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Choosing the Road Less Traveled is Fine with Joe Kelly

By Paul Silverfarb

In running for the Connecticut 150th House District seat, Joe Kelly might not have the political experience as some of the seasoned veterans have up in Hartford. That’s fine with him.

Kelly might prefer to listen to ideas first before coming up with his own ideas to solve the problems facing the Constitution State in 15 minutes or less. And when asked what he’s running for when going door-to-door to chat with people in his district, he says a “nice guy” before then saying he’s running for state rep.
Kelly isn’t the typical politician. But then again, he rarely chooses the typical route.

When trying to describe the team-approach that he would bring to the State Capitol if elected, Kelly spoke fondly about the times he spent coaching the Greenwich High School rugby team, a team that won eight state championships and has appeared in the High School National Rugby Championships throughout his tenure as head coach.
“Every kid on the team wasn’t a top-quality athlete,” Kelly said. “There are kids that have never played a sport before in their lives, but they participated and contributed. The contribution they gave and the satisfaction that the better athletes had in seeing these kids that were once struggling do much better was amazing. Winning became a byproduct of bringing all that together. I want to apply that same strategy to Hartford.”

Although Kelly is a relative newcomer to politics in Connecticut, he’s no stranger to calling the Nutmeg State home and being heavily involved in the community. He’s the CEO of a uranium markets a commodities brokerage firm located in town. Kelly serves on the
Greenwich Board of Education and is the president of Forestland Development a real estate development company.

If that’s not enough, Kelly worked on Wall Street for 25 years, has been a firefighter with the Amogerone Volunteer Fire Company for nearly two decades, used to coach soccer, basketball, football and rugby as well as referee the sports, and played rugby all over the world.

According to Kelly, the key to having success up in Hartford is to spend much more time than people are spending now talking about what they agree on. He said that lately, people jump right into the part of the topic that they disagree on and that is why a lot of ideas stall before getting off the ground.

“People today are not spending enough time actually getting to know each other and talking about the things they agree on,” Kelly said. “Back on Sept. 11, and the couple of days I spent down in the search and rescue down at Ground Zero, there was no disagreement. Everybody agreed because we had one thing in common. We are Americans, we got attacked, and are now all drawn together because we have one common goal. Whatever the strategy was going forward, we would do it as a unified group.”

Kelly believes that he brings the ability to work with others and to find a common ground.

“This whole divisive atmosphere which is going on right now within the world of politics is so opposite of what I am about,” Kelly said. “I am about bringing people together, about motivating people, about people feeling good about themselves, and about encouraging to buy in to things so it’s a group decision or group process. I want a lot of people to contribute to a solution and not about who is right and who is wrong. If everybody feels like they are contributing, then they are more likely to work together.”

Joe Kelly with his family

Bringing people together means a lot to Kelly, as was ditching negativity that lately looms over campaigns battling each other.

In fact, Kelly’s first phone call after winning his party’s nomination was to his democratic challenger for the 150th district, Steve Meskers. He didn’t contact Meskers to say he was ready to attack. It was the exact opposite.

“I said that any negativity arises within the campaign that he hears to please call me immediately and I will address it because my campaign will not have any negativity. I let him know that we are not going at him,” said Kelly. “I want people to vote for me, not vote against him.”

The republican nominee said that he doesn’t care what prospects are in front of him, where if he conformed a little bit to that divisiveness that he could advance his political career.

“I say ‘No thank you,’” said Kelly. “This political stuff might spit me out in two years if I get elected because I am not conforming. I am going to continue to hold my ground on being someone that is going to unite instead of divide. I want to get to know people and make friendships with people.”

With the way politics are being portrayed as being so divisive and throw into the mix people throughout the country dealing with COVID-19 fatigue, politicians at the local level have had to navigate some uncharted waters when trying to gain votes. Kelly is no exception and admitted that he gets a knot in his stomach every time he knocks on someone’s door or speaks at an event.

“I want to just go out there, knock on doors and start to chat with somebody about what I would like to see fixed in Hartford and what I believe in,” Kelly said. “Usually in the first few minutes, people ask what I am. And my response is that I am a nice guy. I don’t identify the party because I want to have a genuine conversation, keep talking to people and create some bonding and a relationship first.

“In all the years of coaching, I have never asked a family if they are republicans or democrats when I coach their kids,” Kelly added. “When I was a fireman at the front door of a house and the house was burning, I wouldn’t stop at the front door and ask what party they are affiliated with. Now I am knocking on doors. Greenwich is a very polite community, so it’s a small minority, but there are some that say no thanks and shut the door. They won’t even have a conversation and that bothers me a lot.”

If Kelly gets elected to the 150th House District seat, his plan might be a little different than some of his colleagues. And that’s fine with him. Kelly said that when people get elected and step foot into Hartford, they have a whole bunch of new ideas that are going to change the world and turn the state upside down.

“There are people in that group of 151 other people that have served for many years now,” Kelly said. “Instead of going in there and telling those people what they should be doing, I think the key is going in there, listening to what has already been done, and then finding out as quickly as possible what didn’t work before, what other people’s plans are, and what they are trying to do. It’s then when to try and enhance what they are doing and see if it fits into what you believe is the case. I am going to respect that a lot of stuff has already been thought through by a lot of really smart people. If elected, I am not going in and forcing my opinion on anybody.

If elected, Kelly, who has had businesses in the Nutmeg State for over two decades, wants to get right to work, and that means trying to create the opportunity to identify businesses that exist right now and see what help they need to stay here and continue to function in the state.

“No one in the state has come up and asked me what they can do to help me make my businesses continue to stay here,” said Kelly. “I think that crucially important. We should create a group to reach out to all the businesses in the state, represented by the state, as being an ambassador of the legislature to say what can we do to help. If we could get some sort of business committee to recruit other companies to our State, that would be great. We can then address the regulatory changes that might need to be in place to bring businesses in and make necessary tax adjustments.

“There is so much negativity being mentioned about our great state,” added Kelly. “If we could as a legislature create a positive environment and pitch that, that would be a huge help to get businesses into this state and keep the ones that are already here.”

Joe Kelly

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