Re: Cox Center
I should have been more clear. Sorry. OCURA is now more transparent than it has ever been, and that is thanks to The Alliance. Ask anyone who has followed them closely or covered them in the media over the past couple of decades. Seriously. For starters, yes, you could/can get minutes and agendas from pre-Alliance days via requests, and always could. But they were not routinely published online until The Alliance began to manage OCURA under agreement with the City. Now the meetings, agendas, packets and minutes are published like clockwork on The Alliance's website. You can find all of that here: https://www.theallianceokc.org/2018-meetingsOriginally Posted by Pete
On the same page you can find schedules, agendas and minutes for The Oklahoma City Economic Development Trust and the Oklahoma Port Authority.
Other problems that used to challenge the transparency of OCURA was a tendency to move meetings around to different locations and to not always have regular office hours. These were mostly due to small staff and resources, but obviously were not optimal. The Alliance has changed all of this.
Regarding The Alliance itself, it is NOT a municipal agency but instead a professional management team contracted by Oklahoma City to manage the affairs of these other orgs and to become a one-stop shop for businesses looking to locate a presence in Oklahoma or invest. Their job is to sit down with these companies and figure out what is required to bring new investment and jobs to our city. Then to direct them to the proper mechanisms, which can include City incentives, state and even federal dollars. Instead of chasing around to a bunch of agencies which may or may not be on the same page, The Alliance streamlines the process and helps OKC move fast in securing economic development.
But as a private organization The Alliance itself has fewer requirements than do the organizations it manages. By the way, other cities have very similar models. OKC's was in part modeled after one in Kansas City, if I recall correctly. Having recently been to Austin on a ULI trip one of my biggest takeaways was that Austin is desperate to get a similar org in place. In fact, it is probably the one and only thing about OKC of which Austin is jealous.
Unhhh...of course they are. It has been a recurring theme on this board for a long, long time and lately has been a dominant topic here.
I think that we can all agree that is a noble sentiment. But it ignores reality. Let me explain why: one of the first rule of negotiations is to not lay all of your cards on the table. Or put another way, the first person to name a price in a negotiation LOSES THE NEGOTIATION.
There of course is a purist argument that we (OKC, the state of Oklahoma, whoever) should not use incentives at all, and to just let the market determine what happens. Frankly, I personally would prefer it this way... ...if everyone else did it too. Unilateral disarmament when it comes to incentives would be disastrous, ESPECIALLY for a city which historically struggles to be noticed. Incentives:
- Allow OKC to attract businesses/jobs which might not otherwise locate here (Boeing, etc)
- Encourage development in areas of the community where it is more challenging/expensive to develop or where you wish to concentrate employment for strategic purposes (downtown, health center) or where it might be difficult to attract interst at all (JFK neighborhood)
- Secure retail in your community which might otherwise not locate here to begin with or instead locate in a metro municipality where sales tax would be siphoned off
Think all of our competition isn't also playing the incentive game? You're dead wrong if so. I mentioned this in another thread a month or two ago, but OKC is providing COSTCO with about $3 million in conditional incentives, while Dallas - who arguable needs to use incentives less than almost any city in our region - gave COSTCO how much? Yep, $3 million.
Even in our own state and our own metro, our neighbors are playing the game...AGAINST OKC. Norman, Edmond, Midwest City and more have incentives designed to lure business and development (and sales tax dollars) to their communities based on proximity to Oklahoma City. Considering pretty much all of our operational budget as a city is dependent upon sales tax revenue, we have to protect against this as if our lives depend on it. Because it sortof does.
So again, unfortunately I am of the opinion that playing the incentives game is a fact of life. If you agree with this in principle, the next step is to decide how you are going to play the game. Whether this involves property or money is beside the fact. Both have value. If you are doing it and you don't want to get absolutely fleeced, having all of your potential resources and all of your methods on full display is only going to give the next company a road map for exactly what your thinking is, exactly how you operate, and exactly what you have to offer, to the dollar. And by the way, it also gives competing municipalities a road map to outbidding you.
Also, by the way, many companies would simply refuse to come to the table at all if they were unable to negotiate under protections of NDAs and the ability to keep certain proprietary information absolutely private.
So, THIS is why The Alliance was formed as an organization which can negotiate on behalf of the City while maintaining some level of discretion. I truly believe they are solid reasons, and despite what is being suggested these elements actually PROTECT the City's interests, its tax dollars, and its economic development opportunities. It's completely fair to keep giving this process scrutiny, but automatically jumping to the conclusion that the reasons are nefarious is a bad, bad idea and a total mis-read, in my opinion.
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