The Watertown Daily Times reports - “A new state tax cuts into grant and payments-in-lieu-of-taxes money that industrial development agencies pass on to local municipalities and businesses.

The state Department of Taxation and Finance has levied a 4.72 percent assessment on gross revenues from every industrial development agency in the state. The assessment, approved as part of the 2009-10 budget, brings $5 million into state coffers.

IDA officials complain they did not receive adequate notification of the fee and that it unfairly taxes items that aren’t really earnings for the agencies.

Gross revenue includes collections of payment-in-lieu-of-taxes and grant revenue, but IDAs don’t actually keep any of that money. They pass the money directly on to local municipalities and businesses or programs that they serve as the applicant for.”

To read more click here.

Brian McMahon, the executive director of the New York State Economic Development Council writes in an op-ed in today’s Buffalo News.

One and a half million New Yorkers have left our state since 2000, more than any other state. They left mainly because of the lack of job opportunities caused by high taxes and high electric, workers’ compensation and Medicaid costs.

In order to overcome these cost disadvantages and compete for economic development projects, municipalities in New York use their industrial development agencies to lower this tax burden in an effort to level the playing field and encourage businesses to invest and create jobs. Too often, though, New York is eliminated from consideration as an investment location because of the very high cost of doing business here.

Now, legislation sponsored by Assemblyman Sam Hoyt and Sen. Antoine Thompson, both Buffalo Democrats, and another measure proposed by Gov. David A. Paterson, would make things even worse. These proposals would impose job-killing wage mandates on the construction of most industrial development agency-financed projects, as well as the permanent jobs they create.”

To read the rest of the story click here.

Two New York City daily newspaper editorial boards oppose wage mandates for projects built with Industrial Development Agency (IDA) assistance.

Both The New York Post and The New York Daily News editorials agree with The Business Council of New York State that these mandates would kill jobs.

The Post writes:  “Gov. Paterson’s poll ratings may be poor, but that’s no reason for him to try to buy union support with a bill that would destroy jobs.

Alas, that seems to be his thinking in promoting legislation to force developers and landlords at state-assisted projects to pay workers, essentially, union scale.

Salaries at such projects would have to be in line with “prevailing wages” — i.e., union wages. In New York City, that would be a hefty $19.20 an hour — nearly three times the $7.25 minimum wage.

And, again, the bill would cover not just construction workers on a project but also a landlord’s workers far into the future — including “guards, doormen, building cleaners, porters, handymen, janitors, groundskeepers, elevator operators and collectors of garbage.”

Leave no worker behind, it seems, in terms of pay — even if it means leaving far too many of them behind when it comes to jobs.

That’s right: In one fell swoop, the bill would make many projects uneconomical — even with the state assistance (which usually covers just a small portion of the costs, anyway).”

Read the editorial.

The Daily News writes: “There may be no place on the planet that generates more noble-sounding but awful ideas than Albany. In the latest, Gov. Paterson and the Legislature would attempt to repeal the laws of economics.

At the behest of politically powerful SEIU 32BJ, the union for building service workers, the officials are considering imposing wage mandates on projects that get economic development incentives to create jobs.

To qualify for benefits such as low-interest loans and tax breaks, construction firms would be obliged to pay based on local union contracts - which generally call for higher wages than nonunion workers make.

Similarly, building management companies would have to provide doormen, custodians and other workers with prevailing wages based on the 32BJ contract. Finally, all employers that occupy the building would have to pay at least $19.20 an hour in New York City - almost three times the normal minimum wage.”

Read the editorial.

“Why — in the middle of the worst crisis since the Great Depression — would the governor want to kill an economic development program that has created over 200,000 new jobs?” said Kenneth Adams, the president of the Business Council of New York State in a New York Times article. “It’s a proposal that destroys hope for economic recovery in New York.”

Read the article.

Legislature makes needed changes, but leaves one step untaken

The following is part of an op-ed that appears in today’s Buffalo News.

“Another day, another piece of good legislation meant to distract voters. This time, legislators in Albany passed a measure to reform the way state authorities operate. Too bad they don’t do anything about how they operate.

In particular, it’s too bad they won’t cut spending to fill a deep, and growing, budget deficit. More broadly, it’s too bad they won’t change the rules of their chambers to empower minority party members and wrest iron control from the hands of each chamber’s leader. It’s too bad they won’t operate like a democracy.”

To read the rest of the op-ed click here.

