Important Public Hearings March 15th

There are two important public hearings taking place on Monday, March 15th that I wanted to share with you.

Finance, Revenue & Bonding Committee: 9 a.m.

These two controversial bills before the Finance Committee will result in tax increases for residents across the state:

• SB 171: An Act Establishing a State-Wide Tax on Real Property, which establishes a 1 mill state-wide property tax on commercial and residential property.
• SB 172: An Act Establishing a State-Wide Assessment to Encourage Affordable Housing in the State, which establishes a state-wide assessment on real property based on the percentage of affordable housing in your municipality. While I certainly support increasing options for affordable housing, penalizing residents of municipalities on this basis is not fair.

Click here if you’d like to testify virtually (via Zoom.) The deadline to register is Sunday, March 14, at 3 p.m. Speakers are limited to 3 minutes of testimony.

To testify via email, submit testimony in a Word or PDF document to FINtestimony@cga.ct.gov. Include your name and the bill number you are testifying on. All testimony submitted becomes public record.

Especially given our current situation, we should not be raising taxes on individuals and businesses as we are all struggling to pick up the pieces after a year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Planning & Development Committee: 10 a.m.

Local control over property zoning is an important issue that is coming into focus this session. There are proposals that will essentially create a “one size fits all” zoning mandate from Hartford, require changes to zoning density around transportation-oriented development, and require developers to set aside larger percentages of development as affordable. Other proposals would establish a zoning “bill of rights” to firmly solidify control with local officials, and a Constitutional Amendment that would mandate the state stay out of these local issues.

These proposals will be discussed at Monday’s public hearing. View the full list of proposals here.

Among the bills is SB 1024, An Act Concerning Zoning Authority, Certain Design Guidelines, Qualifications of Certain Land Use Officials and Certain Sewage Disposal Systems.

Click here if you’d like to testify virtually (via Zoom.) The deadline to register is Sunday, March 14, at 3 p.m. Speakers are limited to 3 minutes of testimony.

To testify via email, submit testimony in a Word or PDF document to PDtestimony@cga.ct.gov. Include your name and the bill number you are testifying on. All testimony submitted becomes public record.

Housing diversity in Connecticut should be addressed, however the needs of individual communities must be considered. There should not be state control over local zoning; these decisions should be left to the individual municipalities.

As always, feel free to contact me with your questions, ideas and concerns related to state government.