1 of this section, motor carriers, barge lines or railroads engaged in transporting property for hire or any interexchange telecommunications company that establish a new business facility shall be eligible to qualify for the exemptions allowed in sections 135.215 and 135.220 , and the credits allowed in sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the refund established and authorized in section 135.245 , except that trucks, truck-trailers, truck semitrailers, rail or barge vehicles or other rolling stock for hire, track, switches, bridges, barges, tunnels, rail yards and spurs shall not constitute new business facility investment nor shall truck drivers or rail or barge vehicle operators constitute new business facility employees.

3. Notwithstanding any other provision of sections 135.200 to 135.256 to the contrary, motor carriers establishing a new business facility on or after January 1, 1993, but before January 1, 1995, may qualify for the tax credits available pursuant to sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the exemption provided in section 135.220 , even if such new business facility has not satisfied the employee criteria, provided that such taxpayer employs an average of at least two hundred persons at such facility, exclusive of truck drivers and provided that such taxpayer maintains an average investment of at least ten million dollars at such facility, exclusive of rolling stock, during the tax period for which such credits and exemption are being claimed.

4. Any governing authority having jurisdiction of an area that has been designated an enterprise zone may petition the department to expand the boundaries of such existing enterprise zone. The director may approve such expansion if the director finds that:

(1) The area to be expanded meets the requirements prescribed in section 135.207 or 135.210 , whichever is applicable;

(2) The area to be expanded is contiguous to the existing enterprise zone; and

(3) The number of expansions do not exceed three after August 28, 1994.

5. Notwithstanding the fifteen-year limitation as prescribed in subsection 1 of this section, any governing authority having jurisdiction of an area that has been designated as an enterprise zone by the director, except one designated pursuant to this subsection, may file a petition, as prescribed by the director, for redesignation of such area for an additional period not to exceed seven years following the fifteenth anniversary of the enterprise zone's initial designation date; provided:

(1) The petition is filed with the director within three years prior to the date the tax credits authorized in sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the exemption allowed in section 135.220 are required to be removed pursuant to subsection 1 of this section;

(2) The governing authority identifies and conforms the boundaries of the area to be designated a new enterprise zone to the political boundaries established by the latest decennial census, unless otherwise approved by the director;

(3) The area satisfies the requirements prescribed in subdivisions (3) and (4) of section 135.205 according to the United States Census Bureau's American Community Survey, based on the most recent of five-year period estimate data in which the final year of the estimate ends in either zero or five or other appropriate source as approved by the director;

(4) The governing authority satisfies the requirements prescribed in sections 135.210 , 135.215 and 135.255 ;

(5) The director finds that the area is unlikely to support reasonable tax assessment or to experience reasonable economic growth without such designation; and

(6) The director's recommendation that the area be designated as an enterprise zone is approved by the joint committee on economic development policy and planning, as otherwise required in subsection 3 * of section 135.210 .

6. Any taxpayer having established a new business facility in an enterprise zone except one designated pursuant to subsection 5 of this section, who did not earn the tax credits authorized in sections 135.225 and 135.235 and the exemption allowed in section 135.220 for the full ten-year period because of the fifteen-year limitation as prescribed in subsection 1 of this section, shall be granted such benefits for ten tax years, less the number of tax years the benefits were claimed or could have been claimed prior to the expiration of the original fifteen-year period, except that such tax benefits shall not be earned for more than seven tax periods during the ensuing seven-year period, provided the taxpayer continues to operate the new business facility in an area that is designated an enterprise zone pursuant to subsection 5 of this section. Any taxpayer who establishes a new business facility subsequent to the commencement of the ensuing seven-year period, as authorized in subsection 5 of this section, may qualify for the tax credits authorized in sections 135.225 and 135.235 , and the exemptions authorized in sections 135.215 and 135.220 , pursuant to the same terms and conditions as prescribed in sections 135.100 to 135.256 . The designation of any enterprise zone pursuant to subsection 5 of this section shall not be subject to the fifty enterprise zone limitation imposed in subsection 3 ** of section 135.210 .