Christine StuartHARTFORD, CT — Everyone agrees Connecticut’s roads need to be repaired and no one wants to see a bridge collapse, but there seems to be little agreement about how to finance it.
The opposition to Gov. Ned Lamont’s proposal to erect electronic tolls on Interstates 84, 91, 95, and Route 15 was visible and vocal Wednesday, but only about 50 people signed up to testify at a public hearing. Opponents packed the Legislative Office Building Wednesday morning, but many left before testifying.
Lamont joined toll supporters, including mayors, construction workers, and business executives, for a press conference before the start of the public hearing. His leadership on the issue was applauded by the group.
House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, said it would have been easy for Lamont to punt the issue to the legislature because “the rewards will not be felt before the next election,” in 2021.
“Please respect the leadership shown by this governor,” Aresimowicz, a proponent of tolls, said. Aresimowicz is not running for re-election.
Aresimowicz and Senate President Martin Looney have been pushing for tolls for the past few years.
“Anyone who is not committed to tolls in 2019 is not committed to dealing with our infrastructure problem regarding our roads and bridges,” Looney said to loud boos in the room from opponents. “They might be posturing about it, but they’re not committed to a real solution…we have to have a new stream of revenue.”
Toll opponents and Republican lawmakers vehemently disagreed.
Senate Republican Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, said under Lamont’s proposal they are removing money that was scheduled to go into the Special Transportation Fund under the bipartisan budget agreement.
Lamont’s budget freezes the transfer of new car sale taxes to the Special Transportation Fund at 8 percent. By cutting off the revenue stream, Fasano said, Lamont is actually taking money away from the fund.
“They’re plan not only weakens the transportation system, delays the infrastructure for at least five years if not longer and doesn’t bring certainty,” Fasano said.
Fasano said the state would not be able to divert the general obligation bonding Republicans want to dedicate to the fund away from it. But it conflicts with Lamont’s desire to cut bonding by $500 million a year.
He said by prioritizing bonding and using a specific amount of general obligation bonds the state can improve its infrastructure without a new revenue stream like tolls.
Lamont said adding to Connecticut’s credit card is the “exact wrong thing to do.”
“That’s why our fixed costs are going through the roof,” Lamont said. “That’s why I’ve strongly said we need to go on a debt diet. That’s why we need a new revenue stream.”
He said they could leverage $400 million of the $800 million in net toll revenue from out-of-state drivers. If the state relies simply on borrowing then all of the money will come from Connecticut residents, Lamont’s administration argues. Linda Shapiro of Southbury, who opposes tolls, said no one disputes that Connecticut needs better infrastructure, “but where’s the money we already send to take care of it?”
“You need to spend wisely what you already have,” Shapiro said.
Donna Cody, who also opposes tolls, said the money wasn’t always spent on what it was intended for, but there’s little anyone can do about that now.
“We voted overwhelmingly on a lockbox this year and money has been moved,” Cody said referring to the new car sales taxes. Opponents say traffic diversion from tolled roads to local roads will force hardworking commuters to decide if it’s worth adding time to their commute everyday rather than pay new toll taxes.
Hilary Gunn of Greenwich who stood outside the hearing room with a knitted cap that said “No Tolls” said Connecticut already pays too much for the roads it has.
“And we pay much higher than the national average,” to construct the roads, Gunn said. Also, “I don’t believe we should reward the failure of the legislature to properly budget.”
Gunn said she’d like to see them cut spending in order to fund improvements to the system.
Another bill the committee heard Wednesday calls for the creation of a Connecticut Transportation Finance Authority, Department of Transportation Commissioner Joseph Giulietti said he’s not enamoured with the idea of creating a Connecticut Transportation Finance Authority to oversee tolls.
He said if the General Assembly wants to create an authority to oversee tolls it’s essentially “adding a layer of management, a layer of costs.”
He said unless there was a reason to create an authority than he doesn’t recommended it. Lamont also was not wedded to the idea and said it’s something that could be negotiated. He said he would be reluctant to create a body that doesn’t have a direct connection with the legislature and the Office of Policy and Management.
Giulietti said the administration’s proposal for congestion pricing is in compliance with the Federal Highway Administration.
He said the conversation is not a new one but the federal government won’t approve Connecticut’s toll proposal without the legislature enabling them to have that conversation.
Toll gantries under Lamont’s plan would be about every six miles. It would cost about $213 million to construct the gantries.
Giulietti asked the committee for more time to calculate what the cost would be for the average Connecticut driver who frequents the roads.
Sen. Carlo Leone, D-Stamford, said he understands no one likes tolls, but they have to find a new revenue source.
Leone said if they don’t find a source of revenue “it’s gonna come from somewhere eventually because we cannot afford a broken infrastructure system.”
Democratic leadership fell one vote shy of getting a toll proposal passed in the House two years ago and have since expanded their majority in both the House and the Senate. However, it’s unclear if there’s enough support since tolls isn’t necessarily an issue that breaks along party lines.
