We have to pay businesses to open stores here?

A few months ago, we were told the "Lifestyle Mall" was going to be paying us. (Lifestyle mall paying special tax, October 16, 2006). Now, just a few months later, and after the election that asked for the taxes to be raised, we find out (funny thing) actually we will be paying them. Evidently, the Bass Pro Shop didn't like the idea that the sales tax in Manteca is the highest in San Joaquin County.

It's it curious the way the headlines before the election told us how we don't have a penny to spare, there's not enough money for the police and fire departments, and developers have to pay special extra taxes.

Now we find out the city was planning to pay the mall project developers about $1.7 million a year in the form of a "rebate" of the sales tax! Surprise!

By the way, this was pushed through the city council so fast that if you went on vacation on Friday two weeks ago, and came back last Monday, you would have missed it. That's right, it was announced three days before the Monday night regular meeting (the minimum time required by law) and then passed with the second reading the next Monday at 9am, again the minimum time required. (Actually, five days is the minimum but that would have been on the weekend.)

Imagine spending as much money as was spent on the "Big League Dreams" ballpark and introducing the idea and passing it all within a week! The public debate over the Big League Dreams project took years. (Maybe that's what they were trying to avoid?)

I asked the mayor and council about this and how long they knew about the plan to pay the mall developer $61.7 million. The mayor said they'd been working on it in secret closed session, for "what, like two and a half years?"

In other words, they knew they were planning to give this huge gift to the mall developer before the election. While they were telling us how poor the city was, and begging people to please vote for the new sales tax and how critical it was to your children's safety, etc. -- they were secretly planning to give nearly half of the money collected by the new tax to this wealthy developer!

There's no way that anyone would have voted for the new tax if they knew half of it was going to be given away to "entice" a Bass Pro Shop to move here.