GAE Committee Hearing Transcript for 03/21/2003

REPRESENTATIVE O'ROURKE: We've got a large crowd. A lot of important bills today, dealing with campaign finance reform, and a lot of other important issues. Just to remind people to look around. There are a number of people here that want to speak, and we want to give you our full attention.

We want everyone to have a chance to address the committee today. So, we ask that people keep their remarks to three minutes, not because we want to cut you short, but because we want to provide our attention to everyone who came here and took the time out of their day to be with us and share their thoughts.

And again, I remind members who want to show interest in these bills and ask questions, but to the extent that we can, we'll try to keep the questions brief. And for everyone who testifies, when you're asked some questions, that doesn't open up another three minutes, okay? (Laughter).

We need to have short answers to things, because again, every hearing, about half of the people that come to testify, and sign up and stand in line, don't get to testify because it goes on for hours. And I always feel bad about that, so we're really going to try to stick to the time today, to get people going. With that, my co-chairman is here, and I'm going to turn it over to him.

SENATOR DEFRONZO: Okay. Our first speaker is First Selectman Bergstresser, Town of Greenwich. I hope I pronounced that good. Okay. Welcome, Mr. Selectman.

RICHARD BERGSTRESSER: Thank you. I'm Richard Bergstresser, first selectman, town of Greenwich. I'm joined by Denise Sourageau, our director of conservation. We're here to address HB6662, AN ACT CONCERNING THE CONVEYANCE OF CERTAIN PARCELS OF STATE LAND.

Specifically, two properties identified in section 2, 1.3 acres near the Merritt Parkway, on Spring House Road, and section 3, 2.4 acres, the west side of the Merritt, near Riversville Road, for those of you who are familiar with our town. We request this conveyance, one, because it supports our policy on open space.

Secondly, it provides sound barriers to traffic on the Merritt. It preserves the beauty of the Merritt, and protects our environment, and we urge the passage of this bill, and I'll turn it over to Denise now, to give you some of the background on the property.

DENISE SOURAGEAU: Yeah, just very quickly, want to talk about the benefits of the property. The two properties are located both near significant wetlands. One of the properties has vernal pool on it, and some other wetland areas. The other property is located just upstream from a fisheries area managed by the Department of Environmental Protection, on the Byram River.

Both of the properties provide, as Mr. Bergstresser said, significant pollution prevention, in terms of water quality runoff from the highway, as well as air quality from the highway for the residents. So, both of the parcels function as open space, and all of those benefits we would come to expect with open space.

I think along the highways, it's really important for us to maintain the open space parcels that do protect residents from the pollution that happens on our highways, and conveying these parcels rather than allowing them to be developed, but conveying them to remain as open space, I think would be a benefit for all the residents, not only of Greenwich, but of Connecticut, as we maintain these highway corridors and these forested buffers along our highways.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Are there any questions from our committee members? Representative Floren, you're more than entitled.

REP. FLOREN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just wanted to thank you both for being here, and for being so alert when this was about to be excessed, to come to the General Assembly, and for getting the Department of Transportation to agree to this. Thank you.

DENISE SOURAGEAU: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I might add, you have a strong advocate in Representative Floren, so I'm sure your interests are well protected here.

RICHARD BERGSTRESSER: I realize that. (Laughter).

SEN. DEFRONZE: Carlos Vazquez.

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, members of the committee. My name is Carlos Vazquez, and I am chairman of the Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission. Today I appear before you to offer you comments on HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION.

I must say that the comments are mine, and mine alone, even though I have discussed this -- my comments with other commissioners of the Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission. The stated purpose of the bill is to require information now sent to the Governor by the Commission, be also sent to the General Assembly on revised duties of the Commission.

I take that to mean that we now need to do a lot of reports, because that's what the bill exactly does. It also requires that all those reports be filed by a day certain. While we do send a report to the Governor on every major project that we do, whenever we do issue one of such reports, we share those reports with every member of the General Assembly.

We do not operate in a vacuum with the Governor. We are under the jurisdiction of the Committee on Legislative Management, and it is incumbent upon us to maintain all of our bosses, including all of you, informed of what we do.

We not only advise the Governor, but we also advise the General Assembly, in the form of advocacy, in issues that affect our communities, no matter where they are. Whether they be in Latino -- if we want to call them that -- legislative districts, but in every Latino community from Greenwich to Stonington, from Windsor to New Haven, no matter how small or how large that community may be.

In my opinion, the date of all these reports, in itself, sounds puzzling to me. The reports are -- would be required to be filed on March 1^st, especially reports on legislative issues. It sounds a little bit kind of out of place, since it would be smack in the middle of the legislative session.

Issues within our legislative agenda are shared with the Latino legislators, and we do so before the General Assembly convenes its session. Items two and three of the bill ask us to advise the administration of the current bill -- I should say the current act -- to advise the administration on state policies, coordination and administration of state programs, and we do just that.

If the issues that we are working on merit a report, we already prepare such a report, and share it with the General Assembly, as well. The bill now would require us to do another report, even if one is not warranted.

Item five, proposes to institutionalize a process we already established within the Commission, that is a (inaudible) database that contains peoples' names, office, addresses, that may be used by appointing authorities for the appointment to different boards and commissions, be they state or local governments.

All they have to do is ask, and we have provided -- we have stated to them and to other appointed authorities, that that database is available to them. Items four and seven of the bill also seem to be intended to make the Latino and Puerto Affairs Commission, meaning the State of Connecticut's Commission, beholden to state legislators that are of Latino descent, instead of all governmental entities, including all of you.

I happen to live in Meriden, and we don't have a legislator who is Latino. It seems to me that if Representative Donovan or Senator Gaffey, or any of the other legislators from Meriden have issues that affect their community, that we should give priority to them as well, and to all of you.

I'm going to summarize, Mr. Chairman. In summary, the Commission's roles have been of advocacy, of policies, programs, and legislative proposals that affect the Latino and Puerto Rican communities in the whole state of Connecticut. Our role is best accomplished in an environment of independence, while sharing information and collaboration with all legislators, when this sharing of information is mutually beneficial.

We should be able to speak our minds when our views are different, and those of our legislators, be they Latino or not. In my opinion, HB6657 takes away that independence, and requires the Commission to use our very limited resources for writing reports instead of playing our role as advocates for those in our communities, that, for a long time, have not had a voice in the process. Thank you for your time, and if I may answer any questions you have.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Mr. Vazqeuz. Are there any questions? Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome, Mr. Vazquez. A quick question. Would you describe for us how the Commission itself arrives at deciding what legislative priorities they will recommend at the Commission, which I understand, because I've seen it every year, amounts to the legislative agenda that has been opened and recommended. What is the process that you go through?

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: Our bylaws have established a Legislative and Priorities Committee. The Committee works throughout the year, seeking advice from legislators, and from the community, itself, to arrive at legislative issues that need addressing by the General Assembly.

That process, it's open to the public. Our committee meetings are open to the public. Our Commission meetings, also in accordance with FOI, are also open to the public. And the public can participate. We don't -- you know, we don't prevent anyone from participating and offering us our opinions on those legislative priorities.

Once that committee issues its report on the legislative priorities that we should be considering for the next legislative session, it comes before the full commission for approval, for discussion. And at times, we don't agree with the commission. The entire commission does not agree with the issues that are being raised.

And that's the process that we use now. In addition to that --

REP. O'ROURKE: Carlos --

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: Yes?

REP. O'ROURKE: It's getting a little long winded on this question.

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: Okay.

REP. O'ROURKE: We have another representative from the same agency coming up, and in the future, one per agency during the public officials list, okay? Carlos is a registered lobbyist.

REP. MANTILLA: Mr. Chairman, could I ask a quick follow-up question?

REP. O'ROURKE: Could you save it for the executive director? He's up next.

REP. MANTILLA: I'm asking it of the chairperson of the Commission. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I'll be very brief. Just quickly, could you describe the work of the actual Legislation and Priorities Committee? Are -- once you present the agenda to the Latino legislators, as you do every year, is that agenda considered to be final, or is it open for comments and additions?

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: It's open for comments and additions.

REP. MANTILLA: Okay, thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate that.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Mr. Vazquez. Sorry to rush you, but we have a very long schedule today.

CARLOS VAZQUEZ: Not a problem.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Our next speaker is Fernando Betancourt, to be followed by Senator Finch.

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Good morning, Senator DeFronzo and Representative O'Rourke, and honorable members of the committee. My name is Fernando Betancourt. I'm the executive director for the Latino and Puerto Affairs Commission, and I am here to comment and offer testimony on raised bill HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION.

I would like to start by pointing to the committee that our commission was not approached or given the opportunity to submit recommendations on this bill that highlights our agency. We are convinced that if we had such an opportunity, it would have had language that would have strengthened our commission, as that is the intention of this committee, as I understand it.

Second, let me share, we're concerned at the title and the statement of purpose as the first version of the bill made reference to the need for more accountability from our commission, as well as to clarify the responsibilities of LPRAC. Needless to say, this created the wrong perception in our community, that we had not been accountable in the past.

We have measured that fact by the numerous phone calls that we have received during the last two months on, on this subject. For our commission, this is not a new issue. I want to submit for the information of this committee, and by reference, that analysis conducted by the Office of Legislative Research, from their report of January, 2000, that those reports are -- Report 2000-R0088, and 0121, that are specific, and by reference also.

I'm going to give the information to the commission -- to the committee that reports of 1999, February 1999, those are 0320, 0321, 0331, and furthermore, the report 0379, all are specific reports from OLR about the responsibilities of the (inaudible) Commission, the responsibilities and duties of the commissioners, and the functions and operations of our commission.

Furthermore, the Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission hire an outside firm to do an assessment of the operations of the commission, including its staff, as well as the clarification of the duties and responsibilities of all commissioners. That report by the NESC was presented to the commission, and has implemented.

To my knowledge, we are the only commission to take this step as a direct result of the commission wanting to have a system in place that was both transparent and with accountability measures. If the committee so desires, we can provide you copies of that study.

On the content of the legislation, I would like to offer the following. On subsection C, 1, 2, and 3, recommended that a report be submitted to the General Assembly, we're not in a position because that has been the practice since 1995. The commission always understood that as the language on our law, defining us as a legislative commission.

On subsection 4, the new language used is not defined, and might cause more confusion. The proposed language talks about giving priority and serving as the liaison between our commission and the governmental entities to, and I quote, members of the General Assembly who represent one or more Latino and Puerto Rican communities.

If we were to use this language, it will include every member of the General Assembly, according to the latest census report. In my recent conversations with the two proponents of the bill, honorable Representative (inaudible) Gonzalez and Lilia Martinez, I believe that this is contrary to what they want to accomplish.

Our commission invited all five Latino legislators to our monthly commission meeting that took place this last Wednesday, March 19^th. I am pleased to report to this committee that on that evening -- may I? The commissioners had the opportunity to hear from the five distinguished legislators on the potential impacts of the facts from this proposed legislation.

Since it was the first time for commissions to read the new language, I can assure you that the discussion was frank, open, and honest. On this particular section, there seems to exist some confusion on how to operationalize it. On subsection 5, I want to clarify that we keep (inaudible) as our chairperson indicated before, and it's open for the public.

Now, on the proposed new section 7, it's (inaudible) our opinion from the same weakness that we eluded on section 4. Our commission establishes and implements a strategic plan that is developed and approved by the Board of Commissioners. Additionally, we invite our five Latino state representatives once a year to share the commission's legislative priority agenda for the session, before the session starts.

We do so with the intention of providing these legislators with an opportunity to discuss public policies that are the commissioner's priorities, and to hear which ones are theirs. This added layer of accountability is meant to be an open discussion to brief our commissioners on any issues that the honorable legislators would seek our advice and input.

And last comment on the proposed language, and thank you for allowing me to extend my testimony since it is directed to ours, we recommend that the date be changed from March, for the obvious reason it is in the middle of the session, and I believe that in your desire to strengthen our agency, you have started -- this committee has started a much needed public policy discussion on accountability and operations of commissions in the state government.

We welcome that public discussion, and thank you for the opportunity to express our opinions, and to provide recommendations. We want to alert the committee (inaudible), and you know, we believe this is important, of a potential or intended consequence of the approval of this bill.

That is the perception that these new mandates are being required solely from the entity that represents Latinos in the state. I am sure that this issue of fairness and equity will be given serious consideration. I -- you have my written testimony. I am available for any other questions.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Mr. Betancourt, some of us are a little perplexed by this bill, and I don't want to drag it out here, but substantively, in a concise fashion, what would this bill -- how would this bill affect the operation of the commission, as it's presently structured?

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: I am not sure what the effect will be, that's one of our concerns. As you notice, in the paragraph that I did not read, as a recommendation, I'm asking this committee to consider postponing this bill, tabling, and work with the commission on language that might be clearer.

One of our main concerns is this. I believe that it is not good public policy when a particular bill is -- incorporates the assignment of reporting to a particular group of legislators. For me, I believe that we have the responsibility for all the citizens of the state, to report and to have an open dialogue, and that's what we have done on both sides of the aisle for the last seven years. So, I am very concerned about that.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate once again. Mr. Betancourt, I wonder if you can describe to us, I think one of the benefits of this conversation is really a better understanding of the role and the accomplishments of the commission.

I understand that the commission works a lot on collaboration with outside agencies on a number of the issues that we have deemed to be priorities. Would you describe for us what some of those collaborations have been, and what they have resulted in?

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Thank you, yes, Representative Mantilla. We do that not only with corporations, private businesses, municipalities, and every single legislator that approaches us on a particular issue. To give you just an example, we are working with Senator Roraback on just to look at to asses the needs of the Latinos in that area of Torrington. So, we do that constantly.

We, as you might imagine, we receive hundreds of calls asking us to be specific about what we can do for constituencies, for citizens. And our mandate, we have seven different mandates, that we accomplish through the work of the committee and the commission.

REP. MANTILLA: Would you mind just describing very quickly, some of the organizations that you have worked with outside, and on what? I know it's a long list, but give us a few examples.

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: I can provide you with a list, but to give you some examples, Connecticut Association of Latinos and United Action, Connecticut Citizens in Higher Education, Connecticut Association of United Spanish Action. I can keep going on and one. There are so many. The Hispanic Professional Network, the Connecticut Hispanic Bar Association. And, I mean, we do a lot of work with a lot of organizations.

REP. MANTILLA: Mr. Chairman, if I may ask one last very quick question, (inaudible) some of the description of the work that the commission has done inside, as well as outside the legislature, has the commission, in fact, advocated on different types of issues that -- obviously, we know many are related to what's happened here in this building, but also what's happening outside, that might affect the community?

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Absolutely. Not only have we been testifying on issues that affect the citizens of Connecticut, but we have also been invited nationally to speak on issues that we research. Let me also point out that we are the only -- out of 23 commissions in the United States, we are the only one under the General Assembly. So, we have some flexibility to provide some recommendations in that area.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you. Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Representative Reinoso, did you have question?

REP. REINOSO: Yes, thank you Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Betancourt, for coming to testify this morning. I'd like to -- you eluded that the commission, for the commission there is an outsider form that does the assessment. Can you elaborate a little bit more about that?

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Yeah. We decided to have a third party to do an assessment, and we contracted the firm of NESC. This is a firm of retired executives from IBM, from Phoenix, and from Hartford. And what they did was an assessment of all the responsibilities of the commission, the staff, and how we have to report vis a vis the General Assembly, the judicial branch, and the executive branch, among other things.

REP. REINOSO: On the makeup of the commission, could you explain what is the makeup? How many members of the commission, and how are they selected, please?

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: By law, it's established with 13 commissioners, and three are appointed by the Governor, and the rest, the other ten are appointed by the leadership of both houses, majority and minority leaders. So, the speaker of the House has some appointments, the President Pro Tem, and then majority and minority leaders of both houses.

REP. REINOSO: Thank you, Mr. Betancourt. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: You're welcome. Thank you. Any other questions? Representative Adinolfi.

REP. ADINOLFI: I'm outside looking in. (Laughter). It's obvious that this bill was put in, somebody felt very strong about this. And I looked through it, and really, it seems to me that people have some problems with communication. I know that in my -- I represent my constituents, and there are special interest groups and certain groups, and I get notification many times from various departments in there.

Kids are coming up from school, do you wish to see them. All different things that affect my immediate community. And I don't see where that bill can hurt.

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Well, Representative Adinolfi, thank you for the question. And I sincerely believe that we -- it's not appropriate for us to talk about intentionality on any bill. Now, we talk about the effect, and I agree with you that perhaps it's a lack of communication or understanding, and that's why I testified to the fact of how open our meetings are, our communication piece with all legislators, and specifically with Latino legislators.

So, I think that if we can do anything, that's why I proposed that we go -- this is not, in my opinion, a priority at this time, for the legislature, because there are so many other pressing issues, that what I propose is that we sit, we look at the language.

If the purpose is to strengthen our agency, and to make it better for all the citizens, we are all for it.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you.

FERNANDO BETANCOURT: Thank you for the opportunity.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Is Senator Finch here? Okay, we'll pass over Senator Finch. Steve Kidowitz, followed by Commissioner Kirk.

STEVE KIDOWITZ: Good afternoon, Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, and members of the committee. I'm Steve Kidowitz. I'm the legislative liaison for the Department of Public Works. I'm here to testify on raised bill HB 6655, AN ACT CONCERNING DISCLOSURE OF SECURITY-RELATED INFORMATION.

This bill involves three proposed changes that DPW seeks in order to clarify the list of security related records be exempted from disclosure under the FIO Act. Each of these proposed changes takes a measured case by case approach to protecting sensitive information in compliance with the FOI Act.

The first change, roman numeral ten, involves employee personal address and contact information. Our research and experience in the workplace violence area indicates that there are instances where there may be a substantial risk of harm to the employee, if this information were disclosed.

Such as victims in a workplace violence case fear escalation or retaliation. Confidentiality can provide some level of protection in getting people to report incidences. There's a deterrent to reporting when people fear that the information is going to become public.

Also, another big area is employees can become targets in high risk workplaces, where they may have predominantly involuntary and sometimes hostile clients and work environments. And disclosing information can risk workplace violence threats, moving to the home and family.

Roman numeral ten proposes and exemption for procurement-related documents that involve security equipment, surveillance equipment, and investigatory services

This change attempts to balance need for public bidding with the need for discreteness that is often required for investigations to be effective, and it also is in recognition that the disclosure of equipment types or proposed device locations can expose a facility's security vulnerabilities, and potentially jeopardize the safety and security of state assets and building occupants.

Finally, roman numeral eleven proposes that incident reports may be held from disclosure where there is substantial risk of harm to a complainant or another person. This proposed change is the result of the experience in workplace violence reporting environment.

The possible disclosure of workplace violence reports, again, is a deterrent to reporting. Victims and witnesses are often reluctant to come forward because they fear reprisal. Depending on the content and context of the incident disclosure, the details could lead to further harm.

The FOI Commission did raise some concerns on this section, as to the language as it's currently written, and I've attached to my testimony a change to this language, as we understand those concerns, and it's a language change that I think we can both live with, and I'll be happy to answer any questions you may have.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Steve. Are there any questions? Thank you very much. Commissioner Kirk. Good morning, Commissioner.

THOMAS KIRK: Good morning. Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, distinguished of the Government Administration Elections Committee, I'm Thomas Kirk, Commissioner of the Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, and I'm here today to comment in support of HB6655, AN ACT CONCERNING DISCLOSURE OF SECURITY-RELATED INFORMATION.

As many of you know, we're a health care service agency, and as such, we operate an array of outpatient, inpatient, residential service programs throughout the state, for persons with psychiatric disabilities and or substance use disorders.

Some of these individuals we serve have requested such personal information on DMHAS employees in the past, and then use that information to make harassing phone calls to a member of their treatment team that they're dissatisfied with, as well as other instances of inappropriate activities regarding a state employee's home address, home phone number, or residential email.

A number of our employees have gone to the trouble of not listing themselves in the phone book, to avoid such situations, and they question why that protection does not follow them in their employment.

The bill before you, HB6655, would grant that protection to certain state employees, and we appreciate your support for that passage. I appreciate the opportunity to comment, and am open to any questions you may have.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Commissioner. Are there any questions? Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, Mr. Commissioner.

THOMAS KIRK: Good morning.

SEN. RORABACK: You know, there are other parts of our statutes where we categorically protect the names and addresses of people. Judges, prosecutors, et cetera, et cetera. And you guys aren't looking to go with that kind of structure. You're going to ask the Department of Public Works on a case by case basis, to protect that information?

THOMAS KIRK: No. At least as I read the bill, it's not on a case by case basis. It's that section, roman numeral nine, under 19, related to state employees, where disclosure may result in significant risk. I wasn't aware that we would be getting DPW approval for this.

SEN. RORABACK: Okay. I'm confused. I just -- it doesn't seem to be a blanket category of individuals. It seems like there would have to be a finding that someone was put at risk, but I can ask the Freedom of Information Commissioner, when they testify. And thank you.

THOMAS KIRK: Okay.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Other questions? No questions. Thank you, Commissioner. Appreciate it.

THOMAS KIRK: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Tom Hennick?

TOM HENNICK: Good morning.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Good morning.

TOM HENNICK: Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, committee members. For the record, I am Tom Hennick, public education officer at the Freedom of Information Commission, and I am here to speak also about raised bill HB6655, AN ACT CONCERNING DISCLOSURE OF SECURITY-RELATED INFORMATION.

The bill proposes adding three categories of records to the list of records that can be exempt from disclosure under the Act, for security related reasons. Now, as you heard from previous speakers, we had some difficulties with the third of these three record categories in the bill, but I am happy to report that we worked with them, and -- the people from DPW, and I think we've crafted satisfactory language that you were just given.

We did have one other major concern about that third category. It's in lines 173 to 177 of the bill. And our fear was that this would somehow be construed as a blanket exemption of all workplace violence reports, rather than only those that pose a substantial risk of harm to the complainant or of another person.

We feel that the blanket exemption would probably be bad public policy, and ultimately, we can think of some examples where it would have actually the reverse impact of public safety envisioned by the bill. But we've discussed those concerns with DPW, and they shared with you what they've assured us, that the exemptions of these documents is intended only for those situations where there's a substantial risk of harm.

And with that, that's all I have on that bill. I'd be happy to answer any questions.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Tom. Questions? Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just as a follow up. Am I reading this --

TOM HENNICK: Right on time. You're reading it correctly.

SEN. RORABACK: I'm reading it correctly. That the Commissioner of DMHAS is going to go to the Department of Public Works, and say we have an employee who is at risk, and DPW, their commissioner is going to say, you're right. You don't need to disclose that person's name or address.

TOM HENNICK: That's correct.

SEN. RORABACK: But it seems like we kind of -- we may be trying to put a round peg in a square hole. I think we -- but anyway, that's -- so be it.

TOM HENNICK: That's correct.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Other questions?

TOM HENNICK: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Tom. Is Senator Finch here yet? Susan Bysciewicz won't be here until later on. Okay. Representative Martinez. We have both of you at the same time. Representative Gonzalez and Representative Martinez. Good morning.

REP. MARTINEZ: Good morning. If you don't mind, we'll appreciate that.

SEN. DEFRONZO: That's fine.

REP. MARTINEZ: Good morning, Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, and members of this committee. I'm going to put my glasses on. The Latino Puerto Rican Commission was created by Connecticut legislators in 1994, for the purpose of insuring proper representation and recognition of the Latino and Puerto Rican communities.

