Delegation heads to Asia seeking foreign investors
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By Louis Porter VERMONT PRESS BUREAU - Published: October 21, 2009
MONTPELIER – Gov. James Douglas, two other state officials and executives from Vermont businesses leave today for Asia to try and attract foreign business investors to the state.
In exchange for making an investment of $500,000 or more, foreign investors can receive green cards for the U.S., effectively in some cases jumping the line on the visa process. After two years, in order to remain in the program, investors must demonstrate the projects have created ten jobs or more and meet other requirements.
Douglas said he doesn't have a problem with the system of allowing preferential visas for investors, who have brought investment to the Jay Peak and Sugarbush ski resorts and which he hopes will put more money into Vermont firms. Overall immigration law needs to be reformed as well, in part to help farmers in Vermont and elsewhere to hire workers, Douglas said.
The program will help fulfill "the need to do everything we possibly can to position Vermont for recovery," Douglas said.
Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont proposed an extension of the temporary EB-5 visa program, which passed the Senate Tuesday and is on its way to President Barack Obama. Vermont has also just won permission to use the program, which had been restricted to businesses related to tourism, for other firms involved in manufacturing and other work.
"This program has become an economic engine in Vermont, and we have proven it with the creation of hundreds of jobs," Leahy said in a statement. "I want Vermont to stay on the cutting edge in harnessing these investments for economic development throughout our state. The biggest impediment to this program is its lack of permanence."
Taxpayers will cover the roughly $5,000-per-person cost of the trip for Douglas, two Agency of Commerce officials and two state troopers. The private business people, including officials from the Vermont Chamber of Commerce, will pay their own way on the two-week trip that will include stops in China, Hong Kong, South Korea and Taiwan.
The governor arranged a previous economic development trip to China in 2007. Douglas and Commerce Secretary Kevin Dorn Tuesday did not point to any specific trade or business dealings produced by that trip, focused on building business for energy and environmental firms.
But Asia is growing in importance as a trading partner for the state, and it is important to have alliances and relationships with companies and officials there, Douglas and Dorn said.
"Especially with the Orient, it is about building relationships," Douglas said.
"It is not like doing business in Vermont or in the United States," said Dorn, who will accompany Douglas on the trip. "You don't walk into the room and do a deal."
A half-dozen Vermont companies that have approval or are seeking it for EB-5 investors are accompanying Douglas on the Asia trip. Another half-dozen people from the state who are interested in the possibility but are not applying – yet – to the program are also going along.
louis.porter@rutland herald.com
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