O'Malley touts 'hard work' and successes

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ANNAPOLIS — Gov. Martin O'Malley acknowledges that the 2008 General Assembly session has been difficult, though mostly a success, as state lawmakers prepare to finish work today.

Mr. O'Malley, a Democrat, recently called his first 14 months as governor worthwhile but the "most unpleasant" of his political career.

"We've done a lot of hard work, we've cast a lot of tough votes, and our state is better off for it," he said after a bill-signing ceremony Thursday.

Members of the Democrat-controlled General Assembly on Saturday approved a $31.2 billion budget that funds most of Mr. O'Malley's initiatives. They also have approved or are expected to approve all of his legislative proposals.

The governor has signed major reforms to aid residents facing foreclosure, and is expected to testify Thursday before Congress about his foreclosure plan.

Mr. O'Malley and Public Service Commission Chairman Steven B. Larsen bartered a deal with Constellation Energy that returns $2 billion to customers over the coming decades.

Lawmakers also have approved a deal Mr. O'Malley brokered with Prince George's lawmakers and local leaders to take over the county's hospital system.

"If you look at both years together, Maryland has made tremendous progress in many areas that help working families," said Vincent J. Demarco, president of the Citizens Healthcare Initiative, which has worked closely with Mr. O'Malley and other Democrats to expand health care coverage in Maryland.

However, Mr. O'Malley has struggled against slumping public support, old political foes and a slowing economy in the first two years of his term, leading him to lament last week about his difficult situation.

His public support dropped sharply after he raised taxes $1.4 billion during a special General Assembly session in November that he called to help close the state's budget shortfall, which was estimated to be at least $1.5 billion.

Shortly after a poll last month showed 37 percent of voters approve of his job performance, Mr. O'Malley revoked his support of the unpopular computer-services tax, passed in the special session.

He joined Comptroller Peter Franchot, a Republican, and hundreds of small-business owners in pushing to repeal the tax, but proposed replacing it with a temporary "millionaire's tax."

Mr. O'Malley made peace with state schools Superintendent Nancy S. Grasmick, clearing a potentially difficult battle in the session to remove her.

But his firing of Baltimore City Police Commissioner Kevin P. Clark in 2004 resurfaced when the state's highest court deemed the action illegal. Mr. Clark's attorneys said they would like to depose the governor.

Mr. O'Malley also has struggled with black lawmakers and civil rights groups who opposed his plan to expand DNA collection, much as they opposed his policing tactics when he was mayor of Baltimore.

Budget problems forced lawmakers to cut funding from many of Mr. O'Malley's initiatives, including $25 million from the Chesapeake Bay Trust Fund and $50 million from the Transportation Trust Fund.

The Assembly's small but forceful band of Republican lawmakers — they hold 51 of the 188 seats — said they will continue to hold Mr. O'Malley accountable.

"A lot of stuff he has pushed through a compliant legislature will not have its effects felt for many months, or in some cases years," said House Minority Leader Anthony J. O'Donnell, Southern Maryland Republican. "I believe he may have done great damage to Maryland's future."