Burnt Orange Report

Keep in mind that offering incentives to corporations to relocate does have benefits. And Texas is not the only state that does so.

Even if the corporations end up avoiding taxes, their employees don't. So you have additional taxes coming in from those additional employees. That is the rationale behind such incentive programs. As well as the benefit. It increases the tax base. Simple economics.

And companies do not move where the best educated employees are. They move where the cost of doing business is lower which allows them higher profit margins. Again, simple economics.

Calling such incentives bribery is ludicrous at best. Slush funds. Bribery. Chris Bell loves to toss around all these criminal sounding words, doesn't he? Tossing innuendo along with them. Appparently he never bothered to read the letter the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct sent him.

Not sure exactly what this has to do with redistricting. But then I guess everything has something to do with redistricting to Chris Bell. If he were a fundamentalist, no doubt he would claim redistricting was a sign of the Apocalypse. I'm beginning to believe the main motivation in his run for governor is just simply "sour grapes."

275 jobs. $215 million. Is that good, Baby Snooks? I know you hate Bell to the point where you'd probably curse at him as he was saving your own life, but really -- all he's doing is raising issue with one of Perry's worst programs. Republicans in the House didn't even want to let an audit report of the Enterprise Fund ever come to light, b/c they didn't want anyone to see how little it had actually done so far. Aren't you the one that is always against school districts wasting money -- or at least not spending money where it is needed? I think I've read that in your posts -- well, the Enterprise Fund is like one, giant, HISD boondoggle.

Put aside your hatred of Bell for half a second and look at the issue.

If it were really such an issue I would imagine Carole Strayhorn would have been all over the map with it already. She's not exactly shy about attacking Rick Perry. I haven't heard her say a word about it. And she's the comptroller. Who better than the comptroller to raise holy hell about malfeasance and who raises holy hell better than she does? Particularly since she's opposing him and could get a lot of media coverage over it?

This is just another example of why the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct admonished Chris Bell a year ago.

She might also be in support of it...could be a reason she hasn't attacked him for it.

Bell can do things right, too. I'm not saying he's the best one -- it'll be interesting to here the conversation of issues between him and Gammage over the next three months. But this is a good issue to talk about, so give him a little credit, huh? Or at least back off...

The issue with redistricting was that the Perry spokesman said

"If he doesn't understand job creation and economics any better than this, it's no wonder that Chris Bell's own constituents kicked him out of Congress after only one term."

It was a poor attack if you ask me. The redrawn district only consisted of a fraction of his actual constituents. The rest of the district were people that he had never represented before. In all honesty, it was as if he and his opponents were running for an open seat.

Snooks, it was Perry's guy who raised the '04 congressional mess, not Bell. Dislike the guy if you want but at least read the article before you go after him for something he didnt even say.

Besides, I think your "simple economics" criticism rings a little hollow. Low-wage, low-skilled industries may move to wherever the taxes are lowest to protect their margins, but high-wage cutting-edge jobs certainly don't. Else how do you explain why the '90s tech boom was centered in Northern California, or why the biotech industry is centered along the I-270 corridor in subrban Maryland. Tough to find many places with a higher cost of living than those. Seems to me that a high quality of life and nearby education centers (Stanford, Johns Hopkins) played a much bigger role in those places than taxes or real estate costs. If those are the type of jobs we're trying to attract (and they should be) we should look at what's worked in those other places and invest in education.

Incentives may have benefits like you say, but Bell was citing the state's own official report when he said the 275 jobs figure. I don't think it's slimy innuendo to say that Perry's rhetoric doesn't match those objective facts.

Calling it a slush fund and using the word bribery is what I'm referring to. It's what the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct was referring to. His use of innuendo.

Is it possible for Chris Bell to offer a reasoned argument or engage in reasoned discourse without resorting to diatribe?

It doesn't seem it is. And that is probably why so many across the state have not supported his candidacy and why most won't.

