MAYVILLE – The Chautauqua County Industrial Development Agency has assisted with the creation and retention of thousands of jobs since 2006.
The CCIDA offered a presentation to the Planning and Economic Development Committee on Wednesday, which detailed some of the work it has done over the years. The presentation included a video in which top executives of 13 county companies spoke about how they were affected by the CCIDA. The 13 companies represented in the video also account for 1,846 jobs in Chautauqua County. Additionally, Bill Daly, administrative director for the CCIDA, detailed projects not accounted for in the video. According to Daly, 1,104 jobs have been retained since 2006; 121 new jobs have been created; and 1,030 new jobs are forecasted.
“We work like crazy,” Daly said. “We have hundreds of man hours in these projects.”According the presentation, since 2006, the CCIDA has made 54 Al Tech and Chautauqua County Revolving Loan Fund loans in the amount of $14,382,673. These loans leveraged an additional $56,688,764 of investment into the county. And, the loans were projected to retain 2,771 jobs and helped create 532 additional jobs. The CCIDA has also closed 20 payment in lieu of tax agreements, which Daly said created 266 jobs as of the end of 2011. The agreements generated $10,919,643 in payments to the taxing jurisdictions in 2011.
Additionally, the CCIDA has issued five tax-exempt bonds in the amount of $103,206,000, which have created additional capital investment of $234,885,000 in Chautauqua County. Also discussed at the Planning and Economic Development Committee meeting was a resolution by Timothy Hoyer, D-Jamestown, requesting the New York State Legislature to limit tax exemptions granted by the CCIDA. During the meeting, Hoyer expressed that he is concerned that municipalities lose their voice and right to vote on a project being developed by the CCIDA. He also said he is concerned that exemptions are given when they are not necessary.
“It just seems to us on the outside that we don’t have the information about these large corporations, not industrial, but large corporations when they are coming to developers and are given tax exemptions when they don’t need them,” Hoyer said. “They are just given out.”
Hoyer also praised the video shown by Daly during the meeting, however he said it was not enough to ease his concerns. In a memo to the committee, Daly wrote, “This appears to be a poorly constructed attempt to send economic development in our county backward at a time when the CCIDA is doing great work with ‘Business Retention and Expansion,’ plus attracting new business. We accomplish this in an environment where NYS taxes, fees, regulations and the cost of those regulations continuously get NYS ranked the 49th best place to do business in out of 50 states.”
Committee Chairman George Borrello, R-Irving, also addressed Hoyer’s concerns during the meeting. “Local municipalities do not lose any tax dollars,” he said. “They simply are limited to when, according to the PILOT, when the increases happen.”
The committee unanimously voted down the resolution.
