New Haven Register: Campaigns play the numbers

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New Haven Register: Campaigns play the numbers

The New Haven Register July 21, 2006

By Andy Bromage

The Dan Malloy for Governor campaign, seeking an edge in the Democratic primary race, has turned the issue of job growth against rival John DeStefano Jr. in a mailer that relies on discredited employment figures.

Malloy's campaign has mailed a flier saying Malloy has created 5,000 jobs as mayor of Stamford, while DeStefano has presided over a loss of 2,700 jobs as the New Haven's mayor. But the data used only listed the number of working people living in Stamford, not the number of jobs there.

The Malloy campaign acknowledged goofing Wednesday, blaming an editing error for the mix-up. But the campaign insisted its overall claim was correct, and even better for Malloy, and worse for DeStefano, than first thought.

Malloy's campaign released revised numbers Thursday that said Stamford added 9,858 jobs from June 1995 to November 2005, the period of Malloy's tenure, while New Haven lost 6,709 jobs from June 1993 to November 2005, the bulk of DeStefano's term.

Malloy cites state Department of Labor job counts as the source of the 1993 and 1995 figures. The 2005 numbers were pulled from community profiles on Stamford and New Haven produced for the Connecticut Economic Resource Center Inc., by D&B Sales and Marketing Solutions, the business unit of Dun & Bradstreet.

However, Dale Shannon, senior economist for CERC, said Thursday that CERC's own numbers are "inappropriate for estimating job data at the town level and should not be used that way." The reason, he said, is that D&B estimates job data using ZIP codes, which often cross town lines, as is the case with New Haven and East Haven.

The DOL's state labor economist, John Tirinzonie, said state data shows Stamford added just 1,117 jobs from June 1995 to June 2005. New Haven grew by 269 jobs during that same period, he said. Tirinzonie said he could not immediately provide figures back to 1993, the year DeStefano took office.

"The numbers I gave you are the official numbers that are published by the labor department and those are the numbers we stand by," Tirinzonie said.

Additionally, economists reached Thursday warned against comparing employment data from two different months, as Malloy's campaign did, because it does not account for seasonable jobs.

"The problem with that is you're not comparing apples to apples," said Todd Martin, an economic adviser to People's Bank.

The DeStefano campaign delighted in Malloy's apparent slip-up Thursday, accusing Malloy of spreading "false information" and calling on him to "level with voters about his real record on job growth" before the Aug. 8 Democratic primary.

"Dan Malloy appears to be misrepresenting his record on job growth," said DeStefano spokesman Derek Slap. "Malloy is running on his record and voters deserve to know the truth."

The mayors have made job growth a central campaign theme and a favorite weapon against Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell, pointing to every factory closing and each laid-off worker as evidence the state needs new leadership.

But their own squabble over jobs illustrates the escalating tensions between the Democrats as the primary that will decide who faces Rell in November draws near. A Quinnpiac University poll released Thursday shows DeStefano has widened his lead over Malloy among likely Democratic primary voters to 20 points, though fully half of those polled said they could switch from both candidates.

Malloy spokeswoman Lisa-Joy Zgorski said Thursday that she feels confident in the numbers.

"We relied on those two numbers and cited a source the New Haven Register, and other newspapers, have relied on for years," she said. "Dan Malloy has used round numbers and is being conservative in his estimate of 5,000 jobs."