EB-5 Immigrant Investment Regional Center
The U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Service administers an immigrant investor visa program titled EB-5. The program grants foreigners permanent U.S. residency in exchange for helping create U.S. jobs.
The program is loosely modeled on a successful initiative started a decade ago in Canada to lure Chinese investors. The U.S. program requires a $1 million investment in urban areas or a $500,000 investment in rural or targeted employment areas and the creation of 10 permanent jobs. The investment must also remain “at-risk” without repayment for a period of two full years.
Idaho has applied to have an EB-5 regional center, benefitting all 44 of Idaho’s counties – located here to foster foreign direct investment to the state. A regional center will provide a marketable investment opportunity that can attract and capture immigrant investors, and direct their pooled or individual investments toward industry and community projects that the regional center identifies.
In the first stage, the EB-5 facilitates the initial flow of foreign dollars into the regional economy for new business development or business expansion. In the second stage, stakeholders guide program investments into industries that are export-oriented. Ultimately, this leads to an increase in business activity, resulting in a direct and indirect increase in regional employment and earnings.
From an economic development perspective, the potential for regional growth is significant. New job creation can spawn growth in several other areas of the economy, particularly housing and retail. This, in turn, would create new fiscal sources for state government revenue to be focused back into key development projects.
There are approximately 50 active regional centers in the U.S. with diverse business models and functions. The most successful of these centers have attracted more than 1,000 investors and $500 million to various projects administered through the regional center.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security must first designate a “regional center” in Idaho under the EB-5 program. The Idaho Department of Commerce, through its Commercial Innovation Division is facilitating and supporting the establishment of a statewide EB-5 Regional Center. Approval is anticipated by the fall of 2009.