Here's a quick update on what we won in the 2011 CT legislative session.
The Governor played a strong leadership role this session. The budget is as good as it is for children and families because of his leadership. In some cases - in particular around consolidating the State's early childhood programs, being more aggressive on health care and in the entry age for kindergarten - your stories, calls, emails and just plain speaking out helped move the Governor to a better place than where he started.
Families and children did well at the legislature this year. Here's some of the things we won (thanks to the Early Childhood Alliance for some of the info), with links to more information:
EARLY CHILDHOOD
Budget for Early Childhood Programs - In a year dominated by budget woes, the governor and the legislature maintained funding for early childhood programs such as Care4Kids, School Readiness, DSS State Funded Centers, Family Resource Centers, and State Funded Head Start; in addition, funding was maintained for the Nurturing Families Network and HUSKY was largely preserved. Also, the legislature approved $500,000 in new money for Even Start.
SB 1103 - Sets up a two-year planning process to look at all early childhood funding streams and make recommendations to the General Assembly and Governor Malloy's administration to create a coordinated early childhood system. The bill calls for the system to be in place July 2013. Your stories, thoughts and vision will be important in making this real.
SB 927 / Public Act 11- 54 - Creates a more realistic time frame for Connecticut to meet early childhood teacher requirements.
SB 983 - Addresses emergency response plans for children and child care settings.
HEALTH CARE
HB 6308 - Keeps Connecticut on a path of making sure all families have access to quality, affordable health care. It builds on and strengthens federal health care reform and sets up the Governor's SustiNet Health Care Cabinet as a working team. Among the priorities will be to look at implementing federal health reform's Basic Health option, which would streamline and open HUSKY and other Medicaid programs to more CT families. The Cabinet will also work on the creation of a non-profit health insurance option as a new choice for Connecticut families.
SB 921 / Public Act 11 - 53 - Establishes the Connecticut Health Insurance Exchange to create a standardized, understandable marketplace for consumers and small businesses to purchase health insurance. The Exchange, authorized under the Affordable Care Act (ACA), must be operational by 2014 when the ACA’s individual mandate becomes effective. Federal subsidies will be available to working families with low-wage jobs.
SB 11 - Makes sure that if insurance companies want to raise their rates, the people covered by that plan and the general public are informed and have time to respond. For some rate increases exceeding 10%, a public "symposium" must be held.
SB 913 / Public Act 11 - 52 - Connecticut becomes first state in nation to require certain employers to offer their employees paid sick leave. Businesses in the service industry with 50 or more employees must allow their workers to accrue one hour of sick time for every 40 hours worked. The measure covers only service workers who receive an hourly wage, an estimated 200,000 to 400,000 of them, including waiters, cashiers, fast-food cooks, hair stylists, security guards and nursing home aides. It allows each employee to earn one hour of paid sick time for every 40 hours worked, with the number of days capped at five per year. Child care workers and programs with and without sick days played a leading role in advocating for this law.
SCHOOLS
There was lot of action on the higher education front, but most changes in K -12 were deferred until next year. CT Parent Power and other organizations will be working between now and February, 2012 (when the legislature returns) on making sure parents understand the issues and are prepared to be heard.
SB 1138 - Expands the types of conduct that constitute school bullying and the situations where it can occur. It expressly identifies as bullying (1) any targeting of a student based on the student's actual or perceived “differentiating” characteristics, such as race, gender, sexual orientation, or physical appearance and (2) actions taken through electronic communications or devices that otherwise qualify as bullying and are known collectively as “cyberbullying. ” The bill (1) makes the school principal responsible for investigating or designating someone to investigate and address bullying whether it occurs in or out-of-school, if it affects the school or students in the school or school district, and (2) requires all school employees, not just teachers and administrators, to report bullying incidents they see or that are reported to them to the principal or his or her designee. For more info, see our blog.
SB 929 - Takes action on the achievement gap in Connecticut; one part of this bill addresses early reading success. A section that would have delayed the age of kindergarten entry was removed because of concern about the impact on low-income children and the cascading effect it would have on school readiness; we will need to keep working on this issue.
A Task Force on State Financing of Education - Embedded in Section 189 of a massive budget implementer / "kitchen sink" bill, HB 6651, is a study of state funding for education in the context of state constitutional requirements. A task force must report to the Governor and the legislature an initial report on January 2, 2012 and a final report on October 1, 2012.
Whew! We won all this because of the calls, letters, emails and other organizing you did. Congratulations to all of us. It was good year.
