It’s awkward when you invite someone to a dance and the person don’t show.

But it is downright embarrassing when you still have to go out on the floor and dance solo.

Miss Manners suggests that when this happens, you should pretend you intended to be by yourself.

So it was in Olympia last week, when representatives of Tacoma government and the business community testified for House Bill 3099, which would forgive the sales taxes that normally would be charged on the construction of corporate headquarters.

Which corporate headquarters? No company was mentioned to members of the House Community and Economic Development and Trade Committee. Not once did anyone say the bill is part of a campaign called Project Destiny that has one purpose: to persuade Russell Investments to stay in downtown Tacoma.

Instead it was pitched as a means to expand on the success of so-called community empowerment zones.

“It is another tool,” said prime sponsor Rep. Troy Kelley, D-University Place.

Tom Luce, the director of the Executive Council for Greater Tacoma, noted that current law gives tax breaks for construction of warehouses and factories in empowerment zones, but not headquarters.

Headquarters, however, are important to communities, Luce said, noting that Columbia Bank gave half a million dollars to community groups last year.

Columbia Bank? Is the bill about Columbia Bank? Well no, that was just an example of the impact of having company headquarters in town.

So the bill sounds pretty generic. Except that it would apply only to new buildings that cost at least $50 million. And it would apply only to headquarters constructed in empowerment zones, of which there are only six in the state, including downtown Tacoma but not other Russell suitors Seattle or Bellevue or South King County. And the headquarters must house at least 500 people who earn at least the average state wage.

Seven companies in the state are technically eligible to benefit. But it was obvious to most everyone in the room that the company in question is Russell. Everyone knows that the tax benefit worth at least $4 million is part of the aggressive campaign to keep Russell in downtown Tacoma and not in some suburban setting.

But no one used the name. Russell’s own lobbyists were nowhere to be found because the company is not taking part in all this.

The whole thing got even more strange when the same committee took up House Bill 3101, which would fix glitches in a business and occupation tax credit for “international services” businesses that create jobs in four special zones in the state, including downtown Tacoma.

While there are other companies that could claim the tax credit, Russell was clearly the target of the original tax credit, and Russell was clearly the target of this change.

Maybe they don’t have to speak the name because everyone knows. But everyone knew the huge package aimed at getting Boeing to build the Dreamliner in the state was about Boeing, and they still used the company’s name in hearings.

So goes the strangest courtship since Lyle Lovett and Julia Roberts. Tacoma wants Russell. And it’s working on a passel of gifts and goodies to woo the always growing company that has 1,100 workers downtown.

But Russell isn’t saying whether it wants Tacoma. Russell isn’t saying much of anything, other than that its downtown lease expires in 2013 and that it will either expand here or move somewhere else in the region.

It certainly isn’t saying that the legislative changes will influence its decision.

So the city and its legislators and its business community are left to woo and court and hope that their moves are enough to entice the king of the ball out on the dance floor.

Peter Callaghan: 253-597-8657

peter.callaghan@thenewstribune.com

blogs.thenewstribune.com/politics