more important to me. god bless the commonwealth of kentucky. we love you. good night. [applause] >> >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these television companies and more, including comcast. comcast is partnering with what -- 1000 community centers, so students from low income families can g the tools they need to be ready fornything. >> comcast supports c-span as a public service, along with these other providers. giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> connecticut governor ned

lamont gave his state of the state address from the capitol in hartford. he was reelected for a second term in november. he talked about his vision for small business, housing, and education. his remarks are about 20 minutes. >> ladies and gentlemen, it is my great privilege to call the -- the appointed committee has indeed fulfilled its duty and is discharged and it is now my great pleasure to introduce to you our wonderful governor, ned lamont. [applause] >> thank you, guys. [applause]

thank you guys. yeah. all right. mr. president mr. speaker senator kelly. representative candle laura, lieutenant governor bysiewicz. members of the general assembly. thank you for inviting me back to the road where it happens four years later and what a four years it has been. alright. every election gives us a fresh start. starting with 36 new legislators. we have a freshly minted secretary of state thomas. we have our first we have our

first millennial constitutional officers, controller scaling and treasurer russell. unlike washington, we have a speaker of the house. speaker of the house readers at the ripe old age of 40. so not to worry kevin and marty and i are hanging around chaperoned this party just a little bit longer. alright, thanks for the birthday greetings. i did turn 69 yesterday. alright, so time marches on. feel like i better hurry up. maybe i'm a little less guarded, a little more blunt and i'm feeling a little more urgency to get the yes. also tell you getting older is kind of liberating, you know, and i don't want you guys to have to wait a generation until

you feel equally liberated. look, when i was, when i turned 18, richard nixon was president. my friends and i were listening to the transistor radio the lottery who's gonna get drafted off to vietnam and i have been a democrat ever since. but even in public life were so much more than our party affiliation. my defining professional experience was starting a telecom company operating that. watching my amazing wife, where's my amazing wife? watching my amazing wife invest in great entrepreneurs.

i want you all to remember, this is a citizen legislature. i get it, the republicans are over here and the democrats are over there, you have caucuses and you have leaders, but you are also much more than that. you bring different experiences and backgrounds to the table. we are all much better for it. perhaps you ran for office because you wanted to fix something that takes you off. i don't know what inspired you, but i urge you at the end of that hearing, grab a beer or cup of coffee or that beverage to your left or right, see what you have in common.

or maybe you are here just because you are proud to be an american citizen serving in our democracy. what's the matter with that? we have four new legislators who were not born in the united states of america. there you are, an amazing entrepreneur. joe from albania, there you are. hector from argentina. rachel from france. their neighbors in greenwich and little france, i love to hear those world cup squabbles.

more importantly, whether you're born in argentina or france or albania, thank you for making connecticut your home. and that's not woke, that is america. while i'm at it, i want to give a special shout out to sarah, she's a student at gateway community college. she hails from afghanistan, where the taliban no longer allows girls to go to college.

sarah, gateway community, if the taliban doesn't welcome you back, you always have a home here. these are connecticut values. let's show how much we can get done by working together, demonstrating how our differences is what brings us together, not tears us apart. so four years ago, the elephant in the room was a permanent physical crisis, remember that? i got a little riled up and said let's fix the damn budget once and for all. we didn't permanently fix it,

but we made the first step. we delivered balanced budget on time without relying on the tax increases that had become the historic norm. just as we were beginning to feel that momentum opening, -- covid hit, and it hit our region hard. i love john lennon, i know he saying imagine. he also said, life is what happens while you are busy making other plans. and nobody had a plan for covid. we reached out to the hospital, to leaders, asking how can we keep our communities safe and how can we get our economy open safely? and i want to say special thanks to each and every one of you, you helped make sure that we are

all speaking in one voice, that we are all rowing together in the same direction. i really think that helped connecticut heal and heal faster. [applause] so in those early months, it was all about lifelines and rescue operations, or more test assistance for essential workers or the unemployment. three years later i still worry like heck about covid, but i worry even more that we will lose the opportunity to lift families up. so the next four years should focus more on recovery, less need for lifelines and more focus on ladders. making sure that growth means a

ladder to opportunity for everyone, regardless of background, regardless of zip code. that is what connecticut is all about. doug macquarie always likes to remind me that talent is widely distributed, but opportunity, not so much. i fiscal priorities are economic growth, because growth is a precondition to economic opportunity. we have 100,000 jobs right now, a smaller share of our workforce of working age is working. our population is growing, but it is growing slowly. and maybe these unfilled jobs require extra training.

