Maryland

Maryland's Capital Debt Affordability Committee is recommending the state stick to its guns by endorsing a plan to borrow up to $1.75 billion for capital projects in the coming fiscal year, despite the job shedding inflicted by the Trump administration's plans to shrink the federal government.

"The project is not dead," said the transportation planning board chair.

The Department of Transportation is offering its Consolidated Transportation Bonds in a competitive sale Wednesday to what promises to be a receptive market.

The administration wants the project "to be a model of how to build quickly and cost effectively," Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said.

Maryland's comptroller reports the state is projecting a $189 million drop in general fund revenue due to the unfolding effects of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which could result in the state decoupling from federal tax laws.

The state has teed up a $21.5 billion, six-year transportation budget as it deals with the fallout from federal workforce cuts, a credit downgrade, and a feud with the Trump administration.

The Trump administration has denied Maryland's request for Federal Emergency Management Agency funding to aid communities on the western side of the state who were flooded out in May.

The effects of the One Big Beautiful Bill have yet to make a dent in state and local budgets as market experts and academics look into the future with concern.

Moody's has downwardly revised the outlook for Baltimore's issuer rating and several classes of bonds due to a trend of declining fund balance levels in a city dependent on a major international shipping port.

The state of Maryland is going to market on Wednesday by selling $1.56 billion of general obligation bonds, which will be the first major sale since the state absorbed a credit downgrade from Moody's.