GOVERNOR HOGAN: Good morning. Good morning. Guys had some coffee this morning. Good morning, thank you so much. Good morning. It’s so great to be back in Ocean City with everybody again, face‑to‑face. I want to first of all start out by giving a big thank you to Michael Sanderson and the entire MACo staff for bringing us all safely back together again in person. Thank you very much for all your hard work. It’s been a great conference.
And I want to take a moment to just say something about the big guy that just introduced me, because I’m really proud of him and the job that he’s done. And I would like to just have you please join me in a warm round of applause and appreciation for MACo President Buddy Levengood for his tremendous leadership throughout this very difficult past year. I know that all of Maryland’s local leaders have been serve on the front line including during this very difficult battle of COVID‑19. I just want to take a moment to sincerely thank each and every one of you for your dedication to your communities and for your continued service to the state.
Seven years ago when I first came into office, I committed that we were going to work together with you to try to build a true partnership with our county governments. I said that our administration would be more accessible and more responsive to you and your needs, and I just want to also take a minute, because I see a bunch of them sitting out, thank our entire cabinet and staff for their hard work and living up to that commitment we made seven years ago. Thank you so much for all of your hard work.
You know, it’s never been more important to have the collaboration and the partnership that we’ve had over the past 18 months. None of us could really have imagined the toll that this pandemic would take on you are lives and on our very way of life. But as the theme of your conference this year, we’re reminded that ‑‑ you know, I’m very proud to say that together we were resilient, responsive and ready. All of us summoned every ounce of strength and every resource at our disposal in order to cob front this threat. And I think we met the crisis head on with courage and resolve.
As soon as those first cases of COVID‑19 were confirmed in Maryland, we immediately declared a state of emergency in order to take unprecedented actions to bring our entire public health arsenal to bear against this invisible enemy. We immediately convened calls between county leaders and senior members of our team and our cabinet and our public health officials to ensure that the lines of communication remained open throughout the crisis. As the number of infections rose, we worked with you to expand our hospital surge capacity across the state by 6,000 beds. We procured and distributed tens of millions of gowns and masks and other PPE and deployed thousands of contact tracers in every jurisdiction. We worked with your county health departments and other partners to build up an entire testing infrastructure from scratch, going from doing just 50 COVID tests per day to now having completed more than 11.7 million COVID tests. We built a massive vaccine infrastructure from scratch, deploying a team of 11,400 people and opening thousands of points of distribution at every corner of the state. And through our no arm left behind mission, we’ve administered more than 7.4 million COVID vaccines. And 80 percent of all Marylanders 1 and over have already been vaccinated. We vaccinated 94 percent of Maryland’s seniors, making Maryland one of the most vaccinated states in America.
As a result of all those efforts our case rate Anita positivity rate are also among the lowest in America, and we continue to have by far one of strongest health recoveries in the nation. Thanks to our swift and decisive action that provide more than $2.1 billion in state economic relief measures, we’re also having one of the best economic recoveries in America. We invested $700 million in state emergency economic relief, including $215 million through our state COVID‑19 emergency relief fund to 16,000 businesses. We provided $50 million through our hotel relief fund, $80 million through our restaurant relief fund, and $50 million through the Maryland nonprofit recovery initiative to 2,000 different organizations. We awarded over $31 million through the layoff aversion fund to more than 1,200 small businesses, which directly saved more than 21,000 jobs. We directed $8 million to 32 local entities that rely heavily on tourism and visitors. $7 billion in awards for 41 main street trams across the state. $40 million in relief for 155 different entertainment venue, and $5 million was provided through our Maryland farmer COVID relief fund to more than 1,300 Maryland farmers and producers.
At the start of the legislative session in January, I introduced the Relief Act of 2021 as emergency legislation, which included the largest tax cuts in state history. This $1.45 billion package provided urgently needed tax relief and economic stimulus for struggling Maryland families, small businesses and those who had lost their jobs due to the global pandemic, allowing them to keep more of their hard‑earned money in their own pockets. We passed our Relief Act with near unanimous bipartisan support in both houses of the legislature, and it has offered a real lifeline to those hardest hit ‑‑ families who were struggling just to get by, and small businesses who are desperately trying to stay afloat. For more than a year, we’ve been working to keep people in their home, committing more than $110 million in rental relief six months before the federal government stepped up. Then we received another $400 million from the federal government, which was immediately distributed out to all of you in the counties. You’re closest to the needs of your constituents.
