Following a report that tech company Oracle has begun laying off workers from its Nashville location, the libertarian conservative political advocacy group Americans for Prosperity is calling on state and local leaders to scrutinize the company, especially after having received “nearly a quarter of a billion dollars in taxpayer money.”
As previously reported by The Tennessee Star in May 2021, Oracle received $175 million in local property tax breaks to “further develop infrastructure around the area.” In return, Metro Nashville agreed to reimburse part of Oracle’s property tax revenue over the next 25 years or until the company’s investment is paid off.
Then, in September 2021, state leaders approved a measure through an anonymous vote to provide approximately $65 million in economic incentives for Oracle to build a new campus in Nashville.
As a result of the company’s move, the Nashville community expected to gain nearly 8,500 new jobs with an average salary of $110,000 per year, The Star noted.
As first reported by NewsChannel 5, an anonymous current Oracle employee in Nashville told the outlet he “knows of at least 10 people based in Nashville who have been given layoff notices, but he suspects the actual number could be much higher.”
In addition, the anonymous employee provided NewsChannel 5 with an email from Oracle to an employee detailing the layoff, as well as a corporate Reduction In Force document the company emailed him.
As a result, Americans for Prosperity – Tennessee (AFP-TN) is “calling on the legislature to utilize clawbacks on ECD funding if employment numbers are not hitting benchmarks and on Metro Council to examine forgone revenue from future property tax breaks.”
“If true, layoffs by Oracle are a massive breach of taxpayer trust. It is exactly why clawback provisions are important with any deal the government makes,” AFP-TN State Director Tori Venable said in a statement. “If a company is not living up to their community development promises, taxpayers should not be stuck with the bill to fund a private business’ profits.”
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Kaitlin Housler is a reporter at The Tennessee Star and The Star News Network.
Photo “Oracle Buildings” by Håkan Dahlström. CC BY 2.0.
