Locke Signs Tax, Aid Bills Law Benefits Coal Power Plant, Hard-Hit Towns And Workers

Bruce Springsteen crooned from a loudspeaker and miners in yellow hard hats cheered as Gov. Gary Locke on Thursday signed a $130 million tax break to keep a power plant and coal mine going.

Earlier in the day at Aberdeen, the first-term Democrat signed a measure granting tax breaks to employers and local governments in economically hard-hit communities.

Locke also signed a bill providing cash aid to laid-off loggers and salmon fishermen as they train for new occupations.

“These new laws give the state tools to keep and attract jobs that are essential to healthy, thriving communities,” Locke said. “From Centralia to Grays Harbor County to Vancouver, we’re giving tax and regulatory relief that will attract and keep businesses that provide good jobs for Washington families.”

In Centralia, hundreds of people at the Centralia Steam Power Plant and coal mine assembled under a huge tent to hear speeches and then cheer as Locke signed a measure that backers said will preserve about 670 plant and mining jobs.

The power-plant measure grants $130 million in state sales and utility tax breaks over the next three decades to help the plant and mine owners finance the purchase and installation of $264 million in pollution-control scrubbers. The scrubbers will help the plant meet federal and state clean-air requirements.

The cost of the tax breaks will be about $5 million in the coming two years, an estimated $27.57 million in the following biennium and increasing amounts over the following 26 years. If the plant should close, the owners will be required to pay the state the value of the tax breaks.

The plant is owned by a consortium that includes Portland-based Pacificorp, Tacoma Public Utilities, Seattle City Light, Washington Water Power Co. and five other utilities.

WWP put its 15 percent share of the plant up for sale in November. The Spokane utility was also half-owner of the mine, but sold that interest in 1990.

The coal-fired plant is the largest single source of sulfur dioxide emissions in the state. Now producing 100,000 tons of sulfur dioxide a year, the plant has agreed to reduce emissions to 10,000 tons a year by 2002, but only if it gets the tax breaks to buy and install the scrubbers.

Backers said the aid could keep the plant and nearby coal mine in operation for another 25 years.

At Aberdeen, Locke signed a bill that would make employers in economically distressed areas eligible for a business-and-occupation tax credit of $2,000 for every new employee hired. The break is expected to cost the treasury about $7 million in the coming two-year budget cycle beginning July 1. The measure continues an existing B&O break that is set to expire, and also expands it to make more employers eligible.

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