Governor may have burned bridges by not calling special session

by Patrick Gannon, Capitol Press Association, published in Greenville Daily Reflector, September 15, 2014.

In a video posted online Friday afternoon, Gov. Pat McCrory, smiling throughout, announced he wouldn’t call legislators back to Raleigh this year to consider new economic development incentives or extend existing tax credit programs. He left the door open, however, to summon the General Assembly if a “major job-recruitment effort develops and it requires legislative support.”

Not everyone was smiling after watching the video. Here are a few thoughts about the governor’s decision not to compel a special session.

1) The governor and his staff considered this an important decision. The 4 minute, 47 second video posted to YouTube mirrored a media strategy McCrory’s used previously to make other big announcements. The Republican governor released a video last year to explain why he vetoed two Republican-sponsored bills related to immigration and welfare benefits. He also used videos to tout economic progress in his first year in office and to announce that he was signing controversial elections legislation, which included the voter ID requirement.

The fact that his office sent out the video without notice at 4 p.m. on a Friday suggests that it was hoping for less media attention than such a message would otherwise garner.

2) The decision wasn’t easy, and the first-term governor might have burned bridges in making it. A member of his cabinet, Commerce Secretary Sharon Decker, was part of a contingent that urged the governor to bring lawmakers back. She wanted more money for a popular incentives program, known as JDIG, and a special cash fund to help close deals with companies in the latter stages of negotiations with the state. The N.C. Economic Developers Association, Democratic U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, Charlotte officials, film industry advocates and some Republican and Democratic legislators also wanted a special session. Another cabinet secretary, Susan Kluttz of Cultural Resources, had pushed for the renewal of the historic preservation tax credit program, which expires at the end of the year.

But the governor resisted, saying it would be “counterproductive and a waste of taxpayer money to bring the General Assembly back when there is no agreement in place” on the incentives issues. Lawmakers couldn’t agree on a package of incentives legislation during the short session, which ended last month.

3) The decision might have implications for the November elections for state House and Senate. Don’t be surprised if you see ads or receive mailings about the incentives issue before Nov. 4. Already, some Democrats are speaking out about the potential negative impact on job creation of backing away from incentives.

“I’d like to know how the governor hopes to finance teacher raises if there’s no commerce going on in this state,” Rep. Susi Hamilton, a Wilmington Democrat, told the Wilmington StarNews.

The conservative group Americans for Prosperity, however, praised the governor. “The time for corporate welfare and special interest handouts is ending in North Carolina,” said Donald Bryson, AFP’s North Carolina director.

4) The incentives issue again will be a topic for debate when the Legislature convenes in January for the long legislative session. It will be interesting to see whether this year’s anti-incentives legislative session is a sign of what’s to come from the GOP-dominated Legislature. In the video, McCrory hinted that he would push next year to implement new economic development tools to recruit jobs and ask lawmakers to pass a program to restore historic buildings.

We’ll see what happens next year. But McCrory didn’t feel the need to do it now.

 http://www.reflector.com/opinion/other-voices/gannon-special-session-killed-2652151