Kansas, Missouri battle over companies

[GRID]

Just tossed my AMC vip card. I promise. I will never ever set foot in an AMC theater again.

[kboish]

Have you no appreciation for the investment the company has made in restoring and enthriving 2 historic structures in an unproven "entertainment district" that is partly unsuccessful, that provides desirable amenities to those who live or want to visit downtown?

I do have an appreciation for their contribution to furthering DT development. What I don't have an appreciation for is them removing support for that DT development. They did a great job redoing the Empire theater and rebranding the Midland. Now, because of their lack of support for DT they won't be receiving my support nor should they receive any support from any other DT booster. I am not going to subsidize their suburban relocation with additional revenue.

[mean]

No more AMC for me.

[aknowledgeableperson]

OK. So AMC is leaving downtown for Park Place in Leawood (which, by the way is not a strip mall). Questions to AMC that should be asked by KCMO leaders. Besides the $40M why are you leaving downtown? Why leave behind what has happened in downtown, does it make any difference to your business decision? Wouldn't a new building downtown, or the Plaza, give you the same benefits that you get in Leawood?

[KCPowercat]

They did contribute to Mainstreet and Midland somewhat....I don't think their cash involvement was too great but love someone to provide the numbers....

that being said, this is a far bigger negative than the positive they assisted with....if a guy helps change my tire but then robs me, do I have to thank him for changing my tire????

[KCPowercat]

OK. So AMC is leaving downtown for Park Place in Leawood (which, by the way is not a strip mall). Questions to AMC that should be asked by KCMO leaders. Besides the $40M why are you leaving downtown? Why leave behind what has happened in downtown, does it make any difference to your business decision? Wouldn't a new building downtown, or the Plaza, give you the same benefits that you get in Leawood?

Answer = $47M and don't have to relocate employees. A company focused solely on that can't turn that type of cash down. Both sides taxbase loses but nobody seems to care about that in either state.

$9000 per employee per year is what that equals up to....JFC are we insane around here?

[kboish]

There CEO said it, it was a completely monetary decision. They give me 40 million dollars, I build an "iconic" 4 story building (thats the biggest joke of it all) on the prairie for 30 million dollars and I ( the ceo) will get a huge effin bonus next year b/c shareholders are short sighted uninterested lemmings that only look at today.

he could build an amazingly iconic building right next door to PAC if he wanted to...high visibility, wonderful setting...the only problem? he'd have to pay for it....

[pash]

.

[GRID]

This is 100% about the money. Period.

45 million plus to move several hundred jobs from downtown KCMO to a suburban greenfield in Kansas? They are building a 30 million dollar building and getting forty something million to do it.

Seriously?

How in the world is that a smart financial move for the state of Kansas to pay that much money just to alter some commutes of a long time kcmo company. All this is doing is destroying the very city that gives suburban Kansas a reason to exist in the first place.

Why are Kansans not completely freaking out about this? This is not good for KCMO, Missouri or KANSAS.

I can tell you that Maryland would not in a million years offer 45 million to move 450 jobs from a Virginia suburb to Maryland or from Downtown DC to suburban Maryland. They would not even offer that to move a company from Seattle or LA. No way.

No way would Downtown DC or Downtown Baltimore offer that kind of money to develop an urban area. They might offer 2-3 million if you are lucky and that's only if they are bringing in new jobs.

The residents of Maryland would go off on the politicians if they even tried to do something like this and most politicians here would not do it in the first place.

Why doesn't the state of Kansas just build a bunch of state owned office parks along 435, furnish them and then offer free rent for five years to every kcmo company that will move and get it over with?

45 million cash to move a company from an urban area to a wealthy suburb of the same metro. That's what incentives are for??? All while most of KCK rots away outside its own little island of corporate welfare way out west?

It's bad enough the KS side freeloads off the MO side and it's bad enough the KS side has an "I'm better than you attitude" toward the MO side.

But to actually cause this much harm to the city is beyond comprehendible. I have yet to find a similar example of corporate welfare in any other metro and this is like the third such example in KC this year alone. KC is totally self destructing and Kansas is only hurting themselves in the long run.

If only the residents there were smart enough to know it.

But yea, if somebody gave me $800,000 to move from my $120,000 old condo in the city to a $600,000 home in a brand new subdivision and still had money left over to pay off all my credit cards and buy two brand new cars, I would probably do it no matter how much I hate suburbs.

But still shame on AMC for taking the bait and especially shame on Kansas. Most people in KC will see this as KCMO failing and Kansas prospering which shows just how brainwashed people in KC really are.

