With as much as $18 billion on the line over the next two decades, lawmakers debated Monday over a controversial plan to install electronic tolls on Connecticut highways in a battle that could come to a vote next month.
Lawmakers continue to weigh the expected state revenue versus the cost to motorists in deciding whether to install tolls on the state's roads. The proposal has been brought up multiple times since tolls were dismantled following a fatal crash in Stratford in 1983, but has never been passed.
But House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, who says that tolls are "inevitable," said the legislature could vote next month on the issue that has sharply divided lawmakers.
Proponents say that tolls could generate as much as $18.3 billion by 2040, including 30 percent that would be paid by out-of-state drivers. But opponents argue that still leaves 70 percent of tolls to be paid by Connecticut residents.
"What no one can deny is that we are surrounded by states that collect billions in tolls," said Nate Brown of the 3,000-member Operating Engineers Local 478 that favors constructing tolls. "Why should Connecticut's I-95 or I-84 be the only 'freeway?' When we drive down the New York Thruway or Massachusetts Turnpike, Connecticut residents are tossing money into the coffers of those border states, funding their transportation costs. Yet when cars and trucks are crossing into Connecticut to enter New England, all we are is a pass-through state footing the bill."
But state Sen. Toni Boucher, a Wilton Republican, said in an interview that tolls are simply another tax for consumers.
"It would disproportionately hurt Connecticut residents," Boucher said, adding that she has received 500 emails against tolls from her constituents in Fairfield County. "It's a pay cut from their paycheck."
The transportation committee has already approved a bill on tolls on a strict party line vote with Democrats in favor and Republicans opposed. The finance committee, which focuses on revenue, held a public hearing Monday on a separate, broader bill that also authorizes loan agreements between the state and the U.S. Department of Transportation that could provide better interest rates and repayment arrangements. While noting that the transportation committee has the primary responsibility on tolls, finance committee members noted that they have jurisdiction on anything regarding revenue. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Questions emerge about Norwalk mall’s viability
NORWALK — General Growth Properties’ request to drop a hotel from the SoNo Collection sparked a larger discussion Monday evening on how long two anchor tenants might stay and the viability of shopping malls.
During a special meeting at City Hall, resident Margaret Kozlark stated to the Common Council’s Planning Committee her opposition to the yet-to-be-built mall.
“Data I found said that over 3 percent of malls are vacant right now, some of them as much as 40 percent vacancy rates,” Kozlark said. “What I don’t want is for Norwalk to spend all this money and all this time building this mall that’s just going to sit there and be another shell for everybody to drive by on I-95.”
Kozlark’s comments came after Chicago-based mall developer GGP made its case for eliminating the approved eight-story, 152-room hotel that would be built atop the Bloomingdale’s store on the south parcel of the dozen-acre development site off West Avenue and Interstate 95.
After discussion, the committee advanced to the full council GGP’s request to initiate the required changes to the city’s Reed Putnam Urban Renewal Plan and Land Disposition Agreement governing the SoNo Collection. The changes are needed for the hotel to be removed.
The SoNo Collection site plan calls for 728,000 square feet of retail space, including anchor stores Nordstrom and Bloomingdale’s, as well as 80 to 100 smaller retailers, public realm space and the hotel on the site.
GGP Senior Director Douglas T. Adams outlined several market studies demonstrating the difficulties of building a hotel, offices or residential units atop Bloomingdale’s and generating enough return money to justify the construction costs.
“The building costs twice as much as what the market would support for the uses,” Adams said.
Under land uses approved by the council, GGP may build a hotel, office or residential space in addition to the required retail and public realm space. The company chose a hotel, explored its design and reached out to potential operators before concluding late last year that it wasn’t feasible, Adams said.
“It took you six months to figure out the hotel wasn’t going to work?” asked Councilwoman Shannon O’Toole Giandurco, a District D Republican on the committee.
Although GGP’s primary request is for the council and Norwalk Redevelopment Agency to allow the elimination of the hotel in exchange for a $3.5 million payment to the city, a separate request also generated significant discussion at the meeting at City Hall. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Want infrastructure spending? Here's how to pay
When the American Society of Civil Engineers published its latest Infrastructure Report Card last month, the results were sobering: a grade of D+ for the U.S. and an estimated price tag of $4.6 trillion to make needed repairs by 2025. Such shortcomings have gotten widespread coverage in recent years, with images of Amtrak derailments, crumbling highways and the damaged Oroville Dam vividly illustrating the costs inflicted by decades of underinvestment.
So far, though, Congress has been unable to come up with a sustainable model for funding necessary improvements. President Donald Trump wants to spur $1 trillion of investment by relying on tax credits and public-private partnerships. Senate Democrats have announced their own $1 trillion program, with more conventional federal appropriations aimed at repairing roads, bridges, railways and water systems.
