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Some towns would gain and some would lose state funding under Gov. Ned Lamont’s proposal for town aid grants, including the Education Cost Sharing grant, the largest operating grant to K-12 school districts.

The state’s $2.3 billion Education Cost Sharing program would continue to follow a previously authorized schedule of increases, growing by more than $157 million in the first year of the new biennium and by another $11 million in the second.

Similarly, the grant that reimburses communities for a portion of the revenue they lose because certain properties are exempt from local taxation also will grow as planned, by about $40 million over the next two years combined.

Some towns will see changes in the amount of education aid they receive.

Keith has spent most of his four decades as a reporter specializing in state government finances, analyzing such topics as income tax equity, waste in government and the complex funding systems behind Connecticut’s transportation and social services networks. He has been the state finances reporter at CT Mirror since it launched in 2010. Prior to joining CT Mirror Keith was State Capitol bureau chief for The Journal Inquirer of Manchester, a reporter for the Day of New London, and a former contributing writer to The New York Times. Keith is a graduate of and a former journalism instructor at the University of Connecticut.

Renata is the data reporter for CT Mirror. She recently graduated from Columbia University with a master’s degree in data journalism. For her undergraduate studies, she graduated cum laude from Pennsylvania State University with dual bachelor’s degrees in international politics and broadcast journalism, and minors in global security and Middle East studies. Renata has a background in data analysis and programming, with proficiency in Python, QGIS, and HTML, among other tools. She previously interned at the Malala Fund and has reported stories from Scotland, Ireland, Northern Ireland, and Brazil. She speaks four languages and is currently learning a fifth.