Fines or Taxes

It’s been said that if you do something wrong you get fined, if you do something right you get taxed! I hate to start this on a cynical note, but it seems like the two are inexorably connected. During this tough economic time the government, whether federal state, or local is looking for revenue streams and they may be coming from your watering hole. We had a business roundtable last week with the new Mayor Jonathan Rothschild and Councilman Paul Cunningham. One of the men that spoke at the meeting shared how in the seventies he built the tallest building (outside of the downtown area) and got the permits completed in 6 months. He has a smaller project that he has been working on for 3 years and said he expects it to be another year before he gets out of permitting. This lengthening of the process for permitting involves two things that are extremely counterproductive. The first is that during this process the client is being pummeled with fees and extraordinary expenses. The second is that the project is not out of the ground. The loss of time costs us jobs and opportunity. John Strobeck with Bright Solutions said that there is currently 20 percent of the new construction that there was in 2006. So it stands to reason that you probably only have about 20 percent of the permits being submitted now as compared to 2006. Yet, you probably have about the same number of people working at Tucson Planning and Developmental Services. So they lengthen the processing time and increase the fees to ensure job security. Yet, if they processed these permit applications in a timely manner the projects would be out of the ground, people would be working and the sales tax revenue would be increasing. Mayor Rothschild said that one of his priorities in his first 180 days was reform in Planning and Developmental Services and the Land Use Code. This should be applauded and encouraged before our watering holes dry up.