I am in favor of all that the Latino Puerto Rican Commission has been designed to do, however to insure continuation, the following addition has been proposed by Representative Gonzalez and myself, to increase the level of communication between the Latino Puerto Rican Commission, and the legislators.

I did have a conversation a year ago with the director of the Latino Puerto Rican community, about submitting more reports and being more closer, with also doing more things with us, and he pointed out to me that he does submit reports to the Governor, and that he has accountability with the Governor.

When I checked the rules that he has in his commission, he was right. If you look at the new that we add, the new additions that we add, and the old ones that were there, all we did was, for example, in number one, it says review and comment on any proposed state legislation and regulations that would affect the Latino Puerto Rican population in the state, and submit it to the General Assembly to review.

To provide information to the Governor, that's all, on the state's policies concerning the Latino Puerto Rican communities. What we added was, and submit a report, the same report -- we're not asking him to do more. The same report to the General Assembly, on such advice and information, in accordance with subsection, blah, blah.

Advise -- number three, advise the Governor concerning the coordination and administration of problems serving the Latino Puerto Rican population. We ask, and submit a report to the General Assembly on such advice in accordance with -- and then -- okay.

Therefore, we're not asking him to do more. Just the same thing that he's doing to the Governor, we're asking him to give it to us. And then we add, to maintain -- it says before, maintain a liaison between the Latino and the Puerto Rican communities, and governmental entities, included -- that's what we add -- included but not limited to the General Assembly, with priority given to members of the General Assembly who represent one or more Latino or Puerto Rican communities.

And we discussed this with them when we met with them in the commission. And he felt that it was to much to inform every legislator, and he expressed that when he addressed you before. So -- but, you know, if we have a Latino Puerto Rican Commission that represents Latinos, and if one of the legislators needs -- has the need to sit down or to present something, and we're not asking them to work with us and to do our job.

We do have a staff here that works with us, and we work in our communities. But I don't see much asking him to be -- to work with us, any state representative or senator that has one Latino or more in their community. There's room for that, for improvement, if you wish to do that.

Then something new that we added, they have a bank of people that were names and the bibliography, in case we need a commissioner or a board member. All we ask is that that should be accessible to people like the mayor of Hartford or Bridgeport, if they have commissions than we have people who are from there to us.

Sometimes they ask us for a commissioner -- I mean, for a board member, and sometimes, you know, we don't know, and if we had a place that we could go, I think that would be good for us. And then we would like to add, and it is true, they do invite us to go at the beginning of the year, and tell them the goals, the things that we would like to accomplish during the year. We do that.

But we don't follow up on that -- so, okay, I'm going to finish this. And I would like to, and I know (inaudible) would like to, to work closer with them, and perhaps it is true, there's also lack of communication between the commission and us. Thank you. Any questions? Do you have any questions, or would you like for Representative Gonzalez to go, and then ask your questions?

SEN. DEFRONZO: Why doesn't Representative Gonzalez go?

REP. GONZALEZ: Good morning, Representative O'Rourke, Chairman DeFronzo, and distinguished members of the Government Administration Elections Committee. My name is Mary Gonzalez, and I want to thank the committee for giving me the opportunity to address you this morning.

I'm here in support of HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION. This bill will serve to realize some goals that will improve the relationship between the Commission and the legislature. There is currently not a clear defined direct with respect to the Commission reporting of information to the legislature.

The enacting legislation makes it clear they must report to the Governor, but it does not require the Commission to work directly with the legislature. HB6657 is meant to address sections of the original enacted legislation that marks the relationship the Commission is expected to have with the legislature. And this is where we, as legislators, have encountered most of the communication problems we agree must be addressed.

It is stating the enacted legislation, that the Commission must review and comment on any proposed legislation that will effect the Latino and Puerto Rican communities, but it doesn't specify to whom they must direct their comments.

This bill further defines reporting procedures and allows for periodic and predictable reporting of information that will assist the legislature. In so far as working with the legislature, the Commission is only obligated to maintain a liaison with governmental entities.

But because a liaison, legislator relationship, is not clearly defined, it makes it difficult on the part of legislator to avail themselves of information that may make for more informed policy making, because of the fact that legislators are the ones that must introduce and implement legislation.

Communication on the part, commensurate with legislators, especially legislators representing the affected community, must be a priority. The Commission should be utilized to bring together a group of individuals from diverse backgrounds from across the state, in order to work on recommendations concerning the Latino and Puerto Rican communities.

Legislators should then take recommendations from the commissioners, present it to them via commission staff, and consider them for possible legislation. Again, this is an effective manner to maximize the Commission efforts, and will continue to more inform the session.

This hasn't materialized the way we would hope, and doesn't seem we have had an opportunity to review, much less implement in to legislation. That's all an idea of the commissioners. The Commission has to make regular annual and statistical analysis of the fate of the Latino and Puerto Rican communities. However, we would also like to review inputs that commissioners with diverse backgrounds and ideas submit to the Commission. In conclusion, there is a communication problem between the Commission and the legislature.

This and clear definitions of communication guidelines has caused problems with respect to the expected implementation of legislative recommendations the Commission may be working on, because it is clear that we can (inaudible) the language of the original legislation, has contributed to the problem of drafting and changing the language, will contribute to the improvement of the Commission legislature relationship. Thank you, and we are open for any questions.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Representative. Do we have any questions from committee members?

REP. ADINOLFI: Just a quickie.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Representative Adinolphi.

REP. ADINOLPHI: Thank you, representatives, for being here. You have a large number of co-sponsors on this bill? I know you both submitted it.

REP. GONZALEZ: Yes. The first bill it went to Legislative Management, and when they transferred the bill at that time, we had like 60, 70. Now, after they changed the number, because the bill went to a different committee, still we have, up to know, like maybe 40, 50. But we're planning to get at least 100.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you. (Mike not on).

REP. GONZALEZ: Well, I want to respond to that. It is not -- they're picking and choosing, and I don't think it's right. Is that right?

SEN. RORABACK: (Mike not on).

REP. GONZALEZ: I don't think so. I don't think -- right now, right now I do have here, information, and after I present this bill, now I receive at my house, suddenly I'm on the mail list. And I got a letter and a report from 2001. Suddenly, after the bill is up. I've been seven years here, and never -- they never work with me.

And I don't think that I'm looking for them to help me presenting legislation, as they are saying, no. I'm here, and what I'm looking with this bill is to be sure that we have a good relationship, not only with the five Hispanic representatives. With everybody of the General Assembly.

Like the Commission on Women (inaudible), like the Children's Commission is doing, I think that we need to be sure, and because it's not in the state statutes. They are saying they don't have to report to us.

SEN. RORABACK: (Mike not on).

REP. GONZALEZ: It's different.

SEN. RORABACK: (Mike not on).

REP. GONZALEZ: Yeah. The Commission on Women (inaudible) and Children is very clearly the same. Governor and legislature, or General Assembly.

SEN. RORABACK: (Mike not on).

REP. GONZALEZ: And I want to add to this, that we provide the funds. And I think that we have a problem in the state of Connecticut --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 1a - 1b)

REP. GONZALEZ: -- what -- you know, it's a little bit. The only problem, this is not against the commission. This is not against any staff member. This is accountability. And this is not against the commission. We don't have no problem with the commission. But I think that we can improve the commission, and we can do some changes, and that's what we're looking for. Some changes.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Representative. Other questions? Representative Donovan.

REP. DONOVAN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just to follow up on Senator Roraback's question, that the language actually -- and Representative Martinez, your testimony which lists how the commission is charged. I was looking through that. There is no indication of the General Assembly, and your thought is that there be, in statute, some recognition of the General Assembly.

REP. MARTINEZ: If I may, you know, every organization goes through changes, and we do many amendments on the floor to do changes here in the House. And I honestly don't think that by doing this we're against the commission, the director, or anybody else.

What we're doing is trying to improve the level of communication, and to make this commission more effective for all the Latinos that we represent here in Connecticut.

REP. GONZALEZ: I want to add a comment that one of the things that we're requesting here is to have if you, if any, not only to work with us, but any reps that have Latino and Puerto Ricans in their district.

If they need some help, to go and talk with the commission, and they shall help. But right now, they're complaining, and they think there's a lot of work. That's accountability. If the commission is there to help, and work with the committee, why not? The commission is bigger than us.

It's bigger than the executive director. The commission is community, and with $102,000.00 dollars a year, I think that they can, you know, can do a lot. That's only one salary, and I think that if we can make that kind of money, we can complain the work that we're asking for.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much, representatives. No other questions? Thank you very much.

REP. GONZALEZ: Thank you. Have a nice day.

REP. MARTINEZ: Thank you very much.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Let's move on. Is Senator Finch here? No. Okay, Maria Knoudson, first selectwoman of Harwinton. Good morning.

MARIA KNOUDSON: Good morning, Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, and happy spring to everybody. Isn't this nice? You could all have the rest of the day off.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Are the shad running yet? (Laughter).

MARIA KNOUDSON: At least in Harwinton, they are. I'm here wearing three hats today. One as the first selectman in my sixth term for the town of Harwinton, one as a member of the Board of Directors for Klaus, and I know that Mr. Russell is going to be speaking and giving you written testimony, and third as the vice-chairman of the Litchfield Hills Council of Elected Officials.

And again, as first selectman for quite a long time now, a lot of meetings have transpired and a lot of discussion takes place, and the hottest issue right now for us is SB1129, AN ACT CONCERNING MECHANICAL LEVER VOTING MACHINES. And I told LHCEO, the Litchfield Hills Council, that I was going to come and testify about that bill.

This is regarding mechanical lever -- the mechanical voting machines. And everybody said oh, make sure you say, make sure you say, so therefore, my testimony is shot. I said write me one sentence, and I'll say it. So, I have other towns, so please know I'm representing all these towns, who I'll tell you.

This is from Gerry Zin, the first selectman of Litchfield, please state on behalf that Litchfield wants to keep our perfectly good lever machines. Thanks for your efforts in this manner. This is from the first selectman of Norfolk, Sue Dyer. Our current lever voting machines work well, and as the old saying goes, what is not broke, don't fix.

An unfunded mandate to change a working system to an unproven system in these hard times, economic times rather, is irresponsible to the taxpayer. I don't believe this new system has been thoroughly thought out. It is not just the changing of the machines, it's all the hidden costs that aren't figured in when a decision like this is made. Again, that's from the town of Norfolk.

This is from Harwinton, that thriving metropolis near Litchfield. Tracy Mursky and Candace Crawford, that's a democrat and republican registrars of voters, who say that our current mechanical voting machines work perfectly, are accurate, require little maintenance, are tamper free, and user friendly.

Replacement parts are readily available from the Voting Machines Services Center in New York. Given the current financial situation of all levels of government, tossing out a system that has a proven track record, and replacing it with one that is much more expensive and unproven is simply irrational.

This is from Jim O'Leary, first selectman of Goshen, your territory, Senator Roraback. I'm not aware of anyone in Goshen every having a problem with voting on the lever machines we currently use. From a cost benefit assessment, there is simply no benefit, and the cost is prohibitive.

This is from the town of Hartland, from the voting machine mechanic whose name happens to be Wade Cowell. Due to budget constraints and low funds available in and to Hartland, dollars that would be used to purchase new machines would be much better spent for projects of immediate concern.

This would be a burden. Harwinton has limited facility and security for storing new machines. Please reconsider requiring the use of these machines with or without federal funding. This is from Hartford, Billy Baxter, with the current -- excuse me, William Baxter, first selectman Baxter.

With the current state of the economy, and the budget problems at all levels in the state, lever machines which have served us extremely efficiently to this point should not be mandated for replacement. The fact that no new technology has been proven to be totally and irrefutably reliable, along with the learning curve and the cost associated with new machines, would make the choice to replace them, at this time, an irresponsible one. We're nearly through here.

Harwinton is currently very satisfied with the mechanical lever voting machines, and would like to continue to have the option of using these machines for all elections. My concern with the proposed options are, cost of purchase, continued cost of software for each election, storage of ballots after each election, and the ability to accommodate the size of our ballots, written by Patricia Williamson, the town clerk in the town of Harwinton.

And to the General Assembly, in favor of SB1129, we would like the option to voting lever machines. These machines have worked well for Hartland, and the residents are familiar with their operation. And this is signed by the first selectman Robert Hilbreck and Jean Levin, who is on the Board of Selectmen.

And finally, as town clerk of Hartland, I would like to preserve the right of municipalities to use mechanical lever voting machines. We have had no problems with them at all, and that is signed by Betty Hilbreck, who is the town clerk of Hartland. And at our meetings -- I can't believe that bell didn't go off.

We are all unanimously in favor of retaining the system we now have. If anything, modify, but we really like them, and people are comfortable with them. We have a very -- I would say a good proportion of our population is elderly. They're used to it. They like going behind this little screen, and I think it really does work. Thank you very much. Please reconsider this bill.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much for your testimony. It's an interesting --

MARIA KNOUDSON: I didn't get to say mine. This is everybody else's.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I know. (Laughter). Very interesting approach. I wish everybody here would do the same thing, on target as you are. Thank you very much.

MARIA KNOUDSON: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Senator Finch is now in the hall, I believe. I think I saw him, or did I? Okay, Senator Finch is here. And company. (Laughter).

SEN. FINCH: Thank you, Chairman DeFronzo, Chairman O'Rourke. I haven't seen you in the committee in a long time. We were just together a few hours ago in Bridgeport. I can't get enough of your committee. (Laughter). Thank you very much for hearing a bill that -- it's a little unusual how it got here.

We have a little contest in our district called who wants to change the world, and there's students in our high school, our three high schools, write an essay about how they want to see the world changed. And it's a very difficult thing for me because I have to help the committee of the Greater Bridgeport Area Foundation, and Hanes Construction, who sponsors it, to try to pick the best essay in each school.

And I'm very proud today to have Anisa Vohra with me, who is going to tell you why she would like the Muslim High Holy Days to be recognized by the state of Connecticut, on the Connecticut state calendar. Anisa? Anisa is from Bridgeport Central, and her classmates and family are all here.

ANISA VOHRA: Hi. My name is Anisa Vohra, and I'm an American Muslim from India. And I would like my bill to be passed because all -- usually, all the holidays are recognized, at least one from each religion, like Rosh Hosanna, Hanukkah, Quanzzah, Christmas, Thanksgiving. But the Muslim holidays are not recognized at all.

If they can at least be on the calendar, that would be a great accomplishment. I would have liked to get days off from school, but if that can't be made possible (laughter) -- since that can't be made possible, due to Connecticut's financial concerns, at least if we just recognize it on the calendars, that would be a big help.

Right now it's not fair that all the other religions -- all other holidays are recognized, and Eid is not recognized at all. But we can change that by making Eid, Eid-Al-Fitr and Eid-Al-Adha recognized on the calendars.

SEN. FINCH: (Mike not on).

ANISA VOHRA: Eid-Al-Fitr is -- we spend a whole month fasting, and then it's like a feast that takes place at the end of 30 days or 29 days of fasting. It depends on the sighting of the moon, when the holiday will be. On the 29^th day of fasting, if we see the moon in the United States, then the holiday is the next day, but if we don't, then we have 30 days of fasting, and making it the day after.

SEN. FINCH: (Mike not on).

SEN. DEFRONZO: Do you want to explain the other day also, or --

ANISA VOHRA: Yeah. Eid-Al-Adha is a holiday where we usually like eat meat, and we had one prophet who sacrificed himself for God, so we usually celebrate that.

SEN. FINCH: (Mike not on).

ANISA VOHRA: It comes about two months after the Eid-Al-Fitr.

SEN. DEFRONZO: We want to thank you for bringing this to our attention, and Senator Finch, for coming up. I'm going to ask if the -- please be comfortable. This is not -- we're not going to cross examine you or anything, but I wanted to see if any of the other committee members here have any questions for you, okay?

ANISA VOHRA: Okay.

SEN. DEFRONZO: We do appreciate your initiative on this, and we do want to -- all these are your classmates here from Bristol Central? Why don't you all raise your hands so we can acknowledge you here. Oh, geez, you've got quite a -- welcome to the state capitol. (Applause). Any questions? Representative Spallone.

REP. SPALLONE: Good afternoon, and thank you for coming to the LLB today. And I have a question for either you or Senator Finch. There was mention of a state calendar. It seems that we have a calendar that lists, perhaps, it doesn't necessarily mark things as holidays where the state is closed down, but lists various holidays, whether they be religious or secular. Could you clarify that for the committee? There's such a calendar that the state produces that we'd like to add these to? Is that what we want to do?

SEN. FINCH: Yeah. It's our understanding that there is a calendar that the state keeps, but I think more importantly than actually having the date on the calendar, which of course would be a natural offshoot if you passed this law, is part of her bill also is to call upon whoever the Governor is during that time period, and have some kind of an acknowledgement of it, as we do with other holidays.

Sometimes the Governor will issue a proclamation wishing people of one particular faith or interest group, congratulations on this day. And what struck me about Anisa's idea is how obvious it should be to all of us that a large percentage of our population who are neither Christians or Jews, are Muslims.

And one of things that, you know, I was reading this -- when did you write it, about four months ago? Three months ago?

ANISA VOHRA: Yeah.

SEN. FINCH: It was before the country's situation was what it is today, but we did know that there were conflicts in our country because of things that have happened between Muslims and non-Muslims, and when Anisa wrote this, I just thought it was a very simple plea to acknowledge all of us and our diversity.

And of course, in Bridgeport, we do have a significant number, as we do in Connecticut, of people who are practicers of the Muslim faith.

REP. SPALLONE: Well, thank you, Senator. Thank you, Anisa.

ANISA VOHRA: You're welcome.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay, thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and good afternoon, Anisa. Did Senator Finch explain to you that if he works very hard up here, not only could we get that day acknowledged, but it could also be a day off from school? (Laughter). You don't have to answer that question.

SEN. FINCH: That would be next year, we'll come back.

SEN. RORABACK: Fair enough. It's great to have you here. Thank you for your idea, and we certainly appreciate you and your classmates traveling here to Hartford. You've made an impression with all of us. Thank you.

ANISA VOHRA: You're welcome.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Representative Reinoso.

REP. REINOSO: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Mr. Finch, for -- Senator Finch, and Anisa, for coming here, and for this morning or this afternoon. Speaking of diversity, I'm a resident also of our city of Bridgeport. Also, I'm a immigrant. I want you to feel proud of your accomplishments, and proud of your heritage. And to all the members of the Central High School, probably not all of them are Muslims.

They probably are Hispanic, African Americans, but that's the reality of what our communities are. You should be very proud, and please consider this as your home. This is your house, too, okay? And I thank you for what you're doing, and thank you, Anisa, because you are a role model for many of our kids in the city. Thank you for coming. Thank you, Senator Finch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Representative Reinoso. Well said. Senator Finch, did you say Ms. Vohra's parents were here?

SEN. FINCH: Yes.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Would you just recognize them? Well, you ought to be very proud of her.

SEN. FINCH: And her father and her grandma are here. (Applause).

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Okay, thank you very much. Thank you.

ANISA VOHRA: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I'm sorry, what would you like to say?

: I'd just like to point out, for the benefit of Senator Roraback, that as a result of this essay, this class indeed does have a day off from school. They've come here to visit us today. (Laughter). If they do this once a year, they'll have a day off, whether or not we recognize the holiday.

SEN. FINCH: And the one who most appreciates it is their teacher, Professor Wade, right over there. (Applause).

SEN. DEFRONZO: Alright, thank you very much. Appreciate your time. Okay, we're going to move on. Secretary Bysciewicz is not here, I don't think. No? Mayor William Dickenson, from Wallingford.

WILLIAM DICKENSON: Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, members of the committee, my name is Bill Dickenson, mayor of the town of Wallingford, and I'm here to express support for raised bill SB1129, AN ACT CONCERNING MECHANICAL LEVER VOTING MACHINES.

There are several reasons. I'll be as brief as possible. Number one, the lever machines are reliable and performing well. Two, machines and parts are available for replacements and repair. Funds are not available for purchase of new technology and the potential electrical needs at polling places.

In support of the issue of the reliability, I have a copy of the CalTech MIT Voting Technology Project, dated March 30^th, 2001. That project compared information from four presidential elections, and concludes that paper ballots, lever machines, and optically scanned ballots produced lower incidents of error than other voting technologies, and they expressed surprise in the report that the older technologies outperformed the newer.

Given all of these reasons, we certainly urge the committee to look favorably upon this legislation.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Are there any questions? Thank you very much for your time. Let's move on to Keith Robbins, first selectman of Bozrah.

KEITH ROBBINS: Thank you. Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, members of the committee, thank you for hearing me this morning. I'm here to speak in favor of raised bill SB1129, AN ACT CONCERNING MECHANICAL LEVER VOTING MACHINES. In reading the bill, it is my interpretation that Connecticut's cities and towns will still be able to use the current lever voting machines if the bill passes.

The current machines are easy to use, maintain, and the public of Connecticut is extremely familiar in their operation. It is obvious that there are problems with the way other parts of the country vote. What is also apparent is that there are few, if any problems, with the way we vote here in the state of Connecticut.

In my 15 years of operating a voting machine, and having interaction with machine mechanics, the only thing in Bozrah that is broken is the cable which operates the curtain. That repair only took a few minutes to make. A year or so ago, we needed to modify one of our machines, to make it handicapped accessible.

This was done with some parts from a company in New York, and a few hours of labor from one of our mechanics. I am also aware that there is some amount of federal funding available for new voting machine technology. I would suggest that those funds be used for something that is actually broken, like the lack of equitable funding for education, or the continuing decrease in state aid to Connecticut's cities and towns.

I urge all of you to support raised bill SB1129. As the Yankee tradition says, if it's not broken, why do we need to fix it? Subject to your questions, thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, sir. Are there any questions? Representative.

REP. O'ROURKE: (Mike not on) -- and everyone's familiarity and fondness for the lever voting machines. The federal government seems to have mandated that we move on to machines that allow for a paper record and greater accessibility for people with disabilities. Are folks asking us to ignore that federal mandate, and how do you suppose we handle that, like the Help American Vote tax?

KEITH ROBBINS: I would suggest we go back to Senator Dodd, and ask that the legislation be amended, because I will plead ignorance. I did not realize until the Florida fiasco, that not everybody voted by lever machine. I knew there was some paper ballots in smaller communities, but -- and I also understand, and I'm not as familiar with the machine as some, that there are some lever machines that do, in fact, have a paper trail. And I'm researching whether or not our machines can be modified.

There is not, as you are well aware, Representative, always a fix to solve the problem everywhere. I don't think it's a major problem here in Connecticut. With modifying our machine to assist people with disabilities, we've never had a problem.

Granted, it's a community of 2,400, with about 1,500 or so people that are eligible to vote. Of those, about 1,000 vote. Of those, about 800 vote on the lever machines, and the lever machines have been good to me these last two terms, and I would hope that they would continue to be good to me. But we really have never had a problem, humor aside.

REP. O'ROURKE: (Mike not on).

KEITH ROBBINS: You're welcome.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Representative Metz.

REP. METZ: Mr. Chairman, I'd just like to make a remark that I don't think it's appropriate for town leaders to over-state the reliability of lever voting machines. They are pretty reliable. They are not absolutely reliable. And it does seem to me that given the fact that we're now in the 21^st century, we are going to be moving toward some form of more modern voting process.

Whether it's an existing electronic machine or something else, that's fine. That being said, it doesn't seem to me that a bill that might allow towns to phase in to a newer technology over a period of time, when we can see that the technology is proven, might not be so good.

