Messer said he is uncertain about timing for an announcement on the plant and he is unsure what other sites are being considered.
“There’s a lot of competition for this opportunity, both across the U.S. and also our friends in Canada and also in Mexico,” he said. “So we are aggressively competing and out-hustling and out-competing, and we’ll see what happens.”
It benefits Ford to keep its decision-making a mystery, but not taxpayers, said James Hohman, director of fiscal policy at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.
Even if the automaker has internally already settled on a site, it will wait to get the best deal before committing. Moreover, Hohman said, conducting deals in private lessens the chance of public blowback.
“I think a lot of these major companies that have a factory to sell are afraid of that kind of blowback, so they’re hosting their competitions in secret, and that’s an inappropriate way to do business,” he said.
In turn, the perceived threat of losing the project compels the MEDC to go to the table with the biggest incentives package it can offer to secure the investment.
“We will use every available tool that we have in our toolbox, and I think it would be imprudent to talk specifics,” Messer said.
Similarly, it serves the MEDC to not divulge how many hundreds of millions of dollars in tax incentives it might be offering, should a competing state decide to one-up. It’s a high-stakes game of blind poker, of sorts.
“We don’t want to tip our hand to the competition,” Messer said.
As Michigan vies for the battery plant, a “megasite” in Marshall is readying for its moment.
The 1,900-acre site is the state’s marquee property for a “transformational” project. It is one of three being actively prepared for development – along with a site in Mundy Township outside of Flint and Eagle Township near Lansing — and it is the furthest along in the process.
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