It’s not just anyone who can talk state lawmakers into giving them a months-long spotlight for their public policy ideas, but Bob Patricelli and Jim Smith have been at the top of Connecticut’s corporate influencer food chain for years.
Each has been a prominent business builder, earning many millions of dollars in the process.
Bent on tackling Connecticut’s fixed costs and liability burdens, the two hatched a plan in 2017 to form the Commission on Fiscal Stability and Economic Growth, recruiting other Hartford-area execs to stick their necks out into the thorny realm of public policy.
As expected, their privately funded commission’s policy agenda was controversial calling for major spending cuts, union givebacks, lowering of the top income tax rate, a higher minimum wage and modest road tolls.
Though lawmakers didn’t take immediate action on the report, following his election, Gov. Ned Lamont quickly named Smith co-chair of the revamped Connecticut Economic Resource Center (now called AdvanceCT) and also supported tolls and a minimum wage hike — and no tax rate increases — in his first year in office.
Smith recently wrapped a 30-plus-year career at Webster Financial, where he was CEO since the mid-1990s. His father founded the bank in 1935, which today is publicly traded and has grown to more than $30 billion in assets. He briefly toyed with a run for governor in 2018.
Patricelli, a noted philanthropist and investor, has built, led and sold three healthcare companies — most recently Avon-based Women’s Health USA — for a total deal value of well over $1.4 billion.