Landing a regional Scotiabank office is a coup for Dallas, boosting its bona fides as a major financial hub. The Dallas City Council approved a 10-year property tax break and $2.7 million in grants to lure the Canadian bank away from Charlotte, N.C., and the state sweetened the offer with nearly $11 million from the Texas Enterprise Fund Grant.
In exchange, Scotiabank will set up shop in Victory Park and add more than 1,000 jobs with an average wage of $135,000.
The Scotiabank deal, along with Goldman Sachs’ 3-acre campus under construction in Uptown and the presence of two stock exchanges, has Dallas riding high on its Y’all Street allure. But the city can’t rest on those successes alone. Residents should be alarmed by news reports that AT&T, a major employer in Dallas, is scouting locations out in the suburbs.
Dallas leaders have previously told us that losing AT&T would be catastrophic for downtown.
Opinion
The telecom giant employs thousands of people in its downtown office. AT&T is an anchor of the central business district, occupying a high-rise that is part of a lively four-block plaza featuring restaurants, bars and a massive LED screen.
As reported by the Dallas Business Journal, AT&T officials recently toured office spaces north of Dallas, including an 1.8 million-square-foot site in Plano. The company has declined to comment on its intentions, but whispers that AT&T might decamp to the suburbs have been swirling in business circles for a while. While the company has reportedly faced pressure from employees resistant to a full return to the office, Dallas officials had been told that AT&T would consider relocating if public safety issues downtown were not addressed. Fear of losing AT&T helped precipitate the Safe in the City campaign that has boosted police presence downtown and cracked down on homeless encampments in the city core since May.
Linda McMahon, CEO of the Dallas Economic Development Corp., told us that keeping AT&T downtown is an “extremely high priority” for the city.
“AT&T is an extremely important business,” she said. “We want to do everything we can to make their employees, customers and shareholders happy.”
Safe in the City has visibly improved conditions downtown, and it’s a reminder that growing and maintaining the corporate tax base isn’t just a game of incentives. While the business retention strategy for AT&T may include future enticements, safety remains a priority for the company, McMahon said.
Enticing companies is only the beginning. We are glad that Dallas landed Scotiabank, but Dallas shouldn’t lose sight of its greatest competition. Its biggest rivals are not peer cities in other states; they’re the suburbs here. Our neighbors are competing with us on housing, schools and quality of life.
Corporations like Scotiabank and AT&T bet on Dallas, but will Dallas bet on itself? Will the City Council make painful budgetary trade-offs to hire more cops, repair more streets and sidewalks and improve other core services? Will City Hall streamline zoning and permitting and keep a sense of urgency about addressing homelessness?
Dallas’ Y’all Street reputation has given our city a new sense of glamour. But that glamour will fade if it doesn’t invest more on the basics.
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