Alltel will repay the state $11.4 million in tax breaks

ATLANTA - A telecommunications company that got tax breaks from Georgia in exchange for a promise of new investment and jobs told the state Friday it can&#39;t fully meet its end of the bargain and will pay back the $11.5 million it saved in taxes. <br> <br> Alltel Corporation said in a letter to Revenue Commissioner Jerry Jackson it fulfilled part of the agreement with an investment of $76 million in Alpharetta, but cannot meet its other commitment to add 785 new jobs because of increasingly competitive conditions in the communications industry and the weak economy. <br> <br> The company serves about 1.2 million customers, primarily in rural areas. <br> <br> Alltel was one of a handful of companies awarded $98 million in tax breaks through an economic development project once so secret that even the governor was not supposed to be privy to its workings. <br> <br> After a series of newspaper articles focused public attention on the program, Governor Barnes pushed legislation this year making some of the program&#39;s records open to the public. <br> <br> Created in 1988, the program was intended to reward companies for locating in Georgia or expanding in Georgia. The more jobs they created and the higher the payroll, the larger the tax break they could receive.