OPINION: We need jobs now
Colorado Springs voters soundly defeated the 1A tax proposal Tuesday, telling city leaders they don't want to give City Hall roughly $10 a year from each household to fund a nebulous promise of "Jobs Now." In the event city leaders haven't picked up on this, with the sound defeat of two recent tax proposals each titled "1A," here's what voters have said: Read our lips, no new taxes during these tough economic times.
Voters in Tuesday's election clearly didn't believe City Hall could achieve a task best left to private enterprise. If a corporation needs to relocate to the base of Pike Peak and hire thousands of employees for the long haul, it won't be the result of some enticement paid for with a tax. It will be in response to the company's legitimate needs in a quest to meet a market demand. If not, the move is most likely irresponsible and temporary.
While Colorado Springs voters were wise to defeat 1A, it's a sound bet most who voted against the tax favor employment growth, "jobs now," and other forms of economic development. Today, two days after 1A's death, business leaders, politicians and local citizens should start looking at holistic and sustainable plans for enhancing economic development. Today, Colorado Springs should work toward becoming the city known nationally for refusing to play the corporate incentives game, opting instead to get the heck out of the way of genuine success achieved on a fair and competitive playing field.
The single best thing local government can do to attract, incubate and grow business is to get out of its way. In the wake of 1A's defeat, we as a community must examine all regulatory barriers that may impede new and growing businesses. We should consider eliminating the city's business personal property tax. We should also work with our legislative delegation, along with their political allies and the governor, to eliminate the statewide business personal property tax. We should each familiarize ourselves with the policies and practices of the Pikes Peak Regional Building Department to determine how it can provide uniform public safety with minimal regulations that reduce construction time, cost and red tape.
As Colorado Springs becomes the community known for refusing to play the incentives game, which has ratcheted out of control across the country, we should emerge as the country's pre-eminent free zone for prosperity, limited government and minimal taxation.
We should be the city that will never favor one business at the expense of others, and the city that will never play favorites by creating trouble for any business with a plan to succeed.
With the defeat of 1A, we should become the national model of a community that knows how to entice economic development without crude and unfair incentives.
Everything we do, going forward, should involve a concerted effort to get out of the way of reasonable business and development endeavors. That would put Colorado Springs in a league of its own, attracting the kind of sustainable businesses we want.
In addition, Colorado Springs should work toward cultivating an enviable, well-educated workforce. That can't come with an incentive crafted to meet the unique training demands of one or a few shiny new business prospects from some other town. It will come only through the continued development of a school system that's second to none, and one centered more on children and less on the special interests of the teachers' union.
As private enterprise profits most from public education, it's incumbent upon business executives in our community to take active roles in supporting and financially sponsoring public and private schools.
Each of us is responsible for creating "jobs now," and bolstering economic development in Colorado Springs. It not a simple matter of approving a tax. Instead, it's a process of friends and neighbors meeting up to brainstorm plans for making Colorado Springs the country's most inviting zone for prosperity and freedom. Prosperity, and all else which makes this city great, has never and will never emanate from City Hall.
One private local organization, the Limited Government Forum, has already taken on the cause of grassroots economic development. At the organization's Limited Government Week '09, the week of April 27, the group will host at least one panel on civic innovation and another on creating a "vibrant local economy."
Economic development in Colorado Springs must be among the highest priorities in our city, if it's to remain a great and growing community for generations to come. But it can't be achieved with an ill-conceived tax, or with the valiant efforts of Mike Kazmierski and his Greater Colorado Springs Economic Development Corp. alone. It can best be achieved in a hands-on effort by citizens to create a free environment in which enterprise will thrive, without artificial enticement and subsidization. Leave those crude crutches of mediocrity to cities far less desirable than ours.
