{"id":7175,"date":"2016-10-12T07:00:05","date_gmt":"2016-10-12T11:00:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=7175"},"modified":"2016-10-11T19:02:04","modified_gmt":"2016-10-11T23:02:04","slug":"does-larry-hogan-really-care-about-jobs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/?p=7175","title":{"rendered":"Does Larry Hogan Really Care About Jobs?"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco.<\/em><\/p>\n

Larry Hogan has worked hard to portray himself as a Jobs Governor.\u00a0 In nearly every one of his public appearances, speeches and press statements, he talks about jobs, jobs, jobs.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a quote from his inaugural address that has set the tone for his administration.<\/p>\n

\u201cMaryland has an educated workforce, world-class universities and colleges, great community colleges, and public schools. We have our beautiful Chesapeake Bay, the Port of Baltimore, and a great location in the heart of the Mid-Atlantic region. We must leverage these amazing assets to transform Maryland into a place where businesses can flourish and create more jobs and opportunities for our citizens. Starting today let me say loudly and clearly: Maryland is open for business.\u201d\u00a0 <\/em>Governor Hogan, Inaugural Address, 1\/21\/15<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The statement above deserves a big asterisk.\u00a0 In practice, Hogan\u2019s enthusiasm for jobs depends on where they are.\u00a0 When jobs are located at a Northrop Grumman facility in Anne Arundel County<\/a>, the Governor proposes tens of millions of dollars in state subsidies for them<\/a>.\u00a0 When employment growth lags in the Eastern Shore and Western Maryland, Hogan promises a new jobs initiative<\/a>.\u00a0 But when the Red Line was projected to add billions of dollars in economic activity and over 15,000 badly needed jobs to the City of Baltimore<\/a>, Hogan cancelled it.\u00a0 And last week, he sent another large public works project into limbo: Montgomery County\u2019s Corridor Cities Transitway<\/a>.\u00a0 What do Montgomery County and the City of Baltimore have in common?\u00a0 You guessed it \u2013 they voted for Hogan\u2019s opponent in the last election.<\/p>\n

The Corridor Cities Transitway (CCT)<\/a> is one of the state\u2019s preeminent transportation projects, and one that has an awful lot of job growth tied to it.\u00a0 The CCT, a 15-mile Bus Rapid Transit Line from the Shady Grove Metro Station to the southern part of Clarksburg, has been planned since the 1970s.\u00a0 It would link some of Montgomery County\u2019s fastest-growing places, including Gaithersburg, Germantown, Clarksburg, the Life Sciences Center and the federal government\u2019s National Institute of Standards and Technology, in an area that has few transit options.\u00a0 A 2011 economic impact analysis<\/a> by Parsons Brinckerhoff estimated that the project would create $2.2 billion of economic activity through 2050 and would create over 6,000 jobs during its construction phase.\u00a0 Those jobs would go to craft employees like carpenters, laborers, operating engineers, cement masons, iron workers and electricians \u2013 blue-collar workers whom the Governor cultivates.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe government needs to do everything it possibly can to help people provide for themselves and get a job.\u201d\u00a0 Larry Hogan, candidate for Governor, 10\/9\/14<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

But the CCT is far more than just a transportation project.\u00a0 It is tied to the massive Great Seneca Science Corridor Master Plan<\/a> passed by the Montgomery County Council in 2010.\u00a0 The plan leverages the CCT to allow new development including 10.6 million additional square feet of commercial space, 5,700 more residential units and 31,300 new jobs.\u00a0 This would be one of the biggest developments in the state, comparable to Baltimore\u2019s Port Covington project<\/a>.\u00a0 Many of the Great Seneca plan\u2019s jobs would be professional and high-paying, including scientists, doctors and engineers.\u00a0 All of this is worth countless billions to the State of Maryland.\u00a0 But because the area\u2019s existing infrastructure can\u2019t handle the traffic volume created by this level of development, the plan is contingent on the CCT\u2019s construction.\u00a0 In other words, no CCT \u2013 no jobs.\u00a0 As Council Member George Leventhal has said<\/a>, \u201cBy deferring this project, Governor Hogan is deferring our high-tech economy.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe primary focus of our administration is economic development, growing our private sector and creating more jobs.\u201d\u00a0 Governor Hogan, MACo conference, 8\/22\/16<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Governor Hogan is uniquely qualified to understand the ties between growth, development and jobs.\u00a0 He is, after all, a real estate developer<\/a> who has made a fortune building projects not so different from those that would be located near the CCT.\u00a0 He requires no education on the economic merits of this issue.\u00a0 But the politics are a totally different matter.\u00a0 The Governor\u2019s political play is obvious: he gets to kill (or at least indefinitely delay) a transit project in a blue county so that he can spread highway money around to the red counties who will presumably vote for him.\u00a0 And because he (barely!) allowed a stripped-down version of the Purple Line<\/a> to proceed, he can ax the CCT and still raise money from his friends in the real estate industry.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe primary focus of my administration is to get Maryland open for business once again and create jobs for our citizens.\u201d\u00a0 Governor Hogan, 5\/12\/15<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

In economic terms, the CCT and its associated development would be a huge win for everyone around the state.\u00a0 That\u2019s because the state government is the primary recipient of income tax revenues from new residents, and it\u2019s the only recipient of sales taxes and corporate income taxes from new businesses.\u00a0 Because of how Maryland\u2019s wealth formulas work, the huge majority of those state revenues would not stay in MoCo \u2013 they would go to the poorer counties of the state, many of whom are in rural areas that vote in huge numbers for Hogan.\u00a0 In his effort to score points with his supporters, the Governor is actually damaging their economic interests.<\/p>\n

So what does the Governor really care about?\u00a0 Is it jobs?<\/p>\n

Or politics?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Adam Pagnucco. Larry Hogan has worked hard to portray himself as a Jobs Governor.\u00a0 In nearly every one of his public appearances, speeches and press statements, he talks about jobs, jobs, jobs.\u00a0 Here\u2019s a quote from his inaugural address that has set the tone for his administration. \u201cMaryland has an educated workforce, world-class universities … Continue reading Does Larry Hogan Really Care About Jobs?<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,189,1197],"tags":[1545,1555,968],"class_list":["post-7175","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adam-pagnucco","category-cct","category-larry-hogan","tag-adam-pagnucco","tag-cct","tag-larry-hogan"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4mKJE-1RJ","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7175","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7175"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7175\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7180,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7175\/revisions\/7180"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7175"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7175"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theseventhstate.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7175"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}