So, I'm listening to what you have to say, and I would also remark to the Chairman, that I've looked a little bit ahead in the testimony, and I think that Bart Russell, of COST, is going to address your questions, so you may find the answer there. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Would you like to comment on that, or --

KEITH ROBBINS: Just that I'm not necessarily opposed, Representative Metz, to the new technology. I'm opposed to the cost in these current fiscal times. I'm very familiar with incentives from the state and federal government, and my concern is that the federal incentive will not even come close to covering the cost.

And then what happens when those machines need to be updated, and my ultimate concern is where do I find a mechanic to repair these machines, at noon on election day, when the two gentlemen I have now are extremely familiar and can repair one of the three machines in a matter of minutes.

I would suggest that it is an area that needs to be looked at, and I am not, again, not opposed to changing the technology. But in this current fiscal times, in a community with a combined education/general government budget of a little over $5.5 million dollars, unless this voter technology company is willing to take my American Express card, we just don't have a way to fund any of it.

REP. METZ: I concur with your statement 100% percent. That is the biggest weakness in this mandate, the fact that they will not be funded anywhere near the cost. And, in fact, the machinery has not been developed to the point of reliability. It may be that very soon it could be acquired at a very low cost, when there's more of it around, and we determine what is the most reliable and best system.

But my point to you was that I don't think it serves a purpose to come here and say lever machines are 100% percent effective. They're fool proof. They're not. I've had experience with them myself, in which they have malfunctioned on election day, to the detriment of a candidate.

And so you can't make that statement. That simply isn't true. It doesn't necessarily mean that this bill is not a good idea. But don't over-state the case of it.

KEITH ROBBINS: If I may, Mr. Chair --

REP. METZ: We need to move forward somehow to improve our voting mechanism, even though it may be the best available in the country at the moment. But just don't over-state the case for the infallibility of lever machines.

: (Mike not on).

KEITH ROBBINS: Thank you, sir. I think I did state that in my testimony, that it has broken on occasion. My point is that at the current level of technology, and what's available in voting, this, in my non-learned opinion, is the most cost effective of the moment. Thank you, gentlemen.

SEN. DEFRONZO: (Mike not on).

CHRIS RECTOR: Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, distinguished members of the Joint Committee on Government Administration and Elections, my name is Chris Rector, and I'm a freshman member of the Maine State House of Representatives, and I'm here to speak to you on -- in favor of HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

I grew up in Massachusetts, and attended Boston University, and moved to Maine to finish my degree, after working for a year in Boston. I never left Maine after obtaining a B.A. in economics. I entered the retail field, and operated, with my wife, two retail art galleries, with locations in the resort community of Camden, and in the city of Portland.

I had a staff of 15, and it was one of the largest picture framing art galleries in the state. I have experience of growing our business, purchasing commercial real estate, meeting a payroll, providing benefits, and all the general responsibilities of an owner/operator.

In 1989, we added an ice cream take out business in Camden, and in 1992, we began a publishing business, doing art publishing. While being involved in micro-business, I participated in a variety of community activities. Since 1989, I've been a member of our town Comprehensive Planning Committee, that develops the strategic plan around which all regulations are based.

I've been a member and officer of a variety of non-profit orgs, including the Center for Maine Contemporary Art, for over 20 years. I served on an executive committee of the Camden Rockport Lincolville Chamber of Commerce, and am a long time member and former co-chair of the Camden Downtown Business Group.

I'm an active member of my local fire department, and have served in numerous other community and nonprofit orgs and committees. Recently in our town, the Maine State Prison relocated to another neighboring community after 180 years as a community institution. In the Comprehensive Planning Committee, we studied the possible reuse of that facility, and when it was clear that reuse was not economic, several residents spearheaded a grassroots effort to secure funding in the demolition of the facility, after it was vacated.

I was a leader in that effort, and found myself before the Appropriations Committee of our legislature, to lobby for full state funding of that demolition. It was that process that led me to run for legislative office, as a way to expand my impact in community service.

I give you this as background for why I ran for the state legislature. But for me, one other key to entering the race was the existence of the Maine Clean Election Law. I'm not a wealthy person. I had two sons who still had the prospect of college looking in the future. I could not make a large personal investment in the run for office.

Additionally, I do not come from a wealth community. Incomes in Maine are comparatively low. They're the lowest in New England. The Clean Election Law meant that I could run for office with a modest fund request from a limited number of people, and then receive qualifying contributions to run a credible campaign.

The need for those qualifying contributions is at a level that would discourage the non-serious candidate, but not prove so daunting that the serious candidate has to expend all of their energy qualifying before the race begins. I know that my case is not unlike that of many of my fellow legislators, both new and returning.

Two hundred and thirty one of the 372 general election candidates in Maine ran as Clean Election candidates in the 2002 election, up from 116 in 2000, the first campaign year of the Clean Election law in Maine. Many of us would not have considered a run for office if we were forced to finance our campaign by fundraising through individuals, businesses, and pacts.

Our time was well spent meeting our constituents, and talking about issues. Not holding out our hands and asking for funds. Both the reality of not being obligated to any particular interest, and the perception of that lack of obligation are important facts to me and to my fellow Clean Election candidates.

I also would contend that our Clean Election Law has been good for democracy. While candidates ran for officer under the Clean Election program, the discourse on issues and not money is a direct improvement in our election process. A broader number of candidates from a greater variety of backgrounds, not limited by economic abilities, meant more far reaching and lively debate.

Our goal of a true citizen legislature is better served. Does outside money still have an influence? Of course. Is our system perfect? Of course not. Were there loopholes that allowed pack contributions for Clean and traditional candidates in ways that subverted the intent of the system? Yes.

Did other abuses occur that pushed the boundaries and the intent of the Clean Election Law? Absolutely. Does it reduce campaign spending overall? It does not seem to do that, though if both candidates in the race are running Clean campaigns, the amount spent will be specified, and fairly modest.

There are problems, but we're looking for ways to move toward a closer example of what the law intended. The fact is, our Clean Election Law is not perfect yet -- the fact that our Clean Election Law is not perfect yet is no reason not to have the law, or to continue its improvement. It's a work in progress. We're proud of the trail that we've blazed.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Good timing. Bingo. (Laughter). Thank you very much for your testimony. Thank you for coming down to visit us today. Are there questions from members of the committee? Representative Spallone.

REP. SPALLONE: Good afternoon. Thank you for coming all the way down from Maine. Is your district in Camden, is that what you --

CHRIS RECTOR: Actually, I'm in the mid-coast. I'm in Thomaston. I cover Thomaston, South Thomaston, Saint George, Owls Head, Mettinicus, and the unorganized township of Crehaven. That's two islands, as it happens.

REP. SPALLONE: Yeah, Mettinicus, is that an island?

CHRIS RECTOR: Yes, it is.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay. That's great. Thanks for coming down. It's a long trip. I have about three or four, I think they're pretty brief, questions, and I think I applaud Maine for having gone down this road. Has there been any attempt since the legislation was enacted, to repeal it by opponents of it?

CHRIS RECTOR: Not that I'm aware of.

REP. SPALLONE: Are there any pending bills in your session now to repeal it?

CHRIS RECTOR: There probably are. I haven't seen them. All our bills aren't printed yet, but my suspicion is there may be, but it came forward by citizen initiative, and so my sense is that it's not going to be repealed.

REP. SPALLONE: I remember two years ago when a delegation came down from Maine, when I was a freshman here, which was very helpful that they came down. They said that many people who had been against the Clean Election Law had changed their mind after having the dry run -- or having a real run with it. Is that still the case? Do you find that people that were opposed to it at one time find themselves more supportive of it now?

CHRIS RECTOR: I would say so. You know, I don't want to pretend that everyone is in favor of it, but I would say that there is quite broad acceptance. Over half of the candidates that ran in the last election ran as Clean Elections candidates. Thirty seven percent were republicans, somewhere closer to sixty percent were democrats.

I happen to be a republican, so I'm in that minority of candidates, and I think everyone who utilized the law would say that it was successful for them, and probably would do it again.

REP. SPALLONE: Mr. Chairman, can I have a couple more?

SEN. DEFRONZO: Sure.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay. Are people -- so, I get the impression people can opt out of being a Clean Election candidate, and then they're just subject to whatever other fall back laws you have?

CHRIS RECTOR: That's right. And if you're a -- we call the non-Clean candidates, traditional candidates, which seems appropriate. Traditional candidates can opt out. They can fundraise based on standard, you know, restrictions. I think $250.00 dollars is the largest individual gift they can receive, or contribution.

And then if they raise more money than the Clean Elections candidate has been allocated, the Clean Elections candidate is -- they file a report to the Ethics Commission indicating that, and the Clean Elections candidate is then allocated a comparable amount of money up to three times their original allocation.

We, for the first time, actually, in this last election cycle, had a gubernatorial candidate running as a Clean candidate. He was representing the Green Party.

REP. SPALLONE: How much do you need to raise to get funds from the state?

CHRIS RECTOR: For a House race, you need 50 $5.00 dollar contributions. It can't be more than $5.00 dollars, it can't be less than $5.00 dollars, it has to be $5.00 dollars apiece, a minimum of 50. As it happens, I raised -- I had 55, so that you raise additional -- you know, just to put some additional funds in the coiffures, but that money goes directly to the Clean Elections fund.

It is funded by $2,000,000.00 dollars from the General Fund, by a check off on our income tax form. By fines for ethics violations, if there are any, and by the seed money funding that candidates bring forward.

REP. SPALLONE: And this is my last question, Mr. Chairman. I think it's the most questions I've ever asked in a row up here, but -- and my last question, Representative, is in these difficult fiscal times, are anybody -- do you find your constituents or the general public grousing about funding the election campaigns of their elected leaders?

CHRIS RECTOR: I think the spending overall is a concern, and I don't mean Clean Elections candidates, but I just mean general campaign spending, I think is a concern of many people, if you speak to them. But I think the Clean Elections Law has actually worked to keep the funding somewhat limited, and I think people appreciate that. There is no -- I don't hear anyone complaining about the general fund allocation of $2,000,000.00 dollars, for instance.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay, well, thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your indulgence.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Representative Metz, then Representative Donovan.

REP. METZ: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. The check off on your income tax return, is that a direction of taxes that you pay anyway, or is that an additional contribution taken from refund or --

CHRIS RECTOR: It's an additional contribution. It's a $3.00 dollar check off, and it's an additional contribution.

REP. METZ: It's a $3.00 dollar limit?

CHRIS RECTOR: Yes.

REP. METZ: And how much has that raised?

CHRIS RECTOR: About $275,000.00 dollars, I think, in the last year.

REP. METZ: And what percentage of returns have actually made that contribution?

CHRIS RECTOR: I don't know.

REP. METZ: Is that an increasing number over the years?

CHRIS RECTOR: I'm not sure about that either, Representative. I'd be happy to try and find out for you, though.

REP. METZ: So what is the outside parameter that you could raise? It would be the $2,000,000.00 dollars that dedicated by the General Assembly, plus -- is there a finite limit to how much --

CHRIS RECTOR: How much money the state raises or --

REP. METZ: -- could be raised, and fines, and what have you, probably don't contribute a whole lot. Has anyone come up short, in terms of obtaining contributions from the state?

CHRIS RECTOR: We haven't. In the last -- we had a budget curtailment, as many states did, to try and keep our balanced budget, which swept $4,000,000.00 dollars from the Clean Elections Fund, over the objections of many people within the legislature, in to the General Fund. But we are still confident that we have enough money to stay solvent.

REP. METZ: What happens if you run short?

CHRIS RECTOR: I'm not sure if there's a statutory ability to get additional funds. My guess is it would take some act of the legislature to allocate additional funds.

REP. METZ: Well, I'll tell you, the most telling answer was the participation of people who are given the ability to contribute more money, more of their own money, to the fund, which I think is probably the key. We've had alternate schemes here that would require essentially funding by the state, which is probably not as indicative of a person's support of a clean election law, by just telling the state how to spend the money that's there already, but thank you for your answers.

CHRIS RECTOR: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Senator O'Rourke -- oh, Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: It's that time of day. (Laughter). Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good morning, Representative Rector. Thanks for yucking down here. It's always been a consideration of mine that public financing of campaigns is not as effective as it might be absent serious efforts to control independent expenditures. And I'm wondering whether your law has in place mechanisms which attempt to control independent expenditures, and if so, whether they're working/

CHRIS RECTOR: It doesn't have any provisions yet, and I would agree with you that I think that's a weakness. I think it's unfortunate, in a sense, that we associate free speech and dollars, and I think that's sometimes a problem. You know, dollars and free speech are considered synonymous, in a sense, within our democracy.

But what we -- we do have some pending legislation to identify the source of campaign advertising, and so on, in a broader way, in a better way, I think, in a more transparent way, so that people understand the source of money.

And I think the desire is there on the part of the public to have full absolute outright disclosure, in a way that they understand that a candidate has or has not had influence on what advertising materials are put out. If that answers your question?

SEN. RORABACK: Well, it does. My own point is is that even as a candidate running exclusively with public financing, if interest groups are out there promoting your candidacy, and spending lots of money to do it, it's hard for many to believe that you wouldn't at least be cognoscente of that fact, and perhaps have your judgment clouded when you arrive at the capital, with those expenditures.

CHRIS RECTOR: If I could give you an interesting example, we had a very close Senate race in this last election cycle, and the president of the Senate sent around a piece of campaign literature that was -- ultimately drew an apology from him, because it was considered inappropriate.

And in the end, that Senate race was won by the democrat -- not the person who that piece of literature went out for, but the other person. I think it was a backlash, in a sense, and that Senate race was won by a single vote. And that single vote determined the balance of the Senate, which is 18 to 17.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you, Representative.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Representative O'Rourke.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you for coming down to join us today. I know it's a long ride, but we really appreciate you bringing your experience down here to help us craft our law. I can't find it in your testimony, but what percentage of candidates overall are participating in the Clean Election in the legislature?

CHRIS RECTOR: In the last election cycle, around 60% percent.

REP. O'ROURKE: Of 60% percent.

CHRIS RECTOR: Yes. I actually sent around -- you'll get something if you haven't received it yet, but I did bring some information down. Yeah, it could be that that's it. Yeah.

REP. O'ROURKE: So, over half are --

CHRIS RECTOR: Are Clean Election candidates in the last --

REP. O'ROURKE: Now, has that increased in each election?

CHRIS RECTOR: We've only done it for two election cycles, so it's still relatively new, but it's basically twice the number that participated in the year 2000 election.

REP. O'ROURKE: Twice the number. And do you have it for the Governor's office, as well?

CHRIS RECTOR: We do.

REP. O'ROURKE: You do. And have those candidates availed themselves of this?

CHRIS RECTOR: Only the Green candidate took advantage of the Clean Election law in this past election cycle in the general election. In the primary, we had a primary candidate in the Republican party who also ran as a Clean candidate, but he lost in the primary, so --

REP. O'ROURKE: But you weren't a legislator before Clean elections were established?

CHRIS RECTOR: And I wouldn't have been a legislator today if it were not for Clean elections. I can say definitively that knowing that the fundraising component, the concern, the anxiety, how to put something together as a campaign was taken out of the picture for me. It allowed me to move forward as a candidate, and I wouldn't have done it otherwise.

And I know of a number of other legislators sitting, and others who ran as candidates, and perhaps weren't elected, who would feel the same way.

REP. O'ROURKE: Do people who have been there before, and since, do they speak about any change in the culture at the legislature, in terms of is there any lessening of the role of special interests groups and the power that lobbyists weigh in with at the capitol, in deliberations?

CHRIS RECTOR: I'm not sure I can speak to that specifically, Representative. One of the things that's happening in Maine is we had another citizen initiative a few years back that brought about term limits, and we are now seeing the experience of term limits taking effect, so we've had quite a turnover.

Within the Republican Caucus, of which I'm a member, we have 34 freshman and 33 returning legislators, which gives you an idea of the amount of turnover. There's probably 40% percent of the House of Representatives are freshman at this time.

REP. O'ROURKE: And the Republican party in Maine is supportive of the Clean Elections program?

CHRIS RECTOR: I wouldn't make that characterization quite that broadly. I would say that it depends on who you speak with. But as a caucus, overall, I don't know that you necessarily get support from the entire Republican caucus.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Representative Labriola.

REP. LABRIOLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just a quick question. Am I right that the proposal, or your law in Maine, prohibits individual spending on your own campaign to $100.00 dollars?

CHRIS RECTOR: That's correct. You can make a personal contribution to your campaign of up to $100.00 dollars. You're allowed in seed money, so called seed money, as a Clean Elections candidate, a maximum of $500.00 dollars raised from any sources that you choose, no single contribution being in excess of $100.00 dollars.

REP. LABRIOLA: Now, the U.S. Supreme Court has said that a candidate has the right to spend virtually an unlimited amount of money on his or her own campaign. So, what are your views on that particular facet of the law in practice?

CHRIS RECTOR: I would say that you're certainly welcome to spend as much as you want on your own campaign. You just can't be a publicly financed Clean Elections candidate, so I think that's really the difference. I have no problem with it.

REP. LABRIOLA: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Well, thank you again for coming down, and it was very informative testimony. Thank you.

CHRIS RECTOR: My pleasure. Thank you for hearing me.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Let's move on to Steve Earl, followed by Bonnie Burr.

STEVE EARL: Good afternoon, Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, members of the committee. I'm Steve Earl. I'm the vice president for administration at the Connecticut Institute for the Blind in Hartford. We're the largest human service provider delivering human services to the state of Connecticut.

And I'm here today representing our own organization and the non-profit human service --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 1b - 2a)

STEVE EARL: -- asking for your support for HB6656, AN ACT CONCERNING CONTRACTS BETWEEN STATE AGENCIES AND NONPROFIT HUMAN SERVICE PROVIDERS. Over the past few months, these chambers have reverberated with the phrase do more with less, and for decades, Connecticut's nonprofits have helped the state do more with less.

And we're here today to reaffirm our commitment to improving human services in Connecticut in a cost efficient manner. We need your help if we're to succeed, and HB6656 is just the help we need. Each year, you appropriate more than $1 billion dollars to pay for the private delivery of critical state of the art human services.

But the contracting system that defines those services sets the price and describes the agreements of the parties is far from state of the art. The system, if it can even be called a system, grew haphazardly in each state agency, and today, no two state agencies use the same contract.

The contracts use out of date accounting procedures. The contracts are long on unnecessary detail, and very short on accountability. Almost all of the contracts have one year duration, even though they're for services that span many years.

Short contracts necessitate excess staff at state agencies to process them, and excess staff in the nonprofits to do the same. And worse of all, the contracts are often so one sided that nonprofits shy away from bidding on them, and state agencies miss out on the opportunity to get the services done.

For example, almost every state contract requires a nonprofit to absorb any and all financial losses under the contract, but to return to the state any and all financial gains. No business, even a nonprofit can stay solvent this way.

Your HB6656 sets in motion a process for trimming costs, removing redundancies, and streamlining the contracting process to everyone's benefit. Now, by itself, this bill doesn't fix the problem. Instead, it requires contracting parties to work together toward that goal, and to report their progress back to you, the legislature.

It creates a vehicle for positive change, and more importantly, I think it will help state agencies do more with less. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much. Any questions? Thank you very much then. Thank you. Bonnie Burr, followed by Ron Cretaro.

BONNIE BURR: Senator DeFonzo, Representative O'Rourke, and members of the GAE Committee, my name is Bonnie Burr, and I'm with the Connecticut Farm Bureau. I also submitted testimony today from May Schmiddle, who is the chairman of the Northeast Dairy Compact Commission.

We are here to give very strong support for SJ24, (COMM) RESOLUTION MEMORIALIZING CONGRESS TO RENEW ITS CONSENT TO THE NORTHEAST INTERSTATE DAIRY COMPACT. We feel that this is a very important resolution which needs to go forward to Congress, in order to get the mechanism back in place which gives relief to the dairy farmers in this state.

You do have my written testimony, but just let me summarize real quickly. I understand you do have a number of people still to go. Right now, the dairy farmers in this state are getting about a dollar a gallon for milk. In order to meet all of their expenses, they need to have about $1.25 dollars.

Currently, they're selling off land, they're using savings, and they're taking out personal loans in order to cover those basic expenses. We expect probably within the next two to four weeks, to hear of a number of more dairy farmers in the state of Connecticut that will go out of business right now.

We're losing about one every ten days to two weeks, and we anticipate that because it's going to be time for them to buy seed and fertilizer, in order to start planting the summer -- I'm sorry, the spring planting for summer and fall crops.

We would certainly hope that you would support this resolution, and we thank Senator Roraback for helping to work on this. If there's any questions, I'd be happy to answer.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much. Are there any questions? Senator Roraback has been educating me on the situation in the state, so I appreciate it.

BONNIE BURR: Good. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: And I appreciate your testimony. Thank you very much. Ron?

RON CRETARO: Hi, Senator. Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, I'm Ron Cretaro, the executive director of the Connecticut Association of Nonprofits, and I, too, am testifying today on behalf of the Connecticut Nonprofit Human Services Cabinet, which is a statewide coalition of 19 human service organizations.

Back in the early `90s, there was a Harper Hall Commission which, for the first time had a task force of -- a purchases services task force of it, which for the first time recommended landmark legislation related to state contracting for nonprofits with state government.

Those recommendations ultimately led to the creation of a purchases service unit within the Office of Policy and Management, and we -- this legislation helps formalize some of the intent behind and those changes and modifications that the nonprofit community wish to have realized back in the -- originally in the 1990s.

Some of the things that this legislation will help to address are, again, one, the multi-year contract. Most of human services are re-bid -- are continued every year, and when the legislature runs in to a late session, or you know, overtime, there's no continuing resolution that permits re-contracting prior to the end of the fiscal year.

That needs to be worked on so that nonprofits can have contracts in place July 1^st, and therefore not have to assume additional costs or anxiety about what happens with their contract. It has become, for several state agencies, expectations that routinely nonprofits will obtain -- will utilize lines of credit, and obtain cash flow loans in order to meet their payroll during a new contract year.

We think that needs to -- that practice needs to be interrupted, and non-profits should no longer be expected, particularly in these times, to have to go out and borrow money to meet its payrolls, while waiting for the state agency to develop a contract for it, and ultimately pay it on time.

We also need to clarify that OPM has the authority to troubleshoot and resolve problems when they arise, and systemic problems that arise among and between state agencies and nonprofits over contracts and other issues. There are also conflicting procedures and policies with -- among state agencies, and we need to have more uniformity.

Those conflicts arise around allowable costs, and also around the kinds and forms of reports that nonprofits have to file, if they particularly contract with multiple state agencies. And then finally this bill would also address incorporating the judicial branch as a purchase of service organization, as it does for DCF, DMR, DHMAS, Department of Public Health, Department of Corrections, Board of Parole, among others.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Ron. This isn't a new concept, obviously. We've been working on this with OPM for a number of years, and can you characterize for us the -- say, the interest or commitment level on the part of the administration?

RON CRETARO: The commitment has -- of the administration has, at times, been very strong, and at other times is, you know, because of budgetary issues and other things, become distracted. There's some question about what authority OPM has to manage the state agencies around some of these issues.

Obviously, there's budgetary authority, but is there authority, you know, with the -- and does it have the resources around contracting with nonprofits, and compelling some of the state agencies to do uniform kinds of contracting and procedures and policies.

And that's what we hope, that this will send a message to the executive branch that, you know, we want to proceed with that. And there has been progress in the past. It just seems that it's in fits and starts, and I say it gets interrupted, and then, you know, takes a while for us to get back to it.

