Posted on March 31, 2023
HARTFORD – Rep. Tammy Nuccio, R-Tolland, issued the following statement on the advancement of H.R. 26 and S.R. 26, which authorize the payment of an arbitration award for more than 34,000 state employees in the amount of $49 million for additional pandemic pay.
The Appropriations Committee voted to advance the legislation on Thursday during its meeting and the measures now await passage on the floors of the Senate and House. The legislation authorizes payments – ranging from just over a $100 to thousands of dollars – to state workers and members of the Connecticut National Guard. The award was split between “high risk” and “low risk” state employees and who worked in person between March 2020 and March 2021.
Rep. Nuccio, the ranking House Republican member on the Appropriations Committee, voted yes to authorizing the payments, but noted her reservations.
“State employees worked through a pandemic and we recognize that many heroically showed up on the job through unprecedented times. But it has to be noted that this is a large expenditure of taxpayer money for state workers who have already received multiple raises and non-pandemic related bonuses,” Rep. Tammy Nuccio said. “There are private sector workers who kept the heat and the lights on for us, and nurses who cared for COVID patients for weeks on end who do not qualify for pandemic pay, which is troubling to me. We need to start thinking about the more than three million people who live in this state, not just 30,000 state workers. We could, and should, be doing much more to provide tax relief for residents, and there has to come a time when we take their needs into account.”
About $35 million from federal ARPA dollars have already been budgeted for the expenditure.
Rep. Nuccio can be contacted at Tammy.Nuccio@housegop.ct.gov or (800) 842-1423 with any questions or concerns related to state government. You can also follow her legislative activity by visiting her website, www.cthousegop.com/Nuccio or on Facebook by clicking here.