SideBlogs (to your left) are often frequently updated, even when there are no new regular posts.

More actual BlogWood posts coming soon. Stay tuned.

Posted as Misc

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

States and municipal governments have long been in the habit of providing tax breaks and other incentives to employers who promise to bring jobs to their region. Often, the per-job cost to the state more than offsets any economic gain, and lost tax revenues lead to infrastructure problems down the road.

Corporate welfare encourages states to compete with each other to reach the bottom of the barrel. If Georgia offers a company $100 million to locate there, then Florida is likely to offer even more, thus starving schools and roads and police and fire departments of much needed revenue. And the resulting jobs are often low paying and not guaranteed – the companies and and do pack up and abandon their new communities on a whim.

Ironically, corporations rarely see incentives as deal breakers. Rather, they are often simply icing on the cake that companies routinely demand and receive even after deciding to move to an area regardless of any incentives.

Look to Tampa’s recent Whore Off victory for an example of how this all works. The city has promised the NFL over $11 million for one stinking football game, yet we can’t seem to find any cash to feed our homeless or school our kids.

Anyway, the Supreme Court has decided to look at a case form Ohio in which a sweetheart corporate tax deal was ruled unconstitutional, and “corporate relocation specialists” are going batshit trying to justify the legalized bribery that has become the norm.

Unfortunately, the usually perceptive St. Pete Times buys into the corporate welfare argument with hardly a murmer of dissent, offering only a token paragraph or two way down toward the end of their article to counteract the empty arguments of the pro-welfare crowd.

A case to be argued before the U.S. Supreme Court could bar state and local governments from using certain incentives to lure business jobs, Florida’s solicitor general warned Wednesday.

Chris Kise, author of a friend-of-the-court brief signed last month by Florida Attorney General Charlie Crist and 29 other state attorneys general, said a federal appeals court was wrong to rule unconstitutional an Ohio tax incentive that persuaded DaimlerChrysler Inc. to build a Jeep factory in Toledo. The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held last year that the incentive hindered free trade among the states by rewarding only companies that created jobs in Ohio.

If that decision were upheld, Kise said, Florida and other states would no longer be allowed to use tax-based incentives to lure or retain employers. Such a ruling would not only contradict prior Supreme Court decisions but hasten the stream of U.S. companies moving overseas.

Not really. Globalization is the root cause of the overseas job loss. Does anyone truly want to compete with third world call centers to offer the lowest wages and most corporate friendly tax base?

At the core of this scandal are corrupted definitions of “competition” that obscure cause and effect. We must create no-tax zones for factories, say the governors, to be competitive with other states - even though the whole country is bleeding manufacturing jobs and the obvious issue is globalization. We have to create a new TIF district (that’s “tax increment financing”) and steal shoppers from neighboring suburbs, say the mayors, to compete for tax base - even though malls in older areas are dying.

Those who peddle and those who buy into these corrupted definitions salute the corporate bottom line while thumbing their noses at common sense, social science, and good government. These corruptions are the deliberate creations of a 50-year campaign by corporations to divide and conquer the states - as well as the suburbs. This corporate gospel of competition preaches that governments at all levels must not be allowed to cooperate with each other. Public relations campaigns, consulting studies, lobbying of federal and state legislators, litigation all the way to the Supreme Court - companies will do whatever it takes, but governments must not be allowed to work together against the corporate assault. They must be kept in the dark and allowed into the room only when it’s time to talk about subsidies. Localities must compete for tax base by pirating jobs and retail sales from each other, even though this means chewing up farmland for wasteful sprawl and throwing away older areas, poor people, and past infrastructure investments.

At every level, this system demeans and degrades public officials: the economic development official forced to bid for an unknown company against unknown competing sites; the school board members who have no say in the property tax abatements that will corrode their budget; the revenue director whose sober advice is upstaged by the frothy projections of an economist rented by the Chamber of Commerce; the governor who overspends on a “trophy” project because she so fears being known as “the governor who lost us Mercedes-Benz.” Those who would dare to ask an impertinent question are quickly singled out for ridicule and isolation: they must be against jobs.

These blindfolded public officials practice job creation guided by wolves posing as Seeing Eye dogs. Companies, on the other hand, often know just where they want to go (or stay), but create a bogus competitor in order to “whipsaw” locations against each other and get more subsidies from the place they intended to go to all along.

A retired North Carolina construction executive who had used this scam admitted during a lawsuit deposition:

“I hate to give the example, but we decided very early in the game we were going to locate somewhere in the Winston-Salem/Greensboro area and narrowed it down to Kernersville rather rapidly; but spent a lot of time in Siler City and Asheboro and other communities hearing their story, primarily to use as a leverage to get all we could out of Winston-Salem. Now I give you that as a local example. But a more recent one - in Dickson, Tennessee, we had about ten west Tennessee municipalities chasing us with all kinds of offers; although we knew through the whole process it was going to be Dickson. And it was unfair and probably, as bad as it sounds, we used the others to get what we could out of where we were going in the first place. . . . you know, I’ve been around it a long time; but to me it’s the process. Usually, you know early where you are going, and you use your leverage.”

