Targeted Growth Through

Targeted Growth Through Collaboration:

Utah’s Opportunity Zones and Mega Sites

Utah is known for cutting-edge universities, a booming tech scene and robust life sciences industry, national and state parks, and world-class outdoor recreation. But you might not know that Utah is also home to 46 Opportunity Zones and numerous Mega Sites. These economic growth outlets provide investors with opportunities to generate lasting community impact while earning market or above-market rate returns on investment.

Stimulating growth in underserved and overlooked communities

In partnership with the Utah Association of Counties and the Sorenson Impact Center, the Governor’s Office of Economic Development has prioritized education, outreach and engagement on the opportunity zone incentive in rural communities throughout the state. Opportunity Zones are a new community development program established by Congress in the Tax Cut and Jobs Act of 2017 to encourage long-term investments in low-income and urban communities nationwide.

In Utah, this community initiative evolved into the recently announced Rural Opportunity Zone and Recovery Playbook, a new two-year program jointly funded by GOED and the Economic Development Administration (EDA). “The goal of the playbook is to share rural economic development best practices and provide technical support to projects in 21 participating counties,” said Grant Baskerville, director at the Sorenson Impact Center. “Over the next two years, we will seek to support a more equitable recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, drive investment into an array of impactful developments, and support economic diversification.”

For more information about the program, visit opportunityzones. utah.gov.

Bringing new investment to Utah

Attracting new manufacturing projects to the state requires a daunting amount of research to identify operation sites. How do growth-minded communities balance the need for data with the need for speed? Luckily for Utah, a program exists to help. In 2018, under the GOED’s direction, the Economic Development Corporation of Utah (EDCUtah) launched the Utah Mega Sites program.

Mega Sites are large-acreage land sites that are extensively vetted and pre-qualified through the Utah Mega Sites certification process to house large and complex corporate projects.

According to Katherine Morrell, who directs the Utah Mega Site program for EDCUtah, certification is “a detailed process involving geotechnical analysis, engineering studies, utility availability studies, land use and planning studies, air quality and environmental studies, and a lot of due diligence. It’s really in-depth.”

The state now boasts 11 different Mega Sites, ranging from the 610acre Northwest Quadrant site in Salt Lake City managed by the Colmena Group to the 418-acre Iron Springs Mega Site west of Cedar City. These Mega Sites have plenty of advantages for prospective clients.

“Take a head-to-head comparison of two similar parcels, one certified and one not. The certified parcel has an advantage in that questions about the site’s characteristics and viability are all answered,” Morrell said. “A project’s timeline is more predictable and is faster to market.”

For more information about the program, visit edcutah.org/siteselection/utah-mega-sites-program.