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Former state Comptroller Natalie Braswell, at the podium, with Gov. Ned Lamont and Lt. Gov Susan Bysiwiecz in 2021. Braswell was appointed interim chancellor of the CSCU system on Tuesday. Credit: ctmirror.org

Natalie Braswell, Gov. Ned Lamont’s general counsel and the former state comptroller, was selected to be the interim chancellor of the Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system on Wednesday.

Her appointment follows the departure of former Chancellor John Maduko in April and the resignation earlier this month of Martin Guay, the chair of the Board of Regents.

Ari Santiago was named the interim chair of the board on Friday.

“Natalie is a steady hand. Time and again, she has stepped into challenging situations, tackled tough issues head-on, and delivered results when the stakes were high,” Lamont said in a prepared statement. “She has been one of my closest advisors as we navigated some of the most complex matters facing our state. Natalie doesn’t back down when something gets difficult. She brings steady leadership, sound judgment, and a deep commitment to public service, and I know she is exactly the right person to help CSCU turn the page and continue focusing on what matters most: delivering opportunity and success for our students.”

Maduko resigned in April after learning he was the subject of a complaint from an employee who claimed he had sexually harassed her. The employee also claimed that Guay told her that he’d once had a woman fired after she made a sexual harassment complaint. The employee said the comment felt like “a threat or a test.”

Earlier this month, the CSCU Board of Regents voted to hire an outside consulting firm to conduct an independent review of Maduko’s behavior and whether the CSCU system responded appropriately when the allegations were brought forward.

Maduko was appointed interim CSCU chancellor last June after the previous chancellor, Terrence Cheng, stepped down in the wake of an audit from the comptroller’s office that found Cheng had charged the university system for expensive meals and chauffeured rides.

CSCU is the public higher education system consisting of four state universities (Central, Southern, Eastern, and Western); Connecticut State Community College and its 12 campuses that are located throughout the state; and Charter Oak State College, an online higher education institution.  There are about 66,000 enrolled students across all its campuses.

As CT Mirror's Managing Editor Stephen helps manage and support a staff of 16 reporters.  His career in daily journalism includes 20 years at The Hartford Courant, where he served as a member of the editorial board, data editor, breaking news editor and bureau chief.  Prior to that Stephen was city editor at the Casper Star-Tribune in Casper, Wyo., and the editor of the Daily Press in Craig, Colo.  He has won many awards for editorial writing, data journalism and breaking news. While he was breaking news editor, The Courant was a named finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for breaking news for its coverage of the Sandy Hook shootings.  Busemeyer is a Koeppel Journalism Fellow at Wesleyan University, where he teaches data journalism, and he has also taught at the University of Hartford, the University of Connecticut and the University of Colorado.