Unfortunately, so far only about 20 percent of that money has been spent by the counties. Some are doing extremely well, including Carroll, Cecil, Howard and Prince George’s counties, which have already utilized a sizable portion of that funding. But others are lagging behind, and I just can’t emphasize enough how important it is for you to try to get this relief out to the people that need it most as quickly as possible. And our team at the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development stands ready. We’re available around the clock to try to assist you in accomplishing that mission.
We also committed more than $1.2 billion in relief to help county school systems get our students safely back into the classrooms. And we’ve been urging counties to use these resources for effective COVID prevention strategies, including the testing programs that state officials have made available, as well as for upgrading filtration systems and other health even safety improvements. And now that we have transitioned from a state of emergency to an ongoing public health management response, we’re renewing our focus on the long‑term health of our economy by continuing to invest in rebuilding our infrastructure, which is critical to creating jobs and improving the lives of everyday Marylanders and Americans.
We’ve taken a balanced approach, an all‑inclusive approach to infrastructure, investing far more in roads and transit than any other administration in state history. Just last week, the U.S. Senate passed a bipartisan infrastructure package, which I’ve been pushing for for more than two years and working toward that goal. The bipartisan compromise bill will allow us to significantly expand our infrastructure investments. We were able to get the President and both Republicans and Democrats in the Senate onboard, and now we’re pushing the House of Representatives to get it done for the American people.
In the coming week, state transportation officials will be rolling out a bold, new consolidated transportation plan, which will include even more unprecedented infrastructure investments across the state. In fact, while we’re here in Ocean City this morning, I want to take this opportunity to announce for the first time that our new CTP will include funding for the planning of the long‑awaited and desperately needed Maryland Route 90, the gateway to Ocean City project.
Maryland 90 is a stop priority, not only for safety, access and the local economy, but also for its vital role in emergency response. We’re very pleased to be taking this important step forward, and we also look forward to working with each of you in your jurisdictions on all of the critical projects in your counties. Expanding access to broadband in both rural and urban communities continues to be a key part of our infrastructure investments. I know this has been a top priority for all of you at MACo. Yesterday in Snow Hill, I launched a transformative new initiative called Connect Maryland which will increase access to high speed connectivity in households and communities all across our state. Through Connect Maryland, we’re going to invest $400 million in the expansion of broadband access in order to fully address ‑‑ yeah, $400 million ‑‑ in order to fully address the digital divide for everyone in our entire state. To ensure this funding gets invested in local communities and these important projects get underway as quickly, efficiently and effectively as possible, we’re also establishing a new bipartisan Maryland Broadband Advisory Workgroup which will work together with key stakeholders from across the state and include representatives from MACo and MML, as well as members of the General Assembly, together with all the leaders in our executive branch of state government.
Connect Maryland will also be making broadband more affordable. Yesterday I announced the launch of a new emergency broadband benefit subsidy program to reduce the cost of internet service for low and moderate income households. This will combine state assistance with other resources to give a discount of $65 per month for up to 12 months on their internet service, and it will help us remove some of the barriers to access.
Maryland has set an ambitious goal of ensuring that university broadband gets to every single person in the state of Maryland by no later than 2025. Connect Maryland is the game‑changing initiative that’s going to help us get there, and we’re very much looking forward to partnering with each of you to help make it a reality.
Thanks to all of our hard work together, Maryland is leading the nation in both health and economic recovery from this once in a generation pandemic. I’m pleased to report that Maryland has now added more than 56,000 jobs so far this year, including the more than 22,000 jobs announced yesterday that we just added in the month of July alone. Our unemployment rate is at the lowest level it’s been since the pandemic began, and more jobs are now available in our state than ever before.
Maryland has remained open for business and a new national survey just last week ranked Maryland as the most improved state for business in America. As we reflect on the hard work and the many sacrifices that have been made over the past year and a half, I want to sincerely thank each and every one of you, as well as all the countless Marylanders who have helped us step up and set this example for the nation. I want to thank all of our healthcare heroes, our county health department, our hospitals, all of our doctors and nurses who have taken care of the over 480,000 Marylanders who have been infected with the virus and the 45,000 who were hospitalized. I want to thank our Maryland national guard citizen soldiers and members of our small business community and every single Marylander who rolled up their sleeves and got the vaccine.
But I also want to take a moment here this morning to pray for all those families with an empty chair at the dinner table. We must resolve to not ever forget any of the 9,716 Marylanders who have been killed by this deadly virus. I’m so proud of the people of Maryland, and I’m grateful to have had such a tremendous partnership with the Maryland Association of Counties and each one of you throughout this crisis. Together, we have proven that with all of us working together, we are resilient, even in the face of the most daunting challenge of our lifetime. We are responsive to the need of the citizens that we represent. And we are ready to come back from this pandemic stronger and better than ever before. Thank you all very much.
