Teacher’s union sues over Malloy budget executive order

HARTFORD — The state’s largest teacher’s union filed a lawsuit Wednesday, in an attempt to stop Gov. Dannel P. Malloy’s budgeting by executive order.

The Connecticut Education Association, which announced last month its intent to sue the state, said that in the absence of a state budget, Malloy does not have the authority to reduce the state’s education grant.

Malloy’s executive order cuts $557 million in education funding from 139 cities and towns.

CEA waited until several communities affected by the order, joined the cause. Torrington, Plainfield, and Brooklyn are part of the initial filing. The union said it has received call from more than a dozen others wanting to join.

“This is harm that is rolling out immediately as we speak,” Don Williams, executive director of the union said at a Wednesday afternoon press conference on the steps of state Superior Court in Hartford.

Williams and others called the governor’s cuts catastrophic.

“This is going backwards,” Tony Detrio, a former Norwalk principal and now chairman of the Connecticut Association of School Administrators, said.

Detrio predicted the cuts will lead to heart breaking decisions, teacher layoffs, and in some communities, the return to half day kindergarten.

“Connecticut deserves a responsible budget that does not harm school children,” Williams said.

The state is three months into the new fiscal year with no budget as lawmakers wrestle over how to deal with a $5 billion deficit in a way that does the least amount of harm.

Last week, the Legislature failed to act on Malloy’s veto of a Republican plan.

“First of all I think CEA is acting on a premature basis,” Malloy said Wednesday speaking to reporters at the Capitol. “Under normal circumstances those checks don’t go out until the end of October. Secondarily, they’ll have to handle the issue of the fact that we have a lot less money to spend without a budget than we do with a budget. Their stronger argument might be that we can’t make any payments to communities in the absence of a budget. That’s one I would be afraid of … They would be hard-pressed to say they have (legal) standing any time before the checks would otherwise go out.”

Usually one quarter of Education Cost Sharing payments go to towns and cities at the end of October. The checks went out early to communities still getting them.

Some 85 towns received nothing, under Malloy’s executive order. Among the zeroed out communities are Fairfield, Milford, Monroe, Shelton and Trumbull. Another 54 get less than last year.

Torrington is used to getting $8 million in its first quarter. Instead it got $1.2 million, a Torrington teacher at the news conference said.

The state’s 30 neediest districts — including Ansonia, Bridgeport, Danbury, Derby, Norwalk, New Haven and Stamford — are receiving flat funding compared to last year.

Williams, a former legislator, said the union felt it had no choice to take every step possible to protect students.

“We have a strong legal case to block these cuts,” Williams said.

The union points out that even Connecticut Attorney General George Jepsen questioned the legality of the governor's executive order in a recent legal opinion.

"We can't sit by and watch our public schools dismantled.” CEA President Sheila Cohen, added. "This injunction is the first step toward ensuring that our state lives up to its commitment and constitutional obligations to adequately fund public education."

It is unclear how quickly the court will act on the matter.