Chairman of Fluor Threatens Move if Measure R Loses
The top executive of Fluor Corp. said Sunday that the firm, which employs more than 2,000 people locally, might leave Orange County if voters Tuesday defeat Measure R, the sales tax increase to help bail the county out of bankruptcy.
“Frankly I’m disgusted with the political rhetoric around this issue; we have a debt and we have to pay it,” said Leslie G. McCraw, chairman and chief executive officer of one of the county’s biggest employers. “If not, we will lose our credibility around the nation. It speaks to the fundamental issue of honesty and integrity.”
McCraw was reiterating in an interview from his home statements he made in a June 12 letter to company employees. If the half-cent sales tax increase fails at the polls, the letter said, “we would have to decide as to whether it made good long-term business sense to remain located here.”
Opponents of the measure characterized McCraw’s comment that Fluor would consider moving elsewhere as an idle threat.
“They sound rather desperate,” Bruce Whitaker, chief spokesman for the Committees of Correspondence, a coalition of anti-tax groups that has actively opposed Measure R, said Sunday night.
“I don’t think it’s much of a risk that Fluor would choose to move,” he added. “They’ve been a fixture here for a number of years and Orange County is a good base for them to operate internationally. The cost of moving would be prohibitive.”
“They’re an important employer and no one would want them to leave Orange County,” Whitaker said. “They’re just pulling out all the stops here as we head down the wire to the election.” A major engineering and construction company responsible for building industrial plants throughout the world, Fluor generates revenue of $8 billion a year.
In the June 12 letter, McCraw outlined a number of reasons why he believes that the failure of Measure R would make life more difficult for his company and other firms.
“To not pass Measure R certainly puts a cloud over the county’s future,” he wrote. “Your real estate values would most probably continue to decline. The county would see increasing cost of defending against lawsuits, and we would obviously have a difficult and costly time in borrowing for needed services. New businesses would be disinclined to locate in an area known for reneging on its debt.”
McCraw said he felt compelled to write the memo as part of an “obligation to inform our employees on the issue so that they can make an informed decision.”
Measure R would increase the sales tax in Orange County from 7.75% to 8.25%, raising about $130 million annually for the next 10 years.
The tax would cost the county’s 2.6 million residents about $50 a year each, though proponents say 20% of that would be borne by tourists and other visitors.
