CBIA Releases 2024 State Legislative Voting Records

The state’s largest business organization today released its annual legislative scorecards, reflecting key state Senate and House votes from the 2024 General Assembly session.
Votes were scored for 12 bills, chosen based on their potential impact—positive or negative—on job growth and the state’s competitiveness and economic outlook.
CBIA’s Transform Connecticut policy solutions—supported by a bipartisan group of 84 state legislators—are featured in many of those bills.
CBIA president and CEO Chris DiPentima said the scorecards reflect lawmakers’ awareness of key issues such as healthcare, childcare, housing, and the high cost of living and doing business.
“We approached this legislative session with a package of commonsense proposals designed to capitalize on the state’s strong fiscal health,” DiPentima said.
“Our voting records reflect lawmakers’ priorities and their positions on issues critical to growing Connecticut’s economy.”
Bipartisanship
DiPentima noted that the bipartisanship and collaboration that was a hallmark of the 2023 session took a step backward in 2024, with this year’s scorecard featuring fewer legislators with 100% scores.
“It’s critical that lawmakers on both sides of the aisle remember that the decisions they make have impacts that extend far beyond the halls of the Capitol, affecting people and businesses across the state,” he said.
“Our voting records reflect lawmakers’ priorities and their positions on issues critical to growing Connecticut’s economy.”
CBIA’s Chris DiPentima
DiPentima added that when legislators work together and collaborate, “everyone benefits.”
“We saw this particularly in legislation addressing the state’s childcare crisis, updating the teacher certification process, evaluating school outcomes to drive career and college preparedness, and expanding access to rapid whole genome sequencing for critically ill infants, which all saw widespread support,” he said.
“These are bills that will have an impact on not only the lives and well being of families, but will also help businesses attract the workforce that will grow our economy.”
Impact
DiPentima also noted that the scorecards reflected lawmakers’ actions on a series of costly workplace mandates.
“Legislators must understand the impact mandates such as expanding paid sick leave and providing taxpayer-funded benefits for striking workers have on the state’s small businesses, the backbone of our economy,” he said.
“Legislators must understand the impact mandates have on the state’s small businesses.”
DiPentima
“These mandates, along with lawmakers’ inaction on transformative, bipartisan legislation providing hundreds of thousands of small business employees access to quality, affordable healthcare, make it harder for businesses to compete and make our state less friendly for businesses.
“This is reflected in the steep decline from 16th to 39th for Connecticut’s business friendliness in CNBC’s just-released America’s Top States for Business rankings.”
Bipartisanship
DiPentima urged lawmakers to embrace bipartisanship and develop policies “that make Connecticut more affordable, ensure the state’s fiscal health, and prevent more costly small business mandates.”
“It’s critical that we return to that spirit of collaboration to move our economy forward,” he said.
“That will be tested early in the 2025 legislative session, with critical decisions relative to the guardrails that have restored the state’s fiscal health.
“Those guardrails allowed for much needed investments in a variety of areas, while also paying down our long-term debt obligations, long a drag on our economy.
“Making Connecticut a more affordable place to live and work, tackling our workforce challenges, and growing our economy for the long term must be at the center of every conversation candidates for office engage in ahead of this fall’s election.”
Voting-Records_2024CBIA is Connecticut’s largest business organization, with thousands of member companies, small and large, representing a diverse range of industries from every part of the state. For more information, please contact Scott Beaulieu (860.244.1929).
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