A panel of economic development officials offered a collective shrug toward Gov. Andrew Cuomo‘s tax-free zones initiative, predicting that it could help but won’t be a silver bullet forthe upstate economy.

“There’s a real danger of overselling it,” said Brian McMahon, executive director of the New York State Economic Development Council, at Wednesday’s symposium — “The Upstate Jobs Crisis” — at the Albany Institute of History and Art.

Distinct from the Cuomo-controlled EmpireState Development Corp., the council is composed of leaders of economic development groups and businesses such as engineering and construction companies.

“I think that (the proposal) has potential, but I just worry that the expectation is that we’re going to have a lot of SUNY Albanys around — we’re just not,” McMahon said, referring to the unique success that the University at Albany’s nanotechnology campus has achieved.

The nanotech initiative was conceived at the outset as a way to combine academia and industry, and it took a lot of money to get started, McMahon said. Similar initiatives in other spots haven’t always taken root.

A portion of the Southern Tier “was going to be the next Silicon Valley, but with the ceramic industry. It never happened,” said Shawn Hogan, mayor of Hornell. The effort to develop a large ceramic industry cluster along I-86 in the western region was meant to harness research at SUNY’s College of Ceramics at Alfred University and the industrial expertise of companies like Corning Inc.

Hogan said that plan hasn’t lived up to its promise.

Since it was unveiled a few weeks ago, the governor’s tax-free plan has generated both praise and criticism. If approved by lawmakers it would create a decade-long tax abatement for startups on SUNY and some private college campuses. The tax break would also apply to employees, who would get a 10-year income tax holiday.

At Wednesday’s summit, sponsored by the fiscally conservative Empire Center, several speakers said New York’s high taxes need to be lowered and its regulatory structures reined in before any upstate revival could really start.

Participants also provided a vivid but dismal picture of upstate’s economic decline over the past half-century.

Since the 1960s, manufacturing has given way to “eds and meds” — tax-supported education and health care jobs — as the mainstay employers.

Were it not for the exodus of people from the region, the unemployment rates would be even higher. In 2010, for example, the median age upstate was 40 compared to 37 nationally.

Carl Schramm, a Syracuse University professor and expert in entrepreneurship, scoffed at Cuomo’s “New New York” TV ads, including one that he viewed while in California that featured entrepreneur Warren Buffet promoting Buffalo.

“There’s not going to be a new Buffalo,” Schramm said, adding that “it’s not going to be the invention of a public relations scheme.”

© 2013, Albany Times Union