Hartford Business Journal

www.HartfordBusiness.com • October 8, 2018 • Hartford Business Journal 17 That would include moving more toward bundled or value-based insur- ance payments and better leveraging the state's purchasing power to lower drug prices. He also wants to improve sales tax collections and generate new revenue by legalizing recreational mar- ijuana and online gambling. However, he acknowledged that he may not be able to accomplish a number of those items in time for his first budget. Asking more of employers Though he's promised not to dip further into wealthy and corporate pockets to solve the state's deficits, Lamont said he still needs companies to step up to the plate. If elected, he wants businesses to help market the state and recruit companies to locate here, similar to his involvement in a recent success- ful attempt to woo tech giant Infosys to hire 1,000 employees in downtown Hartford. He's unimpressed when com- panies "complain from the sidelines," preferring that executives get involved in the public debate, as they did with the recent high-profile Commission on Fiscal Stability and Economic Growth. Lamont supports raising the mini- mum wage to $15 an hour over a four- year period, as well as requiring some form of paid family leave for private- sector workers. The minimum wage is an area where he stands apart from both Stefanowski and unaffiliated candidate Oz Griebel. Businesses will likely oppose both ef- forts, but Lamont noted that Massachu- setts and New York have each recently enacted a $15 minimum wage and paid leave. Besides competitive consider- ations during a time when unemploy- ment is relatively low, he said the policies are the right thing to do regardless. "I'm tired of subsidizing companies that don't pay a better wage with earned income tax credits and such," Lamont said. "I've got to find ways to have other people step up. We can't do it by ourselves." Lamont has also proposed a uniform motor vehicle tax to replace Connecti- cut's disparate tax rates set by munici- palities, a position on which Stefanows- ki has attacked him repeatedly. A statewide rate would likely lead to higher car taxes on residents of wealthier communities, but lower taxes for the majority of others, ac- cording to Lamont. In biz incentive war, Lamont wouldn't disarm In a debate last month, Lamont called Malloy's corporate incentive program, First Five Plus, "a disaster." "We lead with the bribe and it's the wrong way to go," Lamont told the New Haven audience. He charges that First Five is "politi- cians picking and choosing" winners and losers and that his approach would focus more on helping employ- ers create training programs and lead- ing with reasons companies should be here beyond taxpayer grants. However, Lamont's criticisms shouldn't be mistaken for any drastic departure from Connecticut's cur- rent economic-development strategy, which acknowledges that many states offer business incentives. "Broadly, by way of philosophy, I would deemphasize incentives," Lamont said. "Am I going to take them off the table? Are you kidding? I'm not going to disarm, I'm in a nuclear world." That Lamont felt compelled to criticize First Five (which is provid- ing incentives to Infosys, the IT company he takes partial credit for wooing) may speak to the dynamics of the tight and contentious race. Stefanowski has seized upon Malloy's unpopularity, telling voters in debates and in advertisements that Lamont would be more of the same and raise their taxes. Lamont has countered by tying Ste- fanowski's politics to President Donald Trump, who endorsed Stefanowski on Twitter after he won the GOP primary in August. Lamont — who recently re- ceived the endorsement of former Presi- dent Barack Obama — said debating the successes or failures of past governors won't make "a dime's worth of difference" come January, when the next governor must begin to right the state's fiscal ship. It's true that Lamont shares Malloy's policy views on topics like re- newable energy, environmental protection, prison reform, gun con- trol and the Af- fordable Care Act. "I would say, [Malloy's] done, you know, a lot of good things, but he failed in the big thing, which is to fix this budget," he said. "I'm not saying he didn't try, I'm not saying he didn't do a hell of a lot more than Jodi Rell and John Rowland." Lamont said his style differs from Malloy, a self-described "porcupine" who was an assistant district attorney in the 1980s before entering private practice. "Malloy, he's a prosecutor, right? That's how he grew up. I was an en- trepreneur who started a business," Lamont said. "You could not have two more different backgrounds than that." Long-term challenges Besides the immediate deficit the next governor faces, there will also be longer-term structural problems to address — financial challenges that threaten to imperil the state's econo- my, education system and social safety net in the coming decade. Lamont said he will ask state em- ployee unions to return voluntarily to the bargaining table, in the hopes of restructuring their recently renegotiat- ed SEBAC agreement, which expires in 2027 with layoff protections until 2021. Lamont, who once chaired the state pension fund's advisory council, wants to tackle the state teachers' pension fund, whose annual cost could rise from $1.2 billion to $6 billion over the coming decade, due to its backloaded payment schedule. Lamont hopes to find financial flexibility by restruc- turing a 2008 bond covenant that requires the state to make full annual contributions to the teachers' retire- ment system through 2032. He also favors a recent proposal to transfer the state's lottery assets to the teachers' fund, to help shore up its unfunded liability. Such a move, he said, would be a "show of faith" to unions and perhaps make them more open to bargaining other changes. Here's where Lamont said he stands on a few key topics in the Capital City: Hartford's debt bailout: Lamont said he wouldn't have supported the legislative deal this year in which the state agreed to pay off more than $500 million of city debt over decades. While it helped avert a municipal bankruptcy, Lamont views the deal as a bailout for investors who bought the city's bonds. Despite that, Lamont indicated that the state may be stuck with the deal. "Now you have a contract with the bondholders," he said. "So it's not like I can just tear it up and walk away. That's not really the choice I've got." XL Center: Lamont said the aging Hartford arena should be overhauled by private investors, with state oversight and direction, rather than investing hun- dreds of millions of taxpayer dollars in the venue. A Chicago private equity firm recently cast a bid to buy the XL. Lamont said he'd prefer to see more competition. "I guarantee you I would get more people to look at that deal if I was gov- ernor," he said. Investing in Hartford housing, real estate: Lamont said he favors the Cap- ital Region Development Authority's public-private approach to develop- ment in Hartford, and thinks the state must continue to invest here. "This city is really on the cusp of something important," he said. Would a Lamont administration maintain the level of state support for that development? "I know how important it is. Would I continue it? Let me take a look at that," he said. "We're a little tight on money." "I'm tired of subsidizing companies that don't pay a better wage with earned income tax credits and such. I've got to find ways to have other people step up. We can't do it by ourselves." Lamont on raising the minimum wage in Connecticut. Providing government incentives to spur business growth has become a war among states. Despite some criticisms of those programs, Lamont says he wouldn't disarm.

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