June 4, 2004 |
2004-R-0466 | |
STATE MANDATES THAT AFFECT MUNICIPALITIES | ||
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By: Kevin E. McCarthy, Principal Analyst | ||
You asked for a summary of legislation passed in the past five years that imposes mandates on municipalities, the estimated costs of these mandates, and state funding for them.
SUMMARY
The legislature has imposed a wide range of mandates on municipalities over the past five years, most of them imposing minimal costs on municipalities. The fiscal notes prepared by the Office of Fiscal Analysis generally do not estimate the costs of these mandates, but rather indicate the types of costs that municipalities may incur as a result of them. In many cases, the costs cannot be determined when the legislation is adopted, and there is no available comprehensive data on the actual costs the municipalities incur after the mandates go into effect.
Generally, the legislature does not appropriate funds or establish a dedicated revenue stream to pay for the costs of a specific mandate.
STATE MANDATES
As used in this report and as defined by CGS § 2 or 32b, a municipal mandate is a state action, other than a court order legislation needed to comply with a federal mandate, that requires local governments to establish, expand, or modify its activities in a way that requires additional expenditures from local revenues. For 2000 through 2003, information on which acts impose mandates and the costs they impose is taken from annual reports on mandates prepared by the Office of Policy and Management (OPM). The 2003 report is available at http: //www. opm. state. ct. us/igp/acir/man03lis. doc. Earlier reports are available in the Legislative Library. The OPM reports also describe legislation that reduces or eliminates municipal mandates. The information for the 2004 legislation is taken from fiscal notes prepared by the Office of Fiscal Analysis (OFA), which are also incorporated in the OPM reports, although OPM and OFA differ on the fiscal impact of some acts.
Table 1 describes public acts that establish or expand state mandates with more than minimal costs in the view of OFA or OPM. In most cases, OFA and OPM do not estimate the costs of the mandates. Instead, they identify the types of costs that municipalities might incur, when appropriate indicating whether they believe the costs will be significant. Similarly, the legislature seldom appropriates funds or establishes a dedicated revenue stream to pay for the costs of a specific mandate (PA 04-144 is an exception. ) In some cases, an existing statutory grant formula will offset part of the cost of an expanded mandate (cf. PA 00-157).
Table 1: State Mandates with Potential Costs or Revenue Loss
Public Act |
Mandate |
Potential Cost/Revenue Loss |
03-1 June Special Session |
Municipalities must pay a 50 cent fee for each vehicle or snowmobile report on the delinquent tax list tax collector submits to the Commissioner of the Department of Motor Vehicles. |
Workload and expenditure increase |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
Potential Cost/Revenue Loss |
03- 6 June Special Session |
• Bars municipalities from charging or collecting interest on property tax due, for one year, with respect to a taxpayer who was a member of the military serving in the Middle East when the tax came due. • Eliminates the state reimbursement for revenue loss due to additional exemptions granted to veterans who do not meet regular program financial parameters. • Removes the property tax exemption on totally disabled persons and on machinery used for mail distribution services for the grand list year 2002 municipalities recouping their money from this exemptions that have already been granted. |
Indeterminate revenue loss, foregone revenue |
03-270 |
Expands, in some case, property tax exemption for a charitable corporation’s real property. |
Grand list loss in some towns |
03-269 |
Extends tax exemptions on servicemen’s vehicles to leased vehicles and entitles any person claiming this exemption to a refund of any tax paid on such vehicle. |
$ 3 to $ 4 million annual reduction statewide in grand lists |
03-241 |
All primaries for nominations to state office must be held on the second Tuesday in August in the election year. All primaries for nominations to a local office must be held on the 56th day before the election. |
Establishing an August primary for state offices will result in staffing and other costs to municipalities. The extent of the costs depends on the municipal population, the number of primaries held, and whether it is a state or district office primary. |
03-236 |
