e-Update 8-13-10
1.Mayor Chris Coleman Says “No New Taxes”
2.Government Debt and Government Pay Hit Record Highs
3.Liberal Minnesotans Outraged by Minnesota Business Focusing on …..Business?
4.Home Grown Company Lured Away
5.Just One More Bailout
6.Federal Stimulus For Private Development
1.Mayor Chris Coleman Says “No New Taxes”
Following in the foot steps of his predecessor, Mayor Norm Coleman, this week Mayor Chris Coleman stated his proposed 2011 St. Paul city budget will “keep taxes flat for residents” and add additional services. The budget includes money to add parks and recreation staff and services, provide new personnel for police and fire and to do work on the Central Corridor and some bridge projects. What a concept – improved public services without raising taxes.
Continue reading here
2.Government Debt and Government Pay Hit Record Highs
Rumors of a ‘double dip’ recession are all over the news, the economy continues to stall, and wages are stagnate at best, yet the government is managing to pay itself almost double the wages available to the private sector. If government workers earned the average of what private workers earned it would save $339 billion a year. When will the elected officials do something about this private sector public sector pay gap?
Continue reading how public sector salaries
defy logic here
3.Liberal Minnesotans Outraged by Minnesota Business Focusing on …..Business?
This election year presents a unique opportunity for the business owners and job creators in Minnesota by allowing them to actually contribute to political campaigns, but the enthusiasm was short lived after Target Corporation donated to a candidate that has pledged to keep business taxes down and was bombarded with threats of boycotts and vicious media attacks. Why wouldn’t a corporation that provides thousands of jobs support a candidate that proposes to limit taxes for Minnesota businesses?
Click here to find out why profit is considered a four letter word in Minnesota
4.Home Grown Company Lured Away
Viper Motorcycles of Hopkins is the latest Minnesota grown business to be lured away from the nest that incubated it. After 8 years of development Viper is taking a step toward large scale development and away from Minnesota. The company is moving to Auburn, Alabama and a 63000 square foot production facility next year. Viper says they plan to bring 100 jobs to Auburn. CEO John Silseth said that the year round riding weather, a relationship with the Auburn University engineering school, and a $4.5 million financial package put together by the business community helped seal
the deal.
Click here to get the details on how Minnesota let another job provider slip away
5.Just One More Bailout
This week congress passed another $26 billion bailout in the guise of education aid.
$167 million is on its way to the Minnesota Dept. of Education, promising to keep up to 3000 Minnesota teachers gainfully employed, if only for 9 months. Funding for the bill is slated to come from future cuts to the food stamp program and tax increases on multinational businesses. President Obama claims that the money will create “hundreds of thousands of jobs” even after billions of deficit spending has failed to budge the nation’s 9.5% unemployment rate. What is not mentioned is that the Government will do anything to ensure the jobs created are within the public sector; even if that means yet another tax increase for the true job creators.
$167 million is on its way to the Minnesota Dept. of Education, promising to keep up to 3000 Minnesota teachers gainfully employed, if only for 9 months. Funding for the bill is slated to come from future cuts to the food stamp program and tax increases on multinational businesses. President Obama claims that the money will create “hundreds of thousands of jobs” even after billions of deficit spending has failed to budge the nation’s 9.5% unemployment rate. What is not mentioned is that the Government will do anything to ensure the jobs created are within the public sector; even if that means yet another tax increase for the true job creators.
Continue reading about the permanent tax increase for the temporary fix here
6.Federal Stimulus For Private Development
Long-delayed plans for an upscale $130 million hotel at the Mall of America are back on track because of tax-exempt financing available through the 2009 federal stimulus bill. Hennepin County decided it will allow use of the tax-exempt bonds that were created for use on public projects such as roads and bridges. Due to legislation that passed in 2010 the hotel project will be eligible to receive public money through excess tax-increment funding (TIF), funds collected from special mall taxes and the extra property taxes from the enhanced market value of a development to pay for part of the development costs.
Click here to find out why the bonds aren’t being used for roads and bridges
