We keep formulating volunteer boards. If it's not for one thing, it's something else. We have all bases covered from recreation to planning and our LDR's. Now the city wants to appoint volunteers to an Enterprise Zone Board, members who will sit on it and serve longer than an elected official.
Any why would our city want to make nearly the entire city an Enterprise Zone? They tell us because we are a poor city with little tax base and we need to do something to encourage development in our neighborhoods, etc. Handing over our city on a silver platter to a volunteer board to make financial decisions, is extreme. This should go to a Workshop to allow the citizens to understand the advantages and disadvantages of abrogating power to an unelected board consisting of some people we more than likely never heard of and how it might help our city. I said "might."
1 comment:
HUD Office of Policy and Research
Same Stick and Carrot?
"The six sets of hypothetical yields were tested against the research group's proprietary "enterprise zone tax impact model." The tests indicated that the incentives have only a marginal impact on cash flow during a new firm's first years; thus the incentives would be of most value to established firms considering expansion.
Designation of zone areas creates particular problems: selecting cities, determining how many
cities to select, drawing boundary lines within the cities. Two other problems faced when cutting taxes for enterprise zones are dilution of the
effect by general tax-cutting and the fact that tax policies seem to have little effect on business decisions to relocate.
The authors question whether present incentives are enough to influence employers to create enough jobs in the zones. They note that deregulation, part of enterprise zone theory, seems to have little place in the evolving American enterprise zone pattern.
Noting that the mere designation of a zone increases property values, they endorse continued experimentation while adding several recommendations: Federal funding should be made
available for infrastructure improvement, a source of venture capital should be provided through tax policy, technical assistance should be provided to zone businesses, and zones that work with established neighborhood groups should be favored."
file:///C:/Users/Owner/Documents/Section%20II%E2%80%94Enterprise%20Zones%20%20Key%20Issues.htm
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