Doing business carries an element of risk. It’s a key part of the formula that produces success and, therefore, wealth. Smart planning, good research, wise choices and hard work minimize that risk, but it’s impossible to eliminate.
The same is true for a community’s economic development programs and strategies. In order to enhance an economic climate in which businesses can flourish and good jobs are created, a community takes risks by investing in itself and providing incentives to encourage entrepreneurs, lure business prospects and keep existing businesses in place.
Among the common tools used by communities to fuel an economic development engine are tax abatements — government-induced property tax breaks for facility construction or new equipment purchases and installation. Tax abatements generally last for 10 years and gradually decrease through the period until the owner is paying a full property tax bill.
Tax abatements have always been somewhat controversial because they are inherently unfair to other businesses in a community that continue to pay full price on property tax bills. The tradeoff is when one business flourishes, others also will flourish. Success breeds success. So government leaders are willing to give one entity a break in order to help it succeed and, ultimately, benefit the entire community.
Economic development is a competitive arena. As long as one community is willing to take risks and provide incentives, others will follow suit in order to keep up, even if they find some to be distasteful.
Being known as a business-friendly community is important to economic development. With that in mind, we encourage Terre Haute’s and Vigo County’s elected officials to tread lightly in their current efforts to review tax abatements and evaluate whether those receiving them are living up to the job-creation promises made when obtaining them.
In the interest of full disclosure, the Tribune-Star has participated in the tax-abatement process. In the mid-’90s, the company was approved for an abatement on its downtown office building but did not use it. A few years later, however, the Tribune-Star did obtain and exercise an abatement on its new production facility on Margaret Avenue.
From a business development standpoint, the community has benefited from the new production facility. Advanced technology could have permitted the newspaper to build its plant in another county — or even another state. The tax break provided important incentives for the company to keep the facility in Vigo County.
The Tribune-Star fulfilled its jobs-related promises in the abatement. Unfortunately, not all affected businesses have been able to do so, especially with today’s economic turmoil.
We find no fault in city and county leaders seeking accountability from those who have been awarded lucrative tax breaks. In fact, as they have pointed out, the review process is part of state law. Even if it were not, it’s smart to scrutinize all functions of government.
In this instance, there is much at stake. If not handled fairly and in keeping with a community’s overall economic development vision and philosophy, the all-important business climate could be poisoned in such a way that it deters future progress.
So far, city and county leaders have struck an appropriate chord. The city already met once to begin reviewing its abatements. The county will begin conducting compliance hearings on Tuesday.
Despite risks associated with abatements, they are useful tools in the campaign for economic growth. They should be handled as such, and there should be no doubt for business prospects that they are entering a community that values economic progress and the benefits it brings.
Editorials
Tribune-Star Editorial: Officials must be careful enforcing abatements
- Editorials
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EDITORIAL: Drug-testing bill lacks fairness and decency
The current session of the Indiana Legislature has produced plenty of initiatives that play well to the majority party’s base.
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EDITORIAL: Keep religion out of science class
An uncertain fate remains for an Indiana Senate bill that would, if it were to become law, allow public schools to teach creationism and other origin-of-life theories in their classes. But this fight may have already been grounded.
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EDITORIAL: Delivering on infrastructure
With national, state and local economies showing distinct signs of recovery from the Great Recession of 2008, it is good to hear Mayor Duke Bennett sounding optimistic about Terre Haute and its immediate future.
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EDITORIAL: Volunteer ‘army’ serving the needs of children
You know, of course, that casa means house. But do you also know that its all-capitals cousin, CASA, means home?
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EDITORIAL: Big dreams do come true
Consider this Super Bowl Sunday to be proof that anything is possible.
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EDITORIAL: Big ‘kick’ from a native son
Every player in Sunday’s Super Bowl is from somewhere. But not every player remembers where he’s from and reaches out to consistently help those back home. Not like Steve Weatherford. Make that not like Terre Haute’s Steve Weatherford.
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EDITORIAL: Smoking ban good enough
When it comes to getting things done in the Indiana General Assembly, progress is often measured in baby steps. Indeed, it can take years to achieve even meager accomplishments.
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EDITORIAL: United Way’s strong reputation helps sustain community trust
It would be foolish in any community to take “positives” for granted, but it’s easy to understand how a casual observer would assume that United Way of the Wabash Valley will always come through with flying colors.