We're hoping that we can sustain some progress, and that this will clearly designate OPM as having some of the responsibility and the authority to move forward on these issues. And we are currently meeting with the Office of Policy and Management, particularly around -- and they've been very responsive around the implementation of the HIPA, the Health Insurance Portability Act. So, that's important to nonprofits, but there are a whole range of other things that we would like to see move forward with, as well.

SEN. DEFRONZO: With the wide range of grant programs that we have, you do feel it is realistic to work towards the attainment of a uniform standard, with respect to contracting?

RON CRETARO: Well, certainly increased uniformity, I mean, it would certainly be more efficient and save time on the part of the state, as well as nonprofits, if there were more uniformity and standards, and more standardization. It may not -- I'm not saying that each and every state agency should have, you know, totally the same, you know, reports, or the same procedures and policies, but I think there could be certainly a higher level of uniformity than it currently exists.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Representative O'Rourke.

REP. O'ROURKE: Ron, OPM hasn't signed up to testify and address the committee today, and I haven't seen any testimony from them, looking through our packet. They indicated to you it seems like they're not opposed to the bill at this point?

RON CRETARO: We hope that's the case. We have obviously let them know that, you know, we have submitted this legislation, and hopefully they will embrace it.

REP. O'ROURKE: Maybe you mentioned it, but how many years have you been in discussions with them about this issue?

RON CRETARO: Well, I mean, there have been multiple issues. I mean, since back in '92 when the legislation was original -- Harper Hall legislation was approved, and so, you know, we've had -- you know, there have been times when we've met, and there have been times we've not, and there's been some receptivity.

You know, there was one time that Secretary Ryan was very eager to proceed, and then other things got in the way, and you know, there was not necessarily any intention to ignore it, it was just that there were other over-arching kinds of issues that have, you know, distracted OPM from the attention.

And, you know, and also some changes in personnel. And there's a person assigned to purchase of service, and that person would move or change, and therefore, that would delay things.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you. I'll just comment it seems like a long time to go without final resolution to something as important as this. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Ron. Tom Kemble, followed by Ken Leech.

TOM KEMBLE: Good afternoon, Senator DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, members of the GAE Committee. My name is Tom Kemble, state legislative affairs coordinator for the Caucus of Connecticut Democrats. I wish to testify in favor of raised bill HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

Public financing of political campaigns is long overdue in Connecticut for a variety of reasons, and I wish to mention three very important ones. First, it is a fantastic bargain for taxpayers. All campaigns, federal, state, and local in this country, during the year 2000 election cycle, could have been paid for by a $25.00 to $30.00 dollar contribution from each household in the United States.

Reasonable ground rules on television and radio advertising could easily have cut that amount in half. Compare that expenditure to the Savings and Loan scam of the `80s, which will end up costing well over $3,000.00 dollars per man, woman, and child in this country. Further examples from our own state are not hard to find.

Second, public financing would encourage able, honest folks from across the political spectrum to run for public office. Once elected, lawmakers could concentrate more effectively on the public's business. Third, getting elected is every bit as much a part of the governing process, as are making and administering laws.

There is a compelling public interest in adequately and fairly funding all aspects of governing. The argument of wishing to fund only the campaigns of candidates with whom one agrees makes no more sense that wishing to pay the salaries and expenses of only those legislators of one's own party.

We need to have all reasonable viewpoints adequately and fairly represented in our state government. Public financing of political campaigns would go a long way toward making it happen. Thank you for this opportunity.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much for your testimony. Are there any questions? Thank you. Ken Leech?

KEN LEECH: Good afternoon, Senator DeFronzo and Representative O'Rourke, and committee members. My name is Ken Leech. I represent the IBEW, the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, and I'm here to support bill HB6658, AN ACT CONCERNING EXEMPTIONS FROM CERTAIN CONTRACTOR LICENSING REQUIREMENTS.

The state does allow for specific exemptions during emergencies, and we understand and support that emergency line work 100% percent. This year's ice storm clearly demonstrates the need for it, and I can remember when it went back in to effect in '74, when it first came out, when Ella Grasso put it n under that emergency.

Unfortunately, Connecticut has seen an increasing number of unlicensed individuals doing electrical work under the exemptions in the state statutes, which say electric line or emergency work. The word or has created a loophole for some contractors to exploit the use of or emergency, and their interpretation of what a true emergency is.

They have included work which in no way is an emergency, but is new construction, renovation, maintenance work, and normal repair. Furthermore, it has had a huge impact on unemployed electricians, contractors in the state to date, who are not getting this work because they are being flooded from out of state, and don't need a license to do this work.

The IBEW is working with the Department of Consumer Protection to resolve their questions in regards to the current language, and would like to work with the legislators on the same language to see that this law is clarified, and that only real true emergencies are exempt from normal licensing. HB6658, to maintain a safe and fair working environment, and to insure quality work. I thank you, and if there's anything I can --

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you for your testimony. Maybe you could -- if you know the answer to this, who are the primary entities that this bill would affect, in terms of requiring licensed workers? Is there a specific industry or --

KEN LEECH: Well, right now if anyone claims -- any department claims it's an emergency work or emergency, it could be done by unlicensed people. That has never happened in the past, and line work has always been done under the emergency. That's when this first language came about, during the ice storms, for emergency work.

And where it says or emergency work, that part now has been picked up and used where they say, even if you want to build a new building, it's being built as an emergency. This is an emergency, we have to build this. It's put out to bid, but these people that bid it can come in from out of state and not use licenses and do the work.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I understand that, but I'm saying are there specific cases that you can point to, with specific companies?

KEN LEECH: Yes. I've seen it done in utilities. I've seen it done in the phone companies, where work is let out to bid, contractors from out of state get the work, come in and do it, and they don't need licenses. They've been told they don't have to have a license to do that work, when normally that always, always used to be done by licensed people.

SEN. DEFRONZO: And this is under the guise of the emergency --

KEN LEECH: Of emergency. That it's an emergency, that this work is an emergency.

SEN. DEFRONZO: That's what I didn't understand. Okay, that's helpful. Any other questions? Representative Adinolfi.

REP. ADINOLFI: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You mentioned about bringing in non-licensed contractors to work on houses and residential and buildings, this only speaks to public service.

KEN LEECH: No, I didn't say houses or residential. I said it leaves that open for the people, the utilities, if they want to build a new facility or any other type of work they normally have always done and put out to bid, to say it's an emergency, and do that work now without licensed Connecticut people doing that work.

REP. ADINOLFI: Are these licensed -- people that are not licensed in Connecticut, that they bring in for, like, say telephone work, is from Maine or Massachusetts, or --

KEN LEECH: Or New York, or whatever.

REP. ADINOLFI: Are they licensed in those states, to meet the standards in those states?

KEN LEECH: I don't know because they don't have to be licensed. Some could be licensed, and some may not be licensed. We found it both ways, that on the jobs, people would be hired off the streets, even, to do the work, maybe it was something as small as pulling wires, where they could oversee the operation.

REP. ADINOLFI: Okay, thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions?

KEN LEECH: Thank you for your time.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you for your testimony. We'll move on to Joe Camposio, followed by David Silverstone.

JOE CAMPOSIO: Good afternoon, Senator DeFronzo and members of the GAE Committee. My name is Joe Camposio, the legislative chair of the Connecticut Town Clerks Association, and the town clerk of Manchester. To my left is Barbara Tarbox, my co-chair, and also the town clerk of Groton.

We are here today to support HB6619, AN ACT CONCERNING PUBLICATION OF PROPOSED CHARTERS, CHARTER AMENDMENTS, AND HOME RULE ORDINANCE AMENDMENTS. And also. HB6620, AN ACT CONCERNING IDENTIFICATION OF ELECTORS AT POLLING PLACES. And also, we would like to comment on HB6616, AN ACT CONCERNING REGISTRARS OF VOTERS.

We laud the intent to clarify the responsibilities of the registrars of voters. We also believe that such an effort merits being evaluated by a committee, and should also include a study of the role of town clerks. As always, we would be willing to be a participant in that process.

With respect to HB6616, we believe there is a need for clarification and understanding. In particular, Section 1P, there is new language declaring registrars the administrators of elections held in a municipality. In light of existing statutes, and the number of duties performed by town clerks, we also believe that we are considered administrators, as well.

Our statutory election duties begin in January, with a report to the Secretary of State concerning voting machines. And through July, we are providing lists of office s to be filled to the political parties, and to the Secretary of State. We also are involved in the certification of candidates, certification of nominating petitions, which includes publication of primary referendum and election notices to all local newspapers.

We prepare and print voting machine ballots, absentee ballots, sample ballots, monitor and amend all changes in candidacies, and prepare explanatory text referendum questions. Our absentee ballot responsibilities range from blank ballots that go out 90 days in advance, to military personnel, 45 day ballots, overseas ballots, presidential ballots, and of course, the regular absentee ballots.

We assist in the training of the absentee ballot counters and election officials. We prepare and supply the moderator kits for the moderators, and also are involved in the training of the moderators. We also provide security for all returned absentee ballots, accounting for each serial numbered envelope that is issued by name, by address, and by district.

We oversee campaign finance law for compliance with local elections. After the election, we secure all the materials used for the election, the results, declare the sealing of the voting machines and election materials, as necessary, and call for certain re-canvasses. We file numerous election reports with the Office of the Secretary of State.

Town clerks are the keepers of voting machine keys. When an election is contested in the court, the town clerks are subpoenaed, since they are the keepers of all election materials. And when the registrars are not available, we accept and admit registration of voters, as well.

We believe these responsibilities and others demonstrate that town clerks are also administrators. Also, I'd point out that in the (inaudible) bill, we note that the Secretary of State has named not only as registrar, but also a town clerk, to work with her in the implementation of that bill.

In summary, the evaluation of election responsibilities can be useful, but not as indicated in raised HB6616, and I would be happy to entertain your questions.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much. Are there questions? In current statute, would you argue that you are the designated election official, or --

JOE CAMPOSIO: I believe we share the role with the registrar. One point of interest, though, is that in many interests, registrars are not full time employees, where in the 169 cases of town clerks, they are indeed full time employees. And in essence, I would interpret the current statute to show that we both have responsibilities, which I would perceive to be that of administrating an election.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Representative Reinoso.

REP. REINOSO: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to hear from you, and maybe -- what would be your reaction as the town clerk, since you are eluding that he is the election administrator, but a relative of the town clerk runs for office? And that's one case, and the other case is the town clerk is also the chair of the town committee? I'd like to hear you respond to this, sir.

JOE CAMPOSIO: Well, the very essence of the role of the town clerk is intended to be that of neutral in the election process, and in my assessment, if a town clerk is doing their job with the diligence and the interpretation of what is statutory law, they should be doing their job in a very neutral perspective.

That is why there are so many, many statutes. In fact, not only with election law, but probably in the range of 95% percent of the responsibilities a town clerk, ranging in the areas of vital records, land recordings, and all of our duties, perhaps as much as 95% percent of it is in some way directly or indirectly connected to statutory law.

So, my interpretation of that, regardless of whether one holds some other position, approximately 60% percent to 80% percent, I would say somewhere in the range of 80% percent of the town clerks in the state are elected, so we have to be in a position of neutrality when doing our job in the form of -- as a town clerk.

REP. REINOSO: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Fine. Thank you very much.

JOE CAMPOSIO: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: David Silverstone, followed by Bob Young.

DAVID SILVERSTONE: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee. My name is David Silverstone. I'm the president and chief executive officer of the South Central Connecticut Regional Water Authority. We provide water service to half a million people in the greater New Haven area.

I'm here to ask your support for raised HB6654, AN ACT AMENDING THE SECURITY EXEMPTION TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT TO INCLUDE WATER COMPANY FACILITY INFORMATION. I don't have to tell this committee that times have changed over the last 18 months. We take great pride in what we do, and frankly, we like showing off.

We used to give tours of our facilities. We would explain in infinite detail, our water supply plans, to anybody who would listen. And we wanted people to understand entirely what we did, in infinite detail. Circumstances have changed, and we need to react to these changing conditions.

I want to emphasize this is not a change in philosophy by us, but rather it's a need to respond to the conditions we're facing today. I would hope that sometime in the future, we could go back to our transparency, when circumstances warranted, but right now, we need to be vigilant, and we're asking that certain of this information be kept confidential, as described in the bill.

I want to compliment the Department of Health officials, and the Freedom of Information Commission employees, for assisting us in drafting this legislation, and recognizing that we are in changed times, and we do need to respond to these new conditions. I urge your support of this bill, and would be happy to answer any questions. Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: Thank you, sir. Do any of the members have any questions? Okay, if not, thank you for your testimony.

DAVID SILVERSTONE: Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: Thank you for your testimony, sir.

DAVID SILVERSTONE: Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: Next is Bob Young, and he will be followed by Faterma Masswood.

BOB YOUNG: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. My name is Robert Young, and I am here in my capacity as the legislative co-chair of the Connecticut Water Works Association. CWWA's members are public, private, and regional utilities that provide almost 2.5 million of the state's citizens with drinking water.

CWWA strongly supports HB6654, AN ACT AMENDING THE SECURITY EXEMPTION TO THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT TO INCLUDE WATER COMPANY FACILITY INFORMATION. This bill will help to safeguard Connecticut's public water supplies from terrorism or other criminal acts, by protecting security related information from disclosure, under the state Freedom of Information Act.

At this time of heightened security, it is absolutely critical that law makers act swiftly to protect information that may jeopardize security of our water supplies and water infrastructure, from disclosure. Since September 11^th, Connecticut water utilities have been responding to the urgent need for greater security.

We have been advised by federal authorities to proactively protect information such as vulnerability assessments, sabotage prevention plans, operational plans, and other documents from disclosure. Our water companies are currently reviewing documents that have been or will be submitted to state or local agencies, or released to the public, to determine whether such information poses a security risk.

In reviewing such information, it became evident that there was a need to amend Public Act 02-133, AN ACT CONCERNING THE DISCLOSURE OF SECURITY INFORMATION UNDER THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT, to include water companies and specify certain documents and information that must be protected from disclosure.

This proposed bill protects the following security sensitive information from disclosure. Vulnerability assessments, risk management plans, operational plans, water supply plans, inspection reports, technical specifications, and other materials that depict or specifically describe critical water company operating facilities, collection and distribution systems, or sources of supply, from disclosure.

Disclosure of this information to the public would clearly pose a security to Connecticut's public water supplies and water structure. Vulnerability assessments, for example, are required to be completed by water utilities, pursuant to federal law, to pinpoint areas within the water supply system that are vulnerable to sabotage or contamination.

Water utilities are also required by state law to file individual water supply plans with the DPH, with copies provided to DEP, DPUC, OPM, municipalities, and regional planning agencies. These plans include such information as the location of wells, where chemicals are stored, sources of water supplies, backup wells, various interconnections. Clearly, this information should not be put in the hands of terrorists or criminals.

We have met with the Freedom of Information Act Commission, and they understand and have been very supportive of our efforts to protect this information from disclosure. We look forward to working with the Commission to be sure that the bill adequately protects a wide range of security related information, maintained and submitted by water companies to state and local agencies, without unduly jeopardizing the public's right to know.

To strengthen the bill's provisions, we will continue to meet with the Commission to further clarify and define the intent of the current language of the bill, and other materials that depict or specifically describe critical water company operating facilities, collection and distribution systems, and sources of supply.

We would also request that the bill be effective upon passage, due to heightened security concerns. As previously mentioned, CWWA is also meeting with the state DPH to develop an information protocol for insuring that information submitted to the agency is kept secure, with access limited only to authorized personnel, similar to how classified documents are handled at the federal level.

We sincerely appreciate the efforts of the FOI Commission, the state DPH, and other agencies involved in developing procedures for protecting documents that may pose a security risk. Thank you for your attention, and I'll be more than happy to answer any questions.

REP. SPALLONE: Thank you, sir, for your testimony. Do any of the members have questions? Representative Floren.

REP. FLOREN: Thank you for your testimony.

BOB YOUNG: Thank you.

REP. FLOREN: I just had a question. This would also include any geographic information system?

BOB YOUNG: We would hope so. I think that's where the intent of the other documents that depict -- (inaudible) the exact language, and other materials that depict or specifically describe, that would be that kind of information.

REP. FLOREN: That would be very important, I think, going forward, and we'd appreciate your support on that.

BOB YOUNG: We would agree. I am a municipal water utility, so that information is open, and that's something that's very dear to my heart, as well. Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: Thank you, Representative. Any further questions? If not, thank you, sir, for your testimony.

BOB YOUNG: Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay. The next person that we're calling is Faterma. Is she arround? Faterma Masswood? If you could help us with the pronunciation of your name, we'd appreciate it. Please.

: (Mike not on).

REP. SPALLONE: Okay. Thank you very much. And please have a seat, and we look forward to hearing from you.

FATERMA MASSWOOD: (Mike not on).

REP. SPALLONE: Excuse me just a moment. Let's get the microphone set up, and if you could move closer, so we can all hear what you have to say. Thank you very much.

FATERMA MASSWOOD: My name is Faterma Masswood, and I live in Cromwell, Connecticut. On a personal note, I would like to mention that my younger brother goes to school (inaudible). Every Christmas and Easter, there's a long vacation, and everyone knows when Hanukkah starts, or when Passover is, but if I say Eid is coming soon, everyone asks me what Eid is.

Muslims just want recognition for their major holidays, and a chance to celebrate them. Just like Christmas and Easter have a meaning for Christians, and Hanukkah and Passover have a meaning for Jews, Eid-Al-Fitr and Eid-Al-Adha have meanings for Muslims.

Eid-Al-Fitr is a holiday to celebrate the end of the month of Ramadan, and a kind of congratulations for fasting for a whole month. Eid-Al-Adha celebrates Abraham's faithfulness and loyalty to God. As we all know, Judaism, Christianity and Islam all trace their foundation to Abraham.

Our holidays are very important to us. Muslims would like to have a day off to properly thank the Lord and appreciate his blessings.

REP. SPALLONE: Well, thank you very much for your testimony. One of the things about being here in the legislature is that it's a lot like school. We learn something new every day, and I think some of the legislators and audiences learned things today about these holidays. Do any of the members have any questions? Okay. Well, you did an outstanding job. Thank you very much. And we'll let Representative O'Rourke know you were here.

FATERMA MASSWOOD: Thank you.

REP. SPALLONE: The next person on our list today is Sherby Worthin, followed by -- it looks like George Cody.

SHERBY WORTHIN: Good afternoon, Representative Spallone, Senator Roraback, and other members of the Committee on Government Administration Elections. I'm Sherby Worthin. I'm a vice president from United Way of Connecticut, and I'm here in support of raised HB6656, AN ACT CONCERNING CONTRACTS BETWEEN STATE AGENCIES AND NONPROFIT HUMAN SERVICE PROVIDERS.

And I'm here representing United Way. We are also members of the Nonprofit Human Services Cabinet. And first of all, I would like to thank the co-chairs, who are not here at the moment, but they raised this bill just a short time ago. And my remarks will really echo my colleagues, who spoke earlier, Ron Cretaro from CAN, and Steve Earl from the Connecticut Services for the Blind.

But United Ways across the state fund over 700 nonprofit agencies, and they have always worked closely together with their agencies, especially now that there's a strong focus on measuring outcomes. I came from a United Way meeting this morning, and a number of the directors there had been scrambling to get us some more material that I could share with you this morning. Sort of cases from their nonprofits.

I have a few points that I would like to include. And I think the biggest issue for nonprofits are the timeliness of payments. This has always been a key area of concern. The time lapse between award, award letters, contract signing, and funds getting to the nonprofit provider.

There's often a need to borrow operating funds, based on award letters and past performance of nonprofits. Of course, in the present environment, it will be difficult for non-profit agencies to float programs without payments on state contracts, sometimes for over a year.

And because contract policies and protocols differ from agency to agency, some nonprofits may fill out four different formats for four different state agencies. You heard some about the history of working on the purchase of service issues. For several years, a small group from the Nonprofit Cabinet met with state agency staff to try to improve the contracting process.

And although progress was made in some areas, overall it was very limited, and only with certain state agencies. In 2002, the Cabinet met with John Mengaci, the Undersecretary at OPM, to create a framework on purchase of service issues. The key concerns were the standardization of Part I of the contract, and uniform statewide cost accounting procedures.

Although there was good progress made at subsequent meetings around HIPA issues, the purchase of service issues were not able to be addressed because of lack of authority at OPM to establish or enforce statewide uniform policies and procedures, and lack of resources for OPM to implement the purchase of service project.

Now, thanks to the proposed legislation, which establishes a purchase of service advisory group, and a human services contract compliance unit at OPM, we hope the purchase of service by state agencies will be improved by reducing the cost of the purchasing process for both state agencies and human service providers.

Streamlining the purchase of service and reporting process will save time and money. The nonprofit agency will achieve more financial stability by having a more predictable and consistent system, and there will be increased accountability by human service providers to state agencies for producing measurable and positive outcomes.

We look forward to a new streamlined system, which although it cannot make up for the cuts to critical human service programs, can at least mitigate the cost to both the nonprofit provider and the state agency. Thank you for the opportunity to testify in support of raised HB6656.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Are there any questions? I have just one question for you. The sense some of us had is that more of the services which are currently provided by state agencies and state employees are going to be shifted either intentionally or by necessity, or by some scheme, to the private sector, and this is probably true in the human services area, as well.

And this effort you're undertaking here, although a decade old in origin, would facilitate that process -- and would facilitate -- I'm not saying that you're endorsing the concept, but I mean, if, in fact, you are going to be asked to be taking on more responsibility in the delivery of services that have previously been provided by the state, this would be a mechanism to facilitate that transition, would it not?

SHERBY WORTHIN: Clearly it would. It would be very important to have this smoother mechanism if more services are going to be delivered through the nonprofits.

SEN. DEFRONZO: And is my observation correct, do you think, or -- (laughter).

SHERBY WORTHIN: Well, I think from what we've heard, some of the Department of Social Services plans, moving forward, clearly are looking at more services being provided through the nonprofit sector, which are already being funded through the contracts. So, we -- you know, we anticipate there will be a lot to do. There's certainly a lot of needs.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Alright, thank you very much. We'll move on to George Cody.

GEORGE CODY: Senator DeFronzo, members of the committee, I thank you today. My name indeed is George Cody. I am the registrar of voters in New Canaan, and I am co-chair of the Registrar of Voters Association Legislative Committee. I am here today to ask your support for three bills on your agenda today. And you have all received written testimony on these bills.

HB6620 -- well, we'll start with HB6616, AN ACT CONCERNING REGISTRARS OF VOTERS, this bill makes technical and clerical changes in the statutes. The first change is in the definition of registrars, defining them as administrators of elections held in the municipality, and is intended to compliment the (inaudible) bill without changing any existing responsibilities or statutory duties.

The second change would remove the current statutory requirements to place the place of birth of an applicant be recorded, and the bill specifies that the registrars enter the voter information in the state centralized voter registration system, where the proposed bill requires registrars to supply the clerk with an updated list of active voters on a monthly basis.

We would recommend that the wording include the option for the submission of a supplemental or updated list. The addition of a supplemental list allows us in the larger communities to supply the clerk on a monthly basis with a list of new voters, rather than to constantly be replacing the --

It appears elsewhere in the statutes, that the registrars and the clerks work in conjunction on this, and when the clerk requires an additional -- a full list, we will supply a full list. There's no question there. But we do think that adding supplemental to that bill would improve it.