Like it or not, the fact is that the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct took his complaint regarding ethics violations by Tom De Lay and then not only admonished Tom De Lay but admonished Chris Bell as well. For his lack of ethics as demonstrated by the accusations leveled in the complaint and the language used in the complaint. Specifically citing his use of innuendo solely to garner publicity for himself. His chief of staff even went so far as to question the ethics of the committee itself. Because it didn't do what Chris Bell wanted it to do. Remove Tom De Lay from his seat in Congress "just because." Just because Chris Bell wanted it to. Demanded it. Just because. Just because Chris Bell had lost his seat in Congress and decided to blame it on redistricting?

That is not someone I want in the governor's mansion. If I did, I would just vote for Rick Perry.

BS! It IS a freaking slush fund. It IS corporate welfare. Are you going to request an ethics review of every Democrat who attempted to allocate that money to reduce air pollution, increase healthcare funding or give teachers a pay raise????? I drafted several appropriations amendments hitting the TEF which were promptly tabled, but we made our damn point.
The lines of your reality are very blurred. The Texas House is not Congress. The TEF IS used for state sanctioned bribery no matter who says it! Any Democrat in the Texas House worth their merit will tell you EXACTLY that and it has nothing to do with anything Chris Bell does or says.
Jesus Christ get off the man's jock already. We all you hate him but this is insanity. You're obsessed.

How is offering incentives to corporations to relocate to Texas bribery? I'm missing something. Or you are.

I'm so tired of explaining things to her. Someone else care to indulge BS and tell her why giving companies cash and tax breaks, while they are accountable to no one, is wrong?

Anyone?

Waiting.

While someone is trying to come up with something, here's something I found rather interesting about the support Rick Perry has had with regard to the Texas Enterprise Fund.

http://www.governor.state.tx.us/divisions/press/pressreleases/PressRelease.2004-10-06.4143

""Perry added that Houston Mayor Bill White’s recent announcement that he will support the creation of a local enterprise fund in the Bayou City patterned after the TEF is high praise."

As I said, interesting. Not as interesting as this however.

""Support from the Texas Enterprise Fund was the essential ingredient in GE Health Care's decision to commit $30 million to the creation of a center for advanced diagnostic imaging in Houston. In this venture, we will be able to develop new ways to detect cancer, heart disease and other illnesses in their earliest stages, when we can best help patients. The center also will create nearly 600 new jobs in its first full year, and eventually bring a total of more than 2,200 new jobs to Houston over a decade. Thanks to the Texas Enterprise Fund, this new venture promises job growth, additional private investment, as well as substantial progress in improving health through research. It would never have happened without the Texas Enterprise Fund.""

John Mendelsohn, M.D.
President
The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center

The fund was not meant to create instant jobs anywhere. It was meant to provide incentive for the creation of jobs over a period of time. In MD Anderson's case, over a ten year period. Projections of job creation also depend on the economy in general. The Bushes are enjoying a wonderful economy. The rest of us aren't. Including quite a few institutions that no longer pay their light bill on time and get those cute little pink slips like the rest of us.

All of this is just someone running for governor trying to turn projections of an estimated number of jobs created into absolute committment of an exact number of jobs created as a means to launch another diatribe against the governor and the legislature and the world. Sour grapes.

The Texas Enterprise Fund is in its second year. Rather early to start saying it is a failure and is simply a slush fund used to bribe corporations with.

I'm still waiting for the explanation of how offering incentives for corporations to relocate to Texas constitutes bribery.

Maybe Chris Bell can call his good buddy Bill White and Bill White can come up with something since he praised the Texas Enterprise Fund a year ago. Maybe Bill White was misquoted by the governor and he didn't realize it?

DUH...a person associated with a team that gets the money praises it. Now that's evidence! BS - ALL CAPS.

So-called "job creation" programs are rolling taxpayer paid campaign press conference for Governors across the country. With the Bush/DeLay administration passing the tax buck to them, they seek ways to milk some "good" PR to save their political hides. When a Perry has a record of failure and his politics preempt his kicking an administration that owns him politically, a little TEF press can help almost as much as a hurricane in terms of media opportunites.

Several studies indicate these TEF-type programs have little or nothing to do with corporate/job location, but if the gov't. is asking to be blackmailed, big business will willingly pick our pockets - what a nice scam.