And I want to take a moment to just say something about the big guy that just introduced me, because I’m really proud of him and the job that he’s done. And I would like to just have you please join me in a warm round of applause and appreciation for MACo President Buddy Levengood for his tremendous leadership throughout this very difficult past year. I know that all of Maryland’s local leaders have been serve on the front line including during this very difficult battle of COVID‑19. I just want to take a moment to sincerely thank each and every one of you for your dedication to your communities and for your continued service to the state.
Seven years ago when I first came into office, I committed that we were going to work together with you to try to build a true partnership with our county governments. I said that our administration would be more accessible and more responsive to you and your needs, and I just want to also take a minute, because I see a bunch of them sitting out, thank our entire cabinet and staff for their hard work and living up to that commitment we made seven years ago. Thank you so much for all of your hard work.
You know, it’s never been more important to have the collaboration and the partnership that we’ve had over the past 18 months. None of us could really have imagined the toll that this pandemic would take on you are lives and on our very way of life. But as the theme of your conference this year, we’re reminded that ‑‑ you know, I’m very proud to say that together we were resilient, responsive and ready. All of us summoned every ounce of strength and every resource at our disposal in order to cob front this threat. And I think we met the crisis head on with courage and resolve.
As soon as those first cases of COVID‑19 were confirmed in Maryland, we immediately declared a state of emergency in order to take unprecedented actions to bring our entire public health arsenal to bear against this invisible enemy. We immediately convened calls between county leaders and senior members of our team and our cabinet and our public health officials to ensure that the lines of communication remained open throughout the crisis. As the number of infections rose, we worked with you to expand our hospital surge capacity across the state by 6,000 beds. We procured and distributed tens of millions of gowns and masks and other PPE and deployed thousands of contact tracers in every jurisdiction. We worked with your county health departments and other partners to build up an entire testing infrastructure from scratch, going from doing just 50 COVID tests per day to now having completed more than 11.7 million COVID tests. We built a massive vaccine infrastructure from scratch, deploying a team of 11,400 people and opening thousands of points of distribution at every corner of the state. And through our no arm left behind mission, we’ve administered more than 7.4 million COVID vaccines. And 80 percent of all Marylanders 1 and over have already been vaccinated. We vaccinated 94 percent of Maryland’s seniors, making Maryland one of the most vaccinated states in America.
As a result of all those efforts our case rate Anita positivity rate are also among the lowest in America, and we continue to have by far one of strongest health recoveries in the nation. Thanks to our swift and decisive action that provide more than $2.1 billion in state economic relief measures, we’re also having one of the best economic recoveries in America. We invested $700 million in state emergency economic relief, including $215 million through our state COVID‑19 emergency relief fund to 16,000 businesses. We provided $50 million through our hotel relief fund, $80 million through our restaurant relief fund, and $50 million through the Maryland nonprofit recovery initiative to 2,000 different organizations. We awarded over $31 million through the layoff aversion fund to more than 1,200 small businesses, which directly saved more than 21,000 jobs. We directed $8 million to 32 local entities that rely heavily on tourism and visitors. $7 billion in awards for 41 main street trams across the state. $40 million in relief for 155 different entertainment venue, and $5 million was provided through our Maryland farmer COVID relief fund to more than 1,300 Maryland farmers and producers.
At the start of the legislative session in January, I introduced the Relief Act of 2021 as emergency legislation, which included the largest tax cuts in state history. This $1.45 billion package provided urgently needed tax relief and economic stimulus for struggling Maryland families, small businesses and those who had lost their jobs due to the global pandemic, allowing them to keep more of their hard‑earned money in their own pockets. We passed our Relief Act with near unanimous bipartisan support in both houses of the legislature, and it has offered a real lifeline to those hardest hit ‑‑ families who were struggling just to get by, and small businesses who are desperately trying to stay afloat. For more than a year, we’ve been working to keep people in their home, committing more than $110 million in rental relief six months before the federal government stepped up. Then we received another $400 million from the federal government, which was immediately distributed out to all of you in the counties. You’re closest to the needs of your constituents.
Unfortunately, so far only about 20 percent of that money has been spent by the counties. Some are doing extremely well, including Carroll, Cecil, Howard and Prince George’s counties, which have already utilized a sizable portion of that funding. But others are lagging behind, and I just can’t emphasize enough how important it is for you to try to get this relief out to the people that need it most as quickly as possible. And our team at the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development stands ready. We’re available around the clock to try to assist you in accomplishing that mission.
