Politics & Government
Too few traffic lights; too much high-density housing
Republican state Senate Leader Stephen Harding is concerned about New Milford Route 7 safety and apartments in Brookfield Town Center
By Scott Benjamin
BROOKFIELD – In September 2002 state officials stood along Route 7 in New Milford, not far from the Veterans Bridge, and tossed a ceremonial shovel of dirt to mark the start of construction of what would be a widened roadway
The goal was to create a more efficient traffic network that would make the commute from New Milford to Brookfield less time-consuming.
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The next component in the revised road network came in May 2007 when then-Gov. M. Jodi Rell (R-Brookfield) was featured as construction started for the 2.1-mile Route 7 bypass near Federal Road in Brookfield.
That project would reduce the flow of 30,000 vehicle trips per day through the Four Corners intersection of Federal Road that produced traffic delays during the rush-hour commuting and made a left-hand turn a challenge. Much of that traffic would be diverted to the bypass.
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It would make it possible to turn the 198-acre Brookfield Town Center into a pedestrian-friendly New England-style central business district.
It appears that both projects are experiencing growing pains.
State Senate Republican Leader Stephen Harding (R-30) of Brookfield said that while canvassing the Willow Springs housing in New Milford in his bid for a second term, residents told him that when they attempt to enter or exit Route 7 “you are taking your life into you own hands.”
He said that along with the urging of New Milford Mayor Pete Bass and state Rep. Bill Buckbee (R-67) of New Milford the state Department of Transportation conducted a traffic audit earlier this year along three miles of Route 7.
In March, Kaitlin Lyle reported in The News-Times of Danbury that Chuck Ballard, the road design engineer for the New Milford Public Works Department, said there had been 15 road fatalities along the widened stretch of Route 7 between 2013 and 2023.
In an interview with Patch.com, Harding said, “My hope is that they come back with recommendations of more traffic lights. That is one of the things that a lot of the residents think is necessary to slow down the traffic there. Trying to make a left-hand turn out of Willow Springs is almost impossible.”
In Brookfield, construction at Brookfield Village, a major component in Brookfield Town Center began in 2016 – about a year and a half after Harding was initially elected to the General Assembly as the state representative from the 107th state House District.
At this juncture, new multi-family housing is about to open north of the Four Corners and on the southern side, Emporium Plaza, which will feature a supermarket, smaller retail outlets and apartments above them, will start operations within months.
Harding declared, “It is too much high-density development too quick. Frankly, it doesn’t seem like safety has been put into the thought process. If you look at one of the buildings just north of the Four Corners, there is almost no gap between the building and the road. It is a state highway. It doesn’t seem like there was a lot of planning. That’s what you get when you have high-density housing development in such a small area.”
“Four Corners used to be a quaint part of town,” Harding added. “I think the original vision was an area with commercial space with some apartments above it. It has expanded though [beyond that] through the northern section [of Brookfield Town Center]. It is too dense.”
Brookfield Democratic First Selectman Steve Dunn agreed, saying that he has spoken with municipal Zoning Commission Chairman Curtis Timmerman about placing a “moratorium on new multi-family buildings until the new Plan of Conservation and Development is completed.”
The Planning and Zoning commissions will merge into one unit in December 2025.
“We only get one shot at this,” Dunn explained. “Every time you put up a building, it is going to be there for 50 or 60 years minimum. We have to get it right the first time.[Currently] it is too dense. It is too much, too quickly, and we need to take a step back. A lot of what we have in the town center is great. Some of it is not as great."
Harding faces Democrat Justin Potter of Kent, a businessman and the president of Kent Affordable Housing, in the November 5 election in the 30th District, which encompasses 18 towns – stretching from Brookfield to North Canaan. Geographically it is the largest of the 36 state Senate districts. No Democrat has prevailed since 1978. Harding took 53.8 percent of the vote in 2022 to garner his first term.
Harding said taxes and electricity costs are the prime concerns among voters.
He said that with $4.1 billion in budget reserves he wants to explore adding an expanded child care tax credit and reducing the 6.35 percent sales tax. He said the state needs to consider further reducing income tax rates, which dropped from five percent down to 4.5 percent for the middle income and from three percent to two percent of the lower income following approval in 2023.
Harding said the state should look at ways to lower the municipal property tax burden.
“I think we have overtaxed the people of the state of Connecticut,” Harding exclaimed.
Potter said, “We always should be looking at reducing taxes." He said, if possible, his priorities would be to reduce the sales tax and the gas tax.
However, Potter acknowledged that the next state budget will be “challenging” with “a lot of competing interests” as it is developed.
CT Mirror Budget Reporter Keith Phaneuf and Capitol Bureau Chief Mark Pazniokas have stated that there will be a $700 million gap to address in the next state budget as federal pandemic funds were used as a stop-gap in the current spending package.
Will that make it more difficult to slash taxes?
“Yes.” Harding said.” However, it doesn't mean we can't continue to find ways to reduce taxes in next year's budget.”
He added that he had opposed using one-time federal funds for operating expenses.
