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08/22/2017 12:00 AMOn Aug. 18, Governor Dannel P. Malloy landed another blow on municipalities: If no budget is adopted by Oct. 1, 85 school districts will lose all of their Education Cost Sharing (ECS) money and another 54 would see reduce funding. For towns like Guilford that had already been threatened with an end to ECS funding, the news doesn’t change anything, but it underscores for local officials the difficulty of running the town and schools without certainty on funding.
In fiscal year 2016-’17, Guilford received a total of $4,817,046 in statutory formula aid, combining grant monies from programs such as the Town Aid Road Grant, Local Capital Improvement (LoCIP), Special Education, and Education Cost Sharing (ECS). In the governor’s February proposal, Guilford’s ECS grant, which serves as the state’s primary financial resource to help municipalities run their schools, was completely zeroed out, taking the town’s total ECS grant from $2.7 million this fiscal year to nothing in the next. In the governor’s most recent proposal, the message remains the same: No ECS money for Guilford.
“In the absence of an adopted budget from the General Assembly, my administration is reallocating resources to pay for basic human services, education in our most challenged school districts, and the basic operation of government,” Malloy said. “The municipal aid that is funded as part of this executive order reflects the nearly impossible decisions Connecticut must make in the absence of a budget. It will force some of our municipalities—both large and small—to make similarly difficult choices of their own.”
For many towns along the shoreline, those “difficult choices” will mean finding a way to fill the void left by millions of dollars of cuts. Locally, Branford, Chester, Clinton, Deep River, Essex, Killingworth, Madison, North Haven, Old Saybrook, and Westbrook would join Guilford with an ECS funding drop to zero.
First Selectman Joe Mazza said he hopes this proposal won’t stick and that it’s just an attempt by the governor to get the lengthly budget process moving.
“The conventional thinking is the governor put this out to try and kick the legislature in the rear to get to work…This would be a big hit to the Town of Guilford,” he said.
Mazza said he has reached out to state representatives and senators to discuss the issue and encourage them to focus on the fact that Guilford has already made difficult financial decisions.
“When I spoke to Senator Ted Kennedy [D-12], he wanted to get a list from me of what we have done as a board and as a town and the hard choices we have made,” he said. “I said I will certainly give that to you because I feel that the state has not done what Guilford and many other towns have done to work hard with our bargaining units and establish efficiencies to raise our credit rating and increase our fund balance, which the state has failed to do.”
Mazza said he has encouraged all of those representing Guilford in Hartford to get to work.
“We are going to do our best, but we are asking our state legislators to do their best to fight for the Town of Guilford and I will do my best to work with them,” he said. “That is where we are right now.”
State Representative Sean Scanlon (D-98) said he is working hard to protect his constituents and has encouraged his party leaders to get a budget on the table as soon as possible.
“The cuts to our municipal aid proposed by the governor would be a disaster for Guilford and Branford,” Scanlon said. “As I’ve said since the new fiscal year started on July 1 without a budget, Democrats and Republicans should work together, find a compromise, and pass a budget. If we can do that before October when this proposed plan takes effect, we can avoid the governor’s painful cuts. I will continue to push for a bipartisan solution that won’t completely eliminate our funding.”