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Groups try to influence legislature over fiscal guardrails

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Groups try to influence legislature over fiscal guardrails


A new report from the Connecticut Project Action Fund Wednesday suggests lawmakers look at relaxing some of the state’s fiscal guardrails.

Vice President of Advocacy and External Affairs Melvin Medina said the purpose of the report isn’t to make recommendations, but also notes it makes the case that the guardrails are now limiting the state’s ability to pay for certain needs.

“This is about improving, strengthening the fiscal rules, but striking a better balance,” Medina said.

The report comes four weeks ahead of the start of the next legislative session, when lawmakers will begin working on a new two-year budget.

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The fiscal guardrails will likely be a focal point of that debate.

Other groups have also tried to get ahead of that debate by pushing to uphold those constraints and many lawmakers have voiced concerns about making changes.

“It’s the sole reason we have been able to prevent tax increases, it’s the sole reason we’ve put $4 billion in reserve,” Sen. Stephen Harding said.

The state has four guardrails:

  • A spending cap that limits growth based on inflation
  • A volatility cap that restricts spending of income taxes from Wall Street investors
  • A revenue cap that keeps lawmakers from spending 100% of expected revenues
  • A bond cap that limits borrowing

The Connecticut Project report suggests lawmakers could revisit the spending and volatility caps.

The report notes the volatility cap, in particular, has resulted in significant excess cash.

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Revenues that are subject to the cap have exceeded it every year since 2018, often by more than $1 billion, but those funds can go toward the rainy day fund or debt.

Various groups have pointed to those funds in hopes of getting extra money for programming.

Medina said that’s something lawmakers could do, but also noted the state will need extra money for existing services.

Medicaid is on pace for a deficit exceeding $200 million, while lawmakers will consider increased funding for local school aid and other needs.

“That budget cliff is looming, and so our belief is you probably start where the gaps are,” Medina said.

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Supporters of the guardrails say it’s those constraints that free up money in the long run. The Yankee Institute has been airing ads urging people to tell their lawmakers not to support changes.

“If we get rid of the guardrails, then we go back to the bad old days where every budget cycle, we had emergency tax increases, budgets that didn’t balance,” Yankee Institute President Carol Platt Liebau said.

Some Democrats have voiced support for revisiting the volatility cap, but that doesn’t mean the votes will be there to make a change.

Sen. Cathy Osten (D-Sprague), who co-chairs the legislature’s Appropriation’s Committee, said the state has increased spending for various needs. She also said paying down debt will help the state do more of that over time.

“I think that’s important to recognize that by doing what we’re doing, we’re opening up more funding opportunities,” Osten said.

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Person reported missing found dead in Brookfield

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Person reported missing found dead in Brookfield


A person who was reported missing late Friday night in Brookfield has been found dead.

Police received a report of a missing person around 11 p.m. As officers were searching the area, they said they found an ATV off of the roadway and in the woods on Candlewood Shores Road.

According to investigators, the sole occupant of the ATV was found dead at the scene. The person’s identity has not yet been released.

The investigation is active and ongoing. Anyone with information is asked to contact Officer Brian Flanagan at (203) 740-4169.

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Newly released video shows Connecticut prison officers striking inmate before he died

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Newly released video shows Connecticut prison officers striking inmate before he died


HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Connecticut prison inmate J’Allen Jones was suffering a mental health crisis in 2018 when correctional officers struck him multiple times, stripped him naked, put a spit bag over his head and sprayed pepper spray at his face shortly before he died.

Video of the series of events was released Friday by a state judge in Hartford overseeing Jones’ family’s lawsuit against eight officers and a prison nurse, following a yearslong legal battle and after both sides agreed to certain redactions.

The Department of Correction had sought to keep it sealed since 2019, saying in part that its release could present security problems because it shows the physical layout of the prison and staffing patterns. But Jones’ family, the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut and local NAACP officials called for publicly releasing the video, saying transparency was needed in Jones’ death.

“The events in the video are as disturbing as the events in the video of George Floyd’s death,” Ron Murphy, a lawyer for Jones’ family, wrote in a court document, referring to the man killed by a Minneapolis police officer in 2020. “But in some ways, the video of J’Allen’s death is worse.”

