Ned Lamont

Lamont was born in Washington, D.C. In 1976, he received a B.A. in sociology from Harvard College. In 1980, Lamont received an M.B.A. from the Yale School of Management.

Lamont founded Lamont Digital Systems (originally Lamont Television Systems), a telecommunications company. Among the company's divisions was Campus Televideo, which provided cable television services to hundreds of university campuses. Lamont sold Campus Televideo in 2015.[10][11] As of May 2021, he was an adjunct professor of political science and philosophy at Central Connecticut State University.[12]

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Campaign website

Lamont's campaign website stated the following:

Reducing Property Taxes for the Middle Class

From Middlebury to Middletown and Norwalk to Norwich, people in Connecticut feel squeezed. Our state has become one of the most expensive places to raise a family or start a business. And in the face of stagnant wages and weak job growth, Hartford politicians have hit middle class families with tax increase after tax increase. Even worse, there’s barely anything to show for it: after three decades of mismanagement by governors of both parties, our budget hole remains deep and Connecticut’s working families are being asked to pick up more of the tab. It’s unfair, it’s unproductive, and it needs to change. Connecticut’s middle class needs and deserves a break.

Businesses won’t come to a state where their employees can’t afford to live. Young people won’t consider building a future in a state where they can’t afford to own a home. And long-time residents won’t retire where they can’t afford to remain.

That’s why I’m proposing a plan to give Connecticut families a property tax cut. Decades of fiscal mismanagement mean we can’t afford pie-in-the-sky promises, so I’m proposing a smart, achievable commitment to responsibly give middle class families the tax relief they deserve. It’s not only the right thing to do for working families; property tax relief is key to making Connecticut a better place to start or grow a business and create jobs.

Connecticut’s property tax system is broken. We rely far too much on taxing people’s homes and cars to fund essential local services. And towns and cities with the greatest local needs also have the greatest difficulty raising local revenues, with less local wealth to draw on and much of their local property exempt from taxation. Municipalities must become more efficient and reduce costs – but our state must also provide immediate relief to hard-pressed middle class families.

High-need towns and cities have schools to fund, roads to repair, and police and firefighters to keep on the job. With flat or declining local wealth, they are backed into ever-higher property tax rates – making it harder to attract residents and businesses and keep long-time locals in their homes. Development is distorted, too, creating incentives for towns to limit access to families with school-aged children and making it less attractive to develop affordable housing in our cities. Worse still, the burden of high property taxes is unfairly distributed: lower- and middle-income families and seniors are hit the hardest. And this is a problem that isn’t unique to homeowners: 20 percent or more of the cost of rent in Connecticut is due to local property taxes.

Reforming this broken system is imperative, but it will take time to turn around – and working families in Connecticut can’t afford to wait. Recently, the middle class lost one of the last breaks it got. Governor Malloy rolled back the property tax credit, effectively raising taxes on the middle class.

In my first biennial budget as governor, I will restore and expand the property tax credit for working families. Starting in the second year of my first budget, I will reverse Malloy's tax hike by raising the property tax credit for existing beneficiaries by 50 percent. And I'll expand eligibility, allowing any taxpayer with property tax liability to participate and growing the number of Connecticut residents who can get a break. If your household earns up to $160,500 a year, you’ll qualify for relief from property taxes paid on your home or your car. 900,000 taxpayers in homes with more than 2 million Connecticut residents would see a benefit. About half of these residents will be getting much-needed property tax relief for the first time in four years. That is meaningful relief, and it’s delivered responsibly at a cost of around just 1 percent of the most recent annual state budget.

Looking ahead, we need to do more. It’s no secret that Connecticut’s budget is as broken as our property tax system. Decades of fiscal mismanagement by Hartford politicians in both parties have put real limits on how much of a tax break we can reasonably afford – constraints that the Republicans willfully ignore in the hopes that no one will call them out on their fantasy math. Impossible promises won’t ever put money back in the pockets of working families in Connecticut, but responsible planning will.

That’s why in my second biennial budget, I’ll propose additional property tax relief targeted at the low- and middle-income taxpayers who are hit the hardest by this broken system. We’ll use the first two years to begin to get our state’s finances back on track, so that we can afford critical tax relief aimed at the families struggling hardest in Connecticut to make ends meet. For a relatively modest cost, we can provide up to a $1,200 credit to working families owning or renting a home and paying more than 6.5 percent of their income in property taxes. There are nearly 350,000 taxpayers in Connecticut, in homes with 915,000 people, who would stand to benefit. And the average beneficiary will receive a nearly $700 tax cut.