David Robinson writes in the Buffalo News - “Imagine this scenario: Chris Koch and other top executives at New Era Cap Co. are sitting down, trying to figure out which of its U. S. factories to keep open, either one in Derby or a sister plant in Alabama.

They paw through stacks of paperwork, comparing incentives, labor costs, taxes and utility rates. They weigh the pros and cons of each facility. They discuss all the intangibles they can think of.

“Wait,” someone says. “A big piece of the puzzle if we stay in Derby are the tax breaks we’d be getting, tax breaks through an industrial development agency. We can’t afford all the strings that are now attached to them. Alabama’s looking better and better.”

That conversation didn’t happen— but it could happen a lot if Gov. David A. Paterson succeeds in pushing through his frightening proposal for IDA reform that would require most companies receiving tax breaks through those agencies to pay workers—and even some vendors— higher wages.”

Read the rest of the posting click here.

New York is losing Starwood Hotel’s global headquarters and its 800 jobs because its economic development incentives cannot compete with Connecticuts.

LoHud.com’s Ben Rubin reports that the company will move just 13 miles from Westchester to Stamford, CT.

He writes: “It wasn’t even close.  The efforts of state and county agencies in the past two years to keep Starwood Hotels’ global headquarters on this side of the border could not match Connecticut’s offer.

 “We have tried for two years to make this happen and fill the gap,” said Salvatore J. Carrera, Westchester County’s director of real estate and economic development. “And the gap was $40 million.”

 Wednesday’s announcement that Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide Inc. would move from White Plains to Stamford, Conn., reinforced the view of many real estate and development experts that New York stood little chance in an incentives fight with Connecticut.

 “New York state and Westchester don’t have the programs and incentives to compete with the state of Connecticut, plain and simple,” said William V. Cuddy Jr., an executive vice president at CB Richard Ellis Inc. “No one should be shocked if this is the first of subsequent relocations.”

Read the story.

Joseph Spector reports in today’s LoHud.com - “State lawmakers yesterday called on Gov. David Paterson to sign legislation that would overhaul the state’s scandal-scarred public authorities after they released documents that show Paterson’s counsel is critical of the bill.

Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, D-Greenburgh, and state Sen. Bill Perkins, D-Harlem, have pressed Paterson in recent days to support the legislation, which they say is a key step in reforming public authorities.

But Paterson, while saying this week he supports 90 percent of what is proposed, said he may seek changes to the bill.”

Read the rest of the story click here.

As the battle over IDA reform continues the Buffalo News supplies two intresting and differing opinions.

Renee A. Filip: How the Erie County Legislature failed taxpayers

Angelo Vellake: Prevailing wage, apprenticeship programs beneficial

Liz Bengamin of The Daily News writes today - “Today’s Siena poll finds a whopping 77 percent of New Yorkers are furious that the Senate - as the question was posed - “wasted more than a month of valuable time accomplishing nothing.”

(Well, when you put it that way, who wouldn’t be angry?)

Sixty-two percent of those polled said they believe most voters will remember the stalemate when all 62 senators come up for re-election next year, and 40 percent say they would vote for a major party challenger to their local lawmaker (assuming there was one) if the election were held today.

“Voters from every party and every region overwhelmingly reject the notion that it was good that Senators took the time to resolve their differences,” said Siena NY poll spokesman Steve Greenberg.

“Rather, there is real anger at senators - regardless of the voters’ party affiliation or region. Although voters have long demonstrated particularly short memories, most feel that their fellow voters will remember the Senate fight next November and a plurality are already prepared to vote out incumbent senators.”

To read the rest of Liz’s comments click here.

To read the poll data from Siena College click here.

Proposals would add to projects’ costs

Matthew Spina of the Buffalo News writes - “State legislation that would let industrial development agencies again offer tax-exempt financing to not-for-profit organizations has stalled in Albany by proposed reforms — one in particular:

Forcing those beneficiaries to pay the prevailing wage to the construction workers on their projects.

Lawyers for the Erie County IDA and County Executive Chris Collins recently proposed a way around the roadblock. They drafted a measure to let a special unit of Erie County’s IDA, rather than the IDA itself, arrange the cheaper, tax-exempt financing that hospitals, schools and colleges prefer for expansions.

Other counties are taking similar paths. All Collins and the county IDA needed was the County Legislature to go along. Then the tax-exempt financing arranged through the IDA’s “Industrial Land Development Corp.” would pass muster with the Internal Revenue Service.”

To read the rest of the story click here.