In business parlance, Tucson means ‘can’t do’

ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW

By Hugh Holub
 
Inside Tucson Business
Published on Friday, August 6th, 2010

Raytheon Missile Systems’ decision to pass up Tucson as the site for a new production plant is a familiar story.

Among the issues causing Tucson to lose out to Huntsville, Ala., were encroachment at Raytheon’s main site south of Tucson International Airport, lack of infrastructure and the incentives that were offered in Alabama.Tucson lost an opportunity that would have created 300 jobs paying an average of $60,000 per year.
 
Interestingly, this project never even got to the stage where Tucsonans were whining “not in my back yard” about the Raytheon’s expansion.

In the past, Tucsonans have blocked many new job-creating facilities because companies attempted to locate these projects on the north or west sides of Tucson. Remember Motorola and General Instruments?

Obviously there is expansion land opportunities south of the Hughes Access Road for more industrial development without a lot of neighborhood associations screaming “no way.”

But the word “infrastructure” raises a red flag to me.

What were the infrastructure needs for this facility? Water? Tucson is busy kicking lands out of its water utility service area and getting a major main extension to serve a new facility may have been problematic and costly to the company. We don’t know.

Wastewater capacity is also an issue for a lot of new projects. The Town of Sahuarita got into the wastewater business because Pima County demanded that the master planned community of Rancho Sahuarita include a giant new sewer line through the San Xavier District of the Tohono O’odham Nation’s reservation, with the effluent from Sahuarita ending up on the north side of Tucson.

Was there a problem getting a sewer line or a satellite wastewater treatment facility for the proposed new Raytheon facility?

Then there are questions about electric energy capacity. There is lots of opposition to Tucson Electric Power building new substations and electric transmission lines in the area south of the airport that would serve the proposed Rosemont Copper Mine.

People want electricity in Tucson, but not power lines. Did that play a role in the infrastructure issue?

From first-hand experience back in the 1990s, I learned why Tucson is so often the bridesmaid but never the bride when it comes to industrial development and job creation.

The Howard Hughes Estate had 12,000 acres of land for sale in Pima County in an all or nothing transaction. Hughes Helicopters, which at the time was owned by McDonnell Douglas, approached the people running the estate to ask if it would sell a square mile of its land next to the airport for a proposed Apache Helicopter plant that would employ 500 workers. The estate said of course, since that kind of project would have made the rest of the estates’ holdings in the region more valuable.

Hughes Helicopters then met with city and airport officials about infrastructure needs and access to the airport.

The responses they got were: “Oh, that’s a problem.”  “No way can you have access to the runways.” “We don’t have the water lines.” “We don’t have the wastewater capacity.” And on and on.

Hughes Helicopters went to Mesa where the company was greeted with “When do you want to open?” Mesa city officials tasked  its staff to solve any problems. Mesa got the 500 jobs and the company, now named MD Helicopters, continues to have a healthy payroll.

Tucson has a great track record for making lists of problems. But Tucson has a poor track record in getting its act together among jurisdictions and interests to solve those problems.

Tucson comes across as a “can’t do” community.

The number one thing Tucson can do to make new industrial development possible is to round up all the entities and interests whose approvals and cooperation are needed, put an industrial development czar in charge of the gaggle of players who can take names and kick butt to get things done, and be the sole contact point with a new industry trying to locate here.

The last thing any new company wants to do is figure out how to deal with 216 different agencies and departments and negotiate with each separately.

The next time a company wants to build a new plant in the Tucson region, they need to hear “When do you want to open?” Then take the list of the things that need to get done and solve them.

Contact Hugh Holub, an attorney who works in real estate development, public utility, water and environmental law, at HughHolub@msn.com.

Holub represented the Hughes Estate in the Hughes Helicopters matter.