Since 1995, Cincinnati officials have given or said they would give financial subsidies similar to the one being considered for Saks Fifth Avenue. The money has gone to pay for public improvement projects, including the rehabilitation of vacant buildings and to create new apartments and business downtown.

        All were planned using tax-increment financing, which involves paying project costs back through increased property taxes generated by the projects. The projects included:

        • Nordstrom at Fifth and Race streets: The city put together a $48.7 million package to build a department store, a parking garage beneath it and skywalks linking it to other retailers. The project died when Nordstrom pulled out.

        • Shillito Lofts: Transforming the former Lazarus department store on Seventh Street into 814,000 square feet of offices and residential units. The $10.5 million development turned the vacant city-owned building into 98 lofts and townhouses above first-floor office space.

        • Fountain Square West: About $68 million went to the project across Vine Street from Fountain Square. It brought the city a new Lazarus and Tiffany & Co. The city spent $42 million on the block to buy land, demolish buildings and dispose of asbestos. The city put about $27.8 million into the project and agreed to pay $227,175 a year in Hamilton County property taxes for 65 years.

        • Walgreens at Sixth and Race streets: The drugstore is being relocated just a few doors down from its original location. The city agreed to help relocate small business owners to make way for 11,940 square feet of street-level retail space and three floors of housing above, about 24 units. The project developer also will be given rights to develop housing above the CVS pharmacy, located across Race Street from the planned Walgreens. The project is not finished.

        • Seventh Street and Broadway: Construction of a $12 million garage that would support residential units at the site of a paved parking lot. The garage would have 400 spaces that downtown housing advocates say is critical for other planned housing. The garage is to be built so it can support 100 residential units. Not completed.

        • Fourth and Race streets: Rehabilitating the vacant McAlpin's department store and two other empty buildings into shops, restaurants and offices. The $27 million project is in its early stages.

        • New hotel: Construction of a 150-room Hawthorne Suites & Inn at Elm and Fifth streets was supposed to begin this year, but it has been delayed.

        • Fort Washington Way: City officials say they used similar financing to help pay the $314 million reconfiguration of Fort Washington Way, the biggest road project Greater Cincinnati has seen in nearly 40 years. The project was paid for entirely with public money from the state, Hamilton County and the federal government.

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