The U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday halted, at least temporarily, a Biden administration rule that would have helped moderate Connecticut’s longstanding summertime smog and other air quality problems.

The rule would dramatically cut Midwestern and Western power plant and industrial emissions that travel east into Connecticut and contribute to the state’s high asthma rates and air quality that is perpetually out of compliance with federal standards.

The court’s action, a 5-4 decision written by Neil Gorsuch with the three liberal justices and Amy Coney Barrett dissenting, once again thwarts decades of legal efforts by Connecticut to force upwind states to do something about the cross-state pollution that disproportionately plagues Connecticut.

“This case is going to have a direct impact on the air quality of Connecticut and the entire Long Island Sound region, the entire New England region,” said Roger Reynolds, senior legal director for the environmental advocacy group Save the Sound. “Connecticut and New York are working hard to reduce emissions, but that’s being completely undermined by pollution that’s coming in through these Midwest power plants. And if we’re not able to address the pollution from the Midwest power plants, we’re never going to be able to effectively address pollution in Connecticut.”

“This disappointing decision is a serious setback for Connecticut’s air quality and public health,” said Attorney General William Tong in a statement. “As Justice Barrett states in her dissent, this injunction ‘leaves large swaths of upwind states free to keep contributing significantly to their downwind neighbors’ ozone problems for the next several years.’ That’s an unacceptable outcome. But our fight is not over. While the Supreme Court has temporarily paused enforcement of the Good Neighbor Provision, we will continue to aggressively pursue our ongoing litigation.”

The ruling adds to the list of recent pushbacks to Biden administration environmental policies by this most conservative iteration of the Roberts court. Two years ago, it prevented the Biden administration from regulating greenhouse gas emissions from existing power plants. It narrowed what bodies of water can be protected under the Clean Water Act. Before this term ends, there will a major decision that many expect will significantly weaken the power of administrative agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency to follow the science. On Tuesday, the court announced that next term it would take up a challenge to the 1970 National Environmental Policy Act that requires in-depth environmental reviews for federal projects.

“This is the worst three years for the environment in the Supreme Court ever, since the passage of our major environmental laws in the early ’70s,” Reynolds said. “There is a clear pattern of weakening the ability of agencies, and there’s a particular focus on the EPA.”

The rule at issue, known as the Good Neighbor Plan, was finalized by the Biden administration in March 2023. It ordered 23 states in the Midwest and West to reduce pollution from their power plants and industrial operations, tightening previous standards set in the Obama administration. The Trump administration took no similar action, even though to be in compliance with the Clean Air Act, it was supposed to. The Clean Air Act, in place since 1970, contains a good neighbor policy designed to keep upwind states from polluting downwind ones.

While the rule was implemented in some of the states, many states had fought the plan, resulting in a hodge-podge of court rulings that have and have not included stays of the rule. A few states that were not granted stays appealed to the Supreme Court as an emergency, and the court decided to hear the appeal to decide whether to grant the stay while the various cases continue to wind through courts.

Connecticut was among a dozen states and other entities that filed comments with the Supreme Court asking it to not impose a stay.

In the meantime, Connecticut is facing yet another summer of air pollution and bad air quality. Pollution emanating from the west and south of Connecticut typically travels east and north on the prevailing winds and in the summer essentially “cooks” in the sun, forming ozone or smog. Connecticut is its landing pad.

The EPA has noted that “southern Conn. experiences the highest ground-level ozone levels in the eastern half of the U.S. The ozone recorded at air quality monitors in Southwest Conn. comes almost entirely (90-95%) from out of state. Connecticut cannot reach attainment with EPA’s ozone air-quality standard without upwind emission reductions from sources in States south and west of Connecticut.”

The American Lung Association’s 25th annual State of the Air Report, released late last year, found that, once again, Connecticut received an F grade in four of its eight counties for high ozone levels, and that Fairfield County has the worst ozone pollution east of Texas.

For nearly half-a-century most of Connecticut has registered ozone that exceeds the National Ambient Air Quality Standards set by the EPA. Right now, the southern part of the state — Fairfield, New Haven and Middlesex counties — doesn’t even meet the more lenient 2008 standards. Officially, that’s called being “in non-attainment,” and those counties worsened in recent years to being in “severe non-attainment.” The entire state is in moderate non-attainment with the stricter 2015 standards. It’s anticipated that designation will worsen to “serious.”

Already this ozone season, which runs from March through September, the state has registered 12 bad air days. In the whole of last season there were 19, low for the state and nothing like the brown cloud pollution of the 1970s.

Some of what causes the state’s ozone problem is created locally, largely from transportation. The last coal-fired power plant in New England — the Merrimack Station near Concord, N.H. — is set to close in 2028.