Local health directors must comply with any orders of the Commissioner of Public Health for isolating or quarantining persons during a declared public health emergency. Law enforcement officers must take into custody, when directed by the commissioner, any individual who refuses an order to be quarantined or isolated. |
Cannot be predicted |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
Potential Cost/Revenue Loss |
03-220 |
Schools boards must (1) implement a program for ongoing reviews to maintain and improve the indoor air quality in schools, (2) starting in 2008 and every five years thereafter, inspect and evaluate every school for its indoor air quality, (3) provide for a environmental site assessment for all school construction projects, and (4) ensure that heating and other building systems are properly maintained and operated. |
Indeterminate |
03-68 |
Group health insurance policies (including those for municipal employees) must cover specified services provided in conjunction with dental services. |
Increased insurance costs to municipalities that do not provide this coverage |
03-37 |
Group health policies must cover craniofacial disorders. |
Increased insurance costs to municipalities that do not provide this coverage |
02-55 |
Group health policies must offer policyholders and their dependents the option to continue group coverage during illness, injury, and certain disabilities, regardless of eligibility for other group coverage. |
Potentially higher premiums |
02-96 |
Group policies must cover adopted children on the same basis as other dependents and policies may not contain any preexisting condition, insurability, eligibility, or underwriting approval provision relating to adoptees. |
Potentially higher premiums |
01-4 June Special Session |
School boards must include a chronic disease as part of the health assessments conducted for students entering the 7th and 11th grades. Boards must also include, on annual basis, the number of students diagnosed with asthma. Local health directors must work with the Public Health commissioner to establish a comprehensive statewide asthma plan. |
Increased workload for school districts health personnel |
01-6 June Special Session |
Reduces, from 100% to 80%, state reimbursement for property tax exemption on new machinery and equipment. Allow Economic and Community Development commissioner to extend property tax exemption for pharmaceutical companies by five years. |
Revenue loss |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
Potential Cost/Revenue Loss |
00-133 |
A municipality or school district may not claim sovereign immunity or that an activity is mandated by the state as a defense in any action brought by someone for injuries received while being transported to or from school. |
Potential legal claims and costs |
00-151 |
Each public safety answering point (PSAP, e. g. , a fire department providing 911 services) must provide medical dispatch, or arrange for it, for calls requiring emergency medical services. Each PSAP must submit information quarterly on emergency medical service (EMS) calls to the Office of Statewide Emergency Telecommunications. Each EMS provider must submit quarterly reports to the Commissioner of Public Health. Each municipality must establish a local emergency medical services plan. |
Training costs of about $ 150,000 per year statewide, plus various legal and other costs |
00-157 |
Extends the mandatory age for school attendance from 16 to 18 unless the child is a high school graduate or has parental consent to withdraw from school. The school district must provide such parent with information on educational options available in the school system and in the community. Extends the truancy laws to cover 16 and 17 year-olds. |
Increases the number of students attending school, with associated costs for additional staff and other resources. The exact cost cannot be determined as data is unavailable on potential students not currently attending school by age group nor can a projection be made on the number of students who will consent to their dropping out. Costs are likely to be greatest in large urban districts, where drop out rates are relatively high. Increased costs will be partially offset through the Educational Cost Sharing grant formula. Could also result in additional costs to police departments for truancy enforcement. |
Source: For 2000-2003 mandates, Office of Policy and Management
Table 2 lists mandates that impose a minimal cost on municipalities, in the view of OFA and OPM. PA 04-144 is unusual in that it establishes a revenue stream (an increase in land use application fees) to offset its costs.
