House Approves Balanced, Bipartisan Budget

Hartford—The House approved a $51 billion, two-year budget on a vote of 139-12. Broad-based tax relief proposed by House Republicans was adopted in the budget plan, including a reduction in the income tax from 5% to 4.50% and 3% to 2%.

“I am pleased we’re helping the middle-class through tax relief and helping the nonprofits by increasing their funding by 2.5 percent. While the Highway use Tax was unfortunately not eliminated under this plan, the reporting requirement will be moved to quarterly instead of monthly helping some of our smaller trucking businesses,” said Rep. Patrick Callahan (R-108).

An amendment was offered to include funding for the Danbury Charter School, which was approved by the State Department of Education in 2018 but not yet funded.

“As a member of the Danbury delegation I wholeheartedly supported an amendment to fund the Danbury Charter School, which has been passed over too many times before. There is funding in the budget for the three other approved charter schools, but not Danbury,” said Callahan.

The amendment failed 69-81.

The plan fully funds the Excess Cost grants for special education reimbursements to towns. The budget also invests $150 million in education funding that will implement a portion of HB 5003, revising how public education is funded in Connecticut. It caps tuition payments to magnet and vocational agriculture operators at 58% of the amount paid per student in FY 24. There is also an allocation of $15 million for paraprofessionals to defer health care costs.

The budget also:

• Increases the EITC for working families from 30.5% to 40%
• Freezes the diesel tax at 49.2 cents per gallon for one year and won’t be recalculated per statue by the Department of Revenue Services effective in FY 24
• Increases WIC Coupon and Senior Food Vouchers for fresh produce
• Creates a new Fallen Hero account with Comptroller that will provide $100,000 death benefit to the family if a police officer is killed in the line of duty