Get the whole story here.

Posted as Florida, National, Workers

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

In Hillsborough County, developers are whining over the use of logic and common sense to steer new growth. With the lowest school impact fee in the state ($196) and pro-developer commissioners running the show at the BOCC, these guys are used to getting whatever they want and getting it cheap, and the idea that some sort of infrastructure needs to either be in place or at least planned and payed for is really irking them.

Recently, staff at the county management office have begun recommending against zoning changes that would allow unfettered growth in areas that do not have adequate classroom space to handle an influx of new students. This is a huge change for builders that are used to having their sprawling projects rubber-stamped by the likes of Mark Sharpe and Brian Blair, 2 commissioners who relied heavily on funding from developers to get themselves elected.

Threats of lawsuits are being bandied about, and because it wouldn’t be Tampa or Hillsborough County without some serious conflicts of interest, School Board member Carolyn Bricklemyer’s husband is a partner in a law firm that is in the thick of the battle, on the side of the developers. One project, in Apollo Beach, represented by Bricklemyer, Smolker & Bolves, has already had its denial overturned.

The school board claims that it has a funding shortage and is being squeezed by the class size amendment. Both of these statements are probably true, however a simple change in the impact fees charged to developers would provide money for new construction and allow Hillsborough to reach the class size goals mandated by law. (Other simple fixes, such as using Community Investment Tax money for school construction instead of building a boondoggle of a sports palace are apparently not under consideration.)

But developers don’t want to have to pay for the very infrastructure that they are creating the need for, and county commissioners don’t want to piss off their sugar daddies by actually charging them a fair amount to do business in the county, so look for a ”compromise” in this case which lets the builders off scot-free while forcing kids into double sessions and long county-funded school bus commutes.

This is not a new problem, but don’t expect a real fix anytime soon.

Overcrowding in Hillsborough schools is so dire that county growth management officials recently recommended denial of four new subdivisions, the first time they have done so because of a classroom shortage.

Yet this week, when a school district planner learned of that recommendation, based on his findings that there weren’t enough area classrooms, he told county staff it was “premature” to delay projects because of overcrowding.

Why is the same district that says school overcrowding is at crisis levels questioning the county’s first-ever attempt to ease congestion through zoning?

The school planner, John Bowers, said there are no regulations or policies the district could use to tell rejected developers what they can do to improve the situation in neighborhoods with crowded schools.

“It’s not a system we have in place at this time,” he said.

School officials have known about the growing classroom deficit for at least three years. During this period, more than 35,000 housing permits have been approved in Hillsborough County.

Posted as Florida, Tampa

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

Palm Beach just passed a buffer law to give women some relief from the American Taliban - domestic terrorists who use violence and intimidation to further their quest for total control over women’s personal medical decisions.

City commissioners on Monday approved a law that will prohibit anti-abortion protesters from coming any closer than 20 feet to the driveways of the last remaining Palm Beach County clinic that provides abortions, nearly three months after someone set fire to it.

Planned Parenthood Vice President of Public Policy Helen Reid (center) celebrates outside city hall after West Palm Beach approved the buffer zone Monday.

A related measure passed Monday prohibits “amplified sound” and “unnecessary noise” within 100 feet of the Presidential Women’s Center and other medical facilities in the city.

The law takes effect on Oct. 6, meaning that what some call “sidewalk counseling” and others call “terrorism” can take place outside the center for one more Saturday, the busiest day, without the buffer zone.

Posted as Civil Liberties, Culture war, Florida

Other posts by Norwood.

1 Comment »

Storms Apologizes To Castor For Remark

Hillsborough County Commissioner Ronda Storms has apologized to Commissioner Kathy Castor for a verbal attack this week.

“I’m not going to use the excuse of being tired and these long hours,” Storms said late Thursday at the end of the commission’s budget hearing. “It was inexcusable, and I wanted to publicly apologize to her.”

Castor accepted the apology.

“Thank you very much, Commissioner,” Castor said.

Storms, a Republican, and Castor, a Democrat, have clashed before, but Storms’ statements at Wednesday’s regular commission meeting caught many observers off guard.

Commissioners were discussing how to spend $350 million in sales tax revenue. Castor suggested allocating $25 million to bolster neighborhood projects throughout the county.

“I just want you to understand I think this is nothing more than raw politics and looking for a byline on your campaign literature,” Storms said.

Castor is running for Congress.

“Either you’re the most incompetent politician in the history of the universe that you didn’t lay it on the table sooner. … I don’t spring it on people at the last minute.”

Castor defended the relevance of her suggestion.

Last month Castor criticized Storms’ late submission of an agenda item on the county bus service without advance details.

“It seems like government by ‘let me spring it on you,’ ” Castor said at the time.

Storms also offered a suggestion Wednesday that wasn’t on the meeting agenda and previously had not been discussed. She proposed dipping into an extra three years of sales tax money to pay for stormwater drainage and transportation work.