The Good Neighbor Plan as conceived would have taken effect in 2026. EPA projects that in that year alone it would have prevented some 1,300 premature deaths, avoided more than 2,300 hospital and emergency room visits, cut asthma symptoms by 1.3 million cases, avoided 430,000 school absence days and 25,000 lost workdays.

The high court is likely to see the case again as the lower court challenges continue to play out.

This story was originally published by the Connecticut Mirror.

Despite hitting widespread public opposition to its affordable housing plans in several wealthy Connecticut towns, Vessel Technologies has gotten mostly support for its proposed 64-unit apartment building in Avon.

Only one resident spoke against the plan at a hearing Tuesday night, and letters and email about the project ran 6-1 in favor of it, zoning officials said.

The town is expected to decide next month whether New York-based Vessel may build 64 small, high-tech apartments off Avonwood Road near Route 44.

The company has invoked Connecticut’s 8-30g law, which sharply limits the authority of local zoning commissions over affordable housing proposals.

Vessel has encountered a range of responses to similar 8-30g plans elsewhere: Cheshire approved one relatively quickly, while Granby recently rejected another. Vessel took Simsbury, Glastonbury and Rocky Hill to court after they tried to keep it out; the company negotiated a compromise with Rocky Hill, reached a settlement with Simsbury and is still pursuing its Glastonbury suit.

In most of those communities, groups of homeowners were outspoken in urging the town to stop Vessel from building. Mostly they cited concerns about too much density and traffic, but objections included water runoff from the parking lots, architecture that wouldn’t conform with the surrounding neighborhoods and excessive building height.

In some towns, hearings on Vessel plans have been adjourned to larger venues to accommodate overflow crowds. But in Avon, Vessel has gotten more pushback from the planning and zoning commission than from the public.

Only two residents spoke at Tuesday night’s hearing, with one man emphasizing that 8-30g doesn’t prohibit the commission from voting “no.” Instead, it gives developers an advantage afterward if they appeal a rejection — and that only comes into play if they’re willing to take the town to court, he said.

Avonwood Road homeowner Nancy Maccoll told commissioners that parking and traffic are serious issues with the Vessel plan. Since Avonwood is a cul de sac, Maccoll said it can’t accommodate overflow cars from Vessel ending up parked along the roadside.

“I’ve lived here for over 20 years. Avonwood Road is a very small, tiny road, there’s one lane going in and one gong out. I find it totally unacceptable that you would even consider people parking on the street,” she said.

There’s heavy traffic already when the Reggio Magnet School is in session, and putting even more cars through the Avonwood and Waterville Road traffic light will cause backups, she said.

But even though Avonwood has nearly 200 apartments, no other people spoke Tuesday night.

Two commissioners raised reservations about parking and fire safety, noting that 8-30g lists public health and safety as the two factors that could justify rejecting affordable housing plans.

After company President Josh Levy agreed to add three spaces to the 70 already planned, one commissioner pressed for more and warned that overflow visitors would end up parking along the street and potentially blocking firetrucks and other motorists. Levy said his consultants would work with town staff to see if reconfiguring the landscaping would allow a couple additional spaces.

Commissioner Robin Baran, though, cautioned that the zoning rules that cover Vessel’s plan require only 67 spaces.

“One thing I’ve learned in eight years here is that you have to vote to the regulation. That is legally how we have to vote,” she said. “I share everyone’s concerns up here and favor working together to maximize the parking, but this has been deemed a suitable property (under Avon’s long-term development plan) for affordable housing and apartment buildings.”

Vessel plans a four-story building with 61 one-bedroom, 560-square-foot apartments and three two-bedroom, 560-square-foot units. Levy would set aside 30% as “affordable” under state regulations, so rents would be restricted for 40 years to be affordable to people earning no more than 60% or 80% of the area’s median income.

Levy said that would work out to monthly rates of $1,240 at 60% and $1,450 at 80%, but noted those figures change every year based on state data. The other 70% of units would probably be leased in the $1,600 to $1,700, but that estimate isn’t firm, Levy said.

The commission discussed the public safety language in 8-30g, but Chairman Lisa Levin noted that the law brings that into play only when those concerns “clearly outweigh” the need for affordable housing and cannot be addressed by reasonable changes to the plan.

“This applicant has been making every effort to accommodate and make the reasonable changes with the overflow parking,” she said. “I don’t know that we can ask more.”

When one commissioner suggested more than 30% of the apartments should be limited to affordable rents, Levy said that would leave no way to control expense increases in the future. He said Vessel would be willing to talk with town officials if Avon wanted to provide long-term tax caps.