We also committed more than $1.2 billion in relief to help county school systems get our students safely back into the classrooms. And we’ve been urging counties to use these resources for effective COVID prevention strategies, including the testing programs that state officials have made available, as well as for upgrading filtration systems and other health even safety improvements. And now that we have transitioned from a state of emergency to an ongoing public health management response, we’re renewing our focus on the long‑term health of our economy by continuing to invest in rebuilding our infrastructure, which is critical to creating jobs and improving the lives of everyday Marylanders and Americans.
We’ve taken a balanced approach, an all‑inclusive approach to infrastructure, investing far more in roads and transit than any other administration in state history. Just last week, the U.S. Senate passed a bipartisan infrastructure package, which I’ve been pushing for for more than two years and working toward that goal. The bipartisan compromise bill will allow us to significantly expand our infrastructure investments. We were able to get the President and both Republicans and Democrats in the Senate onboard, and now we’re pushing the House of Representatives to get it done for the American people.
In the coming week, state transportation officials will be rolling out a bold, new consolidated transportation plan, which will include even more unprecedented infrastructure investments across the state. In fact, while we’re here in Ocean City this morning, I want to take this opportunity to announce for the first time that our new CTP will include funding for the planning of the long‑awaited and desperately needed Maryland Route 90, the gateway to Ocean City project.
Maryland 90 is a stop priority, not only for safety, access and the local economy, but also for its vital role in emergency response. We’re very pleased to be taking this important step forward, and we also look forward to working with each of you in your jurisdictions on all of the critical projects in your counties. Expanding access to broadband in both rural and urban communities continues to be a key part of our infrastructure investments. I know this has been a top priority for all of you at MACo. Yesterday in Snow Hill, I launched a transformative new initiative called Connect Maryland which will increase access to high speed connectivity in households and communities all across our state. Through Connect Maryland, we’re going to invest $400 million in the expansion of broadband access in order to fully address ‑‑ yeah, $400 million ‑‑ in order to fully address the digital divide for everyone in our entire state. To ensure this funding gets invested in local communities and these important projects get underway as quickly, efficiently and effectively as possible, we’re also establishing a new bipartisan Maryland Broadband Advisory Workgroup which will work together with key stakeholders from across the state and include representatives from MACo and MML, as well as members of the General Assembly, together with all the leaders in our executive branch of state government.
Connect Maryland will also be making broadband more affordable. Yesterday I announced the launch of a new emergency broadband benefit subsidy program to reduce the cost of internet service for low and moderate income households. This will combine state assistance with other resources to give a discount of $65 per month for up to 12 months on their internet service, and it will help us remove some of the barriers to access.
Maryland has set an ambitious goal of ensuring that university broadband gets to every single person in the state of Maryland by no later than 2025. Connect Maryland is the game‑changing initiative that’s going to help us get there, and we’re very much looking forward to partnering with each of you to help make it a reality.
Thanks to all of our hard work together, Maryland is leading the nation in both health and economic recovery from this once in a generation pandemic. I’m pleased to report that Maryland has now added more than 56,000 jobs so far this year, including the more than 22,000 jobs announced yesterday that we just added in the month of July alone. Our unemployment rate is at the lowest level it’s been since the pandemic began, and more jobs are now available in our state than ever before.
Maryland has remained open for business and a new national survey just last week ranked Maryland as the most improved state for business in America. As we reflect on the hard work and the many sacrifices that have been made over the past year and a half, I want to sincerely thank each and every one of you, as well as all the countless Marylanders who have helped us step up and set this example for the nation. I want to thank all of our healthcare heroes, our county health department, our hospitals, all of our doctors and nurses who have taken care of the over 480,000 Marylanders who have been infected with the virus and the 45,000 who were hospitalized. I want to thank our Maryland national guard citizen soldiers and members of our small business community and every single Marylander who rolled up their sleeves and got the vaccine.
But I also want to take a moment here this morning to pray for all those families with an empty chair at the dinner table. We must resolve to not ever forget any of the 9,716 Marylanders who have been killed by this deadly virus. I’m so proud of the people of Maryland, and I’m grateful to have had such a tremendous partnership with the Maryland Association of Counties and each one of you throughout this crisis. Together, we have proven that with all of us working together, we are resilient, even in the face of the most daunting challenge of our lifetime. We are responsive to the need of the citizens that we represent. And we are ready to come back from this pandemic stronger and better than ever before. Thank you all very much.