Today, following a tour of the Connecticut Center for Advanced Technology, Senator Chris Dodd (D- CT) unveiled his new, comprehensive jobs agenda that will allow businesses to expand and add jobs, access credit, and put Connecticut’s unemployed workers back to work.
“While our national economy shows promising signs of turning around, times are still tough for workers and small businesses in Connecticut. Record-high unemployment, state and local budgets stretched to the breaking point, and a lack of available credit for businesses have all put a squeeze on families across the state,” said Dodd.
“Connecticut needs new jobs now—which means helping businesses expand and add critical jobs that will help put our state back to work. By investing in innovative new technologies, providing resources that allow our small businesses to grow, and making common-sense investments in our communities, my jobs agenda will move Connecticut in the right direction in the coming weeks and months.”
Dodd’s jobs agenda is three-pronged. It calls for investments in 21st century technologies and industries like clean energy and the home health care profession. It encourages small business growth by renewing the flow of available credit to these companies and rewards small businesses for creating and retaining jobs. Finally, Dodd’s plan calls for an infusion of immediate, common-sense investments in Connecticut’s transportation and sustainable development infrastructure and proposes using unspent economic stimulus funds for home weatherization projects that will not only reduce home energy bills, but will put the construction and homebuilder sectors back to work.
Joining Dodd were Eliot Ginsburg, president of the Connecticut Center for Advanced Technology (CCAT), and Gio Tomasi of RSL Fiber, Inc. RSL is the most recent company to join the CCAT.
Highlights of Dodd’s Jobs Agenda
Innovation: New Technologies, New Jobs
Establish Clean Energy Business Zones
Jumpstart 21st Century Manufacturing
Create the “Connecticut Care Corps”
Empowerment: Helping Small Businesses Grow
· Get Credit Flowing with “Main Street Micro-Lending”
Reward Small Businesses for Creating and Retaining Jobs
Extend a Helping Hand to Entrepreneurs
Infrastructure: Common-Sense Community Investments
Create a New “Cash for Caulkers” Program
Invest in Transportation and Sustainable Development
Establish the National Infrastructure Bank
