State Reps. Charles Ferraro, fourth from left, and Kathy Kennedy, second from right, met with constituents at Milford’s Athena Diner Jan. 8 to discuss the upcoming legislative session. Contributed photo.
State Reps. Charles Ferraro (R-117) and Kathy Kennedy (R-119) met with local residents at the Athenian Diner in Milford Jan. 8 to talk about the upcoming legislative session that will start on Feb. 5.
The topics of discussion included tolls, the environment and the state’s fiscal issues.
“I want to thank the residents that came out to express their concerns and share their ideas about how we can better move our state forward,” Ferraro said. “Our state still faces many fiscal problems and we need to address how we are spending our money in Connecticut. It’s time to start prioritizing our spending and if we do that we don’t need tolls or increased taxes.”
“It’s incredible that even with $1.7 billion in new taxes passed by legislative Democrats on last year’s budget we still find ourselves in a budget deficit,” Kennedy said. There seems to be no political courage to shrink the size of government to what we as a state can afford. This is another reason I cannot support tolls. The constituents I talk to do not trust government with their money.”
Recently, Comptroller Kevin Lembo announced that the state is headed to end the year with a $28 million budget deficit. The state budget that was passed this year was crafted by Gov. Ned Lamont and legislative Democrats without input from Republican lawmakers.
Lamont met with legislative Democrat this week to encourage them to call a special session to pass truck-only tolls. Ferraro and Kennedy have been vocal opponents of tolls and believe truck-only tolls will just be the beginning and will lead to tolls on both cars and trucks, taking more money out of the pockets of Milford taxpayers.
After the coffee hour, Ferraro and Kennedy co-signed a letter to the governor asking him to host additional town hall meetings about his truck-only tolls plan to allow the public to ask questions and express their concerns.