Shawn Vestal: Shelly O’Quinn worries political divisiveness is keeping business from Spokane, but maybe that’s what companies want

Is political divisiveness fouling Spokane’s business climate?

Or is it fueling it?

County Commissioner Shelly O’Quinn suggested recently that political divisiveness in city politics – the unholy vipers and snipers who criticize the mayor, presumably – was dampening the business climate. The business climate, as you surely know, is always presumed to be terrible, hanging by a thread, threatened by a tax; it is a constant among conservatives that business is being driven out by regulation – forced to flee to Idaho! – by sick-leave policies, by Indigenous Peoples’ Day, by bicycle lanes, by the failure to support oil trains …

In the world of politics, the business climate includes a sky that always falls, for whatever reason you choose.

So, sure. Headlines and divisiveness are damaging the business climate. The only glitch in the theory is this: Economic activity in Spokane has been speeding up right as the political climate has been cratering. Over the past couple of years – as the controversy over the bumbled Frank Straub departure descended into a bitter and sometimes unbreachable-seeming divide between the council and Mayor David Condon – the economy has outperformed the years that preceded them, sometimes dramatically.

Household incomes are up, outstripping national improvements. The housing market is showing more strength than it has in years. New construction – up. Building permits – up. Employment – up. Wages – up.

As Condon himself pointed out in a speech to the City Council this week, the city has showed more income growth than the county at large – which is overseen by the undivided, all-GOP commission.

“Median household income in the city grew to $44,350 in 2015,” Condon told the council. “That figure is up nearly 13 percent since 2013 bolstered by two consecutive years of growth during a period when Spokane County as a whole saw relatively little gain.”

Naturally, Condon sweeps up this statistic as a feather for his cap, calling it “growing our citizens’ discretionary income.”

Am I sensing a new city slogan?

Spokane: Growing Our Citizens’ Discretionary Income Through Divisiveness.

This is obviously ridiculous. No one could credibly argue that political controversy is good for business. But it’s not much more credible to suggest that political controversy – or politicians speaking their minds about all the hide-the-ball going on with the administration – are keeping businesses away. That’s what O’Quinn did not long ago in a debate with challenger Andrew Biviano, saying she knew of a company that would not have come to Spokane five years ago had the headlines been the same as they are now.

(For the sake of reference, recall that 2011 was the year of such harmonious, business-attracting headlines such as the attempted Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade bombing, an attempted recall of prosecutor Steve Tucker, the trial of Officer Karl Thompson in the death of Otto Zehm, and a hard-fought mayoral race, in which a challenger ran fairly “divisively” against an incumbent.)

“I have to tell you, when they read the newspaper, and what they see is divisiveness all over the paper, it doesn’t help us when we’re trying to get (companies) to come here,” she said. “We have to do everything we can as a community to make sure that we are creating the business climate that is attractive to businesses coming to this community, and make sure that we are working collaboratively together versus always fighting over issues.”

Maybe so. Maybe more businesses would be flooding here if the Negative Nellies and the newspaper just got with the program. Maybe the economy would be doing better. But the actual link between political rhetoric and the business climate is a very tenuous one.

For example, if you had a nickel for every time a Republican lawmaker decried Washington’s business climate, you would be able to start your own business, put an entire small city on the payroll and locate it wherever you want. Funny thing is, if you went looking for recommendations as to where to locate this new business, a lot of people would tell you to put it right here in Washington. Where the climate is so consistently decried as unattractive. Forbes ranks Washington 10th on its list of Best Places For Business. The Tax Foundation ranks us 17th for the business tax climate – even better than the supposed business dreamland of Idaho, at 20th.

Not top of the heap, but well above average, and reflective of the fact that the business climate and the “business climate” as a talking point are not the same thing.

Condon was bullish on the city’s economy Monday night, as he outlined a number of statistics showing that “we are making steady progress.”

In addition to the rising household incomes, he noted that the value of new construction in the city – $336 million through September – is up 32 percent over this point last year, and has already surpassed the total of each of the two previous years. Total construction permitting at the city is up 24 percent over this time last year. Median home prices are up 20 percent in the past two years, sales tax revenue to the city rose 4.2 percent in the past 12 months, and city roads projects are pumping tens of millions of dollars into the local economy – if not, for the moment, into the coffers of local businesses in construction zones.

It’s not all such sunny news. Things could always be better, and too many people are still hurting in a town where poverty, and its effects, are all too often apparent. And the city, in addition to all those positive markers, also is paying close attention to economic indicators tracking the possibility of another looming national recession.

No word yet on whether divisiveness will play a role.

Shawn Vestal can be reached at (509) 459-5431 or shawnv@spokesman.com. Follow him on Twitter at @vestal13.