In the longer term, we need fundamental structural reform of Connecticut’s broken property tax system. That means having every stakeholder at the table – from municipal and nonprofit leaders who must do more with less, to teachers and first responders who make our communities run, to homeowners and renters who have to be able to afford a place to live. Structural reform starts with identifying inefficiencies within our fragmented system of 169 towns and cities, but it also means critically reexamining whether regional services make more sense than leaving every locality to fend for itself. These are tough choices, and only one candidate is telling the truth about them. I won’t be afraid to lead on structural reform – and to stand up right away for working families and the middle class who need a break and cannot wait.

First Biennial Budget

In the second year, reversing Malloy’s tax hike by increasing the property tax credit by 50 percent and expanding access to more middle-class taxpayers. Singles earning up to $116,500, heads of households earning up to $138,500, and joint filers earning up to $160,500, will get relief of up to $300 from property taxes paid on a residence or car.

That’s $165 million in new property tax relief for 900,000 taxpayers in households with more than 2 million Connecticut residents.

Roughly half of those 900,000 taxpayers will see property tax relief for the first time since 2015.

Second Biennial Budget

After beginning to stabilize Connecticut’s finances in our first biennial budget, we’ll deliver targeted relief for the hardest-hit working families in our second biennial budget.

There are nearly 350,000 taxpayers across the state who pay an enormous percentage of their household income in property taxes and who would qualify for much-needed targeted relief. More than 900,000 people and their families in Connecticut who spend at least 6.5 percent of their income on property taxes –and many who spend as much as 12 percent –would benefit.

That’s $185 million in long-overdue relief to working families who pay a disproportionate percentage of their household income on property taxes, providing them with up to a $1,200 credit.

To shore up property tax relief for Connecticut’s seniors, we’ll also restore state funding cut during the Malloy administration for the municipal property tax credit program – and add new funding to cover 25,000 senior renters under the same program.

Finding Savings for the Tax Plan

Republicans want you to believe they can eliminate the income tax and punch a $20 billion hole in the biennial budget without offering a single way to pay for it. That isn’t a serious plan. My proposal is different. It relies on practical and responsible ways to pay for the targeted relief that so many Connecticut families desperately need.

Here are some of the cost-saving measures over the next four years that will make a meaningful and responsible middle-class tax cut possible:

Reducing costs at the Department of Correction. We currently spend over $1.3 billion a year on prisons and corrections – more than two and a half times what the state budget allocates to higher education. Thanks in large part to smart and sensible criminal justice reforms, Connecticut’s prison population continues to fall – as does the state’s crime rate. Keeping pace on these reforms will drive down these costs by $125 million a year.

Improving tax enforcement and leveling the playing field for Connecticut businesses. By using technology, modern analytics, and rapid response, the Department of Revenue Services can improve tax collections, audit, and enforcement and close the “tax gap” (the amount of taxes that are owed but not collected). These reforms will generate savings and additional revenues from $150 million to $200 million.

People have long participated in under-the-table sports gambling; a recent Supreme Court decision makes it possible for Connecticut to regulate this activity, after negotiation with our tribes, and draw between $30 million and $50 million in annual revenues from it for the first time.

These cost savings range from $305 million to $375 million and will responsibly fund meaningful property tax relief for the middle class.

Building a Fair Economy

When Annie and I made the decision to start our family, Connecticut was where everyone wanted to be. The right mix of cities, close to Boston and New York, good schools, great neighborhoods, but most importantly Connecticut was full of opportunity. That’s what a strong and vibrant economy is: opportunity. Today, a strong economy is a fair economy. An economy that pays a living wage, supports women and people of color in the workplace, and provides everyone with a second chance.

Why I support equal pay for equal work

I have spent most of my career starting up and running small businesses. I know that paying workers fairly is important to the culture of a company. When someone is treated unfairly that impacts morale across the workplace and reduces productivity.

Equal pay for equal work can contribute to ending Connecticut’s fiscal woes. Annually, women who are employed full time in Connecticut lose a combined total of $15 billion to the wage gap.

This is why I support passing legislation that will prevent employers from salary questions, including the legislation currently raised before the Connecticut legislature.

Why I support Paid Family and Medical Leave

I know how important it is to a workplace that you do not lose a great member of the team because they are faced with a personal crisis. Her leaving the workplace is bad for her, and it's bad for business. Paid family and medical leave is the right thing to do, and the smart thing to do. Workers in Connecticut should not have to choose between spending the first days with their child, the last days with their parent, or paying their mortgage.

