The Connecticut Mirror is conducting ongoing conversations with members of various communities about topics of interest to them, their families and the public. We are meeting with college students in Hartford, people living with a behavioral health challenge in New Haven, people with young children in Bridgeport, and ALICE residents (Asset Limited, Income Constrained, Employed) in Waterbury. We recently asked the Bridgeport group to complete this sentence: “Revitalizing Connecticut’s major cities is a good investment of my state tax burden if…”
Dan Pflug, Easton
… it incentivizes companies to bring high-paying jobs to our state.
Amy Parkinson, Bridgeport
… more companies would move here to produce more jobs and education.
Elman Rodriguez, Bridgeport
… investments in education, innovation, and bringing major companies to Connecticut would improve revenues.
Kerry Whitham, Stratford
… it brings companies and better jobs to the city, which would bring more tax revenue to the city, surrounding towns, and the state.
Jessica Racaniello, Stratford
… there would be job creation, crime reduction, education, new companies, and better utilization of my taxes… and we would stop being told there is no money.
Jamie Banks, Bridgeport
… new schools are built, neighborhoods are cleaned up, and new employment opportunities are available. You want to know where your tax dollars are being invested.
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I hope that Bridgeport gets a break. It deserves it. It had so much going for it.
I am an old guy from that town and remember downtown being so crowded, people would come out to the amusement park on Pleasure Beach and swear at the silly rotating bridge that got stuck every week, a Socialist mayor – Jasper McLevy, a Huckster Mayor – P.T. Barnum, a housing project called Yellow Mill Village (later Father Panik Village) was a model for low–income housing, and the Barnum Festival drew a million people. And, oye, the industries – Sikorsky, Avco, Singer, Remington Arms, Aerosol Techniques, Warner, Handy and Harmon, Remington Shaver, and GE which had one of the largest industrial buildings in the world in Bridgeport.
Then the factories closed.
CT’s once formidable WWII cities focused on arms production never transitioned to major civilian industrial cities. And have languished for decades and decades. Roughly 1/3rd of our lower CT income residents live in half a dozen major CT depressed cities. Without a major program to heavily subsidize the introduction of major industry these cities will continue to stagnate. And remain a stain on a State that has both half a dozen severely depressed cities and a wealthy Gold Coast. Rebuilding our cities wasn’t addressed during the recent election campaign. And best be told its not on the current agenda either.
Maybe we ought hold a “bus motorcade” for CT’s Legislators to actually tour Bridgeport for a day and see the utter disrepair of the City. Bridgeport has huge areas of industrial infrastructure with major utilities installed with CT’s largest harbor. With an inspired CT leadership Bridgeport could be a major component of a renewed CT economy. That would be some Legacy for Gov. Lamont.