Martinsburg’s opportunity zone census tracts constitute the majority of the city east of the I-81 corridor, including downtown and historic Martinsburg and multiple former industrial sites the City seeks partners to redevelop.

Martinsburg’s opportunity zone census tracts constitute the majority of the city east of the I-81 corridor, including downtown and historic areas.

 Opportunity zones in Martinsburg

Opportunity zones are areas where federal and state tax policy seeks to encourage investment. The opportunity zone concept originated in a federal tax bill to provide federal capital gains incentives to spur investment in geographic areas in need of such investment. Seeking to make its opportunity zone areas even more attractive to investment, West Virginia’s legislature added an additional suite of state tax incentives for the same zones.

In a nutshell:

  • The federal opportunity zone incentive provides forgiveness of capital gains taxes on property and businesses within an opportunity zone.

  • The state opportunity zone incentive provides forgiveness of state income taxes on income derived from new businesses located within a West Virginia opportunity zone.

For a full explanation of the federal and state opportunity zone benefits, the following links provide access to the full explanations of the programs.