Jennifer Leeper

Today is the last day of our legislative session, and we will be working right up until midnight passing bills on behalf of the citizens of Connecticut. In the coming days, I will provide more information on some of the other bills we passed this week, but today I want to give you an overview of the budget we passed Monday night.

After months of negotiations, we passed a budget that includes the largest income tax cut in the state's history and significant increases in funding for local schools, also known as Education Cost Sharing funds.

This balanced, bipartisan budget maintains our commitment to promoting fiscal responsibility and stability to continue strengthening our economy, while delivering on key investments to support children, families, and seniors.
 
With this good budget stewardship and honoring the fiscal guardrails, we will maintain our excellent credit rating and pay down debt.

The bill passed last night in the Senate, and is on its way to Governor Lamont's desk to be signed into law.

Below, please find some key highlights of our budget.

• Deposits $3.3 billion into the Rainy Day Fund, helping us maintain a high credit rating and preparing us for any possible economic downfall.
• Pre-pays an additional $2.072 billion in unfunded pension liability.
• Includes the largest Personal Income Tax Cut in CT history ($190.6 million in FY 24 and $421.7 million in FY25).
• Exempts more retiree income from the state income tax.
• Continues our car tax cap
• Increases funding to towns – helping stabilize and lower local property taxes
• Continues property tax credits for homeowners

The budget supports our robust safety net services by:

• Funding our nonprofit providers – 2.5% cost of living increases for critical service workers
• Providing funding to group home employees – roughly a 4.5% pay increase
• Making historic investments of over $30 million for residents with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities