Newsletter Signup
The Austin Monitor thanks its sponsors. Become one.
Most Popular Stories
- New federal cash paves way for East Austin’s ‘wishbone’ bridge over Lady Bird Lake
- Austin’s airport is getting a new concourse and 20 more gates but not until the 2030s
- Judge rules city can’t use taxpayer money for South Central TIRZ
- Save Our Springs Alliance sues City Council over Open Meetings Act
- Democrats vs. Republicans: First election coming for Travis Central Appraisal District board
-
Discover News By District
City Council passes economic incentives ordinance, debates living wage
Friday, October 2, 2009 by Josh Rosenblatt
On Thursday morning, the City Council voted to approve an ordinance establishing an enhanced review process for economic incentive proposals. The ordinance requires the implementation of a formal cost-benefit analysis to determine the costs of any economic incentive agreement proposals and a timeline to increase opportunity for citizen review and comment prior to the Council’s taking action on any proposals.
Though the ordinance passed unanimously, the debate wasn’t without controversy. Members of Austin Interfaith, one of the stakeholders that worked with City Manager Marc Ott on recommendations for the proposed ordinance, spoke at the Council meeting about concerns they have with the city’s approach to economic incentives.
Group spokesman Fred Krebs, pastor of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church, said Austin Interfaith is calling on the Council “to pass an ordinance that requires any company receiving city tax abatements to relocate to
“According to numbers released last week,” Krebs said, “
Krebs went on to say that he and his colleagues don’t want
Council Member Sheryl Cole responded by saying that while she agrees that everyone in Austin should have health benefits and livable wages, she is “concerned that we still have people in this community who are unemployed and underemployed who are only qualified to receive low wages, and for us to adopt a policy that totally excludes them from incentives troubles me.”
Responding to Austin Interfaith Strategy Team member Minerva Camarena Skeith’s claim that it would be better to lure more high wage rather than low wage jobs to the city, for the reason that the city doesn’t need more of the latter, Cole said, “The unemployment rate in the African-American community is upwards of 30-40 percent, especially among African-American males. And statistics for the Hispanic community are worse than that. And then when we talk about people who actually use social services, it’s worse than that. So [I don’t agree with] the premise that we have enough low-paying jobs.”
Speaking in favor of the ordinance, Dave Porter, senior vice-president of economic development for the Austin Chamber of Commerce, argued that though he sympathized with the concerns of Austin Interfaith, the time isn’t right to add new restrictions to the city’s policy on economic incentives. With the country in the midst of a recession, he said, the most important thing for the city is to create new jobs and foster economic growth, a task made more difficult by the fact that other cities have been willing to provide better incentives than
“To show you how the game has changed during this recession,” Porter said, “this past April we competed with
“We’re not attracting low-income jobs or low-wage jobs; these are good jobs. We welcome the debate, but if we put further restrictions on this policy that’s so seldom used, we’re not going to be using it at all. We should have this debate at a different time. Now, we need to be attracting jobs and immediate income for families. We need to be aggressive.”
Interfaith spokeswoman Skeith said the group hopes to have language for a new incentives ordinance ready by Nov. 15.
You're a community leader
And we’re honored you look to us for serious, in-depth news. You know a strong community needs local and dedicated watchdog reporting. We’re here for you and that won’t change. Now will you take the powerful next step and support our nonprofit news organization?