Lawmakers Will Vote Whether To Extend Lamont's Emergency Powers

Danbury CT

13 July, 2021

4:32 PM

Description

CONNECTICUT — At the request of Gov. Ned Lamont the Connecticut General Assembly will be reconvening a special legislative session Wednesday to vote on whether to renew his declarations of public health and civil preparedness emergencies. Specifically, the governor has asked that 11 of his executive orders, set to expire July 20, be extended. The House will meet at 9:30 a.m., and the Senate will meet later. Both chambers plan on voting the same day, and with both legislative bodies heavily Democratic, the extensions will likely be granted. Among the orders the governor seeks to salvage is one that allows for the distribution of vaccines in parking lots, and another that affords tenants additional time to pay back rent. Arguably the most hotly contested orders involve mask-wearing in some settings, most notably among children under the age of 12 who cannot be vaccinated. "These orders are still needed to protect the public and continue critical measures to provide healthcare access and economic relief and respond to evolving changes," Lamont wrote in a recent email to state lawmakers. He has said the emergency powers need to stay in place at least through the beginning of the school year. An estimated 250 who disagree took part in a protest Monday afternoon at the state capitol. "For more than a year, Connecticut residents complied with the rules and dutifully stayed home, wore masks and socially distanced, yet now, when more than 60% of the population is vaccinated, businesses are returning to normal and the facts clearly show a substantial reduction in infection, transmission, hospitalization and death, the governor is trying to mislead the public by contending the threat is still so grave he needs to retain near-unilateral control of the state," said Rep. Mark Anderson in a prepared statement. Lamont issued executive orders on a near-daily basis between mid-March and into early April 2020, and they came with their share of controversy even then. Some Republican legislators argued that they reached too broadly beyond health and into economic matters, such as private contracts between tenants and landlords and the right to sue in the case of nursing homes. The governor announced the first extension of the orders last September. Declaring a state of emergency was a common governance tactic in the spring of 2020, but it has become a tougher sell as infection rates have plummeted. Across the U.S., 27 states still have virus emergencies in place, but another 23 have lifted theirs. In the Northeast, the emergency orders remain only in Rhode Island and Connecticut The demand for the vaccine has also dropped sharply. Just over 36,200 doses were administered in the most recent week reported by the Department of Public Health, down from a high of around 315,000 in April.