SECAUCUS – Newark Mayor Cory Booker, Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, and officials from Panasonic are set to announce Wednesday the company’s intentions to leave Secaucus for Newark.
A press release circulated Tuesday afternoon states that the announcement will be made Wednesday morning at Newark’s 1 Riverfront Center on Raymond Blvd.
Earlier this year the New Jersey Economic Development Agency (EDA) approved a package of tax incentives for Panasonic, worth $102.4 million under the New Jersey Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit Program, if the company relocated to Newark.
Panasonic currently leases 1 million square feet of space at 1 Meadowlands Parkway from Hartz Mountain Industries. The location includes 300,000 square feet of office space, plus 700,000 square feet if warehouse space, and serves as Panasonic’s U.S. corporate headquarters.
But after 34 years in town Panasonic is apparently set to leave Secaucus for Newark. Panasonic had also considered moves to other states, including California, New York, Georgia, and Illinois. To keep the multi-billion-dollar company, and its 800-plus jobs, in the Garden State, the EDA suggested that Panasonic apply for New Jersey’s Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit. This application was later approved.
The Urban Transit Hub Tax Credit Program gives tax credits to certain companies that employ at least 250 full-time workers and build or rent office space in or near nine designated urban transit communities, one of which is Newark.
Secaucus, by contrast, is not among the nine communities included in the Urban Transit Hub Program.
Ever since the EDA approved the tax package, however, Secaucus officials and Hartz have cried foul, arguing that the tax credits should not be used to lure a corporation from one New Jersey municipality to another. Hartz and Secaucus have both claimed the tax incentives offered to Panasonic are a misuse of the Urban Transit Hub Program. And earlier this month Hartz and Secaucus filed an appeal with the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey to vacate EDA’s decision. – E. Assata Wright
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