HB6620, AN ACT CONCERNING IDENTIFICATION OF ELECTORS AT POLLING PLACES, we consider this an important bill. This bill would strengthen the identification requirements at the polls, without infringing on the right of a voter to cast a vote. Under current statutes, a prospective voter who arrives at the polling place without any identification is required to sign an affirmation that he or she is the voter they purport to be.

And are then crossed off the list, and allowed to cast their ballot. The Form I sign is without any formality in appearance, and is actually similar to a petition form one might sign in front of a grocery store. The affirmation is printed at the top of the page, and the result is that the voters rarely read the affirmation.

And this system also affords the election officials, with little in the way of verifying the information. The bill before you would strengthen the process by having the prospective voter complete a separate form, which would include their name, date of birth, address, along with a clear declaration of the penalty of false statement, above their signature, similar to that in the (inaudible) bill and in the extended voter registration bill.

We feel that this change would reinforce the seriousness of signing such a statement, allow for a method of verifying the voter, and would help to dissuade anyone from misusing this provision.

Finally, HB6621, AN ACT CONCERNING THE ELECTION OF REGISTRARS OF VOTERS, again, this is a bill that we have proposed. It would standardize the election of registrars of voters, and establish a four year term for all registrars.

Currently, 75 registrars in Connecticut are elected to four year terms. Forty nine of these are elected to four year terms in presidential years, 26 to four year terms in gubernatorial years. Ninety two of the remaining, 92 are elected to two year terms, with one municipality elected by local districts, resulting in four registrars.

This bill, by standardizing four year terms elected in presidential years, would provide consistency and reduce the potential conflict of registrars as candidates. I thank the committee for their attention. I'd be happy to answer any questions you might have.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Mr. Cody. Are there any questions? Apparently there are no questions, so thank you very much. Appreciate it.

GEORGE CODY: Alright, thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Is Ken Hazzar present?

KEN HAZZAR: Good afternoon, and thank you. My name is Ken Hazzar. I am the director of sales and marketing for LHS Associates. Those of you who are long time members of this committee will know that I've testified at least a half dozen times here over the last several years, on matters concerning elections.

I'm here today to address HB6622, AN ACT REQUIRING NEW VOTING EQUIPMENT TO ACCOMMODATE RANKED ORDER VOTING AND CUMULATIVE VOTING --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 2a - 2b)

KEN HAZZAR: -- currently, LHS Associates is conducting instance runoff of what are called proportional representation elections in the city of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and we have been for the past six years.

As many of you are aware, the optical scan system, the Accu-Vote is the only other certified piece of equipment, other than the lever machines, that can operate here in the state of Connecticut, and it is that same Accu-Vote that is conducting these IRV elections in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The way the system -- frankly, there are no technical limitations or impediments to cumulative voting as well, which is a little bit different, so I'm going to just get in to just a quick explanation for people who might be sitting here. Instant runoff voting is whereby, in contrast to plurality voting, which is where the winner -- whoever gets the most votes wins, whether you get 50% percent or not.

If three people are running, and one person gets 42% percent, and the other two get in the 30s, that person who gets the 42% percent wins. In instant runoff voting, or proportional representation voting, the voters -- and by the way, I brought eight or nine examples of the Cambridge city ballot, which I will leave behind for you.

In that type of voting, the voter votes for their candidates in order of preference. Candidate preference number 1, 2, 3, 5, 5, up to whatever number of candidates may be running. And what you then do is that on the first pass, when you're calculating the results, anybody who gets 50% percent of the vote is automatically in.

If nobody gets 50% percent of the vote, then you go to the number of people who wrote in that person as their number two choice. And when the ones and the twos add up and get you 50% percent, you're in. And any votes that you have left over, then go back in to the pool, and the calculation takes place on a regular -- it just keeps on going until you've found enough candidates to fill whatever number of open slots you have.

That's how instant runoff voting works. That's how it works in Cambridge, and the system is pretty much an off the shelf Accu-Vote system, is ablet o do this in conjunction with what's called a back end program called a PR Master.

And what the machine does, is every time you vote, it creates an image of your ballot, and at the end of the day, the memory card that the system runs on, is fed in to the computer. Those images are downloaded to the computer, and then the computer program calculates the results. And that's how instant runoff works.

I'm not here to speak in favor or against instant runoff voting. I really have no opinion one way or the other. I just wanted to let all of you know that it is feasible. It is technologically feasible. It's operating. It has been operating successfully.

And the other type of voting, cumulative voting, there's really no technical impediment to that, as well. Cumulative voting is where if there are three open seats in a race, each voter is given three votes for that race, and that voter can then apportion those votes in any way he or she wishes.

They can give all three votes to one candidate, or they can split them among candidates. If you have any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much for the testimony. Are there any questions? Senator Roraback.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you. I'm just curious. Did you submit written testimony to us today?

KEN HAZZAR: No, I did not.

SEN. RORABACK: Okay. I'll stop looking for it then.

KEN HAZZAR: No. I brought some ballots. I was able to get about eight or nine ballots. I figured I'll just leave them behind and you can see what they look like, but I didn't have anything written.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Any other questions? Mr. O'Brien. Representative O'Brien.

REP. O'BRIEN: Mr. Chairman. You say Cambridge uses ranked order voting, and they -- what kind of machine do they use that --

KEN HAZZAR: The Accu-Vote is the system -- the paper ballot system. And in fact, if you see that one, you have a ballot, all of the candidates are listed, and then you have a matrix next to them, so if there are 19 candidates, these numbers 1 through 19 appear, and then you vote for them in order of preference.

The ballot is fed in to the optical scanner, just like any other system, but instead of the optical scanner calculating the results, it creates an image of that ballot. In other words, it says that that particular ballot has a one here, a two there, a three there. And then you need the ancillary program to actually do the calculation.

When that image is fed in to the PC, the PC then takes that image and does the calculation as to who got the most number of number one votes, number two votes, number three votes, and so on.

REP. O'BRIEN: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: (Mike not on).

KEN HAZZAR: Thank you.

JOYCE WOJTAS: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. My name is Joyce Wojtas, and I'm director of government affairs for Connecticut Construction Industries Association. I would like to go on record in support of HB6618, AN ACT CONCERNING PAYMENT BONDS FOR THE PROTECTION OF EMPLOYEES AND MATERIALMEN.

The statute that this covers is known as Connecticut's Little Miller Act, and it provides important protection for subcontractors and suppliers on public construction projects. However, we keep hearing from many subcontractors that oftentimes municipalities waive the bond requirements.

And we have an amendment to the bill that you have -- your committee bill, that would provide a process, because last year, we got his bill out of this committee, and some of the municipalities were complaining that they would be caught blindsided with claims from subcontractors.

The amendment would provide a process for timely notice of claim in a timeframe for denial of the claim. It would be the same process if a bond were in place. And when a municipality waives the bond, the municipality has to realize that their accepting the same risk as the surety company.

We don't know why bonds are waived, but it's happened, and it happens sporadically. And it really is not fair. This amendment, though, also expressly excludes the state from the provisions in the bill, because to our knowledge, the state has never engaged in this practice of waiving bonds.

The bond requirement is there for a purpose. It's important because if you don't pay the subcontractors, many of them can't afford to continue in business. What's happened is we've taken this case to court, and found -- the court has ruled that it's up to the subcontractor to demand that there be a payment bond placed by the general contractor.

And the minute the subcontractor gets involved in that activity, the subcontractor is not going to get the subcontract. We think that we provided for a good process, and remember, any municipality who doesn't waive the bond, isn't going to be subjected to anything anyway. So, if they pay attention to the law, there's no problem.

The other bill I'd like to testify in opposition to is HB6658, AN ACT CONCERNING EXEMPTIONS FROM CERTAIN CONTRACTOR LICENSING REQUIREMENTS. I was here for the previous testimony of the proponent of the bill, and I would just like the committee to know that this exemption has been in the statutes since 1975. Prior to that, it was much broader, and it was narrowed.

The people -- it would have a devastating impact on a major segment of the construction industry, mainly the work performed by utility contractors who do work for all the public utility companies. The exemption is to cover work on the public utility facilities which they are regulating and controlling and inspecting.

And our work, we handle conduit, which is the pipe that wires will go through, and because that's in the definition of electrical work, if the exemption was taken away, we wouldn't be able to handle the pipe anymore. I think that the exemption is clear, it's been clear.

We've had this debate before the Electrical Examining Board 100 times. I've been with the industry for 22 years, and it keeps coming up. It should remain in place. I think it's been clarified over and over again. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you for your testimony. Has there ever been an attempt to compromise that issue of -- you know, this last bill you were talking about, the --

JOYCE WOJTAS: The licensing?

SEN. DEFRONZO: The licensing. I mean, if there are clearly responsibilities that don't require the need of a licensed electrician, why is that included in the exemption?

JOYCE WOJTAS: Anything that is controlled by the utility company is exempt. It's electrical line or emergency work for a public utility company. I think that there will be speakers after me. I know that Mr. Leech was talking about a building, and it's not going in to a building ad doing particular wiring, like an electrician.

I mean, an electrician still does that type of work. This is work for those utility companies, including electric telephone, cable, whatever else you have. We do -- my contractors do underground work. We do the excavation and the pipe laying activity.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I guess my question is whether if the exemption exists for all of these activities which do not require the skills of a licensed electrician, was there a point in time when those activities did require the --

JOYCE WOJTAS: Not to my knowledge, no. As a matter of fact, the exemptions prior to the change in the law, in 1975, the exemption was much broader, and it also exempted employees of any contractor while said contractor is performing work for or subject to inspection by any federal, state or municipal agency, or a corporation other than a municipal building department.

Now, that was taken out in '75, and it was left that electrical line or emergency work for any public service company. So, prior to 1975, I think there could have been a problem, but yet it still did not allow the work if it was inspected by a municipal building department. So -- I mean, that still is subject to inspection.

So, if it's something that requires, I believe, a building permit, then it's not exempt under the existing statute.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you very much. Tom Swan.

TOM SWAN: Good afternoon, Chairman DeFronzo, Representative O'Rourke, other members of GAE. My name is Tom Swan, and I'm the executive director of the Connecticut Citizen Action Group. I want to thank you for raising HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY. It has been nearly three years since the legislature passed similar legislation in response to the Silvester scandal, only to have Governor Rowland veto it.

Recent events prove that this type of comprehensive reform is needed now more than ever before. First item of proof on that is Joe Ganim, Joe Ganim, Joe Ganim. Why do I use his conviction as an argument? One of the related guilty please in this case was by the Leacini family.

The committed to contribute over $500,000.00 dollars to fund a possible Ganim campaign for governor. Even less egregious examples would clearly give candidates allied with monied interest an unfair advantage, thus undermining the principle of one person, one vote.

A second example, the pharmaceutical industry, during this last election cycle, spent three times as much money on radio and TV, lying about Nancy Johnson and Rob Simmons' record on prescription drugs, than the democratic candidate for governor was able to spend on radio and television.

This should be criminal. I do not have enough time to go in to all the scandals related to Governor Rowland. Suffice it to say that the money tied up in the scandals related to Rowland and his cronies could fund vote owned elections for multiple election cycles and balance the budget.

This level of corruption is reminiscent of the Log family of Louisiana, but memberships to Rowland's share the wealth club is limited to campaign contributors and cronies from Waterbury. This legislature has to act to restore the trust in our government now.

Reform proposals should meet the following criteria. Limit the ability of monied interest to undermine the principle of one person one vote. End the constant money chase that candidates must endure. Level the playing field for candidates that demonstrate a reasonable level of support, and pass constitutional muster.

HB6653 does this for state-wide offices. Unfortunately the proposal falls short for legislative races. We recommend that you amend this piece of the legislation to establish a work group of each caucus, and an equal number of good government groups to negotiate details on caps, thresholds, and to develop a proposal for how the legislature can operate under the same rules.

Before I close, I also want to state CCHE's opposition to HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION. The legislative commission should maintain their independence. Thank you very much.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Are there any questions? Representative O'Brien.

REP. O'BRIEN: You mention in here that balancing the budget. What did you mean by that?

TOM SWAN: What I meant was that if you aggregated the amount of money between the various scandals relates to the Rowland Administration, that we could not only fund this cycle, but we could balance the budget. Let's just do the math with a few of these.

Let's go back to one of the first scandals within the Rowland Administration. Vito Santascioro, pawn broker for the environment. Mr. Fix-it at DEP. With the amount of money that he cut off the fine that the McDermaid Corporations should have paid for trying to create a fish free Naugatuck River, we could restore all the cuts within the DEP budget that's being proposed.

Let's move along a little bit to Bridgeport. Deputy Commissioner of DECD, Mark Hinckley, pleading guilty to the exact same scandals in the development that Ganim was indicted and convicted for. Let's fast forward a little bit. Paul Silvester. The amount of money that was paid in finders fees of politically connected friends of John would fully cover an entire four year cycle of clean money campaigns.

Rowland's statement about not knowing who was hosting the New York fundraiser that he went with to Silvester, is about as believable as Joe Ganim was during the trial. Let's move forward to the nursing homes. They raise $100,000.00 dollars --

: (Mike not on).

TOM SWAN: I'm answering his question. They raised $100,000.00 dollars for Governor Rowland. He illegally spends $30 million dollars to try to break the union. That money would put sprinklers in nursing homes and restore Husky.

: (Mike not on).

TOM SWAN: Okay.

: (Mike not on).

SEN. DEFRONZO: Bart Bouricious.

BART BOURIZIOUS: Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Bart Bouricious, and I'm representing the Center for Voting and Democracy. I'm here to support bill HB6622, AN ACT REQUIRING NEW VOTING EQUIPMENT TO ACCOMMODATE RANKED ORDER VOTING AND CUMULATIVE VOTING.

The Center is a non-partisan, non-profit educational organization that studies the American electoral process. The Center is supported by individuals and foundations, including the Ford Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, and the Open Society Institute.

Former congressman John B. Andersen is its president. HB6622 is an important precaution to protect an investment in new voting and equipment from early obsolescence. While there may be no immediate plans to use rank order voting or cumulative voting in Connecticut right now, interests in these alternative voting systems is mushrooming across the country.

First let me give a thumbnail sketch of what these voting systems are, and are about, because there isn't time to explain them in any detail. Rank order voting, also called preferential voting, choice voting, or instant runoff voting, is recommended by Robert's Rules Of Order as superior to the commonly used plurality voting.

Rank order voting allows voters to rank candidates in order of choice, rather than select just one. It eliminates the spoiler problem in races with multiple candidates, and can assure majority rule and full representation.

Rank order ballots have been used in over 20 U.S. cities, with San Francisco being the most recent city to adopt it. In San Francisco, it will save the city millions of dollars by eliminating the need for separate runoff elections. Especially in this time, it's worth considering saving some money.

Louisiana uses rank order voting for their overseas absentee ballots. Legislation to adopt rank order voting is pending in over a dozen states. Cumulative voting is a system of voting used in numerous municipal elections in the U.S. It gives voters the freedom to concentrate or spread their votes in multi-seat districts.

It accomplishes the same goal as Connecticut's law assuring minority party inclusion in municipal government, without the limitations on voter choice imposed by the Connecticut law. Most states have laws that provide for cumulative voting in corporate board of directors elections, as a way of protecting the rights of investors.

In Illinois, for example, cumulative voting was used to elect House of Representatives members from three state seat districts for over a century, until 1980. There is currently a move to reinstate cumulative voting for the Illinois House.

Many jurisdictions have also adopted cumulative voting as part of the settlement of voting rights lawsuits because it provides for a more representative city council or school board, while allowing racial minorities to elect a share of seats roughly proportionate to the voter population, without creating racially defined single seat districts.

HB6622 takes a reasonable approach to protect these states' investment in new voting equipment. The vendor should not be allowed to demand additional time and money to modify software or hardware. Most new voting equipment --

SEN. DEFRONZO: If you want to finish your thought, go ahead. Or summarize, or --

BART BOURICIOUS: I'll do my best to summarize. I thought I was going fast, but -- just one important point. I'm going to go down to the bottom here. We strongly suggested one small but critical amendment to the language of the bill, and it's section 9-242, subsection b.

The language goes not withstanding the provisions -- this is (inaudible) -- not withstanding the provisions of this section, the machines will also be constructed so as to provide for rank order voting and cumulative voting. It's very important to include where it says the machine shall, to include the words the machine and included software shall also be construed.

The reason for this is certain states have ended up having to spend millions of extra dollars because they didn't include this kind of language when they went to vendors for voting machines. I'm just concerned that Connecticut doesn't end up making the same kind of mistake that Georgia did, for example, where the vendor ended up having a monopoly on providing new software.

And there's a lot more of it. You have, I think -- I think it's been distributed to people, so I won't take up more time. If there's any questions?

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Thank you very much. Are there any questions? Thank you very much.

BART BOURICIOUS: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Welcome, Representative Caruso. Just in time for someone we heard last night, I believe, right? Alma Maya? Did you get any sleep?

ALMA MAYA: Not much. (Laughter). You probably got less than I did. Thank you for coming to Bridgeport again. I want to thank you again. My name is Alma Mea. I'm the current executive director of (inaudible) of Connecticut. I'm a former member of the Governor's Council for the Latino Puerto Rican Affairs, and I helped write the original language, draft the original language to create the commission, the Latino Puerto Rican Affairs Commission, so I have a personal knowledge of what the mandate of the commission is.

As to amendment, subsection c, 1, 2, and 3d, I know that the LPRAC already provides an annual report to both the legislature and the Governor, as well as written testimony on both -- on issues affecting the Latino and general community.

On subsection c, 4 and 7, I also know that LPRAC works with all legislators, and this ensures a wider scope of support and influence. I asked the question of what is expected of other like commissions, and I'm wondering if this is something that's just being expected for LPRAC.

I also believe that some of these reporting requirements seem to be burdensome an, you know, duplication of efforts, because the reports are there. And I'd like to say that as a private citizen, and as a former commissioner, whenever I've asked for any information, reports, data, I have had no problem in getting any information from the Latino Puerto Rican Affairs Commission.

The Latino Puerto Rican Affairs Commission goes through a strategic planning process on a yearly basis, to establish its priorities here at the legislature, and I believe that this maybe could be expanded to include a joint meeting of the Latino legislators prior to coming up with the priorities, if that may be able to solve some of the problems.

But I know that they are invited to meetings, have attended them, and there have been discussions between the commissioners and the legislators on all issues. Therefore, because of this, I do not see the need for these amendments to the original law. I believe that LPRAC is meeting its mandate with the current language.

My experience with LPRAC's staff and the commissioners has been very positive. They have been responsive to our needs for information, data, especially the Latino socio-economic study, which helps us in putting proposals together.

The staff has participated in several conferences and meetings of our youth, especially the ones that we serve, they have served as speakers to our clubs. They have come and participated in our annual youth conferences. They have prepared tours for our youth to the Capitol, just to name a few things.

We have partnered together on advocacy issues such as redistricting, voter registration, immigrant rights, language rights, and effective bilingual education programs. And the testimony provided by LPRAC staff is invaluable to the legislative decisions that affect our communities.

It's always surprising to me when I see the yearly accomplishments of LPRAC, considering it's limited staff and resources. I believe they accomplish so much because they know how to collaborate with others, and maximize their resources.

I would suggest that any language that is proposed, ensure that LPRAC can continue to be an effective, non-partisan entity whose mandate is to be the institutional voice of the Puerto Rican Latino communities, here at the Capitol. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Are there questions? Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you so much, Mr. Chairman. Welcome, Ms. Maya. A quick question. Since much of your testimony is related to the work that the commission has been able to do also outside of the legislature, working with agencies such as yours, would you mind characterizing for me, perhaps, what you feel is the outside perception by our agencies and leadership, in terms of the quality of the work of the commission?

ALMA MAYA: As far as I'm concerned, and the community I serve, we only have the highest regard for the Latino Puerto Rican Affairs Commission and its staff. And I have to say, whenever I refer anyone, and I refer a lot of people because I get a lot of calls from across the state, asking me for names for commissions and boards, and I always say call the commission.

I give them the names, because I know they have the data bank. And everybody who calls me back, says that they have, you know, gotten the information they needed.

REP. MANTILLA: So, if I may, you would characterize, you know, the work of the commission as rather well respected within the Latino community?

ALMA MAYA: Well respected and very necessary, and that's why we created it in the first place.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you. I appreciate that. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Representative Caruso.

REP. CARUSO: Yes, just very quickly, Alma. I read through what the latest proposal is, which seems to be reporting to the legislature. Is that already being done?

ALMA MAYA: When I was commissioner, we were reporting -- the reports were available to everyone, including the legislature and the outside community, the agencies. It's all public record.

REP. CARUSO: Well, then what's the thought behind doing it? I don't get it.

ALMA MAYA: I really don't understand, myself.

REP. CARUSO: Okay, thank you.

ALMA MAYA: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. Any other questions? Thank you very much, Ms. Maya.

ALMA MAYA: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Bruce Bergstrom, followed by Fernando Muniz.

BRUCE BERGSTROM: Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. My name is Bruce Bergstrom. I am president of the Connecticut Surety Association. Our membership includes insurance companies, insurance agencies, brokers, accounting firms, and law firms. We fully support HB6618, AN ACT CONCERNING PAYMENT BONDS FOR THE PROTECTION OF EMPLOYEES AND MATERIALMEN, and the proposed amendments by the CCIA.

We also recommend and suggest that statute 49-41 include a specific requirement for a performance bond, since in our judgment, a performance bond is no more difficult to get once a contractor is already qualified for a payment bond.

A little history on the Little Miller Act, which is 49-41, the Little Miller Act followed the Federal Miller Act, which was a result of, in the `30s, various -- numerous contractors became insolvent on federal projects, leaving trails of uncompleted jobs and unpaid subcontractors and suppliers.

In 1935, the federal government enacted the Federal Miller Act, and states followed thereafter with the Little Miller acts. The benefits to providing bonds -- for requiring bonds, it protects tax payer dollars, provides a vehicle for payments to subcontractors and suppliers, it promotes fairness in the bidding and awarding process, and also enables municipalities to get the best subcontractor pricing.

In -- with municipalities that waive bonds, that would, in our opinion, increase the risk profile to subcontractors, since they are unable to file a mechanic's lien on a public project, and without the protection of a payment bond for the general contractor, the subcontractors would be encouraged by us to look carefully at the job, and whether they want to bid it, and if they were to bid it, to add an appropriate risk premium to their bids, which would then increase the cost to the taxpayers.

If municipalities do not obtain performance and payment bonds, they open up themselves to questions of impropriety and loss of taxpayer dollars, if a contractor fails. The latest statistics that I have for 2000, the surety industry incurred $84 million dollars of losses on contract bonds, and that was money that would have been borne by taxpayers or subcontractors and suppliers.

And that's after the industry had already pre-qualified these contractors. If the pre-qualification function of the surety industry was removed, that money would be many multiples that would expose taxpayers and subcontractors and suppliers to. And I will entertain any questions.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you for your testimony. Are there any questions from members? Thank you very much. Fernando?

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee. I just want to say I thank you again for coming to Bridgeport. I enjoyed your hearing so much last night, I decided to follow you all up here and offer my testimony. I'm here to testify on raised HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO AFFAIRS COMMISSION.

I think that the language in the bill would add undue burdens to the commission, and may hinder its work in the future. Specifically the language in the bill that calls for detailed reports to the legislature. I think the commission already publishes a public and very detailed annual report, as is required in the mandate.

I would add that the report is widely disseminated, not only to the Governor, but is made available to the legislators. And in fact, is made available through the world wide web to constituents out in the community. Incidentally, I spoke to my mother on the telephone out in the hallway, and she got a copy of the report, because she attended a LPRAC function two years ago.

