Collins: Wind won’t transform city.

I had the good fortune to meet the genial mayor of New Bedford, Jon Mitchell, when Mystic Seaport's whaling ship Charles W. Morgan made a ceremonial visit in 2014 to its original homeport.

As an old whaling city, New Bedford has a lot in common with New London, and I remember asking Mitchell about plans percolating then for a New Bedford casino.

Mitchell seemed blasé about the casino, which indeed never happened, but he was transfixed by plans for waterfront staging areas in New Bedford for the developing offshore wind industry.

Indeed, I saw in recent news reports, Mitchell was beaming about the awarding of the first Massachusetts purchase awards for offshore wind. The city that once lit the world with whale oil, Mitchell enthusiastically told me in 2014, was going to help light some of New England with wind.

I see in New London Mayor Michael Passero the same enthusiasm, now that plans for Connecticut offshore wind are coalescing. He beams when talking about the idea of some of a new industry landing here.

Gov. Dannel Malloy, too, is on the offshore wind bandwagon, arriving in New London on Tuesday, promising $15 million in bond money to improve State Pier here and make it more offshore-wind friendly, a staging area for assembling and shipping components needed offshore.

Of course, the companies competing for Connecticut's offshore wind business are likely going to want to use New London's port and make investments in it. One promises it would spend $15 million of its own on the state facility.

Malloy, pushing borrowed money at them, is a bit like a car dealer throwing in the clearcoat after you already have agreed to buy the car. I guess it's too late to think the lame duck governor might break his addiction to bond money, still using it generously even when it's not necessary.

At least the governor someday will be able to claim much statewide benefit from offshore wind development, which at the very least is going to create a lot of new jobs and possibly could lead to significant manufacturing startups.

But I don't see how the wind business is going to be transformative for New London. There is some hope that offshore development will lead to new manufacturing in parts of the United States, not just the assembly of things shipped here. But that's a long shot and probably unlikely for land-challenged New London.

The $15 million that Deepwater Wind promises to invest at State

Pier, for instance, would be on state property and would not generate a dime in new real estate taxes for the city. The city might get an increase in state reimbursement, payments in lieu of taxes, but will that even be enough to cover the increased need for city services?

Yes, more people would be working in New London. But how many of those jobs would go to city residents? It’s hard to know.

It will bring commerce. Deepwater promises to headquarter the project here and occupy downtown offices if it gets the Connecticut award. That is positive and would be good for the city, if just for the extra feet on downtown sidewalks and lunchtime spending. A big workforce at State Pier also might breathe new life into Hodges Square, and that would be great for the city.

If I owned a grinder shop there, I would be ecstatic.

But I don’t see why city property owners should see much tax relief from new development not paying taxes while using city services. It seems like another example of the way New London shoulders responsibility for the rest of the region, hosting colleges and social service agencies and a hospital that serve an area well beyond city borders without paying city taxes.

Now the city will get to host a profit-making business, making big profits in fact, guaranteed with established electric rates, enhanced because of the renewable source, without tax benefit. It’s nice to be wanted but it also would be nice to be paid.

I’m all for offshore wind development. I think it’s exciting that Connecticut seems to be trying to catch up as the industry matures.

Block Island hit a home run by hosting the first offshore wind farm, essentially a trial project. It not only lowered the price of electricity on the island but it laid a cable to the mainland, something that would never otherwise have happened, and shuttered the dirty, noisy and unreliable diesel generators that ran on fuel brought precariously in tank trucks on the ferry.

Deepwater seemed to follow through and do everything for Block Island that was promised.

I don’t see any big jackpots for New London.

Malloy made his pitch Tuesday before a statewide audience watching television news that Connecticut is out front in developing this exciting new industry and its promise of new investment and job creation.

But I didn’t see him pull anything for New London out of his deep bag of goodies.