Lamont has spent most of his political capital on the issue and is asking the business community in join him in support of the issue.
Dan Haar: Middle ground on tolls with a tax giveback
Seeing the show at the state Capitol Wednesday, you’d think highway tolls were a black-and-white issue. It’s only simple on the surface, though.
As the two sides talk past each other, I’d suggest a few things to make tolls work. First, not a vague promise to lower some other tax sometime way in the future if and only if we find the money.
No, the General Assembly should pass a tax cut or credit for middle-class taxpayers of $175 million a year as part of the tolls package, right from the start. I’ll say why I picked that number in a minute; think corporate stock buybacks.
And, the pro-toll side needs to show a lot more calculations than we have now. With tolls, Gov. Ned Lamont said Tuesday, “We would be able to borrow against that, we’d be able to put together private public partnerships...That allows us to hit the ground running by leveraging it several-fold.”
Well, there are good public-private partnerships and bad ones. Skeptics need to see more details. And on the subject of details, we need to stop thinking tolls will suddenly speed up transit and motoring.
Spending money on this stuff is probably more like putting a new roof on your house than buying a new car. That roof is necessary but it doesn’t change you life all that much. You’re thinking about a 6-speed manual 124 Fiat Spider, oh yeah, that would alter your lifestyle.So please, pro-tollers, stop selling a sports car when we’re buying a new roof.
Here’s the simple part, the basics: The pro-toll side, led by newly accolyted Lamont, says Connecticut can’t afford not to raise $800 million a year with highways tolls. We must to maintain our highways, speed traffic to an acceptable crawl and — I’m not making this up — make the trains run at the now-famous 30-30-30 speeds, a half hour from Hartford to New Haven, New Haven to Stamford and Stamford to Manhattan.“We’ve got to bring our infrastructure into the 21st century and we’ve got to do it now,” Lamont said.
It’s not helpful that he only came to that conclusion a month after taking office. Bob Stefanowski, the Republican nominee who ran against Lamont’s promise to toll trucks only, was in Hartford Wednesday and he’s a bit of a victim of Lamont’s switch, though Lamont is right in the end.
Lamont is generally backed by other Democrats, big business and the tech sector.
The anti-toll side basically says enough is enough. We can’t have a $1 billion tax hike in 2015, followed by Lamont’s proposed $750 million tax hike that would take full effect in 2020, mostly in the form of an expanded sales tax; followed by an increase in the minimum wage to $15 an hour, along with a paid family and medical leave bill, which would tax paychecks by 0.5 percent, or about $400 a year for someone making $80,000.I’m sure I’m leaving some proposed cost increases out but you get the point. Something has to give. The enough-is-enough side, led by Senate GOP Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, includes all Republicans — as far as I can tell — and many Main Street businesses such as the Danbury Chamber of Commerce along with a few very liberal Democrats who favor taxing the rich instead of tolls.
The anti’s get that we can’t keep fixing highway supports with steel patches — literally, what we’re doing on I-84 and I-95 in the oldest sections. They get that you can’t be a state without spending big money on highways, bridges and transit systems. They think we can borrow the money and do it somewhat on the cheap, and make room for all that borrowing by borrowing less elsewhere.
Both sides have a point. Connecticut can’t do everything that costs money. Somehow, somewhere, we need to have some recognition that enough is, in fact, enough. Former Gov. Dannel P. Malloy did a decent job cutting costs out of state government, paring thousands of state jobs, but it wasn’t enough.
If it really does cost more for Connecticut to maintain highways than other states pay, we need to get to the bottom of it. I’m not convinced.
There might be middle ground here. Tolls are after all, a source of free money. Last time I looked, it costs me about $70 in tolls round-trip to and from Washington, D.C., and our state doesn’t see a dime of that.
Of that $800 million raised, at roughly 4.5 cents a mile on the state’s four busiest highways, about $350 million would come from out-of-state trucks and motorists. We can quibble about who exactly gets a lowe rate, based on where people buy their EZ-Pass, but that’s silliness.
That $350 million spells a decent windfall. I understand that Connecticut needs every penny it can get, but in good faith, the state can and should do what publicly traded corporations do with some of their profits. They give it back to the shareholders as either dividends or share buybacks.
That’s where the $175 million comes in. It’s reasonable for the state to promise, up-front, to refund to taxpayers half the out-of-state dividend. Yes, I know the Federal Highway Administration doesn’t allow direct rebates. But we can come close with targeted property tax credits against the state income tax.
A cut in the $500 million-a-year gasoline tax, which now totals about 50 cents a gallon including the 25-cent direct levy and a wholesale charge, would be the fairest way to go. But as a user tax, the gasoline tax isn’t a terrible thing.
