Connecticut
Pension fund assets for retired CT state employees and teachers up 14%
State Treasurer Erick Russell achieved a 14% increase last year investing Connecticut’s pension fund assets, gaining roughly $8.3 billion for retirement programs for state employees, teachers and other municipal workers.
The state, which oversees nearly $69 billion in pension assets, aims for an average annual return on pension investments of 6.9%.
Expectations for bigger gains grew throughout the past year as key stock market indices surged. The Dow Jones Industrial Average, an index of 30 prominent companies listed on stock exchanges, grew by more than 13% in 2025. And the S&P 500, which follows 500 traded companies, topped 16%.
Among peer states and other entities that manage public pension funds holding more than $10 billion in assets, Connecticut’s 2025 performance ranks in the top 17%, Russell said.
But the treasurer, who also announced this week he will seek a second term, said the latest big earnings stem from more than the big gains Wall Street enjoyed in 2025.
“Markets certainly have been strong, but a lot of this is about our overall asset allocation,” said Russell, who updated the Investment Advisory Council Tuesday on the state’s portfolio. “The progress we’ve been making … is a good sign that we’re set up for future success.”
Russell also reported investment gains of 10.3% for the 2024 calendar year and 12.8% for 2023.
State officials particularly have focused on improving investment returns since a May 2023 report from Yale University researchers found Connecticut’s results badly lagged the nation’s over the prior decade.
That only compounded an even larger pension problem that state officials began to address in the early 2010s. According to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College, Connecticut governors and legislatures failed to save adequate for pension benefits for more than seven decades prior to 2011. This deprived the state treasurer of huge assets that otherwise could have been invested to generate billions of dollars in revenue over those seven decades.
The treasurer’s office under Russell has put more funds into private and domestic markets and curbed reliance on investment managers who receive large fees for their work.
Gov. Ned Lamont and the General Assembly also have greatly assisted efforts to bolster the fiscal health of pension programs in recent years. Since 2020, they have used $10 billion from budget surpluses to make supplemental payments into pensions for state employees and municipal teachers. That’s in addition to annual required payments that currently approach $3.3 billion in the General Fund.
“These returns highlight the impressive work of Treasurer Russell and his team in increasing investment returns,” Lamont’s budget spokesman, Chris Collibee, said Tuesday. “Gov. Lamont’s focus has been on building a sustainable Connecticut for the future. Every dollar in additional investment revenue is funds the state can use to cut taxes and provide more resources for essential programs like education, child care, housing, and social services safety nets.”
Russell, a New Haven Democrat, said he has tried to make the office both “disciplined and forward-looking.”
“Over the last several years, we haven’t just changed how the office works, we’ve changed who it works for. We’re ushering in a new era of fiscal responsibility, making significant payments on long-term debt that has allowed us to invest in the residents of Connecticut and begin to lift up communities across our state.”
Russell also brokered a key compromise in 2023 between Lamont and the legislature that salvaged the Baby Bonds program, an initiative that invests long-term funds in Connecticut’s poorest children when they’re born to help finance educational and business opportunities later in life.
Keith M. Phaneuf is a reporter for The Connecticut Mirror (https://ctmirror.org). Copyright 2026 © The Connecticut Mirror.
MANSFIELD, Conn. (WTNH) — The Mansfield Drive-in is back open and ready to play some movies for guests starting the first weekend of April.
The drive-in’s first showing will be Thursday, April 2, with shows only through Sunday, April 5. At the start of the season, the theater usually sticks to weekend-only showtimes.
Gates will open at 6:30 p.m., with the first showtime starting at approximately 8 p.m. each night.
Movies playing this weekend include:
Screen 1:
8 p.m. “Super Mario Galaxy Movie”
9:55 p.m. “Reminders of Him”
Screen 2:
8 p.m. “Project Hail Mary”
10:10 p.m. “Crime 101”
Screen 3:
8 p.m. “Scream 7”
10:10 p.m. “undertone”
Tickets are available online in advance or at the gate. Pets are allowed as long as they are leashed and owners pick up after them.
The Original Southington Drive-In is slated to open in June.
The Iran war is having a big impact on farmers in Connecticut who are now dealing with soaring fertilizer prices. It’s a crucial material that helps grow or produce the food you buy at the grocery store.
“I go to the grocery store, and you see how expensive it is,” Jon Hermonot, an owner of Fairholm Farm, said.
High supermarket prices have Hermonot wincing whenever he makes a grocery run, but he has a good understanding of how prices are set, as he owns Fairholm Farm. It’s a dairy farm in Woodstock. Hermonot says it’s a very demanding and intensive operation with small profit margins.
“We put a lot of our money back into it, and we want this farm to be here,” he said.
He has hundreds of cows to feed and care for, but doing so has gotten harder ever since the Iran war began, especially because of the price of fertilizer.
“You combine that with the price of fuel and the other costs on the dairy farm, and to top that off, it’s like a perfect storm right now,” he said.
At the farm, they have seen the price of fertilizer double in about a month, in the tens of thousands of dollars. It’s used to grow the corn that goes into the feed the dairy cows eat.
“No fertilizer, no food. No farms, no food,” Paul Larson, president of the Connecticut Farm Bureau board, said.
He said fertilizer is crucial to grow many types of crops.
“Whether it’s vegetables, you’re raising hay, corn silage,” he said.
Larson explained that natural gas, a key component in fertilizer production, is affected by the war. That region produces a lot of it, and tankers are unable to get through the Strait of Hormuz, leading to a jump in price on the world market. Larson said farmers across Connecticut are noticing.
“It went around $400 in early February, but then after this war started in Iran, we’re now up to $850 to $900 a ton,” Larson said.
UConn vegetable and hemp specialist and educator Shuresh Ghimire said the timing isn’t great. Farmers have to decide now what to grow and how much to plant, so they’re ready for harvest in the fall.
“Not enough fertilizer would mean decreased crop yields. And that would also translate to increased produce prices at grocery stores later in the summer and fall,” he said.
Ghimire says even if the war ended quickly, there’s no immediate relief for farmers.
“The prices are not going to come down the day after. It will take some time to come down,” he said.
Larson and Hermenot hope President Trump secures a peace deal soon that ends the conflict and reopens trade to stabilize prices.
“That would be amazing. That would take the edge off of this,” Larson said.
“Maybe coming down to an agreement that can maybe open up the channel for oil to be flowing again,” Hermenot said.
Connecticut
Eversource flying helicopters to inspect electric lines in several Connecticut municipalities
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (WTNH) — Eversource is conducting aerial inspections of electrical lines in several municipalities in the state this week, according to officials.
A low-flying helicopter will survey the condition of the electrical lines to identify potential issues before they cause power outages, officials said.
The helicopters will fly along the utility right-of-way Wednesday through Friday between 8 a.m. and 3 p.m. depending on the weather, officials said.
Inspections are expected in:
- Avon
- Bloomfield
- Bolton
- Cromwell
- East Hartford
- Hartford
- Manchester
- Rocky Hill
- Simsbury
- West Hartford
- Wethersfield
- Windsor
Between Monday and Tuesday, Eversource helicopter inspected Berlin, Bethany, Bristol, Cheshire, Durham, Farmington, Meriden, Middlefield, New Britain, Newington, Plainville, Plymouth, Prospect, Southington and Wolcott.
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