Hartford educators say an ad campaign discouraging parents from sending their children to suburban schools reflects success of the city’s education reforms, but a lawyer for plaintiffs in the Sheff vs. O’Neill desegregation case says it threatens to undermine a court-ordered plan to reduce the racial isolation of city students. Hartford Public School officials launched […]

After seeing Democratic candidates battered in 2010 by Republican groups that raised money from anonymous donors, supporters of President Barack Obama are forming similar organizations in preparation for his 2012 re-election bid, Jeanne Cummings reports at Politico. The move reflects a reversal of Obama’s past rejection of outside money and criticism of anonymous donations made […]

“Pain at the Pump? We Need More.” Now, that’s a provocative headline for a New York Times opinion piece calling for a carbon tax, especially when one of the authors is Daniel C. Esty, the man advising Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on energy policy. And provoke it did. House Republicans used the article to assert […]

In the face of a move toward agency consolidation, Sen. Beth Bye has dropped her efforts to to create a new department to manage early education and daycare programs, and instead hopes to consolidate them all under the State Department of Education. “They’re not into starting a new agency, I get that,” Bye said Thursday. […]

The “birther” movement that prompted President Barack Obama to release his long-form birth certificate yesterday is part of a broader attack on civil rights, the Rev. Jesse Jackson told minority legislators in Hartford today. Jackson slipped into the Legislative Office Building for an unpublicized, closed-door meeting with the Black and Puerto Rican Caucus, urging them […]

A Superior Court judge has ordered the closure of four financially-troubled nursing homes that together have 472 beds and employ 575 people. Judge Jerry Wagner’s ruling Thursday follows a recommendation from the state-appointed receiver in charge of the homes that they be closed because of financial problems. Wagner ordered the receiver, Phyllis A. Belmonte, to […]

Sen. Richard Blumenthal has joined the ranks of self-funded candidates–those who use their own money for all or a substantial portion of their campaign treasury–albeit unintentionally, according to his latest campaign finance report. Blumenthal lent his 2010 Senate campaign slightly more than $2.5 million, of some $8 million spent. He was forced to reclassify most […]

Surrounded by jewelers and their lobbyist, Senate President Pro Tempore Donald E. Williams Jr., D-Brooklyn, patiently listened to complaints about a proposed new luxury tax. He nodded sympathetically. Then he shook his head. No, Williams said, he is not interested in revising the tax package that was approved last week by the Finance, Revenue and […]

Connecticut Democrats are resurrecting the ad book, a fundraising tool banned for use by state candidates as part of the campaign finance reforms passed in 2005. The Democrats are selling space in ad books to be distributed at the 63rd annual Jefferson Jackson Bailey fundraising dinner, where Gov. Dannel P. Malloy will be the keynote […]

One of the big unknowns about the federal health reform law is how much is will really do to control costs. Some Democrats say the law includes tough provisions that will “bend the cost curve,” while others say it didn’t go far enough to really tackle spiraling health care costs in the U.S. That’s the […]

An employee of a Greenwich Porsche dealer called Sen. Bob Duff yesterday at 5:53 a.m. to complain about the proposed luxury tax on, among other things, expensive cars. That went well.