Governor Lamont.

Thank you for coming back on the wheelhouse once again.

Good to see you, Francie.

Great to have you on.

I'm going to ask you some questions.

Now, we talk abou electric bills in Connecticut, as though politicians could do something to sav ratepayers money on their bills, or could do the land share of the work.

Our residents electric bills something you can impact in any meaningful way.

Long term, yes.

Let's face it, we've had some of the highest electric bills.

We be New England going back 50 years.

Ella Grasso ran for office o the high price of electricity.

We're bending the curve there a little bit.

We've gone from one of th very highest in the country to, you know, the only state that actually reduced electric rates over the last year.

We have a long way to go.

We need more generation.

I ain't Texas, I can't stick a straw in the ground.

And out comes electricity.

That's why we're doing nuclear.

And that's why our doing wind.

That's why I do it.

Hydro.

That' where I look at it.

Natural gas.

And we got to hold the Eversource accountable.

They were throwing everything in the kitchen sink into the rate base, which is what you pay on.

No longer the big executive salaries, no longer the advertising, no longer the lobbying, the charitable contributions that's borne by the shareholders, not us.

Listener Heather Webb commented on threads she's seeing a projected increas in energy costs in the future.

You're you're pointing out now that electricity rates are falling.

That's important to note.

I guess she's worried about some kind of projection she's seen maybe through, charge, or maybe that the public benefits charge could be restored at some point anyway.

She's saying that bills are are are looking down right now, but she's worried about them going up in the future.

Heather is wondering what you're doing to keep bills down for the long term.

I guess.

Everybody else unplugged.

Nuclear power.

Seven years ago, when I was in office, we doubled down and kept that going.

That means more carbon free generation.

Always on and in $0.0 a kilowatt hour is so much less expensive than natural gas.

That's what's, allowed u to eliminate the public benefits charge for now.

And it's a big plus.

And again, like I said, hold Eversource accountable.

Make sure you only pay fo reliability and affordability.

A little bit of the curve.

It sounds I don't know about the percentage, but it sounds like a not all of the public benefits charge has been, has been taken away.

Do you want to do that in the future?

Do you want to get rid of all of it, or is that you're not getting rid of it?

That's just sort of a political a happy talk.

You know, that's how you pay for your nuclear power.

That's how you pay for, energy efficiency.

So maybe you say I want the taxpayers to pay for it, not the ratepayers, but they're all you're doing is just rearranging the deck chairs.

I don't think that really makes a difference.

What we did was, eliminate it for now by making sure that we were a lo less expensive than natural gas.

Let me ask it this way.

You want to keep the programs that might help people like hardships and, and unpaid bills.

You want to keep those kind of programs for the future?

I would imagine.

You do energy efficiency.

We can save.

Yeah, 3 or $400 a month if you have an older house, say pre 1980.

We help do that.

You know, that saves everybody in electric prices because there's less demand on the grid.

Hardship is tough.

I worked with, legislature worker Ryan Fazio when it came to hardship related to, Covid.

There are a lot of people that just weren't able to pay their bills.

That was a big nut.

We had to make up that.

We moved over to bonding.

Get that out of, electric rates.

Energy bill are part of the cost of living.

What can you say about your record regarding affordability in Connecticut?

One of the campaign mailers we've seen from Ryan Fazio is that he says that Ned Lamont makes life more expensive.

What would you say against that?

Well, I said that, you know, we're the only state to actually reduce electric rates, down about 5% and others are up about 10%.

So it's a 15% differential that makes the difference.

I can say that everybody's been, toasty.

Republicans are saying they're going to, eliminate the income tax going back to low Weicker, where the only, governor, actually to reduce the, income tax, not for the richest people, but we had the biggest middle class ta cut in the history of the state.

We eliminated the income tax for most working families and for most seniors who are making some progress, talked about the income tax and reducing that.

Are we an environment where we can reduce taxes and not necessarily or, excuse me, reduce them, instead of raising them?

Josh Elliott was somebody who primarily always talked to you about, or talked against you about raising taxes for people that made a lot of money, basically.

So is this something you're considering increasing taxes at a time where there's so much money not spent?

Look, I yeah, in the primary, they accuse me of, not been been unwilling to raise taxes, which is true now in the general election to say Lamont loves to raise taxes.

Maybe those two should have a, a debate of their own.

Look.

Right now, we've got eight balanced budgets in a row right now.

We've done that in a way that allows us to double down on early childhood and more funding for education, make sure we have the best schools in the countr and do a middle class tax cut.

And that's because we have a growing economy.

Frankly, we were eight years ago, ten years ago, we were one of the slowest growing economies of the 50 states.

Today we're the seventh fastest.

And I've said it a million times, I'll say it 1,000,001.

I don't want more taxes but I don't mind more taxpayers.

That's what's paying the bills.

We talked about somebod chiming in from threads earlier this election cycle.

We've encouraged listeners to hit us up, through our election survey on CT public.org/election.

