"We have to jump-start the credit markets and get private lending going again," Mr. Obama said in an appearance at the Transportation Department to announce the first road projects to get financing from the new economic stimulus law.
The credit squeeze is making it harder for developers of some projects to get financing, among them a proposed development in Brooklyn that would house what is now the New Jersey Nets team in the National Basketball Association.
In their bid for a public subsidy, however, the developers have encountered a major roadblock: Deputy Mayor Rudy Washington, whose support is crucial for the project to get financing from the Upper Manhattan Empowerment Zone, a $300 million program intended to foster local economic development.
"These are very high-innovation, capital-intensive, long-term businesses, and new-energy technology is a very new field," said David Danielson, a former venture capitalist who is assistant secretary for energy efficiency and renewable energy at the Energy Department. "We need a new model for how these projects are going to get financed and commercialized".
The project is in keeping with other green projects that Mr. Spano hopes to get financed.
Rao's banking experience came in handy: His was one of a few independent power projects (IPP) to get financing and only the third to be completed in India since the sector opened to private enterprise around 1992.
He hopes that a major international aid project might be a way to get financing for Mississippi.
In an economy that until recently had been soaring, contractors have found plenty of private work, where residential developers and homeowners have often been willing to pay more than the going rate on publicly financed projects to get them completed quickly.
In addition, banks tightened lending standards, making it harder for builders to get financing for projects.
Reflecting a new reality about how these kinds of projects get financed, Stahl is kicking in $120 million of its own equity for the $265 million project, or about 45 percent, which is a huge change from the boom years.
