August 19, 2003
Katz To Pitch City Fund For Business Recruitment And Retention
Today's Oregonian details a new proposal from the Mayor's office:
Portland Mayor Vera Katz said Monday that she wants to set up a fund to retain and recruit businesses, the first time in her 10-year tenure that the mayor has proposed using city operations money to raise Portland's corporate recruiting ante.
The money falls millions short of the amount requested by the city's business advisers and its economic development arm, the Portland Development Commission.
But Marty Harris, the commission's economic development director, said the fund's approval would signal a significant shift in a city that has been reluctant to subsidize business growth and recruitment outside its urban renewal areas.
Apparently, this plan was to be discussed in a work session this morning at City Hall, so perhaps there will be more in tomorrow's paper. Meanwhile, some other aspects of Katz's proposals:
Beyond setting up the fund, the mayor said she also wants to certify some of the city's scant and often contaminated industrial acreage as "shovel-ready" for development; focus on industry "clusters" such as creative services where Portland has a competitive advantage; and institute a buy-local program to boost government contracting with regional companies.
Reportedly, the program will operate from $380,000 a year from the City's general fund. The paper pegs Commissioner Leonard as expressing a preference for using "the money to hire more plans examiners and inspectors and pay them more." It also says that Commissioner Sten "wants to make sure that the city keeps its eye on maintaining its livability, a key asset in recruiting business." Those are quotes from the article, not from the Commissioners in question.
Comments (1)
Dave Lister on 20 Aug 2003
This plan is typical political thinking, and a last ditch effort by the sitting council members to make it look like they care about business retention. The catalyst, I'm sure, was the Tonkin situation.
In my opinion it is ludicrous to take money from the general fund, which is already hurting, and give it to the politicos to determine how to spend it to stimulate business. They know nothing about how to stimulate business. A better approach would be an overall decrease in the city/county business tax (which was just retroactively increased) to assist all businesses. The city should then strive for overall budget reductions through elimination of inefficiencies and use the savings to continue to lower the taxes on business. At the same time they need to continue to streamline permitting processes and clean up some of the zoning issues which are making it hard to do business. That seems to be Commissioner Leonard's opinion and I, once again, applaud him.