A special tax district for downtown Wilmington is definitely not going to happen this year, city officials said Wednesday.

Under a proposal from Wilmington Downtown Inc., an additional tax of 7 cents per $100 of tax value would have been charged to property owners in the city’s Central Business District, resulting in an annual budget of about $275,000 to fund extra security, cleanliness, economic development and other programs for downtown.

Logistically, the proposed Municipal Services District would have had to be approved by city officials before the end of the fiscal year, June 30, to become a reality in 2016, and the city was not going to be able to make that deadline, said Malissa Talbert, city spokeswoman.  

In the next fiscal year, which starts July 1, the city staff is expected to gather more information on a potential MSD, better define what questions city officials and downtown stakeholders have about the issue and determine what the next steps might be, Talbert said.

WDI and an MSD task force had worked on an MSD recommendation for almost 18 months. After an additional public input meeting in March, the city staff was directed to develop the final proposal, said Ed Wolverton, president and CEO of WDI.

“I think at the end of the day,the city just kind of ran out of time, especially with other initiatives on the table, including the Water Street parking deck [redevelopment project], the North Waterfront Park, the brick street issue and the short-term rental issue,” Wolverton said.

He said it will be up to city officials whether WDI is involved in any future MSD proposals.

As for Wolverton’s reaction, he said, “Best practices in other communities will note that these often take a lot of time to do, to build the support behind it and also to make sure that you’re providing the services that are going to add value to the people that are within the district. ... I think the general literature will say that it’s 18 months to two years [the time frame] and so we were right at 18 months. We knew we were working on an accelerated time frame, but we felt like we had the experience to be able to bring that forward.”

In a Greater Wilmington Business Journal article last month, Wolverton said the average cost to a downtown property owner under the WDI and task force proposal would have been about $242 a year or 66 cents a day.

“This shows that the average annual amount is affordable and will not force small shops to close. In fact, the benefits of a safer and more attractive district can increase business,” Wolverton said.

Property owners opposed to the measure have said they don’t think the services are needed and that they feel the rate would end up increasing from a potential 7 percent.

One of those property owners, Justin LaNasa, had been collecting signatures on a petition to have the matter put on the general election ballot in November.

LaNasa said Wednesday that he believes the MSD proposal will be considered by city officials in the future because of proposed state legislation that would require a significantly higher number of signatures on a petition like the one he had started against the MSD.

“I guarantee it [the MSD proposal] will be back if this bill’s passed,” LaNasa said. “I would put a $10,000 bet on it.”