Advocacy group sues state over Google incentives

RALEIGH — An advocacy group that opposes giving incentives to lure industry filed a lawsuit today challenging the millions of dollars that state lawmakers promised last year to convince Google Inc. to build a data center in Caldwell County.

The N.C. Institute for Constitutional Law filed the lawsuit in Wake Superior Court alleging the incentives violate the state constitution.

State lawmakers passed tax credits and other breaks that could save the company as much as $90 million over three decades. When state and local inducements are combined, Google could save $260 million over 30 years, depending how much Google invests in the facility.

The suit names Commerce Secretary James Fain, Gov. Mike Easley, Google and others.

Mountain View, Calif.-based Google announced in January it would build the $600 million data center — essentially a building filled with computers — and create as many as 210 jobs with average salaries of $48,000 near Lenoir. The town, about 70 miles northwest of Charlotte, has been hit hard by the collapse of the furniture industry in recent years.

The institute said it filed the lawsuit on behalf of three citizens: Michael Munger of Raleigh, Barbara Howe of Oxford, and Mark Cares of Bear Creek.

The group filed a similar lawsuit in 2005, protesting some $242 million in state and local incentives offered to Dell Inc., which built a computer plant in Winston-Salem. A trial judge threw out the lawsuit last year, but it is now before the state Court of Appeals.

A spokeswoman for Attorney General Roy Cooper said his office was reviewing the Google complaint.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.