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February 1, 2024

CBIA’s 2024 legislative priorities: fiscal guardrails, affordable housing, association health plans, biz tax cuts

PHOTO | CONTRIBUTED Connecticut Business & Industry Association President and CEO Chris DiPentima speaks at a CBIA event.

The Connecticut Business & Industry Association (CBIA) on Thursday released its 2024 legislative policy agenda, which mainly focuses on government modernization, competitiveness, and of course, workforce development, according to the organization’s CEO Chris DiPentima.

CBIA released its 12-point package of recommendations ahead of the start of Connecticut’s 2024 General Assembly session, which convenes Feb. 7. The top priority this year is protecting the state’s fiscal guardrails that were implemented through 2017’s bipartisan budget reforms.

“We've got to keep those fiscal guardrails in place,” DiPentima said. “Those have given us the budget surpluses to be able to make any investments that we have. The way to free up more money to invest in Connecticut — whether that's more money for our nonprofits, more money for child care, more money for social services, more money for education — is not to play around with the fiscal guardrails. It’s about making government more modern and efficient, lowering overtime costs that frees up money to be spent, looking at tax credits that aren’t working and repurpose that money somewhere where that money would be more effective.”

The CBIA also wants to see legislators work to improve access to affordable, high-quality health insurance for small business employees. There have been efforts in the past to allow small businesses with few employees to group together with others as part of an organization or chamber to access insurance options and flexibility typically offered to larger employers.

Efforts to allow so-called association health plans in Connecticut failed last year.

“It’s about really expanding the ability for those small employers to bundle together under an association and look like a big employer to be able to leverage those purchasing powers, to be able to spread the risk across a bigger pool, and the results have been minimal, if any increases over multiple years,” DiPentima said referring to the success of similar legislation in other states. “That's the stability that our small businesses want to see — they're really struggling with those costs increases right now.”

Many of CBIA’s other policy recommendations focus on expanding career pathway opportunities, and making Connecticut a more affordable place to live and work. Government modernization is also a focus, DiPentima said, because streamlining and upgrading parts of government operations can help the state save money.

Other policy objectives include:

  • Implement first-time homebuyer tax incentives
  • Make necessary investments in the state’s child-care industry
  • Reduce and cap occupational license fees
  • Create a task force to develop bachelor’s degree equivalents for second act teachers who want to teach trade courses
  • Restore the pass-through entity tax credit to its original level, returning more than $60 million to 123,000 small businesses
  • Lower the cost of state government by reforming overtime practices and improving state pension fund investment returns
  • Eliminate the temporary corporate tax surcharge
  • Let corporations reduce a greater percentage of tax liability through credits
  • Increase transparency through third-party litigation funding reform
  • Promote new biotech industries by incentivizing the creation of more lab space
  • Make business investments in renewable energy more attainable by eliminating savings ratio requirements for related capital projects

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