I 
116TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 3538 
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide for new markets 
tax credit investments in the Rural Jobs Zone. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
JUNE 27, 2019 
Ms. SEWELL of Alabama (for herself and Mr. SMITH of Missouri) introduced 
the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Ways and Means 
A BILL 
To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide 
for new markets tax credit investments in the Rural 
Jobs Zone. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Rural Jobs Act’’. 
SEC. 2. ALLOCATIONS OF NEW MARKETS TAX CREDIT LIMI-
TATION FOR RURAL JOBS ZONE. 
(a) IN GENERAL.—Section 45D(f) of the Internal 
Revenue Code of 1986 is amended by adding at the end 
the following new paragraph: 
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‘‘(4) ALLOCATIONS
FOR
THE
RURAL
JOBS 
ZONE.— 
‘‘(A) IN
GENERAL.—In addition to any 
new markets tax credit limitation under para-
graph (1), there are the following amounts of 
new markets tax credit limitation which shall be 
allocated by the Secretary only to Rural Jobs 
Zone development entities for making Rural 
Jobs Zone equity investments: 
‘‘(i) $500,000,000 for 2019. 
‘‘(ii) $500,000,000 for 2020. 
‘‘(B) RURAL
JOBS
ZONE
DEVELOPMENT 
ENTITY.—For purposes of this paragraph, the 
term ‘Rural Jobs Zone development entity’ 
means any qualified community development 
entity a significant mission of which is the eco-
nomic development of, and the creation and re-
tention of jobs in, the Rural Jobs Zone. 
‘‘(C) RURAL JOBS ZONE EQUITY INVEST-
MENT.—For purposes of this paragraph, the 
term ‘Rural Jobs Zone equity investment’ 
means any equity investment which would be a 
qualified equity investment if the only low-in-
come community was the Rural Jobs Zone. 
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‘‘(D) RURAL JOBS ZONE.—For purposes of 
this paragraph, the term ‘Rural Jobs Zone’ 
means the area comprised of low-income com-
munities which are a portion of neither— 
‘‘(i) a city or town that has a popu-
lation of greater than 50,000 inhabitants, 
nor 
‘‘(ii) any urbanized area contiguous 
and adjacent to such a city or town. 
‘‘(E) MINIMUM
INVESTMENT
IN
PER-
SISTENT POVERTY COUNTIES AND HIGH MIGRA-
TION RURAL COUNTIES.— 
‘‘(i) IN
GENERAL.—The Secretary 
shall prescribe regulations or other guid-
ance pursuant to which not less than 25 
percent of the Rural Jobs Zone equity in-
vestments made pursuant to allocations 
made under this paragraph are invested in 
areas which are persistent poverty coun-
ties, high migration rural counties (as de-
fined in subsection (e)(5)(B)), or both. 
‘‘(ii) PERSISTENT
POVERTY
COUN-
TIES.—For purposes of this subparagraph, 
the term ‘persistent poverty county’ means 
any county that has had 20 percent or 
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more of its population living in poverty 
over the past 30 years, as measured by the 
1990 and 2000 decennial censuses and the 
most recent Small Area Income and Pov-
erty Estimates. 
‘‘(F) APPLICATION OF CARRYOVER.—Para-
graph (3) shall be applied separately with re-
spect to the amounts specified in subparagraph 
(A).’’. 
(b) EFFECTIVE DATE.—The amendment made by 
this section shall apply to allocations made after the date 
of the enactment of this Act. 
Æ 
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