Details aside, the point is, there are ways of thinking about this that make sense. “To just say yes or no to tolls is not a very thoughtful answer,” David Stemerman, a Greenwich resident and former Republican candidate for governor, said Wednesday in the busy atrium of the Legislative Office Building.
“The place where this conversation should begin is, what are our goals?”
Sadly, it’s a roof. Even with tolls, we might not get that Fiat Spider. Not the turbo-charged convertible, anyway.
Hundreds turn out to speak out on highway tolls proposal
Susan Haigh
HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Hundreds of people turned out Wednesday for a legislative hearing Wednesday on whether Connecticut should institute electronic highway tolls, highlighting the strong divide that's developed over an issue being pushed hard by the state's new Democratic governor.
Many proponents wore green stickers touting how an estimated 40 percent of the estimated tolling revenue would come from out-of-state drivers, while unionized operators of construction equipment handed out T-shirts that read "Fund Our Roads." Some opponents stood outside the hearing room holding handmade signs and encouraging people to sign a petition they say have surpassed 53,000 signatures.
"I look at it this way. They're in a race. We're in a race," said tolls opponent Jen Ezzell of Lisbon, who held a sign that read: "Not One Penny More." She said it's a "crapshoot" as to which side will win the battle this session.
"If we can get them out there, we have a good chance of stopping this," she said of her fellow opponents. "But if they get ahead of us and they get their votes that they need, then they're going to win."
John Daddona, apprentice coordinator at the International Union of Operating Engineers, Local 478, said people don't like tolls, but the message is getting across that Connecticut needs a new source of transportation revenue."The tolls are the fairest way. Nobody wants to pay taxes," he said. "But at least the people who use them now are paying for what they're using."
Electronic tolling has become one of the hottest battles of this year's legislative session. The General Assembly's Transportation Committee was the first to take up the issue, holding a lengthy hearing Wednesday on two bills, including one proposed by Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont that could lead to about 52 gantries on approximately 330 miles of roadway along Interstates 91, 95, 84 and Route 15.
Lamont began the morning by releasing a video on social media, arguing that toll revenue is vitally needed to "speed up our transportation system" and to "get this state moving again" economically. He also appeared at a news conference with business leaders who warned how the lack of infrastructure improvements is hurting the state. The state's main transportation account, which relies heavily on gas tax revenue, is projected to be insolvent by 2024.
"Look, it's tough," he said. "I hate to say, we've got to pay our bills. And we haven't done that in this state. We've been putting everything on the credit card ... and that's what's gotten us into the situation we're in today."
Lamont, who campaigned on imposing tolls only on big trucks, offered two options in his budget proposal: tolling trucks or tolling all vehicles. But he has made it clear he prefers more widespread tolls , which are estimated to eventually generate $800 million annually after covering about $213 million in startup costs. Truck-only tolls are predicted to generate about $200 million annually.Tolling has been estimated to begin in 2023. Even if the legislature approves tolling, Connecticut will still need federal approval.
Lamont's tolling plan is currently a "starting point for a discussion," said Office of Policy and Management Secretary Melissa McCaw.
Some lawmakers raised concerns about how the 52 gantries would be located six miles apart, noting there are only 13 tolls over 138 miles of the Massachusetts Turnpike. Department of Transportation Commissioner Joseph Giuletti said there's a greater distance between exits on the Mass Pike and Lamont's plan attempts to address drivers who want to bypass tolls by using local roads. But Giuletti acknowledged the distance between gantries could be changed. He also promised to provide lawmakers with an estimated cost for the average Connecticut driver, after accounting for discounts. A DOT study suggested charging 4.4 cents per mile during peak hours for passenger vehicles and 3.5 cents per miles during off-peak hours.
Fight begins on tolls: State legislators weigh in on governor's bill
The General Assembly’s Transportation Committee listened to testimony Wednesday on two tolling bills, including one proposed by Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont that could lead to about 52 gantries on approximately 330 miles of roadway along Interstates 91, 95, 84 and Route 15.
In coordination with the public hearing, the governor’s office released a written transcript of the administration’s presentation. In that presentation, the state Department of Transportation commissioner introduced the toll plan at the hearing.
“We’re here to talk about the governor’s bill, HB 7202, which would enable Connecticut to construct tolls along several highways. But we believe the dialogue should be much broader. We believe tolling is “how” we should move forward, but we need to spend a few minutes on the ‘why’ – why are we having this conversation in the first place? Simply put, Connecticut’s aging transportation infrastructure and lack of sustainable, recurring revenue in the Special Transportation Fund has hampered our ability to just maintain a state of good repair, let alone make the investments necessary to move our state’s residents and the economy. This lack of funding to maintain our infrastructure leads to major capital costs and the need to entirely revamp systems, which is not strategically smart or a financial best practice,” transportation commissioner Joe Giulietti said.
Electronic tolling has become one of the hottest battles of the legislative session.
Following Wednesday’s hearing, state Rep. Chris Ziogas, D-Bristol, said the discussion around tolls is a work in progress but he agrees with the concept.
