STOP TRANSPORTATION CUTS
The state legislators are considering budget proposals that will gut Connecticut's transportation funding.
If passed these proposals will cut transit services and road repairs. This will cripple our economy, impede mobility, increase delays, and make travel less safe.
Tell your legislators to oppose transportation cuts!
Take 2 minutes and use this link to send the message.
There have never been this many job openings in America
The U.S. boasted 6.2 million job openings in June, a record level, according to a Labor Department report published on Tuesday.
The high number of job openings illustrates a strength and a weakness of the U.S. job market. On the good side, American employers are ready to hire. During the Great Recession, job openings plunged to as low as 2.2 million in 2009. The Labor Department began tracking open positions in 2000.
On the downside, employers increasingly say they can't find skilled and available workers to fill their open positions.
A growing debate has emerged among economists: Some say American workers need better skills while others argue that employers need to offer higher wages to attract better talent.
Regardless, job openings are abundant in several industries. There were 388,000 manufacturing job openings in June, 225,000 construction postings and even 23,000 unfilled mining jobs. Each of these industries was up compared to the previous month and compared to a year ago.
Schools and hospitals have the most job openings: There were 1.2 million postings in health and education services in June.
President Trump hopes to fill some of those open jobs by investing more in apprenticeship programs, which tend to be located at offices or factories. Administration officials announced in June they would put $200 million toward ApprenticeshipUSA, a grant program, using already-allocated Labor Department funds.
However, Trump's proposed budget seeks to significantly cut funding for job training programs that offer more classroom-based learning.
The budget would reduce funding for job training by $1.1 billion, or 40%. U.S. officials say job training programs have had checkered success. Some programs considered to be thriving are asking the administration to reconsider.
Newington Residents Express Support For New Town Hall Project
At a public hearing Tuesday night on a proposed new $28.8 million town hall, residents overwhelmingly expressed their approval of the project citing the deterioration of the current building as a reason to move forward.
"As someone who is here on a weekly basis ... I see up close and first hand the shape this building is in ... it leaks when it rains," resident Bernadette Conway said.
At a meeting earlier this summer, the town council heard preliminary plans for the new building design.
According to the plan, board of education offices will be on the third floor with government and human services offices on the second floor. Town council chambers, community television and the Transition Academy will occupy the first floor.
Architect Tom Arcari said plans for the community center space include two full-sized basketball courts, locker rooms, a kitchen, a multipurpose room and craft rooms. The plan also includes more storage space and a more private entrance for human services.
If approved by voters at a November referendum, the new building would be in the upper town hall parking lot. During construction no town offices would be moved, saving the town $2 million, and the old building would be demolished upon completion of the new facility.The project was originally billed for $29.5 million, but the price tag decreased to $28.8 million thanks to an extra bonding item that was mistakenly included in the total. The use of some capital improvement funds earmarked for the renovation project also brought down the cost.
The existing building was once Newington High School and has wide hallways, which don't use space efficiently, Arcari said. Over the years numerous attempts were made to renovate the building.
"You try and you try and you try until you get it right," resident Wayne Alexander said. "I guess this time you got it right ... obviously this is the best package that came up."
Some residents were concerned about potential tax increases as a result of the project."We instinctively know that with a project like this our taxes could go up," resident William Lanza said. "We'll still have to pay more taxes to pay back that debt." CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
Larson Outlines $1 Trillion Infrastructure Plan That Could Fund Hartford Tunnels
Standing along the Connecticut River Tuesday, Rep. John Larson announced a $1 trillion infrastructure bill that would fund projects across the country — including his $10 billion proposal to tunnel I-91 and I-84 through Hartford — by taxing carbon emissions.
A $49 per ton tax on carbon, increasing annually 2 percent above inflation, would generate $1.8 trillion over the next decade, enough to fund $1 trillion in infrastructure improvement.
The remainder of the money would go toward tax rebates to consumers who would see energy prices increase due to the new carbon tax on coal, oil and natural gas and to provide assistance to workers in carbon-intensive industries.
Larson expects Congress to take up an infrastructure bill. “How it will be funded is what the debate will be,” he said.
The legislation will be introduced when Congress returns next month. A member of the House Ways and Means Committee, which sets tax policy, Larson admitted he had no Republican support yet for his proposal. But there is bipartisan support to boost spending on infrastructure, he said, and Larson believes his plan is the best way to do it.
“There clearly are a number of ways to pay for it, but we think this is the most dynamic and most dramatic,” he said. Joining Larson at Great River Park were fellow lawmakers, including his brother, state Sen. Tim Larson, D-East Hartford, and representatives from the building trades.
The America Wins Act, as Larson is calling the bill, would create between 13 million and 22 million new jobs, according to a fact sheet distributed by his office.
“These are American jobs. These are Connecticut jobs,” said Don Shubert, president of the Connecticut Construction Industries Association. “You can’t take the jobs in the plants and the quarries and the construction companies in Connecticut and send them overseas.”
As an example of a project that could be funded by the legislation, Larson again described his vision to tunnel sections of the two major highways that travel through Hartford. Motorists on I-84 would travel in a tunnel from East Hartford to near Flatbush Avenue in Hartford. And I-91 would be buried as it travels along the Hartford riverfront.Burying the highways, Larson said, would reopen acres of valuable real estate in the two cities and drive economic development.
“It would put us on the map — now and forever,” said state Rep. Tony Guerrera, D-Rocky Hill and chairman of the legislature’s transportation committee. He described a vision similar to the San Antonio’s iconic River Walk, with restaurants, bars and housing along the water. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE
On CT’s budget, it turns out there may be a nuclear option
One of the unconventional revenue-raising schemes considered by legislators in pursuit of an overdue budget would have Connecticut extract millions of dollars from Dominion Energy in return for legislation boosting the profitability of electricity generated by the company’s Millstone nuclear power plant.
Call it a mark of desperation or sign of creativity, the ill-defined Dominion proposal is one of the ideas floating around the State Capitol, where legislators Tuesday marked the 39th day without a plan to close a $2.3 billion budget gap and pay for a government that costs about $20 billion a year. A bipartisan meeting of legislative leaders yielded nothing new.
The legislature’s struggle to match revenue and spending for the fiscal year that opened July 1 is complicated by the lack of a strong working majority in either chamber, a governor whose political capital is growing short, and the fact that various ideas for cutting spending or raising revenue come with complex policy implications.
Malloy, for example, still is pushing a plan to require municipalities to contribute $400 million to the underfunded teacher pension fund, now wholly a state state obligation. He and some legislators also are eager to draw up a new education aid formula to direct money to the neediest systems, an undertaking certain to produce winners and losers in a year of tight money.
And then there is the future of Millstone.
Its two active nuclear reactors in Waterford generate electricity equivalent to about half of Connecticut’s electric needs and nearly all its carbon-free power. Dominion says relatively cheap natural gas is depressing prices, potentially putting Millstone on the road to an early retirement.
Dominion has lobbied hard for legislative relief over two years, opposed by competitors that would benefit by the disappearance Millstone, as well as skeptical consumer advocates. The issue seemed to die for the year with the end of the regular annual session on June 7.
It has come back to life — some legislators and lobbyists have branded it a zombie bill — in the ongoing special budget session as a potential piece of an unfinished fiscal puzzle.
“There are still ongoing conversations,” Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk, said Tuesday. “Nothing has been settled — or even remotely settled. Dominion continues to have conversations with various legislators.”
Senate Democrats met Monday night to consider a range of budget approaches. One of them was to explore whether Millstone could generate cash for the state. CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE