A resolution supporting an eight-year, $1 million state grant to support Frito-Lay's $60 million expansion of its Aberdeen facility was recently approved – albeit narrowly – by the Aberdeen City Council.
The resolution is largely symbolic, because it's not the city's money, obviously, but the two who voted against it, Mayor Patrick McGrady and Councilman Steve Goodin, took the opportunity to criticize the concept of government aiding private businesses. Their criticism was just as symbolic as the resolution.
"I think Frito-Lay is a great business, and it's great to be in the City of Aberdeen," Goodin said. "I just have a philosophical difference with the idea of governments giving private businesses, for lack of a better term, a bonus."
McGrady, meanwhile, called Frito-Lay "a great partner with the City of Aberdeen," while noting the company has made investments of up to $100 million in its local plant in recent years and "created a pile of jobs."
"It's great for Aberdeen, it's great for Harford County, but I can't endorse the State of Maryland granting them $1 million for this," he said.
The resolution was approved, 3-2, with council members Melvin Taylor, Sandra Landbeck and Tim Lindecamp voting for it. "I think if we don't pass this resolution then other businesses won't come into the City of Aberdeen to build," Lindecamp said.
Whether the latter statement is true remains to be seen; however, if there's a point where ideology needs to take a back seat to reality, this was it.
The incentive game has become a standard operating procedure for governments in the contemporary economy. If you don't play, you probably can't win. If you do, there's still no guarantee a business will pick your town over somewhere else. What choice do you have?
Frito-Lay has been in Aberdeen since 1994 and has received numerous tax and other incentives. But the company has indeed stuck around and steadily expanded its local operations. There are dozens of incentive deals made for other businesses in Harford County over the years that didn't pan out so well. Does the name Merry-Go-Round Enterprises ring a bell?
McGrady's and Goodin's Frito-Lay posturing aside, just two months earlier the mayor lamented that the European grocery chain Lidl chose Cecil County for its new regional headquarters and distribution center, rather than Aberdeen or Harford County. (The company's representatives have said Aberdeen will be among the first to get a new store – small consolation though it may be.) Lidl may have had its eye on Cecil all along, as a Harford County government spokesman insisted when asked last week about Harford's non-consideration, but who's to say?
Businesses weigh all kinds of factors when they decide to build a new plant or distribution center or store or open an office. Government incentives are among them.
While opposing such giveaways may sound good when you're making a stump speech, those words ring pretty hollow when you're leading a city and you've made it clear you want and need more economic growth. In this instance, it would have been better for the two Aberdeen officials to just eat their Cheetos quietly.