1SI at the bat: Watch for the hit and run

We at NAC are growing accustomed to silence from CEO Michael Dalby and his 1SI cohorts when it comes to questions seeking clarification about the group's actions, so when public statements are made, it's all the more interesting.

I was intrigued, then, to find the image of a baseball on the 1SI home page last week denoting a 3000 club. It's since been removed but the document to which it linked is provided below.



It seems 1SI is straining its creativity to invoke a baseball metaphor as a means of self-congratulations, announcing that it's responsible for an "epic milestone": "unprecedented job growth" of over 3,000 new jobs.

While it's unexplained and unclear how 1SI is directly responsible for 3,000 new jobs, what is clear is that "unprecedented", according to Oxford American Dictionaries, means never done or known before. Fortunately, or unfortunately if you're getting paid to sell fuzzy math to the public with bad puns involving players banned from their own sport, a review of U.S. Census Bureau job statistics for Clark and Floyd Counties between 1984 and 2004 shows that 3,000 new jobs is akin to a certain Hall of Famer's déjà vu all over again.

According to census information, the two counties, long before the advent of 1SI, topped the 3,000 new jobs mark in 1987 (3,315), 1990 (3,663), 1995 (3,722) and 1998 (4,494). Worth noting is that Census Bureau statistics document growth during periods of 12 months, not 17, as does 1SI's announcement.

1SI's self-reported 12-month figures show 2,190 projected new jobs. I'll assume I don't need to define "projected" for them as well and simply mention that, even if all the projected jobs had already come to fruition, it would mean that 1994 was a better year as well with 2,985 new jobs. Other notable, non-1SI years are 1992 (2,066 new jobs), 1997 (1,914), and 1999 (2,081), all between 87 and 95% of 1SI's projections, which can't actually be counted until they become real jobs. And, even then, they'd be counted in the year of hire, not announcement.

We hope to spend part of the next week or so in consideration of 1SI's business luring practices and what they cost the community. It's important for now, though, to establish that any such discussions need be based on real, documentable numbers rather than promotional numerology, no matter how quaint the presentation. Doing so would be unprecedented.