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THE TIMES LEADER www.timesleader.com
THURSDAY, JUNE 21, 2012
Editorial
PAGE 11A
OUR OPINION: SUPPORT LIBRARIES
Bag some books at Osterhout sale
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OR $100 OR MORE jigsaw puzzles, board games, you can get an e-read- compact discs, DVDs and – for er and start download- those who didn’t give up all old ing books, boosting technology – books on cassette profits of some distant corpora- and movies on VHS. The savings bonanza comes tion. Or you can spend a fraction of that at the Osterhout Saturday, “Bag Day,” when you Free Library annual book sale, can buy a bag full of education stock up enough books to last a and entertainment for a pitsummer or two, and support a tance because, as they say, everything must go. vital community asset. Traipse through the tent and A perennial bargain for biblipour through the ophiles, the book pages; boost your sale has been going We are talking a brain and sate on all week in a tent feeding frenzy of your soul. It all next to the Wilkes- facts, fun and helps support one Barre library on of the truly fundaFranklin Street and fancy. mental assets we continues through have: A public liSaturday. Visit often, brary. they never stop adding. As Lady Bird Johnson said, We are talking a feeding fren“Perhaps no place in any comzy of facts, fun and fancy. There are children’s books, munity is so totally democratic comic books and cookbooks; as the town library. The only featherweight flights of whim- entrance requirement is intersy and ponderous tomes of eru- est.” And a fitting finale from Condition; picture books and books on taking pictures; alma- fucious, as true today as it was some 2,500 years ago: nacs and atlases. “You cannot open a book The bounty goes beyond books. The collection includes without learning something.”
QUOTE OF THE DAY “We’re talking about violence among youth and we’ve not really talked to the youth. We need to hear their voice.” Shawn Walker The pastor of First Baptist Church and co-founder of the Building Bridges community response to recent youth violence in Wilkes-Barre spoke at a public gathering Tuesday.
OTHER OPINION: CAMPAIGN MONEY
Citizens United merits revisiting
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N A FEW days, the U.S. Supreme Court will announce a decision that could have a profound impact on America’s future - and, it’s not about health care. American Tradition Partnership Inc. v. Bullock is better known as “the Montana case.” The court has been asked to overturn a 5-2 Montana Supreme Court ruling that state elections in Montana are so fraught with the potential for corruption that strict campaign finance laws must be enforced. The Montana court ruled that the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United v. FEC applies to federal elections, not Montana elections. Citizens United held that corporations could contribute unlimited amounts to elections. A group of Montana corporations is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to overturn the Montana ruling. The justices also could schedule a full hearing on the case. This would be a courageous admission that it got Citizens United wrong. Don’t hold your breath. Montana Chief Justice Mike McGrath, in his majority opinion in American Tradition Partnership, identified the key fallacy in Citizens United: the court’s assertion that corporate EDITORIAL BOARD
spending “does not give rise to corruption or the appearance of corruption.” Justice McGrath suggested that the corruptive history of Montana’s “copper kings” shows the problem. In 1907, Mark Twain wrote of U.S. Sen. William A. Clark, a mining millionaire turned Democratic politician: “He is said to have bought legislatures and judges as other men buy food and raiment. By his example he has so excused and so sweetened corruption that in Montana it no longer has an offensive smell.” Twain would have loved Sheldon Adelson, the 78-yearold casino mogul who underwrote Newt Gingrich’s bid for the Republican nomination. He is reported to be prepared to spend $100 million to help elect Mitt Romney instead. If money is a protected form of free speech - as the Supreme Court ruled in Buckley v. Valeo in 1976 - then the obverse is true: Lack of money equals lack of speech. Because of the Supreme Court, some citizens today are less important than others. A cynic might say that’s always been the case. But it shouldn’t be enshrined in law. St. Louis Post-Dispatch
PRASHANT SHITUT President and CEO/Impressions Media MARK E. JONES JOSEPH BUTKIEWICZ Vice President/Executive Editor Editorial Page Editor
MALLARD FILLMORE
Manufacturing tax credit a great opportunity for growth SHELL ANNOUNCED in March it would consider building an ethane cracker plant in Pennsylvania, a plant that could be the single-largest private natural resource development investment in state history and one that could ignite a new industrial revolution here. Cracker plants remove ethane from natural gas and “crack” the ethane into derivatives used to manufacture countless products from sealants to sneakers, from pipes to plastics and from tires to toys. Pennsylvania, led by Governor Tom Corbett, beat out tough competition because the package of incentives we offered – including KOZ designation for the plant location and a tax credit awarded for purchase of natural gas containing ethane – was superior to the 25 years of tax breaks reportedly offered by West Virginia and the more than $1.4 billion in incentives proposed by Ohio. Our proposed tax credit provides exactly what Shell and other natural gas processors need: security that the natural gas suppliers and downstream manufacturing industry a cracker plant requires for success will be built here from scratch, because the tax credit provides development incentive to spin-off industries. Because of our incentive package, Shell and others are considering Pennsylvania for their operations as opposed to the Gulf Coast, where the ethane
