Politics & Government
Berthel insists Connecticut needs to become more affordable
Watertown Republican state senator faces Democrat Desmarais in 32nd District race
By Scott Benjamin
WATERTOWN - - U.S. Sen. John Boozman (R-AR) offered a sobering message to state Sen. Eric Berthel (R-32) when he saw him in the audience at a recent luncheon in Washington.
Boozman said the middle income in Connecticut only have $169 a month in disposable income.
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“We have the highest cost of living in the country,” exclaimed Berthel of Watertown, who faces Democrat Jeff Desmarais of Watertown in the November 8 election in the district, which extends from Seymour to Bethel. They opposed each other in the 2020 election with Berthel annexing more than 58 percent of the vote
Inflation is currently at its highest levels since Joe Montana was guiding the 49ers to their first Super Bowl.
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CT Mirror recently reported that the state’s General Fund has a $445 million surplus for the fiscal year that ends in June. There is another projected $1.85 billion in investment earnings and business tax return surpluses that will be placed in a special savings program that restricts officials’ ability to spend those funds.
In an interview with Patch.com, Berthel – a former vice chairman of the Watertown Board of Education and a former state representative – insisted the current surplus projections are misleading.
He noted that he voted against the revised $24.2 billion state budget this spring because “it expands spending and programs that utilize [federal] ARPA [American Rescue Plan Act] funds, funds that will dry up in the next 12 months, leaving us with unfunded expenses and what will likely be, by estimation of the Office of Fiscal Analysis, a budget deficit for 2024 of 3 - 4 billion dollars.”
However, even with the projected deficits, Berthel said that since inflation is raging, state officials should reduce taxes, particularly on the middle- and lower-class residents.
“We should be taking dollars today to help people,” said Berthel. “The deficits are coming either way. . . That money belongs to the people. Right now, people are being forced to change their lifestyles.”
He has endorsed the Republican plan to address inflation through such steps as reducing the sales tax from 6.35 to 5.99 percent, lowering the income tax for people earning $75,000 or less, eliminating the diesel tax and not implementing the highway tax which will impact, among other things, the delivery trucks from Amazon, United Parcel Service and Federal Express.
According to the September 2021 Truth In Accounting report., Connecticut ranks last among the 50 states in fiscal health. Its pensions are only 43 percent funded – an improvement from the March 2018 report from the state Commission on Fiscal Stability & Economic Competitiveness report - when they were 29 percent funded.
Through the years, some municipal and state officials have told Patch.com that a pension plan for public employees needs to be at least 80 percent funded to be in the “good” category.
Berthel remarked, “We’ve made strides.”
Patch.com has reported that CT Mirror budget reporter Keith Phaneuf told a Wilton League of Women Voters forum in April 2019 that the pensions for the state employees were structurally under-funded each year from 1939 through 2010.
According to the Office of Management & Budget, the governor’s budget arm, the amount of payment toward the pension debt was about $1.2 billion in fiscal year 2008 and grew to about $3.7 billion during the current fiscal year of 2023.
Berthel said that due in part to the volatility cap that was part of the 2017 bipartisan budget agreement and relief funding related to the pandemic, the state has boosted its payments the pensions for the state employees.
However, Berthel said “a lot of fraud takes place” in state spending, noting that Republican gubernatorial nominee Bob Stefanowski of Madison has said that, if elected, he would conduct an audit of each state agency.
The state senator said the General Assembly receives regular reports from the state auditors.
Berthel remarked, “The problem is that many times we never act.”
Desmarais stated that Berthel’s comments are inaccurate.
“Mr. Berthel’s claim of “a lot of fraud” is unsubstantiated and frankly, ridiculous. It is irresponsible for a sitting state senator to make such unsupported accusations as a blatantly attempt to manufacture voter outrage before an election,” he wrote in an e-mail statement to Patch.com.
“The expenditures by various state agencies are monitored and audited to reduce and eliminate waste and unnecessary expenditures,” Desmarais added. “Those systems are being followed as they are designed. Mr. Berthel knows this but is trying to mislead voters who aren’t as familiar with the administrative process.”.
The voters in the 32nd District have not elected a Democrat since Charles Lymon of Washington in 1891 – 21 years before Fenway Park opened.
Berthel, who has a wife and two sons, annexed better than 58 percent of vote in his two re-election campaigns. He succeeded Republican Rob Kane of Watertown after winning a February 2017 special election.
Following the recent reapportionment, the district - geographically one of the largest in Connecticut - has, for example, added parts of Brookfield and Bethel.
“We remain a very conservative district,” Berthel commented.
He said there are a number of older voters, noting, for example, that the Heritage Village section of Southbury is the largest retirement community in Connecticut.
However, Connecticut has been undergoing a political identity change. More suburban voters have been trending Democratic. In 2018, for example, Democrats got elected in the Greenwich-based 36th District for the first time in 88 years; in the Wilton-Westport-based 26th District for the first time in 48 years; and in the metro-Danbury based 24th District for the first time in 26 years.
State Rep. Stephen Harding (R-107) of Brookfield, who is the GOP nominee in the neighboring 30th state Senate District, said in a phone interview with Patch.com that, “You’re not seeing that change in political identity in the 32nd District like you have seen in lower Fairfield County.”
Berthel is currently the ranking Senate Republican on three committees in the General Assembly, and Harding said there is potential that, if re-elected, Berthel could ascend to be the second ranking senator in the Republican caucus.
He was recently selected to be the first member in the history of the GOP Senate caucus to be selected by the Council of State Governments as a Harry Toll Fellow. Reportedly, it is considered to be the most prestigious leadership opportunity for state legislators. There are only 48 members in the bipartisan program.
