Gov. Ned Lamont promised to cut taxes for the middle class in his first address to state lawmakers since being sworn in for a second term in office, and called for collaboration to address high costs in housing, healthcare and energy that he said limit the state’s opportunity to grow in the coming years.

Lamont said in his State of the State speech on Wednesday that when he first took office in 2019, the discussion was about Connecticut’s “permanent fiscal crisis.” Now, he said the state is on stable ground thanks to budget guardrails put in place by the legislature in 2017, and is in position to make what he promised would be a “meaningful middle-class tax cut.”

Lamont praised residents of the state for sticking together to help Connecticut to move into recovery faster. Now, three years on, with less concern about emergency recovery, buying masks and tests, and keeping businesses open, Lamont said he worries more that the state and country will miss the opportunity to “lift families up” in the recovery. Read More

Connecticut’s population grew by just 2,850 people in 2022, a year after the state saw its best growth in more than a decade.

U.S. Census Bureau data shows Connecticut’s 0.08% population growth rate ranked 28th among all states last year.

Connecticut added a net 66,000 residents in 2021 (0.72%), largely driven by an influx of New York City residents during the pandemic.

That was 12th best in the U.S. and marked Connecticut’s best net gain of the past decade, with the state’s population declining between 2014 and 2020. Read More

A new course brings together three Yale professional schools with community partners to find real-world solutions to the state’s affordable housing crisis.

In Housing Connecticut: Developing Healthy and Sustainable Neighborhoods, Yale Law School students and faculty join counterparts from the Yale School of Architecture and the Yale School of Management to create proposals for adding homes to New Haven. Their assignment is to create building projects anchored in affordable housing that more broadly consider additional community needs. Read More