Table 2: Municipal Mandates with Minimal Costs
Public Act |
Mandate |
04-185 |
People or municipalities that maintain registered water diversions in use as of July 1, 2001 must annually report monitoring data about them to DEP. |
04-144 |
Towns must adopt regulatory standards for managing land uses in floodplains and reducing potential hazards pursuant to federal law. |
04-243 |
Any school board that employs an athletic coach must have his supervisor evaluate the coach annually and provide him with a copy of the evaluation. If a board terminates or declines to renew the contract of a coach who has held his position for three or more school years, the board must: (1) inform the coach of the decision within 90 days after the end of the season covered by the contract and (2) allow him to appeal the decision to the board. |
04-227 |
School boards in districts required to provide bilingual education must include information on second language acquisition in their in-service staff training programs. |
04-181 |
School boards must adopt written policies and procedures for administering medication in schools. |
04-113 |
Registrars of voters must post their hours and enter information on the statewide centralized voter registration system, among other things. Voter registration agencies must record an applicant's party affiliation on his application receipt. |
04-40 |
Imposes requirements on assessors to allow servicemen and veterans or members of their families to keep receiving certain property tax exemptions when they move to a different town during the assessment year. |
04-115 |
Establishes reporting requirements and makes other changes to the “490” program, which provides landowners with tax relief to reduce the pressure to develop their farm, forest, and open-space land. |
03-156 |
Police departments must, upon complaint of identity theft, prepare a report on the matter and investigate the alleged violation |
03-160 |
Police departments must send a copy of each racial profiling complaint and subsequent disposition to African-American Affairs Commission, in addition to parties that receive copies under prior law. |
03-177 |
Requires a water pollution control authority or sewer district to act on certain applications within 65 days of receiving them. |
03-224 |
Town clerks must forward the second copy of process papers served against a town board, commission, department, agency or employee to the appropriate person. |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
03-241 |
Registrars, upon the receipt of any page of a candidate petition for state or district office, must sign and give to the person submitting the petition a receipt, in duplicate, stating the number of pages filed and the date and time of filing. The registrar also must certify each page of the petition. |
03-244 |
Imposes reporting requirements on peace officers in connection with drunk boating. |
03-256 |
Town clerks must publish, when provided by a special district, the names of each candidate for district commissioner or any issue placed on the ballot of the district. |
02-35 |
Local law enforcement officials must assist the Agriculture Commissioner, upon request, in controlling and eradicating livestock and avian contagious or infectious diseases. |
02-69 |
Contractors on municipal prevailing wage construction projects must adjust wage and benefit contributions each July 1 during the contract to reflect changes in the prevailing wage. |
02-70 |
Eliminates a municipality’s authority to waive the requirement for conducting a site location hearing for a new or used car dealer approval certificate under certain circumstances. |
02-72 |
Local building officials must forward to the state building inspector applications for building code exemptions, modifications, or variations, and their comments on the merits of the applications. Local fire marshals must forward to the State Fire Marshal any application received for a variation or exemption or alternate compliance with their comments on the merits of the application. |
02-83 |
Voter registration agencies must provide a receipt to persons submitting a voter application. |
02-119 |
School boards must adopt and implement policies addressing the existence of bullying in its schools. |
02-137 |
Exempts certain resident veterans from paying the fee for a town hawker and peddler permit. |
02-143 |
Assessors who grant exemptions on certain machinery and equipment must notify OPM whenever a business that received an exemption ceases operations or moves entirely out of state. |
02-33 |
Increases the minimum wage from $ 6. 70 to $ 6. 90 on January 1, 2003 and to $ 7. 10 on January 1, 2004. |
01-33 |
Increases from 15 to 34. 5 cents per mile the amount employers must reimburse workers’ compensation recipients when they use their own vehicles to go to and from medical appointments. |
01-55 |
Increases from one to three years the time an employer must retain the medical records of its employees following termination of employment. |
01-74 |
Town clerks must enter a property owner’s name in the grantor index when recording a mortgage assignment or other transfer of interest in a mortgage. |
01-79 |
Town clerks must file an affidavit with the Department of Environmental Protection attesting to the accuracy of the accounting in their annual report on fish and game licenses. |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
01-80 |
Allows municipal employees who retire before 65 to receive an annual cost of living adjustments (COLAs), increases the range of COLAs for previously retired municipal employees, increases benefits for survivors of police officers and firefighters, and allows municipal employees to vest in the retirement system in five years. |
01-85 |
Makes minor changes to workers’ compensation laws regarding payments to pharmacists. |
01-101 |
Requires group health policies to cover specialized formulas when such they are medically necessary for the treatment of a disease or condition and are administered under the direction of a physician. |
01-104 |
Requires police departments, when they seize cash that was not stolen, to notify the defendant of the circumstances under which it was seized and give them an opportunity for a hearing. If ordered by the court, the department must deposit the money in an escrow account. |
01-124 |
