By Jeremy Duda | Arizona Capitol Times
The Arizona Commerce Authority’s deal-closing fund became more of a deal-making fund during the 2013 legislative session, opening the possibility that more special projects could be in the agency’s future.
The fiscal year 2014 budget included a provision allowing the authority to issue a $2 million loan from the Arizona Competes fund for the “purpose of attracting or retaining business” in Navajo County. The loan is intended to help civic and business leaders in the Snowflake area keep a railroad in operation after the paper mill that owned it went out of business.
Critics who warned that Arizona Competes would become a government-sponsored “slush fund” for well-connected business interests say the loan validates the concerns they voiced in 2011, when the Legislature and Gov. Jan Brewer created the Commerce Authority. The loan goes far beyond what lawmakers were told the deal-closing fund would be used for, they say, and paints a troubling portrait of its future.
