O’Malley challenges lawmakers to make ‘tough choices’

Gov. Martin O’Malley called on Maryland lawmakers Wednesday to make “tough choices,” including backing several tax increases that he argued are needed to maintain the state’s top-ranked schools and rebuild its transportation infrastructure.

O’Malley (D), in his sixth State of the State address, also pressed for the legalization of same-sex marriage, casting the issue as a matter of fairness for children of gay couples.

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(Mark Gail/ THE WASHINGTON POST ) - Maryland Gov. Martin O' Malley during the state of the state address to a joint session in the Statehouse on February 01, 2012 in Annapolis, Md.

The governor argued that his budget priorities would bolster job creation, and he said he was not “sugar-coating” proposals to raise income taxes for high-earning Marylanders and the taxes motorists pay at the pump.

“Asking our fellow citizens to do more will not be popular,” O’Malley acknowledged in his 33-minute speech. “But without anger, fear or meanness, let’s ask one another: How much less do we think would be good for our children’s future? How much less education do we want? How much less public safety? How many fewer jobs? There are costs and there are values.”

The address to a joint session of the General Assembly was interrupted by applause about two dozen times. But outside the chamber, parts of O’Malley’s speech were criticized by Republicans and Democrats, underscoring the challenge he faces in the remainder of the 90-day session.

In pushing the most expansive legislative agenda of his governorship, O’Malley is counting on support from officials who feel alienated by his other initiatives.

Howard County Executive Ken Ulman (D), for example, said Wednesday he could not take a position on an O’Malley plan to apply the state’s 6 percent sales tax to gasoline because he was still smarting over O’Malley’s proposal to shift half the cost of teacher pensions from the state to the counties.

The shift is a major component of O’Malley’s plan to close a shortfall in the state budget.

“Frankly, it’s such a devastating proposal for local governments that it’s hard to get past it and focus on anything else that is in the governor’s agenda,” said Ulman, who just concluded a year leading the powerful Maryland Association of Counties.

O’Malley administration officials and legislative leaders have said that the support of county officials is key to corralling enough votes in the General Assembly for a gas-tax increase, which would be used to fund hundreds of millions of dollars in transportation projects.

In pressing his case on that issue Wednesday, O’Malley told lawmakers that Maryland “has some of the worst roads in America” and argued that, “We pay a heavy price in terms of the time we spend idling in bumper-to-bumper traffic when we could be at home with our families.”

Prince George’s County Executive Rushern L. Baker III (D) and Montgomery County Executive Isiah Leggett (D) applauded O’Malley’s transportation plans. But both Washington area leaders also criticized the governor’s pension proposal after his speech.

Leggett, who leads the state’s largest and wealthiest county, objected as well to O’Malley’s plan to raise income taxes on those with six-figure incomes.