“Tolls are necessary for our infrastructure repair,” he said. “We need that money to move forward. If we can tap into the money of people passing through the state it will be beneficial. If we can improve our infrastructure then we can attract more businesses and then we all win.”
Ziogas said that he believes both sides agree that something needs to be done about infrastructure. The debate lies in the method.
State Rep. Cara Pavalock-D’Amato, R-Bristol, serves on the appropriations committee. She said a representative from the governor’s office came to testify on tolls and informed the committee that truck only tolls were not an option. According to that testimony, truck only tolls would be financially insolvent within 10 years. The state cannot issue bonds if there is a projection of insolvency.
“To me, it seems like truck only tolls were never going to be an option, even though he (Lamont) campaigned on truck only tolls,” she said.
Many central Connecticut officials said their constituents were against tolls for in-state residents.
“I’m looking to see if we can find any common ground, but of the people from Bristol and Plymouth who have contacted me, 90 percent of them are vehemently opposed to tolls,” said state Rep. Whit Betts, R-Plymouth, Bristol. “It is very unfortunate to me that the ones arguing for doing the tolls seem to ignore the idea that there is more than one option.”
Betts said he is also concerned about a provision where unless the speaker of the House and the president of the Senate bring up the toll legislation for a vote within 15 days, the Department of Transportation can move forward on a study and planning and it would be “deemed approved.”
“To me, that would be unprecedented and a total end run around of democracy,” said Betts. “Taxpayers will be outraged if they use that kind of tactic. It would be a clear case of taxation without representation.”
Betts said that he, “like many people in Bristol and Plymouth” is skeptical that the money raised by tolls would stay in a transportation fund. In the past, he said this money was taken out to pay for deficits in the general fund.
State Sen. Henri Martin, R-Bristol, Plainville, and Plymouth, said that both parties agree that the state’s infrastructure is in “dire need” of repair.
“The bottom line is how do you pay the bill,” he said. “They want to institute tolls and we’re saying that’s a mistake. The proposed bill would let them have gantries every 6 or 7 miles along 95, 91, 84, and parts of 15. They way it is written would also leave the doors open to add more roads.”
On Tuesday, state Sen. Gennaro Bizzarro, R-District 6, urged residents to attend Wednesday’s public hearing and oppose the toll proposals.
“People need to know that tolls would not just be on the state borders, and tolls could be on all vehicles,” Bizzarro said. “This will be a mileage tax, plain and simple.”
Following the hearing Bizzarro spoke at length about the governor’s plan on Lee Elci’s radio show. He said, in part, “Between the tolls and all the proposals to increase taxes, people have just had enough in the state. We are trying to figure out ways to make it easier for hard working middle class people and their families and now we are going to tax them on their commute to work. These costs are just not going to be absorbed and disappear. They are going to flow right back in, the consumers are going to end up paying and then there are lots of other issues. That presupposes that we are going to be able to efficiently raise revenue by implementing the system. I think at the end of the day we are going to end up increasing the bureaucracy at a point and time where we really need to be looking at ways to make government leaner and more efficient.”
Lamont, Dems hint at sweetener for CT tolls
Ken Dixon
There’s a chance that if electronic highway tolls are installed around Connecticut, the state’s gasoline tax would be reduced from the current 25 cents per gallon.
That was the potential sweetener offered Wednesday, when Gov. Ned Lamont joined local leaders and union leaders in pushing for tolls ahead of a daylong public hearing on the issue that brought out hundreds, from either side of the issue, to the state Capitol.“I think that’s something we can look at,” Lamont said when asked by a reporter. “We’ll see how that balances out. I think that makes some sense.”
Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney, D-New Haven, predicted the possibility in a jammed meeting room in the Legislative Office Building. Noting that even if the issue were approved this year, it would be several more years to install the system of overhead gantries, he said the $800 million to $1 billion in annual revenue from the tolls would be crucial to repairing the state’s aging rail, highway and bridge system.
He recalled that back in 1983, the collapse of an Interstate 95 bridge over the Mianus River in Greenwich underscored the state’s pattern of deferred maintenance. The subsequent reaction helped improve the transit infrastructure, but now the roads are crowded and the trains to New York are slower than they were 100 years ago.
Looney said that the amount raised by the gasoline tax has been declining in recent years because of fuel efficiency and the popularity of electric and hybrid vehicles. But according to recent fiscal projections, the current fiscal year is expected to end June 30 with $505 million in revenue from the gas tax, about what it raised three years ago.
“The revenues from the gas tax project to be flat in years to come as our infrastructure needs go up and up and up,” Looney said. “I don’t think anyone wants to increase the gas tax to astronomic proportions that would have to be necessary.”
Looney said it would be “important” to reduce the gas tax at the same time that tolls take effect, to target relief for state residents.
