By Chris Fyall, Herald-Times
cfyall@heraldt.com
A draft memorandum of understanding presented Tuesday between Printpack and the Monroe County Council could signal the end of a difficult era for local tax abatements.
The tax incentiveprograms have always been all or nothing propositions.
If a company didn't fulfill part of its promised employment, or promised investment, county officials had to decide whether to revoke all of the company's abatement or - and this has been the county's typical response - none of it.
By most accounts, that hasn't worked well.
"Rescinding an abatement is an ugly situation," Monroe County Council president Vic Kelson said Tuesday. "That's not a trigger you want to pull."
"You end up just saying, 'Oh. Yeah. Whatever,'" he said. "Those kind of discussions are the discussions that make the public think we're just giving money away."
With Printpack, the council is doing something different.
A four-page memorandum of understanding establishes gray areas for the company's proposed abatement.