January 27, 2007

What lies ahead for Genesee county?

When Michigan suffers economic demise most generally related to the rise and  fall of automotive sales, Flint and Genesee county really take a beating.

Genesee county has infrastructure; interstate highway hubs, Bishop airport and cheap land costs. One would think that we should be attractive  to some industry besides General Motors . . . There is the question of vacant industrial properties that now sit idle. It's really time to take some action.

According to the study by the Anderson Economic Group in East Lansing Michigan -- The people of this state and particularly the people of this county who have been hardest hit by the Delphi bankruptcy will suffer $400 million to $945 million in lost tax revenues and $5 billion to $10 billion in total economic losses to the nation in total, mostly from the assumption of pension liabilities.

If you or I screwed the people and the government out of this much money they would put us in prison but Delphi has committed no felony so what can we do about this?

We can access their closed plants to $0 value and condemn them as blight. Once the county or city gets title to the property we can place a proposal for a countywide bond issue or perhaps get a bank or federal government bond guarantee for  a site redevelopment.

If the federal government can guarantee loans and bonds for foreign nations they sure as hell should guarantee loans or bonds for us, its own citizens.

Now just what do we do with these buildings and lands? That's the big question. We either need to adopt a casino gambling plan or a strategic technology plan to create jobs. I know that casinos have been tossed around for Flint and personally I have no problem with that -- Casinos do create jobs as well as other economic development. However, if there is any way to  develop a non-monufacturing service industry that is technology based, this is the better way to go.

If we are going to go the technology route the city and county need to build a dedicated power plant for the project of get Consumer's Energy to cooperate in providing reasonable rates to encourage new high-tech development.

It will take a joint effort to save our sinking ship. The days of giving tax abatements to old industries like Delphi must end. Today we see the results of these failed policies.