Many states are catching on and stopping this thievery. Seems we aren't that quick. Bell is just saying what many of our legislators and academicians have been saying for 3 or 4 years, so jumping him for this speech is simply aiding and abetting the crime.

My barber gets this. She's run a small business for over 20 years, and we talked about this recently. She knows politicians don't create jobs (bet Perry even said that before in front of an audience when the tables were truned), and she didn't need you, me, or Chris Bell to tell her she and other small business owners aren't get any of the pie served up by supply side.

And Jesus, look at Perry (Sharp) "Tax Commission" sham: Perry says "its gives the people of Texas a seat at the table" but he doesn't mention that only millionaires can afford the ante.

Keep writing those amendments, Marie.

Now I'm aiding and abetting a crime. Would be nice to know what the crime is. Chris Bell calls it bribery. You call it thievery. Are you saying Perry is bribing the corporations with stolen money? The legislature gave him the money. How many Democrats, by the way, voted for the Texas Enterprise Fund? Are they criminals also?

I think you hit the real nail on the head. Institutions like MD Anderson are benefiting from the program. But you're not. Sour grapes. Of the worst kind. When I read that MD Anderson has benefitted, that's all I need to read.

And how many jobs would a small business owner create? Two? Four? Ten at best? How many would this barber create? How much should the Texas Enterprise Fund give her and the other small business owners? The same as GE? GE will, per MD Anderson, create a projected 2,800 jobs in ten years? They create jobs. People like you just want "a piece of the pie" and probably wouldn't create a single job with it. Not everyone is guaranteed a piece of the pie. Sorry.

Accusing people of criminal acts when you can't define just exactly what the criminal act they've committed is doesn't do much for your credibility let alone your argument.

It just appeals to the baser instincts of a few.

FYI:

http://www.austinchronicle.com/issues/dispatch/2005-04-15/pols_lege.html

The Austin Chronicle ran a story about exactly where the TEF money could have gone. How bout you read up on the issue first, instead of just being a reactionary, and learn something. This is an issue that Gammage would be behind, too -- so just imagine Bell didn't introduce it, and learn about the damn issue for once.

Baby Snooks --

The Texas Enterprise Fund has created 275 new jobs, and spent $215 million doing so. Please explain why that's a good thing, why that's not wasteful government spending, why that money wouldn't be better spent on nursing homes or CHIP or textbook funding or any number of things that will actually help any number of people.

If you sunk $215 million into small businesses, you'd get a hell of a lot more than 275 jobs. Small businesses need starter boosts to get over the hump -- a majority of small businesses sink in the first 3 years. Against small businesses now, or are big businesses the only ones that deserve the help?

Hey -- it doesn't matter how important that money could be spent on CHIP or nursing homes or small business or anything else. Bell said that the TEF money isn't being used well, and Baby Snooks is against anything Bell said, remember? Baby Snooks -- the one that always bitches about how Democrats and Republicans need to look past their own political biases and do what's right for people -- won't ever agree with Bell. Stop trying to have a reasonable discussion -- won't happen so long as Bell's the subject matter, because BS can't distinguish the difference between having a letter sent to your office advising you to tone down the rhetoric, and a man who's being indicted for money laundering. One in the same!

"...because BS can't distinguish the difference between having a letter sent to your office advising you to tone down the rhetoric, and a man who's being indicted for money laundering."

The committee didn't advise that he "tone down the rhetoric." The committee considered it a "serious matter" and who is to say that the committee wouldn't have taken further action had Chris Bell retained his seat?

The committee didn't indict Tom De Lay. The Public Integrity Unit of the Travis County District Attorney's Office indicted him. And would have indicted him whether Chris Bell had filed a complaint or not.

I didn't say the fund was perfect. I didn't say the money has been used wisely. I didn't say Rick Perry isn't guilty of some "sleight of hand" with regard to his juggling figures and using projected figures of how many jobs will be created to imply that those jobs have been created. But I also didn't say it was criminal.

