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CITY COUNCIL VOTES TO GIVES TAX CREDIT TO COMPANY

By AmyJo Brown/OF THE COMMERCIAL STAFF
Tuesday, March 18, 2008 2:35 PM CDT

Pine Bluff’s City Council voted 8-0 Monday to give the owners of Pine Bluff Poultry a sales tax credit, the amount of which was estimated to be about $82,700.

The dollar impact was discussed earlier that day at a council Ways and Means Committee meeting and was given by Third Ward Alderman Bill Brumett.

“It’s a feeling of the economic and community development department that we would get a return on our investment in two to three years,” said Brumett, who chairs the committee.

And, Brumett later told the full council, “We need the jobs.”

The credit, the first of its kind many Pine Bluff officials could remember approving, was offered to Phuellink Investments LLC, a California-based company who announced in December it planned to move into the former Tyson Foods plant on West Second Avenue.

At the time they announced their decision, company officials said they would begin hiring employees in April, and expected to have hired 300 by the end of 2008.

With the council’s approval, the company will be able to receive a refund on any sales or use tax levied by the city on any materials the company purchases for the construction of a building or the remodeling of an existing one, according to the resolution.

The company has said it plans to spend $3 million this year and next remodeling the former Tyson facility, which it will use to process spent hens.

Lou Ann Nisbett, president and chief operating officer for the Economic Development Alliance of Jefferson County, said Monday that the company plans to invest up to $5 million in projects that would qualify for the tax incentive, which is being applied for through the state’s Tax Back program.

The credit is performance-based, and will be refunded only if the company meets certain criteria set by the state, such as creating the number of jobs promised within in a certain time period and having a certain payroll amount.

The credit will expire three years after it was authorized. While the city has projected the savings to the company at the $82,700 figure, there is no cap on the amount of taxes Pine Bluff Poultry could potentially have refunded within the three-year timeframe.

Also Monday, sponsors of a proposal for a new city flag and logo pulled their resolution before the full council could vote on it. Instead, they said, it will be discussed in the council’s Public Works committee before being officially considered.

“They felt like more input should be put into it rather than two or three people making the decision (for the city),” said Fourth Ward Alderman George Stepps, one of the three sponsors.

Proponents of the new flag and logo — which refers to Pine Bluff as the “Harbor City, the anchor of Southeast Arkansas” — attempted to keep the details of it sparse, saying they wanted to get it through the council with minimal fanfare so that they could make a big unveiling of the design at a later date.

Greg Gustek, executive director of the Pine Bluff Image Campaign Committee, went individually to the three aldermen on the council’s administrative committee, seeking their sponsorship of the resolution — circumventing the need for the committee to meet and discuss it publicly.

Mayor Carl A. Redus Jr. said after the council meeting that the proposal for a new city flag and logo took him by surprise.

“I haven’t had a chance to look at it,” he said. “When we change something like that ... the citizens should have some input.”

He also said there was confusion about what logo the new one would replace.

Some council members remember a slogan oft-used that said “Pine Bluff loves people. And a seal in the City Council Chambers refers to Pine Bluff as “the city of progress,” while some business cards and other city objects refer use a “Positive Pine Bluff” slogan.

Also Monday, the council:

< Voted 8-0 to send a proposed ordinance requesting re-zoning of land along Grider Field Road back to the city’s planning commission. The council asked the commission to fix procedural errors with the way the proposal was handled. The proposal seeks to allow a multi-family affordable housing development to be built on 10 acres in the 100 block of Grider Field Road.

< Appointed Julia Lamb, a secretary in Redus’ office, to the Board of Trustees for the Arts and Science Center of Southeast Arkansas.

< Appointed Don L. Scott, an insurance salesman, and Edward A. Long, a management consultant, to the Pine Bluff Planning Commission.

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