Kaine says Va. poised for bright economic future: For the state to realize its potential, the governor said, it must first settle its transportation problems.. Check it out:
(Roanoke Times, The (Roanoke, VA) (KRT) Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) Sep. 30--Gov. Tim Kaine disclosed his administration's economic development strategy Friday in Roanoke, saying Virginia has a highly rated business climate with strong air and sea connections to other countries.
Those strengths were not helped by the General Assembly's transportation special session, which "came to a very ignominious end" Thursday in Richmond, Kaine told the Virginia Economic Developers Association meeting in Roanoke.
Lawmakers failed to adopt a transportation funding plan during the three-day session.
Still, Kaine said he was optimistic about Virginia's economic potential 10 to 20 years from now.
"I believe we are in a very powerful position here in Virginia," Kaine said, because of opportunities in global trade.
Virginia was formed, he pointed out, with English investors backing the Jamestown colony 400 years ago.
Today, some Virginia communities that have lost textile and other manufacturing jobs have reason to fear global competition, Kaine said, but companies on other continents are willing to invest in any American states that compete for them.
"We have to embrace that competition and win," Kaine said.
That could mean an attractive incentives package for a select few types of businesses, Kaine said. Virginia can't afford the dollars some states put into incentives, he said, but the right prospect might be worth a generous package.
Virginia's business climate was endorsed this year by Forbes magazine's first rating of states for their business climate. No other state "was even a close second" to Virginia's No. 1 ranking, Kaine said.
Two things in Virginia's favor are Dulles International Airport and the ports of Virginia, he said.
Dulles has direct flights to every continent, and few states can match that, Kaine said. The problem that keeps Dulles from reaching its potential, Kaine said, is congestion on the roads leading to it.
Virginia's ports already are the second-busiest on the East Coast, and can surpass New York because Virginia's bays can be dredged to accommodate ever-larger ships.
New York Harbor has a rock bottom, and making it deeper would be difficult, Kaine said.
Virginia needs better highway and rail connections with the ports, Kaine said.
"I look at the power of our education system and the connections we have in transportation that other states don't have," Kaine said.
But there are some "flies in the ointment," he said, and a major one is that the legislature, after nine months of talking about transportation, has "ended up with very little to show for it."
A compromise plan that was developed over the summer by Republican legislators from Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads was shot down Tuesday, the first day of the special session, Kaine said.
"On the critical issue of investing dollars in what we need, there has been zero progress," he said.
Kaine said the transportation issue isn't settled yet.
"I don't have any doubt we will deal with it in the course of my term," he said. But the delay means inflation will reduce what Virginia can afford for a solution, Kaine said.
His presentation in Roanoke also attracted a protest.
A newly formed group called Free Enterprise Watch, headed by Michael Reynold in Richmond, posted a mockup of a Trojan horse near the Hotel Roanoke, where Kaine spoke.
The group said Kaine favors organized labor because he received 10 times more campaign contributions from labor groups that did his predecessor, Gov. Mark Warner.
Free Enterprise Watch also noted Kaine appointed two people from labor groups to his administration: former AFL-CIO president Daniel LeBlanc to be his senior work force adviser; and Jean Bankos, former president of the Virginia Education Association teachers' group, as his senior adviser for education projects.
Copyright (c) 2006, The Roanoke Times, Va.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
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