We need to increase the number of workers in our state who will have access to paid family and medical leave. This will make us a more attractive state to modern workers. According to a study done by the Connecticut Campaign for Paid Family Leave “more than 38% of millennial workers said that they would not only move state’s but move to another country for better parental benefits.”

We need to protect against harassment in the workplace

Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. once said “It may true that the law cannot change the heart but it can restrain the heartless.” The power of the #MeToo movement and the courage of women everywhere who have stood up and spoken out about sexual harassment has begun to change hearts, it is our responsibility to make sure that we restrain the heartless.

A second chance

Connecticut is leading the Nation on Criminal Justice reform. I am so proud to live in a state that is working to fight back against the impacts of institutionalized racism. Making sure that all of our returning citizens have access to a second chance and a good career is an essential part of the fair economy. Expanding partnerships with Labor and with our community colleges and four year universities, like the ones that I have seen at Asnuntuck and Goodwin College, will be a priority for my administration.

A strong labor movement

The Republicans here in Connecticut and Nationally are working to dismantle the key protections that labor movement helped our country put in place to build the middle class. Pushing for a fair wage, advocating for safe and dignified working conditions, and building a path to a secure retirement are things that all American workers have a right to. That’s what labor fights for, and that’s why I will fight for labor. The outcome of Janus vs. AFSCME will have profound impacts on labor and working families across the nation. As Governor I will protect workers rights and keep labor at the table.

Why I support a $15 minimum wage

Creating a $15 minimum wage is an important step in improving the quality of life for working families across Connecticut, and I believe it will boost wages across the board. In this modern economy, workers have never been more productive, yet wages are stagnant. As cost of living rises and our economy continues to transition, I believe a $15 minimum wage will ensure that working families can thrive in our state. Building up our middle class is good for our families and good for our economy.

Increasing the minimum wage to $15 is also a tool that will help close the wage gap between men and women in our state. More than 60% of minimum wage workers in Connecticut are women, and a significant population of those women are women of color. In our state Latinas and black women make 47¢ and 58¢ respectively for every $1.00 paid to white, non-Hispanic men. This disparity is even more troubling when coupled with the reminder that more than 170,000 households in Connecticut are headed by women. Median annual income for single female-headed households in Connecticut with children under eighteen is $30,795, while the same for single male-headed households with children under eighteen is $45,986. That’s a difference that puts single mothers behind single fathers in their ability to pay for child care, cover tuition fees, put food on the table, pay the mortgage or cover their rent.

Fixing the DMV

Let’s be honest – nobody likes going to the DMV. Wait times regularly turn what should be a quick visit into a daylong ordeal. Residents who should be treated as well as customers at any private business are subjected to extended delays, confusing requirements, and poor service. Errands that require 10 minutes in other states require a day off work in Connecticut. Even efforts to upgrade the system become mired in delay and disappointment.

It doesn’t have to be that way.

The DMV touches almost all Connecticut residents. It’s one of the most common interactions between Connecticut families and their government – and our DMV is stuck in the past.

I will take it into the 21st century. Cloud-based technologies customers expect in other states and other sectors could transform the DMV. Like New Yorkers, our residents should be able to renew a license from the comfort of their homes. Like Californians, they should be able to schedule all DMV appointments over their phones. And like customers at other crowded businesses such as airline check-in counters and popular restaurants, those who visit DMV service centers should be greeted by modern and efficient technologies: kiosks that allow them to bypass long lines for simple services and the option of receiving a text message when a window is ready.

Many of those transformative technologies can be rolled out from day one. Others require we finally get serious about updating and integrating the DMV’s three principal computer systems. Those systems – a 40-year-old licensing mainframe, a distributed registration platform, and an online payment and scheduling tool for learners permits and road tests – have different code bases, and don’t talk to each other well. For too long, the DMV has focused on patchwork solutions rather than on creating a unified architecture. If we don’t act now, we’ll continue to fall further and further behind.

We all watched as the DMV botched its initial effort to unify those computer systems. Residents grew frustrated. Wait times skyrocketed to as long as eight hours. The images of lines out the doors of the branches were startling. Connecticut watched as the DMV went back and forth with its vendor, and as the agency struggled to adapt to a new system. Even today, years after that partial roll-out, wait times at the DMV routinely exceed two hours.

It has to change.

