President’s Message: Alibaba and the Sales Tax Thieves
Over the last year and a half, I have written several messages about the pressing need for passage of the Marketplace Fairness Act. In those messages, I have cited numerous reasons including:
- To level the playing field.
- The government shouldn’t be choosing winners and losers by providing unfair tax advantages to some.
- The taxes are owed so this is not a new tax – just a loophole in the law (which over 98% of people don’t choose to pay).
- Lost sales tax revenues are crippling our state and local governments who depend on this revenue and this will only get worse unless this trend is reversed – either services will be cut or taxes will be raised in other ways.
Now, you can add yet another reason to the list – Alibaba (a Chinese company larger than Amazon and eBay combined) – recently launched the largest IPO in Wall Street history. The current loophole in the internet sales tax law will allow foreign companies, like Alibaba, to unfairly compete with our U.S. retailers who employ people here, pay taxes here, and have brick and mortar presence here. That is unfair. Watch the latest commercial that is now being run by the Alliance for Main Street Fairness.
Recently, I was in Washington, D.C. with a small group of CEOs representing the International Council of Shopping Centers. We met with key members of Congress to urge them to pass Efairness legislation. This ICSC article offers more details about our meetings.
The good news is that they are listening, but we need to continue to have our voices heard. This link offers an easy method to take action by phone, email or tweet. I encourage you to contact your members of Congress today.
Stirling Properties Opens New Office in Pensacola, Florida, To Further Expand Gulf South Presence
Stirling Properties is pleased to announce the opening of a new office in Pensacola, Florida, in SunTrust Tower at 220 West Garden Street, Suite 802. As the company’s first location in Florida, the office joins 12 other offices located in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama to further strengthen Stirling Properties’ presence in the Gulf South. Will Barrois, Vice President and Regional Manager of Alabama/Florida, oversees all business development throughout the region.
“Stirling’s expansion into the Panhandle of Florida is yet another important step in the long-term strategic plan of servicing the entire Gulf Coast market,” stated Marty Mayer, President and CEO of Stirling Properties.
Stirling Properties will continue to handle the full-time management and leasing of SunTrust Tower. The 9-story, 95,000 square-foot office tower has been the premier office address in the downtown market for 40 years. Jason Scott, Senior Sales and Leasing Executive/Property Manager, transferred from Stirling’s Mobile office to the Pensacola office, where he will oversee the management and leasing of SunTrust Tower. Holding a broker’s license in both Alabama and Florida, Mr. Scott will also be responsible for expanding third party brokerage and management opportunities in Northwest Florida. With over 35 years’ experience in commercial real estate, Mr. Scott began his career in Pensacola and is excited to be part of Stirling’s expansion into Florida.
“Handling the management and leasing of SunTrust Tower gives us a great opportunity to expand Stirling’s footprint into the Florida Panhandle,” stated Will Barrois. “We are looking forward to serving our existing clients and expanding the full complement of property management, brokerage, acquisitions and development from our new Pensacola office.”
For your commercial real estate needs in Florida, contact Stirling Properties at the new office located at 220 West Garden Street, Suite 802, Pensacola, Florida, or call (850) 418-6792.
Stirling Properties’ Beth Cristina Elected as President of Louisiana Realtors
Stirling Properties is pleased to announce that Beth Cristina, Senior Broker Associate in our New Orleans office, has been elected to serve as President of Louisiana Realtors.
Louisiana Realtors represents its membership on important real estate-related issues to state and federal government, while providing legal assistance, professional development opportunities, discounts, and other unique services for its membership of over 10,000 realtors statewide.
Beth was installed alongside 7 Louisiana Realtors officers and 11 local board presidents. In addition to her many duties and responsibilities as President of Louisiana Realtors, she will also serve as a director of the National Association of Realtors (NAR) during her term.
Beth has previously served as Secretary Treasurer, Director at Large, Vice Chair of the Strategic Planning Committee, Vice President of Region 4. She was also recently recognized for outstanding commercial achievement as a National Commercial Award recipient by the Commercial Real Estate Division of NAR and received the 2010 Realtor of the Year award from Louisiana Realtors.
Stirling Properties Welcomes Angela McArthur to its Mobile, AL Team
Stirling Properties is pleased to announce the addition of Angela McArthur to the Commercial Brokerage Division as Sales and Leasing Executive. Mrs. McArthur will work from the company’s Mobile, Alabama office located at 1110 Montlimar Drive, Suite 830.
Mrs. McArthur brings with her over 25 years of experience in Commercial Real Estate. Prior to joining Stirling Properties, Angela was with Prudential Cooper & Company in Mobile, Alabama. Through the years, she has represented a wide range of local, regional and national clients and has developed an expertise in the areas of retail site selection and acquisition, sales and leasing, property management, buyer/tenant representation and corporate leasing services.
Angela can be reached at 251-342-7229 or via email at amcarthur@stirlingprop.com.
