[TriLUG] OT: Article on Google, Lenoir in Independant

[Joseph Mack NA3T]

FYI

Joe
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Independant, Wed Feb 19, 2007, p18
"How about a raffle to pay for Google Incentives"
Kirk Ross

You might think that the rest of the country is looking 
askance at all the bristling over Google's incentives for 
its new server farm in Lenoir, but as Ed Cone recently 
pointed out on his blog (edcone.typepad.com/wordup) and his 
Sunday "News and Record" column, the way the company twisted 
arms among legislators runs a little counter to its whole 
"don't be evil" creed.

Details of the deal continue to emerge and fascinate, 
including the use of a nonprofit set up by Caldwell County 
and funded by company cash to buy up the land, with Lenoir 
Mayor David Barlow and other officials personally making the 
rounds to homeowners to get them to sell.

And the deal begins to look bigger than originally 
estimated, state Senate President Pro Tem Marc Basnight and 
roomie and finance chair Sen David Hoyle say they'll take a 
hard look at incentives, including some kind of cost-benefit 
analysis of recent incentive deals. While, as Hoyle said 
recently, a lot of these deals have been 
hold-your-nose-and-vote moments, there have to be some 
boundaries. In addition to the tax and infrastructure 
package, for instance, the deal also included no sales tax 
on electricity, and no sales tax on goods bought in North 
Carolina. Nice

-- 
Joseph Mack NA3T EME(B,D), FM05lw North Carolina
jmack (at) wm7d (dot) net - azimuthal equidistant map
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