I will implement a common-sense plan to make the DMV more efficient. By limiting how often people have to visit the DMV, reducing the amount of time each visit takes, and thinking strategically about how to move its computer systems into the future, I will bring efficiency and change to an agency that has frustrated people and defied politicians for decades – saving Connecticut money and saving our residents time. I have an eight-step plan to improve our system:

Less Time at the DMV

Extend Licenses and Registrations

The simplest and most cost-effective way to improve your interactions with the DMV is to reduce your interactions with the DMV. Although many states allow their residents to go eight years between new licenses, our legislature recently refused to extend Connecticut licenses beyond six years. I’ll extend the length of your license by a third. I’ll also extend the length of your registration by half, to three years –the length of most car leases –instead of two. Those changes will decrease visits and improve wait times for everyone.

Transform Customer-Facing Processes

We’ve all been there – you wait in line for an hour only to be placed in a second one to fill out another form, and then another. You get in line, take a number, sit-down, only to stand back up, show your paperwork, and sit down again to wait for another window. There are simply too many steps in the process for customers – and the sheer number of steps within a branch to complete a single transaction results in a poor customer experience full of confusion and frustration. It’s driving up wait times. I will charge the commissioner with cutting out unnecessary bureaucratic steps, revamping processes so that they’re simple and straightforward, and making sure staff are trained to use any new software up front, rather than having to learn it on the fly.

Open New DMV Express Centers

Connecticut residents shouldn’t have to go to a DMV location for simple services. Until recently, they didn’t have to: AAA offices in eight municipalities processed 150,000 annual renewals. Since those offices closed, wait times have spiked. One proven solution is making better use of an existing resource: our 169 town halls. By opening DMV Express Centers staffed by experienced DMV employees in twenty of those halls and by deploying kiosks to additional businesses, we’ll be able to provide simple, effective services to residents across the state and reduce lines inside agency branches at a relatively low cost.

Create New Regional DMV Supercenters

As we open local centers across the state, we also need to tear apart service-as-usual and completely reinvent, rethink, and revamp the way the DMV flagship branches do business. Right now, there are 8 hub offices, 5 limited service locations, three appointment-only offices, and one “other service” location. That means we have 17 locations with varying and limited degrees of service. Instead, we need to modernize our hub offices into new supercenters, well served by public transportation, that are thoughtfully designed, equipped, and staffed to offer a best-in-class customer experience – during business hours convenient for those customers. That will streamline service provision and save money down the line.

Bring the DMV into the 21st Century

Introduce Modern, Customer-Facing Technology

Modern conveniences perfected in other states, and by banks and other private companies, need to be introduced across the Connecticut DMV. That begins with everyday expectations like remote renewals so that residents will rarely need to visit a branch in person. It includes more pioneering customer-centered technologies, like a recent Louisiana program that allows residents of that state to carry a validated digital copy of their license on their phones and tablets. And it ends with a better experience for every DMV customer in the state. We also need to publicize which services are currently available online, because one in every three DMV visitors is there to accomplish an errand that can already be done remotely.

Overhaul Software Platforms

It’s not just our customer-facing software that’s fallen behind the times. DMV computers rely on a decades-old mainframe and a patchwork of other systems that cause glitches, create inefficiencies, and waste time. We need to modernize and integrate those systems to provide a seamless customer experience and 21st-century services to Connecticut residents. That’s why I will complete the long-standing project to overhaul the DMV’s software.

Accountability

Strengthen Outside Contracts

The last time the DMV tried to modernize its systems, Connecticut residents spent $26 million on a lemon. 3M, the company hired to do the job, didn’t live up to its end of the bargain. As a result, wait times spiked, registrations were cancelled, and confusion ensued. We need stronger claw back standards on the books and in our contracts so that taxpayers know their money is being well-spent on quality services – and that their money will be returned if companies don’t follow through on their promises. In the middle of a fiscal crisis, we cannot let vendors get away with doing a poor job or find ourselves in prolonged legal battles over shoddy service. Instead, we need to be clear that if you want to do business with the State of Connecticut, we expect best-in-class service – and our money back if we don’t get it. We also need to ensure we have full and instant access to the code written by the vendors we hire.

A Top-To-Bottom Review Aimed at Cutting Fees and Saving Dollars

The DMV should not make Connecticut residents stand in line all day, and then make them pay some of the country’s highest fees for driver’s licenses, road testing, and other services. I commit to a thorough review of the fees at the DMV and to making sure that fees for non-commercial services like driver’s licenses are no more than the regional average. Non-driver photo IDs, which are required to unlock so many public and private services, should be free to all our residents. And we should incentivize improved performance by allowing anyone forced to wait an undue amount of time for a straightforward service to get what they came for without paying a dime.

