Lt. Governor Discusses Important Topics In Goshen News Interview

Susan Bysiewicz, Lt. Governor, recently sat down with Goshen News Publisher Leya Edison to explain her role as the state’s No. 2 officer and her thoughts on issues of the day.

“I think it's important that people know what I do,” Bysiewicz said. “…I am the governor when the governor goes out of state or out of the country, and I step in for him on a variety of occasions depending on what's needed. But also, I preside over the State Senate.”

“I would contrast our Legislature and our legislative partners on both sides of the aisle in a much different way than I would characterize Congress and the President,” she said. “Because 95% of the legislation … here is bipartisan. They work together to find common ground.”

She continued, “Will there be some initiatives that are completely partisan? Yes. But most of what we do here in the Legislature is extremely bipartisan.

Bysiewicz said some of Trump’s executive orders and legislation forced states like Connecticut to become more creative in caring for its residents.

“I will also say that our President has put us in a situation where we've had to step up to take care of the people of Connecticut… (for)example,” she said. “… at the end of October when we still did not have a federal budget, we were concerned because the President didn't want to fund the SNAP Nutrition Assistance Program. So, we stepped up and we made sure that, over the weekend, SNAP cards were loaded with money for food so that 430,000 people didn't go hungry.”

Bysiewicz said the passage of Trump’s One Beautiful Bill Act raised concerns of higher insurance costs.

“When the Big Beautiful budget went into effect, we were very concerned about literally the doubling of insurance costs because the federal insurance subsidies were going away, so the Governor stepped up and put $150 million toward putting those subsidies back so that … our most vulnerable two-thirds of the people on our ACA program would be protected from raising insurance rates. Literally could be a couple thousand dollars for a family and that was just, wow.”

Bysiewicz said Connecticut is fortunate to have a healthy rainy-day fund.

“We have a very healthy rainy-day fund of $4 billion.”  …Having that $4 billion has also helped us because the Legislature has set aside $500 million to use for healthcare or nutrition or food, critical items, if necessary, because of federal cuts.”

She continued, “And we're also very lucky because, by paying down the $10 billion of debt, we've had an extra $800 million to put into job training, extra education funding, childcare, and other things, the things that lift people up. So, I think that's important to point out. So yes, our surplus has been thinner than usual.”

Bysiewicz believes the rainy-day fund is thinner, in part, due to the volatility of the stock market.

“Our budget is very sensitive to the stock market because people pay income tax on stock market gains, and the market was doing very well during our first seven years,” she said. “And now there are things like the war in Iran, tariffs that are slowing down the economy. And so those are things that we can't plan for. But the rainy-day fund is there when we need it. And that's also why we have fiscal guardrails so that we can be in a strong financial place.”

Bysiewicz said when she and Gov. Ned Lamont took office in 2019 the state had a $2 billion budget deficit. “So, to be able to balance seven budgets, and we're working on the eighth, we really have been able to get the state on some financial footing.”

Bysiewicz addressed the growing voter dissatisfaction of both parties in the state.

“As someone who's been the Secretary of the State, in some states, unaffiliated voters can vote in primaries, like in New Hampshire. And so, there is an incentive,” she said. “And some states let anybody vote in a primary, which is kind of crazy. In our state, by party rules, both parties have decided that they will only allow registered Republicans and Democrats to vote in the primaries.”

“She added, “Now I will say to unaffiliated voters, if you see a primary happening, and for right now, it appears on the Republican side, there's going to be a Republican primary for governor. On the Democratic side, we may have one. (As of this writing, there will be a primary for the Dems for governor). So, I would just say there's more opportunity to participate if you join a party. Or if you are an avowed unaffiliated, switch so you could vote in a primary, then you'll have to wait in the waiting period, and then you can go back to being unaffiliated. There's a waiting period if you want to switch parties.”

Bysiewicz said in presidential elections, about 80% of the people vote, in state elections, about 60%, in local elections, about 40%.

“So, one way to get a more moderate electorate is to get 100% of the people to show up actually because then you'd have everybody weighing in,” she said. “And I do believe we just passed a task force to look at some of the systems like in Mexico where they have 90% voter turnout. And there are some other countries that, instead of having elections every other year for municipalities, every two years for some, every four years for some, every six years for some, that's what we do, they have elections every four years for everything.”

She added, “And that's why the 90% show up because they make it a holiday every four years.  ..We'll have a study group on how can we get to that 100%? Because I can guarantee you we'd have a more moderate electorate if everybody participated. And I think we'd make better decisions if everybody participated.”

Bysiewicz said it’s important to stay involved at the local level.

 “And what I love about local government is it's right there. If you want to volunteer your time on a parks and rec commission, on a building committee, on a park committee, usually you just have to walk into the first selectman's office in a small town like yours and say, "Hey, I volunteer." And he or she would say, "Oh my goodness, thank you so much. What would you like to help with?" And the party doesn't even matter,” she said. “And if you see a problem at your local level, and you want to do something about it, I would say go pick a party. It doesn't matter which one, Republican, Democrat, start helping out. Attend a meeting. Probably five minutes later, they will be asking you to run for something, and you will be in a position to do something about what you have a complaint about.”

Bysiewicz said there are options for residents who have concerns on how their local government operates.

“Well, I'm thinking a couple of things,” she said. “Number one, there's our Freedom of Information Commission. Because usually you can't get information about financial malfeasance or whatever unless you have documents to prove it. So, that's a key thing. And the State Ethics Commission provides guidance in a lot of towns.”

 Bysiewicz said more municipalities are creating their own ethics commissions.

“A lot of municipalities are starting to have them,” she said. “And I would say if you think you see malfeasance in local government, you could always go to your local prosecutor's offices. The state's attorneys have offices. And in fact, the federal system, the FBI and the United States Attorney in Connecticut, have prosecuted corruption in West Haven government, for example, with Michael DiMassa stealing a million dollars and gambling. So, the federal prosecutors in the US Attorney's office did that.”

Bysiewicz said she wants to make the state more affordable.

“We'd like to expand the Time to Own Program to give priority to nurses, teachers, firefighters, and police officers because we're trying to recruit new people to those professions,” she said. “And that would give them an incentive to go into those professions. We have a proposal in our state Legislature to cut licensing fees for people in the building trades, for nurses and teachers. So, I think that would also be an incentive for folks to go into high need occupations.”

She also wants to see energy costs lowered.

“We'd like to try to bring down the cost of energy,” she said. “And one way that I think we're doing that for the future is through our Revolution Wind project off the coast of New London because that's increasing our supply. And when you increase the supply, (it) brings prices down. So, we're going to keep fighting to make our state more affordable.”

Bysiewicz said a key goal for Lamont and herself is universal free breakfasts for students.

“And there's one more thing that I'm hoping we pass, which I think is going to be really critical, and that's universal free breakfast for every one of the 500,000 kids in our K through 12 public schools that will help make life more affordable for our families,” she said. “But also make sure that our kids are ready to learn, are on their best behavior, and are able to do well on their standardized tests and set themselves up for the future.”