However, why cut taxes when as of last June, according to the state comptroller's office, the pensions for the state employees were only 52 percent funded? It is one of the lowest rates in the country.
The March 2018 report from the state Commission on Fiscal Stability & Economic Competitiveness stated that at that point the pension were only 29 percent funded. Thus, there has been improvement.
However, Dunn has said that the actuaries want public pension systems to be at least 80 percent funded.
In 1999 shortly after the federal government had its first budget surplus in 29 years, Democratic former President Bill Clinton vetoed a $792 billion Republican tax cut proposal and said that instead, the federal government should take steps to ensure the long-term solvency of Social Security and Medicare – which are largely retirement programs.
The federal government did not move in that direction, although Clinton submitted four consecutive budget surpluses. Harding lamented that the last time a president sent forward a balanced budget was on October 1, 2000, when he was in middle school.
Why shouldn’t the state of Connecticut be placing more attention on getting to the 80 percent threshold for its retirement programs for the state workers, and then, after doing that, consider cutting taxes further?
Said Harding, “When that was done by Clinton in 1999 it wasn’t the equivalent of us having $4.1 billion in reserves in the state of Connecticut. Looking at where we are: We’re one of the highest tax states in the entire country. We’re still very unaffordable to live in. We’re sitting on $4.1 billion in reserves. Now is the time to offer further tax relief. I think it can make our state much more competitive. We can bring more revenue into the state if we offer further tax reductions. We have a long way to go before we can be considered more affordable in the state of Connecticut.”
“I think comparing the federal government to the state government is comparing apples and oranges,” Harding added. “The state government has always balanced its budget. We’re required by the state Constitution to do it.”
However, some governors have balanced the budget by borrowing money and selling off state assets.
“That’s wrong,” Harding said “We haven’t done that in recent years, which is a positive thing.”
“Our credit rating is stable. It is good,” he remarked. “[We are] paying down the pension debt more than what the actuaries have recommended on an annual basis in recent years. I think we’re moving in the right direction.”
Regarding surging electricity costs, Harding said that the state should limit all future power purchase agreements by the state to rates that are no more than 150 percent over the wholesale electric market price.
He said currently it has been as much as, “four or five times the market rate.”
Doug Hardy of CT News Junkie has reported that the Republicans have called for a special session to address electricity rate increases.
Harding commented, “We have the second most expensive electric rates in the country.”
Harding was a delegate in July at the Republican National Convention, which nominated the national ticket of former President Donald Trump and U.S. Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio).
Wall Street Journal columnist William Galston has stated that Trump has remade the Republican Party into a more working-class populist coalition and joins Lyndon Johnson and Ronald Reagan as one of the three transformative presidents since Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal of the 1930s.
In response, Harding said that the national party ratified, “The most moderate Republican platform of all time. We need to be a big tent.”
Matt Grimes, a candidate last year for the Republican nomination for first selectman in Brookfield and a former Brookfield Board of Education chairman, told Patch.com earlier this year that. “The Republicans face a lot of headwinds in Connecticut this year.”
Harding said that he disagrees, predicting that the GOP will adds seats in the state Senate and state House. The GOP has fewer seats in both chambers now then when it entered the 2018 election.
He said the Democrats in state government have advocated ill-advised policies – such as trying to alter the fiscal guard rails; increasing energy costs; trying to establish state zoning regulations; and providing insufficient support for state and municipal police.
Harding ascended to the Republican leadership position on February 16 after state Sen. Kevin Kelly (R-21) of Stratford, who had been elected the caucus leader in November 2020, stepped down and the 12-member caucus voted for Harding to succeed him. The change has been described by numerous sources as being unusual since it occurred during a session.
When asked if he could provide additional insight into the reasons for the change, Harding said that he and the other Republican senators have “great respect” for Kelly. “All of us are still on good terms” and Kelly “continues to be helpful” in the caucus deliberations.
Harding added that the caucus has become “stronger in the end.”
Now that he is a legislative leader, standing front and center at news conferences in the Legislative Office Building and sharing anecdotes with convention delegates from throughout the country, has Harding experienced an increase in autograph requests when he is walking through bowling alleys?
No,” he said with a laugh. “In fact, I wasn’t getting them anyways.”
Resources:
Interview with Stephen Harding, Patch.com, on Sunday, August 4, 2024.
E-mail interview with Stephen Harding, Patch.com, on Wednesday, August 7, 2024.
Interview with Steve Dunn, Patch.com, on Thursday, August 8, 2024.
Phone interview with Justin Potter, Patch.com, on Friday, August 9, 2024.
https://ctnewsjunkie.com/2024/08/09/republicans-call-for-special-session-on-energy-policy/
E-mail message from Madi Csejka, CT State Comptroller’s Office, on Thursday, August 8, 2024.
https://patch.com/connecticut/brookfield/connecticut-s-wealthy-can-afford-pay-more-taxes
https://patch.com/connecticut/brookfield/potter-carries-democratic-banner-30th-state-senate-district
