奥巴马在市政厅上发表的国情咨文

JUDY WOODRUFF: A day after the president's State of the Union address, both Republicans and Democrats predict most of his proposals won't go very far.

The gridlock in Washington has left the heavy lifting of government to more local levels, the cities and towns across the country.

We wanted to find out what some local leaders think about the issues raised last night, among others, what the economy and infrastructure look like to those managing it.

For perspective on that, we are joined now by two mayors. They are Democrat Stephen Benjamin. He is the mayor of Columbia, South Carolina. He's had the job since 2010. And Richard Berry is mayor of Albuquerque, New Mexico. He has been at his city's helm since 2009. He was that city's first Republican mayor in three decades.

And we welcome you both to the program.

MAYOR STEPHEN BENJAMIN, Columbia, South Carolina: Good evening.

MAYOR RICHARD BERRY, Albuquerque, New Mexico: Glad to be here.

JUDY WOODRUFF: So, Mayor Berry, let's start first with a question about the president's speech last night. What did you hear that you think you could support that sounded good to you? What did you think that you couldn't support?

RICHARD BERRY: Well, as a Republican leader that actually takes pride in being able to work with the White House, there were some things that I heard that are really exciting to me, because we're working on those in our city.

Women's pay equity, for example, I think is an important issue nationally. We were the first city in the country really to put forward an incentive for our local companies to really make that a priority.

From the standpoint of taxing the capital gains, certainly can support a middle-class tax cut, but as a small business person myself, with my wife and I having really worked hard for 20 years to build a business, I think he's off-base with the capital gains tax increase, because I think that's really going to hurt Main Street and it's going to hurt those that are really trying to invest to create jobs in our country.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Even though the purpose of it would be to put money in the pockets of the middle class?

RICHARD BERRY: Right, but you can do that in any number of ways.

So, once again, I think we're all heading towards some similar goals, but just maybe some different philosophies on how we get here.

JUDY WOODRUFF: So, Mayor Benjamin, what about you? What did you hear that you liked, that you could support, and what gave you pause?

STEPHEN BENJAMIN: Well, certainly, heard a great deal in the president's speech that we could support, pay equity, obviously making child care more affordable, making access to higher education, community college being potentially free, a focus on apprenticeships and getting more people into the work force and starting earlier directing children towards some real opportunities in the 21st century economy.

All of those were very appealing. What I wanted to hear more of — and we will certainly wait for the president's budget — and I think Richard would agree with me here — is hear more talk about infrastructure and the way in which we finance infrastructure.

As you know, over 90 percent of America's gross domestic product is created in cities and metropolitan economies. And our ability to invest in infrastructure, water, sewer or roads using the tax-exempt municipal bonds is essential to America's prosperity and our ability to compete globally.

So, we want to make sure that our message, that we protect that 100-year-old tax exemption on municipal bonds. Local governments don't tax federal debt, and we're asking the federal government not to tax municipal debt.

JUDY WOODRUFF: And infrastructure, it's interesting you raise that. I know that is an issue for you in Columbia.

What about in Albuquerque, Mayor Berry? How much is that an issue is that? Tell us about your economy.

RICHARD BERRY: It's a big issue, infrastructure.

And we just had a great example of our community about — understood that you can't do just it by yourself anymore. We can't just rely on dollars coming from Washington. We just did a major infrastructure project where the taxpayers of my city and the state, people in the legislature and our governor teamed with the federal government to get things done.

We have been able to in our city. We are required by law to balance our budgets. I know that Mayor Berry is as well. So, we balanced our budgets. For five years, we have had a budget surplus in Columbia, eight years without a tax increase.

That comes with some planning. The ability to be able to do that, along with a state government that is being a participant, and certainly with the ability to plan according to a long-term federal budget would be an incredible blessing.

JUDY WOODRUFF: Well, we're glad to have both of you here to tell some of the story of what's happening.

Mayor Steve Benjamin from Columbia, Mayor Richard Berry from Albuquerque, we thank you both.

STEPHEN BENJAMIN: Thank you.

RICHARD BERRY: Thank you.

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