Here are excerpts from Governor Glendening's State of the State address:
What is the state of Maryland today? I believe it can be described as anxious, in both senses of the use of the word. Our citizens are anxious -- that is, nervous -- because too many people cannot sit on their front porch or walk down their street without being afraid. Too many jobs are leaving our state. Too many children are not receiving the quality of education to prepare them for a bright future.
But our citizens are also anxious in a positive sense -- and that is, excited -- to get started on the work ahead Clearly, we must plan ahead to prepare for the 21st century. That means making long-term decisions, and looking at things like our budget not as a series of annual crises, but as a four-year road map. . .
The road map that will take Maryland into the 21st century has been developed by more than 500 men and women, from all parts of our state, from a variety of backgrounds and experiences, who joined together to participate in the Maryland Forward transition effort.
Each policy committee was charged with studying a particular area, and making recommendations as to specific improvements that can be made in the lives of our citizens, businesses and constituents. . .Let me give you a sampling of the types of recommendations that have been advanced by these committees and which I have already adopted.
The Policy Committee for Effectiveness and Efficiency in Government recommended we improve the regulatory process by coordinating the work of Maryland Department of Environment and the Maryland Department of Natural Resources. Duplication, overlapping and in some case contradictory regulations are costly and result in frustration in the community and sometimes even lead to noncompliance.
We are submitting a bill which places the regulatory power under one agency, the Department of the Environment. The Department of Natural Resources will then become the conservator, protector and manager of our great natural resources, including the Bay, but will not have regulatory power or permitting responsibility. . .
From the Policy Committee studying environmental issues, we are proposing a tax benefit for the purchase of electric and alternative fuel vehicles. This will result in tax relief for businesses that use these vehicles and will promote clean air.
The Policy Committee studying methods to make our communities safer recommended, under the leadership of Lieutenant Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, that legislation be submitted to streamline the death penalty process. This administration is committed to the belief that those who commit crimes so heinous that they are found guilty by their peers, and are sentenced to death, will be held responsible and will be executed.
In the area of Human Services, a bill is being submitted which places more responsibility on parents, specifically finding missing parents and deadbeat parents, and which eases the regulations for adoption of children.
Several committees have recommended a major focus on revitalization. Our package creates a Neighborhood Business Development program that will award funds to small businesses in economically disadvantaged communities. . .
This is almost, if you will, a mini-UDAG [Urban Development Action Grant] program of the type that was the heart of the success for the Baltimore Inner Harbor. If grants of millions of dollars were right for big business in the Inner Harbor, why would not smaller grants be right for neighborhood business? We have already included $7 million in our budget to get this program started.
All the threads from these different policy groups and committees lead to economic development. . .
A strong economy in Maryland will go a long way toward providing the resources for improving our schools and for making our streets safe. Good jobs, good private sector jobs are the basis of prosperity. No government program, no welfare program, no social program can replace the opportunity for meaningful work. . .
I am introducing legislation to create a business-focused Department of Business and Economic Development. We will transfer the employment and training functions currently handled 1,200 of the 1,400 DEED [Department of Economic and Employment Development] employees to the new Department of Labor, Licensing and Regulation.
By having a single mission, bringing jobs to Maryland and retaining the jobs that are here, the Department of Business and Economic Development will be a leaner, more focused agency. We will also put in place a system of one-stop shopping to serve the needs of existing and prospective businesses.
Second, the private sector must have a key role in guiding economic development efforts. After all, who knows how to talk to a CEO better than another CEO? Would you rather have a state bureaucrat talk to you about moving your business to Maryland or would you rather have someone who is here doing business right now?
Legislation is being submitted, therefore, to create a private sector-oriented Maryland Economic Development Commission within the newly structured Department of Business and Economic Development. The mission of this commission is to create a strategic plan for economic development for this state. . .
Secondly, the commission would recommend a program and spending priorities and review the allocation of economic development funds and oversee the state's marketing efforts to attract and retain business and jobs.
The new Department of Business and Economic Development will help us streamline and rationalize the overlapping and contradictory regulations in the state of Maryland. These regulations are costly and result in frustration in the community, and sometimes lead to non-compliance. Business can be helped simply by removing some of the red tape and releasing the natural vigor of the private sector.
The new department will also focus on specific strengths of each region. For example, the I-270 technology corridor, the southern Maryland military technology, the Eastern Shore agriculture and western Maryland's tourism are each in its own way a magnet for certain businesses. The commission will work with existing businesses to help them expand since most of the jobs created come from existing businesses.
