CT Progressive

From Governor Rell:

“Help me as I lead Connecticut to a smaller, more affordable, more responsive government.”

“We must not forsake this opportunity. We must do what every family across our state has been doing – cutting back and doing more with less – and less.”

A smaller government is, by definition, less responsive. If I have a problem, and the department that would have dealt with it is shuttered, the only “response” I’ll get when I call is a not-in-service message.

In the same vein, you can’t do more with less. Less is called less for a reason. In fourteen years as Lt. Governor or Governor, neither Rell nor anyone around her has even figured out how to do the same amount of work for less.

Though in fairness, maybe our Governor is referring to the increased quantity of daytime television our former civil servants will be viewing. More unemployment checks. More people in line at the DMV. That kind of thing.

Rick Green hears something different in Rell’s budget speech:

Republican Chair Chris Healy was ecstatic and Democratic mayors were wary, but if you closed your eyes and cut out the red-meat-for-right-wingers portions of her talk, Rell didn’t sound so GOP to me[.]

Well, sure, if you ignore those portions of the talk.

“If you closed your eyes.” Just… wow.

There’s a lot to criticize in Connecticut’s political media, but when something is worthy of praise…

This week’s Fairfield County Weekly seems to have stepped up the pace on the political reporting front, with a handful of stories that are refreshingly informative and detailed.

First, Cut and Run by Andy Bromage:

Like most Gulf War vets, the federal Veterans Administration refuses to test Sterry for exposure to depleted uranium or other chemical toxins she was exposed to in the Middle East.

So Sterry turned to the state government, and in 2005 helped Connecticut become the first state in the nation to craft a law to test returning combat troops for exposure to battlefield health hazards, including depleted uranium. The law would also establish a veterans health registry to catalog mysterious symptoms crippling war vets, similar to the Connecticut Tumor Registry, which tracks cancer patterns in the state. The data could be used as leverage to pressure the federal government to accept disabilities as service-related, and therefore treat them.

But the state has turned its back on Sterry and the more than 30,000 Connecticut troops who have deployed to combat zones in the Middle East and the Balkans since 1990. The Weekly has learned that Gov. Jodi Rell, through her budget office, quietly killed funding for the veterans health registry without telling the lawmakers who sponsored the program, nor the veterans whom it would serve. [...]

Linda Schwartz, commissioner of Veterans Affairs for the state, broke the news last week to the legislature’s Select Committee on Veterans Affairs during a special meeting at the Connecticut veterans’ home in Rocky Hill. Her budget was being cut, she said, and $165,000 of it would come from the sick-soldiers registry.

What she didn’t mention, and what some lawmakers were not aware of until very recently, was that the funding was eliminated last June during Gov. Rell’s first round of state budget cuts.

In fact, after four years of hearings, debates and lobbying, the program was just days away from receiving the money it needed to hire staff and begin testing. Funding was set for release on July 1, 2008. The governor’s office announced the cut on June 24.

Decoding Rob Simmons by Andy Bromage:

“In reading through the recent speech given to the new legislature, did you see any specific recommendations for dealing with this problem?” Simmons asks me in a recent interview. “Since then, have you heard any specific recommendations for dealing with this problem, other than taking a free day?”

Well, there was the governor’s cost-cutting plan recently approved by the legislature, I say.

“In this environment — in an environment of permanent fiscal crisis — these ideas have to be out there,” Simmons says. “It’s not good enough to surprise everybody in February.”[...]

It’s rare to hear Democrats go after Rell these days for fear of retaliation, let alone a Republican. Let alone a Republican who worked for Rell just a few weeks ago.

Simmons left that job early last month after Rell and the legislature essentially dissolved the Office of the Business Advocate as a cost-saving measure.

Now Simmons is in the market again but he wouldn’t tell me whether he’s interested in running for governor in 2010, or for Chris Dodd’s U.S. Senate seat, as has also been rumored.

Fact and Factions by Nick Keppler, an article about Bridgeport NAACP President (and former Shays GOTV worker) Craig Kelly:

One dispute has been about money. A letter from Dorothy Smith — to Kelly, the Executive Committee and state and national NAACP officials, dated Nov. 10, 2007 — complains that, unbeknownst to her, Kelly arranged to have money raised at the 2007 Freedom Fund Banquet, the branch’s largest yearly fund-raiser, deposited in a new account to which she did not have access. National officials told Kelly to close the account and put its funds in the general account. (Kelly confirms this series of events.)

[...]

Last November, Kelly was challenged for the presidency by Wayne Winston. It was not pretty.

On Nov. 13, 114 people who claimed to be members of the Greater Bridgeport NAACP voted at Messiah Baptist Church. Only 82 of the ballots were counted, and Kelly won 42-40.

Among the 32 people whose membership was challenged were such Bridgeport politicos as City Councilman Andre Baker, State Rep. Don Clemons and State Sen. Ed Gomes. Wayne Winston’s standing as a member was also challenged. All of them were denied by then-Secretary Carolyn Vermont, who was voted first vice president that evening under the slate headed by Kelly. She says those voters simply didn’t have their membership in order.[...]

