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CTPP928B_2024-09-28-16-57-03

I'm Mark Sudal. Welcome back to Power and Politics. Christy PTI, President and CEO of the Connecticut Business and Industry Association joins us now and welcome, great to be with you again. Well, now you just released a long term road map for economic growth and opportunity in our state. What was involved in putting this big project together? And how long did it take? Uh It took about a year. We created the CB A Foundation for Economic Growth and Opportunity. Uh Last August 2023 and uh the first uh part of the foundation process was to hire consultants and economic consultant to do an analysis of economic competitiveness compared to all states in the country, but certainly focusing on the northeast. The consultant also looked at about 25 studies that have been done in Connecticut since 2018. So we've got a whole lot of research in Connecticut around how to make the state more competitive. And then in the winter time, we held about 30 forums across the state of Connecticut, bringing in a variety of stakeholders, residents, teachers, students, nonprofits for profits, policymakers, uh really bringing in a big tent of individuals to understand what's going well in the state where are some challenges and this overall effort, which is the sole mission and focus of the foundation to have a long term economic road map for Connecticut uh in order to grow the state to create more opportunities for our current residents and our future residents. So, Chris, what were some of the factors you looked at uh in this 48 page report? Yeah, we really have to have four areas relative to what is economic competitiveness, workforce and education, uh infrastructure and transportation, uh innovation and business, climate, regulatory and taxes. What was interesting is Connecticut rates very high, very strong on innovation. Uh Maybe, you know, not so surprising to those who are maybe in the manufacturing construction areas where they're often innovating in order to uh fill some of the workforce challenges that they have in order to meet demand, despite the fact that they can't fill all the job openings they have. So we're we rank very highly connected as a, as a state of innovation. Um When we looked at some of the other areas, that's really what makes up the crust of the 48 page report. There's three buckets or three pillars with a variety of solutions underneath each. The first is business climate, which is that regulatory tax piece, the second pillar of workforce and education. And the third pillar is the bucket that we call quality of life and in there. We have things around childcare, housing, infrastructure, and energy and what was interesting we heard at every form and we heard a lot of the surveys that we did that connect. It has excellent quality of life. And so we intentionally name that bucket because we continue to ask ourselves well, if we have such a great quality of life, which we do, there's pieces of it that are missing. You should have more access to affordable and quality child care, more access to affordable housing, easier transportation system, lower energy costs. And so that's why we name that third bucket quality of life. Now, what are some of the key recommendations of your plan? Yeah, what was interesting uh from our consultant perspective is that every other state that they've worked with, they've worked with about 30 other states to develop similar uh type of road maps or long term economic competiveness plan and every other state they've worked with over the last decade. Workforce and education has been the number one challenger issue in Connecticut. That wasn't the case. Interestingly enough in Connecticut, it was business climate and specifically with regulatory and it wasn't just regulatory relative to the business community. It was regulatory relative to our teachers. The way we measure our teachers in our schools is really sat and college prep or what we call a college or bus scorecard versus a college and career scorecard. The way we measure uh the nonprofits or the way we work with our nonprofits, we over regulate our nonprofit, we even heard from state agencies in our, in our towns and cities, how they're overregulated. So the the bucket of solutions in the business climate, one really start with making Connecticut more streamlined from a regulatory environment, looking at all of our regulations and we're an old state and we pile regulation top of regulation. So recommendations like using artificial intelligence uh to look at our statutes and streamline our regulatory language, the state of Ohio has done that recently and we cite them as the best, best practice reorganizing the executive branch. Uh Right now, the governor has many, many commissioners that report to him or her reorganizing it so that we have three secretaries in Connecticut reporting to the governor to ensure that the gubernatorial vision permeates through all the agencies. So having a Secretary of Commerce overseeing all economic development and having the agencies that impact economic development, reporting to that single secretary, having a secretary for it and admin a secretary for human Services. So really streamlining how the executive branch looks is some of the big recommendations in the business climate. All right, Chris, great information. Thanks so much for being with us. Always good to be with you. Mark. Yeah. Well, speaking of our state's economy, they're hiring at the future Wegmans in Norwalk. It will also be the first Wegmans in Connecticut. Being a part of this is really exciting. Makisha Casey from Norwalk has come to Wegman's hiring event looking for a job in customer service. I'm very good. We're talking about customers experiencing the needs and stuff Wegmans hopes she'll be one of the hundreds of applicants coming to interview Tuesday and ultimately filling 500 positions for the new store, full time customer service positions all throughout the store and then select part time positions. We'll give you a computer to apply and we'll interview you same day and it kind of makes the process a little bit quicker. The suite where the interviews are taking place was packed with applicants available positions include entry level management and food service roles in culinary and perishable departments. Something unique to Wegmans is we look for a values match. We want somebody that fits into our culture. We can teach you how to do everything else. I really hope I get the point and we wish her luck. Well, Wegman's is ranked one of the country's best places to work. The Norwalk store opens next summer. Still ahead. A cartoonist on the dangers of getting political in these deeply divided times.

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CTPP928C_2024-09-28-16-59-09

Well, this year all eyes are certainly on the election. But have you ever wondered what goes into drawing a political cartoon? Well, some Fairfield University students got to find out this week news 12 Connecticut's John Craven shows us at Fairfield University. This is an art class here. A cartoonist is using wooden rails. The topic is political cartoons and this is a funny drawing and you can't see the caption. The teacher is Sean Kelly, a Southport artist whose work has been featured in the Washington Post and the New York Times. He even illustrated comedian Stephen Colbert's book, Midnight Confessions. I like solving the problem. Kelly says the key to breaking down a complicated political point is focusing on a single visual element like Nixon's nose or Biden's ray bands. It's very almost metaphorical that if you can reduce something to a situation or a dynamic that would be familiar to people in their lives. But in deeply divided times, sometimes bad things happen to funny people. Political commentary is getting dangerous. We're in such polarized times. How do you thread that needle even more? So today, I think it's essential to be fair and uh to create images that are not extreme or not uh sensationalized in the age of social media. Kelly says memes are the new political cartoons which can lead to misinformation. But in the end, it's just a cartoon and it's important to realize that a drawing is not a weapon, but it can make people think crafting a new way to think about troubled times in Fairfield, John Craven News 12 Connecticut and to see more of Sean Kelly's work, just head to the News 12 app or News twelve.com and click on this story. Well, that's all our time. I'm Mark Sudha. Thanks for watching.

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