Posted on 02/13/2017 1:37:08 PM PST by TigerClaws
Two dozen California companies have said they are tired of the business-bashing in Sacramento, along with the high taxes -- and they are now threatening to leave the state.
Prop 30 spurs business backlash as firms flock to flee Calif. The day after Proposition 30 passed, triggering $6 billion in new annual taxes, Arizona launched a campaign to lure some of California’s top companies.
KCRA 3 has learned that 24 chief executives are flying to Phoenix, Ariz., to explore the land of lower taxes and a much friendlier business environment.
View photos -- Ariz. launches campaign for Calif. businesses
“We can deliver the mayors, we can deliver the CEOs, we can deliver the legislative support,” said Barry Broome, president of the Greater Phoenix Economic Council.
Broome launched his campaign to recruit California CEOs one day after voters in the Golden State approved Prop 30 last November, and the campaign is working.
Broome said 24 CEOs already have committed to leaving California.
“You start sending the wrong message to those folks and they start voting with their feet,” Broome said.
Dave Albertson is one of the people who found greater opportunities in the Grand Canyon State.
Albertson recently moved his marketing and technology company, Wholesalefund, from California to Arizona, where he now does business in a Scottsdale office park.
“Certainly when we were weighing the pros and cons, the operating costs and certainly some of the benefits of Arizona, (it) looked favorable,” Albertson told KCRA 3.
The Greater Phoenix region grew by 50,000 jobs last year.
Meanwhile, many California companies are thinning their ranks.
Chevron is moving 800 jobs from their Bay Area headquarters to Texas, and Waste Connections shifted more than 100 jobs to Texas from Folsom.
Other California firms are also on the move.
Business relocation expert Joe Vranich has been counting.
“I tracked for 2011, that 254 companies of all sizes and shapes and kinds left the state for primarily other states,” said Vranich, the president of Spectrum Location Services in Irvine.
He told KCRA 3 that companies leave California for three primary reasons: “High taxes, excessive regulations and the threat of really ridiculous lawsuits.”
And they are leaving for places such as Arizona, a state that means business.
The state is big on streamlining business regulations and cutting through bureaucratic red tape.
In Phoenix, the emphasis is on granting business permits very quickly.
Arizona’s fast-track permitting allows certified architects and engineers in Phoenix to get building permits in a single day.
By contrast, Duane Woods told KCRA 3 that California’s process is painfully slow.
As a former executive at Waste Management, the largest recycling company in the world, Woods moved his regional headquarters from California to Arizona.
“We started trying to permit a major recycling facility in LA at an old landfill site, mind you. That site is still not permitted to this day,” the former VP told KCRA 3.
Woods said the permitting process has taken more than 10 years, and there still is no facility in California.
Yet, it took just two years to build the same plant in Arizona.
“If you took a white board and said, how can we make it difficult, how many agencies can we layer on, California is just as complex as it can be,” Woods said. “It’s not an employer-friendly state. And to that end, it’s more difficult -- definitely more costly to operate in.”
Of all the states, California ranks dead last for policy friendliness, with key negatives for high taxes, high workers compensation costs and high electricity costs, according to the most recent report from the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council.
But the Brown administration denies that California is bleeding jobs to other states, despite the 254 companies counted by Vranich.
“Well, we know businesses are concerned about tax policy,” said Kish Rajan, the director of the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development, or GO-Biz for short.
“But at the same time Mike, I have to tell you -- we see companies that are coming here, that are expanding here. Great names like Caterpillar, Amazon, Samsung, Sutter Health up here in the Sacramento area, VSP in the Sacramento area,” Rajan told KCRA 3.
But the former executive of Waste Management believes it’s too little, too late.
“Denial is not a strategy,” Woods told KCRA 3.
The California legislature is now considering a bill to add yet another paid holiday for state workers.
Meanwhile, Arizona has placed a moratorium on future regulations for business. The contrast exemplifies how Arizona and California have radically different values when it comes to business and labor.
California used to be a magnet for people to move from other states, but U.S. census data shows the population patterns have reversed.
Nearly 100,000 more people moved out of California than moved in, with the prime destinations being Texas and Arizona.
Of course, there are multiple reasons for people to leave a state, including family issues -- so, not all the migration is job related.
But the trends continue to show California as a net exporter of people to other states.
People from outside of California screwed it up here, so now it’s your turn.
Yep. Californication is a metastatic cancer. On the plus side, it can only hasten the day of settling scores between the two Americas.
My husband’s company made the decision to leave California 8 years ago. We came with them to Arizona and haven’t looked back (much). Miss the gorgeous state and the wonderful weather, but the politics here are much more like us. Hopefully, Trump can get a handle on the illegals and Arizona will turn back to a more Conservative place again. Just an FYI-it was Soros money that defeated Sheriff Joe. Something has to be done about outside influence in local politics. (But there was also the phony indictment against Joe Arpaio, the night before early voting started. I even had Conservative friends tell me Joe was dirty.)
Yes. We’ll take the jobs, but leave the people. (AZ).
I was at a Christmas party about ten years ago and the HR Manager was talking about their California office and what a headache it was to comply with all the nonsense out there.
She actually told the story in a mocking style. Snickering and shaking her head. And as I said, this was about ten years ago.
It will be wonderful to finally, finally scrap and let rot the ‘California model’ of education. So happy the idiots in Cali will now receive their just rewards.
Thanks to all for commenting.
Sad that liberals never learn. They are stuck on stupid.
Rather than realize their politics was the cause of the decline of California and rising up, they bring their Democrat preferences with them. This puts the new state they infest at risk.
They are not unlike termites. Or Muslims.
So true, AZ is turning more blue every day. We already have two Dem Senators and Sheriff Joe lost this time.
then out of desperation California will adopt an “exit tax”. (just like Canada when you leave their country)
Then to protect what little they have left an “equalization of opportunity” tax.
I noticed the "voters" approved that nasty Bloomberg background check item on the ballot. A sure sign of Kalifornication of the voter base.
Sick and tired of paying huge taxes to support illegals
Word yo. I live in Jersey. Winters are brutal here. So are summers. The humidity here is awful.
And do the Kalifornia Kommies Kare?
To them, these Korporations are so Korporationy Korporations.
Not my fault, you guys should have vetted people coming in. Can’t blame me for learning from California’state mistakes.
Good luck keeping them out.
They had better get out sooner than later
before Moonbeam enacts an “exit tax”.
I was born and raised in California by EXTREMELY liberal looney parents. I left in 1999. I started my business out of state in a place that is becoming increasingly infested with Californians. At first you did not admit you were Californian because no one liked them or the Californication. I’m as conservative as they come (that’s why my parents have practically disowned me wondering what went wrong). Now... You hear people proudly admit they came from the bay area because everyone else sold their house there and bought one here cash. Then they lament that there are so many “racist Trump supporters” in their new home and how they are surrounded by a bunch of gun toting rednecks... Ech... In the same breath they complain how taxes and regulations are making California unlivable BUT they do all they can to turn Idaho in to California. First it starts out with bike lanes. Then roundabouts. Then “green” spaces. Then they get elected to town council and set goals to make the city “sustainable” or “carbon neutral.” “HEY, lets bring in a bunch of Muslim refugees so we can finally have an Ethiopian restaurant like we did back in San Fran.”
How do you like Oregon?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.