“I’ve got to give people a sense of direction,” Lamont said. “I know it’s unpopular. I know people don’t want to pay a little bit more. They think there’s a magic wand, another way we can do this. At the end of the day, I feel very strongly we have to put in this recurring revenue stream that invests in transportation. It’s the best way to get jobs back in the state of Connecticut.”
He noted that states around the country are dealing with aging infrastructure in a variety of ways, including Michigan and Ohio, where massive hikes in the gasoline tax have been proposed. “That’s not the way we want to go in this state,” Lamont said. “Whether we can reduce it over time, I think that makes some sense.”
Early Wednesday, Lamont posted a video on his social media feeds stressing the need to rehabilitate the state’s transportation system. On Tuesday, Republicans in the General Assembly said they will continue to oppose tolls, stressing a way to prioritize spending without creating new road-use fees.
Since last month, Lamont has traveled around the state highlighting the need for major infrastructure projects, and the fact that tolls could bring in $800 million a year, 40 percent of which would be paid by out-of-staters.
Some details on tolls, but little common ground
MARK PAZNIOKAS and KEITH M. PHANEUF
The administration of Gov. Ned Lamont started Wednesday to fill in significant gaps in the Democratic governor's expansive highway tolls proposal, a measure that instantly divided the legislature along partisan lines three weeks ago and became an early wedge issue in the 2020 elections.
At a press conference packed with invited supporters from the worlds of politics, labor and business, and then in a nearly three-hour presentation to the legislature's Transportation Committee, the administration tried to regain the initiative in a debate dominated by opponents, a coalition of Republicans, trucking interests and a grass-roots group, No Tolls CT.
"I think they helped frame the issue from an economic development standpoint, from a commuting standpoint and an infrastructure standpoint, and helped outline the serious deficiencies in our current system," said Rep. Roland J. Lemar, D-New Haven, the committee's co chair.
But Republicans on the committee were unpersuaded, as was Peter Sasser, the Stamford firefighter who founded the grass roots group, No Tolls CT. One in a long list of witnesses who lined up to object to tolling in a hearing that stretched well into the evening, Sasser made no effort to hide his anger in sharp exchanges with committee members.
"The public was lied to. The voters were lied to. The trust was broken," Sasser said, referring to Lamont's campaign position of favoring trucks-only tolls, a promise he abandoned on Feb. 16 by proposing tolls for all motor vehicles. "That's why we're so passionate about this."
Rep. Laura Devlin of Fairfield, the ranking House Republican on the committee, said Republicans "violently agree" with the need for increased transportation infrastructure investments, but they heard nothing Wednesday that would convince them tolls are the right way to provide them.
"I don't know that there was whole lot of new light that was shed," Devlin said. "The encouraging thing I heard today was an ongoing willingness to continue to have conversations."
A troika of administration agency heads, backed by planning and engineering staff from the Department of Transportation, made their case for why tolls are needed, what they generally would cost and what the system would look like to motorists. Leading the presentation were Mellissa McCaw, the budget chief; Joseph Giulietti, the transportation commissioner; and David Lehman, the commissioner-designate of economic and community development.
The administration's bill does not entertain legislative oversight over pricing, once the tolls are authorized, but McCaw told lawmakers that point is negotiable.
"The bill is a starting point for discussions," McCaw said.
Tolls on the Merritt Parkway and Interstates 84, 91 and 95 generally would cost about four cents a mile, with 53 overhead electronic gantries silently noting drivers' progress every six miles, Giulietti said. The tolls are projected by the administration to produced net annual revenues of $800 million.
State residents could get discounts of as much as 50 percent, the officials said, and prices would vary by time of day to address congestion. An earlier study estimated that about 30 percent of the tolls would be paid by out-of-state drivers, but the DOT now says their share would be 40 percent — a number some administration officials wore on their lapels.
Specifics would have to be vetted by the Federal Highway Administration, but officials have assured the state that tolls added to interstate highways would not cost Connecticut any federal highway funds.
"I have it in writing," said Thomas J. Maziarz, the chief of policy and planning for the state DOT.
The governor did not address the committee, but he was one of eight speakers at a press conference aimed at framing the day's news coverage around the theme of transportation investment as a much-needed vehicle to economic growth.
"What we're doing is so important," Lamont said. "We've got to bring our infrastructure, we've got to bring our transportation into the 21st century, and we have to do it now."
H. Darrell Harvey, the co-leader of The Ashworth Company, a commercial real-estate company based in Stamford, said the tolls were vital to the state's economic future. Traffic congestion is stifling economic growth in lower Fairfield County.
"It will help decongest our roads. The use of congestion pricing has been proven to work," he said.
The DOT's recommended rate of 4.4 cents per mile would be the same as what is charged to travel the Mass Pike and lower than what is charged in New York and New Jersey.
GOP lawmakers argue Connecticut can rebuild its transportation network without tolls.
But to do that, a major portion of borrowing currently reserved for other functions — about $700 million per year — must be redirected to complement the existing transportation bonding program.