I see nothing criminal and in fact see where the incentives will eventually produce more jobs and expand the tax base. The Austin Chronicle in fact credits the fund with keeping Sematech in Austin. How many jobs were kept in Austin as a result?

I also don't see where the fund has been used to bribe anyone. Bribe who for what?

I don't think TEF is criminal but I do think the checks on it are inadequate. Further, I see $30 Mn committed by GE, but no mention of the outlay from th TEF to bring that investment to Texas, even if at some distant point in the future.

I also question why on earth a company making medical imaging equipment would want to team up with one of the leading cancer treatment centers in the world. Hummm? I bet if it hadn't been GE it would have been another company... Toshiba, for one, even if the TEF hadn't existed. Oh yeah, and the statement came from someone at MD Anderson, NOT GE. For all we know, GE gave little or no thought to the TEF in making the decision.

Businesses do not make decisions based ONLY on where taxes are cheapest and incentives are greatest. Toyota's recent decision to locate new production in Canada was based on several factors but at the top was health care costs and education of employees. Simply put, it's cheaper to train and employ a manufacturing employee who can read than it is one who can't.

We don't offer first rate public education (we can't afford it), we don't offer first rate transportation infrastructure (what is the backlog at TxDOT?), we don't have an adequete health care system that takes burdens off the employer so of course it's tough for a company to make the decision to come here. The only thing we can offer is what municipal and state coffers desperately need, tax revenues. We grant massive abatements and then just cut them checks from TEF. Sweet deal for someone bringing a minimum wage job! Bad deal for us.

The R talking points on this are shallow and simplistic.

I somehow doubt MD Anderson plans to hire minimum wage workers for the imaging center.

Baby Snooks, which economic development company do you work for? Sheesh. Bell is finally on to a campaign issue that will win him votes across party lines. Though I'd rather just keep my money that went to GE (just writing that makes smoke come out of my ears), I'd rather see it spent almost anywhere else. And I voted for Perry. People are sick of these hollow promises by bureaucrats who've never started a business or created a job in their lives.

So vote for Chris Bell. I have no intention of voting for him. And quite a few others have no intention of voting for him either.

Takes more than just a campaign issue at this point. Rick Perry had a lot of campaign issues that attract lots of voters. And look at what they got. And very few Republicans are going to vote for Chris Bell. If any.

And that of course brings up another problem which is how Chris Bell could govern a Republican legislature. He couldn't.

You have to have a governor who can deal with both sides of the aisle. Chris Bell may wear his ethics complaint proudly. But most Republicans look upon it as a scarlet letter.

And then you have the dinner tables. All around the state. I'm not the only one who would not have him in my home. Even if he were governor.

The only Democratic candidate I think even has a chance of winning the governor's mansion is Bob Gammage. Despite the attempt by Chris Bell to tar and feather him before he even announced, he has earned the respect of quite a few people in the Democratic Party and could govern a Republican legislature quite well.

And on that note I think it's important to note how important the legislative races are. I get incensed obviously by the ongoing focus on Chris Bell. And extremely incensed by his attack on Bob Gammage. But the focus really should be on the legislative races. Those are in some ways more important than the gubernatorial race. Without gaining some seats back and eventually a majority, it won't matter who is in the governor's mansion.

I think original Trey had some really insightful comments. Tax incentives and other kickbacks are certainly part of the factors in getting a large corporation to plant down in a state/city and I find no criminal intent in that of itself.

I think the bigger question is what sort of oversight or accountability measures the TEF has. BS did have a point about the fund being relatively young, but when you're dealing with something as abstract as "projected" job creations you need to have a clear and unambiguous way to measure success.

So does anyone have more info on what the oversight and measurement of success for the TEF is?

I think original Trey had some really insightful comments. Tax incentives and other kickbacks are certainly part of the factors in getting a large corporation to plant down in a state/city and I find no criminal intent in that of itself.

I think the bigger question is what sort of oversight or accountability measures the TEF has. BS did have a point about the fund being relatively young, but when you're dealing with something as abstract as "projected" job creations you need to have a clear and unambiguous way to measure success.

So does anyone have more info on what the oversight and measurement of success for the TEF is?