Color me impressed! Front-paged on today’s D&C, in an article entitled “Job creation falters despite Monroe aid: Agency points to many success stories, but a newspaper analysis finds far bleaker picture”, they report on the results of a study they’ve done on COMIDA, which takes our tax dollars to lure businesses to locate here or stay, with the promise that they’ll create jobs in return. Sounds good, right? Well, as we’ve reported here before, it’s unfortunately fallen prey to corporate fraud and cronyism, which is why groups like MetroJustice are spearheading the effort to expose and reform this corruption.

According to yearly records submitted by COMIDA to the state Comptroller’s Office, a total of 92 projects received county tax breaks each year from 2001 through 2005. Of those, only 48 for which complete data were available created or retained the number of jobs anticipated. Thirty-one projects lost jobs and 13 had incomplete employment data.

Legislation to reform this agency passed the Democrat-controlled NY state Assembly but stalled in the Republican-controlled state Senate.Â

Furthermore, the state data do not detail how much the new jobs pay. Also unclear is whether tax breaks were the deciding factor for a company to invest in Monroe County.

“How do they know what the company would or would not have done?” said Greg LeRoy of Good Jobs First, a Washington-based organization that monitors economic development agencies. “Did the company or its CEO ever sign a document under penalty of perjury verifying that the only reason they came to Monroe County is because of the incentives? The corporate decision-making process remains a black box.”

Of course, there are success stories…

But, [State Sen.] Robach said, the agencies’ results statewide have been mixed. So he plans to continue to push the Maziarz reform in the state Senate.

“We want to make sure the projects that (receive benefits) are the ones that are really creating the type of jobs we want to have and not just moving from one area to another. We’re not going to micromanage. But there have been many projects that are helpful and some that have not panned out as expected.”

There’s a couple observations I have after reading all this.Â

1. There needs to be more accountability and more consistent reporting (by COMIDA, not the D&C). It’s hard to compare apples to apples, even with the handy popup window showing COMIDA projects.Â
2. Why were companies given COMIDA money who were planning on locating here anyway?
3. As someone paying for this, I want to clearly see what I’m getting for my money in terms of a better Monroe County. What companies clearly stayed or came due to COMIDA, how many jobs were added/saved, and what did they pay?
4. Why can’t we do more regional planning, like Ontario, Canada does? I believe we’d have something that looked like their much more robust economy if Livingston, Ontario, and Monroe counties weren’t fighting over the same scraps like a couple of starving dogs.

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