Issue link: https://nebusinessmedia.uberflip.com/i/1479583
HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | September 26, 2022 11 ON THE RECORD | Q&A school. Let's get the high schools to start to introduce these these skill sets. I believe in investing in trade schools. College isn't for everybody. I'd like to open a couple more trade schools and expand capacity. Part of it is also having vibrant cities so people want to stay here. You've got to provide affordability so that kids, younger people can live here, and you got to provide the appropriate training. Q. There is a lot of empty office space in downtown Hartford and in other towns in Greater Hartford. What should a city like Hartford do with all this empty office space, and does the state have a role to play in helping bring the city back to life post-pandemic? A. I guess Mayor Bronin is talking about turning it all into residential, but if there are no jobs, people aren't gonna want to live here. One of the things that Connecticut has is we used to be the insurance capital of the world. You go over to New London, there's a lot of defense there. You go down to Fairfield County and it's a lot of hedge funds, financial services. In New Haven there's life sciences. I think we should be capitalizing on those industry clusters to create some tax policies to bring these businesses and jobs in. Look at what Boston did. When GE moved to Boston, part of the decision was related to taxes, but part of it was access to that work- force. We've got terrific universities that could be creating a Silicon Valley-type environment. Q. Downtown Hartford businesses have been frustrated by the fact that state workers are now allowed to work remotely for as many as four days per week. Is that a policy you'd seek to change? A. No, not right now. What we should do is assess the efficiency of how it's working. And I've seen employees that, the more flexibility you give them the harder they work. If the produc- tivity stays where it is, and people can do it working remotely, I'm okay with that. As a manager, I always promoted flexibility, but you have to hold people accountable. Q. Population growth has been relatively stagnant in CT for decades and the root cause of many of our fiscal issues. What policies do you propose to grow the population and help keep more young college graduates in the state? A. For the people leaving, I hear a lot of it when I'm out on the campaign trail. It's the person who just retired on a fixed income. They don't want to leave their friends and family but they simply can't afford to live here. And then to make it worse, they live down in South Carolina, they get a house three times the size with a quarter of the property tax. So, for that part of the population, I fundamentally believe it's affordability. For younger people, it's also afford- ability. It's being able to afford to live here with reasonable rents, it's having activities for younger kids, particularly in the city so that they have some- thing to do and then a career path. Q. You mentioned energy costs are a big factor in the cost of living in Connecticut. How would you address the state's high energy costs? A. I think we should disband the Public Utilities Regulatory Authority, (which regulates utility and telecom- munications companies). Its got three people right now, including appoint- ments by the governor. We should make it a six-person committee with real teeth, with a couple of consumers and business owners on there. Eversource right now is paid a guaranteed rate of return regard- less of performance. Put them on a pay-for-performance basis. If they have a good year, they get paid, if they don't, they don't. We have the highest cost in the continental U.S. We have to look at a variety of answers. I am for clean energy, but it's got to be balanced. It can't be put in overnight where your energy costs go up 15 times. We can't be doing stuff like a TCI tax that the governor wanted to put in. (The Transpor- tation and Climate Initiative was a regional cap-and-trade plan to raise money to address climate change by reducing motor vehicle pollution. It didn't garner enough state legislative support to pass.) What we should be looking at is technology of the future like green hydrogen. That's another place to bring some business in. Green hydrogen is going to be the answer. You split water into hydrogen and oxygen and there are zero emissions. Q. What about transporta- tion? What would be your key initiatives there? A. I think we've got to bring in the private sector and focus on public-pri- vate partnerships. And it's not to create toll roads, but look at what they've done in Florida with Alligator Alley. You want to get in that lane and pay and go fast, that's fine. You don't want to pay a toll, you go over here. There's tons of private equity money out there. Why are we so reluctant to tap into it? But again, you need somebody at the top who knows what they're doing so they don't get taken advantage of. Because private equity will come in and rip off your shirt, if you let them. Q. So, when you say public-pri- vate partnerships, what would be an example? A. The Carlyle Group invested in the I-95 rest areas. That went pretty well and we didn't have to put up any capital. We could be using somebody to help us with the highways, airports. How many airports have been privatized across the world? We're probably one of the few that is still state owned. As you know, you gotta be careful with private equity but you structure a deal where you can both make a reasonable amount of money. The XL Center, when I was close to winning last time, I had a bunch of people approach me about buying that, or doing a sale leaseback, or getting some equity to make some invest- ment. But we got to be willing to do things differently. Q. What about a potential private investor coming in, taking a piece of a highway and making it a toll road. Is that something you'd be open to? A. As long as there is access to non-toll roads. If they want to put in a high-speed lane that you have to pay for, fine. I don't believe in tolls in general, it's another tax. They'll say that a lot of it comes from out of state, but I don't believe it. If you could find a way to just tax out-of-state travelers I'd consider it. Q. Should Bradley Airport be privatized? A. I would look at it. I'd look at New Haven. I'd look at Sikorsky, maybe there's some consolidation we should be doing. A CT Mirror report was used in this story. GOP gubernatorial candidate Bob Stefanowski at HBJ's offices in downtown Hartford discussing his vision for the state. HBJ PHOTO | GREG BORDONARO