Thursday, December 10, 2009

 

 

C.O.R.E. Jobs Act Will Encourage Job Growth

Economists tell joint committee hearing the bill will address state's economic needs

 

Madison -- The C.O.R.E. Jobs Act will address some of the state's most critical economic challenges and create new jobs statewide.  That's the message members of the economic development committees of the State Senate and Assembly heard at a joint hearing today.

 

“The overall strategy of this legislative package is to encourage job growth in Wisconsin," said David Ward, president of NorthStar Economics, an economic consulting firm that completed a study of the bill's potential impact on the state. "Each component of the C.O.R.E. package is focused on how Wisconsin can do a better job in fostering business growth and small business formation."

 

The committees also heard praise for the bill from the Wisconsin Business Council, the Wisconsin Economic Development Association, the Wisconsin Technology Council, along with entrepreneurs, investors and researchers.

 

Senator Julie Lassa (D-Stevens Point), the bill's lead Senate author and chair of the Senate Economic Development Committee, told committee members that the C.O.R.E. Jobs Act is a comprehensive economic development plan that is necessary to move our state’s economy forward. "This proposal focuses on our state’s competitive advantages and on innovative programs that meet our most important responsibility in today’s challenging economy – creating good paying jobs for Wisconsin workers and their families," she said.

 

"Partnering with businesses, these new tools will strengthen our economy by focusing on workers, investors and small businesses,” said Rep. Louis Molepske, Jr., author of the Assembly companion bill.  "The bill proposes new opportunities that are worthy of consideration, and the Assembly Committee on Jobs, the Economy and Small Business is focused on looking at all options for economic recovery."

 

Senator Kreitlow, co-author of the legislation and a member of the Economic Development Committee, testified on the impact tax credits have had in creating jobs in the Chippewa Valley, where the technology zone program helped create over 500 high tech jobs from 2004 to 2008.  “A critical aspect of our economic recovery is finding ways to encourage the private investment necessary to create jobs,” said Kreitlow.  “We have seen tax credit programs that are tied directly to job creation play a big role in start up businesses and expansions all over the state, and the CORE Jobs Plan will make the programs that make those credits available more accessible and more effective.”

 

State Representative David Cullen (D-Milwaukee), one of the Assembly co-authors of the proposal, said the initiative is an important step in helping Wisconsin’s economic recovery.  “We know that government can’t solve all the problems, but we can provide some incentives and tools to assist the entrepreneurs and small businesses that we know are the backbone of our economy,” he said.  “The C.O.R.E. Jobs Act does that.”

 

C.O.R.E. stands for Connecting Opportunity, Research and Entrepreneurism.  The bill was structured around three goals:  Creating New Jobs and Businesses, Retaining and Building Existing Wisconsin Businesses, and Educating and Training our Workforce.  Provisions in the bill include:

 

Creating New Jobs and Businesses

  • Expanding the Accelerate Wisconsin program by adding $3 million more in tax credits for 2010 to spur investment in Wisconsin companies with the credits increasing to $20 million a year thereafter.  The current amount of tax credits available each year is $5.5 million.

  • Grants to help partner small and mid size businesses with research institutions, including the University of Wisconsin comprehensive campuses, to commercialize new technologies faster.

  • A micro-loan program to help entrepreneurs start their own small businesses.

  • Support for a UW system-wide business plan competition similar to the one at UW-Madison.

  • Funding a regulatory ombudsman to provide one-stop help with the state’s permitting and approval process.

 

Retaining and Building Existing Businesses

  • An additional $1 million for the Wisconsin Development Fund, used to attract and retain businesses.

  • Incentives to re-open shuttered factories for use in green energy production or manufacturing.

  • Grants to encourage companies to do Farmshoring – a development strategy that brings good jobs to rural areas of Wisconsin instead of sending these jobs overseas.

  • The creation of the Wisconsin Business Intelligence System (WISBIS) to provide economic modeling data to regional economic development entities.

 

Educating and Training Our Workforce

  • Adding more resources to the popular Advanced Manufacturing Skills Training program grant created in the economic recovery bill from earlier this year.

  • Creation of an employee education investment tax credit.  This credit will leverage new resources for skills training and career education by providing $2 million in incentives for businesses who pay university or technical college tuition for low-income employees. 

 

"The bill contains measures the business community has requested, and that have a proven track record of promoting job growth and business success," Lassa said.  "It is my hope that the bill will quickly move through the legislative process and be signed into law by Governor Doyle within the next few months."