The state of Kansas must be loaded. That's all I can say and for the life of me, I can't figure out why companies are not lined up waiting to get into Kansas from all over the country because you really don't see incentives like this thrown around anywhere else. Not at this level and certainly not for a wealthy suburban location. It just shows how desperate KS is because nobody from outside the area is interested in KS no matter the incentives and so KS has to buy companies, and boy do I mean buy them from KCMO.

[KCPowercat]

Obviously financial considerations are a primary concern running a business but that can't be businesses only decision making criteria. Wonder what MO was able to counter with incentive wise? $20M?

This isn't all on the state....the company definitely deserves heat as well.

[aknowledgeableperson]

This is 100% about the money. Period.

There CEO said it, it was a completely monetary decision.

Those are your takes and assumptions but are not actual statements from the company. Again, what is the company's take on it's decision?

[bobbyhawks]

I'm very disappointed that they are leaving, and I don't know how hard they really tried to find equivalent deals in Missouri after the PEAK incentives were placed on the table, but from a purely business standpoint I can see how it makes sense. Kansas is giving them a net of what? $10-15 million?... to move to the exact office they want. Not ridiculous money for a company of their size, but significant. I don't know how anyone else could match that, or how Kansas will make money from that situation. If you are a CEO tasked with making your company profitable, in a down industry, in a down economy, I can see why they would make this decision. It sucks, because they certainly are turning their backs on KCMO in some regards, but I think our love on the board for progress downtown sometimes makes us castigate companies when there are real underlying business reasons for doing things that they could never put into an article for the public. I/we have been guilty about that with such things with regard to ChefColby expanding his ventures out South, etc.

The JOCO/KS power play to pay more for jobs than the jobs will pay back to the community is probably a bad idea. But, there is still a possibility that harvesting jobs in a down economy will put them in a stronger position when the economy is doing better, and I think that scares many of us. Every fiber of my being says this will not happen, but you never know. It will be interesting to see the budget issues in JOCO vs. KCMO a year from now and two years from now to see if JOCO and Kansas have anything left in the tank or if they are still able to attract new businesses after setting a precident for offering crazy sums of money. For a state that is shedding teachers, slashing the arts, and villifying doctors, they sure have a lot to spare when it comes to free handouts to businesses where at least half, and perhaps a majority of the workers already live in their state. If they alloted $47 million to hundreds of thousands of kids in education, people would freak the f*&^ out, but somehow this causes no alarm when it is to benefit 450 employees and out-of-state investors.

[kboish]

“Leaving Downtown is really bittersweet,” Lopez said. “(This) is a decision that is based on the fiscal responsibility and fiduciary duty that I have to the company and its owners. Be that as it may, the commitment we’ve made to Downtown and the city remains.

AMC officials said Kansas is providing the company with Promoting Employment Across Kansas, or PEAK, incentives worth “in the mid-$40s” million and acknowledged that those payments were a powerful carrot to move the company to Leawood and to keep the company in metropolitan Kansas City, which is the company’s 21st-largest market./quote]

...said Mark McDonald, AMC’s executive vice president for global development. “The incentives help to make what could have been a very complicated situation a much simpler situation.”

“When you combine all of that analysis with a very helpful and very engaged government at the state level and the local level, it was just a tough combination (to beat),” Lopez said.

it is clear as day what he means by these direct quotes IMO...but maybe you're right...there must be other reasons why they moved out there.

from the biz journal

[shinatoo]

I just thew up in my mouth a little

[warwickland]

yikes.

[Highlander]

There CEO said it, it was a completely monetary decision. They give me 40 million dollars, I build an "iconic" 4 story building (thats the biggest joke of it all) on the prairie for 30 million dollars and I ( the ceo) will get a huge effin bonus next year b/c shareholders are short sighted uninterested lemmings that only look at today.

he could build an amazingly iconic building right next door to PAC if he wanted to...high visibility, wonderful setting...the only problem? he'd have to pay for it....

That's my take on it too. The "shopped around the US but the incentives kept us in KC" thing was nothing but a poor attempt at subterfuge to justify taking the money and running.

[Highlander]

delete

[schugg]

I wish I had a few billion dollars laying around so I could donate a half dozen office towers or so. This is a boot in the gut.

[Highlander]

This is 100% about the money. Period.

There CEO said it, it was a completely monetary decision.

Those are your takes and assumptions but are not actual statements from the company. Again, what is the company's take on it's decision?

Have you ever considered that company announcements on issues such as this are spun for greatest PR benefit?

[kboish]

the sad thing is they didn't even try to spin it. they came right out and said it was all about money.

the only thing they did try to spin a little was that fact that they stayed in the metro at all was a favor to us. The ceo made a back handed comment about how this was a small market city where they don't have much to gain from being here so we are basically lucky that kansas bought their allegiance to the area. the balls! (oh, and akp, that was a paraphrase of what he said )