Any additional reporting other than this, I think would be unduly burdensome. The LPRAC staff is a small staff, and they do an awful lot of work. We use a lot of their data in our own reports and in our own grant writing process at (inaudible) of Connecticut, where I work.

Subsection 5 of the bill calls for an accessible list of prospective appointees who are members of the Latino and Puerto Rican community. I would submit to you that such a list already exists in the form of a database that is maintained by the commission.

The list is updated fairly constantly, and I, myself, have received numerous opportunities to update my contact information with the commission, throughout the past couple of years. The language that I think is most troubling is contained in subsections 4 and 7, where the proposed bill calls for priority in reporting and maintaining a liaison, to be given to members of the General Assembly who represent who represent one or more Latino or Puerto Rican communities.

I think that the language, as it's currently written, is way too vague. I know that (inaudible) is currently working with growing Latino communities in Danbury, New Britain, and Greenwich, in addition to other communities. If that language is kept as it is, it means pretty much any member of the General Assembly.

If the language is meant to include only legislators of Latino descent, I would submit to you that our current Latino legislators represent less than 40% percent of the Latino population in the state. In closing, I would also add that the state's general statutes grant autonomy to the commission, and prevent individual legislators from gaining political favoritism for the commission's work.

If the Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission is to report only to the Latino legislators, then I would ask the members of the committee, is that to mean that the Permanent Commission on the Status of Women is to report only to the female legislators, and to whom shall the Commission on Children report? Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Can I just ask you a question? If there is ambiguity about the reporting mechanism, would you be adverse to a clarification of the language, to make it absolutely clear that the reports come to the legislature?

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Mr. Chairman, I think that --

SEN. DEFRONZO: There seems to be some difference of opinion on this, based on our speakers today.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: I think that, and as the executive director of the commission stated, the reports are already provided to the General Assembly as a matter of courtesy. I'm sure that if language is added that reports should be made to the General Assembly, in addition to the Governor, that's something that's already happening. And I'm not sure that it would add any undue burden to the commission.

My concern is that if the reporting that's required is going to be additional reporting, that it's going to take away time some of the valuable research and advocacy that they're doing on behalf of the community.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I understand that. Any other questions? Representative Caruso.

REP. CARUSO: Fernando, I think the commission does great work. I receive their, you know, information pieces they send me, and I -- you know, frankly, I'm very pleased with, you know, what the legislature had established as an effort to get this commission going, and I think they're doing fine work.

My concern is apparently there's -- and if I could be frank, there seems to be a difference within the Latino community over the commission's functioning and reporting, and things of that sort. What I'm exceptionally nervous about or concerned about is that the Latino community, which is growing and trying to identify leadership, and you know, prospering within this state is going to be divided over this situation.

And I guess my question is has there been an effort by both sides to sit down and try to resolve this issue? It seems to me that it can be, and I was wondering if it has been? I would hate to make this a battle on the floor of the legislature, and only hurt the Latino community in the final analysis of it.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Thank you, Chris. I think it is my understanding that the commission, as we stated, has held several open meetings to discuss its reporting requirements and its annual plan, and I think that you're right. You know, we're a community of 320,000 people. Over the last ten years, the Latino population has grown 50% percent.

It's the fastest growing and youngest segment of the community here in Connecticut, and I would submit to you that I think we all know that 320,000 is an undercount. So, I think for this to be resolved on the floor of the House, is certainly detrimental to the community, and it may be premature to consider the bill in its current language. I think it's too ambiguous.

REP. CARUSO: But that's why I'm wondering. You know, when we fought to clean up the power plants, for example, the Latino Commission was one of the first on board, because the neighbors living near these plants are predominantly Latino. And they were there on those issues, and numerous environmental injustice issues, and so forth.

And I just think their work is tremendous. I guess what I'm saying is rather than the public forum, is there an opportunity for you and the director of the organization, and legislators that are on both sides of this issue, to sit down and try to work something out that could, you know, bring peace to this subject?

Because, again, I really think what we should be doing is moving this commission forward, and helping it grow, and I just don't want to see it turn in to a division within the community that's so important to this state.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Chris, I think there's opportunity. Maybe I should also clarify for the members of the committee, that I am not a commissioner, have never been so. I'm just here on my own interest as somebody who loves to read those reports.

REP. CARUSO: Okay. But maybe you could talk to the other folks.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Absolutely.

REP. CARUSO: Thank you, Fernando.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Thank you, Chris.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you very much. Any other questions? Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. With your indulgence, a little bit more of a comment, just to add, rather than a question, for your information, Fernando, related to the question that my colleague has asked, one of the steps that was taken is that the chairperson of the commission sent out a letter a few weeks ago, asking all five Latino legislators to come and join them at their next scheduled commission meeting.

That meeting happened last Wednesday. An opportunity was given to every legislator to express their concern and opinion on this matter, so really, for the benefit of both sides, to understand that some of those conversations have been attempted to be had, and I certainly see openness for more.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Thank you.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I'm happy about that. If there are no other questions -- I'm sorry, did you have a question, Representative Reinoso? I'm sorry.

REP. REINOSO: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Basically, that was my intention to clarify that the intention was there to see if we can resolve this outside of the House. Unfortunately, and I'm afraid what Representative Caruso is eluding, that this issue may go to the floor, and I don't want to see this division within the Latino community.

But I also have to compliment you for coming to testify, because you are the future. You are one of the leaders in our state, and I have high expectations of you, Fernando, and also the other Latinos in our state. And I thank you for coming. You are witnessing something very important that will probably will create what the future we'll have to face, you know, and the state (inaudible) are trying to work together to unite it. I thank you for coming, again.

FERNANDO MUNIZ: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

SEN. DEFRONZO: (Mike not on).

ANDY SAUER: Good afternoon. My name is Andy Sauer. I'm executive director of Common Cause in Connecticut. I want to thank the co-chairmen and members of the committee for raising this issue. I'm here to testify about HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.

By the way, I was also there yesterday at Bridgeport, and at Common Cause, we're very much about civic involvement, and I counted, as an estimate, 50 to 100 people there. That was wonderful. That was great to see everyone turn out for that, especially on a rainy evening. And I thank you and praise you for scheduling a public meeting at Bridgeport.

I want to -- Common Cause brings up a lot, the concept of public trust. It's echoed in everything we write, everything we do, every press release, every public testimony, and I've submitted testimony that's pretty detailed, and I won't read the testimony word for word.

But I think right now at a time when our country is at war, and our countrymen, our sons, our daughters, our brothers and sisters are there representing our country, the thing we want to know the most is that our government, our leaders are doing this for the right reason. We trust them to make these decisions. That's a sacred trust.

Now, in regards to public financing, that trust -- someone asked me the other day, do you think he's guilty? And I said at that point, it doesn't matter any more. The trust has been violated. There's the appearance of impropriety. And that just gives one more reason for someone to distrust government.

We want to avoid that. We don't want it to ever come up. One of the things we like about public financing for political campaigns is that it removes that element. If there's the appearance of impropriety, and someone says, hey, did you do that because someone gave to your campaign? Hey, wait, no, I'm a Clean Election candidate. He donated just as much as another person did.

It removes that element. And this is what it's about. It's about building up the public trust. Now, public money, I've heard always in relation to public financing for political campaigns, the use of public money, and I appreciate the pressures that are on, especially during these times and these tight budgets.

But, I mean, we use public money to build roads, because we need people to get from one point in the state to another. We use public money to spur economic development because we want our people to have jobs. We use money -- we use public money for public education because we want the people of Connecticut to be intelligent. Why not use public money for an election?

Why not use public money to accentuate public trust? To improve the process? Then people trust their leaders and know that they are operating because they believe they're doing the right thing.

In regards to house bill -- the bill I've been talking about, we like -- we support it very much. In regards to the state senate and the assembly races, we found that it follows the Nebraska plan. We're not -- at Common Cause, we're not in favor of this mode of public financing.

We feel that it removes the -- it doesn't remove special interest from the equation, and that's really our biggest goal, in regards to public financing, in addition to keeping the spiraling costs of an elections out of control. Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Andy. Are there questions? Thank you very much.

ANDY SAUER: Have a good afternoon.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Americo Santiago.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Good afternoon. My name is Americo Santiago, and I am the policy director for Democracy Works, an organization dedicated to inclusive democracy. I would like to take this opportunity just to comment on a few bills. I don't want to repeat too much to what was said before this morning.

We also will be introducing written testimony. We support HB6620, AN ACT CONCERNING IDENTIFICATION OF ELECTORS AT POLLING PLACES. The only concern that we have is in subsection b, to make sure that if the assistant registrar is determining who is the person qualified to vote, we would like for the registrars of voters to make sure that they train the poll workers and assistant registrars in a manner that they don't violate or deny the voting rights for that person.

HB6621, AN ACT CONCERNING THE ELECTION OF REGISTRARS OF VOTERS, for a four year term, we support that. We would also like to say that registrars have a lot of work to do, and sometimes they get in the middle of a campaign, where they should be working to make sure that the elections are run fair, and everybody that's allowed to register to participate in the process.

The rank voting, which is HB6622, AN ACT REQUIRING NEW VOTING EQUIPMENT TO ACCOMMODATE RANKED ORDER VOTING AND CUMULATIVE VOTING, new voting equipment to accommodate rank voting, a lot of testimony was mentioned this morning about the process. We just want to make sure to mention that as we approve new voting equipment, when we buy the equipment, also that the programs and the software that is included as it was mentioned before, is purchased.

We don't want to pass legislation, as the gentleman said this morning, that will have to be revisited, and cost the state extra money to buy new equipment. Also, the HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 2b -- 3a)

AMERICO SANTIAGO: -- sure that the language for the General Assembly candidates reflects the language for statewide office. The mechanism for legislative office will not do away with fundraising, and the limits are too high.

For example, the limits for a state representative is $50,000.00 dollars. And in my last campaign, I only spent about $25,000.00 dollars. We urge you to -- we urge you that the legislative mechanism be revisited. And I know that you have time hopefully to convene a group of people between legislators, advocates, and experts, to come up with a mechanism that is balanced, and is inclusive.

Campaign finance reform in the state of Connecticut is very important. We heard many times how municipal office or candidates for all the positions have violated the system. Let me give you a basic example. When I ran for secretary of the state's office, I was denied the opportunity to run because I did not have enough money, and also because it was difficult to get the delegates.

But I remember that one of the main things that happened was that Joe Ganim wanted to run for governor, and he used his power as the mayor, and his friends, to deny me the opportunity to get access to any funding. So, especially in the state of Bridgeport, I remember when we talked with Chris, that was going on.

I feel disappointed that that took place, but that's why we have to change the system, to allow people, people like me, common people, to be able to run for office at that level of government. Not that I'm planning to, but others will.

On HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION, I shouldn't be here taking my time to do this, because I should be doing other things, but since this bill was proposed, I feel that I have to comment for a few moments. I was the person who worked with Alma Maya, many of you who are here, to make sure that we passed this legislation.

When I asked Miles Rappaport to put a bill together with me, and thanks to Lottie Shapiro, for putting the language together, the intent was because at that time, we had three Latino state representatives, and at that time we had close to 200,000 Latinos, over 200,000 Latinos in the state of Connecticut.

My intent of the bill was not to be a bill that -- legislation that would be only a commission working for Americo Santiago as a state representative, or for a community like Hartford, where we have some representation. I wanted to make sure that this commission was a bipartisan commission that included people appointed by the Governor, by the leadership of the legislature, and also that took in to consideration areas where we had people representing that community that didn't have a full understanding of the needs of the Latino community.

And that's why I worked on that piece of legislation, and that's why it was supported by the Governor, by the republicans, by the democrats, by the leadership, and many people throughout the state of Connecticut who came to testify in favor of that. And many people today say Americo, thank you for that piece of legislation.

Out of that also came the African American Affairs Commission, and because of that, Fernando and the members of the staff of the commission, and the commission have done excellent work in providing information to the legislature, and providing information to the community.

Through public events they have provided a number of pieces of literature that have been very important to all the legislators, who legislate to get assistance. This commission was not to replace the Office of Legislative Research. This commission was not to replace a fiscal analysis, or anything like that.

That's what we, as legislators -- when I was a legislator, I used the Office of Legislative Research, I used the Office of Fiscal Analysis, and many other offices that we have here, to work with us. But I wanted something that could be a supplement to the work that all the legislators and members of the community needed, and that's my intention with the commission.

I think the commission is doing an excellent job, and I think we need to really look at what is the intent of this piece of legislation right now, and I hope that the people who introduced the legislation, the legislators, you members of the committee, and members of the commission, can sit down and work this out, as Representative Caruso said, because in the long term, all we want is to make sure that everybody is represented.

And by just having a bill, and going out to the floor, and people start talking to each other, I don't think we are going to accomplish anything positive.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you, Americo. Are there any questions? Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Americo, for being here. I guess I'm listening to your testimony, and I'm thinking of you as both a former legislator who was very much the creator of the existence of this commission in the first place, but you have also served as a commissioner within the commission in various capacities, is that correct?

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Yes. I served -- when I resigned as a state representative, I became assistant secretary of the state. The Governor appointed me to the group that wasn't the commission at that time, until the commission became effective. When the commission became effective, the majority leader appointed me to the commission.

I served as the treasurer of the commission, I served as secretary and also as a chairperson. I am no longer a member of the commission. I would like to continue not being a member of the commission. We need other people to be part of the commission so the commission can grow.

And when I was there, we invited legislators to come to do presentations to the commission. We invited members of the public. We did a report to the legislature, and we continue to do that. And I was very vigilant that Fernando didn't spend any money to make sure that -- you know, he used to get mad at me and say Americo, why do you look?

I said, I want to make sure that this money is used wisely. I don't say that you're not doing it, but I want to count penny by penny. We thank the people who have worked with us in the past to make sure that we get the funding necessary to continue to do the work. This is a very small commission. We're only five members, five staff people.

REP. MANTILLA: With the indulgence of the chair, one more quick follow up question. I understand, also having served as a commissioner before, the commission has a number of seats for basically commissioners, that are appointed by different appointing authorities.

With the exception of a couple of seats that I know are considered to be for the public at large, I understand that each different position is usually by the legislation that was passed, been targeted to bring to the table different types of expertise within the Latino community. Would you mind speaking to us about that a little bit, and you know, what are some of those categories, and you know, what you feel is the importance of having that kind of diversity on the table?

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Thank you, Representative. I have to thank LCO, when I talked with Lottie Shapiro, and Lottie said Americo, the best way to do it is this way. Bipartisan, make sure that people who are appointed to the commission bring some expertise. And that's why I was appointed by the majority leader, because my expertise was a lot, so I didn't have a specific, you know, expertise.

And it is very important because we wanted to have a bipartisan commission. We wanted to have -- to make sure that there were a number of people there that brought expertise in education, housing, economic development, public safety, the environment, and many other fields.

And that's why in the bill, it specifically said that a number of commissioners should be appointed by the majority leader, all the majority leaders, all the speakers, the president of the Senate, the Governor, but with a specific expertise.

And let me just add to this that what has happened is that a number of legislators, and I'm going to be honest with you, a number of Latino legislators have gone to the speaker or to the Governor's office, or to any office, and say to the leadership, we want you to appoint Miguel, or we want you to appoint Carmen, and so on.

And sometimes it's been done without that person having the expertise that that should be appointed to. And so let me tell you right now, the Latino legislators have more influence over that commission than anybody else, because they are influencing the people that get appointed to that commission, and they are determining who should be appointed without taking in to consideration the expertise of that individual.

I don't say that this is done with good or bad intention, but it's happening right now. And maybe this is something that should be addressed in the future, but I don't think right now is the time to go down to the floor of the House and talk about who is doing what for the commission, in a way that will really deny the opportunity of having this commission for the Latino community, as well as for the public at large.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Thank you. If no other questions, than thank you for your testimony, Americo.

AMERICO SANTIAGO: Thank you, honorable chair.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Let's move on to Marilyn Diaz.

MARILYN DIAZ: I'm obviously not Marilyn Diaz. I've been asked to read her testimony on her behalf. She had to leave. So, I'm just going to read it verbatim. Testimony of Marilyn Diaz, esquire president of Connecticut Hispanic Bar Association, and it says that it's a statement in support of the Commission on Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs, and against HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION.

I am here as the president of the Connecticut Hispanic Bar -- if she was here -- Association, CHBA, to share with you how much we value the Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission. Contributions to the Hispanic community of this state, goal that we mutually share, and continue to collaborate on.

To this end, I also take this opportunity to oppose HB6657, which however well intentioned, serves to deprive LPRAC of its apolitical autonomy, and subject it to continued attacks at a time when its elimination is a topic of discussion by the legislature.

By way of introduction, let me quickly tell you who we are. CHBA is a statewide organization with a membership of over 200, which includes lawyers and states and federal judges across the state. Our mission includes serving the public interests, by cultivating the science of juris prudence promoting -- I'm sorry, promoting reform in the law, facilitating an administration of justice, advancing the standing of the legal profession, and preserving the highest standards (inaudible) honor and professional courtesy in our profession.

LPRAC has served as an important partner of CHBA by supporting our goals, serving as a valuable source of information, as an effective liaison for the legislature, and community as a whole. Last Thursday I found myself, on behalf of CHBA, giving testimony to the Appropriations Committee in support of continued funding for LPRAC.

I shared with members of that committee a few examples of the very public and invaluable accomplishments of LPRAC. I highlighted the fact that their presence has served to leverage very scarce funding by documenting existing needs in the community. And a subject that is very near and dear to CHBA, the LPRAC support was instrumental in convincing the legislature to insure that the court interpreters receive appropriate training.

We have turned to them again for support in our quest to increase the number of court interpreters within the Connecticut judicial system, to address the injustice against citizens that are unable to access our state's legal system simply because of their language barriers.

LPRAC has also served to the forum for the professional networking at the Latino Summit. It has also nurtured our future leaders by providing appointment opportunities. LPRAC has demonstrated its leadership skills in tackling many and varied issues, including housing, voter registration, health campaign finance reform.

While I know that you are aware of these accomplishments, let me assure you that the beneficiaries of these efforts, including CHBA, have certainly felt their positive effects. Having said all of that, I must address our concern regarding the effect of HB6657.

The purported purpose of this bill is twofold, to increase reporting requirements and the revised duties of the commission. As to the reporting requirements, I fail to see the need for legislative action in light of the fact that the very public efforts of LPRAC, as cited above, are readily highlighted in its annual report, and through ongoing communications to the legislature.

Of more concern is the language of the bill that calls for maintaining a liaison relationship, with priority given to members of the General Assembly that represent one or more Latino or Puerto Rican communities, and goes on to insert itself in the establishment on the annual plan.

This language serves to diminish the role of the LPRAC as a political entity that can represent Hispanic citizens of this state. When this legislature took action to create this commission, it wisely put in place mechanisms to insure that it was representative of a variety of areas of the expertise, with the input of all political parties.

To enact this bill serves to devalue the role of the commissioners as appointed by the Governor and the legislature. To enact this bill sets in motion a very slippery slope that subjects LPRAC to political whims that would lessen its impartiality and effectiveness.

At a time when some of us -- some are considering the possible elimination of LPRAC, this bill could only -- I'm sorry. I lost my place in this testimony -- elimination of LPRAC, this bill could only serve as fodder to those who would ask why the commission should exist at all in the community. The key is that there are too few of us. We need to focus on our efforts in increasing the presence of LPRAC as an apolitical entity that is currently is and can assist in this effort.

I respectfully ask that you vote against HB6657, and let LPRAC continue to do its work. Thank you for your time and the opportunity to present this testimony. Thank you also for all your hard work, and the many times that it goes unnoticed. Please know that CHBA is readily available to address any other specific questions or concerns that you may have. Respectfully submitted, Marilyn Diaz. And I guess I can take down any questions that you have, and pass them on to -- no? Okay, great.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you. Thanks for reading the testimony. I'm having a hard time reading these names. Rojos Schwan? Is there a Rojos? Mr. or Ms. Rojos Schwan?

: (Mike not on).

REP. O'ROURKE: How about -- is it Louise Gonzalez? Mike DeRosa, the Green Party, you're here.

MIKE DEROSA: I want to thank both Representative O'Rourke and Senator DeFronzo, and all of the people on the committee for giving me an opportunity to speak today. We have three bills that we have submitted, and what I mean by we is VOTER, Voter Opportunity Through Election Reform.

It's a coalition of four parties, libertarians, greens, reform party, and concerned citizens. I'm also the co-chair of the Green Party. And the real issue on these three bills is access and fairness. You know, all parties are equal, but some parties are more equal than others.

And I think the point is that we want a level -- a playing level field for all parties, and I think these bills will allow that to happen by allowing access to the ballot, and more importantly, have a form of permanent ballot access status for minor parties.

I'm going to get right to the point here. On one of the bills we have a little bit of a concern here, and that bill is HB6087, AN ACT CONCERNING THE DEFINITION OF A "MINOR PARTY", and the concern that we have here is when this was written, we assumed that there would be ex-post facto common law applied to it so that the bill basically allows two more ways in which folks can get on the ballot permanently.

And that is if they get 1% percent of the vote for governor, that would give them permanent ballot access status, or 1% percent of the registered voters or registering in a party. So, if the Green Party got 1% percent of all the people who are registered in any party in Connecticut, they would get automatic permanent ballot access status.

And what we'd like to do is to leave the old provision in as an additive, rather than to remove that, because what will happen, and according to what we've heard is that our many victories over the last couple of years will be eliminated by this bill. Now, we're not sure about that, but we've gotten some sort of a legal determination, or at least a rumor of a legal determination that that would be the case.

So, either that the past victories have to be grand-fathered in so that people who have legitimately operated under the old law do not lose their permanent ballot access status. I don't think that would be a fair way to do it. Replace it with this or make it an additive function so that you would have three kinds of ways that you could get permanent ballot access status.

If you won an election, you got 1% percent of the vote, you would have automatic ballot access status. Two, you would run somebody for governor, get 1% percent of the vote, and then you would get permanent ballot access status for four years, or you would go out and petition and get people to be registered in your party, and they would basically be 1% percent of the people who voted for -- people who registered in that party. So, that's one of the bills.

The other bill that we are supporting, both the coalition and the Green Party, is HB6099, AN ACT CONCERNING THE EFFECT OF REDISTRICTING ON BALLOT ACCESS. In 2000, I got 11% percent of the vote for state Senate. In 2002, I find out that I do not have ballot access status, even though I got 11% percent of the vote.

So, I inquired with the secretary of state. They said, well, section 9 -- let's see, I guess it's 9-380 says that under the provisions of the election law, the first district disappeared, and what happened was that I had to repetition because it was a brand new office because of the redistricting.

I think this is spurious. I don't think that's the case, and this will clarify that in very specific language. Lastly is HB5828, AN ACT CONCERNING THE THRESHOLD FOR MINOR PARTY STATUS AND THE SIGNATURE REQUIREMENT FOR BALLOT ACCESS FOR PETITIONING PARTIES, which would reduce the number of signature from 1% percent to get on the ballot, to one half of 1% percent.

The reason I think we need to do this is on a local level, it's not a big issue, but when you get in to the congressional area, or you get in to larger offices, 1% percent is a difficult number to come up with, especially if you're running four or five or six people.

Also, every political monopoly that has ever come in to existence, has come in to existence under the banner down with political monopoly. And I think that the future of politics in this country should take in to consideration the fact that we are constantly having to revisit democratic procedures to make sure that they represent all of the people, and that they represent all of the people well.

