Patch Candidate Profile: Paul Honig For 8th State Senate

HARWINTON, CT — The 2024 election is heating up in Connecticut and there are plenty of races with candidates eager to serve in elected office.

Eyes are primarily focused on the U.S. presidential election, but every state representative and senate seat is up for grabs.

All five of Connecticut's congressional seats, plus one U.S. Senate seat, are up for grabs as well.

There are 151 seats in the state House of Representatives and 36 in the state Senate. Democrats currently hold majorities in both chambers.

Connecticut Patch asked candidates to answer questions about their campaigns and will be publishing candidate profiles as election day draws near.

Democrat Paul Honig of Harwinton, in a rematch of 2022, is challenging state Sen. Lisa Seminara, R-Avon, for her 8th State Senat District seat in the legislature.

The 8th Senate District includes Norfolk, Hartland, Canton, Simsbury, New Hartford, Avon, Barkhamsted, Colebrook, Granby, Harwinton, and Torrington.

What office are you seeking? State Senate

District: 8th Senatorial District

Website: https://paulhonigforstatesenat...

What city or town do you live in? Harwinton

Party affiliation: Democrat

Education: University of Pennsylvania Management and Technology Dual Degree Program
Wharton School of Business; B.S.E. majoring in finance; School of Engineering of Applied Science: B.A.S. concentrating in computer science.

Occupation: I am now retired. I spent 22 years as a fixed-income finance professional and rose to the position of managing director at JPMorgan.

Family: I live in Harwinton with my wife, Diane. We have two sons, ages 25 and 22.

Does anyone in your family work in politics or government? None

Previous public office, appointive or elected:

I am currently serving my third term on the Board of Selectmen in Harwinton.

Age: 61

Why are you seeking this office?

Since April, I’ve been out on my bike and spent hundreds of hours speaking to thousands of our neighbors here in the district.

I’ve heard first-hand the struggles people are facing. While I have experience at the municipal level, many of the problems I’m hearing about can best be addressed at the state level.

I’m running for state senate because I want to use my finance background and problem-solving skills to tackle some of the big-ticket affordability issues causing so much difficulty for so many people, like the cost of housing, the cost of healthcare, electricity and child care.

I think I’m the candidate whose values line up best with the people of this district.

I believe in the right to choose, common sense gun safety legislation, protecting the environment, properly funding schools and police departments, and taking care of seniors and veterans.

What do you believe is the No. 1 issue facing Connecticut, and how do you plan to address it?

Affordability is our number one issue. While there are many aspects to this problem, housing is one of the biggest challenges with regard to affordability.

We have significant numbers of families who are paying 30 to 50 percent of their income for rent, and that’s just not sustainable.

CT Insider reports “currently [the] affordable housing shortage is 169,400 units for low-income residents and 101,600 homes for middle-income residents.”

There’s a housing continuum: from unhoused to temporarily housed to permanently housed.

We need to make sure that we're moving people in the right direction along the continuum.

If you’re homeless we want to get you into a shelter, so we need to make sure there are enough shelter beds.

If you’re in a shelter we want to move you into temporary or permanent housing.

If you’re in permanent housing, but it’s unaffordable, we want you to have housing that’s affordable, meaning it costs less than 30 percent of your income.

The way forward is to build more housing at all levels. Connecticut’s population hasn’t grown by much in recent years, but new household formation has increased the demand for housing.

Current high school students will be graduating from college soon, finding jobs and looking for places to live.

This means we need more housing units for them.

Building more housing for seniors can allow them to downsize and stay in their communities while freeing up larger houses for young families.

The current housing shortage is holding back our economy.

Large employers are eager for new housing to be built so that workers can move to the state to fill the 90,000 jobs openings we have.

The state should provide incentives to municipalities that streamline their processes for building housing.

The newly created Metropolitan Redevelopment Authority is an excellent example of an authority tasked with providing assistance to municipalities eager to build new housing, especially near public transportation systems.

We should make sure that the MRDA has enough funding to make an impact.

There have been an alarming number of deaths on Connecticut's roadways. Is there anything from a legislative standpoint that can be done to address that?

Better enforcement of our traffic laws is key.

In 2023 a bill was introduced to implement the recommendations of the Vision Zero Council, a multi-disciplinary organization whose goal is to make our roads safer.

The group includes law enforcement. One focus of the bill was to permit municipalities to use automated speed and red-light enforcement technologies.

The General Assembly passed the bill overwhelmingly with bipartisan support.

This is common sense legislation that will make people safer in their daily lives. I support this legislation. My opponent voted against it.

What are the major differences between you and the other candidates seeking this post?

I’m a moderate Democrat. My opponent is an extremely conservative Republican.

According to the most recent scorecard from CPAC, the Conservative Political Action Conference, there is only one senator with a more conservative voting record in the Senate.

I support Connecticut’s gun safety legislation. My opponent voted against the gun safety legislation that passed, despite her opposition, in her first term.

She has an A rating from the NRA. I have an F.

I am pro-choice and am endorsed by Planned Parenthood.

My opponent describes herself as personally pro-life but says she won’t vote to restrict abortion access.

Voters will have to decide who they trust on this issue after remembering what the pro-life Republican supreme court nominees did after telling us in their confirmation hearings that abortion rights would be safe on their watch.

That is, they took away the constitutional right to an abortion, and, as a result, put abortion policy back in the hands of state legislatures.

In Connecticut now, abortion rights are on the ballot every two years along with every single seat in the General Assembly.

I support LGBTQ+ rights. My opponent wrote a letter to the editor endorsing a candidate for Avon Board of Education who made anti-LGBTQ+ posts on social media.

What accomplishments in your past would you cite as evidence you can handle this job?

I had a successful 22-year career in fixed income finance and was a managing director at JP Morgan.

I spent my entire career solving complex financial problems not unlike those our state faces every fiscal year.

I have a record of bipartisan cooperation on the board of selectmen in Harwinton, reducing property tax rates and making sure that taxpayer dollars are well spent.

My experience in municipal government and finance makes me uniquely qualified to tackle the important issues facing our state in a fiscally responsible manner.

Is there anything else you would like voters to know about yourself and your positions?

I’m a problem solver and a pragmatic person. I want to go to Hartford and find solutions to problems to make people’s lives better. It’s not enough to pass legislation.

The legislation must be implemented in a way that allows it to efficiently achieve its purpose. I’ll find solutions that work.