Florida governor comes a-courting Pa. businesses

Saying that Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf is planning policies that will be unfriendly to business, Florida Gov. Rick Scott visited Philadelphia Monday on a tour to drum up more business for the Sunshine State.

“You have a governor that’s raising taxes. It makes it easy to show the difference,” said Scott during an appearance with Scott and Wawa, Inc. CEO Chris Gheysens. “We are cutting taxes by $670 million this year. In four years, I’ve cut taxes 40 times. We have the lowest state taxes per capita in the United States.”

One major business that has answered the call is Wawa. The Delaware County company will be opening 50 new stores in Florida over the next two years. The company already has 61 stores in Florida, creating more than 2,100 jobs since 2012.

But company officials say they aren’t moving their headquarters, which will expand in this region.

“I tell people all the time if you have trouble doing business in Florida call me.  I want people to expand in Florida, about 300,000 people moved to the state last year,” said Scott on a bone-chilling night. “A lot of people from Pennsylvania moved to the state last year and I’m sure a lot more are going to go there … if this weather continues a lot more are going to move there.”

Scott called his two-day visit a “domestic business development mission.”