Yet even if these proposals could be enacted, they wouldn’t be sufficient. Due to continual pressure on federal and state budgets, new and more reliable sources of funding are needed.
One promising solution is for states or regional economic zones to lead the way by creating their own infrastructure banks, modelled on successful development banks in other countries. The Northeast has taken the first step, with Massachusetts filing bills in January to establish a state infrastructure bank and examine a regional one. This model could be easily replicated across the U.S. to accelerate investment and economic activity.
How would it work? Taking the Northeast as an example, states from Massachusetts to Maryland could create a jointly owned entity capable of financing critical projects, including those that cross borders. Each state would contribute part of the initial equity, which could then be leveraged with private debt to invest in revenue-producing projects. The equity could be boosted through annual contributions from state transportation budgets - or from other sources - with every new dollar having a multiplier effect.
This approach has several benefits. Projects could be funded on a portfolio basis, with excess cash flow from one investment subsidizing another. Smaller projects could be aggregated to create critical mass. And regional banks could become repositories of best practices, acting as centers of excellence for negotiating complex projects on behalf of taxpayers.
Perhaps more important, regional banks could draw investment from institutions such as pension funds and sovereign wealth funds that generally don’t invest in the traditional municipal bond market. That would significantly expand the pool of available capital for infrastructure, while enabling bigger investments with longer maturities.
Regional banks wouldn’t replace the states’ role in issuing municipal bonds, or eliminate the need for federal dollars. Nor would they aim to privatize public assets. They would simply expand the universe of funding sources and viable projects, thereby boosting regional competitiveness.
This is a tried and tested model. The European Investment Bank, founded in 1958, last reported more than 450 billion euros in disbursed loans, about two-thirds of which were for infrastructure projects. In 2016, China launched the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, with $100 billion to help accelerate investment across developing Asia. Canada is creating a bank that will leverage C$35 billion in state funds with private capital to pay for domestic construction. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Coast Guard Academy discovers it’s been polluting the Thames River for 20 years
New London — Thousands of gallons of untreated wastewater have been emptying into the Thames River from the Coast Guard Academy’s field house over the last 20 years, apparently the result of faulty construction work that was only recently discovered.
The discovery that it has been polluting the river is embarrassing for the academy, which trains cadets to enforce environmental laws on the nation's waterways, among other missions.
“As soon as the problem was found the academy took steps to correct it,” David Santos, spokesman for the academy, said Monday. “It certainly wasn’t our intention. We tried to act as quickly as we could so there would be no further impact to the river.”
The discharge came from the showers, sinks and toilets in two locker rooms in Roland Hall, where physical education and sports competitions take place. The two locker rooms, which have been closed since the discovery on March 29, were used by women’s varsity teams and visiting teams, Santos said. Discharges from other locker rooms and bathrooms used by spectators at Roland Hall sporting events were not involved, he said.
Santos said design work for the repairs has begun. The work will cost an estimated $80,000 to $100,000, he said.
The academy informed the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection about the discharge, he said. DEEP, however, does not have jurisdiction over sewage discharges from individual buildings, according to DEEP spokesman Dennis Schain. Instead, the local health agency, Ledge Light Health District, has jurisdiction.
Santos said the discharge is estimated at 100 to 130 gallons per day during the school year, but some experts are questioning whether that estimate is too low. The problem is believed to have started in 1997 when a contractor working on utility lines cross-connected the wastewater discharge into a storm drain, which empties directly into the river, instead of into the system that takes raw sewage to the city’s treatment plant, Santos said. The incorrect connection, located underground, was found with a scope used during an assessment of Coast Guard facilities, he said.
Stephen Mansfield, director of Ledge Light, said the public health agency just learned of the problem on Monday and is working to schedule an inspection of the site. It will also do its own calculations of the amount of the discharge.
Mansfield said the health district will also notify the state Bureau of Aquaculture about the outfall. A “restricted relay area” for clams is located near the outfall, he said. Shellfish cannot be harvested directly from those areas. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Drywall Subcontractor Files Suit Against Former Dunkin' Donuts Park Developer
A subcontractor on the $71 million Dunkin' Donuts Park construction project is suing the former developer and the surety on the project for about $1.3 million cumulatively.
Manganaro Northeast LLC, a Massachusetts-based drywall company with an office in Rocky Hill, was hired in November 2015 to do about $2.9 million in wall, ceiling and acoustical ceiling work.
Manganaro's action is the third lawsuit filed against the former developers by a subcontractor on the ballpark project, which was plagued by cost overruns and missed deadlines that caused the stadium to open nearly a year late.
