John B. Breaux: “I rise today with Mr. D'Amato to introduce legislation that will improve the use of tax-exempt bonds as a financing…”

“I rise today with Mr. D'Amato to introduce legislation that will improve the use of tax-exempt bonds as a financing mechanism for small manufacturing facilities and other important uses. The first thing our bill does is give States more flexibility under the annual $50 per capita or $150 million cap. Under current law, if the State designates bond money for a project and, for whatever reason, that project is not started in 3 years the State cannot put the bond money toward another project. This bill would allow States to reallocate that bond money to another type of project needed elsewhere in the State. In addition, the $10 million limit on capital expenditures a company can maintain and still qualify for this industrial bond money would increase to $20 million under our bill. The increase reflects the effects of inflation since 1978 when the program was first created and also corrects for future effects of inflation on a company's real worth. Finally, our bill would further clean up an omission in the current law.”