HARTFORD- Governor Ned Lamont announced a handshake agreement on a two year, $40 million dollar budget on Thursday.
Here are some big takeaways from the announcement that would take place over the next two years:
-Phasing out taxes on social security and pension plans
-Adding two billion dollars to the rainy day fund
- Cities most “distress” schools will receive $40 to $80 million dollars
-Savings in healthcare state employee plans- a total of $150 million dollars
With an inherited state deficit of 3.7 billion dollars, the governor said they’ve come up with a balanced budget without raising tax rates - but that doesn’t mean there won’t be tax increases on specific items.
Also revealed- there will not be a shift of teacher pension costs to cities and towns which has some Republicans- who were not a part of the budget discussion- asking where that money is going to come from?
“We did not want to see a cost shift of that to the towns and that is indeed not in there, but that also raises the question, so where are they going to get the money from?” State Representative Gail Lavielle said.
In addition, the governor agreed not to raise capital gains tax on wealthy individuals and said he will be expanding healthcare coverage to 4,000 new residents under Medicaid.
Lawmakers said they are confident they will draft the official bill and vote in the next few days.