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A GUIDE TO RETAIL IMPACT STUDIES Municipal Forms Package A set of sample forms that towns may use, including a "Checklist," which guides town officials through the steps and deadlines established by the Informed Growth Act, and a "Municipal Decision Form," which guides officials through the process of making findings of fact and determining whether a proposed development would have an undue adverse impact. Steps in the Process Here are the main steps involved a typical impact review for retail development: 1.developer A files an application for a project large enough to trigger an economic impact review. The size at which a retail development must undergo an economic impact review varies by jurisdiction. In Maine, projects involving stores of 75,000 square feet or larger trigger the provisions of the Informed Growth Act. Several different types of retailers currently Appendix A: Large-Scale Retail develop and operate stores of this scale. See Formats for a description of these store types. By the time an application for such a development is filed, the applicant typically will have secured a site, evaluated the market demand in the region, and prepared preliminary site plans. In addition, many developers put forth economic and fiscal impact numbers for the project. These values are based on the activity forecast to occur within the project, including construction, retail sales, employment, and tax revenue. However, these figures provide only a partial picture of the economic and fiscal impact of the development. Those millions of dollars in sales and the associated tax revenue and employment do not exist in a vacuum. The new store will be inserted into an existing economic ecosystem, which must be fully understood in order to evaluate the likely changes in spending patterns, employment, tax revenue, and public costs the new store will bring. 2. Municipal officials (i.e., the planning board, city council, or other permitting authority as consultant specified by municipal or state statute) retain a qualified to prepare an impact analysis for the proposed development Cities typically find a consultant through a request-for-proposals process. In Maine, the State Planning Office maintains a list of qualified preparers for municipalities to choose from when implementing the Informed Growth Act. In contracting with the consultant, the town should specify the scope of the study, which, in the case of many municipal impact review policies, as well as the Informed Growth Act, is defined within the law. 3