Arch has also filed a federal lawsuit against Centerplan seeking about $8 million in claims it paid out on the ballpark and another construction project in Storrs. Webster Bank is also suing Centerplan for about $6 million it claims the company owes it for loans related to the ballpark project. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
MGM, Tribes Spar In Legislature Over Southwestern Connecticut Casino
The two sides in the casino expansion debate turned up the pressure Monday at a legislative hearing on the third bill this session to deal with whether the state should allow a casino off tribal lands.
A partnership by the tribal operators of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, which is seeking to establish a satellite casino in East Windsor, released a consultant's report that poked holes in the viability of a casino in southwestern Connecticut.
MGM Resorts International Inc., a strong proponent of opening up the process to more potential casino operators beyond the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans, including MGM, argued that multiple bidders are the only way to ensure the state gets the best deal in an expansion.
And members of the finance, revenue and bonding committee are trying to sort it all out.
"This is a debate about a bird in the hand versus two in the bush," said John W. Fonfara, D-Hartford and co-chairman of the committee. "Much of the testimony so far is about if you've had a bird in the hand and you've had a bird in the hand for many years and benefited from that bird and now we're being dazzled by the potential of something else."
Fonfara added: "That doesn't leave a lot of people comfortable in that we should grab for something shinier and end up with something [worse]."
The plan by the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans is aimed at keeping gambling dollars — and Connecticut's share of that revenue — and jobs tied to the gaming industry from flowing to a $950 million casino complex under construction in Springfield. The complex is being developed by MGM.
The finance committee's bill is framed as one that would set up competition. But Fonfara said both options would be examined, focusing on revenue implications for the state.
Part of the reason a southwestern Connecticut casino wouldn't be able to generate enough revenue is that competition is expected to intensify, Barrow said. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Yet even if these proposals could be enacted, they wouldn’t be sufficient. Due to continual pressure on federal and state budgets, new and more reliable sources of funding are needed.
One promising solution is for states or regional economic zones to lead the way by creating their own infrastructure banks, modelled on successful development banks in other countries. The Northeast has taken the first step, with Massachusetts filing bills in January to establish a state infrastructure bank and examine a regional one. This model could be easily replicated across the U.S. to accelerate investment and economic activity.
How would it work? Taking the Northeast as an example, states from Massachusetts to Maryland could create a jointly owned entity capable of financing critical projects, including those that cross borders. Each state would contribute part of the initial equity, which could then be leveraged with private debt to invest in revenue-producing projects. The equity could be boosted through annual contributions from state transportation budgets - or from other sources - with every new dollar having a multiplier effect.
This approach has several benefits. Projects could be funded on a portfolio basis, with excess cash flow from one investment subsidizing another. Smaller projects could be aggregated to create critical mass. And regional banks could become repositories of best practices, acting as centers of excellence for negotiating complex projects on behalf of taxpayers.
Perhaps more important, regional banks could draw investment from institutions such as pension funds and sovereign wealth funds that generally don’t invest in the traditional municipal bond market. That would significantly expand the pool of available capital for infrastructure, while enabling bigger investments with longer maturities.
Regional banks wouldn’t replace the states’ role in issuing municipal bonds, or eliminate the need for federal dollars. Nor would they aim to privatize public assets. They would simply expand the universe of funding sources and viable projects, thereby boosting regional competitiveness.
This is a tried and tested model. The European Investment Bank, founded in 1958, last reported more than 450 billion euros in disbursed loans, about two-thirds of which were for infrastructure projects. In 2016, China launched the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, with $100 billion to help accelerate investment across developing Asia. Canada is creating a bank that will leverage C$35 billion in state funds with private capital to pay for domestic construction. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Coast Guard Academy discovers it’s been polluting the Thames River for 20 years
New London — Thousands of gallons of untreated wastewater have been emptying into the Thames River from the Coast Guard Academy’s field house over the last 20 years, apparently the result of faulty construction work that was only recently discovered.
The discovery that it has been polluting the river is embarrassing for the academy, which trains cadets to enforce environmental laws on the nation's waterways, among other missions.
“As soon as the problem was found the academy took steps to correct it,” David Santos, spokesman for the academy, said Monday. “It certainly wasn’t our intention. We tried to act as quickly as we could so there would be no further impact to the river.”
The discharge came from the showers, sinks and toilets in two locker rooms in Roland Hall, where physical education and sports competitions take place. The two locker rooms, which have been closed since the discovery on March 29, were used by women’s varsity teams and visiting teams, Santos said. Discharges from other locker rooms and bathrooms used by spectators at Roland Hall sporting events were not involved, he said.
