Dear editor,
Should the city and county government be allowed to give new retail business cash to attract them to come to Iola? If you listen to the proponents, it’s a no lose proposition. They say we are going to make a great return on our money and of course our taxes will be lowered , right? Bill Maness says this is not a giveaway. That sounds like political language, they need to call it what it is.
What I am not disputing is the facts, they represent tax revenue to government may be increased. What I am objecting to, is the goal of government should not be involved in distorting the free market place. A term for this is crony capitalism, when politics and business get together. Consider the example of Bolling Meat Market that opened a few years ago. I don’t recall the city, county, Thrive or anybody else giving them money to come to Iola. They took a capitalistic risk and opened it with their own money and are providing a good service to Iola.
Fast forward a couple of years and the city and county are giving G&W Foods money to come to Iola because they said they could not afford to come here without it. I don’t care what the proponents say about the benefits, there are also consequences. The meat market at G&W is going to impact Bolling’s Meat Market. There are other businesses that will benefit.
My question to the city and county government, is it up to you to pick winners and losers? Most of those who are proponents have never owned a business or will benefit from action such as this. The editor of the paper a few weeks ago said it is for the good of Iola. Would she think the same way if the city and county gave a new startup conservative newspaper money to come to Iola? Don’t get me wrong, I am all about trying to grow Iola. It just makes more sense to offer incentives to manufacturing businesses and let the free market take care of retail. After all, if G&W isn’t going to be economically feasible without the free money, should they be coming here anyway? Just because some other cities are doing it does not make it right. The City of Iola and Allen County should be supporting ALL of its businesses and residents equally.
Jim Daugharthy,
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Iola, Kan.
