In a memo dated April 21, 2016, Pima County administrator Chuck Huckelberry boasts of a letter to the Chuck Huckelberry demanding that it drop its lawsuit against the County for the illegal deal with World View. The letter, signed by a handful of County beneficiaries and Huckelberry supporters, appears to make unsubstantiated assertions in what many believe is an effort to obstruct justice.
Huckelberry writes in his memo:
Attached is an April 19, 2016 letter that was delivered to the Goldwater Institute objecting to their interference with our attraction of World View Enterprises, Inc. to Pima County.
I very much appreciate the support of the business community in this effort. As you know, one of the cornerstones of our Economic Development Plan is to grow our own high-wage, export-based employment. World View Enterprises, Inc. fits this startup model; similar to Accelerate Diagnostics, which has been an extraordinary success – growing from 20 employees to more than 120 in less than three years.
World View is a win-win proposition. The company will receive the facilities necessary to be successful and grow while adding jobs quickly. The County gets hundreds of high-paying jobs and billions of dollars in economic activity over the term of the 20-year lease.
World View is a benefit to our entire community, and I thank the business community for communicating that to the Goldwater Institute.
The letter, signed by Joe Snell, who is the head of TREO; a County beneficiary and leaders of southern Arizona’s struggling chambers of commerce claims that Goldwater must immediately withdraw its lawsuit because the “future of Arizona’s economic competitiveness is at stake.”
Long on hyperbole and short on specifics, the letter writers claim that Goldwater’s lawsuit could “call into question our state’s capacity to grow its innovation economy.” While the claim that “World View investors will sustain unwarranted uncertainty and future investment will be dampened,” one of the reasons the lawsuit has won widespread support from the public is due in part to the secretive process employed by the County and the lack of transparency about the investors and viability of “the future investment” in a publically funded private company shielded from public records laws.
On Sunday, James Manley of the Goldwater Institute wrote a response that appeared in the Arizona Daily Star. In his piece: Goldwater Institute: County taking risky gamble with public’s millions, Manley writes in part:
Space tourism is risky. New Mexico’s “Spaceport America” has cost taxpayers more than $200 million, yet it remains largely incomplete — and empty. Popular Mechanics recently called it a “ghost town,” noting that the prosperity locals were promised is nowhere in sight.
Nevertheless, Pima County has fashioned a complex scheme to essentially mortgage county-owned buildings to fund World View’s new headquarters. All this adds $15 million in long-term debt to the county’s balance sheet — which is already deeply in the red — and if the company defaults, the county will either lose its buildings or taxpayers will be forced to make up the difference.
World View will lease the property at below-market rent with an option to buy, but the county doesn’t expect any return on its investment until Year 18 of the 20-year plan. And though World View agreed to employ a certain number of people, there’s nothing the county can do if it doesn’t — except cancel the contract, leaving it with an empty balloon pad on its hands.
Manley argues that “Arizona statutes require fair and open competition when a county leases property or signs construction contracts. Instead of protecting taxpayers with an appraisal, an auction and competitive bidding, Pima County agreed to rush the project and sidestep these transparency requirements.”
It is because the County failed to meet those requirements that the Goldwater Institute filed the lawsuit.
While Manley applauds the County for actually trying to be business friendly, he notes that using public funds rather than using money from investors who have “real incentives to protect their investments” is the formula that “gets us government-created “ghost towns.”
Manley claims that “better ways to help” grow the economy in southern Arizona. He writes, “Lowering taxes and reducing regulatory burdens benefits all businesses, not just the politically connected few with the flashiest projects.”
“Taxpayer subsidies to businesses encourage backroom deals that benefit the politically connected and leave taxpayers with the short end of the stick,” concludes Manley.
Two Green Valley residents stated, “Goldwater will back off when Pima County cancels the crony governmental arrangement with World View Enterprises. That is the request made by Goldwater. With County Administrator Chuck Huckelberry’s cadre of taxpayer-funded attorneys, what does he care about the cost of fighting to defend a violation of the Arizona Constitution? Supervisor Miller is the only elected official with cajones big enough to take on the corrupt Pima County government. The way out of this 20 year bleed is to stop the money leaks from becoming a waterfall by electing Closen and DeMarco to restore Pima County.”
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