How not to build a regional economy

Here's how you don't go about creating a regional economy: By cannibalizing your neighbors' tax base.

It's not just a jerk move, it's a short-term solution that does little to help the tide rise in interconnected communities.

Yes, I'm looking at you folks down at OliverMcMillan, the San Diego-based developer partnering with the City of Coralville on its ambitious Iowa River Landing project.

Rumors have been floating for a while now that recruiters were knocking on the doors of Iowa City storefronts trying to entice business owners to pack up and move to the Landing, where there's lots of retail space and plenty of free parking.

Gazette business reporter Dave DeWitte recently got confirmation from three downtown Iowa City business owners that they'd been approached, and had politely declined the offer.

Of course, that's something developers do all the time. This is real estate we're talking, not Sunday school. But things get shady when a city gets involved.

Coralville is already taking a beating for the tax-funded, eight-figure incentive package the city used to lure Von Maur - Iowa City's last department store - to the new development.

More than two dozen businesses and individuals have signed on to a lawsuit that claims Coralville and OliverMcMillan violated state law by using public funds to offer Von Maur that sweetheart deal.

But even if it's not illegal, it sure isn't neighborly. Not that Coralville's the only mercenary municipality using tax increment financing and other incentives to entice business across the city line.

Remember last year, when Cedar Rapids Mayor Ron Corbett made a very public attempt to encourage Go Daddy to move its operations, and 300 jobs, from Hiawatha to downtown?

Hiawatha's done the same in the past, using incentives' siren song to lure a fistful of businesses from their neighbors to the south.

It's small-minded for cities to look just a few miles away for growth; actively recruiting over the fence salts the fields where we want regionalism to grow.

It also makes life harder for business owners who have enough to worry about without having to tiptoe around a brewing civil war.

Forget Iowa's Creative Corridor, try Iowa's Covetous Corridor. Maybe Iowa's Crafty Corridor. Actually, call it anything you like - it won't matter. Unless more local leaders start paying more than lip service to regionalism, the designation won't mark anything more than a circle of counties on a map.

Comments: (319) 339-3154; jennifer.hemmingsen@sourcemedia.net