Regional Climate Pact Wins Local Support

New Haven is the 11th most dangerous city in the country when it comes to asthma rates, asthma-induced emergency department visits, and asthma-related fatalities.

A new regional initiative touted by local and state advocates seeks to curb that urban air quality harm by capping greenhouse gas emissions and investing in more sidewalks, bike lanes, and electric buses — a move opponents say will only hurt Connecticut residents in the form of a higher gas tax.

That regional clean transportation effort is called the Transportation and Climate Initiative (TCI).

On Monday morning, Lt. Gov. Susan Bysiewicz held a virtual press conference with state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) Commissioner Katie Dykes, state Department of Transportation (DOT) Deputy Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto, and Prospect Hill/Newhallville Alder Steve Winter, among others, to pump the TCI proposed legislation.

The presser was held just a few days before state lawmakers on the Environment Committee plan to discuss and vote on the matter on Wednesday to determine whether or not the associated proposed bill—Senate Bill No. 884: An Act Reducing Transportation-Related Carbon Emissions—will advance to the floor of the State Senate for further debate and a potential final vote.

If passed, the bill, modeled off of a budget proposal crafted and supported by Gov. Ned Lamont’s administration, would have Connecticut join Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Washington D.C. in requiring fuel suppliers to buy permits for carbon emissions related to the fuel they sell. It would then have the state invest at least 35 percent of associated revenue to ensure that ​“communities that are overburdened by air pollution or underserved by the transportation system” — like New Haven — ​“benefit from transportation projects and policies that reduce emissions from transportation sources.”

The Lamont Administration also estimates that the bill would see a 5 cent hike in gas prices at the planned start of TCI in 2023, with gas prices rising by an estimated total of 10 cents over a decade. 

Bysiewicz and Dykes said on Monday that the TCI would have a transformative impact on air quality and public transportation funding across Connecticut.

Dykes said that the TCI is projected to reduce transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions across Connecticut by 26 percent over a decade. It would also generate roughly $1 billion in new revenue for the state. She said that the combustion of fossil fuels in trucks, buses, and cars contributes roughly 38 percent of greenhouse gas emissions in the state — as well as 67 percent of air pollutants that lead to respiratory illnesses like asthma.

“We have some of the worst air quality in the country, unfortunately,” Dykes said. ​“What’s really exciting is that for the first time, this program will allow us to regulate those emissions directly, to put a cap or a limit on those emissions and ensure that those emissions from vehicle traffic come down over time.”

Eucalitto and Winter, both of whom are New Haven residents, threw their support behind TCI during Monday’s presser as an opportunity for cities like New Haven — which currently bear the brunt of transportation-related emissions by being sandwiched in between I‑91, I‑95, and the Merritt Parkway — to benefit the most from clean transportation investments.

That could mean everything from converting diesel buses to electric, building out more and safer sidewalks, adding ADA-accessible ramps and crosswalks, and constructing protected bike lanes.

“When we talk about creating a healthier and safer Connecticut’s, it’s about creating an environment that’s accommodating for all users, so that you feel safer walking to school, walking to work,” or biking instead of driving in a car, Eucalitto said. ​“Getting people out of their vehicles if they don’t need to use one … that’s going to help reduce emissions in our communities,” and subsequently reduce air pollution.

Eucalitto said that CTtransit has roughly 700 buses in its public transit fleet statewide. Converting those vehicles from diesel to electric will cost ​“hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars.”

That great cost comes with a similarly significant environmental and public health benefit, he said, particularly for bus-congested locations like the New Haven Green. Replacing one diesel-powered bus with an electric vehicle is equivalent to ​“eliminating around 20 to 35 vehicles off the roadway,” he said. ​“Multiply that by 700,” and one gets a sense of the potential impact on air quality by such a move.

Winter cited New Haven’s dubious distinction as the 11th-hardest hit ​“Asthma Capital” in the country, according to the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America.

“By reducing transportation-related emissions and channeling funding into our communities in the inner cities, we can address those who are most harmed by poor air quality.”

He said that residents he represents on Shelton Avenue and Dixwell Avenue and elsewhere in the Newhallville and Dixwell neighborhoods breathe in emissions from ​“heavy-duty diesel vehicles” like public buses and school buses and other nearby industrial-use vehicles every day.

“When you breathe it in when a school bus goes by, you can feel it. It’s revolting,” he said. ​“You can breathe it in and you can feel how toxic it is.”

Investing in improvements like protected bike lanes, speed bumps, and other traffic calming measures along with bus electrification will have a disproportionately positive impact on communities like New Haven, he said.

