City, area could get increased attention

When Robert F. McDonnell visited Waynesboro the weekend before the November election, he offered reassurance to local leaders about retaining and seeking jobs here and across Virginia.

“He assured me Virginia would be more competitive and more aggressive,’’ said Waynesboro Mayor Tim Williams.

Williams came away encouraged because of Waynesboro’s industrial heritage and the need to replace recent city job losses.

Reo Hatfield, president and founder of Reo Distribution, hosted McDonnell, Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling and Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli before a pre-election rally in Waynesboro.

McDonnell met and talked by phone with business leaders during his visit here, a sign that the new governor will cast his eyes beyond Richmond to the Shenandoah Valley, Hatfield said.

Bolling had visited Reo Distribution previously in July.

“They are not just interested in Northern Virginia but the grassroots of the state of Virginia, which is Waynesboro and Augusta County,’’ Hatfield said. “They know our people are stable, reliable and hardworking.”

Bolling said McDonnell will lay out an extensive plan for economic development when he makes his first State of the Commonwealth Address on Monday night.

And Bolling, who will serve as chief jobs creation officer in the new administration, said he has already been working on at least three economic development projects in the Valley.

“We are very focused on an aggressive economic development agenda. That is a major component – the major focus of this administration,’’ Bolling said.

Del. Steve Landes, R-Weyers Cave, said McDonnell’s frequent campaign visits to the Valley allowed him to see parts of the region hardest hit by the recession such as Waynesboro and Page County.

Landes, who served with McDonnell in the General Assembly, said the new governor’s promise to appoint a deputy secretary of commerce and trade to deal with rural areas shows his desire to bring jobs to rural Virginia.

“I’m confident he will make that appointment. He must get the secretary in place first,’’ Landes said.

Rural poverty and the need for jobs won’t be solved in one gubernatorial term but it will not be pushed to the side either, according to a political expert.

Christopher Newport University political scientist Quentin Kidd said jobs for rural Virginia “are not lost and when the budget and economy recover it will still be on the agenda.”

Kidd said recent Virginia governors starting with Mark Warner have paid considerable attention to rural regions.

Warner followed through once he took office, Kidd said.

And while rural Virginia has its woes,  the political power in that part of the commonwealth “is still formidable,’’ Kidd said.

Gauging the political will of rural Virginia is more difficult, Kidd said.

Conservative politically and socially, rural Virginia supported McDonnell in last fall’s election as the Republican cruised state Sen. R. Creigh Deeds, a Bath County native and a Democrat.

“It is not easily predictable,’’ Kidd said of rural voting patterns. “Because of that McDonnell must pay attention.”

Bolling said the economic recovery will be driven at the national level.

But the lieutenant governor said “the states making the smart decisions today will be better able to take advantage of the economic recovery.”

In addition to new jobs and regulatory policy, Bolling said another strategy will be to promote the Virginia story internationally.

The international strategy will include China and India, the world’s two most rapidly developing economies.