Hartford, Conn. (WTIC Radio)-The push is underway to get Governor Lamont and Legislative leaders at the negotiating table to
pass the Transportation Climate Initiative, a proposal to reduce Greenhouse Gases, said the Executive Director of the League of Conservation
Voters Lori Brown.
Opponents have labeled it a gas tax in disguise.
Legislative leaders and the Governor want to bring this proposal out, Brown said.
The Governor changed his stance since Tuesday when he said with rising gas prices it was not the year to do it.
"The increase in gas prices, we have no control over that and it has nothing to do with TCI. Those increases right now, they're up and down all the time, thirty cents or more. TCI is capped, it cannot go beyond nine cents in the first year. And the five cents is based on modeling. It's a lot of complicated math, but it's been thoroughly modeled out," Brown said.
"Tell the cities suffering from asthma that there's no action that they can do this year. Tell people living on the shoreline that's there's nothing to be done about rising sea level and storms and floods. Tell the youth of the future who are furious about no action. That it's okay we get to it eventually. That's just no acceptable", she said.
According to Brown, failure to pass T-C-I would mean the state would lose out on efforts to receive matching federal grants and electric charging stations, traffic and congestion management, rail and bus upgrades and electric school buses.