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26 n e w h a v e n B I Z | J a n u a r y 2 0 2 0 | n e w h a v e n b i z . c o m PARTNERSHIP FOR CT Continued from Page 25 T hink of it as a real-world Gold- en Rule: He who has the most gold gets to make the rules. Ray Dalio has the most gold — with a personal fortune pegged at something like $20 billion, the Greenwich hedge-fund billionaire is said to be the richest man in Connecticut. Which is saying something. e company he founded, Bridgewater Associates in West- port, is the world's largest hedge fund, managing some $160 billion in assets. Dalio speaks frequently about the growing wealth gap in America and the need to radically reform capitalism. You might think Dalio is an unusual figure to be talking about "radically reforming" capitalism. But say one thing for Dalio: He put his money where his mouth is. In addition to radical reforma- tion of the system that yielded him vast wealth, the Greenwich billionaire is also a proponent of what he calls "radical transparency" in business. In July he told CBS' Bill Whitacre that "Everybody at Bridgewater is monitoring every- body else almost all the time." Which is also kind of an irony. At its first meeting Oct. 18 in New Haven, some board members of the Partnership sought to calm con- cerns about transparency around the $100 million in public funds that will go into the $300 million partnership — and then spent the bulk of the three-hour session behind closed doors. Some parents who attended the inaugural meeting asked if it was "an open secret meeting." Another spoke of a "the" of public money. One of the board members, House Minority Leader emis Klarides (R-114) was more circum- spect: "I want to state on the record my concerns with operating any of this partnership not in the full pub- lic view," she said during the public part of the meeting. "I've made my intentions clear to comply with the Freedom of Information Act and my reservations about transparency on this board." e Dalios have close links to the Ned Lamont administration — and not just the common bond of being very rich people who live in Green- wich. Lamont's chief of staff, Ryan Drajewicz, was a senior manage- ment associate at Bridgewater. Public education at both the mu- nicipal and state-bureaucratic levels is to a very significant extent con- trolled by the teacher's union, whose Connecticut chapter president, Jan Hochadel, sits on the Partner- ship's board. e state legislature is Democrat-controlled. at political backdrop is impossible to ignore — even though the lawmakers on the Partnership's board are evenly distributed (Klarides and Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano on the GOP side; Senate President Martin Looney and House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz for the majority party). Barbara Dalio grew up in Spain and is not herself a product of the U.S. public education system. She says she is motivated not by noblesse oblige, but out of her experience as a full-time mother raising four sons, two with learning differences. As a result, "I had to be very involved [in their education]," she explains. e experience "[made] me closer to young people who have difficult circumstances and they need more attention." She has called public education "my passion." Erik Clemons is a product of Connecticut public schools — an experience that motivated him to want to be a part of the solution for a system he says is failing young people. e Partnership's mission is personal to Clemons. Due to an unstable home life as a young person he attended four different high schools in four years. His younger brother never finished high school — he was killed before he turned 18. Clemons believes the failures of public education in Connecticut are mired in poverty. In poor commu- nities public schools are failing, students too oen don't finish high school, and as a result can't find jobs. (Not coincidentally, many of these young people also end up in the criminal justice system.) e unemployment rate for 16-to- 24-year-olds in Connecticut is 12.4 percent, compared to just 3.5 percent for adults 25 and older. is despite the fact that 74 percent of Connecticut employers report diffi- culty finding young adults to hire. To address that disconnect, the Partnership's desired trajectory for its young clients goes beyond the classroom and into the workplace. "e answer is to train these young people starting in high school to give them an idea of the jobs that are available," Barbara Dalio says. She and her husband have staked major dollars on setting solutions in motion. "With the right invest- ments we can work with youth and young adults to create those opportunities," she says. T he question is: Who gets to decide what the "right investments" are? At its Dec. 16 meeting the Partnership board approved a process for soliciting requests for information (RFIs) from poten- tial "partners" to begin to provide solutions. ese include education and workforce-development pro- gram providers, potential em- ployers, "community leaders" and others. e Partnership will accept RFI responses through January. e board also agreed to create a Pro- gram Committee to sort through the applicants and proposals. e board also expects to be close to hiring a CEO before March 1. At the Dec. 16 meeting Willa Perlman of LPA Search Partners re- ported to the board that more than 225 prospective applicants from across the country had responded to the initial search, and the "vast majority" of those knew about the Partnership. "e nation is watch- ing this initiative," Perlman said. Of that initial pool, LPA present- ed 13 CEO candidates to the board, a number that was winnowed to eight slated for personal interviews. Aer Clemons emphasized the importance of a "diverse candidate pool," Perlman acknowledged that six of the eight were "white males." According to Clemons, the board hopes and expects to have the interviewing process completed by the end of January, finalist(s) submitted to the full board for approval some time in February, and the successful candidate hired and prepared to hit the ground running by the beginning of March. As for the recipients of the Partnership's considerable largess, the board will be the ultimate decision-maker — but it will be House Minority Leader and Partnership board member Klarides questions why state government — which already funds public education to the tune of billions of dollars — ought to spend an additional $100 million on a public-private 'side hustle.'

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