And because toll revenues wouldn't arrive until 2023, the Republican plan would invest far more in infrastructure than Lamont's approach would over the next four years.
For example, the governor recommended about $1.6 billion in state borrowing for transportation over the next two-year budget. The GOP is recommending more than $2.9 billion — about 80 percent more than Lamont.
"Our plan brings certainty," Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, said before the hearing.
But the Republican plan also would keep Connecticut on an overall borrowing program that Lamont says is unaffordable.
The governor has proposed a "debt diet" that would trim borrowing for municipal school construction and capital projects at state universities — the same pot the GOP's "Prioritize Progress" program would dip into the enhance transportation work.
Fasano testified before the Transportation Committee, joined by Peter Malone, the chief executive officer of Thurston Foods, a Wallingford-based supplier of lunch foods to schools systems across the state and in Massachusetts.
The family-owned business has 215 employees, 60 trucks and 15 other vehicles that deliver food to 3,000 customers. Malone estimated that the tolls would cost his company at least $250,000 a year.
"The costs are going to get passed along. This is a tax," Malone said.
Sasser, the founder of No Tolls CT who has aggressively criticized legislative supporters of tolls, was challenged by lawmakers.
Lemar first complimented him, praising his skills as an organizer.
"You've done a wonderful job," Lemar said.
"On a shoestring," Sasser replied.
Lemar asked Sasser to look at the legislative supporters of tolls as elected officials acting in good faith to preserve the state's transportation system. Lemar ticked off a list of the needs.
"We have a disagreement on how to get there," Lemar said.
House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, who is not a member of the committee, used his prerogatives as speaker to question Sasser, asking how he would respond to municipalities that want the state to continue funding school construction and other projects. The GOP plan would greatly limit the state's abilities to fund those projects.
"Sir, I am not an elected official. I don't know that answer. I can speak to you as a taxpayer. We pay our fair share. We pay and pay and pay," Sasser said. "When does it stop?"
“We’re here to talk about the governor’s bill, HB 7202, which would enable Connecticut to construct tolls along several highways. But we believe the dialogue should be much broader. We believe tolling is “how” we should move forward, but we need to spend a few minutes on the ‘why’ – why are we having this conversation in the first place? Simply put, Connecticut’s aging transportation infrastructure and lack of sustainable, recurring revenue in the Special Transportation Fund has hampered our ability to just maintain a state of good repair, let alone make the investments necessary to move our state’s residents and the economy. This lack of funding to maintain our infrastructure leads to major capital costs and the need to entirely revamp systems, which is not strategically smart or a financial best practice,” transportation commissioner Joe Giulietti said.
Electronic tolling has become one of the hottest battles of the legislative session.
Following Wednesday’s hearing, state Rep. Chris Ziogas, D-Bristol, said the discussion around tolls is a work in progress but he agrees with the concept.
“Tolls are necessary for our infrastructure repair,” he said. “We need that money to move forward. If we can tap into the money of people passing through the state it will be beneficial. If we can improve our infrastructure then we can attract more businesses and then we all win.”
Ziogas said that he believes both sides agree that something needs to be done about infrastructure. The debate lies in the method.
State Rep. Cara Pavalock-D’Amato, R-Bristol, serves on the appropriations committee. She said a representative from the governor’s office came to testify on tolls and informed the committee that truck only tolls were not an option. According to that testimony, truck only tolls would be financially insolvent within 10 years. The state cannot issue bonds if there is a projection of insolvency.
“To me, it seems like truck only tolls were never going to be an option, even though he (Lamont) campaigned on truck only tolls,” she said.
Many central Connecticut officials said their constituents were against tolls for in-state residents.
“I’m looking to see if we can find any common ground, but of the people from Bristol and Plymouth who have contacted me, 90 percent of them are vehemently opposed to tolls,” said state Rep. Whit Betts, R-Plymouth, Bristol. “It is very unfortunate to me that the ones arguing for doing the tolls seem to ignore the idea that there is more than one option.”
Betts said he is also concerned about a provision where unless the speaker of the House and the president of the Senate bring up the toll legislation for a vote within 15 days, the Department of Transportation can move forward on a study and planning and it would be “deemed approved.”
“To me, that would be unprecedented and a total end run around of democracy,” said Betts. “Taxpayers will be outraged if they use that kind of tactic. It would be a clear case of taxation without representation.”
Betts said that he, “like many people in Bristol and Plymouth” is skeptical that the money raised by tolls would stay in a transportation fund. In the past, he said this money was taken out to pay for deficits in the general fund.
State Sen. Henri Martin, R-Bristol, Plainville, and Plymouth, said that both parties agree that the state’s infrastructure is in “dire need” of repair.
“The bottom line is how do you pay the bill,” he said. “They want to institute tolls and we’re saying that’s a mistake. The proposed bill would let them have gantries every 6 or 7 miles along 95, 91, 84, and parts of 15. They way it is written would also leave the doors open to add more roads.”