Posted as Florida, Politics, Tampa

Other posts by Norwood.

1 Comment »

His own GOP dominated legislature wouldn’t give him the cash for a “Pregnancy Support Services Program,” so he snuck in a line item in his office budget for “crisis counseling.” As previously noted, the GOP, and especially Jeb!, just don’t like democracy.

Gov. Jeb Bush is pushing forward with a $2 million state-sponsored, anti-abortion contract that will include a toll-free hot line directing pregnant women exclusively to local service providers who do not provide abortions.

Bids on the contract must be submitted by 2 p.m. Monday, and are limited to agencies that “adhere to a strict policy of not promoting, referring, or counseling for abortion,” according to Bush’s request for proposals.

Bush had asked lawmakers for $4 million in the state’s health and human services budget to fund the “Pregnancy Support Services Program.”

Instead, he wound up with half that amount in his own office budget in a line item called “crisis counseling.”

Abortion-rights advocates and opponents, as well as some lawmakers, were unaware the funds were included in the budget when asked about it.

The contract makes Florida one of just a handful of states to use taxpayer dollars to support anti-abortion agencies.

Bush’s plan is based on a similar program in Pennsylvania, paid for by the state’s Department of Public Welfare and administered by Real Alternatives, a nonprofit organization based in Harrisburg.
……

The Florida plan awards a single contractor $2 million to set up the hot line, coordinate with local organizations to provide “information, education, counseling and support services solely to encourage and promote childbirth,” and launch a statewide ad campaign publicizing the 800 number.

Abortion-rights proponent Stephanie Grutman of Planned Parenthood said that the $2 million could pay for 55,000 cycles of birth control for low-income women.

“Think about how many unintended pregnancies we could prevent,” she said.

Grutman said Planned Parenthood is considering challenging the contract in court.

Posted as Civil Liberties, Culture war, Florida, Politics, War on the poor

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

Republicans know that they can’t win in an actual democracy. That’s why they often cry fraud in an attempt to disenfranchise black voters.

Georgia’s crackdown on voter fraud would be more credible if it actually pursued fraud. But the new requirement for photo IDs at the polls does nothing to address absentee ballots, where there is considerable evidence of abuse. Instead it burdens the poor and elderly and mostly black voters who have no drivers’ licenses, which is why it is impossible to ignore the poisonous politics at play.

The bill was rushed through the Republican-controlled General Assembly this spring over the strenuous objections of African-American lawmakers, some of whom walked out in protest. It was signed into law by a Republican governor, Sonny Perdue, who called it merely a “common sense step to ensure voter integrity and sound elections.”

The funny thing is, Georgia Secretary of State Cathy Cox, a Democrat, reports no cases of documented identity fraud at the polls.

The law will have an undeniably disparate impact on voters. Among Georgians, blacks are nearly five times less likely than whites to have a driver’s license. The only photo ID card deemed acceptable would be issued by the state, at a cost of $20, at only 58 different locations across a state with 159 counties (Perdue says the fee will be waived for those who sign an affidavit claiming poverty). If the state’s intentions were pure, there would be many more sites to obtain a photo ID card - and the card would be free.

Posted as Civil Liberties, National, Politics

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

Still a little hung over form the high of being named Tampa Bay’s Best Left Winger, BlogWood feels slightly abashed at having overlooked the other Tampa area sites that are getting lots of attention right now.

Sticks of Fire is the Weekly Planet’s pick as the area’s Best Web Site and is also prominently mentioned in a TBT piece on local bloggers along with fellow Planet honoree Midnight Culmination (Reader’s pick for Best Blog). The Planet’s staff pick for Best Blog is Tampa Rail.

The TBT piece also profiles several other local sites: St. Petersblog, DRays Bay, Tampa Film Fan, Seminole Heights, and sarahintampa.

Bloggers around here are understandably all atwitter, and congratulations go out to all.

Posted as Florida, Tampa

Other posts by Norwood.

2 Comments »

New BlogWood posts later today, I hope. In the meantime, there’s lots of good stuff in the SideBlogs over to your left. Don’t miss Phil Donahue’s slap down of Bill O’Reilly from Crooks and Liars.

Posted as Misc

Other posts by Norwood.

No Comments »

It’s official: I’m a winger (or BlogWood is a winger, which may mean that BlogWood has achieved the blog equivalent of corporate personhood, at least in the eye of the Weekly Planet), and BlogWood even shares a page with Ronda Storms. (My loyal reader will recall that while Ronda and I usually disagree, we have been known to land on the same page once or twice.)

Anyway, BlogWood thanks the Weekly Planet for naming Norwood Orrick’s BlogWood the Staff Pick as the Bay Area’s Best Left Winger in their hot-off-the-presses Best of The Bay 2005 special collector’s edition, and BlogWood is really really looking forward to the black tie awards ceremony and, of course, the generous cash prize.

Posted as Politics, Tampa

Other posts by Norwood.

9 Comments »