I like the fact that the this city will not give companies an incentive to locate there and instead depends on being a nice place to live to attract companies.

I knew a guy that relocated a major company from one state to another due to the incentives his company was offered. When I pointed out to him that there would be a long term negative effect on his company he said he did not care. If he could pull this off he would get a $2,000,000 bonus. His income at the time was $1,500,000 annualy. The Board of Directors gave him two years to make it work.

The city paying the incentive wanted the good jobs his company provided, he wanted to move into a new building and hopefully shed about 50% of his workforce that would not want to move. He planned on hiring new people locally and the city was all for it.

This is where the plan went wrong. The highly technicaly jobs he was offering take several years to learn after you have received your University degree, so hiring new people was a BIG problem. The move cost so much that there was no way to undo it, and about 20% of the people that moved with him took jobs in other companies that paid in many cases far more than his company did.

He wound up being fired, and after new managers took over the company is making money again.

What I tell people now is that if a city is willing to pay you to move there how great a place can it be?