MAIL BAG
DAN MEUSER feedstock, infrastructure and petrochemical manufacturing customer base are already established. This proposed facility will require enormous additional investments made by dozens of new manufacturers in order to succeed, and that’s where the tax credit comes in. Capped at $66 million annually and taking effect in 2017, the Pennsylvania Resource Manufacturing (PRM) Tax Credit is performance-based: awarded only if and when a cracker plant buys natural gas containing ethane. And a cracker will only buy such natural gas if it has suppliers from which to purchase natural gas and manufacturers to which it can sell the ethane derivatives. Because the PRM tax credit can be sold to upstream suppliers and downstream manufacturers, the incentive to develop this new industry in Pennsylvania would come full circle. This new industry will create enormous business activity upstream (natural gas purchasing), midstream (the cracker plant itself), and downstream (the new manufacturing base), creating an estimated 17,000 permanent jobs and 10,000 construc-
Dan Meuser, of Shavertown, worked with Pride Mobility in Luzerne County for 20 years before being appointed Pennsylvania Secretary of Revenue.
LETTERS FROM READERS
Crestwood officials urged to reconsider budget plan
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COMMENTARY
tion jobs in Pennsylvania. At those levels of job creation and assuming one or more cracker’s consumption of natural gas in the range of 60,000 to 85,000 barrels daily, the personal income tax generated by such jobs and the business income tax generated by such activity would nearly match or exceed the credit cap each year. The potential return on investment – not even considering additional revenue generated from growth in service industries, hotels, retail stores, housing, etc. – is significant, as the tax credit would pay for itself with job creation and business activity that generates new taxes. Now is the time to enact this tax credit. Shell is looking for security and investment predictability now, as it continues to evaluate the possibility of building its cracker in Pennsylvania within the next few years. Governor Tom Corbett led this effort and won this opportunity for the long-term benefits that will be created for Pennsylvanians across the state. To remain competitive in a global economy, create jobs and strengthen our communities, we must be willing to make carefully calculated investments that will deliver clear returns for our citizens.
he Crestwood School District is fighting the same battle as all school districts throughout the state, thanks to our leadership in Harrisburg. However, there is one striking difference. The Crestwood School Board has heard pleas from dozens of residents and students to use its resources and develop a sensible plan that will keep our district progressive and successful. These pleas have fallen on deaf ears. Reports from the county assessor’s office this week revealed that Rice Township, located in Mountain Top, had the largest percentage increase in Luzerne County in its tax base over the past four months. Township officials attribute this growth of new homes to our community, including our school district, and what it has to offer residents. It is truly disheartening to realize that our elected officials have refused to work as a team, be open-minded, and hear their constituents when asked to look at other options that will minimize the impact of the governor’s actions. The witching hour has arrived; the
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school board has had a year to plan for this day. Last year, teachers in the district took a pay freeze that saved the district nearly $250,000 more than what was necessary to save academic programs. This money was not placed in reserve, but spent on other, non-academic programs. As a parent and a taxpayer, I urge our school directors and administration to use these remaining “budget” days to review their options and amend their plan so that we can preserve the sound education we have established for our children. The current plan will not only threaten the quality of our children’s educations, but also property values. Increasing class size, cutting programs that benefit our students in many ways, and creating job loss is not the answer to maintaining an attractive community. Please
DOONESBURY
reconsider your plan and continue working toward a more academically sound solution. Carolyn Boone President, Crestwood Education Association
Leasing of W-B parking will only hurt business
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et me state that I like Mayor Leighton and believe, for the most part, he is doing a good job for Wilkes-Barre. But putting parking up for leasing will be a short- term boon that will turn into a nightmare for downtown patrons and the business community. Wilkes-Barre’s downtown is showing signs of business progress. Putting parking up for sale will have unintended consequences for years after the mayor has left office. If anything, we need more free parking zones in the downtown area to attract more business. Any business currently contemplating opening a business downtown will be having second thoughts. Gary Cook Plains Township