On Tuesday, state Sen. Gennaro Bizzarro, R-District 6, urged residents to attend Wednesday’s public hearing and oppose the toll proposals.
“People need to know that tolls would not just be on the state borders, and tolls could be on all vehicles,” Bizzarro said. “This will be a mileage tax, plain and simple.”
Following the hearing Bizzarro spoke at length about the governor’s plan on Lee Elci’s radio show. He said, in part, “Between the tolls and all the proposals to increase taxes, people have just had enough in the state. We are trying to figure out ways to make it easier for hard working middle class people and their families and now we are going to tax them on their commute to work. These costs are just not going to be absorbed and disappear. They are going to flow right back in, the consumers are going to end up paying and then there are lots of other issues. That presupposes that we are going to be able to efficiently raise revenue by implementing the system. I think at the end of the day we are going to end up increasing the bureaucracy at a point and time where we really need to be looking at ways to make government leaner and more efficient.”
Lamont, Dems hint at sweetener for CT tolls
Ken Dixon
There’s a chance that if electronic highway tolls are installed around Connecticut, the state’s gasoline tax would be reduced from the current 25 cents per gallon.
That was the potential sweetener offered Wednesday, when Gov. Ned Lamont joined local leaders and union leaders in pushing for tolls ahead of a daylong public hearing on the issue that brought out hundreds, from either side of the issue, to the state Capitol.“I think that’s something we can look at,” Lamont said when asked by a reporter. “We’ll see how that balances out. I think that makes some sense.”
Senate President Pro Tempore Martin M. Looney, D-New Haven, predicted the possibility in a jammed meeting room in the Legislative Office Building. Noting that even if the issue were approved this year, it would be several more years to install the system of overhead gantries, he said the $800 million to $1 billion in annual revenue from the tolls would be crucial to repairing the state’s aging rail, highway and bridge system.
He recalled that back in 1983, the collapse of an Interstate 95 bridge over the Mianus River in Greenwich underscored the state’s pattern of deferred maintenance. The subsequent reaction helped improve the transit infrastructure, but now the roads are crowded and the trains to New York are slower than they were 100 years ago.
Looney said that the amount raised by the gasoline tax has been declining in recent years because of fuel efficiency and the popularity of electric and hybrid vehicles. But according to recent fiscal projections, the current fiscal year is expected to end June 30 with $505 million in revenue from the gas tax, about what it raised three years ago.
“The revenues from the gas tax project to be flat in years to come as our infrastructure needs go up and up and up,” Looney said. “I don’t think anyone wants to increase the gas tax to astronomic proportions that would have to be necessary.”
Looney said it would be “important” to reduce the gas tax at the same time that tolls take effect, to target relief for state residents.
“I’ve got to give people a sense of direction,” Lamont said. “I know it’s unpopular. I know people don’t want to pay a little bit more. They think there’s a magic wand, another way we can do this. At the end of the day, I feel very strongly we have to put in this recurring revenue stream that invests in transportation. It’s the best way to get jobs back in the state of Connecticut.”
He noted that states around the country are dealing with aging infrastructure in a variety of ways, including Michigan and Ohio, where massive hikes in the gasoline tax have been proposed. “That’s not the way we want to go in this state,” Lamont said. “Whether we can reduce it over time, I think that makes some sense.”
Early Wednesday, Lamont posted a video on his social media feeds stressing the need to rehabilitate the state’s transportation system. On Tuesday, Republicans in the General Assembly said they will continue to oppose tolls, stressing a way to prioritize spending without creating new road-use fees.
Since last month, Lamont has traveled around the state highlighting the need for major infrastructure projects, and the fact that tolls could bring in $800 million a year, 40 percent of which would be paid by out-of-staters.
Some details on tolls, but little common ground
MARK PAZNIOKAS and KEITH M. PHANEUF
The administration of Gov. Ned Lamont started Wednesday to fill in significant gaps in the Democratic governor's expansive highway tolls proposal, a measure that instantly divided the legislature along partisan lines three weeks ago and became an early wedge issue in the 2020 elections.
At a press conference packed with invited supporters from the worlds of politics, labor and business, and then in a nearly three-hour presentation to the legislature's Transportation Committee, the administration tried to regain the initiative in a debate dominated by opponents, a coalition of Republicans, trucking interests and a grass-roots group, No Tolls CT.
"I think they helped frame the issue from an economic development standpoint, from a commuting standpoint and an infrastructure standpoint, and helped outline the serious deficiencies in our current system," said Rep. Roland J. Lemar, D-New Haven, the committee's co chair.
But Republicans on the committee were unpersuaded, as was Peter Sasser, the Stamford firefighter who founded the grass roots group, No Tolls CT. One in a long list of witnesses who lined up to object to tolling in a hearing that stretched well into the evening, Sasser made no effort to hide his anger in sharp exchanges with committee members.
