Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

CTMirror asks in a recent story “Is it time to overhaul Connecticut’s tax system?” The progressive wing of the Democratic Party, now in the ascendency in Connecticut, has been trying to “reform” the tax system ever since it was last reformed in 1991 by then Governor Lowell Weicker, the father of Connecticut’s income tax. In the course of its story, CTMirror quotes William Cibes, identified as “state budget director under Weicker and also co-chairman of the finance committee in 1989-90,” on property taxes. Mr. Cibes recently testified before the General Assembly’s Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee, which in the next few weeks will endorse a measure “that could launch a top-to-bottom analysis of how Connecticut taps taxpayers’ wallets.” Mr. Cibes testified that “high property taxes are a major reason why Connecticut’s tax system is broken. So property tax relief would lessen the economic burden on businesses, municipalities and individuals… Property taxes are relatively s...

The guys and gals who work at the Office of Fiscal Analysis (OFA) are the “go to” people for legislators who do not carry an Encyclopedia Britannica around in their heads. Throw some number on the floor before them and they can tell you if the numbers are accurate or fictional. Even on a bad day, they can tell you how many angels fit on the head of a pin. And in our statistical age, when every “non-partisan” agency is connected at the hip to fiercely partisan politicians, the OFA is genuinely non-partisan -- in the way that math or water is non-partisan. Having examined the estimated savings in the Governor Dannel Malloy-SEBAC budget, the OFA has found that 60% of the savings claims made therein are UNVERIFIABLE. The bad news was brought to the attention of the general public by Keith Phaneuf of CTMirror : “Nonpartisan legislative analysts say they can vouch for less than 40 percent of the $1.6 billion in labor savings figured into the next biennial budget, and are unable to asse...

Over at “Raising Hale,” investigative reporter for the Yankee Institute Zach Janowski lifted up another rock and found underneath it more state debt. "Connecticut’s unpaid obligation to provide healthcare benefits for retirees could reach $40 billion by 2017 if elected officials fail to act, according to a December estimate." Bottom line: “Milliman (a firm that produces estimates for the Comptroller’s office) estimated the state will owe nearly $45 billion of healthcare benefits to retirees in 2017.”