Santos said design work for the repairs has begun. The work will cost an estimated $80,000 to $100,000, he said.
The academy informed the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection about the discharge, he said. DEEP, however, does not have jurisdiction over sewage discharges from individual buildings, according to DEEP spokesman Dennis Schain. Instead, the local health agency, Ledge Light Health District, has jurisdiction.
Santos said the discharge is estimated at 100 to 130 gallons per day during the school year, but some experts are questioning whether that estimate is too low. The problem is believed to have started in 1997 when a contractor working on utility lines cross-connected the wastewater discharge into a storm drain, which empties directly into the river, instead of into the system that takes raw sewage to the city’s treatment plant, Santos said. The incorrect connection, located underground, was found with a scope used during an assessment of Coast Guard facilities, he said.
Stephen Mansfield, director of Ledge Light, said the public health agency just learned of the problem on Monday and is working to schedule an inspection of the site. It will also do its own calculations of the amount of the discharge.
Mansfield said the health district will also notify the state Bureau of Aquaculture about the outfall. A “restricted relay area” for clams is located near the outfall, he said. Shellfish cannot be harvested directly from those areas. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Drywall Subcontractor Files Suit Against Former Dunkin' Donuts Park Developer
A subcontractor on the $71 million Dunkin' Donuts Park construction project is suing the former developer and the surety on the project for about $1.3 million cumulatively.
Manganaro Northeast LLC, a Massachusetts-based drywall company with an office in Rocky Hill, was hired in November 2015 to do about $2.9 million in wall, ceiling and acoustical ceiling work.
In a complaint filed late last month, the company claimed that Centerplan Construction Co. and DoNo Hartford LLC, who were terminated by Hartford Mayor Luke Bronin in June 2016, still owes it more than $399,000 for work performed, demobilization costs and other charges.
The company is also suing Arch Insurance, which guaranteed completion of the project after the developers were fired.
The suit claims that Arch is obligated under the payment bond to pay Manganaro about $1 million for work not paid for by Centerplan and DoNo and other costs related to the termination.
According to the lawsuit, Arch representatives acknowledged Manganaro was due much of its claim, but attempted to use its leverage to force the company to enter into an agreement to finish a small amount of work that remained and repair damage to work it had already done or risk having its claim "fall to the bottom of the pile."Manganaro's action is the third lawsuit filed against the former developers by a subcontractor on the ballpark project, which was plagued by cost overruns and missed deadlines that caused the stadium to open nearly a year late.
Arch has also filed a federal lawsuit against Centerplan seeking about $8 million in claims it paid out on the ballpark and another construction project in Storrs. Webster Bank is also suing Centerplan for about $6 million it claims the company owes it for loans related to the ballpark project. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
MGM, Tribes Spar In Legislature Over Southwestern Connecticut Casino
The two sides in the casino expansion debate turned up the pressure Monday at a legislative hearing on the third bill this session to deal with whether the state should allow a casino off tribal lands.
A partnership by the tribal operators of Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun, which is seeking to establish a satellite casino in East Windsor, released a consultant's report that poked holes in the viability of a casino in southwestern Connecticut.
MGM Resorts International Inc., a strong proponent of opening up the process to more potential casino operators beyond the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans, including MGM, argued that multiple bidders are the only way to ensure the state gets the best deal in an expansion.
And members of the finance, revenue and bonding committee are trying to sort it all out.
"This is a debate about a bird in the hand versus two in the bush," said John W. Fonfara, D-Hartford and co-chairman of the committee. "Much of the testimony so far is about if you've had a bird in the hand and you've had a bird in the hand for many years and benefited from that bird and now we're being dazzled by the potential of something else."
Fonfara added: "That doesn't leave a lot of people comfortable in that we should grab for something shinier and end up with something [worse]."
The plan by the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans is aimed at keeping gambling dollars — and Connecticut's share of that revenue — and jobs tied to the gaming industry from flowing to a $950 million casino complex under construction in Springfield. The complex is being developed by MGM.
The finance committee's bill is framed as one that would set up competition. But Fonfara said both options would be examined, focusing on revenue implications for the state.
Clyde Barrow, a consultant to the tribes who has studied the growth of gaming for more than two decades, wrote a report, released Monday, that found that a casino in southwestern Connecticut would not be able to return the level of revenues to the state as now paid by the tribes.
A decades-old agreement between the Mashantucket Pequots and Mohegans gives the state a 25 percent cut of slot revenues each month. The East Windsor casino, if opened, would give the state 25 percent of slot revenue and 25 percent of table games.Part of the reason a southwestern Connecticut casino wouldn't be able to generate enough revenue is that competition is expected to intensify, Barrow said. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE