Atlanta is getting millions from a federal funding program the city has used in the past to expand Grady Memorial Hospital and to help struggling families.
Invest Atlanta, the city’s economic development arm, said Tuesday it has received $50 million from the U.S. Treasury Department’s New Markets Tax Credit program. Congress created the program in 2000 to help attract private investments for those who serve economically depressed communities and revitalize poor neighborhoods.
“The New Markets Tax Credit program creates more equity of opportunity and greater access to the services our residents need,” Mayor Kasim Reed said in a release. “With this award, our city now has additional resources to attract high-impact projects and investment for neighborhoods throughout Atlanta.”
Under the New Markets program, cities raise funds by selling the tax credits to private investors, typically national banks, and using the capital from the sales for local projects, an Invest Atlanta spokesman said. Invest Atlanta will sell the tax credits through its Atlanta Emerging Markets Inc. branch.
Atlanta has received tax credits through the program for at least a decade, funding 10 projects, Invest Atlanta said. Those projects include $12 million for Grady Memorial Hospital’s recent $76 million expansion and $8.5 million for Families First, a social services organization, to convert E.R. Carter Elementary School in Washington Park into its new headquarters.
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