The Chattanooga tax break aircraft named “The PILOT” continues to break the sound barrier. Not even the stunning news about Volkswagen slows it down. We have lots of needs in our city, and yet we continue to erode our revenue base with the number, magnitude and sloppiness of tax break agreements.
The VW crisis could have convinced our elected officials to push the pause button on new tax breaks. A six-month moratorium would allow the dust to settle on the impact of the corporate scandal on our local VW plant. It would allow time for the city and county to develop meaningful clawback language. The two existing VW agreements are an expensive reminder that local PILOT agreements appear woefully inadequate in protecting the taxpaying public when things go bad for a company.
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* VW supplier Gestamp seeks to extend tax break for Chattanooga site * Tax data shows $26 million waived for businesses; Hamilton County officials defend breaks
Gov. Haslam recently said: “If Volkswagen doesn’t create jobs, make the capital investment and doesn’t maintain those jobs, they owe us that money back.” I assume he was referencing the agreements for the state incentives. When will Mayors Andy Berke and Jim Coppinger talk about the local incentives?