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EDITORIAL: Nothing sexy about human trafficking
When kickoff comes at the 2012 Super Bowl, expectations will be high for a fun, competitive, fanatical contest between the two survivors of the NFL’s regular season.
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EDITORIAL: The law’s good ‘Shepard’
Under the radar and against the backdrop of the fractious right-to-work battle going on in Indianapolis, one of state’s leading public servants delivered his valedictory in typical understated, even quiet, style two weeks ago. And before Indiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Randall T. Shepard slips away into retirement, his work needs to be acknowledged and praised.
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EDITORIAL: Cops at risk
Indiana lawmakers are playing with a loaded gun in a bill that passed the Indiana Senate Monday, 45-5.
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TRIBUNE-STAR EDITORIAL: Helping your community, a few mouse clicks at a time
When you type WabashValleyGives.org into your web browser, hundreds of opportunities to help your local community will open on the screen before you.
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EDITORIAL: Raves around the town
To begin the week, we are raving about these recent pieces of local news:
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EDITORIAL: Let Hoosiers have a say on right-to-work bill
Indiana legislators, both Republican and Democrat, may claim to know the will of the people on right-to-work.
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EDITORIAL: Thin ice winter’s deadly scourge
Six-year-old Trevor Wayne Young of Nashville, Ind., and 50-year-old Allen D. Johnson of Galva, Ill., probably had little in common — except the way they died.
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EDITORIAL: Meeting needs at St. Ann's
The caliber of a community often is revealed by its efforts to help its least fortunate citizens.
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EDITORIAL: A sweet deal for Amazon.com
That loud lip-smack on the cheek you heard echoing from Indianapolis last week was the sound of Gov. Mitch Daniels kissing off on what amounts to another sweetheart deal between Indiana and Amazon.com, the online retailing giant.
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EDITORIAL: A new era for growth
The promised announcement of a major new industry for the former Pfizer property in southern Vigo County turned out to be well worth the wait.
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EDITORIAL: Transparency a worthy goal
Do taxpayers have the right to know specific details of contracts between elected school boards and superintendents they hire to run their operations?
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EDITORIAL: Shakir Bell’s success gives boost to Sycamore football
Hope inspires progress. It’s the fuel for a better future.
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EDITORIAL: Inspiration for the future
Hope inspires progress. It’s the fuel for a better future.
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EDITORIAL: Put teeth in public access laws
Indiana’s laws governing public access, as good as they are, lack something important — teeth. There are no significant consequences for agencies or employees who intentionally violate them.
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EDITORIAL: Time for teamwork in Sullivan
The beginning of a new mayoral term in any community is — or should be — a time when the talk of the town is rife with ideas, improvements and changes.
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EDITORIAL: Lawmakers should leave IHSAA, high school basketball alone
In an idyllic world, Indiana could restore its fabled single-class high school basketball state tournament, and thousands of fans would pour into gymnasiums from Angola to Corydon in hopes of witnessing another “Milan Miracle” year after year after year.
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EDITORIAL: ‘Anthem’ proposal way off key
Remember Faith Hill’s impassioned rendition of “The Star Spangled Banner” at the Super Bowl in 2000?
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EDITORIAL: Back from the access brink
It took almost a week, but Gov. Daniels finally stepped up and did the right thing on Wednesday, rescinding new rules aimed at restricting the number of people allowed in the Statehouse during this session of the General Assembly.
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EDITORIAL: Poor decision by local Dems
By a little after 4 this afternoon, Terre Haute Mayor Duke Bennett will have been sworn in for a second term and City Councilman-elect Robert All will have taken the oath of office for the first time.
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EDITORIAL: Be it resolved …
Resolutions for 2012 are top-of-mind today.
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EDITORIAL: Another slice of Classic history
Baseball is the so-called American pastime, but to Hoosiers and to our Illinois neighbors, it’s basketball that gets a community’s blood pumping. And no form of roundball does that any more intimately than high school basketball, whether boys or girls. College hoops is great, but nothing quite beats the packed, overheated confines of a high school gym when a tight game turns on every possession, every shot, every rebound, every pass, every defensive position. The sing-song of cheerleaders, the shrillness of a ref’s whistle, the squeak of gym shoes on hardwood, the shouted instructions from the benches, the aroma of popcorn — those form a Midwestern tableau unlike any other.
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EDITORIAL: A strategy for growth
There are many ways to market an area in order to spur economic growth. Some may work better than others, but there is no perfect approach. The essential thing is to have a strategy and to implement it.
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