From Impact Weekly (Dayton), January 4-10, 2001:
These practices are greatly contributing to sprawl in the Miami Valley. On Dec. 28, Printing Services Co. received a tax break to leave its Second Street location downtown and move to Springboro, a community already stricken with new development. Right next to this new location, planners are hoping to build an interchange and highway near Austin Road.
According to anti-sprawl activist Mike Monett of the local Sierra Club Tecumseh Group, the Printing Services tax break and the Austin Road interchange are perfect examples of what are, in his opinion, the two leading causes of sprawl in Ohio: tax abatements and road construction.
Printing Service's tax abatement is part of the Ohio Department of Development's Enterprise Zone Program, originally designed to grant tax incentives (up to 75 percent exemption for property taxes) to companies moving to areas (enterprise zones) in need of development, such as Appalachian communities and inner cities. Unfortunately, development interests haveUnfortunately, development interests have cor-rupted the program over the years. 'While areas such as downtown Dayton are rightfully enterprise zones, areas such as Springboro have also become enterprise zones.
"The proposed tax abatement for Printing Services Co. encourages sprawl by providing a company monetary incentives to move its business and employees away from the city of Dayton to a suburb that is auto-dependent and experiences haphazard, low-density development," Harps said.
Printing Services Co. employs 170 people and has been located in downtown Dayton since 1933.
"Not only is the vast 'enterprise zone' in this story the home of half-million dollar trophy houses, gated communities and new golf courses," Monett said, "but there is only one pocket in or near it of even remotely affordable, lower/middle-class housing -a trailer park on Wood Road next to 1-75." Yet a map submitted to the Ohio Department of Transportation (ODOT) by the Miami Valley Regional Planning Commission (MVRPC), Monett added, "shows the trailer park... totally engulfed by the asphalt, light poles and guard rails of the huge, spider-like interchange. At the other end of the map, one... ramp conveniently swings right past the Printing Service Co. site. This would obviously provide them and all of their new, tax-abated industrial neighbors with wonderful sign exposure."
Approval of the tax break came with added pressure from the company - Printing Service had threatened to leave the state if its request was denied. "They said they would go to Indiana if they didn't get this," said Ron Parker of Montgomery County's Economic Development Department. Parker also expressed concern that the city of Dayton didn't have a fair shance to offer other properties or expand the current property.
Despite repeated phone calls, a Printing Services spokesperson could not be reached for comment.
THE NEW, $80 MILLION I-75 interchange would be located halfway between the exits for state Routes 725 and 73. The project has Tier II status with ODOT, which means it's being studied but no formal application for funds has been made; Montgomery County Engineer Joe Litvin might apply for funding in the fall. Connected to the interchange would be a new road, the Mound Connector, which would run west to Miamisburg's Mount Plant and onward to state Route 4. In September, the Montgomery County Commission approved a $4 million, two-year study to find the best course for the road.
"What you're really looking for is a balance supporting development in a controlled fashion," said Nora Lake, executive director of the MVRPC. "There are developers whose purpose is to open up and have access to that part of the community. ...People need to understand that there's already a high level of development there. It's happening anyway. The question is how do you deal with it."
Still, many Springboro residents are concerned about further development. "If you talk to most people, they moved out here to get away from the overdevelopment," said resident Julie Dubel, who, with other local citizens, fought the construction of a proposed Meijer's near state Route 73. Petitions opposing the Meijer's were signed by scores of Springboro residents. "The biggest thing is that we don't need a Meijer's here," Dubel said. "It's more growth than we need."
Until state policies are corrected and area planners develop a smart growth plan, one of the greatest challenges for citizens opposed to sprawl will be facing the vicious cycle of enterprise zones and road building. "They (tax abatements) are being given to encourage business where companies are flocking anyway," Monett said. "Then, once all this so-called 'economic growth' happens and the roads get gridlocked, we're hit up again for new freeways, which will just attract more new enterprise zones, and the cycle continues.
"Every year, the state of Ohio spends about $300 million just on brand new major roads, not including dollars from the towns themselves," Monett continued. "We have federal transportation policies that encourage the states to compete for a self-perpetuating pot of road money and state policies that then encourage our local governments to fight over it. What gets lost, in the haste to grab the bucks, are rational debates about if and why we need the roads in the first place."
Monett added that plans for the new roads are deliberately confusing to keep the facts hidden from the public until the project is on a fast track. "That's their strategy: to have the momentum before going to the public," he said. "I had no idea they were planning this (the interchange) either," Dubel said. "And I live here."
CONTACT IW FREELANCE WRITER by email.
To get involved with local efforts to stop urban sprawl, contact Mike Monett at 254-2714 or by email
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