Nelson Pomero is one of our early respondents.

He wants to know what you and other lawmakers are going to d to provide property tax relief.

Hey, Nelson.

I'd say a couple of things.

Generall when people talk about property tax release, they say, I want this tax state taxpayers to subsidize municipalities more.

And that is part of the answer.

That' why here we've added 500 million in funding for education funding.

We've doubled down on municipal aid, in most of our towns and cities.

Those are different way to help reduce the property tax.

We implemented a property tax credi for many people that allows us.

But also, I need the mayors to step up as well.

And I need them to say, look I appreciate we got 169 towns.

We have 169 superintendents, deputy police chiefs and curriculum directors.

We do everything 169 times.

I like to work with the mayor to see if we can at least share some of those back office expenses.

Does everybody have to have their own building inspector?

Does everybody have to have their own purchasing?

We're providing some of these now on a regional basis, and if a town wants to take advantage of it, they can reduce property taxes by themselves.

And the third thing and then I'll shut up.

It's really good to grow the grand list.

And when you have more, you know, you grow the grand.

Let's.

We're built, let's say a couple hundred units of, market rate housing in East Hartford, and they're going to pay, say, 7 or $8 million in property tax there.

That's another way to reduce the property tax by expanding the base.

Talking about housing, Realtor.com recentl ranked Connecticut 46 out of 50.

We're showing up, at the bottom of a lot of those lists in terms of affordable housing.

Recent reporting from one of my colleagues revealed that there was 93,000 units, shortage or something like that.

You've been critical of legislation that could undermine local control with interest rates rising, mortgages going up, renters struggling to find relief.

What do you want to do to, to combat the crisis and show folks that you are prioritizing housing?

What are the reasons, the price of housing is expensive because people want to be in Connecticut again.

You maybe know the greater Hartford region is one of the hottest real estate markets in America.

You know, for years, we're losing population.

Member.

The cool kids are all goin to Boston, New York no longer.

More people are staying here.

But your bigger point, they can only stay here if there's some housing they can afford.

So I had a back and forth the legislature, we ended up with a bill that had a pretty strong support, strong bipartisan support from mayors and first selectman.

It's called towns.

Take the lead.

You show us where you want that housing to go, and we'll be there as your partner.

And we added more new multifamily housing last year, I think, than ever before, probably the biggest increase in building permits of any state in the country.

You know wha we're not taking your cornfield.

It's not in my backyard.

It's usually an old empty mill that's been sitting empty for many years.

Or one of those office buildings is half occupied or a parking lot.

You know, in our cities we have acres of parking lots or even in the suburbs, shopping center that are not doing that.

Well.

We're turning those in the housing, making sure is a place your kids can live.

Are you all trying to fin like, creative solutions to get, I guess, a larger revenue stream that you might be able to to, to put together, to try to fund affordabl housing or anything like that.

Now we've had you know, significant investment in affordable housing.

I feel like, you know, I worry more about, what's coming out of Washington and they can't get their fiscal house in order, $2 trillion a year in a deficit that's driving up interest rates.

You want to kno it's going to slow down housing.

It's those type of factors, you know, the high price of diesel that's driving up the price of housing.

Tariffs on wood from Canada that's driving up the price of housing.

That's what I worry about.

Speaking about.

Another thing Ryan Fazio has been talking about on the campaign trail.

He's talking about data centers.

But nationally, we're talking a lot about AI data centers.

We did a show recently about, Connecticut Public, which people can go back to the archives at CT public.org/the wheelhouse to, to take a look at that.

We don't track data center development in Connecticut.

And this is really what we reached out to, your officials that a long time ago, not long time ago, two weeks ago.

And they told u they don't track, data centers in the state.

So this is like is this a relatively new issue?

This is something that he's saying that, I don't know if he's saying you're flip flopping on it, but he's looking at the data centers can be an I.T.

upgrade in your company, so you can better, you know, navigate that.

Yeah.

We've obviously done that and continue to do that.

I think generally, Frank, when people are thinking about data centers and thinking about those big hyperscal things, we've said no to that.

This is not where are you going to build them?

Not here in Connecticut.

Locals can say no to that as well.

I don't like them becaus they suck a lot of electricity.

Not as much electricity.

Is the greater Hartford area the one they wanted to pu a millstone that we said no to?

So I don't like it for that reason.

Others don't like it because of I. It was the 2021 tax incentives that went through that he was critical of.

I don't know, whether or not he supported that or not, but that's what, for legislation that was passed in 2021, that's what he was talking about.

I have to clarify that because I was rambling for a moment, but that's what I was trying to talk to you about.

Anyway, we're not building any of those big, hyperscale data centers.

And by the way, localities can determine if they want them or not.

Second to that is, how do you put guardrails around social media?

And I, I think that's just as important.

You know, let's talk about AI and let's talk about those chat bots that start whispering swee nothings to your, young teenager and their mother who goes, I can't talk to my parents.

