New London Reacts to Conn Student Voting in Budget Referendum

Despite a visit to Connecticut College by Mayor Daryl Justin Finizio on Thursday, September 13, the budget referendum for the city of New London was defeated last Tuesday, with 60% of voters saying “no.” There was a voter turnout of 18.5%, with 1,436 voting against and 1,007 voting in favor.

The Student Government Association worked through the weekend to register student voters and the Office of Volunteer and Community Service provided transportation throughout the day on Tuesday. When all was said and done, CC Dems reported that 150 students voted in the referendum.

Sparking interest in the voting was Mayor Finizio’s speech at SGA’s general assembly meeting last Thursday about New London’s financial situation and upcoming budget referendum.

“We are at a very critical point in the history of New London. We’re broke – flat broke, in fact,” Mayor Finizio said.

He explained that the current situation is due to years of financial mismanagement including overestimation of revenues, poor record keeping and an overall negative attitude towards raising taxes or cutting services. As a result, the mayor claimed the city is now on the brink of bankruptcy.

Because New London is a municipality, bankruptcy would mean the state of Connecticut would take over all financial management of the city, notably mandating a minimum 30% tax increase.

“This would crush the city of New London; most small businesses would fail – the downtown that I’m sure many of you enjoy going to, would be sacrificed to correct this budget gap,” he said.

To mitigate this, Mayor Finizio has proposed a budget with a 7.5% tax increase, amounting to 79 cents more per day for each New London resident. Ninety-one percent of this tax increase would correct the revenue overestimations of past years. In an exclusive interview with the Voice, the mayor defended the tax increase, saying it was better than the alternative of state-takeover. “In cities such as Waterbury or Bridgeport [where the state of CT has intervened], they imposed at least 30% tax increases and crushed [their] small business economies.”

Without a tax increase, he expressed fear that the city will run out of money as soon as April.

“I know many Connecticut College students vote in New London, but they don’t often vote in referendums. This budget proposal affects you just as much as anyone else – you live here; you are affected by our services and by our quality of life,” he said.

Over the weekend, New London residents reacted to Mayor Finizio’s speech on The College Voice website. Some expressed anger at his one-sided portrayal of the story, while others explained the realities that a tax hike would inflict on New London citizens. The main theme, however, was a plea to students to research the proposal and listen to the opponents before making a decision.

“I consider [Conn students voting in New London] fair only if they, as a voter, are informed on the issues and come to their decision knowing how it might affect their adopted city. I consider it unfair if they, as a voter, are merely voting the way one side instructed them to,” Adam Sprecace, New London City Councilor said in an email conversation with the Voice.

Sprecace explained that his “no” vote on Tuesday was not because he disagrees with the tax, but because he considered the current document incomplete.

He claimed that the document lacked important pieces of information, including employee salaries, employee health insurance costs, debt service details and internal service funds. This information was published on the city website around 4 PM the evening before the referendum, still too late for many voters.

“The importance of properly documenting the Fiscal Year 2013 budget is so that the City Council can do its job over the course of the fiscal year and ensure the Administration is spending taxpayer dollars as approved during the budget process. We currently have no way of doing that with the existing budget document,” Sprecace said.

New London resident Doug Schwartz claims the debate over the budget is a question of salary levels, overtime amounts and staffing. “Many of us feel the city departments are grossly overstaffed,” Schwartz said. He cited the example of law enforcement staff levels, which are significantly larger in New London compared to Norwich – a city similar in demographics that is larger in land area and population but still has a smaller police force. The FBI reported these numbers in 2010 as 105 law enforcement employees in New London and eighty-nine in Norwich.

Schwartz explains that the focus of New London politicians thus far has been to avoid layoffs. A recent example concerns police and fire unions, who decided to make concessions in their contracts in order to avoid layoffs. “Their concessions included giving back some scheduled raises and agreeing to reduced manning levels in the firefighters’ contract, but we still don’t have a firm grasp of the police union givebacks, or whether these will even yield the anticipated savings,” he said.

On the other side of the issue, Laura Natusch, New London resident, supported the right of Conn students to vote, and the budget proposal in the referendum, echoing Mayor Finizio’s concern of looming bankruptcy, “I support this budget because back in 2006, New London had fifteen million dollars in savings, and now we have only three hundred thousand dollars left. To say we don’t need this tax increase is like saying the earth is flat, or that global warming doesn’t exist.”

In the aftermath of the referendum, New London residents continue to question the validity, ethics and even legality of Mayor Finizio’s pitch in comments on articles from the Voice website, the New London Day and New London Patch.

David Collins of the New London Day, in an opinion article dated September 21, found fallacies in Mayor Finizio’s proposal to students. Collins stated that in his opinion, the budget increase is not intended to stave off bankruptcy as the mayor claimed, but rather to uphold the standard of services in New London – standards that Mayor Finizio himself recently fought to raise. Even though the mayor did indeed mention the increase in standards of services in his speech to SGA, Collins claims that in front of students, the mayor emphasized more flashy benefits – like the bars and restaurants downtown.

“My translation of the mayor’s message to students: If you don’t come vote ‘yes,’ all those downtown bars you know and love will fail and close,” Collins said.

Meanwhile, some residents accused the students, as well as the college, of voter fraud. However, the 1979 Surpreme Court case Symm v. United States stated that students possess the constitutional right to vote in their school community. In addition, a phone call to the Connecticut Secretary of State’s Office revealed that in fact this is not a case of voter fraud because students can legally change their registration between their home state and New London, as long as they are not voting twice in the same election.

Although the statutes vary by state, Connecticut law states that students can re-register in their hometowns up to seven days before the general election. Nonetheless, certain residents are claiming that they will file against students who don’t fulfill their obligations as new New London citizens. It was unclear exactly what they meant by this, but presumably they hope that newly registered voters will remain registered in New London instead of re-registering in their home state.

Taylor Gould ’13, President of SGA, defended the voter mobilization that some New London residents are questioning, “As members of the New London community, it is important for Connecticut College students to be involved and informed of issues in our city. At no point did SGA take a side with the referendum but merely provided an avenue for students who are passionate and invested in the issue to become registered voters in New London.”

That being said, many still questioned the ethics of the “students on the hill” voting for a tax-increase that they will not pay for. Many argued that students would pay to register their “shiny new cars” in New London, which would in turn generate revenue for the city. This is true if students remain registered here and own their own cars: registrations must be changed within thirty days. However, most college students don’t actually own their own cars, and thus the expected revenue would still stay in the student’s home state.

Likewise, New Londoners argued that students would be forced to pay property taxes if they live in apartments off-campus. This again is incorrect, not only because a tiny number of students actually live off-campus, but also because unless the student owns the property, it is the landlord who will pay the tax.

In the world of budget politics, multiple referendums are the norm. “Realize that the referendum was just one step in what may take months to play out. It all depends on whether people are satisfied with the next budget produced, and if not, and it is petitioned to a second referendum, things could stay in limbo for a long time until there is a resolution.  Local towns sometimes go until around December before they accept their budgets,” said Schwartz. The town of North Stonington, for example, is heading towards their fourth budget referendum.

Before the next referendum, New London politicians will attempt to reduce the tax increase from 7.5% to 5%. But if this becomes a reality, layoffs and salary cuts are likely according to Schwartz. For now, all city residents can do is sit and wait as the budget is reworked, and hope that an equilibrium can be found between lowering taxes and maintaining jobs. In the meantime, the relationship between Conn and New London hangs in the balance. •

Fred McNulty contributed reporting.