School boards must adopt and implement policies prohibiting any staff member from recommending the use of psychotropic drugs. |
01-130 |
Local authorities must forward the original of a gun permit application to the Department of Public Safety, together with funds for a national criminal records check. Police departments must (1) confiscate and forward to the commissioner any illegal permit possessed by any person, (2) revoke the gun permit of any permit holder convicted of a felony or certain misdemeanors, and (3) test fire every handgun it seizes as prescribed by the act. |
01-134 |
Towns must comply with state anti-glare standards when they use municipal funds to install or replace permanent lighting on local roads. |
01-144 |
Requires municipal electric utilities, among others, to file an annual report on forecasts of loads and resources with the Connecticut Siting Council. |
01-158 |
Towns that meet certain negative economic criteria must participate in a state process aimed at resolving those economic problems. |
01-163 |
Imposes several mandates on registrars of vital statistics, with regard to birth, marriage, death or fetal death certificates. |
01-166 |
School boards must specify the basic skills necessary for graduation, including a process for assessing a student’s level of competency. The boards must also develop a course of study for those who have not successfully completed the assessment criteria. |
01-171 |
Group health policies must cover routine patient care costs associated with cancer clinical trials, hearing aids for children 12 or younger, pap smear tests, colorectal cancer screening, psychotropic drugs and mammograms. |
01-182 |
All employers must make reasonable efforts to provide a room or other location, in close proximity to the work area, where an employee can express her breast milk in private. |
01-185 |
Any water company (including a municipal utility) that applies for a hearing with the Commissioner of Public Health to contest a penalty or order must send a copy of such application to the local director of health in the municipality where the violation occurred or that use such water. Water companies must also include information on the health effects and sources of lead and copper in the educational materials they annually send to residential customers. |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
00-197 |
Expands notice and distribution requirements regarding plans of conservation and development. |
00-173 |
If a school board discovers from a criminal record check that a certified employee has been convicted of a crime it must notify the State Board of Education. Boards also must make a good faith effort to contact previous employers for recommendations prior to hiring anyone. |
00-176 |
School boards must provide school superintendents any educational records of a child seeking to enter or return to a school district from a juvenile detention center, Connecticut Juvenile Training School or any other residential placement. The superintendent must provide such information to the principal at the school the child will be attending and the principal must disclose the information to appropriate staff. |
00-48 |
School boards must notify surrogate parents, in addition to people already required to be notified, of board policies concerning student conduct and school discipline. Boards must also notify surrogate parents of any disciplinary action taken against their minor pupil by the school. The home school district of a special education student who attends an interdistrict magnet school must hold a planning and placement team meeting that includes representatives from the magnet school. The home district must pay the magnet school the difference between the reasonable cost for educating such student and the amount the magnet school gets from other federal, state, local and private sources calculated on a per-pupil basis. |
00-79 |
Town clerks must provide the moderators of each polling place with a specified number of paper ballots. |
00-98 |
Each municipality must include a requirement in any future collective bargaining agreement that all non-essential municipal offices will be closed on Martin Luther King Day. If any municipal employer and employee organizations can not come to a settlement on this issue, the act specifies the procedures and timelines that the parties must follow to reach an agreement. |
00-103 |
Expands definition of motor vehicle to include construction equipment and other types of vehicles for purposes of several criminal statutes, including larceny. This means that local law enforcement officers must handle these items, when stolen, the same way as they handle stolen motor vehicles. |
00-148 |
Municipalities must inspect, as well as place and maintain, signs and pavement markings at railroad crossings. |
00-156 |
A one-half credit course on civics and American Government must be included among the 20 credits already required for high school graduation (also contained in PA 00-187). |
00-187 |
All school districts must participate in a standardized electronic data collection and reporting system, so long as the state Department of Education provides technical assistance and trains school staff to use the new system. |
00-194 |
Prohibits municipalities from assessing improvements to real property that is being used for commercial or retail purposes in an enterprise zone while the improvements are under construction. |
-Continued-
Public Act |
Mandate |
00-200 |
Requires municipalities to forgive at least part of the interest due on a delinquent tax property tax bill with respect to a taxpayer who has received compensation as a crime victim. |
00-206 |
Expands hearing requirements in conjunction with the affordable housing appeals process. |
00-220 |
Imposes notice requirements on school districts when a student moves from one district to another. |
00-229 |
Exempts from property tax any real or personal property owned or leased by a licensed, nonprofit organization on which a nonprofit nursing home, rest home, or residential care home is located. |
00-1 June Special Session |
Require towns that contain a borough to annually file a form with OPM on behalf of the borough that lists and codes the assessed value of each parcel of state-owned real property located in the borough. |
Source: For 2000-2003 mandates, Office of Policy and Management
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