The CT Mirror (https://ctmirror.org/)
Two years ago, U.S. Rep. John B. Larson stunned many in Connecticut with an idea to build a system of highway tunnels under Hartford and East Hartford longer than Boston’s “Big Dig.”
Reactions to his plan ran from “brilliant and necessary” to “the mother of all pipe dreams,” but Larson plowed ahead and asked state Department of Transportation officials to study the tunnel idea. They did.
A reorganization in how the state provides medical care to thousands of inmates will not save the state money this year as promised. Instead, it will cost millions more.
State tax revenue projections surged again Tuesday, shrinking the projected shortfall in the upcoming two-year budget — and leaving Connecticut with nearly $2.1 billion in reserves to combat it.
A recount Tuesday confirmed the re-election of House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, saving Democrats from a high-profile loss amid the party’s strong gains at the General Assembly.
Jenna Shapiro woke up miserable the day after Donald J. Trump’s election in 2016. The daughter of Democratic activists, Shapiro had canvassed for Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire and worked on phone banks at Wesleyan, where she was a senior contemplating a career in teaching. “I felt like I hadn’t done enough, not nearly enough,” Shapiro said. “I never want to wake up after another election believing I hadn’t done everything I could for a candidate I believed in.” She woke up happy this year, having put off teaching to help run the Democratic GOTV campaign in Connecticut.
It has become an annual tradition — politicians and school officials gather to celebrate that more students in Connecticut are graduating each year from high school. This year was no different. But before anyone gets too excited about this jump in graduation rates – from 83 to 88 percent over the last seven years – data shows that many students are not learning what they should before they leave high school. Continue Reading →
WASHINGTON – When she’s sworn into the next Congress, Rep.-elect Jahana Hayes will not be your typical freshman lawmaker with limited influence. Instead, she will be joining a group with the outsized clout — and the ability to potentially block Nancy Pelosi’s bid to be re-elected Speaker of the House. Continue Reading →
Medicaid — which has been a political football between Washington and state capitols during the past decade — scored big in Tuesday’s election. Following the vote, nearly 500,000 uninsured adults in five states are poised to gain Medicaid coverage under the Affordable Care Act, advocates estimate. Continue Reading →
As if it were possible, Connecticut’s government last week got even bluer than it was before Election Day, but the new governor-elect has opened his dialogue with the public with a different message: unity. Continue Reading →
If the defining risk of Election Day 2016 was a foreign meddling, 2018’s seems to have been a domestic overload. High turnout across the country threw existing problems — aging machines, poorly trained poll workers and a hot political landscape — into sharp relief. Michael McDonald, a political science professor at the University of Florida who studies turnout, says early numbers indicate Tuesday’s midterm saw the highest percentage turnout since the mid-’60s. “All signs indicate that everyone is now engaged in this country — Republicans and Democrats,” he said, adding that he expects 2020 to also be a year of high turnout. “Election officials need to start planning for that now, and hopefully elected officials who hold the purse strings will be responsive to those needs.”
Aging technology
Electionland monitored problems across the country on Election Day, supporting the work of 250 local journalists in more than 120 local newsrooms. Thousands of voters reported issues at the polls, and Electionland sought to report on as many as possible. Continue Reading →
Female candidates helped boost Democratic clout in the General Assembly during the midterm election and now they’d like to see the issues they campaigned on — issues like paid family and medical leave — at the top of the agenda in the next legislative session. Continue Reading →
Gov.-elect Ned Lamont launched a series of strategic economic development tours Friday with a visit to Connecticut’s southeastern corner, saying the region exemplifies the state’s potential for growth. Continue Reading →
After eight years of grappling with Connecticut’s finances, Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has one more budget to tackle: offering Gov.-elect Ned Lamont strategies to avert a multi-billion-dollar deficit in state finances. Continue Reading →
A blue wave swept across Connecticut to give Democrats solid majorities in the General Assembly, but the race for governor offered little sign of a political realignment: If anything, the reds got redder and the blues got bluer on the state’s electoral map.
Almost 100 towns voted more strongly in favor of the party they had chosen in 2014. Continue Reading →
Connecticut’s governor-elect, Ned Lamont, is a Democrat who became a liberal anti-war icon during a U.S. Senate campaign a dozen years ago, but he made clear Thursday he also is a well-connected Greenwich businessman intent on using a network of high-level business contacts to help populate his administration. Continue Reading →