Archive for the ‘Jobs’ Category

« Older Entries

The Ongoing Economic Development Privatization Fiasco in Wisconsin

May 7, 2013

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker must decide what to do with the scandal-ridden Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC). Few options remain: ignore it, fix it, or declare it a failure.

The privatized economic development agency was created in 2011. Governor Walker proudly proclaimed that shuttering the state’s Department of Commerce and replacing it with a privatized entity would do wonders for job creation in Wisconsin. Good Jobs First wrote a report documenting the tainted track record of privatized economic development agencies throughout the United States. We warned that these quasi-government agencies frequently lead to unaccountable, opaque organizations spending too much taxpayer dough without jobs materializing. With the Governor’s rosy jobs pledges falling short and the WEDC embroiled in scandal, it appears that the agency is destined to be yet another case study highlighting what can go wrong when a public agency becomes privatized.

Last week another scathing audit by the non-partisan Wisconsin Legislative Audit Bureau found a slew of disturbing practices. This follows on the back of other issues previously reported on our blog. The issues read like a laundry list of everything agencies tasked with managing the public purse ought not to do:

  • Millions in taxpayer money went unaccounted for.
  • The law was broken.
  • Large amounts of taxpayer money were awarded to ineligible projects.
  • Questionable and inexplicable purchases appeared, including sports tickets and gift cards (a similar incident brought down disgraced Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon).
  • The agency turned a blind eye to recipients of public subsidies, even though the law required them to report publicly on their progress.
  • Staffers at the organization accepted some $55,000 in gifts during a six month period in 2011.
  • The agency failed to disclose to the public known conflicts of interest from an IT consultant awarded a no-bid contract.
  • The WEDC even went so far as to hire an auditor while that same company was negotiating a subsidy deal on behalf of a client with the agency.

These findings just scratch the surface of what was uncovered. To dig into more of the juicy details, read the Audit Bureau’s full report here (summarized here).

Members of Wisconsin legislature, from both sides of the aisle, are calling for immediate changes (a rarity in Wisconsin politics these days). Sen. Robert Cowles, R-Green Bay, has stated that, “this audit shows there is a significant disconnect between our expectations of WEDC and the reality of their performance with regard to transparency and accountability.” The Senate Minority Leader sounded like Cassandra foretelling the fall of Troy: “This is what we were saying from the beginning… there needs to be more accountability… more reporting… When you create a pseudo-government corporation, you want to make sure that you’re having the benefits of both, not the downsides of both.”

Despite the outrage by members of the legislature, the agency has embarked upon a public relations campaign to defend itself. The new CEO of the WEDC continues to claim that it has corrected its old ways and that the agency had not made “intentional violations” of state statutes. Whether the new CEO has a firm grasp on the agency is questionable: he has been on the job only a short time. All three of his predecessors have resigned amid scandal: one was found to owe back taxes to the state; another took a more lucrative job at his old company just 24 hours after accepting the WEDC position; and the first head of the agency resigned after federal investigators found mishandling of HUD money.

Governor Walker has called for an emergency meeting of the WEDC to discuss the problems at the agency. Later this week, the legislature is set to vote on the WEDC’s budget. Will Governor Walker insist that the agency take the audit seriously and implement sensible reforms like those we called for in our 2011 report? Will the Governor ignore the troubling findings altogether? Or will he disband the privatized agency and reinstate the Department of Commerce as the flagship economic development organization in Wisconsin?

Posted in Clawbacks, Hidden Taxpayer Costs, Jobs | Leave a Comment »

More Subsidy Disclosure Coming in Oregon

March 15, 2013

winThis week our friends at OSPIRG scored another major win for subsidy transparency and accountability. OSPIRG, which played a central role in getting the state to adopt tax credit disclosure in 2011, is now bringing transparency to another key subsidy, the Strategic Investment Program (SIP).  SIP exempts many of Oregon’s largest and richest companies (especially Intel) from property taxes, based on agreements that those companies will be creating jobs.

Business Oregon, the state’s economic development arm, recently denied an open records request by OSPIRG to provide details about the state’s SIP deals.  OSPIRG then appealed to the state Department of Justice, which decided in favor of transparency and ordered Business Oregon to release records of the deals by next week.  The economic development agency is expected to comply.

While Good Jobs First has successfully obtained some types of SIP subsidy details in the past, the public has never had access to information about what exactly companies are promising in return for the special tax breaks.  Citing the program’s $322 million biennial cost, Celeste Meiffren of OSPIRG stated that “disclosure of information about SIP and all other economic development tax expenditures is important because taxpayers need to be able to track their return on investment.”

