Lawmaker wants to drop daylight saving time
Vail wants state to change to Atlantic Standard Time, end need to set clocks twice a year
State Rep. Kurt Vail says he plans to reintroduce a bill that would move Connecticut and neighboring northeast states into Atlantic Standard Time.
In practical terms, the bill would see the region stick with Daylight Saving Time year-round, so residents just wouldn’t set their clocks back an hour in the fall — as they will at 2 a.m. Sunday.
Vail, a Republican whose district includes Somers and Stafford, first proposed changing the state’s time zone in 2017. He noted the idea has support from both sides of the aisle.
“I’ll keep moving forward with this until we get something done,” he said in a phone interview.
The change would only go into effect if lawmakers in Massachusetts, Rhode Island and New York passed similar laws in their states.
“That’s the same way it’s being introduced in those states,” Vail said “We’re all working together.”
Legislators are able to submit ideas for bills to committee, which can then decide whether to take them up. The plan would be identical to one proposed in the legislative session earlier this year that called for Gov. Ned Lamont to request the United States Secretary of Transportation to change Connecticut’s time from Eastern Standard Time to Atlantic Standard Time, moving clocks ahead one hour permanently. Lawmakers could then eliminate Daylight Saving Time.
The state, he reasoned, is on the “eastern end” of the eastern time zone, so when the sun goes down in Connecticut, Detroit still has an hour of daylight.
“We’d rather be on the western end of the other time zone,” Vail said.
The idea of ending Daylight Saving Time has gained traction in recent years, sometimes resulting in odd political alliances. The Daily Show last year profiled Arizona, which eliminated Daylight Saving Time in the late 60s, putting it an hour behind the rest of the nation for most of the year. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, meanwhile, reintroduced a bill with bipartisan support earlier this year that would make Daylight Saving Time permanent nationwide.
“The overwhelming majority of members of Congress approve and support it. Let's get it done. Let’s get it passed, so that we never have to do this stupid change again,” the Republican senator said in a video released this week.
Vail said the idea came from talks with his constituents. “They just said, ‘what’s the point anymore?’” he recalled. “I went and talked to local farmers and they were like, ‘yeah, we have no purpose for it.’ They prefer not going back and forth.”
He cited a 2017 special commission study for the Massachusetts legislature that found the spring transition to Daylight Saving Time corresponds with an increase in “traffic fatalities, workplace injuries, and heart attacks.” He also cited energy savings and economic activity as reasons to make the switch.
The arguments against setting clocks an hour ahead permanently include children having to wait for the school bus in darkness. Vail said the Massachusetts study suggested moving school start times later — something he favors, but said should be left up to local school boards to decide.
He said the proposal is also opposed by broadcasters.
“Chances are tough when you have the broadcast industry going up against you, but they find a way to broadcast games in Arizona, which they don’t change their clocks,” he said.
Vail claimed that if someone were to propose Daylight Saving Time now, had it never existed, the idea would be taken as “utterly ridiculous.”
“It’s just that we got used to this and sometimes people are reluctant to change,” he said.