The Connecticut General Assembly began its regular annual session on Feb. 3, when Gov. M. Jodi Rell delivered her budget address to a joint session of the legislature. Its constitutional adjournment deadline is midnight May 5. Balancing the state’s budget is sure to be the most contentious issue of the session, and the task will […]
Mark Pazniokas
Mark is the Capitol Bureau Chief and a co-founder of CT Mirror. He is a frequent contributor to WNPR, a former state politics writer for The Hartford Courant and Journal Inquirer, and contributor for The New York Times.
Posted inNews
The budget crisis
The General Assembly begins 2010 with the Democratic majority and Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell in a stalemate over how to close an estimated $500 million gap in this year’s budget. Sound familiar? That’s how they ended 2009. The price of their inability to put the state’s finances on solid footing last year is that […]
Posted inNews
Public campaign financing
A major question hanging over the races for governor and other state offices in 2010 is the status of Connecticut’s new voluntary system of publicly financing campaigns, the Citizens’ Election Program. U.S. District Court Judge Stefan R. Underhill struck down the program as unconstitutional in August 2009, calling it a well-intentioned effort to combat corruption […]