On the Rebound (News Virginian)

By Bob Stuart

Democratic Lt. Gov. candidate Jody Wagner remembers challenges when she became Virginia’s state treasurer in 2002.

There was maintaining Virginia’s Triple AAA bond rating and balancing the state budget. The painful cuts included 23 percent to Wagner’s own budget.

Now, Wagner wants to bring her financial expertise to the task of helping Virginia’s economy rebound, and attack other challenges such as transportation and education.

Her resume also includes tenure as Virginia secretary of finance in the Gov. Timothy Kaine administration.

During a campaign stop Thursday in Waynesboro, Wagner acknowledged the difficult commonwealth economy, that includes a 7.1 percent unemployment rate.

Still, Wagner said, “We are not writing IOUs like California.”

In addition to reducing regulations and helping businesses get start-up capital, Wagner said the state needs to focus on improving its education system in order to revive the economy and keep it humming.

That entails bolstering early childhood education to help lower the high school dropout, she said.

“We have one in five students not graduating from high school. We’ve got to turn that around,’’ she said. “And the first place is early childhood education.”

Mentorship programs will bolster middle school and high school experiences for those students, she said.

Transportation is another key campaign issue. Wagner said attacking that problem will require greater commitment to public transportation.

In recent years, proposed transportation fixes have been felled by the courts or by partisan infighting.

During her visit, Wagner briefly spoke of Bolling, saying she finds his recent support of an increased Governor’s Opportunity Fund surprising, saying he had tried to cut the fund used to recruit business and industry to Virginia.

Republican gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell, who as a state delegate initially opposed the two-year fund, has proposed doubling it from $20 million to $40 million. He’s also chastised Gov. Timothy M. Kaine, a Democrat, for failing to spend all of the money in the fund.

Increasing the fund, McDonnell has said, will provide the governor greater means to lure in business.

“If we don’t put money into the opportunity fund we won’t have tools in the tool box,’’ said Wagner.

The Bolling campaign said their candidate has previously supported increasing the fund, pointing to a series of efforts to bolster it dating back several years.

Bolling issued a news release citing his elevation to jobs creation officer by McDonnell, and his other initiatives to create jobs.

“On the other hand, Jody Wagner has a record of failed leadership,’’ the release said. “As secretary of finance, Wagner’s fiscal mismanagement resulted in $5 billion in budget shortfalls, missed revenue projections by 20 percentage points and significantly increased state debt, while supporting every tax increase proposed in the last 7 years.

“Since Jody Wagner was appointed secretary of fiancee in 2006, Virginia’s unemployment rate has increased 130 percent to the highest level in 26 years and 165,000 more Virginians are unemployed.”

Wagner’s campaign manager, Elisabeth Pearson called the Bolling release “the same tired and misleading partisan attacks that have characterized Bill Bolling’s career. Jody Wagner’s work with [former Gov. and current U.S.] Sen. Mark [Warner] and Tim Kaine in finding bipartisan, common sense solutions, has led to Virginia being the ‘best managed state’ and the ‘best state for business.’

“Jody has helped to create 200,000 new jobs over the last eight years, and her fiscal stewardship has helped Virginia maintain an unemployment lower than the national average, despite the global economic downturn. We look forward to voters comparing the Warner-Kaine-Wagner record with the Gilmore-Bolling record.”

Also on hand for Wanger’s visit was Democratic House District 25 candidate Greg Marrow. He is running against incumbent Del. Steve Landes in November.

Marrow drummed up a campaign theme of his own, saying Virginia must look to the green sector for jobs, and must seek ways to attract more business to the state.

“If we can give tax breaks to Wal-Mart we can do it for the companies paying $20, $30 and $40 per hour,’’ he said.

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