PROVIDENCE — The city is seeking $93,000 in reimbursement for expenses related to a $7.3-million tax incentive granted last year to the delayed American Locomotive Works project, according to city Director of Planning Thomas E. Deller.

Deller says the city paid for design and consultant work to help develop the project’s tax-incremental financing plan, or TIF, which is a way that cities can use tax revenue to promote economic development.

In a typical TIF plan, the expenses would have been covered when the city issued a general obligation bond, according to Deller. But that bond, which was to be issued early this year, has been delayed as the project reorganizes, said Deller.

“These sorts of costs are always meant to be paid from the bond,” he said. But “we view it as [the American Locomotive Works project’s] obligation because [the city] did this TIF on their behalf.”

The city has requested reimbursement from the key players in the project, but it’s unclear who will ultimately pay it.

Struever Bros., Eccles and Rouse, of Baltimore, had been the lead developer in the $230-million rehabilitation of three former manufacturing complexes in the city’s Valley section, when the project, also known as ALCO, was proposed in 2005.

But the company, facing increasing financial troubles, recently relinquished all future ownership stake in the project.

It remains an owner and managing partner in the only phase of the multi-phase project so far built: 200,000 square feet of retail and office space opened two years ago on Valley Street.

Peregrine Group, a Rumford-based developer, joined the project in May and is helping coordinate the next phases of the project, which was envisioned as the largest development in the city after the Providence Place mall. St. Louis-based developer McCormack Baron Salazar has also taken an expanded role in the project.

Deller e-mailed a reimbursement request to Peregrine Group President Colin Kane on Aug. 14.

Reached yesterday by phone, Kane said that the company was in “preliminary discussions with the city relative to the TIF” and was optimistic that the matter would be resolved when the TIF bonds were issued.

Struever Bros. spokesman Bob Rubenkonig said in an e-mail that his firm “doesn’t owe any money for TIF consulting to the city. This reimbursement is an ALCO project expense that is typically funded at the time of closing on the TIF bonds out of the bond proceeds.”

Said Deller: “We will be made whole, whether it’s through the bond issue, from Struever, or from one of the organizations that has taken over the project.”

The City Council approved a TIF plan last December supporting the next two phases of the project.

Under the TIF, the city agreed to borrow money through a $7.3-million general obligation bond on behalf of ALCO. The city would then repay the loan, with interest, from the tax revenues generated by the project.

Another portion of the tax revenue would be used for public-works improvements in the Valley neighborhood, including a river walk, a barrier wall along the river’s edge to prevent ground-water contamination, and the construction of work-force and affordable housing.

According to Deller, city money from the Providence Redevelopment Agency’s Revolving Fund covered the following costs:

•$29,182.84 paid on Jan. 8, 2008 to the Providence law firm Moses & Afonso for work done on the TIF plan in 2006-2007.

•$16,186.50 paid on Oct. 21, 2008 to the Providence-based architectural, engineering, planning and construction management firm the Maguire Group for the “ALCO Redevelopment & TIF Plan.”

•$19,864.50 to Moses & Afonso for work from Sept. 15, 2008 to Oct. 31, 2008.

•$24,548.75 to Moses & Afonso for work from Nov. 11, 2008 to Dec. 31, 2008

•$3,505.50 to Providence law firm Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge for an invoice dated Dec. 23, 2008

pmarcelo@projo.com