HARTFORD — Since it was first put on display in December 2009, the modern bronze copy of “The Genius of Connecticut,” with its steely face, prominent wings and flowing robes, has been a major attraction on the daily tours of the State Capitol.
Connecticut
Opinion: A kidnappers bargain: linking CT union and nonprofit interests
There are whispers in Hartford that legislation being prepared for next session would link funding for non-profits to general wage increases for state employees. But such a law would exploit unsuspecting taxpayers.
State Sen. Cathy Osten, who is co-chair of the powerful Appropriations Committee and a former union president, is seeking a new funding mechanism for non-profit organizations. Ostensibly, this initiative aims to secure consistent funding for nonprofits that provide essential services like addiction treatment, support for individuals with developmental disabilities, and community enrichment programs. But beneath this altruistic motive lurks the dark specter of union self-interest.
Under Osten’s plan, state funding for certain nonprofits would automatically increase whenever state unions negotiate pay increases for themselves. At first, this seems like a solid strategy for ensuring that that nonprofits get funded. Actually, it is a clever tactic to turn nonprofit workers into a sympathetic de facto lobbying group for Connecticut’s dominant special interest — the government unions — despite having no other relationship to them.
This alignment could incentivize nonprofits, which traditionally focus on service delivery, to shift towards advocacy for increased state spending —effectively lobbying for higher taxes and more government spending. What’s more, nonprofits would have a vested interest in supporting higher wages, regardless of the state’s fiscal condition or the actual needs of the programs they administer.
This situation resembles a kidnapper’s bargain, where a criminal holds a hostage to force concessions from their loved ones. Here, the essential services provided by non-profits are the captives, with funding tied to wage increases as the demand. Just as a ransom forces difficult choices, this proposal forces taxpayers to either accept increased government union pay or risk underfunding vital nonprofit services.
What’s more, this overhaul to the funding process would only exacerbate the leading problem with nonprofit funding: inflation. As the Connecticut Nonprofit Alliance itself has stated, the most recent state budget notably increased state funding for nonprofits, but “due to the high inflation of the last two years, community nonprofits remain 46% behind where they were in 2007.”
The proposal is also yet another initiative from legislative leadership that would undermine the fiscal guardrails that have brought a semblance of stability in state spending and at least checked the growth of taxpayer burdens in Connecticut. These are the same fiscal guardrails that have freed up hundreds of millions of dollars to be spent today, or even boldly returned to taxpayers, by paying down the state’s massive debt obligations.
If our state’s nonprofits need more funding, that’s an important discussion worth having. But tying nonprofit funding to state employee wage increases is the wrong way to produce that outcome. The proposed process would grant significant influence to unions and their new allies within nonprofits, enabling them to dictate terms and influence public policy to their benefit, rather than based on the needs of the communities they serve.
Funding for nonprofits should be based on their performance and the genuine needs of the populations they serve. A rigorous needs analysis and evaluation of each organization’s efficiency and effectiveness should be the cornerstone of any funding decision. Instead, Sen. Osten’s plan introduces an arbitrary mechanism that links funding to state employee wages, bypassing considerations of merit and efficiency.
In essence, the proposed process represents a potential betrayal of the taxpayers’ interests. By embedding a new funding mechanism that serves the interests of a particular group, rather than the public at large, this proposal risks undermining the very purpose of government funding for nonprofits —to support the most effective organizations that provide vital and necessary services.
Taxpayers deserve assurances that their money is being used efficiently and for the public good, not as a bargaining chip in a broader political gambit. Rather than incentivizing nonprofits to promote union lobbyists, we should adopt the free-market reforms that increase prosperity for the people who need it most and support the common sense fiscal policies that will keep our state’s balance sheet stable and strong.
Frank Ricci is a Labor Fellow at the Yankee Institute, past president of the New Haven local of the International Association of Fire Fighters union, and a retired battalion chief. Bryce Chinault is the director of external affairs at the Yankee Institute.
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) — Housing advocates and experts are weighing in on a recent report on Connecticut’s housing crisis, after the state received a failing score for a second year in a row.
Titled “Grading the States: Affordability & Homebuilding Report Cards,” the Nutmeg State ranks at number 46 compared to all 50 states. Each grade is weighed on a 100-point scale across two factors: affordability and homebuilding.
The median household income sits at $95,392 per year in Connecticut, yet the median listing price for a home lands a little over $500,000.
While some believe there is some truth to the score, people like Connecticut Realtor Michael Barbaro say it’s a bit of an oversimplification.
“The fact is, we’re a small state. We have high density, we have older housing stock,” Barbaro said. “So all these factors coming together, giving us that score is probably not fair. It’s probably penalizing us for characteristics that we just can’t change here.”
While Connecticut has seen a rise in building permits, factors like a high cost of living, rising construction costs and restrictive regulations aren’t helping in the eyes of some.
