Brazos County economic development agreement update includes three technology projects where construction has yet to start

This podcast contains comments from the October 28, 2025 Brazos County commission meeting.Brazos County commissioners receive an update on multiple economic development agreements at this week's (October 28) meeting.The report from Brazos County economic development coordinator Kimberly Gonzalez included three agreements associated with future property tax breaks to technology companies that have yet to start construction.All three employ chapter 312 tax abatement agreements, which Gonzalez used a definition from the state comptroller's office as "an economic development tool available to cities, counties, and special districts to attract new industries and to encourage the retention and development of existing businesses through property tax exemptions or reductions."Click HERE to read presentation materials from the October 28, 2025 Brazos County commission meeting.Quoting Gonzalez and presentation materials she shared at the commission meeting, two of the three projects are on the RELLIS campus.One is the America's Foundry semiconductor and research complex.This agreement was signed in 2024Length of agreement: 10 years (tax year 2026 tax year 2035)Incentive for tax year 2024: No incentive for tax year 2024Abatement for tax year 2026 tax year 2035: 80% of the maintenance and operations rate portion of the real property taxes collected and attributable to the incremental taxable value for 5 years followed by 50% for 5 additional years, totaling ten years of abatementRequired incremental value increase by Dec. 31, 2035: $10 billionTotal new full time job creation by Dec. 31, 2035: 1,800The other is the RELLIS campus Data and Research CenterThis agreement was signed in 2025Length of agreement: 10 years (tax year 2029 tax year 2038)Incentive for tax year 2024: Not applicable until tax year 2029Abatement for tax year 2029 tax year 2038: 50% of maintenance and operations rate portion of the real property taxes collected and attributable to the incremental taxable value for 10 yearsTotal capital investment by Dec. 31, 2038: $700MTotal new full time job creation by Dec. 31, 2038: 100Maximum abatement amount: $13MThe third project is the expansion of the Honeywell electronic chemicals plant in north Bryan.This agreement was signed in 2024Length of agreement: 5 years (tax year 2025 tax year 2029)Incentive for tax year 2024: No incentive for tax year 2024Abatement for tax year 2025 tax year 2029: 50% of the maintenance and operations rate portion of the real property taxes collected and attributable to the incremental taxable value for 5 yearsTotal capital investment by Dec. 31, 2029: $120MThis agreement is contingent on Honeywell receiving 50% of funding from federal and state grants and that funding hasn't been received yet