Connecticut Legislature Passes Two Major Jobs Bills

Lawmakers passed two major jobs bills during the 2011 legislative session; one modifying several economic development programs and supporting entrepreneurship and innovation, and the other providing incentives to attract large companies to the state. A proposal dubbed Bioscience Connecticut, centered on renovating and expanding the University of Connecticut Health Center, also won legislative approval.

HB 6525 establishes and modifies several economic development programs, including two measures aimed at retaining recent college graduates. Under the new Learn Here, Live Here program, students graduating in the state after 2014 will be eligible for a first-time home-buyers tax credit up to $2,500. The bill requires recipients to remain in the state for five years. Another measure expands eligibility under the student loan reimbursement program to residents receiving degrees in biomedical engineering and the manufacture of medical devices. The program provides tuition reimbursement for students who obtain degrees related to green technology, life science or health information technology.

The bill also creates a Manufacturing Reinvestment Account where up to $50,000 can be used by 50 manufacturers with 50 or less employees for up to five years to reinvest and grow their businesses. Other provisions in the bill include qualifying dislocated workers for entrepreneurial training, allowing more businesses and nonprofit organizations to qualify for loans under the Department of Economic and Community Development's (DECD) Connecticut Credit Consortium program, and establishing a 19-member task force to identify barriers facing Connecticut's businesses and industries. Read the bill.

Gov. Malloy's Bioscience Connecticut proposal, centered on renovating and expanding the University of Connecticut Health Center, also won legislative approval. The $864 million project is expected to be completed in 2018 and generate mostly construction jobs. Its goal also is to double federal industry research grants to drive discovery, innovation and commercialization, according to the governor's office. The initiative includes incubator space to foster new startup companies and a loan forgiveness program to attract more graduates in medicine and dentistry. New bonding totaling $254 million combined with previously approved bonding of $338 million, $203 million in private financing, and $69 million from the Health Center will pay for the project.

Lawmakers also passed the governor's First Five initiative, providing incentives to the first five businesses that each bring a minimum of 200 new full-time jobs to the state within the next two years. The legislation allows eligible companies to combine benefits of the state's Reinvestment Tax Credit, the Manufacturing Assistance Act and the Job Creation Tax Credit. Read the bill...

The enacted budget provides line-item funding for several TBED programs within DECD in the first year of the biennium, including $646,000 for CONNSTEP, $425,000 for the Small Business Incubator Program, $255,000 for CCAT Manufacturing Supply Chain, $191,781 for Hydrogen/Fuel Cell Economy, and $148,750 for Southeast CT Incubator. A new Economic Development Grants account is funded in the second year of the biennium with $1.8 million. Several of these programs, which receive no line-item funding in FY13, will compete for those funds. Under the governor's original proposal, the aforementioned programs along with several others would be consolidated into the new grants account and funded with $2.5 million each fiscal year (see the March 2, 2011 issue of the Digest).

At the close of the legislative session, Gov. Malloy called for a special session next fall to focus on job creation.