Gov. John Hoeven: We Can do More for North Dakota

Op-Ed

Gov. John Hoeven: We can do more for North Dakota

The Office of Management and Budget last week projected a more than $1 billion surplus for the State of North Dakota by the end of this biennium (June 30, 2009), and that is clearly good news for our citizens. It means we have the resources to do more for the people of North Dakota.

We've worked hard to build a dynamic and growing economy. In 2001, we began implementing our statewide Strategic Plan, which streamlined our economic development resources, got everyone working together, and identified key industry sectors where North Dakota could succeed. These include energy, advanced manufacturing, value-added agriculture, technology-based businesses and tourism. That plan set goals to create more jobs and diversify our economy, as well as benchmarks to measure our progress.

Since 2000, we've created more than 30,000 jobs in North Dakota, raised income and wages faster than the national average, and increased our gross domestic product by more than 50 percent. We've gained manufacturing jobs, increasing our manufacturing base by 10 percent, while the nation lost 20 percent of its manufacturing jobs. Last year, we led the nation in export growth.

We targeted energy as a key industry sector, and worked to build it long before the current energy crisis. Following our Strategic Plan, we put programs in place to develop the oil and gas industry in western North Dakota. These included tax incentives to attract investments, an Oil and Gas Research fund to develop new technologies, a Pipeline Authority to move more product to market and a work force development plan to secure the workers needed to meet the demands of this growing industry. At the same time, we put incentives and programs in place to develop other traditional and renewable energy resources, like ethanol, biodiesel, wind, hydrogen, coal, solar and geothermal.

The growth and diversification in our economy is providing not only more opportunity for our people, but also more financial resources. We need to invest these resources wisely. First, we need to fund our priorities - the things that help us build a higher standard of living and better quality of life for our people. Second, we need a reasonable reserve, or rainy day fund, for the future. Third, we need to reduce the burden of taxes on our citizens and continue to create an environment that fosters economic diversification and growth.

We have already proposed plans to increase education funding and provide real property tax relief to the people of North Dakota - and we intend to do more. With our growing revenues, we can not only provide additional broad-based tax relief, but we can also do more for priorities like education, college tuition assistance, healthcare, strong law enforcement and roads and infrastructure.

With a clear and aggressive focus on economic development, we can continue to provide more opportunities for our people, raise our standard of living, improve our quality of life, and build a brighter future for North Dakota.

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