The Register Citizen (Torrington, CT)

Teachers union sues over Malloy order

CEA says governor can’t cut school grants

- By Linda Conner Lambeck

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 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 calls from more than a dozen others wanting to join. Stratford announced Tuesday it was planning to join the lawsuit. It, too, stands to lose millions under the governor’s plan.

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

Williams and others called the governor’s cuts catastroph­ic.

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

Detrio predicted the cuts will lead to heartbreak­ing decisions, teacher layoffs and in some communitie­s, a return to halfday kindergart­en.

“Connecticu­t deserves a responsibl­e budget that does not harm schoolchil­dren,” 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.

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 said state Attorney General George Jepsen questioned the legality of the governor’s executive order in a legal opinion.

“We can’t sit by and watch our public schools dismantled.” CEA President Sheila Cohen said. “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.

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