General Assembly Passes Solar, Labor Bills As Session Winds Down

HARTFORD, CT – The Connecticut General Assembly advanced major bills on renewable energy and labor-related issues Friday evening as the legislative session rushes toward its conclusion Wednesday.

The House spent more than three hours debating House Bill 5340, which would extend the state’s Residential Renewable Energy Solutions program that levies renewable energy tariffs to compensate residential solar owners for the power their systems produce and provide to the local electric grid.

Rep. Tracy Marra, a Republican from Darien and ranking member on the Energy and Technology Committee, said that there was a lack of clarity regarding the ultimate impact the bill will have on ratepayers, and drew attention to the controversial public benefits section of electricity bills.

“Clearly this is going to be something that affects the bills of everyone across the state of Connecticut,” Marra said. “When we have been hearing from customers everywhere, please lower our rates, please lower our rates. This is not what we contemplated here. We’re contemplating putting more on.”

However, Republicans were not uniform in opposition to the bill. Rep. Tim Ackert, R-Coventry, noted that there are 2,400 jobs based in the solar industry in the state, and called the bill’s focus on battery storage and other renewables an investment.

“We need local power here in Connecticut,” he said. “We’re doing that with the last section of this bill, with our fuel cells. We’re doing that with solar, and we have localized solar generation right here in Connecticut. We’re not relying on Maine, or a power supply coming all the way from Canada here on power lines. So I look at this a little bit differently.”

The bill passed the House 99-43, with 9 absent or not voting and is now on the Senate calendar for consideration. The Senate held a session this Saturday, but it was unclear if the bill would come up for consideration.

Connor Yakaitis, Deputy Director of the Connecticut League of Conservation Voters, celebrated the House vote.

“The Rate Payer Impact statement speaks for itself,” Yakaitis said in an emailed statement. “These programs reduce rates to electric customers. Promoting solar energy means championing affordability in Connecticut. We look forward to the Senate considering this important legislation.”

Senate Approves Omnibus Labor Bill

Meanwhile, the Senate spent most of Friday debating HB 5003, a sweeping bill that consolidates several bills the Labor and Public Employees committee considered during the session. It passed the House on April 28.

Major provisions of the bill include job protections for healthcare workers and teachers, enhancements to benefits for public safety officers and firefighters to improve recruitment, requirements for employers to share wage range information in job postings, and more.

The Connecticut Education Association (CEA) celebrated the bill’s passage out of the Senate with a statement saying teachers across the state “are breathing a collective sigh of relief, no longer fearing that arbitrary decisions could force them out of the profession they love.”

The bill ensures that disciplinary and termination decisions related to teachers will be “made through a fair, consistent, and objective process — based on facts, not politics, pressure, or personal bias,” according to CEA. “It is especially fitting that this bill advanced on May Day, International Workers’ Day, when we honor the labor movement’s continuing fight for fair treatment on the job.”

CEA President Kate Dias expressed gratitude after the vote.

“We are extremely grateful to all the legislators who voted for this bill as well as to legislative leadership and Governor Lamont for championing educators,” she said. “When this bill becomes law, educators will have fair and consistent treatment, just like other professionals. When decisions that affect an educator’s career are handled through a fair and transparent process, schools are more stable, experienced educators remain in the profession, and students benefit.”

Teachers facing discipline or termination are currently entitled to a hearing before a neutral hearing officer, but the officer’s decision is only a recommendation to local school boards in Connecticut. Unlike with other school employees, the local school board makes the final decision.

CEA said the current process is “politically biased” and “creates a climate of fear that impacts the entire teaching environment.”

Dias continued: “Every teacher deserves to be treated with fairness and respect, and this bill ensures teachers receive a fair, consistent, objective, and professional process based on facts and evidence regarding disciplinary and termination decisions. This legislation is critical to ensuring that decisions affecting an educator’s career and reputation are handled with integrity, strengthening trust in our schools and allowing our communities to keep great educators in the classroom doing what they do best, teach.”

Sen. Rob Sampson, a Republican from Wolcott and ranking member on the labor committee, took issue with the process for the bill, calling the omnibus package a “legislative buffet” that moved beyond the boundaries of labor issues.

“How did we get here?” he asked. “Why do we have a 75 [section] bill that is a container, effectively, for many, many bills that ran as individual bills themselves and now just end up as a section or two or three throughout this huge document? And how did we get to a point where we’re including lobsters and double utility poles in a labor bill?”

After six hours of debate and multiple failed amendments, the bill passed the Senate 28-7 with one absent or not voting. The bill now heads to Gov. Ned Lamont’s desk. 

“This bill makes targeted, meaningful investments in the people who keep our communities strong — from first responders and veterans to nurses, teachers, and blue-collar workers,” said Rep. Emmanuel “Manny” Sanchez, a Democrat from New Britain and committee co-chair, in a statement on his website.

The legislative session ends Wednesday, May 6.