LANSING (WKZO-AM) — Bills to give a data processing firm massive tax breaks have cleared their first legislative hurdle, but it was far from unanimous.
The legislation is crafted to give Switch as much as $30 million a year in tax relief if they build their $5 billion data center in Kent County.
Democrats and moderate Republicans, like Jeff Farrington of Utica, passed it out of committee despite four votes against the package from conservatives.
Farrington said the bills modernize the tax code.
“Tax code is very much based on products being bought, sold and hand-delivered somewhere,” Farrington said. “We have to move with the times and this is one step in that direction.”
Democrat John Hoadley, D-Kalamazoo, said there are other data companies in Michigan who are telling him it’s not fair to leave them out.
“We’re going to pay to lure an out-of-state company here instead of taking a similar-sized investment and growing some of the (similar) companies in Michigan that have been good tax-payers for years,” Hoadley said.
Democrats who passed it in committee may not be supportive on the floor if some of the amendments being tossed about are tacked on.
The company has made it clear that, if they don’t have the incentives approved by the end of the year, they will take their data center to another state.
The legislation could be up for a vote in the House and Senate by as early as Thursday afternoon.
– John McNeill
