This is a printer-friendly version of an article from Zip06.com.
10/25/2017 12:00 AMThe state’s historic budget impasse may finally be coming to an end this week. Word from Hartford suggests Democrats and Republicans have come together to craft a bipartisan budget designed to mitigate cuts to municipalities and withstand a veto from Gov. Dannel P. Malloy.
The Senate is slated to open the budget debate for a vote tonight and the House is preparing to go in for a vote tomorrow morning, Thursday, Oct. 13 according to State Representative Sean Scanlon (D-98). The proposed budget includes cuts of five percent or less to the Education Cost Sharing (ECS) grant—a good sign for Guilford.
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 this current budget, Scanlon said Guilford is looking at a loss of only $182,869 in ECS funding.
Scanlon said that brings Guilford total state aid, combining ECS and grant monies from programs such as the Town Aid Road Grant and Local Capital Improvement (LoCIP) to $3,474,520, a far cry from initial proposals to cut all aid to the town.
“Throughout this whole process, many people, especially the governor, proposed taking all of our money, not just our ECS money but the town aid, too, so Guilford would have lost about $3.5 million and we successfully as a delegation were able to reverse that and I am really proud of that,” said Scanlon. “That was the case last year, it was the case this year, and it will be the case for as long as I have this job because I truly believe that we do deserve to get funding.”
The budget does not include items such as assigning a portion of the teacher pension contributions onto municipalities, on which Malloy had previously planned. However, because of the bipartisan nature of this budget, Scanlon said he and others believe there will be enough votes to override a potential veto from the governor and pass this budget. An override would require 101 votes in the House and 24 votes in the Senate.
“We will see the final numbers tomorrow, but just from my conversations with colleagues, I think that we are going to have more than enough to override if he does [veto],” he said. “I hope he [Malloy] doesn’t—I hope that he sees the fact that Democrats and Republicans have come together and worked very hard to get to a compromise budget should be enough for him and I hope that he takes that seriously and does not veto this.”
The budget proposal includes an increase tax on cigarettes and hospitals, revisions to prevailing wage and binding arbitration laws, and while municipalities will not pay into teacher pensions, contributions from teachers will increase from six percent to seven percent of their salaries.
State Representative Vincent Candelora (R-86) said there are some things Republicans wanted to see in the budget like pension reform, but said bringing everyone to the table meant being willing to compromise.
"We have worked very had to this end keeping in mind that we need to achieve a veto-proof majority," he said. "By doing that we really tried to keep a balance where we could garner enough support and I am optimistic that we will pass this budget."
Scanlon said he was pleased to see a bipartisan effort and spoke highly of the conversations he has had with Candelora. Scanlon said he and Candelora have been talking for a long time, working together, and bringing together small groups of Democrats and Republicans to discuss common ground ideas.
“We [the two parties] did come together despite it being such a divisive political time in our country right now,” he said. “I think it really sends a strong message and it is a message I have always supported which is that Democrats and Republicans are capable of coming together and solving problems still and we should do it more often.”
Candelora said a willingness to work across party lines is what will ultimately produce an approved budget, calling it a return to the "old way" of doing things.
"We had a governor that was very polarizing and the only way we could accomplish pulling Connecticut out of this chaos was coming together," he said. "Even before the budget process Sean and I have worked well together, especially on local issues for Guilford and having that relationship helped bridge the connection to have significant budget talks between Republicans and Democrats."
Check back for updates.