ConAgra denied tax breakn Support for a peanut butter plant wanes when ConAgra asks for a reduction in property taxes
SUSAN MCCORD
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SYLVESTER — The Peter Pan plant that sat idle for six months after a global recall was refused a property tax break by Worth County officials, whose
legal counsel called the deal ConAgra requested a "straight fraudulent sham."
Worth County Attorney Clarence Miller offered his opinion Wednesday that the
complex bond-financed sale-leaseback deal between ConAgra and Worth County's Economic Development Authority not only infringed on "the taxing powers of the county" but was "bordering on fraud and almost criminality" to Worth's Board of Commissioners.
Worth EDA Director Alex McCoy said the proposal was desired to reward a long-time "good corporate citizen" that had employed many Sylvester residents for decades, and that he didn't believe it bordered on fraud.
"If it does, then just about every development authority and county commission in the State of Georgia is liable to go to jail," said McCoy, who was not at the meeting. "This is a standard document and standard practice."
The arrangement would provide for a gradual reduction of ConAgra's tax bill by 10 percent a year until it reached zero. Worth's inducement to agree to the deal the 26-page proposal calls a "community jobs goal" is up to 30 full-time jobs created through a plant expansion project whose cost is "estimated not to exceed $28 million."
The deal involves the issue of bonds by Worth's EDA and ConAgra's transfer of ownership of its Sylvester facility to the EDA, according to the proposal. At the end of 10 years, the tax abatement ceases and the EDA transfers title of the property back to ConAgra, which is solely liable for repayment of the "cashless" bonds, it said.
The commission refused in a 3-2 vote earlier this year to allow the EDA to issue revenue bonds for a proposed industrial park and has since instructed the EDA it would be refused funding unless McCoy was fired, according to previous reports. McCoy remained at his position Friday.
Officials at the Atlanta law firm Seyfarth Shaw LLP, which authored both bond issue proposals, could not be reached for comment.
"I'll never sign off on a fraudulent document," Worth County Commissioner Bettye Bozeman said after Miller presented his opinion.
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It's approaching RICO; if you're familiar with the federal racketeer-influenced (and Corrupt Organizations Act), this borders on that," Miller continued.
Commissioner Tony Hall, who with Commission Chairman Dan Miller voted in favor of the EDA's earlier industrial park proposal and against the county's threat to withhold EDA funds, made a motion to meet with EDA and ConAgra officials to talk about it.
"If we come together in one room, we can address those things," Hall said. "What are we accomplishing right now?"
"For one thing, you're not adopting this illegal agreement," Clarence Miller said.
Hall's motion died for lack of a second.
"There's no action taken on this thing because our attorney has given his opinion that we throw it out," Bozeman said.
"I go along with that," said Commissioner Jerry Childree.
Miller was replaced as EDA counsel last spring by Tifton attorney Bob Reinhardt, who could not be reached for comment.
ConAgra Vice President of Manufacturing Bob Charleston, who has been working with the Sylvester plant on its restart since the recall, said he'd flown in from Chicago after hearing about the called meeting two days earlier.
Asked to comment, Charleston said only that ConAgra was "involved in economic development all over the world."
Sylvester Plant Manager Earl Ehret said, "We're representing the plant on a local level."
The plant, which employs about 100 people in the production of every jar of the company's Peter Pan peanut butter, is among Worth's top three taxpayers, paying nearly $200,000 in property taxes this year on its buildings and equipment, according to county tax records. Peanut butter made and shipped out of the plant is subject to freeport exemptions and is not taxed.
The company also is one the largest employers in Worth. The county of about 22,000 sends 39 percent of its workforce west, to employers in Dougherty County; 38 percent work in Worth; and 11 percent work in Tift County, according to U.S. Census Bureau data.