Business leaders from across Missouri urged lawmakers to pass in its entirety the bundle of economic development incentives they'll take up in a special session starting this week.
Top officials from the Missouri Chamber of Commerce, the state's three biggest regional chambers and its biggest labor group said the so-called "Made in Missouri Jobs Package" is crucial to the state's economy in the years to come.
This is no surprise. The measure -crafted in months of negotiation between House and Senate lawmakers and Gov. Jay Nixon both during and since the spring legislative session -holds something for nearly everyone.
It includes high-profile ingredients like $360 million in tax credits to boost a cargo hub at Lambert-St. Louis International Airport, and long-standing priorities like data center tax breaks and a science startup fund. It's got smaller-bore incentives to bring big-time colleges ports events to Missouri and to help attract companies to the Missouri side of the Kansas City region. And it goes beyond the compromise unveiled last month by House and Senate lawmakers, streamlining programs run by the Department of Economic Development and even creating a "closing fund" to give upfront cash to firms that move here.
"There's something important in this bill for every part of the state," said Dan Mehan, president of the Missouri Chamber. "We're very confident."
There was little discussion of what would be cut. Under the House-Senate bill, tax credits to rehab historic buildings and build low-income housing would see sharp reductions, prompting grumbling from fans of those popular - and costly - programs. The majority of the $1.5 billion in savings over ten years would come from making renters ineligible for the so-called "circuit breaker" property tax credit for senior citizens. That has some liberal groups and senior advocates crying foul. And groups across the political spectrum continue to poke at the Aerotropolis credits for Lambert.
No one likes everything in the bill, said Richard Fleming, president of the St. Louis Regional Chamber of Commerce. But it's the best chance Missouri has to spark new jobs and new companies after lagging for too long.
"If we don't find a way to change the trajectory of our economy, we're going to continue to face choices that are negative choices," he said. "Embodied in this package are demonstrable high impact investments that we can build on." |