Way to go, OSPIRG!

Posted in Disclosure, Job Quality Standards, Jobs, Subsidies | Leave a Comment »

Massachusetts Business Tax Breaks Evaluated in New Report

March 12, 2013

masspirg reportA new MASSPIRG study asks if Bay Staters are “Getting Our Money’s Worth?” from the Commonwealth’s corporate tax breaks.  The organization evaluates 25 different special business tax subsidies for fiscal safeguards and accountability and transparency practices.  Among other findings, MASSPIRG concludes that:

  • Less than one-third of the subsidies are subject to annual spending limits.
  • Few of the Commonwealth’s special business tax subsidies have well-articulated public policy goals.
  • Nearly half of all business tax subsidy programs fail to publicly disclose information important for transparency such as recipient names, program-wide cost to the state budget, or results generated by the program.

MASSPIRG  also finds that state spending on business tax subsidies has more than doubled since 1996; the Commonwealth spent an estimated $770 million in 2012 through programs such as the Economic Development Incentive Program and the Film Tax Credit.  MASSPIRG’s recommended policy options to help the state get the best results from its substantial spending on special business tax subsidies include:

  • Transitioning from business tax breaks to outright grants.
  • Adding mandatory public policy goals and expiration dates to new and existing subsidy programs.
  • Continuing to improve disclosure of subsidies awarded through these programs.

You can read the rest of the organization’s recommendations to help the state get the biggest bang for its buck in Getting Our Money’s Worth? here.

Posted in Clawbacks, Disclosure, Job Quality Standards, Jobs, Subsidies, Tax Expenditure Budgets | Leave a Comment »

Nike Runs Away with New Oregon Tax Giveaway

December 20, 2012

NikeTown, OR, USAOregon Gov. John Kitzhaber must have missed this month’s major New York Times investigative series on business subsidies.  Less than a week after the nation’s paper of record reported that such subsidies are a “zero sum game,” Gov. Kitzhaber called the Oregon legislature into a one-day special session to pass the Economic Impact Investment Act, a corporate tax giveaway custom-tailored for Beaverton-based sportswear retailer Nike, Inc.  The rushed deal and special session were announced last Monday, just four days before the legislature was to consider the bill, and a publicly available version of the proposed legislation was not made available until Tuesday.

HB 4200, which passed the legislature handily on Friday and was signed by Gov. Kitzhaber this week, allows Nike to determine its tax responsibility to the state through the controversial Single Sales Factor (SSF) apportionment method for the next 30 years, whether or not Oregon enacts tax reform during that period.  Nike had expressed interest in expanding in Oregon, but the company reportedly expressed to the Governor that it needed “tax certainty” to commit to growing in the state.  (Make sure to see the Oregon Center for Public Policy’s excellent take on what would constitute true “certainty” when it comes to taxes.)

In its original form, the legislation would have allowed the state to grant guaranteed SSF tax breaks through the Economic Impact Investment Act for a ten-year period, and those deals would have lasted for up to 40 years.  The few accountability amendments passed during the one-day session shortened the amount of time the governor has to strike these tax deals to one year, while also reducing the period during which the tax break lasts to 30 years.

While the bill requires that Nike and any other company vying for the special tax deal invest $150 million and create 500 new jobs, it is silent on wages and other job quality standards.  Significantly, the new law fails to set a meaningful term during which qualifying jobs must be retained by Nike or any other company approved for the sweetheart deal.  It appears that the last 20 years’ worth of basic accountability reforms – now standard practice for most states – are unknown to Oregon’s lawmakers.

The lack of accountability provisions are not the only controversial aspect of the new giveaway.  The Oregonian reported this week that despite the extraordinarily compressed period the legislature was given to consider the bill, the state has been secretly negotiating the deal, termed “Project Impact,” since last July.  You can read the state’s non-disclosure agreement with a company called EMK (presumably a site location consulting firm contracted by Nike to pressure the state) here.

Oregonians are not the only constituency to express concerns about the new law.  Intel, Oregon’s other major corporate employer, was reportedly involved in several heated exchanges with Nike over a particular provision of the original legislation that would have prohibited it from benefiting from the same deal based on the fact that it is already receiving considerable subsidies through Oregon’s Strategic Investment Program.  Unsurprisingly, that provision was removed from the bill.

Oregon, unfortunately, has no such guarantees that economic conditions and fiscal obligations will remain exactly the same in the decades to come.  There are no promises the state can make that protect its residents from change, and this new giveaway means that Oregon cannot rely equally on all businesses and individuals to contribute fairly in the future.

