Lamont: State needs to ‘get out of the way’ of shared services

Reiterating his new found mantra “to just have the state get out of the way,” Gov. Ned Lamont came to Essex on Friday to drill home that point.

Lamont was at Essex Elementary School along with politicians and school officials from the area who are seen as innovators when it comes to finding ways to share school services.

Essex, along with Deep River and Chester, make up the Region 4 school district.

Lamont met with local officials at the collaborative preschool program, which is shared between the towns of Chester, Deep River, and Essex.

The preschool has been operating for more than 20 years and has resulted in a significant savings for taxpayers, Region 4 officials said. However, Region 4 officials have said that trying to undertake similar efforts in grades K-12 are impossible under the current rules.

Sen. Norm Needleman, D-Essex, introduced legislation that he believes will help other school districts share services and cut costs across the state.

Lamont took notice and backed off his earlier call for penalties for school districts that fail to regionalize some of their back-office services, and would instead use construction bonds to incentivize schools to share services and cut costs.

The Education Committee passed Lamont’s revised bill Friday afternoon by a vote of 22-13, but not without criticism.

The idea of forced regionalization and consolidation was removed from the bill, but that wasn’t good enough for Republican lawmakers.

“It’s all still based on the premise that local school districts must be prodded somehow to act in their own best interests,” Rep. Gail Lavielle, R-Wilton, said.

Lavielle represents a community that organized...

from News https://www.ctpost.com/local/article/Lamont-State-needs-to-get-out-of-the-way-13727610.php