And being able to get on the ballot and stay on the ballot is a fundamental concept in any democratic country in the world right now, and I think that we need to put that right up there here in Connecticut, because to be quite frank with you, Connecticut has been one of the few states in the union that refuses to change their election law, in terms of the times or in terms of other needs.

And I've heard this from many, many people across the state and across the country. So, it's time to have these kinds of reforms. We're hoping to work with the secretary of state's office. We're supposed to be having some meetings in the future, but we have other issues that we're concerned about.

The Green Party definitely supports HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY campaign finance law. We have a few reservations on a few of the items there. Instant runoff voting, HB6622, AN ACT REQUIRING NEW VOTING EQUIPMENT TO ACCOMMODATE RANKED ORDER VOTING AND CUMULATIVE VOTING, is an excellent idea, and we would support that bill, as far as the Green Party is concerned.

And ultimately, you know, the process that we put on the table for the voters is going to make a big difference, and we feel that the Green Party and parties like the Green Party want to get in to the political process. We want to be legal. We want to be able to have a permanent ballot access status system, and we feel that there should not be barriers to people participating in the political process, in terms of running for office.

I mean, if you look at all the states around us, if someone wants to run somebody for president in Rhode Island, in Maine, in New Hampshire, in Vermont, or in New Jersey, you collect between 800 and 1,000 signatures. Here, 1% percent means you really have to go out and collect, realistically, about 8,000 signatures to get a presidential candidate on the ballot.

Now, we're hoping this law will be moot for us because we're the fastest growing party in Connecticut. We've elected three people, and I think in the next coming election we're going to elect another four or five, and some day, somebody is actually going to be sitting on that side of the table, and they're going to have Green Party attached to them.

But right now, we are faced with the reality that is very difficult for many people to spend money and resources to get on the ballot, and then to run for office. So, I think whatever we can do to provide for making that process easier, fairer, juster, I think we ought to do it. And I'm open to any questions, in terms of anything that I've said.

REP. O'ROURKE: Good testimony, Mike. You should consider going in to politics.

MIKE DEROSA: Well, I already have. (Laughter). But I definitely won't come and vote -- run in your district, okay? I guarantee it.

REP. O'ROURKE: Questions for Mr. DeRosa?

MIKE DEROSA: Middletown and Glastonbury is not where I live.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative Caruso.

REP. CARUSO: Hi, Mike. Do you guys have -- does the Green Party right now have access to the ballot? Did they get the 1% percent?

MIKE DEROSA: Well, I have ballot access in the 1^st district in state Senate. In the 1^st district for state Senate. We have several people. Elizabeth Orton-Sheff has ballot access status. Joyce Chen and John Haley in New Haven have ballot access status. So, we think that ought to remain, because I'll tell you why, because you know, I'm not only just speaking here for the Green Party.

There's a lot of small parties that exist in cities or geographic areas. And they don't really want to run somebody for governor, or they don't want to go out and collect 5,000 signatures to have, you know, ballot access status by registering people. Or -- so I think to eliminate the idea that if you run for office and you get 1% percent, you get automatic ballot access status, I think that should be kept in the law.

And I think you should allow it, because what I see happening is that this is a maturing of these political parties, and as they become more mature, they're demanding, as it were, permanent ballot access status, so that they don't have to go through the petitioning process.

And, I mean, under the Equal Rights provision of the U.S. Constitution, I think it makes sense that, you know, minor party provisions should reflect what goes on in the major party provisions. And I think also, from a simple logical point of view, it makes sense to encourage more people to participate in the process.

So, I think that -- even independents who run, I mean, I think we ought to reduce the number of signatures to one half of 1% percent, because I think independent candidacies bring in new ideas, they bring new approaches, they bring in new people in to the political process, the inject enthusiasm and energy in to the process.

And I think that's what we need. I thin people are very cynical about politics. They feel very defeated when they go in to the voting booth, because they can't vote for what they want. And I think we ought to give them what they want, which is choice, and I think ultimately, change.

Now, that's really up to this body to figure out what change means, but I think that in terms of running for office, you should have the keys to open the door. And then what happens after that is really up to the political parties or the individuals who are running.

So, I'm arguing for openness, and I think we ought to have other issues put on the table, like registrar of voters. Minor parties should have an opportunity to have some sort of registration system, whether it's paid or not paid. I think we also ought to talk about IRV, instant runoff voting.

I think we ought to talk about cumulative voting. These are all approaches which open up the system, and if there's a specific town or city in this state that wants to use that kind of mechanism, they should be able to legally do so.

REP. O'ROURKE: I happen to agree with your comments. Just one final comment, Mike -- question. For the governor's position, to gain access, you want to bring the number from 1% percent to a half of 1% percent?

MIKE DEROSA: No. Under what this law -- how this law is written, it would be three ways that you could get permanent ballot access status. You run in a district and you get 1% percent of the vote, so you get automatic ballot access.

REP. O'ROURKE: And you want that to stay?

MIKE DEROSA: The second way would be to run somebody for governor, and get 1% percent of the vote. That would give you permanent ballot access status for four years. Or, go and collect and register people in your party to the level of 1% percent of the people who are registered in all parties.

So, there's three choices, three ways that -- two of them could give permanent ballot access status to parties, the first one would give permanent ballot access to an individual, to a minor party, to a regional party, or whatever.

So, I think the idea would be to change this particular bill, and make HB6087 reflect three choices by which you could get on the ballot permanently.

REP. O'ROURKE: But of those three choices, the one that you're referring to about going out there and getting signatures for the governor's position --

MIKE DEROSA: Well, yeah, you'd get on the ballot, you'd run somebody, they get 1% percent of the vote, then for four years, that party does not have to petition. And by the way, this is going to save a lot of money for the town clerks. This is a draconian task to go around and collect the signatures, but it's a heck of a lot worse for the people who have to check all of these names and process them.

And, you know, I think that it's really a question of saving money and time not only for the town clerks, but also for the political system. They can spend their time doing more important things.

REP. O'ROURKE: I don't disagree with any of that. Let me just -- that one question I'm trying to get answered.

MIKE DEROSA: Right.

REP. O'ROURKE: In the part there, Mike, that deals with the Governor.

MIKE DEROSA: Right.

REP. O'ROURKE: Running someone for governor, and getting 1% percent. Are you saying that that 1% percent should be reduced to a half of 1% percent?

MIKE DEROSA: No. No.

REP. O'ROURKE: Okay.

MIKE DEROSA: I mean, if you want to, it's fine with me, but -- I mean, I would be in favor of it, but the one half of 1% percent really deals with independent candidacy. Someone going out there and saying I want to run for Office X. How do I do it? I have to get a petition. What do I have to do? Collect 1% percent of the registered voters in my district.

And my position is that that's not a big problem for me on a local level, but when you get in to the area of running for Congress or running people for office, for state office, it becomes a very difficult process. And it involves a lot of checking, it involves a lot of follow through.

I means that it's more than 1% percent. Realistically, it's more like 2% percent because I can tell you my numbers, I went door to door to collect signatures, and in Hartford, 25% percent of the -- 28% percent of the names were thrown off, and in Wethersfield, 25% percent were thrown off.

And I asked every single one of those persons, each of those people, are you a registered voter? And in many cases, they don't know if they're registered, or they think they're registered, or whatever. So, you know, just from -- and I was doing it very strictly, and door to door, you know?

But I mean, when you go out to shopping malls and try to collect signatures to get on the ballot, the number of signatures that you have to get doubles from the one that's required. And like I said, it does not reflect the states around us, and I think that nationally it doesn't reflect what's going on in other states.

So, I would just say that it's really important for this committee to, in the 21^st century, to lead the way, and I'm hoping that the secretary of states office will lead also.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative McCluskey?

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Thank you. I just have a question, Mike. I believe in the state of New York, in addition to the republican and democratic party, there's a Right to Life, Working Families, Conservative Party, all have ballot lines, and up until recently, the Liberal Party. Did any of those four parties ever seat a person for the New York General Assembly? Did any of them have a seat in either the Senate or the General Assembly?

MIKE DEROSA: In New York?

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Yes, in recent --

MIKE DEROSA: Oh, the Conservative Party has people in there, and the Liberal Party --

REP. MCCLUSKEY: No. That are run exclusively on the conservative line? They can cross-endorse.

MIKE DEROSA: I believe there's been a couple. I mean, over the years?

REP. MCCLUSKEY: No, but in recent memory? To my knowledge --

MIKE DEROSA: I don't know. I used to be a member of the Liberal Party. I know they elected people there.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Okay. Because I think to your question about, you know, third parties maturing in to major parties, in all of those four cases I don't believe any of them have ever, at least in recent memory -- I think the only one that I can think of is perhaps a unique circumstance with Jacob Javitz in a three way. Other than that, I'm not aware of any.

MIKE DEROSA: Well, we've elected a state rep in Maine, and he ran as a Clean candidate, by the way. And we have elected over 187 officials throughout the country, so, I mean, I think that's an impressive record. Now, I will admit to you that many of them on the lower level, but I think the point is sooner or later, you're going to have to deal with this here or in court. And I think fundamentally that's what it's going to come down to.

Our position is really clear. We feel we want to be part of the process, and we want to be legal, and we want to be involved in the political struggles that go on here. And my view on it is, you know, electing people is only one aspect of the political process.

You know, democracy has to be lived every day, and I think that, you know, electing people is fine, but in many cases the atmosphere in which decisions are made is more important than who is actually got elected. So, I think it's fundamentally based on a lot of other factors.

I don't think the political process in this country is simply a question of electing people and having them do what you want them to do, because oft times, you elect them and they do something different. So, my question to you is I think it's really important to have people in that process asking questions, raising issues, lighting a fire under certain people's feet, and making things happen. To me, that's what the political process is about.

And in Europe, this is common knowledge. This is something that everyone does, and I'm saying we necessarily have to go to the European model, but I didn't know there was a, you know, a violation of our constitution by having third parties represented. And if you look at the history of the United States, the Republican Party was once a third party.

So, I mean, historically, things do change. And looking at the way this country is going, I think third parties are going to play a much more significant role in the next 15 to 20 years. More like two years.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: I just have one follow up. How many registered Green Party people are there in the city of Hartford?

MIKE DEROSA: In the city of Hartford? I couldn't really tell you, but I can tell you one thing --

REP. MCCLUSKEY: More or less than 1,000?

MIKE DEROSA: It's less than 1,000.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Thank you.

MIKE DEROSA: Alright. We have about 5,000 people on our mailing list, and I think it would be an incentive -- if we knew we could get ballot access status, it would be an incentive to us to be able to go around and get those people registered as Greens.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mike.

MIKE DEROSA: I appreciate your time. Thank you very much.

REP. O'ROURKE: Dawn Lincoln? Good afternoon, Dawn.

DAWN LINCOLN: Good afternoon. Thank you, Representative O'Rourke, and members of the committee. My name is Dawn Lincoln, and I am the vice chair of the Libertarian Party of Connecticut, as well as a member of the VOTER group that Mike just referred to, Voter Opportunity for Election Reform.

And I'm here in support of HB6087, AN ACT CONCERNING THE DEFINITION OF A "MINOR PARTY", and HB6099, AN ACT CONCERNING THE EFFECT OF REDISTRICTING ON BALLOT ACCESS. The intention of these bills is to increase accessibility to the ballot by reducing the burdensome and overly restrictive barriers prohibiting reasonable access to the ballot for all minor party and independent candidates.

HB6087, an act concerning the definition of a "minor pary", will being the definition of a minor party in to alignment with the current definition of a major party. Connecticut is the only state which gives candidates who -- where candidates earn minor party status on an office by office basis.

Major party status is given across the board by obtaining 20% percent of the vote for governor in the last election or having 20% percent of the enrolled members of all political parties. If a major party candidate receives less than 20% percent of the vote for governor, they still maintain ballot access for the other offices.

If you -- even when a major party doesn't run a candidate at all for an office, you still maintain your ballot access, where if a minor party, if you don't run for the office, you lose it, and have to repetition and go through that whole process again, starting over from scratch.

This practice appears to be a little bit discriminatory in nature to me, kind of giving special treatment to major parties over minor parties. And I also agree with what Mike said before, about maintaining our current process of getting on the ballot and staying on the ballot on an office by office basis. Not every party, or especially independent candidates are going to be able to run a candidate for governor at this point. The discrepancy here will be resolved with the passage of this bill, HB6087.

HB6099, an act concerning the effect of redistricting on ballot access, will allow the retention of minor party status when redistricting occurs. Under the current system, when a minor party candidate receives at least 1% percent of the vote, they earn ballot access for the next election for that one office.

That is unless redistricting has occurred. The secretary of states interpretation of section 9-380, regarding newly created offices, has included all offices for which a district has changed in any way. It's obvious to me that the fixed numbers of, say, the House of Representatives and the Senate are not newly created offices just because redistricting has occurred.

Support shown in the past for the candidate should be honored, not thrown away, and this bill would help clarify that interpretation. As representatives of the citizens of the state of Connecticut, I ask you to allow the diverse needs and desires of your constituents to be clearly heard through the removal of some of these cumbersome, restrictive, and politically discriminatory laws.

They deserve more choices when they enter the voting booth. We know that voter apathy is a huge problem. If you give them more choice, I'm sure that participation in the political process would increase. Many people see no reason to even bother voting.

Now, I know that bills should always be viewed from an appropriations perspective, so these bills would both offer a cost reduction to the secretary of states office, and the individual towns, because I'm sure it's quite burdensome on them to verify all of those signatures.

And when Mike had mentioned the number of signatures that you need to collect to get on the ballot for governor, say, by statute it's 7,500 ballot signatures, so -- I think he mentioned maybe you need 8,000. In effect, you really need to get about 12,000 signatures.

So, for the towns to be verifying all of those signatures, and the secretary of state to be collating those, it's a very time consuming process. And thank you for allowing me to testify today.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Dawn. I just want to clarify. You said Connecticut was the only state that requires minor party candidates to re-qualify each time? Is that what you said?

DAWN LINCOLN: Connecticut is the only state that you earn minor party status on an office by office basis. We have no process to earn minor party status across the board. Every other state, you earn minor party status by meeting some set of criteria, and then you're a minor party across the board, but Connecticut is the only state that it's only conferred on an office by office basis.

REP. O'ROURKE: So, let me just try and understand this. The other states, if one person on the Green Party ticket or Libertarian Party ticket earns the right to be on the ballot next time, the rest of them are automatically on it?

DAWN LINCOLN: It depends on what it is. It could be some percentage for governor, or they might -- some states it's not even a percentage of vote. It could be how -- that the parties, some states have something like if you're just an organized party and you have, you know, a state system set up, or you're organizing so many towns, or how much vote you received in the last presidential election. Something to that effect.

So, if you hit the threshold there, at that higher level, then the party qualifies across the board as a minor party. I have a document here that I can leave, if you want, that shows what the -- how it is for the different states, to gain ballot access.

REP. O'ROURKE: Isn't that more or less how it works here? Didn't Governor Weicker's party get the top line when he became governor, and kept it throughout the four years?

DAWN LINCOLN: I think that's because he received over 20% percent of the vote, which qualified as a major party.

REP. O'ROURKE: But isn't that what you just said? That some other states if you hit a threshold at the top of the ticket, the rest of the line gets to automatically qualify?

DAWN LINCOLN: Right. I'm sorry. I thought you meant for Connecticut. But other states, yeah, every other state has a threshold that you meet, and to get across the board access for a minor party.

REP. O'ROURKE: Which we have 20% percent threshold for governor it would automatically qualify?

DAWN LINCOLN: That's for a major party. Right, 20% percent for governor, you qualify as a major party. And then you get across the board access. So, major parties get across the board, but minor parties don't.

REP. O'ROURKE: You become major by being a minor party that gets 20% percent, for reaching a threshold.

DAWN LINCOLN: Twenty percent.

REP. O'ROURKE: Are you just saying that the other states have a much lower threshold than 20% percent, is that --

DAWN LINCOLN: They have a different threshold from what I understand, between major party and minor party.

REP. O'ROURKE: Okay, maybe we'll do some more research. I'm thinking that in at least a Connecticut party, they were a minor party that, by virtue of being successful under our statutes, became a major party, but --

DAWN LINCOLN: Right. But that's an awfully high threshold to attain, 20% percent. And say that any -- you know, there's obviously support for minor parties that -- lower than 20% percent threshold. That's rather difficult to attain.

REP. O'ROURKE: Okay, I think I understand.

DAWN LINCOLN: Okay.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative Caruso.

REP. CARUSO: I want to thank you and Mike for coming up. I -- it always troubles me that you folks have to come up and almost, you know, beg to become part of the process that everyone should be allowed to enter without all these barriers. Be that as it may, though, has the Libertarians considered legal action in the past, or have you pursued it in the past?

DAWN LINCOLN: I don't think it's been pursued. It's been tossed around at meetings here and there, but we're trying to take this route first, legislatively, and hopefully we can get reasonable access to the ballot, that would resolve the issues. I mean -- and if not, I guess we might have to resort to legal -- if we had to, but --

REP. CARUSO: The only reason I ask is the same thing with the direct primary, and the whole fight for that, and I think it's, you know, it's a colossal waste of people's time, and it would be better to put people in to the process. They can contribute more. But thank you.

DAWN LINCOLN: Right. Which is a major part of this, for us, is the waste of time we have. We're petitioning and just trying to just get on the ballot. That expends most of our time, energy and money, just trying to get on to the ballot, and that's not what we're really trying to do. You want to get your message out to people and be part of the process, and everything is wasted no getting on the ballot.

REP. CARUSO: Yeah, and as well, we trust the voter, that you get on the ballot, and then you let the voter make that decision. Thank you.

DAWN LINCOLN: Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Dawn. And next up is -- if I can say this right, Fred Pote? And Fred will be followed by Mark Towers.

FRED POTE: Not a lot of people do it that well. That was good. Well, first of all, thank you for this long day in hearing me. My name is Fred Pote. I work for SNET. I've been there 33 years, and I represent network. I was a technician, I was a supervisor, and now I'm a manager.

I know the network quite well, and just to go back on some testimony that we heard this morning, before I read -- by the way, you do have this written testimony. There's a misconception, apparently, about when we build buildings. Everything we do in the building that's not networked is done by electrical contractors, bar none.

I mean, elevators, lights, air conditioning, it's all done by electrical contractors. So, that's not the issue. The issue, as I understand it, is our network. And our network is the wires, the poles, on to the customer's property, in to the office, underground, within that central office, the switching point, that's what the issue is with this bill, okay?

So, anyway, to make a long story short, I do represent SNET, and we do oppose HB6658, AN ACT CONCERNING EXEMPTIONS FROM CERTAIN CONTRACTOR LICENSING REQUIREMENTS. The stated purpose of the bill was to clarify the licensing exemptions for workers who perform work on electrical transmission distribution lines.

This bill, however, does not simply clarify it, although it would significantly change the way the requirements that have been for 25 years. It would require licensing for the contractors who have not had that requirement before. It would also be very costly to the state, and us, and the administration would be -- it's done by the DPUC today, and that's why we are exempt.

One of the problems is we work with low voltage in our transmission lines in the central office and on the wires out to the house. We don't work with the high voltage. And I described that network to you briefly. We come under the DPUC control. We are regulated by all of the work we do there.

And everything that requires electrical contractors, we use them. But when we touch our network, we don't. We're not required by law to do that, at this point. Since you have this, I'm not going to read this word for word, but it would be putting another layer of bureaucracy where you really don't need it, because we have that with the DPUC.

And it exempts contractors like who do the work on the electrical line work. If they work with high voltage, they're exempt. And we work on the low voltage, and this would take our exemption away. If I can entertain any questions?

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mr. Pote. Let's walk through this bill with you for a minute. The bill requires --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 3a - 3b).

FRED POTE: -- actually do that. We don't -- I mean, it's always been done, and always will be done. If we're talking about the building work, you know, the lights, the power, elevators, that kind of work, it's always done by electrical contractors.

REP. O'ROURKE: But this bill deals with telephone lines?

FRED POTE: Right. You know, the work electrical line or, apparently, that's where there's a problem. We have always done this work, and have always been exempt when we do electrical line work. What I'm trying to describe is that the network that we have, it is the network and not the building. The network goes right out to the house, over the wires, underground, in to the switching center, and it continues, in to the infrastructure of the switching centers.

That, we have always been exempt from that, and the contractors we use are manufacturers of the equipment that we install. But when it comes to the electrical work, it's done by electricians. So, I just think there's confusion, based on what I heard this morning, and based on the other testimony, I think other people feel the same way.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative Adinolfi.

REP. ADINOLFI: Would it be better instead of referring to this as electrical lines, to call them signal lines or data lines, and maybe people would understand it better? That it's really not electrical power you're dealing with. You're dealing with signals.

FRED POTE: Right. We're dealing with signals, but more importantly, I think we're dealing with a telephone network, yeah, and under the DPUC regulations, we're very well scrutinized and looked at and measured every which way there is.

And we have, actually, a very long history of not having public service issues. There's no safety issues. I mean, I've been there for 33 years, and this has never been an issue. And I think that there's some kind of misunderstanding, based on what I heard today.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative Spallone.

REP. SPALLONE: Good afternoon, sir. Earlier today -- were you here this morning when a gentleman from the electrical workers was here?

FRED POTE: Yes, I was.

REP. SPALLONE: And my understanding of his testimony was that he and his organization were concerned that somehow the use of the word emergency in the current law was being over-stretched, so that people who weren't licensed were being pressed in to service when there wasn't an actual emergency. And I was wondering if you could comment directly to that testimony? I hope I characterized it correctly.

FRED POTE: I think I understand. I personally know of no emergencies that happen on a day by day basis that we call people in. There would be natural disasters, hurricanes, and that kind of thing, and we wouldn't have enough people in the state of Connecticut, to licensed people, if we have to have licensed electricians, to do the work that we normally do.

The contractors we use are trained, years and years of training, to do the work that they do. It's not electrical work, it's telephone work, on a telephone network. There is a big difference in the distinction, I think.

REP. SPALLONE: So, it's not your feeling that the word emergency within the current law is being over-stretched?

FRED POTE: Not in SNET, no. I could give you an example of back in '89, there was an emergency within the switching network in Stamford, and they called in people from all over the country. And at that time, it was Western Electric. And every one of them was the manufacturer's -- you know, they were our contractor, and they -- it was their network that they installed.

But more importantly, it's a telephone network. And emergency just means, you know -- it doesn't mask anything for electrical contracting.

REP. SPALLONE: Okay. Well, thank you very much for that response, and thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mr. Pote.

FRED POTE: Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Next up, Mark Powers, to be followed by Bessie Raina.

MARK POWERS: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, members of the GAE Committee. I appreciate the opportunity to be here. My name is Mark Powers. I'm with Levin, Powers, Brennan, and Shea. We represent the New England Cable and Telecommunications Association, also known as NECTA, which is turn represents all but one of the state of Connecticut's cable companies, and the vast majority of the companies in the other five New England states, and I have submitted some written testimony.

I'd like to just give you a brief overview. I suppose I could save everybody's time by just saying that I agree with SNET's testimony and the response, which doesn't always happen, but nevertheless, I do agree with what -- the testimony of the previous person from SNET, and, you know, I think he made reasonable points as to, with the greatest respect, that why this legislation should not go forward.

We think -- NECTA believes that the existing current statute has indeed worked well. I'm not aware of any problems that do exist. Currently, the work of someone who is employed by a contractor of a cable company, which is what this -- at least what the proposed changes in the legislation are referring to, is regulated by the DPUC, and frankly, by the FCC, also.

