Jessica's Well is beta testing a ChamberSpeakTM to English translation module in order that we may better facilitate the public awareness of activities ongoing at the Midland Development Corporation.

For today's test we will use an article from last Friday's (05/28/2010) edition of MyWestTexas.com regarding the MDC's dealing with a local aircraft powerplant manufacturer.

Chamberspeak:
Caught between an impatient City Council and local investors who put big money into a 3-year-old aircraft engine company, the Midland Development Corp. on Friday voted to table consideration of making its economic development incentives deal with Trace Engines more stringent.

Plain English:
Caught between an impatient City Council and local investors who put big money into a 3-year-old aircraft engine company, the Midland Development Corp. on Friday voted to table consideration of actually enforcing the mutually agreed-upon development contract with Trace Engines.

ChamberSpeak:
Trace Chief Operating Officer David Czarnicki and Midland oilman Buddy Sipes, the firm's first investor, appeared before the MDC board at City Hall to ask that the $400,000 forgiveable loan the company received in 2007 not be converted into a standard loan that must be repaid.

Plain English:
Trace Chief Operating Officer David Czarnicki and Midland oilman Buddy Sipes, the firm's first investor, appeared before the MDC board at City Hall to ask that the $400,000 forgiveable loan the company received in 2007 be considered a gift from the taxpayers of Midland and not a loan of any sort. Especially one of those icky kind of loans that have to be repaid.

ChamberSpeak:
Arguing that the 2008-09 recession had rendered impossible the contract that the company signed in 2007 to create 114 jobs, Czarnicki said, "2007 engine sales are down by 50 percent. "That's had an effect on our ability to get up to speed. I am concerned that the amendment is not in the spirit of the original agreeement."

Plain English:
Arguing that the 2008-09 recession had rendered impossible the contract that the company signed in 2007 to create 114 jobs, Czarnicki said, "2007 engine sales are down by 50 percent. "That's had an effect on our ability to get up to speed and I would like us to rethink what should be the "spirit" of the agreement...because the actual text of the agreement is pretty much kicking our a** right now."

ChamberSpeak:
Czarnicki said afterward that Trace "is already a lean organization" with 23 employees at 3000 W. Interstate 20, but it will probably cut its staff if the MDC follows the council's recent suggestion and makes the loan non-forgiveable.

Plain English:
If the taxpayers aren't going to pay 'em, then nobody is going to be paying them.

ChamberSpeak:
The former councilman revealed that "what we bought as technology was not as (it had been) guaranteed" by the Orenda Recip Co. of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, and an extra $10 million expenditure was required before a Federal Aviation Administration production certificate could finally be obtained last fall.

Plain English:
We've figured out why Orenda sold us this technology now.

ChamberSpeak:
Sipes said Trace, having paid more than $340,000 in local property taxes, didn't seek tax abatements because the 2007 economy looked like it would remain strong.

Plain English:
Please consider the fact that we didn't ask for even more public subsidies when considering whether or not to gift us that $400,000.

Okay, I am going to stop now for a couple of reasons. First, the translator seems to be working flawlessly. Second, because I am making a bit too light a serious subject.

Trace Engines is a company that is a venture being attempted by several smart, good men, and one that is fraught with risks. The fact that they are having struggles is of no comfort to anyone here. The success or failure of the venture has a real effect on real lives. This we know all too acutely here. What humor that we do find is strictly based upon the complete torture inflicted on the language when describing loans that aren't really loans, and both sides trying to figure out how to get around an agreement that is very plain in its intent and one that they never thought they would have to enforce. That is really kind of funny. But the struggles of a local company is deadly serious stuff.

Having said that....as noble and honorable a venture as these men have undertaken in trying to build a company it is their venture and should remain strictly their venture. There should be no government involvement in it whatsoever save the enforcement of laws (and, ironically, agreements) and the protection of private property rights. There should not be two separate and distinct classes of local businesses. One class either connected to or favored by the local development authorities and therefore eligible for public subsidies in the form of tax breaks and in many cases the outright transfer of funds from public coffers into private hands....and the other class....where individuals or groups of individuals venture into the marketplace with their product or their idea, unsubsidized with cash gifts forcebly taken from their neighbors, to survive or perish based solely upon the value of their product or service to a consuming public free to choose between competing goods.

But then I'm old-fashioned that way.

I wish those behind Trace Engines the best of luck and much success. But it is your venture and you should be risking only your own money and that of any willing investors. Period.

I have hardened a fair amount on this issue over the past couple of years. Before I was sort of of the opinion that if you have a set of people offering up free money (even if is taken from the local taxpayers) that you can't blame a company for taking it, right?

In the face of galloping government spending at every level, and now an absolute crushing amount of public debt set upon us by both elected and non-elected officials at every level.....then, yes, absolutely I can blame them for taking the money.