LANSING – A series of company expansions and potential job developments announced on Tuesday could be the last until 2010 if the Senate does not act on legislation to expand the number of Michigan Economic Growth Authority credits that can be authorized.

The companies with projects announced Tuesday include Magna Seating, which would put 420 jobs into the former Chrysler Corporation headquarters in Highland Park; Quicken Loans, which is moving its headquarters to downtown Detroit; the Attwood Corporation, which is consolidating its marine parts and supplier operations from Tulsa, Oklahoma, to Lowell; AVL Powertrain Engineering, which is creating a hybrid and alternative fuel development center in Ann Arbor; Molder Materials, which is consolidating operations in Saline; Ventra Ionia which is acquiring firms in Ionia, Fowlerville and Kentwood; and Continental Automotive Systems Holding U.S., which is expanding operations in Auburn Hills.

But a spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Mike Bishop (R-Rochester) questioned how the state was expected to pay for the tax credits that would be issued when the state has not resolved its budget issues for the upcoming 2009-10 fiscal year.

The worries about the passage of HB 4922 , which the House approved in June and has been assigned to the Senate Finance Committee, were raised at a press conference where Gov. Jennifer Granholm introduced corporate executives who were leading expansions and consolidations that the state estimated would result in as many as 14,900 new and retained jobs (both direct and indirect jobs).

Michigan Economic Development Corporation President Greg Main said that if the bill did not pass then the state would not be able to make the same type of jobs announcement in August as in July.

The state is currently limited to issuing 400 so-called regular MEGA grants and 40 dealing with high technology. The bill would expand that to 500 regular grants and 75 high tech credits.

Main said he was not implying that the Senate was deliberately bottling the measure up, since it only passed the House a month ago. But if the measure did not pass, then the state would find itself in “universal disarmament,” Main said.

The state has good tools to attract companies to it, Granholm said, but every state is engaged in the same battle to attract companies. “We have very robust tools,” she said. “We’ve got to be in the game, slugging away.”

The state has used up all its available credits, Main said, and needs the additional authority to grant more credits.The state is constantly involved in communications with 50 or 60 different firms about projects, he said.

But Matt Marsden, spokesperson for Bishop, said with a $1.7 billion estimated deficit for the 2009-10 fiscal year, “where are we getting the money?” for these credits.

Calling for action to enact more credits is just calling on the Legislature to spend money it doesn’t have, Marsden said.

But Main said the credits are performance-based and allocate no state money until the firms actually establish jobs. In that way, the state does not lose money on the one end until the companies are creating revenues on the other, he said.

The MEGA board also approved a tax capture project for Whitehall Township to redevelop the former Muskegon Whitehall-Montague wastewater treatment plant.

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