The bill Biden signed with great fanfare in November 2021 offers a windfall to the state Department of Transportation — a 40% increase in the federal funding that generally comes in five-year commitments, a jump from $3.8 billion to $5.4 billion. But Connecticut is one of seven states that have lost construction jobs since passage, a statistic galling to construction unions that have been gearing up for growth in a state with a backlog of highway, bridge and rail work that have meant longer commutes and added costs for keeping a car on roads that get a C-. “We’re not working,” Joe Toner, the executive director of the State Building Trades Council, told a surprised U.S. Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro, D-3rd District, in a public labor gathering. “We’re seriously not working.” The state had 61,600 construction workers in April 2022, the start of the first outdoor construction season after passage. A year later, the industry was down by 1,900 people — the biggest drop anywhere other than California, which lost 5,100 jobs in a construction industry nearly 15 times larger than Connecticut’s.