Republican former state Rep. Richard Antonetti of Watertown, who chairs the local Planning & Zoning Commission, praised Berthel in a phone interview with Patch.com for his efforts to renovate the Main Street business district.
Following two vehicular-related deaths through the area and a subsequent road safety audit, Berthel and other state officials have proposed that the Town Council approve demolishing the building at 686 Main Street, which currently includes the local Republican headquarters, and turn it into a 50-vehicle parking lot with kiosks.
Berthel said the area has suffered from a lack of parking, and much of what is available is on the side of the street without kiosks.
He said that along with state Rep. Joe Polletta (R-68) of Watertown he has created legislation to provide tax incentives for people from the arts who establish businesses along the corridor, which should boost the foot traffic to other retail outlets.
On another subject, Desmarais recently told Patch.com that he has “zero confidence” that the Republicans would uphold abortion rights in Connecticut if they controlled the governorship and both chambers of the General Assembly.
Berthel said that Republicans “do not want to change the abortion rights in Connecticut,” noting that the state has “codified” abortion rights.
He said that he voted against the safe harbor abortion legislation before the General Assembly this spring because it “expanded the scope” of who could perform the procedures, which is “very dangerous.”
Berthel added that it also provided “protections for people who don’t live in Connecticut,” including making them immune from “prosecution.”
He said Connecticut already has “codified” abortion rights.
On a separate issue, CT News Junkie education columnist Barth Keck recently wrote that he spent more than $90 on tolls during a round trip from Connecticut to Baltimore.
He questioned the decision by the General Assembly during Lamont’s first year in office to not even conduct a vote on the governor’s proposal for tolls.
Keck stated, “Connecticut somehow rejected a guaranteed cash cow that every other state along the Northeast corridor continues to milk. How do you spell “missed opportunity”?”
Berthel declared, “Connecticut does not need tolls.”
He said after former Gov. William O’Neill (D-East Hampton) removed the toll booths in the 1980s for safety reasons, the state made an agreement with former President Ronald Reagan’s administration to secure more federal funding for its roads.
“We get billions of dollars from the federal government,” Berthel exclaimed.
“You’re not driving through Connecticut for free,” he said. “That money is coming from your federal taxes.”
Berthel said for years some of the federal money earmarked for highway improvements has been “intercepted” and applied to other budget line items.
On another topic, Berthel, who is an associate director at Post University in Waterbury, said the state has benefitted from the establishment 11 years ago of the Board of Regents, which oversees a combined 17 public four-year and two-year colleges. The state university and community college systems had previously been under separate boards of trustees.
He said the regents have “made some good steps” in saving money through consolidation of administrators and technical resources.
“I don’t think that we need to close campuses,” said Berthel in reference to the decline in enrollments in recent years. “We need to adjust for the lack of enrollments.”
Former Board of Regents President Gregory Gray said shortly after his arrival in 2013 that he wanted to significantly increase the schools’ online offerings. Many staff members objected. Gray’s Transform 2020 reform plan led to votes of no confidence by faculty on some campuses. He left his job in 2015.
Berthel – who has a bachelor’s degree from Manhattanville College and a master’s degree from the University of Bridgeport - said that the Board of Regents’ online profile “hasn’t grown much” while other campuses have expanded offerings.
He said that at Post, “By far, the largest percentage of our students study that way,” including students in Asia and at military bases.
“It is the future,” Berthel exclaimed.
On another subject, Gary Rose, the chairman of the Government Department at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, has praised Republican former President Donald Trump for his policies. But he has said the former president hurt the Republicans in the 2018 and 2020 elections in Connecticut, noting that more suburban women are voting Democratic.
Remarked Berthel, “There were times when things that President Trump did and said even alienated Republicans. But the policies they had in place were good for our nation.”
He said that he agreed with Wall Street Journal columnist Jason Riley, who wrote earlier this year that, “The reality is that when Mr. Trump wasn’t embarrassing himself, he was advancing a more or less traditional Republican agenda of lower taxes and lighter regulations. The upshot was an acceleration in economic activity, higher labor-force participation rates and narrowing racial inequality.”
Berthel said, “In terms of America, we saw tremendous growth. We saw great strides in the security of our country. We saw manufacturing come back. We saw job creation. We saw financial markets that were brighter than they had been in lots and lots of years.”
Which political figures does he most admire?
Berthel said Republican former presidents Ronald Reagan, Abraham Lincoln and Dwight Eisenhower.
He recalled that when Reagan was elected in 1980 the United States was engaged in a Cold War threat from the Soviet Union that had existed since Democrat Harry Truman was president in the 1940s.
Former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher praised Reagan for winning the Cold War without firing a shot.
Remarked Berthel, “Reagan was a remarkable statesman. He had class and authority.”
Resources:
Interview with Eric Berthel, Patch.com, September 18, 2022
https://ctnewsjunkie.com/2022/...
https://ctsenaterepublicans.com/2022/07/sen-berthel-selected-to-distinguished-c
https://patch.com/connecticut/...
0ouncil-of-state-governments-2022-henry-toll-fellowship-pr
Phone interview with Richard Antonetti, Patch.com, September 15, 2022
Phone in https://patch.com/connecticut/brookfield/panel-insists-stefanowski-lost-election-because-two-enemies
https://patch.com/connecticut/...
Phone Interview with Stephen Harding, Patch.com, September 16, 2022.
E-mail statement from Jeff Desmarais, Patch.com, September 27, 2022.
