Gary Turco

The 2020 Legislative Session begins on Wednesday, February 5, and I am pleased to announce my legislative priorities.

Newington is a great place to live and work but residents continue to be loaded with a high cost of living. With focused investment within our community, we can build upon the resources we already have and improve the quality of life for residents while reducing our reliance on property taxes.

This session I want to focus on workforce development, growing the economy, creating new jobs and curbing inefficient state spending to free up dollars that can be invested in the community for education, services, and assist Newington and the state in recruiting and retaining young, talented workers.

As Vice-Chair of the legislature's Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee, I supported our state's Debt-Free Community College program in the 2019 session to provide help manage the ever-rising cost of higher education to reduce the financial burden of student loan debt.

I plan to continue that work in the 2020 session to implement the program to allow greater access to higher education, continue working with the business community to ensure Connecticut's workforce meets employer's specific hiring needs, and reducing the cost of living as he was able to in the 2019 session where he advocated for the passage of a state income tax exemption on social security and pension income for seniors.

My full legislative agenda consists of the following:

• Maintaining state funding for the Town of Newington and its schools to alleviate the reliance on local property taxes
• Cutting wasteful and inefficient state spending and reallocating dollars to programs that provide an investment to grow our economy and create new jobs
• Reducing the cost of living for Newington residents, especially in the area of property taxes on homeowners and utility rates
• Expanding homeownership and promoting first-time homebuyer programs for Newington residents
• Providing improved and increased assistance and economic incentives for small businesses and start-ups to hire new employees, expand their current businesses or relocate to Connecticut
• Continuing investments in workforce development to ensure Connecticut has a workforce that matches industry demands now and well into the future
• Protecting Newington residents from scammers especially in the area of scam robocalls, emails, and text messages
• Reducing the cost of prescription drugs, especially insulin costs and all out-of-pocket health care costs for every resident
• Protecting our natural resources and public drinking water from dangerous contaminates such as lead harmful PFAS
• Investing in the expansion of a mass transit infrastructure, especially expanding the Hartford line to Bradley Airport and an additional train stop in Newington