The city's plan commission approved a $5 million Tax Incremental Financing assistance plan for Oshkosh Truck in their development of a large specialized painting facility. While it does seem bizarre that such a large and successful firm would have the success of a huge, $3.5 Billion contract depend upon the city's financing support, it is probably a good thing to support as this has the potential to bring in over 1000 well-paying jobs at time when living wage jobs are very difficult to find (I'd hope that the city and/or Oshkosh Truck issue a press release after this goes through providing clear documentation on how many new jobs were actually created as a result of this project).
Financing support from this city provides an opportunity for the city to promote and incorporate what residents of Oshkosh have clearly identified as a top priority for our city - that being sustainable practices. Folks opposed to the incorporation of sustainable principles into city practices often offer the unsupported claims that such efforts cost jobs. The documentation simply doesn't support this, while the support of sustainability in our community is clearly documented - including support for adding additional costs to reach sustainability goals. And what better opportunity to incorporate sustainability into our practices than when we are offering TIF support? In a simplified example, some of the financing needs to go into sustainable design principles on site.
So what could this mean?
- Storm water control through rain gardens, planting of trees, and natural filtration design
- Water efficiency hardware through a project partnership with the EPA's WaterSense program
- Natural lighting through strategic design and window placement - something almost always lacking in big box manufacturing and assembly facilities
- Energy efficient lighting and heating
- Environmentally-engineered parking area that incorporates trees and sustainable water management
- Consideration of utilizing the large roof top as a source of solar power generation.
- Partnering with Focus on Energy to assist in the efficient design and energy use of the facility
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While it is likely that the incorporation of these practices would increase the initial cost of the project, the monetary savings as a result of energy efficiency are extensively documented, with many investments paying for themselves in a 20 year timeframe. Further, residents in Oshkosh have become experts on the high cost of bad storm water management planning and practices. Finally, this is the type of thing that the residents of Oshkosh want our city to do - this is their realistic vision of what Oshkosh can be. The city has received resident feedback. They have cleaned house of many of the folks who were responsible for the ways of the past. Now let's actually start incorporating these desirable and supported principles of sustainability into our practices.
1 comments:
The new TIF motto-
To Improve our Future
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