Spearheaded by Winston and Cash — who lost the presidency and first vice presidency to Kelly and Vermont, respectively — 25 people signed a complaint to the national and state NAACP. Scot X. Esdaile, president of the Connecticut State Conference, and Rev. Gill Ford, regional director of the national NAACP, told the Connecticut Post the matter is resolved and Kelly is the victor. When the Weekly attempted to contact state and national officials about the issue, we were referred back to the Greater Bridgeport office.

Fabrizi Unleashed by Rob Sullivan:

Fabrizi also takes exception to Finch’s contention that one of the main reasons for the current budget mess is the former mayor’s excessive reliability on one-time revenue streams to balance the budget.

“When he came into office, there were two outstanding projects for which we were relying on revenue,” he says. “One was the $4.5 million payment from the Steel Point Developers and the other was $3 million from American Fabrics on Connecticut Avenue. Now, his administration wound up receiving $2 million for the American Fabrics location, which I never would have done. And for all his pointing and wagging his finger, he turned around and put the expected $4.5 million right back in the budget.”

That $4.5 million expected payment was included in the city’s budget, which was passed May 13. That payment was lost when Bridgeport and then–lead developer Midtown Properties of Manhattan missed a deadline for a land disposition agreement in late August. RCI Marine of Miami has since become the Steel Point project’s lead developer, and plans are underway for a smaller-scale version of the massive lead development project planned for the city’s East End.

In talking about Steel Point and other stalled development projects in the Park City, Fabrizi observes, “You have to be in constant contact with these developers. Obviously, that didn’t happen.”

I don’t know what led the Weekly to eat their Wheaties for this week’s edition, but these stories are a couple cuts above what we normally see on newsprint in the state. They get facts that can’t be found in any press releases, ask (and follow up on) detailed questions to people who are in a position to know the uncomfortable history of a situation, report on who wouldn’t answer which questions, and importantly, lay out compelling facts for people who are generally informed, and offer context for people who aren’t.

None of that should be remarkable, but all of it is. Let’s hope they keep it up.

Posting has been slow the last couple of days due to work on an political data research project I’ve been doing. One of the questions that came up in this project was how to weight votes cast for cross-endorsed candidates in determining a party’s “base” in a particular voting district.

Fortunately, a bit of research came my way, an essay by Scott Susin from 2004 that answers that question:

That the WFP had a larger effect on the race than the other minor parties is not surprising, since the WFP expended much more effort in the race than the other minor parties. [...] Less expected was the result that the WFP displaced so few Democratic votes, with each 100 WFP votes representing between 65 and 103 new votes for the candidate.

Short answer: don’t count ‘em.

Shelly Sindland, describing why she wasn’t able to accept Dodd’s invitation to examine his mortgage documents, in a post titled Dodd Comes Clean – or Does He?

My daughter starts projectile vomiting. I am covered in toddler barf and instead of calling back Senator Dodd’s office, I call Sadie’s Doctor.

After hounding him since June, Today is the day Senator Dodd decides to release his controversial, country-wide mortgage documents. He says he will re-finance his loans just to play it safe.

You might want to say that Sadie has a “sick” sense about these things. I can’t help but wonder if there is any symbolism here? Either way, this story will have to wait.

Fearless journalism is the cornerstone of our democracy. Obviously, we have nothing to worry about.

FiveThirtyEight via CT Blue shows the bottom end of Democrats supporting Obama’s stimulus package. Note that two Republicans are actually more supportive of the Obama administration on the stimulus than Lieberman.

Heidi from the 1000 Friends points out in the comments that the group is not a member of the “Better Choices” group that put on yesterday’s press conference at the Capitol – I had assumed they were since I received a copy of the press release from Heidi, but that is not the case.

Also, as promised, the “Prosperity for All” blueprint by Cibes, Lamont, et al has gotten fleshed out a bit in a number of PDFs now available on their site. More on this later.

The this interesting article about the new State GOP headquarters that just opened up: they discuss a little about what they’re planning to do with the space, and it’s always good to keep abreast of what the opposition is up to. Healy suggests an emphasis on training, and I’d love to compare notes with someone across the aisle about what our respective parties are up to on the training front.

A couple things jumped out to me, though:

“We got through the election,” Healy said. “Now we’re going back to the voters and telling them we understand their unhappiness with too much government spending and our not sticking to the principles of the party.”

That’s some pretty intense willful ignorance there: if the Republicans “understood” what voters were unhappy about, then the GOP wouldn’t have received such a shellacking this fall. Hint: they’re unhappy with the actual principles of your party. This seems to me like a not-too-coded suggestion that last year’s loss came from John McCain’s deviation from the GOP’s core values, when the shambles of our economy and our foreign policy served as a fierce reminder of their party’s principles.

