Everyone knows that I supported the Triumph pork processing plant, and I'm glad to hear that those 1000 jobs will be coming to the Quad Cities, but....Come on, Illinois can find 16 million dollars within a couple months for a hog plant, but can't find $14 million for the first phase of a COLLEGE CAMPUS?? For crying out loud, for less than the price of the Chicago bean we could have a riverfront WIU campus. Sometimes I just don't understand the Land of Lincoln.
7 comments:
It's $16 million in incentives. The state is not handing them $16 million in cash.
True, but considering that Triumph would have possibly built in Illinois even without the incentives, it is still either spent money or lost revenue. Several million of it appears to be straight "cash" grants for sewer, infrastructure, job training, etc.
I'm mostly just bugged because $14 million is pennies in the IL budget, so why not get started on the riverfront WIU campus?
They sould now go after the $$$ for WIU. With the same "no quit" attitude.
The problem with getting an appropriation for WIU is that the State has promised funding to other Illinois Universities that has not been delivered. It's tough to justify $16 million for WIU when U of I Champaign is still waiting for construction dollars promised several years ago.
INcentives are the same as cash bozo. Are youpaid in cash? Not likely. I guess the retailer who takes your credit card is not really getting paid since its not cash.
Incentives are not the same as cash.
They certainly aren't the same.
For example, this building (The Davenport Lofts) that people like to criticize for its incentives. As an incentive, the city allows them to pay property taxes on the value of the building before it was renovated. This doesn't take money out of the city budget like a cash gift, because if the building wasn't renovated, they'd still be getting the same amount. Another example is where the government entity does essentially give cash, but its paid for out of the new tax money that the project creates.
That being said, there were a couple million bucks in grants as part of the $16 mil, and I assume that that money had to be found in the state budget somewhere. Mostly I was making a point on what a relatively small amount of money is required to get the riverfront WIU going.
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