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10 HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | NOVEMBER 15, 2021 Sen. Murphy: Build Back Better, infrastructure bills will be boon to CT manufacturing By Greg Bordonaro gbordonaro@hartfordbusiness.com U .S. Sen. Chris Murphy has gained national notoriety in recent years, particularly on the issue of national security. But Connecticut's junior senator has always promoted manufacturing as one of his top issues. It makes sense politically, considering 19% of the state's manufacturing workforce resides in his 5th Congressional district, according to U.S. Census Bureau data. Murphy has made it a point to promote various manufacturers around the state doing innovative work. In October, for example, he visited Chester's Chapco Inc., which is manufacturing UV disinfection equipment being developed by Avon-based iCleanse. He also visited Oxford-based JuiceBar, which is a developer of electric vehicle charging stations. Murphy, who has also been a proponent of strengthening the federal government's Buy American laws, said the country's ability to compete globally will depend on the strength of manufacturing. "I know the American economy will die if we aren't making things here," he said in a recent interview. "I don't think you can be a service sector and technology economy only. My belief is that we can't win a contest with China over the next 50 years if we give up on manufacturing. Connecticut may have a reputation of being a financial services state but we have a greater share of our economy dedicated to manufacturing than the national average." Murphy recently talked with the Hartford Business Journal about two key pieces of federal legislation — the $1.75 trillion Build Back Better agenda and $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill — that have been hotly debated in Washington, D.C. Congress recently approved the infrastructure bill, which will send an estimated $6 billion to Connecticut for road and bridge repairs and investments in rail, expanded internet access and electric vehicle charging stations. Murphy discussed what both bills would mean for the state's manufacturing industry and workforce development efforts. Here's what he had to say: Q: What's in the Build Back Better and infrastructure bills for manufacturing, small businesses and workforce development programs? Those pieces of legislation will be transformative for the country's economy and Connecticut's economy. The Build Back Better Act has $40 billion for workforce development. We know our primary obstacle to manufacturing growth in Connecticut is lack of workforce, especially as we start to ramp up defense production at Electric Boat. This bill is going to have significant new funding to expand workforce training programs and we will use a lot of that money in Connecticut for advanced and defense manufacturing. Second, the bill has big money for renewable energy and clean energy manufacturing. Connecticut is going to be a place where a lot of wind turbine energy technology is going to be produced due to the development of wind energy off Long Island Sound. This bill will help those companies scale up in Connecticut. And lastly, the bipartisan infrastructure bill has a historic amount of money for roads, rail and grid improvements. People bring businesses to Connecticut only if they believe they can get the goods out of Connecticut and to major ports easily. The clogged nature of I-84 and I-95 hurt the state so we are going to be able to dramatically unclog our roadways and rail lines with these infrastructure dollars. Q: Do you have a sense of how much of that workforce development funding will come to the state and what kind of programs will they fund? We always expect to get about 1% of the dollars of any new program. That's a significant amount of money, nearly $1 billion in workforce development funding coming to Connecticut. In that bill there is funding for an expansion of apprenticeship programs. There are specific programs for workers who have been laid off and out of the workforce for a long period of time. There are new dollars for jobs dedicated to climate adaptation, and that describes every project happening along Long Island Sound, including a lot of the development occurring in New London. Q: You mentioned funding for renewables and wind energy. What kind of opportunities are there for Connecticut manufacturers? We have a pretty big renewable energy footprint in the state and it's growing. There are going to be major tax incentives in this bill for the manufacturing and purchase of renewable energy products. We will have funding in this bill for fuel cell technology, where Connecticut is an unquestioned leader. And there will be more money in this bill for residential and commercial build-out of solar and wind power, which creates jobs in manufacturing and the installation sector. Q: Why do you think manufacturers have faced a long-term workforce shortage? After all, this issue predates the pandemic. In Connecticut you can't decouple the workforce shortage from the housing shortage. We have an issue of affordable housing in the state and when I say affordable housing I don't mean subsidized housing, I just mean houses that you can afford if you are making $50,000. The Build Back Better agenda has $100 billion to build 1 million new units of affordable housing and affordable single-family houses in the country. That scratches us where we itch in Connecticut. We can build all the workforce training programs we want, but if you can't afford to buy a house on a $50,000 salary then we are going to have a hard time growing manufacturing jobs, when starter houses are easy to find in Texas, Alabama and North Carolina, so that housing investment will be really critical. But there are other pieces in the Build Back Better agenda that will help with the workforce. We need to get more women back into the workforce. It's been mostly women who have left the workforce during the pandemic and we definitely need to get women into manufacturing. Building out universal pre-K and dramatically cutting the cost of child care will allow more women to get into industries like manufacturing. Q: You've visited a lot of manufacturers over the years. What's your sense of their biggest challenges? What about opportunities? We are going to continue to be a manufacturing economy dominated by aerospace. While we've had a temporary slowdown in the On The Record | Q&A U.S. Sen. Chris Murphy 5th Congressional District Committees: Appropriations; Health, Education, Labor & Pensions; Foreign Relations Education: Williams College, University of Connecticut Law School Age: 48 In October, Sen. Chris Murphy (seen second from left) visited Chester's Chapco Inc., which is manufacturing UV disinfection equipment being developed by Avon-based iCleanse. PHOTO | CONTRIBUTED