If you thought the Lake Area Improvement Corporation's claim to have created 500 "potential" jobs was funny, put down your milk and read this:
LAIC exec Dwaine Chapel provided the Lake County Commission with a letter dated June 12, 2011, to request $30,000 from county taxpayers for more economic development projects. The first paragraph includes this incomprehensible tidbit:
The more recent projects that the LAIC has been associated that have added new jobs and increased the local tax base.
On page 2, Chapel tells the commission in general terms how the LAIC will use our tax dollars:
The LAIC would like to request funding for the upcoming year in the amount of $30,000. The funding will be used for operations and specific projects relating to business recruitment and retention, as well as workforce recruitment and retention.
Now buckle up:
Since the inception of Forward Madison a vibrant period of growth has occurred. Support to grow the County has been wide spread [sic]. The public and private sectors respectively committed $2.3 million. With your continued support the LAIC will continue to strive to help the county grow and prosper.
Since the inception of Forward Madison a vibrant period of growth has occurred.
Where? Shanghai? Ho Chi Minh City? Austin, Texas? Sioux Falls?
The oddly unstated import of Chapel's statement is that Forward Madison contributed to vibrant growth here in Lake County. Hard data, including the latest jobs and sales tax revenue figures, say otherwise.
The LAIC board may think words like vibrant make them sound good. Let us hope our county commission will see past the word games and demand real data to justify the LAIC's claim to public dollars.
In rural areas the economy has had a good boost from five dollar corn for a few years now. Ethanol has and will continue this. That extra two to three dollars per bushel compaired with ten years ago is a huge amount of cash inflow into the rural communittees. If your city has had some business growth from that, do not give the credit to the economic developement people. The big cities ecomomies are hurting and taking their jobs is not easy now nor are their companies looking to expand a lot. Spend your developement money when it can do some good and be happy with what you have now.