"The public was lied to. The voters were lied to. The trust was broken," Sasser said, referring to Lamont's campaign position of favoring trucks-only tolls, a promise he abandoned on Feb. 16 by proposing tolls for all motor vehicles. "That's why we're so passionate about this."
Rep. Laura Devlin of Fairfield, the ranking House Republican on the committee, said Republicans "violently agree" with the need for increased transportation infrastructure investments, but they heard nothing Wednesday that would convince them tolls are the right way to provide them.
"I don't know that there was whole lot of new light that was shed," Devlin said. "The encouraging thing I heard today was an ongoing willingness to continue to have conversations."
A troika of administration agency heads, backed by planning and engineering staff from the Department of Transportation, made their case for why tolls are needed, what they generally would cost and what the system would look like to motorists. Leading the presentation were Mellissa McCaw, the budget chief; Joseph Giulietti, the transportation commissioner; and David Lehman, the commissioner-designate of economic and community development.
The administration's bill does not entertain legislative oversight over pricing, once the tolls are authorized, but McCaw told lawmakers that point is negotiable.
"The bill is a starting point for discussions," McCaw said.
Tolls on the Merritt Parkway and Interstates 84, 91 and 95 generally would cost about four cents a mile, with 53 overhead electronic gantries silently noting drivers' progress every six miles, Giulietti said. The tolls are projected by the administration to produced net annual revenues of $800 million.
State residents could get discounts of as much as 50 percent, the officials said, and prices would vary by time of day to address congestion. An earlier study estimated that about 30 percent of the tolls would be paid by out-of-state drivers, but the DOT now says their share would be 40 percent — a number some administration officials wore on their lapels.
Specifics would have to be vetted by the Federal Highway Administration, but officials have assured the state that tolls added to interstate highways would not cost Connecticut any federal highway funds.
"I have it in writing," said Thomas J. Maziarz, the chief of policy and planning for the state DOT.
The governor did not address the committee, but he was one of eight speakers at a press conference aimed at framing the day's news coverage around the theme of transportation investment as a much-needed vehicle to economic growth.
"What we're doing is so important," Lamont said. "We've got to bring our infrastructure, we've got to bring our transportation into the 21st century, and we have to do it now."
H. Darrell Harvey, the co-leader of The Ashworth Company, a commercial real-estate company based in Stamford, said the tolls were vital to the state's economic future. Traffic congestion is stifling economic growth in lower Fairfield County.
"It will help decongest our roads. The use of congestion pricing has been proven to work," he said.
The DOT's recommended rate of 4.4 cents per mile would be the same as what is charged to travel the Mass Pike and lower than what is charged in New York and New Jersey.
GOP lawmakers argue Connecticut can rebuild its transportation network without tolls.
But to do that, a major portion of borrowing currently reserved for other functions — about $700 million per year — must be redirected to complement the existing transportation bonding program.
And because toll revenues wouldn't arrive until 2023, the Republican plan would invest far more in infrastructure than Lamont's approach would over the next four years.
For example, the governor recommended about $1.6 billion in state borrowing for transportation over the next two-year budget. The GOP is recommending more than $2.9 billion — about 80 percent more than Lamont.
"Our plan brings certainty," Senate Minority Leader Len Fasano, R-North Haven, said before the hearing.
But the Republican plan also would keep Connecticut on an overall borrowing program that Lamont says is unaffordable.
The governor has proposed a "debt diet" that would trim borrowing for municipal school construction and capital projects at state universities — the same pot the GOP's "Prioritize Progress" program would dip into the enhance transportation work.
Fasano testified before the Transportation Committee, joined by Peter Malone, the chief executive officer of Thurston Foods, a Wallingford-based supplier of lunch foods to schools systems across the state and in Massachusetts.
The family-owned business has 215 employees, 60 trucks and 15 other vehicles that deliver food to 3,000 customers. Malone estimated that the tolls would cost his company at least $250,000 a year.
"The costs are going to get passed along. This is a tax," Malone said.
Sasser, the founder of No Tolls CT who has aggressively criticized legislative supporters of tolls, was challenged by lawmakers.
Lemar first complimented him, praising his skills as an organizer.
"You've done a wonderful job," Lemar said.
"On a shoestring," Sasser replied.
Lemar asked Sasser to look at the legislative supporters of tolls as elected officials acting in good faith to preserve the state's transportation system. Lemar ticked off a list of the needs.
"We have a disagreement on how to get there," Lemar said.
House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, who is not a member of the committee, used his prerogatives as speaker to question Sasser, asking how he would respond to municipalities that want the state to continue funding school construction and other projects. The GOP plan would greatly limit the state's abilities to fund those projects.
"Sir, I am not an elected official. I don't know that answer. I can speak to you as a taxpayer. We pay our fair share. We pay and pay and pay," Sasser said. "When does it stop?"