Posted in Corporate relocations, Job Blackmail, Job Quality Standards, Jobs, Single Sales Factor, Site Location Consultants, Taxes | Leave a Comment »

New Jersey’s Revel Casino May Fold

December 7, 2012

Revel CasinoNew Jersey’s embattled Revel Casino received more bad news this week.   State Senate President Stephen Sweeney has called on the Division of Gaming Enforcement to investigate the Casino’s “precarious financial position.”  Despite the fact that it has been operating at a loss in 2012, Revel management has claimed that its inability to make good on its construction debts and city property tax bill is a result of Hurricane Sandy.  Predictions that the casino will fold are growing louder.

The controversial project was awarded a $261 million tax subsidy by the state in 2011 to assist its investors in leveraging additional financing to complete its stalled construction.  While this recent news bodes poorly for investors and the state’s Economic Development Authority, it may be a relief for existing casinos in the region that are forced to compete with massively subsidized new development.

Posted in Jobs, Property Taxes, Subsidies, Tax Increment Financing | Leave a Comment »

Wisconsin Leaves Taxpayers in the Dark

October 18, 2012

A new report released by WISPIRG details the failure of the state of Wisconsin to properly disclose whether its lucrative corporate subsidies are providing the promised benefits. Among WISPIRG’s findings:

  • Just 2 out of 251 entries listed in the state’s subsidy database detailed the projected and actual outcomes for the 2009-2010 reporting period
  • $8.2 million of those subsidies had no reported benefits to Wisconsin taxpayers
  • The newly created public-private partnership, the Wisconsin Economic Development Corporation (WEDC), couldn’t account for how much the privatized state agency has recaptured from recipients failing to meet performance requirements. In their response to WISPIRG, the WEDC claimed that it lacked the staff resources to compile that information.

This isn’t the first time WISPIRG has weighed in on subsidy accountability. In 2007, the group successfully led an effort to improve the state’s subsidy reporting. The resulting Public Act 125 requires the state to disclose corporate subsidy data in a searchable database. Prior to the creation of WEDC, that information was published by the Department of Commerce. The WEDC has not posted Act 125 data on its new website. Instead, that site has a hard-to-find link to the now defunct Commerce agency’s website. The old database is obviously outdated compared to standard practices in other states such as Maryland.

WISPIRG recommends the state do a better job implementing reforms that would ensure taxpayers know which companies are getting a subsidy and whether the state did anything to verify job creation claims. “Taxpayers shouldn’t have to be auditors to find out if the economic development subsidies we fund are delivering bang for the buck,” said Alysha Burt, WISPIRG Program Associate and co-author of the report.  “Even state auditors couldn’t quantify the outcomes of these programs because the information isn’t there.  For all we know, millions of our tax dollars could be funding junkets to the Caribbean.” The WEDC could start by putting a better Act 125 database on its website and featuring it prominently on the main page.

All of this comes on the heels of a deeply disturbing letter sent to the WEDC by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development accusing the state of mishandling federal economic development funds. Shortly thereafter, the head of the WEDC resigned. And a June 2012 report by the state auditing agency, the Legislative Audit Bureau, found that state agencies were regularly failing to submit required compliance reports. Worse, the audit found that the newly created WEDC is required to disclose less information to the public than the old Department of Commerce did.

As our January 2011 report showed, the risks of privatizing a state economic development agency can lead to less transparency and accountability for taxpayers. In many respects, Wisconsin appears to be making the same blunders as other states that have gone down the path of privatization: resistance to accountability, questionable claims about the effectiveness of the privatized agency and misuse of taxpayer funds. Better data could ease those concerns.

And there are also conflict of interest issues. The new private-public agency has past recipients of lucrative subsidies deciding how the agency should operate. Companies represented on the board of directors include Logistics Health and FluGen. Logistics Health received at least $3.25 million in tax credits and loans, while FluGen collected at least $2.25 million. Logistics Health didn’t meet its projected job creation thresholds. According to the Act 125 database, FluGen didn’t even have job creation requirements.

We hope that WISPIRG’s report will serve as a wake-up call to taxpayers and legislators in Wisconsin and elsewhere. Without adequately disclosing subsidies, their purported benefits and outcomes, taxpayers will be left wondering why they have fewer services and/or higher taxes.

Posted in Clawbacks, Disclosure, Federal Job Subsidies, Jobs, Subsidies | Leave a Comment »

Shell “Cracks” Pennsylvania’s Tax Code

July 3, 2012

Pennsylvania Governor Tom Corbett’s controversial plan to award an estimated $1.7 billion in corporate tax credits to Royal Dutch Shell became law with the passage of the state’s budget late Saturday night.  The 25-year deal—one of the largest subsidy packages ever awarded to an individual company in the United States—is for an ethane refinery that Shell plans to build north of Pittsburgh in Beaver County. Known as a “cracker,” the facility will break down ethane into other petrochemical products.