To address the state’s housing needs, at least 120,000 units need to be built, according to a 2025 commissioned study by the Connecticut Office of Policy and Management.
“We’re digging out of like a really deep hole on under production,” Chelsea Ross, executive director of the Partnership for Strong Communities, said. “So it’s going to take us a while to have that part of our grade increase.”
State lawmakers passed legislation last year, formally known as House Bill 5002, with the goal to incentivize new builds and alter zoning regulations.
While advocates of the bill praised the step, some say it’s just a start.
“What we have is kind of a framework for that work, but no real enforcement on how suburbs are going to handle that and ensure that they’re building more affordable housing,” Representative Antonio Felipe, chair of the legislative housing committee said.
Connecticut
‘The Genius of Connecticut,’ an allegorical statue, may never ‘return’ to the top of State Capitol
Brian Pencz, facilities administrator for the state Office of Legislative Management, which runs the 14-acre State Capitol complex, in a file photo in 2024. A statue called ‘The Genius of Connecticut’ has no skeletal body inside, ‘so it’s not stable enough to go up on top of the Capitol,’ said Pencz.
While thousands have seen the 18-foot-tall sculpture up close and personal, the goal of Capitol historians and preservationists has been to put the replica atop the gold dome. The original ruled over the building’s Gothic architecture from 1878 until damage to its base was found after the Hurricane of 1938, when the statue was dismantled and removed piece-by-piece.
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Now, though, the discovery of a lack of interior framing inside the 5,500-pound daemon, the allegorical protector of Connecticut, is making the administrators who run the 14-acre State Capitol complex worry whether it would be safe to put the sculpture atop the 274-foot-tall gold dome after a $50 million rehabilitation of the building begins late this year.
“There’s no skeletal body inside, so it’s not stable enough to go up on top of the Capitol,” said Brian Pencz, facilities administrator for the Office of Legislative Management in Hartford. “That is what the X-rays that we had done show.”
‘The Genius of Connecticut’ statue in the central atrium on the State Capitol, in Hartford, Conn., on Sept. 28, 2023. A plan to move it to the top of the dome may not move forward because of structural concerns about the statute.
The half-million dollars budgeted to hoist “The Genius” atop the dome — with its crown of oak leaves representing the state tree, a wreath of dried flowers in her right hand and mountain laurel, the state flower, in the left — could increase dramatically if the 20 pieces have to be taken apart, an armature inserted and the pieces welded back together, he said.
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That’s the issue before the State Capitol Preservation and Restoration Commission. The advisory panel, along with the Office of Legislative Management, considers a remounted “Genius” the culmination of the $50 million cleaning and repair program at the Capitol that includes applying a 3/1000ths-inch of gold leaf on the dome and rehabilitating 522 windows.
That cost doesn’t include necessary repairs to the original base of the “Genius,” above the dome in the area called the “lantern” of the Capitol, itself a tribute to the nation’s role in the American Civil War.
Complicating the work on the “Genius” is that the Polich Tallix Foundry of Rock Tavern, N.Y. — where it was cast, based on the 2007 advanced laser imaging of the plaster copy of the original that resides in the Capitol’s north lobby — has been sold to another company.
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Pencz recently told the Capitol Preservation Commission that it will have to wait a year or more to see whether adding a new skeleton or armature is even possible.
“I reached out to that company and a competitor of theirs to have them come in and look at it so we can at least get the process started, and I have only heard back from one and they’re out until mid-summer next year,” he said.
‘The Genius of Connecticut,’ a copy of an identical statue that was atop the State Capitol between 1878 and 1938, is a regular stop for tours under the Capitol’s 257-foot-tall rotunda. Plans to move it to the dome are threatened by a structural assessment of the sculpture.
State Sen. Cathy Osten, D-Sprague, co-chair of the legislative Appropriations Committee who leads the Preservation Commission, said she would like to know the cost of a skeletal component for the “Genius.”
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“I think it’s important for us to kind of get there. Personally, I’d like to see the ‘Genius’ get back where it belongs,” she said. “That’s where I’ve been along and I’d like to see that happen.”
Before the 1938 hurricane, the original statue had previously been hauled down in 1903, for about a year, when officials were concerned about damage from high winds, according to a 2021 article by Central Connecticut State University Professor Matthew Warshauer.
Warshauer, in a phone interview Monday, said he would also like to see the new version of the “Genius” atop the dome. But Warshauer also said he’d prefer that a statewide, grassroots citizen-fundraising effort pay for it, rather than state funds. He cited the importance of civic engagement, particularly in this semiquincentennial year of celebrating — and discussing — the 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
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“I wholeheartedly support raising the ‘Genius’ to the center of the Capitol and its towering heights,” Warshauer said. “But what will such an action mean if it’s done only by the General Assembly and not the public? Today we have to decide what our symbols are and what they can mean. It’s up to the people to decide, with the help of civic leaders and historians. It’s more meaningful if done with intention by the people and different groups of people.”
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