ALIGN

Chemung County IDA, Southern Tier In summer 2009, CVS Pharmacy broke ground on a regional distribution center in Chemung County, possibly the largest development project underway in upstate New York.…

I work in the City of Syracuse as a bus driver. I work hard everyday to make sure that students with special needs get where they need to go safely.…

I am an owner of Talking Leaves Books, an independent, co-op bookstore in Buffalo. We’ve always sought be a community center and a community resource where diverse and alternative populations can access books that most other stores don’t stock.…

In fall 2009, the city's Capital Resource Corporation, a subsidiary of the Industrial Development Agency, announced it was awarding the developers $20 million in tax-exempt Recovery Zone Facility Bonds, authorized under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in order to jump-start the retail and housing part of the project. The city estimates that it will create 328 construction jobs and 108 full-time equivalent permanent jobs. However, there are no guarantees taxpayer money will create decent, living wage jobs for residents or displaced workers. The permanent jobs will be primarily part-time, low-wage retail jobs, and will actually represent a net loss of jobs in Albee Square.

Initiated in 2008, the Green Collar Jobs Roundtable brought together 170 green employers, unions, workforce development providers and environmental justice organizations to develop a Green Collar Jobs Roadmap, a comprehensive policy proposal for jumpstarting New York’s green economy.

Each year, IDAs are required to report on the projects they subsidize. In the last three years, we have analyzed that data and produced key facts about IDA performance. A look at the most recent data reveals increased spending and revenue loss to local communities, and wasted subsidies.

Our state is facing economic and budgetary crises of historical proportions. Instead of contributing to the economic recovery and revitalization needed in our communities and our state, IDAs are falling asleep on the job. Instead of contributing to the economic recovery and revitalization needed in our communities and our state, IDAs are falling asleep on the job. New research shows...

It just doesn’t make sense that real estate developers and large retail chains are able to cash in on subsidies that will actually lead to fewer jobs than we had before. Small businesses like mine make an important contribution to the community, but they aren’t being adequately supported.

Our government spends billions of dollars each year on lavish corporate subsidies, but these investments too often fail to create the good jobs New Yorkers need and leave local communities without much needed revenue. It's time we get our money's worth from economic development programs.New York created Industrial Development Agencies, or IDAs, in 1969 to serve as engines of economic growth for our communities and to advance the “job opportunities, health, general prosperity and economic welfare of the people of the state of New York.”

Unfortunately, IDAs are not living up to their promises. Each year, IDAs provide hundreds of millions of our tax dollars to private businesses who in turn commit to create or retain jobs. However, much of this money goes to companies that create poverty-wage jobs, no jobs at all, or some that actually cut jobs. The patchwork of 116 IDAs throughout the state often pits community against community, resulting in job shifting instead of new job creation.

The far-reaching 2009 Public Authorities Reform Act (PARA) was enacted in March, 2010 to establish sweeping accountability and transparency requirements in over 700 state public authorities and local Industrial Development Agencies. PARA was necessary in part because New York’s 50 largest public authorities have issued and are currently responsible for at least $161 billion of debt financed by taxpayers—a sum greater than the state’s entire annual budget.