82R26696 BPG-D
By: Button H.C.R. No. 147
CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
WHEREAS, Neighboring cities often compete with each other for
business investment, offering cost reduction incentives to recruit
individual firms or developers rather than collaborating at the
regional level to create the conditions for sustained economic
growth; and
WHEREAS, Striving to foster job and tax revenue growth,
cities use tools such as the popular 4A/4B economic development
sales tax to fund incentives for businesses; unfortunately,
unhealthy competition reduces the value of incentive packages by
diluting the free market concept; a competitive, incentive-driven
approach focuses on local, short-term gains, often to the detriment
of the important development assets that allow a region to prosper
over the long term; and
WHEREAS, Employment and business activity extend across
municipal boundaries to impact regional development patterns and
the location of future growth; when cities fail to coordinate their
efforts, they often intensify uneven investment in
neighborhoods--for example, promoting the creation of major job
centers at a distance from affordable housing and thereby
contributing to traffic congestion, environmental problems, and
other symptoms of sprawl; not only do these side effects negatively
affect current residents, but they make the region less appealing
to the very businesses the incentives are designed to attract; and
WHEREAS, Research shows that access to an educated and
skilled workforce is generally more crucial to employers than the
availability of tax abatements and that individuals often choose
quality of life over job prospects when deciding where to locate; a
city undermines the regional coordination required to develop human
capital and the quality of life essential to retaining that human
capital when it adopts a localized, reactive, incentive-driven
approach that emphasizes short-term goals over comprehensive
planning; and
WHEREAS, Regional coordination is now more important than
ever, as high-growth industries tend to be highly mobile and are
frequently the target of intense competition on the global level;
and
WHEREAS, In order to compete for business investment in an
increasingly complicated global marketplace, while maintaining the
quality of life that fosters long-term prosperity, neighboring
cities should avoid bidding against each other for firms and
development and coordinate their actions within a comprehensive
planning framework at the regional level; now, therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That the 82nd Legislature of the State of Texas
hereby encourage cities to promote long-term economic development
and job growth by working together on the regional level to attract
and retain business investment.