“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Life Support for Aerotropolis “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>The EYE finds it difficult to believe, after the shocking disappointment of the failed special session of the Missouri Legislature, but supporters of the Aerotropolis incentive package for new capital investment in job creation around the St. Louis airport have not yet bled dry in a bathtub after slicing into a deep vein.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Gov. Jay Nixon, who met with Chinese airline officials this week, could keep Aerotropolis alive, if only on life support. He has the discretion to find a million (and change) a year to incentivize flights from China until Aerotropolis dealmakers can go back to the Legislature and get the real thing done – long-term performance-based incentives.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Nixon can send an important signal and keep this bold plan for economic development alive, at least for a very short period of time, if he uses discretionary funds and rewrites regulations and rules regarding existing incentives. This would be nothing on the order of magnitude envisioned by the many St. Louis civic leaders who supported the $300 million piece of tax incentives that was slashed from the economic development bill in the special session, but it would be different than admitting defeat.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>This stopgap measure would leave a lot of ifs for freight forwarders looking to see if there was enough incentive to build new business around St. Louis. It’s one thing to see an eight-year program approved by the Legislature and signed into law by the governor – it’s not difficult to get with that and adapt your business plans. It’s another thing to see a 12-month stopgap measure that fills in for legislation that died. Twelve months does not a route make, and that’s the problem; money is money, but conceptually it’s a different thing. If it comes from a discretionary eco devo fund, it’s still not a program, but still you can put the plan on life support and take that as a first step to the Chinese.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>If that is not what Nixon is saying to Chinese officials, it is what he should be saying. “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Crazies in the Legislature “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>We can only hope, in this new courtship phase, that the Chinese do not ask Nixon or their contacts in St. Louis to provide firm assurances that the Missouri Legislature will get back behind Aerotropolis. No one can provide rational assurances with some of the crazies that now serve in the state Legislature. What other state would be dismissive, the way Missouri has been dismissive, of a willing Chinese partner wanting to create commercial investment in their state’s economic hub? It’s almost Alice in Wonderland, which is why the EYE has been concerned whenever Aerotropolis supporters step into a bathtub with a razor handy.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>One might have thought the Republicans would want to assure they maintain their super-majority and try in earnest to get something passed in the special session, which Nixon said he feared would turn into an expensive debate society. That was rendered impossible when every Senate Republican turned out to be too unwilling or weak to debate state Sen. Jason Crowell – everybody but state Sen. Eric Schmitt. Crowell has bullied and cowed every Senate Republican, which is not difficult. These are not terribly bright people, so it was not hard to convince four or five people that Aerotropolis was just picking winners and losers or a handout for greedy developers.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Nixon also started putting flies in the ointment when his eco devo people read the redrafted legislation and began to obsess over the absence of his signature contribution to economic development, Compete Missouri, which is little more than a marriage of two existing programs, Quality Jobs and Build Missouri. When that was not in the bill, Nixon apparently worked behind the scenes with state Sen. Brad Lager, state Sen. Chuck Purgason and Crowell to undo the compromise.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Lager, who had been an architect of the compromise, suddenly morphed into someone saying this was only a framework to begin negotiation (he knew full well it was a 400-page redraft, not a rough framework). Lager is close to Nixon’s DED, his St. Louis developer friend running point on tax credit programs, and the pointman’s friend at the Business Journal. Lager was supposed to be the guy who kept the moderates in the pro-Aerotropolis business community safe from the unwashed rabble of Purgason and Crowell. A lot of eggs had been dropped into that basket. So when Lager started to pull away, those eggs started to look pretty scrambled.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Rex Sinquefield “font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>and the Show-Me Institute provided steady talking points against Aerotropolis, the policy wonk version of “playa hatin’,” and some rhetorical heat was added by tea party types who created hysteria around a threatened “Chinese invasion” of Missouri subsidized by Missouri taxpayers. The Senate fell into disarray with Lager not supporting the compromise, Crowell running rampant and Purgason not knowing what to do. What they did was pull the $300 million Aerotropolis piece out of the bill, pass it and send it to the House. “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Non-compete Missouri “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Nixon then started his campaign claiming that Compete Missouri can serve the purpose of the $300 million facility piece in Aerotropolis, which it can’t. He backed a version that includes Compete Missouri, which creates more budgetary strain and gives him a closing fund that concerns members of the House who are worried about Nixon playing pay to play. By Nixon doing what his enemies describe as “pay to play” (which might just be discretionary funding by any other name), he slows these programs down, which the Senate right wing likes, so Nixon has allies there. They pass the bill to the House with the $300 million long-term triggered incentive piece stripped out of it.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Speaker of the House Steve Tilley and state Rep. John Diehl balk and say they can’t have that, the long-term triggered incentives were the reason they agreed to seven-year sunsets on some of their pet tax credit programs in the compromise process. There are reports that Nixon’s policy hall-walker Daniel Hall told Diehl to his face that Nixon didn’t like the Senate/House compromise and had them working against it. (Hall is Nixon’s policy guy who works the House and Senate, Hall who walks the halls; he also worked for Bob Holden – he’s a glorified errand boy, but since no one gets to see the wizard himself, there is glory in Nixon’s errand boy.) “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>So the Senate and House Republicans are left looking like they can’t come to an agreement or stick to an agreement, as indeed they can’t and didn’t. But Nixon’s vanity and ego deserve a share of the blame – just to have his signature piece in the deal, he was willing to risk blowing the whole thing apart, which indeed did happen. “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Nixon in China “color: #2a2a2a; font-family: Verdana;”>
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>According to a jaundiced view of Nixon’s actions in this matter, he was never interested in tax reform; he was interested in getting re-elected. The St. Louis developer who ran point for Nixon in the tax credit review process, according to this view, never wanted caps on these tax credit programs. Yet they were able to float and sell their disguised intentions as fact with the help of the Business Journal. It stretched the credulity of anyone who knows the developer and how he makes a living to put him in charge of tax credit reforms, unless you accept the argument that who better knows better how to fix the abuse than the abuser himself.
“font-size: 9.0pt; font-family: Verdana; color: #2a2a2a;”>Politically, Nixon is a winner, since this insider view will never be widely reported or understood by many. The headlines are and should be that Republicans and their super-majorities in the Legislature would not put aside their differences to pass badly needed economic incentives; the governor’s alleged role in preying upon these differences in an attempt to flatter his pet program will not be remembered by many. Given that St. Louis now is left to look towards Nixon for life support for the incentive program this region needs also means Nixon has succeeded in turning what was a promising deal between St. Louis and China into Nixon’s deal with China. Fair enough, in political terms; he is the governor. But now he should act like a forward-thinking CEO and bring maximum state resources to the head start this region has over other areas to build a global cargo hub. Nixon should put Aerotropolis on life support until a new deal can be made.
