The Fort Wayne City Council Finance Committee recommended Tuesday terminating the tax abatement agreements of several mid-sized companies.
The committee annually reviewed the tax abatement agreements the city makes with companies to entice them to move to Fort Wayne. The goal of the review is to make sure the companies are meeting their contract obligations, which generally means creating a certain number of jobs or paying their employees a certain salary.
Following a review process, nine companies were found to be non-compliant with their emissions reduction agreements. On Tuesday, they had the opportunity to present their concerns to the Finance Committee.
Ninth, the Finance Committee recommended terminating the emissions trading agreements with Hoffmaster, a manufacturer of disposable food service items, Accugear, an automotive supplier, Applied Metals & Machineworks, a metal fabrication company, LH Carbide, a manufacturer of home appliances and electronics, and Paul A. Walters International, a manufacturer of home and entertainment products.
The committee voted to keep the other five tax breaks to give them more time to recover from COVID, recover from changing economic conditions or get their business back up and running. Republican Second District Councilman Russ Jehl said the committee had to maintain a balancing act in making its decision.
“If we move too quickly on this, it would actually hurt (the Greater Fort Wayne area’s) ability to attract other similar companies,” Jehl said.
The recommendations of the Finance Committee will be voted on by the Council at a later date.
