Rotten banana scam is rotten

Everybody is dismayed

Two years after a celebrated homecoming, the Chiquita company is considering moving its cargo business elsewhere, and New Orleans port officials were scrambling Thursday to try to keep the company from again leaving the city that was once the country’s top banana importer.

The departure of Chiquita Brands International, one of the world’s largest banana and fruit shippers, could cost upward of 350 jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars of projected economic activity that were expected to flow through the local port over the next decade.

Port leaders and state officials were working to get a better handle on whether Chiquita is indeed planning to leave and, if so, whether it could be talked into changing its mind.

Still, the rumor had circulated “around the docks” that the North Carolina-based company is on its way out, port President and CEO Gary LaGrange said. When he first heard the news, he said, he felt “dismayed.”

But, if we think back, we might remember the deal, like every other deal ever done by Bobby Jindal's Economic Development office, was  based on tax subsidies and direct payoffs. So it's hardly any wonder this result would be tentative.