Special session agenda

Vote on absentee ballot preparation on list for legislators.

HARTFORD — Gov. Ned Lamont released the agenda Friday for a special legislative session this week that calls for consumer protections for utility customers, allotting money for school construction and making counting absentee ballots easier and faster.

The absentee ballot bill is timely because town halls have already been flooded with more than 285,000 absentee ballot applications across the state. The measure provides more flexibility for local registrars of voters and town clerks to prepare in advance of the Nov. 3 election, which includes the race between President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden. Officials expect as many as two-thirds of voters will cast absentee ballots this year after rules were loosened due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“There’s going to be 10, 20 times more absentee ballots than we’ve ever had before, and I want to put everybody’s mind at ease to make sure we can count these votes on a timely and accurate basis,” Lamont told reporters outside the state Capitol. “They can start processing the ABs earlier — the Friday before Election Day. Checking signatures, making sure they’re ready to go, ready to be counted when the time is right.”

While the envelopes can be opened and sorted earlier, the actual counting of the votes would not occur until Election Day, officials said.

The most time-consuming part of the process is handling the ballots themselves. Clerks need to open and sort two envelopes — the outside envelope that is mailed or delivered to town hall and then the inner envelope that contains the actual ballot. The ballots are then smoothed out so that they can be fed into the machines in the same way that voters at polling places across the state place the ballots into the machine.

Local officials said they would not be able to announce the winners on election night unless they had the chance to complete much of their work in advance.

Senate President Pro Tem Martin Looney of New Haven and Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff of Norwalk said in a joint statement that the ballot bill is a top priority.

“With November’s election just six weeks away, it’s just as vital to ensure every vote is counted and the outcome cannot be questioned,” the Democrats said. “We will make sure every absentee ballot mailed will be accepted and counted according to state law.”

Besides absentee ballots, legislators will try to kick-start redevelopment of contaminated properties by the eventual sunsetting of the Transfer Act, a sometimes-unpopular law that has been criticized by business owners seeking to sell properties and businesses like dry cleaners.

“It’s about getting our economy moving again,” Lamont told reporters. “The Transfer Act dates back to the mid-’80s. We’re one of the few states to do it. It’s very complicated, and it really makes it tougher to [sell] properties, especially brownfield properties — those with contamination. ... It keeps the state out of it and allows much more expedited selling of these properties.

Hundreds of properties have been sitting vacant and unused going back decades. This is a bill that really makes a lot of sense.”

The state House of Representatives could vote on the bills as soon as Wednesday, and the state Senate could vote by the end of the week.

But Senate Republican leader Len Fasano of North Haven said many of the bills do not need to be passed this week on an emergency basis because the legislature is already set to convene in January.

“The special session agenda is a disappointing display of one-party rule and partisan politics,” Fasano said of the Democrats. “Based upon this agenda, there is no need for a special session right now when nearly all of these bills could wait for the regular session to allow for more thought and public input. There is nothing on the agenda dealing with the pandemic, public health or the immediate needs in the middle of the crisis.”

Lawmakers will also vote on making sure that condominiums are covered under the law for crumbling foundations and that condominium associations can get loans from the state’s program. They will also vote on the nomination of Appellate Court Judge Christine E. Keller — the mother of House Majority Leader Matt

Ritter of Hartford — for a seat on the state Supreme Court.

The session will also focus on awarding nearly $500 million for construction and improvements at public schools across the state. There will be legislation to help hemp growers and manufacturers, along with improving the state’s environmental justice laws.

Lawmakers will also debate the “Take Back Our Grid Act” that would provide consumer protections for utility customers. The bill will “ensure the people of our state receive the services they pay for, ensuring that corporations focus on the people they serve instead of the profits they earn,” Looney said.

The measure will also provide “performance-based regulation” for electric, water and gas companies, along with requiring the state’s Public Utilities Regulatory Authority to decide whether to make “executive, officer and employee compensation contingent upon performance targets.” The bill would allow regulators to provide residential customers with credits for food and medication that is spoiled during power outages.