News-Record.com

Maybe when we're all knotted up.* Doug

Well just don't stand there! Get a protest sign and by a set of Yellow Pig Chinesse-Mini bikecycle wheels to get even. By the way, if you are so upset about these American Rubber companies getting a state tax break, maybe you can complain about the 20% federal WW2 excise tire taxes that was suppose to be repeal after the War for us little consumers and taxpayers. Heck! Why stop there! Go for the Federal Spanish-American war telephone tax too.

We grow, we learn, we change our minds, but where was your concern for incentive shenanigans when the state legislature was re-writing the Bill Lee Act to qualify FedEx for incentives?

As you'll recall, the changes exempted FedEx from the normal qualifications for incentives of paying the prevailing wage in the area, providing health insurance to its employees and removed the property tax from the planes stationed here.

As I recall, you had no complaints at the time and were quite the cheerleader for the project.

If you've changed your mind about incentives, great. If your opinion depends on who is benefiting or the nature of the deal, well...

Guilty. Which is why I'm conflicted, over the issue.

I was and remain a supporter of the FedEx project, which is a centerpiece of future economic development here. Without it, there's no talk of an aerotropolis, no transportation/logistics hub, no Dell, maybe no HondaJet.

As I recall, you didn't want it under any circumstances. Still feel that way?

From the start the FedEx supporters overstated its significance -- your "wihtout it, no Dell" comment is a good example. Dell is here--operating fine without the FedEx hub. This area did not/does not suffer from insufficient overnight delivery capacity.

It is a canard to say that Dell has and others will locate here because a facility is being built that will collect packages from the southeast at night and send them on in the morning. It's a SORTING hub -- it doesn't offer any new business infrastructure. It doesn't offer something to businesses that doesn't already exist. Dell's location here years before the hub opens is proof of that.

But, back to incentives. It is really just a bunch of hot air for one to bemoan incentives in another part of the state while supporting them in one's backyard. Understandable, but unimpressive.

To answer your question, my position evolved. I thought we were being sold a bill of goods and that impotent leaders who had no ideas of their own latched onto the hub as something--anything that made it look like Greensboro was growing positively. Along the way, I saw that few, including local media, were interested in applying much scrutiny to the project. It's coming, legitimate concerns were brushed aside and I'm staying in Greensboro, willing to see if the promised positives materialize.

I'll also be watching to see what comes to fruition regarding the promises that the noise will only affect a sliver of people near the airport and that our air quality won't be adversely affected. I sincerely hope that is correct. I honestly hope my concerns will be wrong. We'll know soon enough.

We will see, but I think the assertion that the FedEx facility will have little or no economic impact will be proven wrong.

Of course it will have an effect on air quality, as do our highways and even our desire to increase passenger service at the airport. It's a tradeoff.

Increasingly, all these deals look like simple extortion.

My understanding is that FedEx will bring in about 1,500 jobs with a possible 15,000 additional service jobs. Does anyone really believe that Dell would be here without FedEx?

With the loss of the textile jobs, I'm told about 10,000, FedEx seems to be our saving grace. At the time the incentives were granted we were still un-certain of Randleman Dam becuse of appealed law-suits.

My worry is not pollution and noise so much as our schools . I would not relocate my children anywhere with bad schools. That to me is the number one problem here.

"Of course it will have an impact on air quality...?" -- Doug

Doug, can you provide a link or quote where your current employer, the N&R, or previous employer, the HP Enterprise, reported such?

Wayne, you asked, "does anybody believe Dell would be here without FedEx?" Do you mean without the FedEx services currently available or do you mean without the as-yet uncompleted FedEx sorting hub? Because it is irrefutable reality that Dell would be here wihtout the sorting hub. They are. To say they wouldn't be here wihtout something that isn't here is moronic. (My Dell's have always shipped UPS, btw).

Roch

Is Dell operating at full capacity? I may have mis-understood their coming here, but I somehow thought it was because of FedEx. I remember talking to Jim Elza, former Guilford County planning Director, several years ago and he said then that Dell & HP and other computer related services were looking at this area because of FedEx. As you may recall, one main factor at that time was that all of the services above use very little water. And also are envi
ronmentally friendly. Anyway, just my two-cents worth,

Roch, every lawnmower and barbecue grill has an impact on air quality. If you've used air conditioning in the last week, you've had an impact on air quality. Who ever said the FedEx hub would not?

Doug, can you answer my question?

I'm not going to spend several hours researching your question when it's completely irrelevant.

The pertinent question has always been whether the FedEx hub, like any economic development project, would have an unacceptable environmental impact. Why would any reasonable person expect it to have no environmental impact?

I see. The fact is that a new business will create jobs. That didn't stop your employers, past and present, from reporting that fact over and over again. That the hub will increase air pollution was never reported as factually as you now admit -- nor, as I can remember, was it ever acknowledged in the editorials you published while at the HPE. Any concerns about air pollution were always prefaced with "opponents say."

This isn't insignificant, Doug. It's a testament to your participation in slanting the coverage.

I don't agree that the issue was slanted by the news media. Besides, all the appropriate state and federal regulatory agencies have weighed in on the environmental impact and approved the project so perhaps it was the opponents' concerns that were exaggerated.

I know you don't and, while I think you are a likeable guy, I recognize that you, as a journalist, are pretty bad at letting your personal preferences cloud your professional judgement.

Probably. But I am an opinion writer.