Super Region Economy Driving Louisiana Growth
Well respected Louisiana economic experts, Dr. Loren Scott and Dr. James Richardson, released the results of their 2015 Louisiana Economic Outlook.
Based on their forecast, Louisiana will set records statewide and in a number of metro areas for the most non-farm jobs in its history, surpassing 2 million across the state.
The Super Region – consisting of Baton Rouge, Houma-Thibodaux and New Orleans – is forecast to see incredible growth over the next two years. The area is expected to produce 62 percent of Louisiana’s non-farm job creation – a combined 41,400 of the state’s 66,700 new jobs by the end of 2016.
While much of this growth is being fueled by the industrial boom from Lake Charles to Baton Rouge and down river to New Orleans, the encouraging fact is that there are several other sectors, both traditional and emerging, that make Louisiana more diverse. Traditional sectors include international trade, advanced manufacturing and energy. Digital media, information technology, emerging environmental related to water and water management, coastal restoration, and medical are among Louisiana’s emerging sectors.
Putting all of these together, the future has never been brighter for our state and our region.
For additional news coverage about the 2015 Louisiana Economic Outlook:
- “Louisiana forecast to gain 66,700 jobs through 2016”
The Advocate - “News alert: Scott sees La. reaching record employment in 2015”
Greater Baton Rouge Business Report - “Baton Rouge’s more than $16 billion in industrial projects expected to drive jobs beyond 400K in 2015”
NOLA.com
Property Management, Information Technology and the New Paradigm
Used to be that technology was an afterthought, if it was a thought at all, when it came to property management. No one thought twice about putting file servers, telephone systems, sharing the office Wi-Fi with the public and having each management office a self-contained island unto itself. We’re long past the days, when we could put a desktop at a managed property office and simply forget that the computer was there until the computer died or a user complained. While the most important element of property management is still the right property manager, with the advent of Internet-connected building automation, Voice Over IP (VOIP), cloud offerings, server virtualization, software as a service (SaaS), desktop as a service (DaaS) and the well-publicized complete lack of security on the Internet, it’s time to pay attention to how property management offices are utilizing technology, how the offices are secured and how we are maintaining the infrastructure.
Here at Stirling we’ve taken over a lot of management contracts in the last few years and the thing that strikes us from the IT-perspective is how little attention has been paid to the automation and the office systems. Even from the large, national property service companies, we’ve seen file servers and desktops systems at managed properties that are past end-of-life such that the manufacturers are no longer providing security updates. We’ve seen automation systems, directly connected to the Internet with no firewall and still running default system credentials, leaving not only that system, but the entire office vulnerable to attack. Accounting or Point of Sale Systems on the same network as the HVAC or Automation Systems without network segmentation or firewalls is simply asking for trouble.
While other industries have been quick to embrace technology, it sometimes seems that Commercial Real Estate as an Industry has gotten a half-step or two behind where we need to be in maintaining our technology. Overhauling systems doesn’t necessarily have to be a large expense. In a lot of cases, the savings from removing the maintenance costs associated with outdated systems will go a long way towards modernizing and securing your infrastructure. Just as everyone knows and can do the calculation on a commercial real estate’s return on investment, there’s also a return or a savings with Information Technology deployed and maintained correctly.
- Still have an outdated DSL connection to the Internet? Fiber has proliferated in the last couple of years. Look at dedicated bandwidth with a Next Generation Firewall.
- Sharing your Internet with the public? Stop! Or at the very least, make sure your management office network is segmented to protect your critical systems.
- Same with automation. If your HVAC, access card or automation systems are connected to the Internet, change the default credentials and segment away from your office computers.
- Are your servers on the same network as your Wi-Fi? Segment and firewall the network so if your Wi-Fi gets hacked, they don’t have a clear path to the rest of your equipment.
- Still running Windows Server 2000 or 2003? Server 2000 was retired on July 13, 2010 and Server 2003 is ending on July 14, 2015 which means no security patches and a huge vulnerability for you. It’s time to ditch the server and connect to your back office virtually.
- Still have a Windows XP computer or a POS with embedded Windows XP? XP’s end of life was April 8, 2014, leaving your systems vulnerable. It’s time to upgrade your systems or virtualize your desktops.
- Still have an analog telephone system with roll over lines? With dedicated bandwidth and quality of service, you can take advantage of Voice Over IP – sometimes at a substantial savings to what you’re paying for your system now.
- Do you have separate banking computer that you use only for banking? Absolutely no general Internet surfing? Might want to consider dedicating a computer to banking.
- Are you setup with Positive Pay with your bank? This is an important first step.
- Still using an old POP service for email? It’s time to switch to an Exchange-style email system. Setup with your management company or contract online for hosted Exchange or Zimbra email.
Contracting with a property services firm that has a dedicated technology staff makes your life easier and allows you to take advantage of the economies of scale inherent in that relationship, but if you have the time and the wherewithal to work through the vulnerabilities, you can go a long way to securing your systems and leveraging technology for the value it will bring to your property.
