Sun colleague Joe Burris reports:
Gov. Martin O'Malley said Thursday that President Barack Obama's new American Jobs Act would create about 19,000 jobs in the state's infrastructure, schools and services sectors and could help generate future employment opportunities for 100,000 Marylanders by providing skills training.
O'Malley joined Delaware Gov. Jack Markell and Philadelphia Mayor Michael Nutter in a conference call on Thursday to discuss the impact of the proposed jobs act.
Obama has proposed a package of tax cuts aimed at small businesses and the middle class, spending on infrastructure and an extension of employment insurance.
The White House said the American Jobs Act would provide Maryland with an immediate investment of at least $625.5 million for highway and transit modernization projects that would fund about 8,000 jobs.
The plan would include $541.7 million for about 6,000 jobs for teachers, firefighters and law enforcement officers and $315 million in school construction and upgrades. The White House sad that work would generate more than 4,000 jobs.
"We need to pass this now. A four-corners defense is not an option when so many people are without jobs in our country today," O'Malley said.O'Malley said that the jobs plan would bolster efforts the state already has implemented to spur job growth, such as a jobs tax credit.
"A lot of things in this bill are continuations of good things we have been doing," he said. "These are all the things we have been doing as a state. We can do them in an even more robust way and in a way that moves our economy forward with the president's jobs act."
