Allen County Council member Vogt has got to be kidding me
Posted by Mike Sylvester - 1/22/10 @ 8:43 pm - Filed Under Featured, Local Politics
I read the evening newspaper today and was appalled by an article.
GM will temporarily (for a couple of years supposedly) employ 700 additional workers. The vast majority of workers are expected to come here from Pontiac Michigan. These GM employees will have a lot of seniority and they will likely have deep roots in Pontiac Michigan.
Councilman Vogt is a Republican and he has come up with one of the dumbest ideas I have heard in several weeks.
Per the article “He suggested council establish a program under which employees of GM and other companies that have received tax abatements could receive a bonus for buying a home in Allen County. Vogt said a “mini-grant” of $1,000 or so could be paid for from a $760,000 fund created by contributions from companies granted tax breaks in exchange for local investment.”
This is absurd on many levels:
- First off I oppose tax abatements in the first place. Instead Government should lower the tax rates for everyone instead of choosing a favorite few large companies and allowing them to pay lower taxes than the rest of us.
- The County is broke and struggling to make its budget work. Bribing people to buy a home is a complete waste of taxpayer dollars.
- The workers coming here from Pontiac Michigan are temporary workers. Even if they buy a house they will likely turn around and sell it in a couple of years.
- Program like this are unfair to the hundreds of thousands of people who have purchased a home in Allen County without being bribed by County Council. This is another example of special treatment for a few people that ends up harming the rest of us.
I hope this proposal is soundly defeated by our County Council.
Mike
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23 Responses to “Allen County Council member Vogt has got to be kidding me”
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Hey Mike
You have the facts all wrong call me so you can get them and then you can evaluate the plan. If you don’t like it after that you can repost the facts and let others decide what they think. Thanks
Darren
Darren,
Mike is *never* wrong. Just ask him.
Darren, I re-read the newspaper article, it seems pretty simple, what are we missing? Please explain it to us.
Sure but the details have not been worked out. There is a Tax abatement fund that has about 770k in it. It is money from companys who voluntarily returned some of the tax abatement. This money comes in very slowly and never in large amounts. Infact this is all the money that has come in since the inception of the fund, 1995. The fund was set up to do infrastructure, you can see that is is not enough to do that. So that is the history. The plan is to create revenue for all of Allen county not just government. If transferees are buying houses and good and services we all make more money, government and private sector. And I will tell you the private sector will come out way ahead of government as it should. It reduces the housing inventory, more sales tax, more food and beverage tax, more wheel tax, and the list goes on. I listed the taxes collected but you have to spend money at a local business for the local government to recieve a nickle. Even more people needing tax help in Allen county. But this is not any tax money from you or me. I hope this helps. If you want more info feel free to call me 402.1835. Take care DV
Darren Vogt,
I enjoyed talking to you yesterday. I planned to update the post yesterday; however, I got home after 10 PM and did not ahve time. I will update it tonight.
You and I are going to disagree on this issue; however, you gave me a couple of points of information I will add to the post.
Mike
Mark A.
I have admitted I was wrong multiple times on this blog.
I never remember you admitting yuo were wrong. Imagine that.
Mike
Sounds like this slush fund money should be returned to the taxpayers from whence it came. If GM was a stable company that was turning a profit perhaps it would be a good bet. There’s no indication that this too-big-to-fail model of a corp/union money pit alliance won’t just close up the whole shop.
[...] couple of days ago I posted about at idea from Allen County Council member Darren Vogt that was discussed in the local [...]
Councilman Vogt’s idea is ludicrous. Has he paid attention to the tea party movement at all? We the people want a return to free market principles and an end to meddling by our elected officials. Government, both Federal and local, has already subsidized GM enough. We don’t need to subsidize their employee’s choice of residence. Where does it end Councilman? If this is the best idea you have for economic development, then end the fund and return the money to the rightful owners.
Why is it Ford turned over a billion dollars in profit in 2009 and took no government bail out money. Yet, GM did take money continues to lose money and now councilman Vogt believes the employees need a bailout too?
