Paul Bass Photo
For years Roland Lemar joined his fellow New Haven aldermen in begging state lawmakers to give the city permission to install red-light cameras. As of this week he’s one of those lawmakers — and he promises to switch from supplicant to deliverer. Or at least do his best.
Lemar (pictured above) is to be sworn in Wednesday for his first term as state representative from the 96th General Assembly District, which covers parts of New Haven (the East Rock, Fair Haven, and Wooster Square neighborhoods) and southern Hamden.
In the process, the 34-year-old former alderman and city government policy aide steps into a new role: Someone who can cast votes and introduce laws that determine whether New Haven has the money or the legal permission to make streets safer, improve the schools, get people to work, enable people who aren’t rich to run for state office, or become “greener.”
He said he’s ready to make that switch. He has bills he hopes to introduce in his first term to tackle tax reform and electoral reform. He has bills promoted by more experienced colleagues he plans to vote for. He has ideas about changing bus routes, for instance, that he hopes to push in conversations with state decision-makers.
“I owe the city of New Haven and the town of Hamden the dollars that they need to create strong, livable communities,” he said.
At the Independent’s request, Lemar drew up a “to-do list” of his top plans, a list he, readers, and voters can return to during his term to grade his performance. He discussed the list in an interview at Cafe Romeo. Highlights:
1. Progressive Tax Change. Buoyed by the election of a governor who said he supports progressive tax reform, Lemar said he wants to see the state tax the rich more. Right now the 5 percent state income tax applies to families earning up to $1 million a year; higher earners pay 6.5 percent on income above that. Lemar would like to see the income tax rise one-tenth of 1 percent on family income above $250,000, with another one-tenth of 1 percent added every additional $50,000, up to a maximum of 7.5 percent. “It’s a more rational way to tax,” Lemar said.
Lemar said he hopes Malloy proposes such a change in his own budget. If not, “and if nobody else is going to introduce the bill, I will do it,” he promised.
The change would, in Lemar’s vision, also provide money to help preserve cities’ PILOT (Payment In Lieu Of Taxes on tax-exempt property) and ECS (educational cost-sharing) funding. New Haven’s braced for an eight-figure drop in such money this year because of the state’s $3.4 billion projected deficit. New Haven’s school reform drive in particular is endangered by potential state budget cuts, Lemar said.
2. EITC. Lemar also wants to see tax relief for low-income working families through a state earned income tax credit that mirrors the federal government’s. New Haven State Sen. Martin Looney has for years put forward a bill to do just that. Lemar promised to champion it in the House.
How to pay for an EITC? See “1,” above.
3. Local Option. As an alderman, Lemar has implored the legislature to pass enabling legislation so New Haven can install cameras above traffic lights to catch speeders (and keep more of the money collected from the tickets). He and fellow New Haven pols, including the mayor, have also sought state permission to levy a local hotel/lodging tax. Newly elected Gov. Dan Malloy (a former mayor himself, of Stamford) has said he’s open to the idea. Lemar promised either to introduce legislation or actively to support someone else’s bill to make it happen. “We have to allow municipalities to diversify revenue streams,” he said.
Lemar is less enamored of a New Haven push for state permission to levy a local sales tax; sales taxes disproportionately hit the poor, he argued.
4. Clean Elections. Lemar made history in two ways during this summer’s Democratic primary. He became the first Connecticut state legislative candidate ever to qualify for supplemental matching money under the new clean-elections law. He also became the last. That “supplemental” money was allotted for candidates who already qualified for public money by promising to limit fund-raising, but whose wealthy opponents kept raising and spending more and more money. A U.S. Supreme Court decision ruled such supplemental money unconstitutional this year. Lemar has an idea for accomplishing the same goal constitutionally: amending the state’s law to allow candidates receiving public money to resume fund-raising beyond original limits if their opponents also continue to exceed limits. He promised to introduce such a bill this term.
5. “Missing Links.” Right now, if you don’t own a car and live in, say, the West Rock projects, you can’t get a bus home from a job in Dixwell Plaza or the Connecticut Post Mall after 8 p.m. Lemar promised to work to connect “job centers” (shopping centers, for instance) with “population centers” that need more bus routes. How to pay for that? In part, he said, by redirecting money slotted for highway construction.
6. “TOD.” New Haven-Springfield commuter train routes are coming online. The state hasn’t decided where it will stop yet between those two termini. Lemar vowed to press for a stop in Hamden near the motor vehicle department. He also vowed to promote transit-oriented development (aka “TOD”) along the line by having the state work with towns to promote office, housing or retail projects near the new train stops. He’s not proposing mandates for municipalities. Instead, he envisions optional new state guidelines for local zoning changes and money to pay for staff support for local planners.
7. Retrain Workers Endangered By Health Reform. Lemar supports pending health reforms in the state, including switching more people from nursing homes to in-home care as smart cost-effective long-term policy. He acknowledged that in the short term those changes mean many people will lose jobs. Lemar said he’ll work to have the state prepare those workers now for the new jobs that will replace their old ones — by, for instance, helping nursing-home health aides take courses at places like Southern Connecticut State University and Gateway Community College to earn licenses as RNs, LPNs, and home-health aides.
Those seven promises only begin to cover the ground Lemar had to address as a candidate and the menu of issues he’ll vote on as a state representative this year and next. He promised to support a state version of the DREAM act for undocumented-immigrant college students, for instance; to vote to repeal the death penalty; to back the consolidation of state agencies, the implementation of the SustiNet health plan, and the restoration of money for alternative energy projects and home clean-energy and conservation projects. (He’d like Connecticut to replicate a Berkeley, Calif. plan that allows homeowners to pay back home-efficiency loans through the savings on their energy bills.) The seven items on his list represent concrete actions a rookie legislator believes he can take in trying to make a difference in Hartford.
(For a view of how Lemar and fellow New Haven legislators tried to influence their state counterparts when he as an alderman, by contrast, click on the play arrow and read this story; Lemar takes his turn toward the end of the video.)
good luck, rep. alexander! you are right on, imho, re: cameras, taxes, and bus routes. (also--see if you can get the "Q" to run later. i guess i need to talk to pat dillon 'bout that one...)