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Jones, 31, from Atlanta, was serving a 10-year sentence for robbery at Garner Correctional Institution in Newtown, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of New Haven when he died on March 25, 2018. Correction officers had been trying to take him to a medical unit in the prison at the time to get treatment for his mental illness.

Handcuffed inmate appeared in crisis as officers struck him

Portions of the 52-minute video show Jones handcuffed behind his back — and later with his legs shackled — as officers hit his legs and torso with their knees and fists, after he refused a strip search. At one point, an officer pins him down on a bed with a knee on his back while others hold him down.

Jones — who was having a schizophrenic episode, according to court documents — is heard yelling at this point, much of it unintelligible. He repeatedly shouts, “In the blood of Jesus Christ!” At one point, he tells officers, “I command you … to uncuff me now!”

Officers, meanwhile, tell Jones numerous times to stop resisting and to calm down. One officer tells Jones they’re just trying to help him.

About 17 minutes into the video, Jones appears to start having trouble breathing after the spit bag was placed over his head and he was pepper sprayed. Nearly five minutes later, Jones appears to be unconscious as officers struggle to hold him up and put him in a wheelchair. At around the 24-minute mark, an officer requests a nurse to evaluate Jones.

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“Right now he’s just being dead weight, and I just want to make sure he’s OK,” the officer says, talking to the video camera held by another officer.

Minutes go by before life-saving measures are started

About 28 minutes into the video, a nurse starts performing CPR and an officer orders someone over the radio to call 911. An ambulance crew doesn’t arrive until more than 43 minutes into the video. Jones was pronounced dead at a local hospital.

Hours after Jones’ death, the Department of Correction put out a brief statement saying that Jones had become “non-compliant and combative with staff and then became non-responsive.” It did not say anything about officers striking Jones but noted that there were no immediate indications that excessive force was used. It said life-saving measures were performed and he was brought to a hospital.

The medical examiner’s office determined that the cause of Jones’ death was “sudden death during struggle and restraint with chest compression and pepper spray exposure in person with hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.” It ruled his death a homicide, although that designation does not necessarily mean a crime was committed.

In January 2019, a state prosecutor investigating Jones’ death determined that no crimes were committed.

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An internal Correction Department investigation found that excessive force was not used. But the eight officers and nurse violated policy by not recognizing for more than seven minutes that Jones was in medical distress — although not intentionally, the investigation report said.

Punishment of one-day suspensions without pay were handed down to the nine staff members, Correction Department records show.

The correctional officers’ union did not immediately return an email seeking comment.

Family lawyer hopes video release spurs calls for reforms

Allen was Black, and his lawyer says eight of the nine defendants are white. One is Black. In court papers seeking release of the video, Murphy said it’s important that the public sees the footage and can consider “whether his race or schizophrenia played any role in how his cries for help and gasps for air were perceived and handled.”

“I hope everyone who chooses to watch the video does so with an open heart, remembering that J’Allen Jones was a father and a son and that his family grieves every day,” Murphy said in a statement Friday afternoon, adding that he hoped the video leads to prison system improvements.

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He added, “I found the video very difficult to watch as it depicts the painful death of another human being. So please take care of yourself while watching and if you experience overwhelming feelings, consider taking a break or reaching out to someone for support. Thank you.”

Responding to a series of questions from The Associated Press about the video and how officers dealt with Jones, the Correction Department’s interim commissioner Sharonda Carlos, said in a statement that the agency is continually focused on improving the services it offers to inmates experiencing mental health problems.

“Any loss of life in our facilities is a tragedy that we feel deeply, and our sympathy remains with Mr. Jones’ family and loved ones,” she said.

Carlos said she appointed a psychiatrist to lead the department’s inmate medical services in May, and the agency is rolling out major improvements to its mental health training for staff.

“Behind every individual in our care is a family hoping for their well-being, and we do not take that responsibility lightly,” she said.

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40 Years, Zero Accountability: The Union Deal That’s Been Emptying Connecticut’s Wallet

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40 Years, Zero Accountability: The Union Deal That’s Been Emptying Connecticut’s Wallet


Last week, Yankee Institute proposed the Expenditure Records and Information Notification Act, or ERIN’s Act, a reform requiring executive branch agencies to publish purchasing-card transactions in a centralized, searchable online […]



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