The legislation did not name Shell but limited the new credit of 5 cents for each gallon of ethane purchased for processing to crackers that create at least 2,500 jobs and make a capital investment of $1 billion, which is what Shell plans to do.

It is no secret that the Corbett Administration cooked up the new credit in order to land the Shell project, which the company also shopped to Ohio and West Virginiain search of the best subsidy deal. The $1.7 billion price tag of Gov. Corbett’s package shocked Pennsylvania residents and made national news.  Astonishingly, the final signed law contains no annual or cumulative cap on the total value of credits that ethane refineries can claim, meaning the cost may be even larger than Gov. Corbett’s original proposal.

Because the Shell cracker will be located inside a virtually tax-free Keystone Opportunity Zone, the immediate value of its state tax credits will be derived from the cash value of selling them to other firms for an estimated 15 years.  The state changed an existing KOZ boundary to accommodate Shell’s project, despite the fact that the township never requested that the boundary be expanded.

The Corbett Administration, Shell and the American Chemistry Council trade association sought to justify the sweet deal with a contentious claim that the project would create a total of 20,000 new jobs, a figure composed of direct, indirect, induced, and temporary jobs such as construction positions.  The jobs figure was repeated by industry parties and notably, Administration officials, who were later forced to quietly revise the laughably rosy jobs estimate to half that amount, after admitting under pressure that no independent job creation analysis had been performed.  The Administration’s revised 10,000 new jobs figure remains no less preposterous, given that the ACC estimates just 400 to 600 permanent jobs will result from the new refinery.  (For more information about calculating “ripple effects” of job creation, see this report by the U.S. Economic Development Administration.)

Any legitimate economic analysis would have difficulty showing how the state could recoup a quarter of a century of huge giveaways to Shell.  Pollution concerns notwithstanding, the state needs to consider the potentially short life span of an industry based on depletion of limited resources such as natural gas.  Fortunately for Gov. Corbett, he will be out of office long before a final accounting of the deal can be made.

Posted in Climate Issues, Corporate relocations, Enterprise Zones, Jobs, Subsidies, Taxes | 2 Comments »

Colorado Governor Doesn’t Buy Sales Tax Giveaway

May 10, 2012

Westernaires and Color Guard in Downtown Denver opening the National Western Stock Show

Advocates of accountability and fiscal responsibility in Colorado recently achieved a major victory when Governor John Hickenlooper vetoed a controversial economic development bill.  SB 124 was designed to amend the state’s existing Regional Tourism Act, which allows Colorado’s Economic Development Commission to award portions of sales tax revenue as a subsidy to projects deemed important enough to attract out-of-state tourism dollars.  If signed by the Governor, it would have increased the number of allowable projects this year from two to six.

The bill was made all the more contentious by the fact that the Economic Development Commission is currently in possession of an application for the existing Regional Tourism subsidy from Gaylord Entertainment Co., which is constructing a massive hotel-convention center complex in Aurora, Colorado.  The complex, located close to Denver International Airport, has been criticized for its potential to leech convention center business from Denver.  Confirming these fears, the announcement by the Western Stock Show–a Denver institution for over a century–of its intent to relocate to Aurora gave the issue a public symbol in the media.  The Gaylord complex is already approved for a tax increment financing (TIF) subsidy by the city of Aurora and has applied for an additional $170 million in sales tax TIF subsidies through the state’s Regional Tourism Act.

Concerns over intra-regional competition for jobs and tax revenues was not lost on Gov. Hickenlooper, who in his veto letter stated: “the [Regional Tourism Act] does not contemplate…projects that are likely to serve only the interests of a particular community.”  The Governor’s decision also reflected his concern that politicizing subsidy-awarding process would reduce the program’s effectiveness and accountability.  “This [veto] will help ensure the state sales tax increment revenue is used appropriately, and that the EDC is awarding projects that will in fact drive tourism and economic development…we want to ensure that the RTA process remains competitive, resulting in the most ‘unique’ and ‘extraordinary’ projects being approved,” he wrote.

TIF subsidies derived from property tax are used liberally in Colorado by local governments, but the use of sales tax revenues as a subsidy has been restricted thus far.  Recent years have brought multiple ill-informed efforts to deregulate and loosen rules on the TIF-ing of sales tax.  Many of these proposed tax giveaways have been beaten back by a coalition of groups led by the Colorado Fiscal Policy Institute, which successfully defeated a number of wasteful business tax credit and subsidy bills this session.

