Differing plans for path to prosperity

Candidates for mayor in Hartford explain how they would build on fragile economic stability

HARTFORD — Since announcing his reelection campaign at the start of the year, Mayor Luke Bronin has framed nearly every public speech around the same argument — that he’s forged for Hartford a “fragile stability” on the path toward financial strength.

Few residents would dispute that there’s shaky ground beneath those stable finances, achieved in Bronin’s first year in office through a painful combination of layoffs, union givebacks, slashed public services and a state bailout agreement that restricts Hartford’s ability to borrow. To avoid bankruptcy and close what Bronin described in 2016 as a “Grand Canyon-size budget gap,” the city “cut things that we needed. We cut into muscle and bone,” he said at a June forum.

But among the mayoral candidates, views differ about the city’s next steps — how quickly Hartford should expect to climb from solvency to strength, how that may impact the highest tax burden in Connecticut, how likely it is that Hartford could get more money from the state.

Bronin, the Democratic nominee, contends that Hartford residents should stay the course that he’s set. His challengers in the November mayoral election include two petitioning candidates, Aaron Lewis and Giselle “Gigi” Jacobs, as well as the Republicanendorsed candidate, J. Stan McCauley, who all offer visions of their own.

“We have a lot of goals to work toward,” Bronin said. “But first and most important goal is to protect the stability and solvency

we fought so hard for and even protecting that stability is going to require a lot of discipline and a lot of growth.”

McCauley, a Democrat who is backed by the Republican Town Committee, argues that Bronin has already leveraged the city as much as he can, referring to the state's plan to take on Hartford's decades of backed-up debt.

“There are no more rabbits in the big, black hat,” McCauley said. “He can't borrow another dime. So there's nothing else to do but deal with the social, emotional and regional problems that are very real in Hartford, and unfortunately, he doesn't have the deep connections that are necessary to connect people and neighborhoods.

“And that is going to be the biggest challenge Hartford has.”

Lower taxes

The burden of Hartford's mill rate, the highest in the state, falls heaviest on commercial property owners and landlords, who tend to pass the exorbitant expense onto business tenants and renters.

Lowering that tax rate for business owners, particularly small businesses, should be an “urgent priority,” Bronin said last week. But when and how that would happen, he couldn't say.

“One of my goals is to put Hartford in a position at some point to lower its mill rate,” he said. “I think it's highly unlikely we'll be in a position to do that within the next four years.”

Hartford's residential property tax rate is more on par with neighboring towns because single-family homeowners pay tax on just 35 percent of their properties' market value, compared to 70 percent for Hartford's commercial properties, and all real estate in other cities and towns in Connecticut.

In multifamily apartment buildings, the high tax often leads to inflated rents, even in neighborhoods that are seeing little to no economic development.

In a perfect world, Hartford should increase taxes for homes and lower it for businesses, says McCauley, a former preacher who owns a production company, Light Source Productions, and a local social media network called Access TV. The trade-off would draw more business in, increasing the grand list, he said.

“But we don't live in a perfect world,” said McCauley.

Hartford already has the highest poverty rate and lowest home-ownership rate in the state, and those few homeowners have seen their property taxes increase more than 8 percent since 2016 due to a state mandate.

Raise it any faster and homeowners will flee the city, said McCauley.

Lewis, a ghostwriter and founder of a literacy organization called The Scribe's Institute, said he would need to conduct further research to determine whether lowering taxes is feasible by 2023.

Jacobs, who owns a cleaning company called Sister Soldier Environmental Service, said she's diving into that research now.

She's also pushing for greater transparency around the city's finances so residents can understand the process and weigh in. Jacobs, a single mother and businesswoman, vows to run the city like she runs her home and her business — by diligently cutting waste and balancing the books.

But achieving lower taxes would be a prospect for a later time, she said.

State aid

The state is sending nearly $50 million Hartford's way this year as part of an agreement to pay off Hartford's debt, about $550 million, over the next two decades or so.

Connecticut is also making about $30 million in payments in lieu of taxes for Hartford's tax-exempt properties, which include state-owned office buildings, universities and hospitals.

But that's about $61 million short of what Hartford would receive if the state fully funded its reimbursement program.

Bronin said he would keep advocating for the state to follow its existing PILOT formula and would also push for alternative sources of revenue, like sending a portion of taxes on sales, hotels and restaurants back to the communities generating the money.

Jacobs said she would welcome the challenge of soliciting more PILOT from the state. But she questions the wisdom of the state bailout agreement, which placed Hartford under the oversight of a state body called the Municipal Advisory Review Board.

If elected, Jacobs said she would work to regain Hartford's financial independence.

“I don't think it would be a good idea to spend the next 20 to 30 years having to get permission to make decisions,” she said.

McCauley said he would try to end state oversight as soon as possible and achieve a higher rate of PILOT funding from Connecticut, with a goal of full reimbursement.

“If there's going to be an expectation that Hartford's going to pull its own weight and stop asking for more money every year, to stop begging every year, then Hartford needs to be given the opportunity to hold its own,” McCauley said.

Bronin said he's in no rush to eliminate the state's oversight. The MARB isn't detrimental to the city, he said.

Aaron Lewis says he would also request more state money, but for tourism, to begin centering more activity in Hartford around the river. He plans to start by giving small businesses incentives to rent space, operate food trucks and markets along the river to “get people's interest in it initially. That's our starting point to create a bustling, economic revitalization among the locals.”