Of all of the woebegone entities created by the dysfunctional governments of Niagara County and its various towns and cities, perhaps none have failed as miserably in their mission over the past 30 years as the Niagara County Industrial Development Agency.
The mission of the agency, after all, is to attract industry and create jobs in the county. And even Stevie Wonder could see that industry, jobs and people have been fleeing the area in droves for as long as anyone can remember.
So what does the agency do then? It has a significant budget, which means it sucks up tax money like it's going out of style, but more importantly, it somehow has the power to dictate that certain businesses don't have to pay any taxes at all on property they own and improvements they make here.
That's right, while the city inspectors will be at your house in a New York second if you, say, put a deck on the back of your house, estimating how much "value" this adds to your property and then having your taxes adjusted accordingly, the IDA can and does tell municipalities that this property or that property owner is exempt from taxes on the massive new building they're putting up, or merely has to pay some small pittance "in lieu of taxes."
The people who run the IDA have abused this power criminally over the years, the most recent example taking place out in Somerset, where a giant power-generating plant was relieved of nearly its entire tax burden. No new jobs will be created, and the IDA not only gave the owners a free tax pass on the new construction, but on an existing power plant that formerly had been paying its fair share of tax revenue as well.
The people of Somerset and the rest of us will have to make up that revenue gap or suffer a reduction in services to pay for the IDA's largess.
Last week the IDA board of directors recommended a contract extension for their director, Sam Ferraro, whose biggest claim to fame previously was that he was the economic director for the city of Niagara Falls for 13 years.
That isn't a recommendation, it's an indictment. His most recent accomplishment was to recommend paying the predatory Buffalo Niagara Enterprise $50,000 because of that organization's success in convincing HSBC to build a $1 billion data center in Cambria. Hours later, HSBC officials announced that the deal was off.
The sad truth is that the people of Niagara County would be better served if the county Legislature disbanded the IDA entirely.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | Dec. 4 2007 |