By Bill Slocum
Contributing Editor
The state legislature approved a $20 billion budget last week in a party-line vote that a key Greenwich participant in the discussions calls “the same old game.”
State Sen. L. Scott Frantz, deputy leader of the Republican minority whose district includes Stamford and New Canaan as well as his Greenwich hometown, credits Gov. Dannel Malloy and legislative Democrats for sitting down with Republicans at a special budget session earlier this month. Frantz went on to fault them for not taking up key structural issues Frantz believes will come back to haunt the state.
“The whole idea of a special session was to come up with long-term structural fixes for the state of Connecticut, which continues to remain in a perpetual state of fiscal crisis,” says Frantz, who is also ranking member on the Senate Finance Committee. “We are always going to be in a cash-flow crunch, certainly for the foreseeable future.”
The budget bill, which passed 20-15 in the state Senate and 75-65 in the state House with no Republican votes in favor, reduces corporate taxes over two years and eliminates $350 million in state spending. Malloy and other state leaders say the budget reflects a business-friendly, cost-conscious mindset in Hartford.
Frantz argues the final budget package “doesn’t do much at all.”
“All they’ve done was maybe reduce the level of the spending increase,” he says. “They put $63 million in hospital taxes in the normal session, on top of the $550 million hospitals already pay annually. That will really hurt. So in the special session, they cut that $63 million down to $30 million. Do you call that a tax cut, or a mitigation of a horrendous tax in the first place? I would call that the latter.”
Democratic House Speaker Brendan Sharkey blasted Republicans after the budget vote. Taking to Facebook the morning after last week’s vote, Sharkey posted the following: “Unfortunately, the Republicans … took a page out of their D.C. colleagues’ playbook by demanding a shutdown of government instead of reasonable compromise, and walking out of the room when they couldn’t get 100 percent of what they wanted… Remember this the next time the Republicans claim they want to be part of the solution.”
Frantz characterized Sharkey’s reaction as “politically immature,” adding that the overall tone of discussion was less combative on both sides.
“They really didn’t want to do anything,” Frantz concludes about the Democrats at the budget talks. “So there was no point in continuing the negotiations.”
Asked what he wants to happen, Frantz says he would like in part to take up what he calls the “core costs” of state government, in particular the pensions and benefits of state employees.
“State employees have unbelievable benefits,” Frantz says. “I’d like to see their co-pays for doctor’s visits and prescription medicines go up, where instead of paying $5, they pay $15, $20, like the rest of us.”
If the state doesn’t change course, Frantz warns the future could be dire. He took to the floor of the Senate last week to cite two specific examples of wealthy couples he declined to name who were moving out of the state because of current tax policy. If the state continues along its present course, he says, more will follow them.
“When the tax rates go up again and again, and we’ve seen them go up nearly 40 percent here in the last five years, it’s a real slap in the face to anybody, even if they can afford it,” Frantz says. “At some point, they say: ‘Enough is enough.’”
