The recent dustup over the value of industrial development agencies — with competing statistics flying every which way — ought not cloud the reality of these agents of economic growth.

IDAs, which provide state and local tax relief for companies that pledge to add jobs, have worked to increase employment, to attract new business and to keep business upstate. Helping business cope with New York's enormous tax burden has to be a key component of a statewide and regional economic development strategy.

But IDAs — locally based appointive bodies such as the County of Monroe Industrial Development Agency — have a distance yet to travel in terms of accountability and public disclosure. As state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli found, IDAs often don't do enough to verify independently whether companies meet their job targets, and required data reporting to the state often is lax.

COMIDA has enacted internal controls to keep a better eye on job outcomes. But, as state Sens. George Maziarz and Joe Robach say in a good IDA-reform bill they're pushing, weak accountability leads to concerns about inside deals and partisan decision-making.

Such concerns motivated a statewide group, Jobs for Justice, to look at the data available and assert that tax relief resulted in fewer jobs than promised. The Center for Governmental Research countered with its own study, finding a much better job-creation picture.

But taxpayers ought not need conflicting studies to determine whether IDAs are working as the law intends. Transparent accountability and oversight measures should be built into the state statute.

And it's time for local and state leaders to start talking about creating regional IDAs so that counties such as Monroe and Ontario can develop and carry out growth strategies together.

Programs such as IDAs, Empire Zones and others that use tax breaks to build private-sector jobs are needed. But their efforts must be transparent and their successes or failures verifiable.

Otherwise, taxpayer investment will continue to be obscured in did-they-or-didn't-they studies and counterstudies.