Vestas Eyes Portland for HQ Expansion: City Investment Could Yield 850 New Jobs

This is very, very good news. This is helping an existing business with ties to Portland grow jobs - which will help us all do good things for Portland. President Bill Clinton used to say "The best social program is a job." Way to go Sam - let me know what I can do to help!

Ethan Dunham
RedPine

Vestas is a superb company offering an excellent product. I hope that the City remains aggressive in using its tools to attract good paying green industry jobs. There are a lot of smaller alternative energy companies out there that could benefit from locating near an established player like Vestas.

Great news and even nicer to hear it directly from our Mayor-elect. It seems to me that this is exactly the type of public benefit that demands incentives for new employers in Portland. This one is especially important because Vestas will provide a leadership role in moving into more environmentally sound business investment of tax payer funds and awareness of the direct value to tax payers themselves. Wouldn't it be nice to support good government expenditures rather than always picture government as the "wasting our tax money" enemy. Maybe we could actually build solutions rather than simply identify problems.

Congratulations. While this is an obvious home run in this economic climate it also fits in wonderfully with the new emphasis at PSU on sustainability. With the leadership of PSU president Wim Wiewel, the Miller Foundation grant and the John Gray Endowment in Sustainable Development, both directed to the Urban Studies Program, PSU is a natural partner.

As is often discussed Portland's major missing link in becoming a world class city has been a research university like UW, Cal or Stanford. Hopefully this will be the start of filling that gap.

Too bad I'm Disabled; or I'd get one of those Jobs!
As it is, I see - and like seeing - parts of Large Turbines Truckin On Down I-205 almost every day, while I'm waiting for the MAX at Parkrose Sumner.
Now, I guess, I'll see MORE OF THEM!!!
Signed: A Guy who moved to Portland to 'Vote against Infernal Combustion with My (now somewhat meager)Consumer Dollar' (No it wasn't for the Crack and Black C**ks, that's just one of my Ex's Talking Crap!).

Wow, this is great.

Mr Adams, I apologize, I don ot have any personal animosity toward you.

I think your pursuit of Vestas is well worth the efforts you have put into it. I am behind you 100%. These are real jobs now and if we do land them, then I will be the first to congratulate you further.

How many of those new jobs are going to be given to existing Portland residents, and that Vestas will train for the jobs?

Or will they simply be filled from out-of-towners with little to no benefit to Portland other than Portland receiving more tax revenue for the next pet project?

I like new jobs, when they are given to Portlanders to help Portlanders move up, rather than creating low-wage, part-time, no-benefits service jobs to help support these 850 newcomers.

Mayor Elect Adams,

This is why I elected you. You not only targeted a major company that will provide substantive jobs and resources to this community, but you chose a corporation that is forward thinking, in line with Portland's goals, and potentially a lure to other environmental corporations. Well done.

With the State of Oregon posed to offer tax credits for foreign made cars from China and Japan, and both the City of Portland and the State of Oregon offering taxpayer giveaways and subsidies to foreign manufacturers like this one for the Danish company Vistas; rants by politicians like Governor Kulongoski and others about reducing our so called “dependence on foreign oil” and for “Oregon energy independence” are nothing more than hypocritical rhetoric when they are replaced by a dependence on foreign made products and the overseas companies that produce them. The “buy local” oratory too is pure hypocritical rhetoric when the political solution to any problem is to tax, tax and tax the local people and local businesses into oblivion, only to turn around and subsidize foreign owned companies. Moreover, having State and City governments buy foreign products such as foreign cars and trucks rather than domestic products and vehicles is not only NOT keeping dollars local or within the US, but it also can be viewed as a boon to the US companies that provide family wage jobs and pay their share of taxes. It is also a drain to, and adding fuel to the ailments of the US economy.

Portland and Oregon ought to be encouraging and recruiting US companies of all kinds to locate here, not just companies and jobs of a specific color. Energy and construction jobs are only one small part of the work force. Not everybody is qualified to fill those positions. More diversity is needed. I am all for increasing the job base in Portland with more family wage jobs, but the first choice for those jobs should be sought and come from domestic owned companies thereby keeping the dollars in the US economy.

I also agree with Eric; if the City is going to spend taxpayer dollars and subsidize a jobs program with a wealthy company, then the jobs ought to be required to go only to Portlanders and not to people recruited from other parts of the US or abroad. This must be included as part of any agreement reached. With the amount of public dollars the City is expected to handout to Vistas, the cost to Portland taxpayers for each of the 850 new jobs, without State funds added, would be approximately $14, 700.00. Many seniors living on fixed incomes and people in low wage jobs do not even receive that amount of money a year’s time. Therefore, it is only fair that small businesses on Main Street and homeowners living in Portland, specifically seniors and other people on low or fixed incomes, also receive some kind of tax breaks such as discounts on property taxes, discounts on energy taxes, and discounts motor vehicle taxes and fees. It must NOT be the people of Portland that already can barely afford the cost of living here and are just getting by be charged with high, higher and excessive taxes and fees – be it for new special interest toys such as streetcars, or for subsidies handed out to well-to-do foreign companies that promise to create new jobs. . . .

This is great Vestas is a great company on the right track. Again Kudos to Mayor Elect Sam for hard work and his determination on bringing new green jobs to PDX.

Sam Adams said Vestas the wind turbine company is investing around $250 million in a 600,000-square-foot building in South Waterfront. Adams added that the city has offered Vestas approximately $12 million in incentives to grease the skids for the deal.

But Vestas’ spokesman Roby Roberts says the company has not yet made such a decision.

One thing that is noticed (other than the fact that Sam Adams lied about this announcement, as it turns out) is that why is the City of Portland encouraging urban sprawl in South Waterfront?

There are plenty of buildings and downtown office space and un/underdeveloped city blocks downtown which is already zoned and designed for this type of dense employment base.

And now we're sprawling downtown to SoWa?

Doesn't seem very sustainable to me. Especially given that SoWa is a transportation nightmare...it's already noted that many small businesses are upset over the lack of parking and street access, a few have shut down...how will 800 people get to work - they all don't live in the Pearl District and can't take the Streetcar. Some of them, I'm sure, live in Sellwood and will use the Sellwood Bridge. Some of them might use the Ross Island Bridge which passes over SoWa but has no direct access (it requires two, and possibly three, U-Turns to get from the Ross Island to SoWa). Or will Sam Adams decree a law on Vestas that requires 100% participation in walking, biking or the Streetcar (since Sam Adams hates buses because he's better than the 65% of TriMet users that ride the bus, they wouldn't count...and besides, there is only bus service to SoWa in one direction and that's northbound but not southbound)?

I'd walk from Gresham if it means I'm able to properly care for my 6 kids! 3 are special needs and self-employed insurance has not been able to cover much needed services. If I sell my house where will 8 of us go? If there aren't enough maintenance and custodial jobs to keep my business going I'll need a job generated by development and growth. I'm hoping for change!

Terry Parker:

You, sir, are an idiot.

Terry and Erik prove yet again that there are some people who will find something to complain about in absolutely every situation. You must lead miserable lives.