It's unlikely, however, that Maryland's law will have any impact on the state's reputation as "business-unfriendly," Basu said.

"It's not clear that the ability to recruit companies has changed one iota," he said. "This doesn't result in lower taxes or less regulation. What it does do is position Maryland to attract more young, knowledge workers, and there may be economic spinoff from them. All one of them needs to do is start the next Facebook or Google and we can talk about ourselves as Silicon Valley East."

Besides prompting moves to Maryland, the marriage law is expected to boost tourism, state officials said.

"What we know is that the gay market has more disposable income and has a propensity to travel," said Hannah Byron, assistant secretary of tourism, film and the arts for the state Department of Business and Economic Development. "With the passage of the referendum, it puts Maryland on a radar that it hasn't been on before. We want to take advantage of that."

The gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community generates more than $70 billion a year in travel and tourism spending, "so we recognize this is a really good sector for us to focus on," she said.

Byron said she foresees no negative effect from travelers opposed to same-gender marriages. "Families of all shapes, sizes and beliefs find Maryland a welcoming place to spend their vacations, and we do not expect that to change," she said.

Baltimore's tourism officials hope the city will draw gay couples looking to plan weddings and honeymoons. One day after the measure passed, Visit Baltimore launched a micro-site on its website dedicated to helping same-sex couples plan their nuptials and find venues and vendors.

For Wendy Ingram Braswell, who runs an event planning firm with business partner Malinda Davis, the law's passage means a chance to tap into a market of nearly 17,000 same-sex households in Maryland, each with an average household income of more than $103,000.

Same-sex couples living in Maryland are expected to boost wedding spending in the state by $63 million over three years, according to a 2007 study of how same-sex marriage would affect Maryland's budget by the Williams Institute on Sexual Orientation Law and Policy at the University of California-Los Angeles.

Braswell and Davis plan to move forward with a website they started earlier this year, Marylandgayweddings.com, which lists local vendors such as florists and photographers.

Each of the vendors, which pay to advertise on the site, must sign a pledge of nondiscrimination before they can be listed, Braswell said. She said she expects to increase the number of vendors from 20 to about 1,000 in the first year.

"It's a whole new market that every single one of us can tap into," Braswell said. "We have a whole new set of couples we can cater to."

lorraine.mirabella@baltsun.com

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