“This directly relates to systemic racial inequities,” he said about New Haven’s current air pollution burden. ​“This is a racial justice issue. This is a public health issue. This is an equity issue broadly. The need in our communities is so great.”

Supporters: Protect Planet, Boost ​“Overburdened” Communities

Other New Haven elected officials and environmental advocates agreed earlier this month as they submitted written testimony in support of the TCI bill for the Environment Committee’s public hearing on the item on March 8.

The city’s Environmental Advisory Council endorsed the bill, particularly its provisions that would dedicate 35 percent of TCI revenues to ​“communities overburdened by air pollution and underserved by public transportation.” The local council also singled out for praise the part of the bill that would create an Equity Advisory Board, ​“making the allocation of the proceeds a fair process.”

Downtown Alder Abby Roth also supported the bill for helping the state ​“reduce emissions from our transportation system and invest in needed transportation solutions such as expanded mass transit, safe walking routes, and bike lanes.”

She called on state lawmakers to make two amendments to the bill as proposed. The bill does not ​“explicitly address neighborhood level pollution where communities of color and low-income communities often breathe the dirtiest air,” she wrote. ​“I urge you to amend the bill so that it requires guaranteed local emission reductions in the communities facing the greatest exposure to pollution.”

She also called on state lawmakers to amend the bill to give the equity advisory board ​“clear responsibilities to shape the program” and to make sure that people who actually use the bus system have a say in what transportation infrastructure improvements are ultimately made.

“For the past 150 some odd years, we have enjoyed the pleasure of burning oil into the atmosphere with abandon, and our history would look very different if we hadn’t,” local safe streets advocate Lior Trestman wrote.

“However, it is now past time for this blip in the timeline of humanity to come to an end. Companies no longer need to be able to destroy our planet for free to be financially viable, do not listen to them when they say otherwise. If what they say is in fact true, then they need to hire some more visionary executives, and change their business model.”

And Mayor Justin Elicker threw his support behind the proposal as one way to encourage regional action to address ​“disparities associated with poor air quality” like those seen in New Haven.

With TCI, he wrote, ​“we have the opportunity to address transportation-sector emissions on a regional basis and, in turn, support the communities most impacted by the adverse effects of climate change.”

Critics: ​“Regressive Tax Hike” At Gas Pump

In their opposition to the proposed TCI bill and initiative more broadly, Senate Republican leaders Kevin Kelly and Paul Formica zeroed in on related increased costs at the pumps.

TCI ​“would result in higher gas taxes on Connecticut’s middle class families,” they wrote. ​“We have followed the public debate over whether this policy would lead to a 5 cent-per gallon tax hike, a 17-cent-per gallon tax hike or an even higher amount. For proponents to argue that it’s ​‘only’ a five-cent per gallon tax hike is tone deaf. Try making that ​“it’s only five cents” argument to a single mother, to a senior on fixed income or to a retired veteran. Try making that argument to someone who lost her job after the pandemic hit and has not found employment in Connecticut since.”

They criticized the ​“regressive tax hike” as unduly punishing Connecticut families even as ​“states to our west are not moving forward with their own clean air reforms. If struggling Connecticut middle class families are going to be asked to make this financial sacrifice to achieve cleaner air, then states to our west should make the same commitment. Otherwise, we here in Connecticut would get nothing for our sacrifice.”

Retired former New Haven fire union president Frank Ricci also cited the increased cost of gas in written testimony he submitted to the committee in opposition to the TCI.

“This indirect tax hurts those who are hurting the most. Not everyone has the ability to work by ZOOM,” he wrote. ​“Whether it is a worker at the grocery store, restaurant, first responder, hospital, delivery person or the custodian, this bill will end up costing them more at the pump.

“We also know based off experience when the cost of fuel goes up, we end up paying more for consumable goods. It is my hope that elected leaders will advocate for our residents who keep our great state running.”

In his testimony in support of the bill and of TCI more broadly, Wooster Square resident Aaron Goode pushed back on critics’ sole focus on a ​“gas tax.”

“Connecticut already has a massive unseen pollution tax that is paid every day by low-income residents of New Haven, Bridgeport and Hartford through asthma hospitalizations, wide prevalence of respiratory illness, and missed school days (asthma is the number one reason that New Haven children miss school),” he wrote.

“TCI merely internalizes the externalized transportation costs that are currently shouldered by those who can least afford them.”

Click on the Facebook Live video below to watch Monday morning’s virtual presser in full.