Then the chat bot says, well, talk to me.

And down some rabbit holes, you go there.

We had very strong bipartisan support, in the legislature to put some real guardrails around some of the things that I could do.

Ryan was one of the fe Republicans not to support that.

But I think it's the right thing to do to protect our kids.

New legislatio that just came through on that this year on AI data center, something else or excuse me, not AI data centers on AI and education in Connecticut.

Recently, Governor Lamont, you approved a large increase in municipal aid that included $170 million for the state' education cost sharing formula.

The primary means of fundin education here in Connecticut.

Is that a sustainable model going forward?

Are we going to keep trying to find dollars for municipalities to support ECS?

Yeah.

What I said last year was we're going to get, additional funding for our schools, but only do it in a way that you can count upon the next year and the next year and the next year, just like I did with my tax cut.

I wanted to make sure it wasn't a one time thing was something we can continue doing.

But I'll stop you again.

I mean, we've got our, reform commission looking right now.

The answer tonight everything is always more, taxpayer subsidies.

It's also, how can we make sure that money goes into the classroom, not to overhead?

I alluded to that before.

I think special ed is a place where we can make a big difference, helping our towns and municipalities that have some kids real special needs.

Often the town can't handle it themselves.

They send them an hour out of town, costs from $200,000 a year.

They that's the type of place, not just more money, but how do we put it to work to help the kids?

Former state official Dia Mantas made news in September when he fled to Greece rather than face a multiyear prison sentence on federal fraud and extortion charges.

You criticized media outlets like Connecticut Public for giving Diamandis airtime.

I talked to him on, on this station.

We did an interview.

The states pursuing justice i this case and his pension now.

So that's wh I think we're talking about it.

But I guess the reason why I want to ask you it in this form is, is this just like one bad apple, whatever he can, whatever he was convicted of doing?

Can folks trust your administration?

Look, he was a bad dude.

You know, we inherited him from the last administration.

As soon as we found out that he's trying to play games to get his daughter, employed.

This is had nothing to do with the corruption stuff.

He was gone, and that was the right thing to do.

Subsequent to that, they found that he was playing games with the contractors.

I was shocked by the way that the feds, you know, gave him a, you know, low bail, let hi escape, and now he's in Greece.

You know, I wouldn't have given a big platform myself to complain about the justice system.

I think you ought to come back here.

And I think he deserves it.

Just desserts.

A long time.

Helpfu that we did talk to him, though, because we were able to find out about, his house and some of the dealings that he's up to nowadays.

And we met a friend of his that says that they feel like they're out $120,000 after supporting him for it.

So I guess people are learning a lot about cost of the amount to this day.

But we are here for Governor Lamont.

You all are tying Ryan Fazio to President Donald Trump's crackdown on undocumented migrants.

I want to talk through efforts you've made to protect, undocumented migrant who live and work in the state.

That new law focused on transparency.

We're talking about not wearing masks about, federal law enforcement presenting themselves as such to folks.

So is this something that you intend on enforcing?

Will folks get, arrested?

I guess federal law enforcement, if they are, found to be going against this law in any way by local law enforcement?

Yeah, frankly, I just think it's outrageous what Ice is doing.

You probably heard about what happened in Danbury a few weeks ago.

Moms and dads dropping their kids off at school.

These are not the worst of the worst.

I talked to Secretary Mullins the head of Homeland security.

He said, what in God's name are you doing?

You know, and the restaurants and dry cleaners o Main Street are shutting down.

People don't feel safe going there.

900 fewer kids went to school.

The next day after that round up.

Look, we work with DEA, we work with FBI, we work with Ice.

We work with all the feds when it comes to gettin dangerous people off the street.

But when you're just, trying to round up people and detain them and send them out of a state or out of country, I think it's dead wrong.

Can I arrest Ice agents?

That' not exactly what the states do.

We tried to set some very clear, guardrails in terms of what we think you should do and not do.

Most of the time, they follow our lead.

Some of the time, they're rudely defiant.

A recent poll by Sacred Heart University, Wfsb, CT insider, show that half of Connecticut voters, including a quarter of Connecticut Republicans surveyed, want you to stand up to Donald Trump.

Why are you the guy?

Why are you your administration?

Why should you be the one elected here to take down the white House, if that's what people want here in this poll?

Look, I'm fightin for the people of Connecticut, and I'm also fighting for th rights of people in Connecticut.

I'm fighting for Connecticut values.

And where I think Donald Trump crosses the line like he doe when he arrests, moms and dads.

And dare we stand up?

We stand up tall and we push back.

That doesn't mean that I don't talk to the Secretary of transportation or Secretary of Energy on occasion, where there's something we can do together, but on those real moral confrontations where I think Donald Trump is dead wrong, you're damn right I stand up.

You've been listening t Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont.

Governor Lamont great to have you on the show.

Thank you so much for coming on during your reelection campaign.

Thanks, Frankie.

Nice to see you.