It was solving the Great Depression all over again. With a vision of using government money to put people to work, Gov. Neil Abercrombie came into office channeling Franklin Roosevelt.   

The plan was something out of the depression-era Work Projects Administration. Instead of a New Deal, Abercrombie was pitching a New Day plan.

Government gets money by selling bonds. Government uses the money to build needed things, and the state hires out-of-work carpenters and electricians, and everybody is happy.

Abercrombie is still trying, but moving the amount of state construction from the usual to the exceptional is still an open question.

In his first State of the State speech, Abercrombie sounded the call, saying:

“We will utilize the bonding power of the state, partner with willing private parties, streamline processes, and provide work that will result in paychecks for families across our islands,” the new governor said.

This year, Abercrombie used his second annual speech to again pitch new construction.

“Our recent bond and refinancing sale of nearly $1.3 billion, along with

$1 billion of projects that are already on the budget books and another $300 million proposed in this supplemental budget will spur an immediate rise in job growth,” Abercrombie said this year.

This week, while announcing the good news that the state closed the fiscal year with a $300 million balance, Abercrombie also said the state has spent about $331 million in new construction money during the year.

This is mostly from last year’s bond sale, which was snapped up at low interest rates.

The state bond sale is sort of like having a permanent home equity loan deal with your banker. The money is there for you to use, but you don’t pay interest until you start actually writing those tempting home equity checks. If you don’t write them, you don’t owe anything.

The state’s dilemma is that Abercrombie may have a checkbook with more than $800 million in it and he certainly has a desire to spend, but you cannot spend all that in a year.

Administration officials last week admitted that every month they can push maybe $40 million worth of construction out the door. That would be $480 million a year, much more than the $331 million approved last year.

This is just a truism in state government: There really isn’t a capacity to move more than about $350 million in real construction projects. Governors can claim that they authorized or approved more construction, but $350 million is about how much we can handle.

Asked why he can’t move faster and, by implication, create more jobs, Abercrombie said he is cranking the state job engine as fast as he can.

“You do the jobs as the projects arise; I can say with certitude that every single project that is eligible to get moving is getting moving under our administration,” he said.

This year, Abercrombie met with legislative leaders to devise a plan to move more projects faster. The idea was to ditch much of the permitting and public notice requirements for state construction projects.

“We looked for projects that were not mired in permitting delays or only in design and planning stages, but those that are ready to provide impact now,” he said in this year’s State of the State address.

What Abercrombie and the Legislature became mired in were outraged environmentalists and public activists who demanded that the state and counties follow the existing environmental protection laws.

When Abercrombie took office, the state unemployment rate was 6.7 percent and already on a downward trend; today, it is at 6.4 percent. Back before the Great Recession, the 2006 rate was 2.3 percent.

On Friday, Abercrombie announced he was releasing $91 million in construction projects. There are many more steps before that released money actually translates into a government check written to a private construction company, but it is a start.

Abercrombie and the construction industry, however, are likely to find that the new day is much like the old day.

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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.