By GREGORY ZELLER //
A new economic development report puts a positive spin on a tough year for Nassau County.
Pandemic-plagued 2020 was a difficult year everywhere, of course – but the actions of the Nassau County Industrial Development Agency made it a little less devastating in Long Island’s western environs, according to the IDA’s annual Economic and Fiscal Impact report, which measures the agency’s “activities and effectiveness” in growing the county economy.
In fact, 2020 was just about business-as-usual for the IDA, which invested in a total of 12 countywide construction projects – actually besting the 11 approved in 2019.
Acknowledging “innumerable challenges” wrought by the Age of Coronavirus, the report notes more than 3,000 temporary and permanent jobs retained or created with the help of IDA economic-incentive packages, leading to $72 million in new “indirect and induced earnings” and roughly $192 million in new “indirect and induced sales” – big numbers that wouldn’t have been possible without the county’s assistance, according to the IDA.
Harry Coghlan: When the going gets tough.
The report, completed by Saratoga Springs-based urban-development consultancy Camoin 310, goes a long way toward substantiating the economic vitality of those hotly debated incentives packages.
So-called “sweetheart deals” – including years’ worth of reduced-rate Payments in Lieu of Taxes and breaks on sales taxes, mortgage-recording taxes and other levies for companies moving to or expanding in Nassau – are routinely lamented by some observers as unfair and, ultimately, a fiscal loss.
But according to the new report, the IDA’s 2020 investments will ultimately result in $143.3 million in PILOT payments, on property that otherwise would have generated only $117.7 million in pre-expansion property taxes.
All told, the IDA’s assistance will generate $88.2 million in county revenue beyond “otherwise applicable taxes,” according to the report – and love them or hate them, the incentive deals were essential to heading off a potential economic disaster at the height of a COVID crisis that hit Nassau particularly hard, County Executive Laura Curran said Monday.
“Despite the mountain of challenges the pandemic brought, the IDA was still able to make smart investments that aid in the collective goal of driving economic growth in the region,” the county executive added.
All told, the IDA approved 12 projects in 2020 (well behind the 20 projects approved in 2018), with particular focus on corporate headquarters and housing. Television/film production and office-space projects also earned the agency’s attention.
Activity stemming from those projects include 356 construction-phase jobs, while the IDA deal-making encouraged more than $75.3 million in construction-related spending – and added 237 much-needed affordable-housing units to the county’s sum, in addition to 62 market-rate residential units.
Noting “a tough year for so many individuals and businesses,” Nassau County IDA Executive Director and CEO Harry Coghlan applauded his agency’s 2020 efforts, which also included emergency loans for struggling local businesses and the distribution of personal protective equipment.
“The IDA was able to find success in playing a role in supporting our businesses to continue operating and, in many cases, grow and create new job opportunities,” Coghlan said in a statement. “The IDA also launched and participated in many different programs to help the region get through this challenging time.”
