TU: JPMorgan seeks incentives to bring 250 jobs to Jacksonville

[Patricia M. McBride]

After many of you spent hours and hours at city hall yesterday evening, I thought this might be good to put up.  How does everyone feel about it?  It is certainly less money than many of the other folks have asked us to supply to move across town.  These folks are actually coming from out of town which would be a good thing!  Please weigh in on your thoughts about this.........it is more corporate welfare, but would it be worth while since we can no longer give them a property tax break (which is why these incentives are now the means of attracting new businesses and jobs).

 

But JPMorgan Chase wants the city and state to kick in $1.25M in incentives.

Posted: September 27, 2011 - 2:03pm | Updated: September 28, 2011 - 7:04am

By David Bauerlein jacksonville.com Copyright 2011 The Florida Times-Union. All rights reserved. This m...

September 27, 2011 - 02:03pm

JPMorgan seeks incentives to bring 250 jobs to Jacksonville

JPMorgan Chase is seeking $1.25 million in financial incentives from Jacksonville and the state if the bank adds 250 jobs on the Southside.

The bank, headquartered in New York with a global presence, has been hiring new employees to work with customers in trouble with their mortgages. Jacksonville would get a piece of that expansion.

The new jobs would pay an average of $53,000 and be filled by the end of 2012, according to a Jacksonville Economic Development summary of the proposed incentives.

The JEDC is scheduled to vote on the incentive package Thursday and forward its recommendation to City Council.

JPMorgan already employs about 3,800 people at Jacksonville offices in Deerwood Park and Flagler Center. The bank would lease another 66,000 square feet of space at one of those sites for 250 more workers.

Jacksonville’s share of the incentives would be up to $250,000 and the state would give as much as $1 million. The company would not receive any incentives until jobs are filled. Each job would qualify the bank for a $5,000 incentive. The incentives would be paid over a five-year period.

Jacksonville is competing with cities in Ohio and Texas where JPMorgan Chase also operates, according to the JEDC summary.

Earlier this year, JPMorgan Chase said it would hire 500 to 1,000 workers in the Columbus, Ohio, area to keep up with the demand for mortgage servicing.

Jacksonville has been trying to bring more businesses into downtown, a location that can qualify companies for higher incentives. But JPMorgan Chase has chosen to add the jobs at its Southside offices.

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Read more at Jacksonville.com: http://jacksonville.com/business/2011-09-27/story/jpmorgan-seeks-in...

[amanda choate]

Nor is it a function of government to pay people to work for a private company. So if government money going to private individuals is wrong is the criteria, then neither is appropriate. Remember the Stimulus. Government picking winners and losers. Chase had profits in the US of 17.4 billion in 2010, seems to me they can afford to pay their employees themselves. Further how much money are they sitting on, borrowed from the Fed at nearly 0%., that seems stimulative enough.

[Patricia M. McBride]

Hello Amanda.  I don't know how much of this JEDC stuff you have been following, but the amount of incentive being requested by JP Morgan is chump change compared to what we have given several other outfits just to move from one part of town to the down town.  Chase is actually moving from out of town to our city which could be a good thing.  My focus is not so much what they are hiring people to do but the fact it would be 250 jobs that pay in excess of $50,000 starting pay.  That could very well take some folks out of the default position on the home mortgages as well.  So it works both ways as we have many folks who might qualify for these jobs who may be among the long term unemployed and are just hanging on.  I think the people they are talking about helping may not all be in this area.  So, this works both ways sort of of.  You suggest helping those who are defaulting (which is not a function of government) and the council will consider incentives to help get this company to move here (which is also not a function of government).  The thing is, most people never noticed or cared when we gave companies a break for some period of time on the property taxes for the buildings, but for whatever reason, we can no longer do that, so now we pay them incentives instead which seems more objectionable to folks even though the amount may actually be less than the tax breaks were in some cases.  What are you thoughts?

[amanda choate]

Just drug test them like we do everyone else in this state who wants welfare.

So 10% of their salary would be paid by Florida taxpayers, no thanks. If you can process your florida foreclosures in Ohio, do it. I have a better idea, why not take the money and help some homeowners keep their houses and then we wouldn't even need people to process them. The state helping to pay people to process foreclosures, but not one dime to help people stay in their homes. That is FUBAR.