Also, this gem was picked up in the original post:

“New Britain is really the heart of the state,” Healy said. “Not just geographically. It’s emblematic of the kind of hard-working, family-oriented, community-involved city where we want to be.”

John McNamara added:

Nonetheless New Britain seems an unlikely place for the state GOP to locate an office. There are 18,072 Democrats here compared to about 3,699 Republicans — part of the surge that favored Democrats everywhere in 2008. When unaffiliateds (11,749) are counted, Republicans account for little more than 11 percent of the electorate.

Yep, New Britain – deep in the heart of hard-working, family-oriented, community-involved, Democratic Connecticut.

Dick Blumenthal has decided not to run for Governor. This shouldn’t be a surprise, but I figured if any year was the year, this was it. I guess I haven’t been involved in CT politics for long enough.

While Blumenthal would have made a fine Governor, I have to say I’m glad he’s out of the running – he would have cleared the field (even against you, Mr. Amann), and I relish the potential for a great debate between the candidates in the next 19 months. It’s unfortunately rare for the incentives to line up for political people such that showing leadership aligns with their own career interests, but in a Gubernatorial primary, there’s really no caucus or party line to hide behind.

There hasn’t been a lot to love about the game of chicken that Rell and Connecticut Democrats have been playing on the budget, where nobody has wanted to be the first to propose raising taxes.

But it looks like Dems and progressive groups are gearing up for a big response to the proposal Rell’s been hinting at – first, a press release from 1000 Friends and friends, including CT Voices for Children and the CT Association for Human Services:

While Governor Rell has promised that her upcoming biennial budget will include deep cuts affecting every agency of the Connecticut government, Better Choices For Connecticut believes that reliance on spending cuts is both unwise and unnecessary. Slashing public services in the midst of this recession places the Connecticut economy in grave danger. With smarter choices, Connecticut has the capacity to protect our schools, our transit, our infrastructure, our social services, and our public safety agencies.

The coalition will release a white paper [Monday at 1:30pm] proposing a multi-part revenue package that would balance the budget without cutting our state’s vital services.

Better Choices for Connecticut is a community coalition working to help Connecticut make better choices on ways to improve the state’s imbalanced revenue system so that it advances opportunity for shared prosperity for all Connecticut residents; preserves services for children, families and the elderly; creates and sustains good jobs; and reinvests in the middle class and our communities.

From the wording of the proposal, it sounds like the coalition is taking a defensive posture, but in the service of painting the Governor as the radical – which, if she holds her no-taxes line, happens to be completely true.

Also promising is a request from Donovan and Williams to grab some airtime following Rell’s Monday evening address:

Gov. M. Jodi Rell will deliver a live, televised address to the state Monday night to warn citizens about impending cuts in the state budget. It’s the first time in the 4½ years she’s been governor that she will give such an address.

House Speaker Christopher Donovan and Senate President Pro Tem Donald Williams, both Democrats, asked for an opportunity to speak after the Republican governor, and their request was granted by channels 8 and 30.

It may be the first time Rell has given an address like this on this particular subject, but her political capital comes primarily from her ability to get on the evening news three or more times a week. Blumenthal learned this lesson a long time ago, and it’s promising to see Donovan and Williams taking advantage of the opportunity.

Finally, Ned Lamont gets into the budget discussion with former OPM (i.e. “Budget”) Director William Cibes in today’s Courant. It sounds like they may be a part of the same coalition with the 1000 Friends et al, but we’ll have to wait for their press conference or for their website to go live to learn more. Still, they’re the first to venture out with some specifics:

CUTS in projected appropriated spending for the budget year ending June 30, 2010, and the budget year ending June 30, 2011, of $700 million or more, each year.

REDUCTIONS in existing tax exemptions and tax credits such as those for filmmakers, corporations and mixed-use historic structures, totaling $700 million or more.

INCREASES in selected taxes and fees, including among others a sales/use tax on Internet sales, an increase in the gas tax and a tax on snacks and junk food, totaling $700 million or less.

The one thing I’m skeptical about is that the list of taxes that they’re proposing (”among others”) sound like they’ll mainly be squeezing the poor: at a time when wealth is more concentrated in the hands of a few than ever before, and the taxes paid by those few is less than ever before, I’d expect new taxes to be a little more income-aware.

[As an aside, if we're going to be tampering with the gas tax, perhaps we could consider a huge hike paired with a refundable gas tax credit, so that those using the average would see no change, and those using above average would subsidize those who limit their car usage or utilize public transit. The 25¢ a gallon + 7% tax brings in over $800 million a year, so modernizing that could play a meaningful part of that $700 million target.]

But really, there’s a lot of good news today for those eager to see a more organized progressive movement in the state. We’re even seeing some return on the promise shown by Lamont’s involvement with the Progressive States Network, which has been a long time coming. And it’s looking like Monday is going to be the opening of a pretty exciting political season here in Connecticut.