Pandering for votes makes people do weird things.
Just an FYI. A goup met today to flush out the plan. We are doing a cost benefit type of approach to see if it has clear benefits to the county. We will then see if it is a good idea. As with any idea we must make sure there are clear benefits. There are other plans I am looking at as well like shovel ready sites. Please call if you have some input you would like to give my phone is always open 402.1835.
And as for pandering if you knew me you would know that is not the case…but think what you want.
Ford did make over a $billion in 2009, but in 2008 lost over $22 billion. Everything is relative.
Why did Ford make money with no bailout accepted? Product, workers, quality, impression, people thought GM might become a BM and decided to buy Ford on the impression it seemed better.
The economy is based on large part to perception held by the general population.
My therory is Ford is a better ran company.
Once a corporation has sucked off the teet of the government it continues to go back every time because it knows sooner or later the government will open its shirt once again.
Darren my comment of pandering for votes is a “blanket” statement for politicians in general. Not you in specific. I’m glad your doing some due diligence and making sure this makes sense. I wished more politicians would do that instead of having the mind set of throw money at a problem and if it doesn’t disappear we just didn’t throw enough at it.
As a tax payer i’m tired of big companies being mismanaged and when they are and need governments help the only reason help is given because they employ alot of people. Thanks,
Funny no mention by Councilman Vogt of returning the “returned” tax abatement money to the place from whence it came. If the abatement was “returned” then it is logical that it should actually be RETURNED. The original money was appropriated for specific cases of economic development. If that specified purpose is now complete or moot then the money should be returned to the General Fund. It should not be intercepted and held in slush by government on the way back to the taxpayers. Any other “plan” should be “flushed out”.
The money NEVER was in the general fund. And the fund does have a specific use. So it can NOT go into the general fund. It could go back but seeing as how is was a contribution by the taxpayor to use for ED then we should use it for the best ED option we have.
With all due respect Councilman, your idea is what needs to be flushed. This is the creeping socialism that we don’t want. Clearly, it is redistribution of wealth. Here’s the “cost benefit approach” that the Founding Fathers followed. Dollars work best when left to the free market, not in funds created and spent by politicians. If you want to propose something bold and fresh, call for the fund to be dissolved.
Kudos to you Mr. Vogt for having the fortitude to openly address questions and concerns in this forum. Would be nice if your civility could be reciprocated.
I would suggest you earmark the money to help pay off the Maplecrest Extension/Major Bridge Fund bond.
The economic impact study that justified that project was completely bogus and its conclusions have no chance of ever materializing…
It “was a contribution by the taxpayor”, right? It doesn’t matter what shell you choose to hide it under. It should be “RETURNED”. Right now the only “ED” the taxpayer wants is the one that “RETURNS” unused tax money to THEM since THEY’RE the ones who PAY the bills. NOT put in a SLUSH FUND.
Government has no business in economic development period. The Allen County and Fort Wayne elected representatives have no idea what it takes to run companies that need to make a profit to keep going.
Grand Wayne, Hawk, Harrison Square, The old Ball stadium caused the Coliseum to just break even, Southtown Mall, Giving GM millions in tax abatements, to name a few.
All a locality needs to do is provide EVERYONE
I hit a wrong key, tried to edit, but with just 60 seconds, was not fast enough.
All a local community must do is to create a level playing field for EVERYONE. Those who have been here should not have to subsidize some fly by night idea that gets sold to a politician who spends others money. If it is such a great idea, then the company can sells shares to the public to invest.
But to have taxpayers fund economic development as has been done in Fort Wayne and Allen county, we should just line them all up along a wall tar and feather them. Can anyone name one good thing this Economic Development Group has done?
Sorry, but I forgot one more thing. Jeff had a good write up on the Federal Reserve. Take this and look at how the Economic Development group works. Do you see any common attributes between them?
Instead of the value of the dollar falling in Allen County or Fort Wayne, the rise in taxes or reduction in services is the result.
[...] this blog we discussed the proposed bribe incentive that some County officials were considering paying to GM employees who [...]