so what are we going to do about that? were going to make it easier for people to get back to work. a workplace that meets the needs of young family, paid childcare, paid sick days. these will help young people get back to work and stay at work. and a minimum wage that keeps place with inflation -- keeps pace with inflation. career credentials to set you up with virtually a guaranteed job, which is the next rung of the letter. that new job is the start of a career that gives you the experience and confidence to start your own business. thank you for passing the small business boost fun. it has invested in over 100 new

and expanding companies. most of these businesses are led by women and ice burners of color. -- entrepreneurs of color. innovation doesn't begin and end in the private sector. we rely too much on subsidies instead of innovation to provide better service at less cost. in my office our team has heard me say over and over stop pouring money into a leaky bucket, fix the bucket and put the money to work. we can keep spending hundreds of millions of dollars to patch up those old bridges where the trains and the trucks have to slow down to cross safely or you can rebuild the choke points in

our transportation system to help you get to and from work faster and safer. what i'm headed off to new london in about 10 minutes to meet secretary of transportation, the man formerly known as mayor pete, they awarded a big grants to four states connecticut, one of the four states, $158 million grant to connecticut to rebuild the old gold star bridge, rebuild it. you, secretary cardona.

president biden is still on the way, but he will be back. and he knows all too well that education is that ladder to opportunity. so i urge all of our superintendents and principals and teachers. we've got the resources. let's implement your best ideas to help students recover from learning loss. let's get them loving to learn again with apprentice and career opportunities to put them on the path to success. all right, we have high health care costs, high energy costs, high housing costs, but the answer can't always be more subsidies or bailouts. the taxpayers can't afford it. and too often a subsidy is an excuse for no structural reform. deidre gifford and her health care cabinet will continue to make health care more accessible and more affordable. and i love the recently announced partnership between

yukon and connecticut innovations in hartford healthcare to jointly identify and invest in the next generation of healthcare companies and life saving treatments come on. insurance companies don't just pass along those hospital and pharma costs. let's reward patients and companies who seek treatment where they get the best quality in the best come on, electric companies, don't just tell me you're passing along those high natural gas prices at the ratepayer. oh and can you subsidize it just a little bit more? let's get together. we've already getting control of our energy supply. so putin and the saudis don't have control over our destiny and our wallets. we've made a good start. thanks to you by expanding our wind power, extending our nuclear power, pushing hard to get access to quebec hydro and

making our homes more efficient. that's less cost and carbon free. but the biggest slam in our beautiful state to affordability and economic growth is housing or the lack thereof. every business thinking about moving or expanding repeats to me over and over again and i have the workforce. there's no place for them to live. and the answer can't simply be more subsidies, connecticut towns and cities. here's the deal. you tell us where developers can build more housing. tell us where you want to build. it could be built faster, built at less cost pre zoned and local control will determine how and where it is built. what do you think? that's our future. our future is more local businesses, more housing options

in your downtown did walk to work or take public faster public transit. you know what that means? you've heard me say it over and over again. i don't want more taxes but don't mind more taxpayers. more taxpayers guarantee a bigger economic pie, lets us keep the progress in progressive. the next generation in connecticut is all about opportunity and that opportunity starts with economic growth. fiscal stability is the foundation to inclusive growth. in 2017, the legislature put in place the fiscal guardrails that have allowed us to honestly balance our budget four years in a row. thank you for that. thank you for that.

along the way we paid down billions in pension debt, which our predecessors and put on the state's credit card and we're honoring our commitments to teachers and state employees reducing cost to taxpayers for the next generation and we still have a long way to go. it also means that thanks to our collective efforts, the era of connecticut's permanent fiscal crisis is over. it's over. it's over. it's over. as long as we maintain the same fiscal discipline that served us so well over the last four years

and after many years of unfilled promises. now is the time to enact a meaningful middle class tax cut, a meaningful tax cut. that's a reduction in tax rates which take which the state can afford and makes your life more affordable. alright, so connecticut is moving from rescue to recovery, investing in our future in your future. starting with good paying jobs in allowing you to keep more of what you earn. so on election night i was looking at steve kornacki is election maps, remember? and saw the red was getting redder and the blue was getting bluer.

i think here in connecticut was a little different. it's not every day that new canaan and new britain both the same way. that the suburbs of the cities are complementary, not competitive. it's a sign that connecticut is working together as one. take notice washington. so if you make it over to an inaugural bash this evening, i want you all to party like a liberated governor just had a birthday, let your hair down. i wanna see a little footloose on the dance floor. maybe it was somebody you don't know but you maybe see around the building every once in a while you want to get to know and i did this four years ago, thank you for the opportunity to do it again. but after the inaugural four years ago i did get about 10,000 tweets saying, governor never dance in public again. but it's my party.

i'll dance if i want to. god bless the dancing state of connecticut. the dancing state of connecticut, we're gonna be dancing. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2023] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> c-span's "washington journal," every day we take your calls live on the air, on the news of the day, and we discuss policy issues that impact you. coming up monday morning, we will talk with scott one about the latest in the protracted house speaker election and its impact on each party's legislative agenda.

we will also discuss the economic outlook for 2023 and concerns about a possible recession. watch washington journal live at 7:00 eastern, monday morning on c-span, or c-span now, our free mobile app. join the discussion with your phone calls, facebook comments, text messages, and tweets.

>> middle and high school students, is time to get out your fountain start recording for a chance to win $100,000 with a grand prize of $5,000. for this year's competition, we are asking students to picture yourself as a newly elected member of congress. tell us what your top priority be make a five- to six-minute , video that shows the importance of your issue from opposing and points of view. be bold. there is still time to get started. visit our website at st