Future of grocery store in Naples is discussed; also county animal problems

By Marlene J. Bohr
mbohr@steelcountrybee.com

A new grocery store for the city of Naples was again discussed at the Morris County Commissioners court at its Nov. 12 meeting. A grocery store owner had approached the commissioners in October requesting a tax abatement for a new grocery store.
Ray Pruett and his father, R.C. Pruett, who own several stores in Arkansas and Oklahoma and have owned stores in Texas, are interested in opening a store in Naples. They have been in the business for many years. It is a family-owned business.
“We have been working on this since the last meeting,” Judge Lynda Munkres said. “This is different than the tax abatements by the towns. The attorney we had talked to changed two things. We will not take action today, but will soon.”
Morris County Attorney Steve Cowan was in attendance at the commissioner’s court.
 “I was here when Naples came and I asked questions as to what their purpose was in coming to the meeting on their behalf,” Mr. Cowan said. “They wanted to notify us of their action that they had created tax abatements in the city of Naples and they are required by law to give us notice of this. We have an economic development council in the state and we have a project in Morris County and this is something we participated in previously. The granting or not of a tax abatement issue is not on the agenda today. We have two weeks whether or not to grant an abatement and we have to have a process to do it. We have adopted the same language that Naples has.
“Once Morris County decides to establish tax abatements, the court is not bound to grant that to any particular business; it is on a case by case basis. Morris County has never established a reinvestment zone and I think when you do this, you have three choices. You can choose not to participate; you can adopt one to correspond with one used by the city; or you can alter boundaries so it does not include other cities. All this is setting up the criteria of what you require and recognizing you need a public notice and a hearing.”
Judge Munkres said they had to establish an investment zone.
The commissioners accepted adopting the policy, guidelines and criteria for granting tax abatement in enterprise or reinvestment zone in Morris County.
 

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