Congratulations to our allies on their hard-earned victory!

Posted in Corporate relocations, Economic Recovery, Hidden Taxpayer Costs, Job Piracy, Jobs, Sales Tax, Sprawl, Subsidies, Tax Increment Financing | 3 Comments »

Diebold Pushes Ohio Down the “PIT”

April 24, 2012

The recent announcement that Diebold, Inc. would be laying off hundreds of employees from its Ohio headquarters despite having received massive job retention subsidies designed by the state specifically for its benefit came as little surprise.  (We’ve seen it before with Sears, Dell, Boeing, ad naseum.)  The same day, Good Jobs First released “Paying Taxes to the Boss” a report in which we describe the disquieting economic development practice of states allowing employees’ personal income taxes (PIT) to be leveraged as corporate job subsidies.

Among the 22 programs we analyzed in our report is Ohio’s Job Retention Tax Credit (JRTC), which underwent controversial changes last year under the Kasich administration.  At that time, both American Greetings and Diebold were considering relocating their corporate headquarters out of the state.  In response to this job blackmail, Ohio legislators tweaked the JRTC rules to make the credit refundable for companies with a written offer of subsidies from another state.

In the end, Diebold signed a $55 million subsidy agreement (including $30 million in JRTCs) with the state in exchange for a promise to retain 1,500 workers and construct a new headquarters facility.  The catch?  Diebold employed 1,900 people in Ohio at the time the subsidy agreement was finalized.  One year ago our prescient friends at Plunderbund correctly predicted what would come next – the state would be subsidizing Diebold while the company slashed its workforce.  Last Thursday the company announced its intent to move 200 jobs to India, bringing its total state employment down to approximately 1,550 workers.

Diebold’s reasoning for seeking job subsidies from other states is a perfect example of how PIT-based programs accelerate the race to the bottom.  The company claimed it was unable to compete after its chief rival, NCR Corp. relocated to Georgia with the assistance of the state’s Mega Project Tax Credit, yet another PIT subsidy spending program.  (For descriptions of Georgia’s many personal income tax diversion subsidies, see “Paying Taxes to the Boss.”)

The use of workers’ personal income taxes as corporate giveaways fuels already rampant interstate job piracy.  PIT diversions negate the benefits that economic development projects should have on diminishing state tax revenues.  At this rate, it’s not even helping retain jobs in Ohio.  The Diebold situation is proof of that.  Lawmakers should not need more evidence that this is failed economic development policy.

Unfortunately, its failure to generate real economic development hasn’t stopped more states from adopting this foolhardy practice.  Last year Oregon created the Business Retention and Expansion Program, a subsidy that will allow recipient businesses to receive the taxes of workers as forgiveable loans.

Posted in Clawbacks, Corporate relocations, Job Blackmail, Job Piracy, Jobs, Subsidies | 1 Comment »

NYC Unleashes Decades of Subsidy Data

February 1, 2012

After years of nudging by Good Jobs New York and others, subsidy transparency in the Big Apple took a giant leap forward yesterday.

Thanks to the New York City Council and a bill sponsored by Brooklyn’s Diana Reyna, the New York City Industrial Development Agency released data on 623 discretionary subsidy deals. The new report – which includes data as far back at the 1980’s – is trend-setting for being in excel (not just in PDF format) and for including all currently subsidized firms. Previous reports were only required to include project for a seven-year window. Previously, GJNY transcribed this data from PDF’s to create its “Database of Deals” and we will merge the two databases giving New Yorkers of all stripes: advocates, community organizers, elected and public officials, journalists and academics a unique tool that shines a light on how discretionary subsides are allocated.

As we explained in October of 2011 when the bill was passed, New York City is on an up- swing with regards to subsidy transparency. The report, formally known as the Annual Investment Projects Report, includes 126 fields of data including:

  • Current employment, promised employment and employment at time of deal
  • The amounts and types of city subsidies used to date and remaining
  •   Amount of subsidies recaptured
  • Percentage of employees that are city resident
  • Percentage of employees offered health benefits

Combining new subsidy deals, extensive company-specific data in a downloadable, excel format makes what we believe, to be the country’s best local subsidy disclosure report. Though, as reported last month, New York State still has plenty of room for improvement.

Good Jobs New York will be reviewing the data in the weeks ahead and will report back our findings. In the meantime, we encourage you to do the same!

Posted in Clawbacks, Disclosure, Jobs, New York, Property Taxes, Sales Tax, Subsidies | 1 Comment »

« Older Entries
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 37 other followers