Army gives desert land to GM for corporate use
Gas-guzzling GM gets corporate welfare from ArmyYUMA AZ -- In the latest US government handout to big corporations, the US Army is giving a lot of free Sonoran Desert land on the Yuma Proving Ground to General Motors for private development.
GM and the Army recently signed a deal to create a joint-use facility on 2,400 acres north of Yuma next to US 95. GM also will get an unspecified amount of land adjacent to this site for its own exclusive use.
Undeveloped Army land to be paved by GM
The facilities will be developed for testing GM's mostly gas-guzzling global warming vehicles. Because it will be on military protected land and under restricted air space, GM is assured of privacy as it develops new Hummers.
The Army recently claimed it needed to expand the Yuma Proving Ground, but apparently the Army still has plenty of land to give to big corporations for development and profit.
The Army recently claimed it needed to expand the Yuma Proving Ground, but apparently the Army still has plenty of land to give to big corporations for development and profit.
GM sold its longtime Desert Proving Ground in Mesa in December, netting $265 million for 3,200 desert acres, which will now likely be fully paved and developed.
So if GM spends about $100 million to build a new test track facility on YPG's free land, it will keep about $165 million in it's pocket. Sweet deal for GM.
Mesa gets more sprawl, GM profits and gets free land, and military training lands in the sensitive Sonoran Desert will be paved for corporate use.
I was born and raised in a GM town (Lansing MI), and I sympathize with the US auto industry, but this bad Bush/Cheney corporate welfare deal is a rip-off for the public-interest.
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