Key measures needed to implement the next state budget and an overdue fix to a debt-riddled anti-pollution program were earmarked for a special session Wednesday even as lawmakers scrambled to pass more bills before the midnight adjournment deadline. Republicans said they feared legislative overtime would open a Pandora’s box of pet bills, but majority Democrats remained […]

One thing is certain in the budget legislators passed this week: The state will soon be spending an additional $90 million in new funding in an effort to improve the state’s lowest-performing districts. But a larger question looms: Will municipalities be required to spend more on education, too? Top state budget officials say the answer […]

What is it with politicians and sports on TV? Every NFL blackout game provokes congressional intervention. Now, Rep. Kelvin Roldan, D-Hartford, is trying to make the political version of a half-court shot at the buzzer on behalf of a city institution, Connecticut Public Broadcasting. At issue: broadcast rights for UConn women’s basketball. The university recently […]

For the first time since his election in 2010, Comptroller Kevin Lembo is playing a political role as the first openly gay statewide official in Connecticut, urging the Democratic National Committee to take a stand against North Carolina’s ban on gay marriage. North Carolina’s adoption by referendum of a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage creates […]

A quarter of the students who enter a public college in Connecticut spend their first year taking only non-credit remedial courses. Some even spend two years. That may soon end, with the legislature overwhelmingly approving a bill that will, starting in the fall of 2014, restrict the circumstances that college officials can, and cannot, require […]

On a closing day marked by partisan friction, the House of Representatives found a rare moment of harmony Wednesday evening, unanimously granting final passage to a bill imposing penalties in the future on Connecticut’s utilities for poor performance in restoring blackouts. But other bills, including priorities of House Speaker Christopher G. Donovan, D-Meriden, and Senate […]

On the last day of the session, when time is the legislature’s most precious commodity, the Connecticut Senate lavished a long farewell Wednesday on Sen. Edith G. Prague, an indomitable political voice in Hartford for 30 years. Prague, 86, a Democrat of Columbia, is retiring as the oldest member of the General Assembly, a woman […]

Bill Cosby never met state Sen. Toni Harp, D-New Haven, until Wednesday. But after hearing her passion for mentoring urban youth, the actor, comic and activist had his own unique way of complimenting her: With a smile, he vowed to commit voter fraud on her behalf. “I’m going to illegally cross the line in Connecticut and […]

In Connecticut’s post-storms legislative world, most of the focus has been on how to make sure power outages like the ones the state suffered in August and October never happen again. But for communities along the shoreline, where some buildings are still in disrepair, seawalls remain crumpled and some landscapes were altered permanently by Tropical […]

The Connecticut Senate gave final approval early Wednesday to what the national advocacy group Common Cause said would be the strongest campaign-finance disclosure law in the United States. But the general counsel for Gov. Dannel P. Malloy said the bill is plagued by practical and constitutional flaws, an assessment that appears to raise the possibility […]

With 60 minutes left in the 2012 session of the General Assembly, a favored bill of the Senate’s leader was stuck in the House, while a favored bill of the House leader was stuck in the Senate. At midnight Wednesday, both bills die. Senate Democratic leaders were trying at 11 p.m. to salvage S.B. 1, […]

What is it with politicians and sports on TV? Every NFL blackout game provokes congressional intervention. Now, Rep. Kelvin Roldan, D-Hartford, is trying to make the political version of a half-court shot at the buzzer on behalf of a city institution, Connecticut Public Broadcasting. At issue: broadcast rights for UConn women’s basketball. The university recently […]