Fixing the DMV is about more than respecting our residents’ time. It’s about restoring their confidence in government. I will do both – and then I will take the lessons we learn streamlining the DMV and roll them out to other state service providers that also subject residents to undue delays.

Investing in Education

I believe that access to high-quality public education must be a right for all, not just the privileged few.

I have visited educational institutions all over the state hearing from driven students and passionate educators, and I am proud of the hard work that Connecticut has done to improve our educational system over the past few decades. Our teachers and educators are incredibly hard-working and I thank them for their dedication to the well-being of our children and adult-learners alike.

Critically, some of the ideas below represent tangible solutions that have little or no additional cost to the state, such as encouraging partnerships similar to the one between Goodwin College, Pratt and Whitney and local technology companies to grow our students’ skillsets.

A strong and vibrant education system designed for the needs of individuals of all ages and aligned with employers’ needs will help drive our state’s economic recovery, as employers will be able to hire Connecticut residents for Connecticut jobs, and be confident in growing in Connecticut.

That’s why I will strengthen our education system by focusing on:

Child Care & Early Education

Studies show that investing in early education is a good investment for the economic future of Connecticut. At All Our Kin, a non-profit supporter of sustainable family child care programs, I learned that every dollar they spent returned $15 or more to the regional economy. Given this fact, and increasingly strong research on brain development, we can no longer afford to view child care as a convenience, but an educational and economic necessity, especially for low-income families.

In additional to the developmental and educational benefits for children and increased income for child care providers, having quality and consistent child care means parents can reenter the workforce or better retain their jobs.

As governor, I will prioritize:

Expanding nurse-family partnerships, child care, and early education programs. Nobel Prize-winning social science research has shown that each dollar invested in early childhood education results in $15 of future benefits.

Protecting and fully funding the Care4Kids program, which helps low to moderate income families in Connecticut pay for child care costs.

K-12 Education & Vo-Tech

In the past 20 years, the Education Cost Sharing (ECS) formula has been fully funded only twice and legislators in Hartford continually tweak the formula to gain political favor instead of thinking about the needs of our children, the needs of our schools or the needs of our state. Education is the best investment we can make in our future, and funding it should not be a political question.

For example, in fiscal year 2019, Waterbury’s Education Cost Sharing Grant will be underfunded by more than $60 million, according to the Connecticut School Finance Project. During fiscal year 2019, Waterbury is slated to receive $136.6 million in Education Cost Sharing funding – $22.5 million is in the form of an Alliance Grant. Waterbury is not alone: many rural, suburban and urban communities now have different student populations and different needs than they did in decades past, but state funding has not been adjusted to support these communities, and the lack of transparency with how funding is dispersed further impedes fair distribution of funding.

By implementing the education funding formula as it was written – based on need – we can begin to address the disparities that are present in our educational system.

The education achievement gaps between our districts is heartbreaking, because it means that some of our children are being left behind. The increasing segregation of our classrooms is distressing. And we must do more to make sure that we don’t slip further behind Massachusetts or other states in K-12 education quality.

As we continue to address the education achievement gap that is present across the state, we need to look at what public school systems like Macdonough Elementary School in Middletown are doing to foster a better teaching and learning environment.

During the 2017-18 academic year, Macdonough Elementary School faced the possibility of closure to offset a cut in state and municipal aid. As one of 33 Alliance Districts in the state, the Middletown public school system has taken critical steps to close its achievement gap by focusing on improving test scores, increasing instructional time and creating a more diverse staff that is reflective of the student body.

Macdonough has also worked to prepare our students for a 21st-century economy by teaching them problem-solving skills and how to think critically through the school’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics program. Macdonough’s STEM program targets students in grades four and five with a hands-on, inquiry-based approach to learning.

STEM-related careers are among the fastest-growing jobs in Connecticut. We need to encourage all students – regardless of their race or gender – to pursue a STEM education so we can create a more diverse talent pool.

As governor, I will work tirelessly on my first day and every day to improve educational access, equity and outcomes in the state. I am proud to support a comprehensive education reform platform to expand access to childcare and early childhood education; to improve K-12 education; to expand workforce development programs; and to make college accessible to all.

That’s why as governor, I will prioritize:

Fixing and fully-funding the Education Cost Sharing (ECS) formula so that our school districts have the resources to educate our children.

Boosting academic achievement of all students by encouraging more diversity among our teachers. R