Florida Governor Comes To Connecticut To Meet Business Leaders

HARTFORD — Florida Gov. Rick Scott came to the capital city Thursday night on a two-day tour to lure companies to his home state, saying Connecticut Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and the legislature have made it easier for him by raising taxes here.

Scott spoke to business leaders at the Hartford Hilton hotel in a closed-door session, and he plans to speak to another business group Friday morning in Norwalk in an attempt to move jobs to the Sunshine State.

A Republican, Scott said he’s in Connecticut because Fairfield-based General Electric and Hartford-based Aetna and Travelers have complained publicly about a package of increased business taxes that was crafted by Malloy and the Democratic-controlled legislature. The General Assembly has scheduled a special session for Monday and Tuesday to debate tweaks to the two-year, $40 billion budget that would include keeping some taxes at their current levels.

“Right now there is a big opportunity in Connecticut because your legislature and your governor are raising taxes on everybody – on families, on businesses, on everybody – and you can’t pay for it,” Scott told reporters on a downtown street corner outside the hotel.

He added, “When I talk to companies, whether it’s companies out of Connecticut or other states, here’s what they say, ‘I need lower taxes. My customers are not going to pay for these taxes. I need less regulation. My customers are not going to pay for my compliance with regulations. I need an easier permitting process. If I have a problem, I need a governor who is going to respond and fix a problem.’ ”

When asked if he was visiting General Electric during his tour, Scott said that companies want to keep their relocation decisions private. He declined to name any individual companies that he was visiting, but he mentioned that GE and Aetna had gone public with their complaints. He said that many Connecticut businesses already have operations in the Sunshine State and are familiar with the tax climate.

“Pratt and Whitney is adding more jobs in Florida,” he said. “Most of these companies already do a lot of business in Florida. We’re already the second-biggest state for aerospace and aviation establishments and the third-biggest state for the number of technology jobs. … I just want them to move all their corporate offices, their regional offices, and all their back offices.”

Connecticut has gained national attention on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” program as co-host Joe Scarborough, a former Republican congressman from Florida, has spoken repeatedly in recent weeks about the proposed increase in taxes. The state was also the subject of a negative editorial in The Wall Street Journal, which is read nationally by corporate leaders who make relocation decisions.

Since the companies went public, lawmakers and the Malloy administration have been working behind closed doors to reach an agreement on the budget tweaks. Those include keeping the state sales tax on computer and data processing services at the current level of 1 percent, rather than increasing it to 3 percent. The House Democrats are expected to hold a caucus Friday afternoon to discuss the latest developments on the tax-and-spending package.

Despite the criticisms, Democrats have rallied behind Malloy this week as the news spread about the Florida governor’s trip to Connecticut.

Leigh Appleby, a spokesman for the state Democratic Party, said, “This is part of a larger effort by Republican governors to promote themselves on the national stage under the guise of economic development for their states. Texas Gov. Greg Abbott announced that he will make a similar trip to New Hampshire. It’s nothing more than a publicity stunt at taxpayer expense to distract his constituents from what is going on in their state.”

Malloy himself was not present in Hartford for Scott’s arrival. When asked this week if he would be greeting Scott at the airport upon his arrival in Connecticut, Malloy said no. Malloy is spending Thursday through Sunday on Nantucket island at a governors’ retreat that is sponsored by the Democratic Governors Association. He attended a similar retreat two years ago on Nantucket.

State Rep. Stephen Dargan, a longtime Malloy supporter, said Malloy’s profile has been heightened because he will be leading his party’s governors association next year.

“Malloy, becoming chair of the Democratic Governors Association, will get banged by the Republican governors,” Dargan said. “He’s definitely a bigger target. They’re not going to have tea and crumpets with him. They also probably won’t have shepherd’s pie and a Guinness with him.”

Scott, though, said his decision to come to Connecticut was based on the tax increases and had nothing to do with Malloy’s future position with the governors’ association.

“Your legislature and governor are not being responsive to what your businesses are telling them,” Scott said. “Connecticut, like other states, has got to figure out how to make its government smaller. … If you guys were cutting taxes, I wouldn’t waste my time coming up here. I wouldn’t be here if you guys were cutting taxes.”

Joseph Brennan, the president of the 10,000-member Connecticut Business & Industry Association, said that the legislature and governor need to roll back business taxes in order to prevent businesses from leaving the state.

“We’ve got to take a more serious look at the business climate here, so we can compete with other states,” Brennan said Thursday in an interview. “That’s reality. You just have to create an environment so they don’t pick up and move.”

Others may have thought the companies were bluffing, but Brennan said he believed them.

“This is serious,” Brennan said. “I knew it wasn’t an idle threat.”