By Jamie Smith Hopkins and Stephen Kiehl , jamie.smith.hopkins@baltsun.com and stephen.kiehl@baltsun.com|October 19, 2008
A few months after General Motors made its last van at the 70-year-old Broening Highway plant, a seed for Maryland's new economy sprouted across town in West Baltimore.
On a cold morning in October 2005, the governor and mayor heralded the opening of a biopark built by the University of Maryland, Baltimore - a place where researchers would pursue breakthroughs in treatments for diabetes, cancer and heart disease. One of the park's first tenants was a Japanese medical firm. Officials toasted the partnership with sake.
It could not have felt any further from the blue-collar manufacturing work at GM that provided a middle-class life for thousands of Baltimoreans, or from the furnaces at Bethlehem Steel, which went bankrupt in 2001.
Old-line manufacturing and industrial companies have failed, moved and contracted in rapid succession. But a new, knowledge economy has rushed in to replace the old, helping the Baltimore region add 70,000 jobs during the past seven years.
That shift appears poised to continue despite the country's financial and economic problems. Even as manufacturing job losses have accelerated, the metro area has more jobs now than it did at the beginning of the year - while U.S. employers have cut 760,000 from their payrolls.
Health care - less susceptible to downturns - and other knowledge fields have contributed to the growth. And while the widening credit crunch could stall projects and businesses, state officials hope their focus on such industries as science and health will help Maryland weather the turmoil.
A second biopark opened this year on the city's east side, and now cranes hover over depressed neighborhoods that many thought would never rebound. High-tech companies have moved downtown. Hospitals are expanding across the region. And Gov. Martin O'Malley has proposed spending $1.1 billion over the next decade to boost the state's biotech industry - a plan his administration said last week that it still stands behind despite recent budget cuts.
These changes are drawing researchers from out of state. They believe in the region.
"For me, it's almost a matter of destiny," said Francisco Leon, a medical researcher from Spain who specializes in celiac disease - an area in which Maryland scientists have broken new ground. Leon, who joined a Baltimore firm last year, is impressed with the state's commitment to biotech. "They have the political will. They are investing money."
