Chiquita is Coming to Town
Chiquita Banana is moving its headquarters from Cincinnati to downtown Charlotte. The cost is $2 million in city tax incentives and $20 million from the state. At the last minute Chiquita Banana asked for $5 million in moving expenses to seal the deal…….and they got it. Cincinnati only coughed up a total of approximately $6 million, and Chiquita said the Cincinnati airport couldn’t service their business as well as the Charlotte airport. Boy, can Charlotte and the state drive a hard bargain with our money or what! Do you think every corporation considering moving to Charlotte will now ask for the same?
Aren’t jobs for the unemployed worth the cost? Only someone without a heart would criticize this deal, right? The problem is that in order to give Chiquita $27 million, that money has to be taken from somewhere else. How many jobs will Charlotte and North Carolina lose by taking $27 million out of the economy? That’s $27 million less in our pockets to buy cars, spend at restaurants, go to the movies, etc.
The jobs lost because we have $27 million less will be almost impossible to separate from the rest of the jobless population, so we won’t see them. They will none the less be very real, and just as devastating. But the politicians will be able to point with pride to perhaps 200 jobs they “created”. That’s the number of locals Chiquita may hire.
Interestingly, a featured interview about this deal on Charlotte’s Eyewitness News 9 Wednesday evening was with Michael Smith, CEO of Charlotte Center City Partners. CCCP is a city funded enterprise charged with the development
of downtown Charlotte. Chiquita Banana will be moving their new headquarters into the bankrupt office tower of the NASCAR Hall of Fame. Michael was explaining how a corporate headquarters will benefit downtown. The salability
of vacant lots around the NASCAR Hall of Fame will rise, and much needed road improvements will be justified. Restaurants offering broader choices will also be moving downtown.
I would have never imagined 375 jobs (the total Chiquita will employ) in a city of almost a million could have such an impact. It was reminiscent of the promises that were made about how the Time Warner Arena, NASCAR Hall of Fame and light rail (all of which serve downtown) were going to return great riches to the Queen City. Hundreds of millions of dollars were taken from taxpayers to build those gems, and they continue to drain huge sums of money to keep them up and running. They were supposed to make Charlotte a shiny metropolis. Instead Charlotte is the highest taxed, largest debtor city in the state with unemployment and crime rates among the highest in the country. It’s almost as if taking large amounts of money from people doesn’t stimulate the economy like we were promised.
Michael’s job of making sure we feel good about the compensation he gets is never ending. It is the highest among Charlotte’s city employees, $347,000 last year. Michael also gets a well paid staff of sixteen. That’s more money out of our pockets. The CCCP is overseen by a board of thirty-five of the “Who’s Who” that benefit from Charlotte’s downtown growth. To them the CCCP is a good investment of our money. I am disappointed Mr. Smith didn’t take a little time in his interview to thank the citizens outside of downtown that are paying the price to make it all happen.
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