The General Assembly dealt a blow to Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s housing agenda Monday after legislators voted narrowly to override his veto of a bill that loosens the state’s affordable housing standards.
Joe Aresimowicz
Posted inHousing
Malloy vetoes looser affordable housing rules, may face override vote
Updated at 3:27 p.m.
Malloy, in a three-page veto message, said the legislation would perpetuate the harmful effects of bad economic policy and institutional segregation. It is Malloy’s first veto of the session.
Posted inMoney, Politics
House, Senate Democrats unable to agree on provisional budget
Connecticut’s prospects of enacting a state budget — even a provisional one — before the new fiscal year begins July 1 appeared to slip away late Monday night as House and Senate Democrats were unable to agree on a path forward.
Posted inEducation
School funding reform: Three tough questions facing lawmakers
Leaders at the state Capitol agree that changing how the state distributes public school aid is necessary – but that consensus quickly crumbles when specific changes are floated.
Posted inEducation, Politics
Activist’s arrest sets back college aid for undocumented students
One activist’s arrest has offset months of lobbying for a bill that would have allowed undocumented students to receive financial aid at Connecticut’s public colleges.
Posted inPolitics
Voting in your employer’s interest? No conflict in Connecticut
The House speaker is an AFSCME employee. A freshman senator used to lobby for a water company. Neither is barred by Connecticut’s narrowly drawn ethics rules from using their elected positions to advocate for their employers. In a state with a part-time, citizen legislature, almost anything goes so long as elected officials or their families don’t end up with money in their pockets as the direct result of legislative action.
Posted inMoney, Politics
Concessions draw Democrats’ praise, Republicans’ skepticism
Top Democrats in the House and Senate praised the deal and said trying to close a $5.1 billion deficit in the next budget without the $1.5 billion in potential savings from concessions would be the worst-case scenario. But their GOP counterparts had a very different perspective.
Posted inPolitics
Campaign finance, minimum wage bills in the mix despite budget crush
With a little more than two weeks remaining until the session’s June 7 adjournment deadline, dozens of bills unrelated to the state’s budget are certain to be voted upon. Legislative leaders say campaign finance reform and a minimum wage increase are among the contentious issues that could come up in the session’s final days.
Posted inEducation, Money, Politics
Aresimowicz offers phase-in compromise on pension bills for CT towns
House Speaker Joe Aresimowicz offered a compromise Wednesday on one of the stickiest points in Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s budget: asking communities to gradually assume a portion of skyrocketing teacher pension costs.
Posted inEducation, Money, Politics
Malloy begins making a case for changes to local school funding
Malloy, a Democrat, has been reminding everyone that Connecticut covers the entire cost of municipal teachers’ pensions in both affluent and impoverished school districts, and those costs are escalating quickly. This has left many local leaders worried their overall state aid may be cut to help close the 8 percent deficit in the next state budget.
Posted inMoney, Politics
House Democrats block GOP bid to require votes on labor deals
In the first partisan fight of 2017, Democrats in the House of Representatives blocked a Republican proposal Wednesday that would have ended a longstanding practice of approving state employee contracts without a vote.
Posted inPolitics
Subtle GOP protest expected as House elects Aresimowicz speaker
Rep. Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, can expect to be elected speaker of the House on the first day of the 2017 legislative session Wednesday without either opposition or support from the growing Republican minority – a calculated, if subtle, protest of Aresimowicz’s continued employment by a major public-sector union, AFSCME Council 4.
Posted inPolitics
Ethics opinion: Aresimowicz can be House speaker, union staffer
The Office of State Ethics has advised Rep. Joe Aresimowicz, D-Berlin, that nothing in the state ethics code bars him from continuing his job with AFSCME, an influential public-employee union, as he becomes speaker of the House of Representatives next week. Labor costs are certain to be a major issue in 2017.
Posted inPolitics
If Democrats win, Matt Ritter to be next CT House majority leader
The leadership of the state House Democratic caucus is set for 2017 – so long as the Democrats do not lose more than 11 seats on Nov. 8, when all 151 seats in the House are up for election. On Tuesday, Toni E. Walker conceded the race for majority leader to Matt Ritter.
Posted inMoney, Politics
House Democrats outline agenda with a pro-business flavor
EAST HARTFORD — Facing an electorate that gave the General Assembly a 24-percent approval rating, the House Democratic Majority unveiled a campaign framework Tuesday that focuses on job creation and fiscal responsibility and downplays labor issues, such as raising the minimum wage and making the tax structure more progressive.
