Think twice, Layton
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em>"... you are an incredibly competitive boy, and a bit of a show-off. The last thing you need is temptation."
-- "The Incredibles" (2004)
In our experience, Layton's elected leaders have never been smug about their city's economic success. Instead, they've been cautious.
And, it's worth noting, lucky -- three freeway interchanges mark the center of town, giving shoppers and businesses alike quick and easy access.
Unlike many cities in Utah, Layton has achieved its success even though it rarely has offered any sort of financial incentives -- tax-increment funding or rebates, infrastructure work, etc. -- to new businesses. As we've written about here before, when Wal-Mart threatened to leave Layton if it wouldn't provide tax incentives for a new Supercenter, the city wished the corporation good luck and stood its ground; the new Supercenter remained in Layton.
But Layton now finds itself at a crossroads. Its position as a retail hub in the Top of Utah remains assured, and it has plenty of professional office space filled with people who wear suits. The one thing it doesn't have enough of, it figures, is manufacturing.
Its approach to filling that missing slice of the local economic pie has been to contract with the Economic Development Corporation of Utah in an attempt to have that nonpofit organization help the city attract aerospace companies and manufacturers of composite materials for the aerospace industry. The goal is attract lots of steady, high-paying jobs to support the growing numbers of families living in and around Layton, adding another dimension to the city's economic strength.
And right off the bat, the temptation is to begin offering incentives to companies. That was the message by EDCU personnel who met with the mayor and City Council in a work session last week: If you want to tap into state funding to help lure these high-tech businesses to your city, the state will require Layton to first pony up with some incentives of its own.
This is a sobering moment for Layton. It has set aside 550 acres of land east of Hill Air Force Base on which it hopes to create this high-tech manufacturing business park. But will it be able to attract the companies it wants without fertilizing the deals with tax incentives?
We hope Layton resists the temptation for now. It should test the possibility that companies will flock to its development for other good reasons: proximity to the base, its location along State Route 193 (which intersects U.S. 89 to the east and I-15 to the west), the probability of complementary businesses also locating in the business park and the location 20 minutes from Ogden's airport, 30 minutes from Salt Lake International, and the Western lifestyle and scenery that we often take for granted.
Giving too much away should be a last resort. Hang tough, Layton, for as long as you can.
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