The way the bonds work is that the state sells bonds to raise money for developers or small business owners, as the case may be, who then pay the debt back by dedicating a portion of the revenue from their projects. This is different from tax increment financing, an incentive city residents are more familiar with, in which bonds are paid off through the property taxes a project generates — a substantial benefit to the developer. The only incentive here is that developers may get a somewhat lower interest rate than they would by going through a bank, but the spread isn't always great enough to make up for the hassles associated with public financing, which is to say that just because the state is willing to authorize that much doesn't mean developers will necessarily take them up on it. From the state's perspective, the bonds don't necessarily count against the state's debt limit, so it can engage in this form of financing largely without jeopardizing its ability to fund other projects.