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March 30, 2010

Schumer: Law will help jobless get work

Visits Nova Bus plant to discuss tax-cut plan

By DAN HEATH

PLATTSBURGH — U.S. Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) was in Plattsburgh Tuesday to tout enactment of a bipartisan tax cut intended to get companies to hire the unemployed.

"We have to do everything we can to get people back to work," Schumer said at a press conference at the Nova Bus assembly plant in the Town of Plattsburgh.

That is why he co-sponsored the Hire Now Tax Cut with U.S. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). Schumer said President Barack Obama signed the legislation earlier this month.

The act allows companies that hire workers who have been out of work for more than 60 days an exemption from paying the employer's 6.2 percent share of Social Security payroll tax on those workers for the remainder of 2010. Schumer said the act is simple, immediate and applies to any income level.

It provides an incentive for companies to hire immediately, he said, as the tax savings will be greater the earlier someone is hired. There is a provision that companies have to increase their overall employment so firms will not be able to conduct layoffs and then hire the unemployed to replace those workers.

In an earlier press release, Schumer said about 3,700 people are eligible to be hired under the act in Clinton County — about 2,000 in Essex County and about 2,000 in Franklin County.

If employees are retained for next year, the company is eligible to save $1,000, $3,000 or $5,000.

Schumer said the program will be funded by leftover economic-stimulus funds and is even available to nonprofit organizations.

The senator was in town to tour the Nova Bus plant. That will help him as he continues to support the company's efforts to land transit-authority contracts.

Nova Bus plant manager Jim Tooley said the program will certainly help businesses that are looking to hire.

"We are looking at it to see how it fits in our business plans," he said.

The company has 195 full-time employees. They are presently assembling buses for a 90-bus contract with the Metropolitan Transit Authority's New York City Transit.

Nova Bus has also received contracts with Connecticut Transit for 35 buses and with the City of Honolulu and Oahu Transit Services for 24 buses.

"Those two contracts will keep our employees employed" until late 2010, Tooley said.

The company is bidding on a contract with the Niagara Frontier Transportation Authority in Buffalo for 48 buses, with options on additional units. That contract is expected to be awarded in May.

Schumer later met with Plattsburgh-North Country Chamber of Commerce President Garry Douglas and representatives of several projects and initiatives that have sought Schumer's assistance. They include the CBN Connect Broadband Network, the Patriot Hills veterans project in Saranac Lake, Plattsburgh International Airport, continuing development of Akrimax Pharmaceuticals, the Pfizer transition and the Strand Theatre project.

"We have been working with Sen. Schumer and his staff on all of these matters, and he wanted a direct update on each one of them while he was here. That's the sort of working relationship we enjoy with him," Douglas said in a press release. "We sit down with the senator almost monthly, either in Washington or the North Country, working steadily on our economic-development agenda. It's a process that's been working, and we expect further successes in the coming months."

E-mail Dan Heath at: dheath@pressrepublican.com

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