And it will identify targeted business taxes that should be reduced or eliminated. These are specific taxes that our competitors in most cases do not have. And they keep people from bringing their business to Maryland, and they make people that are in Maryland leave.
The new department will also focus on redirecting growth to protect our natural resources and our businesses. This is a strong coordinated policy that emphasizes revitalization and encourages the retention and attraction of businesses and residences in existing urban areas. . .
Every time we move economic development ahead and into already established communities, we take one giant step forward for the environment. And we make one big step toward solving urban and social problems, and we make a major step for business. We must achieve a balance between our environmental goals and our economic development goals.
In some cases, business will be especially happy with our approach to balance. For example, we will submit legislation that will eliminate unnecessary duplication in obtaining wetlands permits. The "Assumption Bill," as it is known, removes the United States Corps of Engineers from our wetlands review process. We do not need to do something three times over to do something right.
At other times, the environmental community will be especially pleased. For example, I totally disagree with those few voices in the business community who insist that states cannot adopt regulations that are more stringent than the federal government. Of course we can do that. In Maryland, our greatest natural resource is the Chesapeake Bay, and we will take every action -- including actions more stringent than federal law -- to protect that great resource.
In the area of tax relief, we will begin by totally repealing, on a phase-down basis, the personal property tax on research and development equipment. Maryland faces fierce competition from neighboring states in efforts to attract and expand high-technology and other growth industries.
A major obstacle in attracting young and growing businesses is that Maryland continues to tax personal properties, such as computers, involved in research and development. We are, as my friends on the Shore would say, "eating our own seed corn" by taxing the research tools of the future.
Additionally, I am supporting the repeal of the snack tax, one of the few of its kind in the nation. The loss of revenue will be more than offset by job growth.
Finally, and I do not mean this as an end because we will continue to review for additional targeted tax relief, but finally, I will work closely with the legislature in your efforts to reduce closing costs for home buyers. We must reverse the advance payment for property taxes at settlement that gives this state one of the highest closing costs in the country.
I will also emphasize the personal involvement of the governor in business development. . .I will make my personal time available. I will make the calls. I will personally meet with whomever I need to, to bring and keep good jobs in Maryland.
I believe that if we take care of these fundamentals . . .and if we add to that our quality of life, our diversity, our affluent, sophisticated consumers, and the fact that we are the fourth largest market in the nation . . .then Maryland's natural assets will make us winners in retaining and attracting jobs.
Now let me switch gears here and say most of my speech has been about business and job development. Let me also say that we must work together to restore the faith of our citizens in government. . .To this end, I will propose changes in contracting and personnel procedures. . .
We must also seriously address the process of judicial appointments and discipline. Our system of justice rests on the quality of our judges and their post-appointment behavior. Although I certainly respect the prerogatives of this body, I also urge that you get on with the task of confronting the problems posed by legislative scholarships, the only such program in the nation. And I look forward to that reform.
Finally, in the areas of needed reforms, I am looking forward to working with the Speaker and others on a bipartisan effort to improve our election process. Our goal can be no less than Maryland having the most modern, efficient, effective, uniform, fair process, and that process must be fair, throughout the state of Maryland.
I have told you much of what is wrong with the state, and our solutions for part of those problems. . .We must put our problems in the proper perspective. The perspective that we have problems -- solvable problems to be sure -- but we are a great state with great assets and a great future.
To help you keep that perspective, that these problems are easily solved as we look forward to a great future, let me close with a story. The story is told about a co-ed at the University of Maryland at College Park, back in the 70s when we had a few riots. She wrote her parents a letter and it went something like this.
"Dear Mom and Dad,
"I'm sorry to be so long in writing you but all the stationery was destroyed the day the demonstrators burned down the dorm.
"Please don't worry about my eyesight; the doctor says it's only smoke damage and I should be able to see again in a few weeks.
"Please don't worry about where I'm living. That kind boy Bill has offered to share his apartment with me. I know you've always wanted to be grandparents, so you will pleased to know that you will be in two months."
A new paragraph.
"Please disregard the above practice in English composition. There was not a fire, I'm not hurt. I'm not pregnant and in fact I don't even have a boyfriend.
"But I did receive a D in French and an F in chemistry and I wanted to be sure that you heard the news in the proper perspective."
Thank you.