Instead, Provo will enter into an annual $150,000 contract with the nonprofit organization and encourage downtown businesses to voluntarily support the alliance.

George O. Stewart, Municipal Council chairman, said Tuesday a vote of downtown businesses revealed an uncomfortably high level of opposition to a property tax assessment to support the alliance, even after the city and the alliance introduced graduated levels to address the criticism.

"None of us likes more taxes," Stewart said. He said voluntary contributions were a viable alternative that may bring in even more money than the assessment would have done.

Critics of the assessment said they are willing to support the alliance's efforts to revitalize the city's core as long as they are making the payments voluntarily.

"I am more likely to contribute even though my clients and I do not receive benefits" from the alliance, said Richard Bradford, a Provo attorney and critic of the assessment district. Bradford said he and others were opposed in principle to being taxed for an alliance that did not necessarily help his business.

For six years the alliance was supported by a property assessment of 0.0014 percent on businesses in the downtown. That assessment was abolished in May after complaints from business owners who said they were being asked to support an alliance that did not help their business.

In September, the council and the alliance proposed an assessment plan that would have divided the business district into three tiers. Under that plan, those closest to University Avenue and Center Street would have paid 80 percent of the old assessment, while those on the fringe would have their assessment reduced by 40 percent. The plan called for the city's property to be assessed as well.

State law required that the assessment plan be put to a vote of the businesses. To pass, property owners representing more than 50 percent of the area's assessed value would have to support the plan. The voting closed Monday, and while almost 30 percent objected, Stewart said that he and other council members were not comfortable with that much opposition.

Bill Bancroft, chairman of the alliance's executive committee, said he was surprised at the opposition to a plan that actually reduced individual payments.

However, he thinks the new plan may actually bring more money since some of the critics said they would rather make voluntary donations than pay a compulsory tax.

"We'll see if they really come in," Bancroft said.

Stewart said NuSkin agreed to voluntarily contribute what it would have paid as an assessment on its corporate headquarters, about $10,000.

dmeyers@sltrib.com