Archive Page - April 2009

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Text Box: Web Update regarding the Tax Abatement Ordinance Despite businessmen and taxpayers begging them not to close the doors of St. Joe County to new business development, the St. Joseph County Council voted 5-3 in favor of the tax abatement ordinance (with minor amendments – view the amended version here). All three Republicans, Councilmen Schafer, Root and DeVon voted against. The good news is the County Commissioners vetoed the ordinance! Republican Andy Kostielney and Democrat Bob Kovach both voted against it, citing the need to make St. Joe County attractive to new business development. True, there are people in favor of the ordinance. The Sierra Club, Northeast Neighborhood Association, NAACP, and others seemed genuinely excited about the prospect that any new businesses seeking abatements would be required to offer certain levels of pay, affirmative action and various environmental and community-friendly programs. What these folks do not seem to realize is that almost no new businesses have come here in years, and the new ordinance pretty much guarantees that none ever will. We have already heard back from site selectors (people who specialize in finding new sites for businesses) that this ordinance will take St. Joe County off their lists. We will never even be presented to the businesses. The biggest benefactors of this ordinance would be the local trade unions. Because all companies wanting an abatement for over 3 years to build anything bigger than $750,000 would have to pay the state's common wage for the construction, this pretty much means only union shops would get to bid. (Non-union shops typically do not use a union wage structure.) Estimates vary as to how many of our 7,200 local construction workers would be hurt. If you use the national average, only 15% of them are union and therefore the number of workers and their families who would be shut out of the bidding by this ordinance would be close to 6,000. If, as Councilman Kruk estimated, there are 3,000 in the unions, then the number of non-union workers to be shut out by this ordinance would be 4,200. But we would all be hurt by this ordinance The “common wage” component alone runs up the cost of projects by thousands of dollars. Businesses have already been avoiding us, presumably due to our high taxes and local government interference. Since this ordinance increases both (our taxes would go up to replace shrinking business revenue, and the new requirements would be even more invasive and costly), it would be devastating to our local economy. That would be poor timing for a county preparing a push for nanotechnology development. How do we sell this vision by putting up signs that say: “You're welcome here but only if you do things our way and are willing to pay more for the privilege”?

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Text Box: Local Tea Parties! Yes! You have been asking, so here they are: not one, but TWO local tea parties! First, on Wednesday, April 15 (Tax Day) in coordination with Tea Parties all over the nation, a couple of guys from South Bend are sponsoring a T.E.A. (Taxed Enough Already) Party on the Courthouse steps (corner of Washington & Main) in downtown South Bend. Event is from 11am to 3pm. Participants are asked to wear green (the color of money). Signs will be provided – or you can come to a sign-making session Tuesday March 31 from 5-7pm at Republican Headquarters. Main theme is pork-barrel spending and high taxes. Speaking on federal, state and local spending will be Dan Herbster, Kevin Mitschelen and Kelly Havens. See attached flier for more info. Then, on Saturday, April 18, a couple of Mishawaka businessmen have organized a beautiful tea party on the river at Beutter Park in Mishawaka. And get this – they have permission to throw loose tea in the river! The event starts at 10:30 am. Bring signs against taxes, excessive spending and government corruption. Also bring loose tea!