Private Sector

In her letter ("Four more years," November 3), Rae Abbot suggests that we give President Barack Obama four more years. Her reasoning is that it "...doesn't make sense for us to hand the reins over to a less capable and more narrowly focused man simply because instant gratification has not been ours. " As to capabilities, Mr. Obama' was a community organizer, law professor and state and federal politician. No private sector experience in that resume. Mr. Romney has been a governor, turned around the troubled 2002 Olympics, and was an executive working with businesses (i.e.

Once again The Sun is out of touch with economic realities in proposing an increase in the state's gas tax ("Pump up the economy," Nov. 25). First, a gas tax is highly regressive and disproportionately impacts the poor. Second, according to Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot, who (unlike The Sun) actually knows all the financial details of the state, we already have ample tax revenues in Maryland, which is one the highest-taxed states in the nation. Third, the state needs to focus on creating an environment that encourages private sector investment and the creation of jobs.

Gov. Martin O'Malley has allocated $25 million for affordable housing in the fiscal 2014 capital budget that will allow the state to " leverage an additional $180 million in private sector and other public funding ," the state housing department said. The money will go toward an initiative the governor started last year, called Rental Housing Works, and is expected to fund the construction or renovation of 1,100 affordable rental units. T he allocation will also support 1,900 jobs and generate $39 million in taxes over 15 years, according to O'Malley's office the Department of Housing and Community Development.

In his commentary in the Baltimore Sun ("End the MTA Monopoly," April 14), Professor James Dorn of Towson University, and the Cato Foundation whose journal he edits, would have us privatize our public transportation. Dorn characterizes the Maryland Transit Administration (MTA) as a monopoly, without mentioning the scores of private transportation providers (vans, shuttles, taxis, etc.), including the massive French multinational corporation Veolia, which already co-exist with the MTA right here in the Baltimore region.

ANNAPOLIS -- After criticizing the paucity of private-sector financing, a Senate panel approved yesterday initial-design funding for three technology-related projects.But the members of the Budget and Taxation Committee's subcommittee on capital spending sent a clear message to the state's economic development community: Give us a return on our investments.The capital budget subcommittee, which includes nearly everyone on the full committee, approved $3.4 million for the three projects:* The Christopher Columbus Center for Marine Research and Exploration, a nearly $200 million complex scheduled to be built on Piers 5 and 6 in the Inner Harbor area.

Invoking Thomas Jefferson on the dangers of government debt and excessive taxation, the Howard County Chamber of Commerce yesterday called for a frugal government that gives private industry more freedom to flourish.At its annual legislative breakfast in Columbia, attended by about 75 business people and politicians, the business group's legislative committee urged the county's state and local lawmakers to hold the line on taxes, privatize some government services and trim regulations.It also said lawmakers should improve transportation systems, scrutinize education spending and push to have such expensive programs as health care insurance and wetlands conservation administered at the state, rather than the federal, level.

Sean Kennedy of the ever-voluble Maryland Policy Institute attempts in "Annapolis dines at federal expense" (June 13) to indict two governments simultaneously. If ever anyone finds oneself on a side with government, do please watch-out; you may be under constant and consistently false attack. Here we find both the feds and Gov.Martin O'Malleysupposedly pulling another fast one past the insufficiently alert public. Well, if anyone is trying to pull a fast one, Mr. Kennedy is the real offender.

Between 2006 and 2011, during the worst economic period since World War II for design and construction firms, my company has quadrupled in size. We have hired both professional and semi-skilled workers. The reason for that is we have focused our work on fixing community stormwater systems. These systems of pipes, trenches and ponds that drain rain water from our cities and suburbs have been badly neglected in the past few decades. Many jurisdictions estimate at least 30 percent of their stormwater facilities no longer function.

A lengthy hearing with close to two dozen speakers delayed a County Council vote last night on a bill to create Anne Arundel's first private agency to raise money for recreational projects.The proposal had been the subject of intensive lobbying, and passage of a bill in the Maryland General Assembly last night allowing the county to create a revenue authority to control money raised for recreation programs.But after more than two hours of council members' questioning county officials about the proposal, and testimony from opponents, it appeared possible that the members would introduce several amendments on the bill to create the Recreational Revenue Authority -- which would require a new public hearing and put off a vote.

WASHINGTON - U.S. diplomats in Asia and Africa worked aggressively to help oil services giant Halliburton Inc., secure lucrative overseas contracts when Republican vice presidential candidate Dick Cheney headed the company, according to State Department memos released yesterday. In one Angolan oil deal, State Department officials there boasted in a cable to Secretary of State Madeleine K. Albright in 1998 that they had "literally camped out" at local government, banking and oil-industry offices, "unraveling snag after snag to obtain the transfer of funds" on behalf of Halliburton.