As the Republican candidate for Branford’s 102nd District state representative, Chris Kelly said he wants to facilitate change and build consensus to fix problems he says are due to five years of Democratic state leadership.

A Connecticut native, Kelly moved to Branford in 2015. He’s had a life-long interest in serving in government and got started by accepting an appointment to Branford’s Planning & Zoning Commission in early 2016. Kelly is a manager with Cohen’s Bagels of Madison and also a part-time real estate agent with Branford-based Sette Real Estate. With “Main Street” experience and a young family including a kindergartner in Branford public schools, Kelly feels he represents issues and concerns facing many Branford residents and businesses.

Kelly said Connecticut is financially mismanaged, overtaxed, and over-regulated. He said fundamental tax and regulation reform is needed to bring relief and help spur economic development. When it comes to fixing the state’s budget woes and reversing the trending budget deficit, which topped $170 million for the 2015-’16 fiscal year, Kelly calls for a “multi-pronged” approach.

“Part of that is budget reform,” said Kelly. “Where are we placing our resources? Where are we spending them? How are we coming to the numbers of deciding how much is being spent? I think that a full audit of our state expenditures is needed. The budget needs to pass certain tests—is it a necessary expenditure, and can it be done for less?”

Another part of his approach would be tax and regulatory reform to decrease bureaucracy and make Connecticut more efficient and cost-effective, said Kelly.

“Rather than looking at a finite amount of resources, where we are in a constant state of a budget crisis, we should look at expanding the resources that we have,” said Kelly. “For so many years now, under one party rule, the answer [has] always been tax and spend. We cannot tax our way to growth. We cannot regulate our way to prosperity. You have to come to grips with the fact that a lot of our issues are government created. We are so top-heavy on the Hartford level that it’s suffocating families, it’s suffocating small business, and that is creating a smaller and smaller amount of resources that our state has to use to spend.”

Kelly recognizes Connecticut’s recent $220 million, 15-year financial incentive deal with Sikorsky Aircraft saved “thousands of jobs,” but said the deal’s also indicative of the state’s “negative and costly business environment.

“Our state had a missed opportunity [to] address other issues that could have benefited more companies and more individuals instead of just people associated with Sikorsky,” said Kelly. “I think our next legislative session in January really needs to focus on economic development not for just a select few companies, but for all companies in Connecticut. Sikorsky is just one company, and thank God we saved them, but we have to address companies that have 1,000 employees, 500 employees, 20 employees. They all deserve relief.”

As a state representative, Kelly said he’d like to help focus on economic development.

“Our state and our town need it. We’ve squandered five years of an economic recovery, to the point where there are a lot of economists out there that say we’re due for another downturn,” said Kelly. “So the fact that our state has been left behind in the recovery, and the nation could be facing another recession in the next year or two, does not bode well for things. We have to make fundamental changes in how Connecticut does business.”

Kelly said up-ticks in areas such as biotech in Branford are among the state’s few economic positives.

“There are definitely bright spots out there that encourage people to still look forward and to still want to invest,” he said, “but I think if you look at a lot of those bright spots, they have been helped along by various different types of corporate welfare, and that corporate welfare is part of the problem with our state government. Rather than picking the winners and losers, why don’t we let the market do that? Why don’t we provide a better business environment for everybody, allow municipalities, maybe, to take it upon themselves to offer different incentives if they are able to, and let the state focus on the grander picture of creating a better environment for all of us to work under?”

Kelly said a familiar question residents and business owners should be asking themselves is, “Are you better off than you were four years ago?”

“Home values are either the same or worse, possibly, [and] we’re seeing more empty store fronts in town than there were a couple years ago. More people are moving out. We are not better off,” said Kelly. “For people like me running for office that have Main Street experience, everything that I’m going to be voting on in Hartford is something that we discuss and worry over at home, or that I deal with at the restaurant at work at, or with my clients in real estate...That perspective, I believe, is invaluable.”

Kelly joined the race for the 102nd seat in July, with the endorsement of the Republican Town Committee. Kelly replaced an earlier candidate, Ray Ingraham, after Ingraham announced it had become necessary for him to end his run (see the story at www.zip06.com). Kelly said running against a four-term incumbent isn’t daunting, and that he has been enjoying campaigning.

“I think that every campaign has challenges,” said Kelly. “I’m feeling rightfully challenged for the office that I’m running for. I think that even incumbents have difficulty with name recognition, because there are varying interests in politics. I’m focusing on getting out there and talking to the small business owner, talking to our local residents at restaurants, at stores, out on the Green at town events, and knocking on doors.”

Kelly said many of the issues citizens are concerned about are tied to taxes and regulations.

“It’s seen with the seniors who can’t afford to stay here, with the small businesses that can’t afford to hire new employees, or maybe open up a new location. It’s seen in our college graduates coming home only to move away and take a job somewhere else,” said Kelly. “The general consensus is something’s got to give, and there is a better way. Even well-run municipalities that have a diverse tax base such as Branford, and that have so much to offer the people that want to live here and want to invest here, are being impacted. In the last five years, we are realizing that towns are not insulated from dysfunction in our capital [and] right now that trickle down dysfunction is effecting us day in, day out. And despite headlines of incremental improvements, it’s not enough. We are still behind the region and we are still behind the nation with our recovery.”

Kelly said all state leaders, regardless of party affiliation, need to begin working together to fix the problem.

“We have to work in a two-party system, but the best way to get the job done is to work together. That is something that really has not been done. Hartford has been very divisive, and that one party has controlled the legislature for close to 40 years. What made Connecticut great 40 years ago is very different than what it is now. We can’t keep doing things the same way.”

Kelly adds he’s proud to be running on the Republican ticket.

“The [Democratic] Party that’s been in control believes that the answers come from government,” said Kelly. “And the Republican Party sides more with the fact that the problems come from government. So as part of that consensus building, there needs to be that middle ground, working with both parties and find different solutions. The ones that have been coming out have not been sustainable, and they have not been creating the broad strokes that every resident and every business needs in the state.”