PA. gives tax incentive program to rich suburb; kept application period a near-secret [View all]

[JPZenger]

Last edited Fri Jan 2, 2015, 02:44 PM - Edit history (1)

http://www.wfmz.com/news/news-regional-lehighvalley/whitehall-township-ignored-by-dced-say-legislators/30406102

http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/lehigh-county/index.ssf/2014/12/tamaqua_awarded_state_incentiv.html#incart_river

The CRIZ program offers state tax incentives to attract new development. It is supposed to be used to help blighted areas, such as downtowns in poor cities that need strong incentives in order to compete with other areas.

With time running out on their regime, the Corbetittes just approved two new municipalities for the program - Cranberry Township - an affluent suburb that includes exits of two interstate highways and that has no absolutely no trouble attracting developers, and Tamaqua. Both are represented by influential Republican legislators. Cranberry Township is 94% white and has a median household income of $94,000 a year.

The State only allowed 2 weeks to submit applications (which was actually only 8 working days because of Thanksgiving), and didn't tell the municipalities that applied last year that the new applications were being received. Those municipalities that didn't know about the application period are represented by Democratic Senators, Representatives and Mayors.

Excerpt from WFMZ:

"“Even though Whitehall officials previously applied, continually expressed an interest in the program and even participated in recent DCED workshops on CRIZ, the department never bothered to notify them about the application period,” said Sen. Boscola.

Rep. McNeill added: “DCED’s sole effort to inform communities about the application period was limited to a solitary press release quietly issued at the end of the day on Nov. 12.

Boscola and McNeill also questioned the department’s decision to cut the application period to two weeks: Nov 14 to Dec. 1. “It’s almost as if the department wanted to limit the number of applications received,” the letter stated."