The commission closed the hearing Tuesday, and may vote when it takes up the matter again July 16.

The ambush killings of two Connecticut police officers was likely fueled by an angry interaction the gunman had with police earlier, along with building pressures in his personal life and his abuse of alcohol and drugs, according to a report released Wednesday by the state’s Inspector General.

The report detailing how Bristol police Sgt. Dustin DeMonte and Officer Alex Hamzy were gunned down in the driveway of a home also found that a third officer who survived the 2022 attack was justified in fatally shooting the gunman, identified by police as Nicholas Brutcher.

Inspector General Robert Devlin’s investigation — required by law in cases of deadly force — describe Brutcher in a downward spiral in the face of mounting debt, his ex-wife’s pregnancy with a former friend, and a scolding by his mother following a traffic stop that evening.

Nevertheless, “It must be emphasized that Nicholas Brutcher is the murderer here,” it said. “It would be wrong to place any blame for the attack on the traffic stop officers or others in Nicholas Brutcher’s life.”

Brutcher made a false call to 911 on the night of Oct. 12, 2022, asking for help with his brother, who he claimed had been acting aggressively since the two were pulled over in a traffic stop after a bar fight earlier that night, the report said.

As DeMonte, Hamzy and Officer Alec Iurato approached Brutcher’s home in response to the call, Brutcher opened fire with an AR-15 style rifle from a hiding spot in some bushes in front of his parents’ house next door, striking all three officers, according to the report. Wearing a camouflage shirt, pants and vest, he then stood over DeMonte and Hamzy where they had fallen and fired dozens more shots at them in front of his horrified parents, Joseph and Catrina Brutcher, who had come outside.

“How proud are you of me? How proud?” Brutcher said as he fired, possibly addressing his parents, according to the report.

His mother’s nonstop screams were caught on police body camera video.

“I don’t think I ever screamed like that before in my life,” Catrina Brutcher told investigators. “My son walked over to one of the officers that was down and just shot him point blank in his head. I was just screaming at him to stop.”

Joseph Brutcher said his son was “in a trance-type thing.”

Iurato, struck in the leg, was able to get away. Bracing himself against a police cruiser, he fired a single shot, striking Brutcher and killing him, the report said.

Friends and relatives said Brutcher had in recent months talked about suicide, describing a morbid side that found its way into a stand-up comedy act that one friend called “dark and tasteless.”

“He told jokes about dead babies, suicide, and disabled persons,” the report said.

The evening had begun at a bar where Brutcher had planned to perform during an open-mic forum, but instead got into a drunken fight with a patron, leading a bartender to call police, according to the report.

After Brutcher and his brother, Nathan, left the bar, officers pulled over their truck and had it towed, saying Nicholas Brutcher was too drunk to drive and Nathan Brutcher had an expired driver’s license. Their mother was called to pick them up. At the scene, she scolded a belligerent Nicholas, an interaction that likely left him feeling humiliated, the report said.

“I was embarrassed and I told him that,” Catrina Brutcher said. “I said, `Nick you’re embarrassing your family; you’re embarrassing our name.’”

Authorities concluded there was not enough evidence to charge Nathan Brutcher, who was struck in the initial round of gunfire.

Nicholas Brutcher fired a total of 83 rounds: 59 from the assault rifle and 24 from a 9 mm handgun, the report said.

“Twenty-four shots landed on Officer Hamzy. Six shots landed on Sergeant DeMonte,” it said.

Brutcher had 14 registered firearms, according to the report, including the assault weapon, now banned in Connecticut. He had purchased the weapon in 2010 and was grandfathered in under the law, but there is no record that he applied for a required certificate of possession or the large capacity magazines in his possession.

His blood alcohol level at .234 was about three times the legal limit to drive, toxicology results showed.

An analysis of his phone suggested that Brutcher was in a “toxic” relationship with a woman, who on the day of the attack told him she may have been pregnant. Information on the phone also indicated he had gotten another woman pregnant, whose due date was in October 2022, around the time of the shooting, the report said.

“The analysis of Nicholas Brutcher’s phone, interviews of family/friends, and a comprehensive review of all collected evidence provided insight into the stressors of Nicholas Brutcher’s life that likely contributed to the ambush attack on officers,” the report said.

DeMonte, 35, was a 10-year veteran officer and co-recipient of his department’s 2019 Officer of the Year award. His wife was expecting their third child at the time of his death.

Hamzy, 34, worked eight years for his hometown police force. Like DeMonte, he was an adviser to a police cadet program.

Iurato joined the Bristol department in 2018.

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Thompson reported from Buffalo, New York.