Property taxes are used to build infrastructure used by the taxpayers, such as roads, water & sewer connections, et cetera. Presumably they will be building such for Tesla, so they will be out some 'real money'.
2) Property and local sales taxes are more likely to stay in the community, whereas the corporate taxes would be sent to Carson City and redistributed to who knows what.
3) Municipalities with strong and diverse property tax sources tend to be community-driven and citizen-oriented. Municipalities with single source of income coming from some corporate giant are incentivized to be pushovers for corporate agenda.