And the cable company is responsible for any problems that do occur. And as I say, I'm not aware of any problems. In particular, and most importantly, I think, any safety issues. I did not -- the proponent, I don't recall any specific concerns expressed about specific safety issues.

So, I think it's also important to emphasize that this proposal would take away the licensing exemption of public utilities, such as cable, that work only with low voltage wiring, which is referred to as electrical lines, which goes to Representative Adinolfi's point, that it might be a little confusing there.

But, nevertheless, it's -- if there's any voltage involved at all, it's strictly low voltage. And what the proposal continues to do is it allows -- remain contractors, employees of contractors who do work with high voltage lines. So, if there's a question of safety, I would submit that the concern would be better placed with high voltage, versus low, if any, voltage.

Again, I'm not aware of any safety issues. Frankly, if the legislation were to pass, the cable industry has some deep concerns about the ability to hire people to do the work. The impact that it would have on the cable industry's attempts to service customers as quickly as possible, either with just basic cable service or the high speed internet, which is so popular these days.

So, I would, on behalf of the New England Cable Television Association, would just respectfully submit that the legislation is not necessary. We don't see a problem with it, and would urge its rejection.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you. Any questions for Mark, from members? If not, thanks for your testimony.

MARK POWERS: Thank you, again.

REP. O'ROURKE: Next up, is Bessie Raina here? No. Hilda Santana? Hilda. She'll be followed by Carmen Sierra. Hello.

HILDA SANTANA: Good afternoon, Chairman O'Rourke and committee members. My name is Hilda Santana. I'm a former state of Connecticut legislative intern, and I'm a graduate of the Women's Campaign School at Yale. I'm pursuing a graduate degree in the areas of economics, public policy, and communications.

I have reviewed and analyzed the proposed bill HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION. I'm here in support of this house bill. Latinos have become and are continuing to be the fastest growing voter block, a key role in elections to come. As the Latino vote continues to mobilize, it is imperative, and especially necessary that legislative agents understand, engage, and act in dialogue that raises issues of concern to the Latino voters, bringing forth agendas that create platforms for legislative action on Latino concerns.

The Latino and Puerto Affairs Commission is a vehicle whose charge has included reviewing, commenting, and reporting on proposed state legislation that would affect the Latino and Puerto Rican communities throughout the state. In the commission's report, Latinos and Puerto Ricans Socio-Economic Study Findings, the commission stated that the study was very important, serving as a blueprint from which to develop public policy that would be brought before the legislature on behalf of our communities.

Listening to the various testimonies that have been given throughout the say, it seems that there are various misconceptions with regards to the proposed law. I have read the proposed house bill. It does not discuss elimination of the commission, nor changing of its charge. What it does propose is to enhance and strengthen the very process that the study describes as one of its charges, to report on proposed legislation.

This bill will open up an increased line of communication, building stronger legislative partnership between legislators that service Latino and Puerto Rican communities, and the commission, which is the vehicle used to present reports and agendas that affect these said communities throughout the state, to the governor of Connecticut.

Although the commission is resistant to working in this capacity with the members of the General Assembly, this bill will serve the purpose of establishing an annual plan of short and long term initiatives based on the needs of Latino and Puerto Rican communities. And will insure that the concerns of the Puerto Rican and Latino communities described in these reports, and prepared by the commission, are viewed not only by the governor of the state, but also are being accessible and viewed by the General Assembly.

This commission -- this house bill that has been proposed in no way attempts to disband the commission or take away any of its charges, as has been dictated in the law. There seems to be a confusion in terms to bringing about the partnership of the General Assembly, stating that this will hurt the Latino communities. I don't see where that will happen.

This will only strengthen the voice that comes from the communities, and is filtered down through the commission, and brought forward to the same legislators who will propose enactment of laws that will help the communities not only now, but in issues that are fastly coming upon us.

I thank you very much for the opportunity of speaking here before you. I encourage you to support this bill. The fact that the commission reports to the Assembly as a matter of courtesy, this bill would insure that this is not just a matter of courtesy, but something that is governed, and the issues of this bill do not hurt the Latino community.

As far as a talent bank, I personally submitted my resume to the commission. I have yet to hear. I know that I spoke personally with the director, Mr. Betancourt, asking for an opportunity to intern at the commission as a volunteer, to work on public policy. This has not been afforded to me, and the bill does not question the roles of the commission.

And I am concerned with the testimony that Mr. Santiago gave, regarding biased appointment of commissioners. If this is the case, then even more so, the lines of communication must be opened to the General Assembly, to make sure that biased legislation is not being purported. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Hilda, nice job on your testimony. Any questions for Hilda? If not, thank you very much. I'm glad to see that our former legislative interns are staying involved. That's good.

HILDA SANTANA: Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Next up, Carmen Sierra. Carmen will be followed by Frank Sallas.

CARMEN SIERRA: Mr. Chairman, members, thank you very much for this opportunity. My name is Carmen Sierra, and I'm the executive director of CAUSA, which stands Connecticut Association for United Spanish Action. It's the largest coalition in Connecticut, of CBOs that serve the Latino community.

And I'm here to also testify on the bill HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION. First of all, for the record, I would like to state that on behalf of the Hispanic agency, including myself, we strongly support the Latino Puerto Rican Commission, and we definitely would like them to stay. It's important for us to have them.

With that, we had the opportunity to also meet as a group, discuss this bill in detail, and it was interesting the interpretation of this bill that people had. However, as we went through this and discussed the bill, the directors noted that, again, the bill does not require or ask for the commission to be eliminated, nor to have -- or question the work that they've done.

They are asking to see if there's more opportunity for the Latino Puerto Rican legislators, to be able to work directly with the commission in the area of policy issues that affect the Latino community. When the commission submitted a report to all of us, including community based organizations, it is a report that talked about Latino community issues.

I know the report is -- one thing is distributing, the other thing is having the opportunity for the Latino Puerto Rican leaders, to have feedback about that report as a draft, before it goes finally to the Governor, and of course, to all of you.

And my understanding, and our understanding as members, they are not also asking all of you to be excluded, because many of you do also represent a very large Latino community. So, with that, the other thing that the members also discussed was that although we had worked with the commission, lately this summer, regarding the budget cuts, we also strongly believe there's always room for improvement.

Not only the Latino Puerto Rican Commission, any commission in any agency, including our community agencies. However, if a bill like this is going to be presented to the Latino Puerto Rican Commission, it would be nice to also have something similar to the African American Commission.

These are thoughts that we discussed as members, and we would like, as I heard this morning from the director of the commission, and from the representative who presented the bills, it seems that yes, there is an issue of communication, but that's everywhere.

And yes, there is an issue of working more together. Again, that's any organization. And I think that overall, the bill is not a bad bill, according to the member agencies. If there was an opportunity for them to have met more and discussed the bill, probably both sides would have cleared out any doubt that there is, at this point.

The perception out there is that the bill is to eliminate the agency, and to question the responsibility and work that they have done, and that's not the case. So, the Hispanic member agency strongly, again, supports this bill, and hopefully, if there is an opportunity for them to go back on the table and discuss those concerns, we really would appreciate that. Thank you for this opportunity.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Carmen. So, just to summarize, CAUSA is strongly supporting the bill?

CARMEN SIERRA: Yes, we are.

REP. O'ROURKE: Okay, thank you. Any other questions? Representative Mantilla has a question.

CARMEN SIERRA: Oh, I'm sorry.

REP. MANTILLA: Just a very quick one. It's been a long day here. I understand that. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Sierra. Just very quickly, I heard you mention that it would be nice, and you would support the same kind of language being applied to the African American Affairs Commission, is that correct?

CARMEN SIERRA: That's correct, because I'm sure they deal directly with the --

REP. MANTILLA: Okay, my quick question is, along those lines then, would you support the same kind of mechanism for the PCSW and the Children's Commission?

CARMEN SIERRA: All the commissions.

REP. MANTILLA: Okay, that was my question. Thank you.

CARMEN SIERRA: Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Is Frank Sallas here? Frank will be followed by Carlos Rodriguez.

FRANK SALLS: Good afternoon, Representative O'Rourke, chair-people in the committee. My name is Frank Salls. I'm a corrections professional. My class title is correctional counselor, and I'm here to speak on HB6660, AN ACT CONCERNING CONTRACTS FOR THE PROVISION OF COUNSELING SERVICES IN CORRECTIONAL FACILITIES.

I am here to support that bill, if in fact the amendment states may not -- I want to make sure that that is clear. I have unique experience in the department. I've been with them for ten years. When I started my counseling career, they privatized counseling service. I worked at Camp Hartell, which is a facility for people usually driving under the influence.

One of my biggest recollections of working with a privatized organization dealing with counseling, is going to Friday afternoon goodbye parties, because everybody that was working with a privatized sector of counseling was often leaving for other jobs. The one I remember most was someone leaving for a second shift manager's job at Kmart, because it was paying more money, and that was the extent of their career in counseling.

I was fortunate to get in to night school, and was hired by the Connecticut Department of Corrections, and I worked up through the ranks to become a correctional counselor now. My primary concern for this bill is safety and security for the public, the staff, and the inmates.

I believe that an agency brought in to deal with inmates at the large number in which they're going to be forced to deal with, and not being paid a fair wage, is just going to be an invitation for safety issues, for corruption, because a person that's making $9.50 dollars an hour is certainly an easy target for someone that wants cigarettes, contraband, or anything brought in to an institution.

That can happen to anyone, however it's much easier if a person is feeling taxed by the pressures of their job. Counselors presently in the state are trained in the same academy as correctional officers, and many times we're asked to perform -- my particular unit has 180 men in it.

It's myself, my partner, who is also a counselor, and two corrections officers. Last week, my counselor partner and I were involved in a physical altercation. The corrections officer secured the area. Another corrections officer got on the radio, and the fight was contained and broken up by two correctional counselors.

My partner is now out on disability because he was injured during this altercation. I do have a hard time believing that someone who was not a corrections professional would have assisted me at that time, and I would have feared for life and limb in that situation.

Our department has a motto of PRIDE, there's professionalism, respect, integrity, dependability, and excellence. And I do take pride in that, and I do feel that the counseling services provided by the Connecticut Department of Corrections are the best they can be.

Safety and security is a huge issue, and we take great pride in knowing that our fellow counselors and corrections officers will be there. The worst problem we have is that when we open up a group of inmates receiving counseling, and have six or seven civilians come in, it's a very stressful situation, not because of the amount of inmates in a room, but because we have to look after civilians that are running around.

And we know the intentions of the inmates. We know our intentions. It's just that babysitting civilians is very stressful in that environment. And there's a lot of training that needs to go on, and I feel fortunate to have that training. I would ask that you support this bill because people that do not have a vested interest in their career as a counselor, working inside the walls, are going to be dangerous for those that they are trying to serve, themselves, and the people that are trying to protect them.

I know that little buzzer hasn't gone off, but I think I am done. (Laughter). It's hard. Thank you very much.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Frank. I guess we had a drafting problem with this bill. It was supposed to bar privatization, as I recall, and it was written so it only bars out of state.

FRANK SALLS: That point has been made clear, that I support the may not.

REP. O'ROURKE: Yes, I heard that.

FRANK SALLS: Thank you very much.

REP. O'ROURKE: I just want to put that down. Thank you. Questions? Carlos Rodriguez? And after Carlos, is Ed Green or Niles Glover here? Neither one? Is that John Green? Okay, I guess you're next. Oh, I'm -- yeah.

JESSICA COHEN: Good afternoon. My name is Jessica Cohen, and I'm going to testify on my own behalf, and I'm am taking Carlos' place, because he's not here. Honorable members of the Government Administration and Elections Committee, I would like to take the opportunity to thank the Government Administration Committee for allowing me to testify on this day.

My name is Jessica Cohen, and I would like to testify on HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION, as a student of Central Connecticut State University, secretary of the Latin American Student Organization, student worker for the Latin American Association of Central Connecticut State University, a Latino resident of the city of Hartford.

As a student of a Latino community in the state of Connecticut, I must say that I have had the honor of witnessing LPRAC take the appropriate actions in making sure that the Latino and Puerto Rican community is not behind. They have involved themselves in many statewide conferences to insure that many, especially students, are involved, educated, recognized, and well represented in the Latino community.

Due to their involvement with students, I understand that their role is to review and comment on any proposed state legislation or regulations that would affect the Latino and Puerto Rican population in the state. They are to advise and provide information to the governor on the state's policies concerning the Latino and Puerto Rican community.

With that, I understand they are to advise the governor concerning the coordination and administration of the state programs serving the Latino and Puerto Rican population. I have also learned that they prepare and submit to the governor, annual reports concerning its activities, with appropriate recommendations concerning the Latino and Puerto Rican populations of the state.

Knowing this, I question the raised HB6657. When reviewing the raised bill, I could not see or understand the purpose of it. I maybe mistaken due to my limited knowledge of governmental procedure, but from what I understand, the bill is asking that LPRAC work closely with state legislators.

My question is doesn't LPRAC already do that? This bill gives me the impression that it was formulated on personal issues and lack of communication. I would think that such issues or concerns should first be addressed to the commission before writing a bill.

In conclusion, my questions have come to my mind in regards to the proposed bill. As a student, I would like to know if those who introduced this bill have approached the commission in regard to their concerns? Also, have they followed up on LPRAC's work? What are they doing to get involved or to get informed?

These are the questions that I would like to know the answer to, in order to understand the purpose of this bill. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you. I didn't get your name, Ma'am? Miss? Yes.

JESSICA COHEN: My name is Jessica Cohen.

REP. O'ROURKE: Jessica?

JESSICA COHEN: Yes.

REP. O'ROURKE: And your name?

SHIRAMI BARCELO: Hi. My name is Shirami Barcelo.

REP. O'ROURKE: Your first name?

SHIRAMI BARCELO: Shirami.

REP. O'ROURKE: Can you spell it for our clerk?

SHIRAMI BARCELO: Yes. S-h-i-r-a-m-i.

REP. O'ROURKE: (Mike not on).

SHIRAMI BARCELO: Barcelo, B-a-r-c-e-l-o. Thank you. My name is Shirami Barcelo, and I am a student at Central Connecticut State University, and a resident of New Britain. I am an active student of the campus, holding to the title of president of CLADA, which is Central's organization of Latin American Dance Awareness, and also treasurer of LASO, which is the Latin American Student Organization.

In order to achieve these positions, I made sure I knew how to be responsible, efficient, open minded, and take in constructive criticism. I submitted my testimony last week because I wanted to listen to the concerns of the Representative Martinez and Representative Gonzalez.

After listening to their position, I questioned their personal involvement to LPRAC, and why is it that they are making aware of their concerns now, rather than when the problem was first noticed? I agree with Representative Martinez that communication must be an open factor. But will passing bill HB6657, AN ACT CONCERNING THE LATINO AND PUERTO RICAN AFFAIRS COMMISSION, assist with the problem at hand?

The philosophy of CARMA is that there wouldn't be a problem if there were no issue. Now, I ask is this bill the only solution available for the problem of lack of communication, or can we be adults about it? Excuse me. Should I continue? (Laughter).

REP. O'ROURKE: We're on orange alert tonight. (Laughter).

SHIRAMI BARCELO: Excuse me. I'll repeat the last sentence. Now, I ask is this bill the only solution available for the problem of lack of communication, or can we be adults about it? We've surpassed the age of technology, where as letter writing was the only method of available, phones and cell phones, which are more accessible, can be proven to good use. Lack of communication goes both ways.

Evidently, if there's difficulty communicating to you, then you haven't been communicating effectively to them, either. To me, it seems that adding this bill will only put to good use as a personal convenience, rather than an accessible one for the work environment. Thank you for allowing me this opportunity to voice my opinion.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you. Any questions from members? Evelyn -- Representative Mantilla.

REP. MANTILLA: Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, and welcome. Congratulations for being part of our democratic process in here. I just have a quick question. For a little bit of background, from you as students, one of the many activities that I know I have observed, led in collaboration with other organizations, is the Latino Leadership Development Conference, that I understand has been held twice.

And I've always been impressed, with my attending that conference, with the participation of a number of young people, such as yourselves. Would you mind giving us a little bit of a description of what that has been all about, and how you've been affected by it?

JESSICA COHEN: The conference that you're talking about is the Latino Summit 2002, which has been held like two years already. Honestly, it's very, very broad on the topic that are touched. In the summit, they touch on issues such as health disparities, education, public service, community service, involvement.

And it's been through my personal experience that I've encountered many active figures, Latino figures in the community that inspire students, as myself. And the purpose for students to attend these summits is so that they can educate themselves of their involvement, so that they are aware of the issues that affect them as students and future leaders.

And it's very important that as minorities and as students, and especially myself as a female, I think it is very important that we are aware of what is being proposed. Like, for instance, this bill and the previous bill, which there was (inaudible) last Thursday.

It's really important as students, we're aware of that, so that we know what's going on in the system, so that we are aware. And what we can do as students and be involved in, like a lot of students don't even know that they are welcome to public hearings, that it's open to the public. And that's issues that when they go to conferences, when they go to summits, they are aware of it. I mean, just for example, some of the things that we do learn.

REP. MANTILLA: Very quickly then, you personally, again, this is your experience, do you feel that exposure to such activities has, in fact, helped you in the development of your own leadership skills?

JESSICA COHEN: Yes, it has helped my leadership skills. I, before, as a student, when I was a freshman in college, for instance, I always wanted to get involved but really, I was fine getting involved on campus, and that was about it. And then my sophomore and junior, and now my senior year, I feel that involvement is not just involvement on campus, but also involvement within the community, and that, to me, is important.

Now, if I want to get involved in the community, I need to learn in what aspects, what is affecting my community? I need to know what is being said in the political aspect. I need to educate myself in the cultural aspect. And leadership now to me is more important than ever, because I feel like I need to stand up for my community, and also defend my community.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you. I really want to congratulate you for that effort.

JESSICA COHEN: Thank you.

REP. MANTILLA: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you both for your testimony. You did a good job. Mr. Green? Oh, it is. Okay. How about Niles Glover, is he here? Niles? Excuse me? He's gone. And then jump ahead to Toby Rhinesmith. Is Toby here?

TOBY RHINESMITH: Good afternoon, Mr. Chairman, and members of the committee. I just want to thank you all for putting all the time in that you do. Obviously, I'm not a regular up here, but if this is what you all do on a daily basis, it's to be applauded, because it's a lot more than I could ever take. But it's a good thing.

Anyway, I'm here representing myself and someone else, on HB6617, AN ACT CONCERNING THE CONNECTICUT EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING COMMISSION. We are in favor of this bill. It's an act concerning the Connecticut Employment an Training Commission. The first one is from someone that wasn't able to make it here today, and instead of reading it verbatim, I will give it to the clerk so they can introduce it in to the record.

But basically, it is from Paula Fox. She is the executive director of the Opportunities Industrialization Center of New Britain, and it's basically outlining her support for this bill. Then on to myself, I'll give you a little 20 second sketch of what the Connecticut Employment and Training Commission does, if you don't know. You might not, like 98% percent of the people in Connecticut.

Connecticut Employment and Training Commission, in conjunction with the Governor's Office for Work Force Competitiveness, are really in charge of Connecticut's employment and training programs. Obviously, in today's economy, with manufacturing moving out of the state at a rapid pace, these services are more needed than ever.

However, the agency that is charged with running these programs, which is not the Department of Labor, as you might expect, it's these two kind of quasi state agencies really operating in their own world without any sort of accountability whatsoever.

For instance, the legislation that set up this agency allows them to pull any employee in any resource from any other state agency at any given time, with no justification whatsoever needed. And although I don't think it's unlikely, you can all imagine some kind of nightmare scenario where this little quasi state agency that's in charge of employment and training, could take over the entire budget and the entire employees of the state police, or the Department of Transportation, or any other agency at any time.

This bill provides for the much needed oversight that is long overdue, and it was probably, really in the beginning, wasn't really envisioned. And like I said, that might be a nightmare scenario, but it is hypothetically possible under the legislation, as it currently exists.

What this bill really -- the meat of it, what it really serves to do is place these agencies under oversight by the General Assembly, where they would have to come before you all and have their plans approved by you, which would obviously provide another layer of insulation, another layer of oversight, and this, and as we've seen in the last couple of weeks, with numerous agencies and department heads kind of working independently almost, I think that that oversight is much needed, and would best serve the people of Connecticut. And that's about it. Thank you very much.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, sir. Any questions from members? No? Thanks a lot. Michael Trueworth? Michael will be followed by Angelo D'Alfonso.

MICHAEL TRUEWORTHY: Just for the clarification, it's Trueworthy.

REP. O'ROURKE: There's no `Y' on my list here.

MICHAEL TRUEWORTHY: I'm sorry.

REP. O'ROURKE: I'll fixe it, though.

MICHAEL TRUEWORTHY: It is indeed Trueworthy. Yeah. My name is Mike Trueworthy. I'm going to kind of dovetail on Toby's testimony. I'm here to strongly support raised HB6617, AN ACT CONCERNING THE CONNECTICUT EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING COMMISSION, and also thank you for -- I know there's been numerous officials of this body here that have supported us, and have been, you know, with us through a fairly long struggle.

I'm also here on my own behalf, and, you know, we'd like to keep it that way. Basically, what this bill does is it really deals with the authority that the chief elected officials have, which is your mayors and your first selectmans of any given town in our particular area.

We have a 22 town region ranging from Burlington, kind of down Route 9, down to Old Saybrook. And the rights that are afforded to them and you, members of the General Assembly, under the Workforce Investment Act. And just for a little background, this -- what you have is the result, or as a result of the probably two years of two different sides and their -- one side feels as though they have the authority to reorganize workforce areas, and our side, I should sense that they don't have the authority to reorganize workforce areas.

And ultimately, it kind of boils down to the authority of the chief elected authorities, and the authority of the General Assembly. Three, or I guess maybe four years ago, when the Workforce Investment Act came in to play, it set up all these things called workforce investment areas. The General Assembly had to approve what was called the five year plan.

The five year plan had in it eight workforce investment areas. What's gone on over the last couple of years is, and this is what we're here for today, is that there's been a strong push to reduce that number down to five. It would seem to me, and you've never voted -- the General Assembly has never voted to reduce the number of workforce investment areas from eight to five.

But since you had to vote on that originally, it would seem to me that you're the appropriate body to approve or to not such a dramatic change to the workforce investment system that is administering, you know, workforce investment things in the state of Connecticut.

And without getting in to too many -- into details, basically, workforce investment areas are judged on two things, federally, this is in the federal law, performance and fiscal integrity. There's never been any issue, as far as our fiscal integrity goes, and our performance -- just the other day, the Department of Labor put out a report saying that we had exceeded 15 of the 16 performance measures that we're judged by, over 100% percent.

And if I look around, I can see the areas. Our agency is also responsible -- there was about -- well, certainly, when Stanley Works closed down, we -- there was a couple of million dollars to help retrain the workers there in New Britain. Let's see. In Old Saybrook, we got $1.7 million federal dollars to help about 500 workers our from R.R. Donnelly, when they closed down.

In Meriden, there was $700,000.00 dollars in federal funds that we gained to help about 300 workers go back to school. So, I mean, I think our performance, as I know that all of you know, is right there.

Ultimately what I was going to say is that it comes down to the mayors' decision and the chief elected officials. There are other areas that have chosen that they don't -- they would like to merge. The northeast and the southeast have gotten together, and their mayors have decided that they want to merge.

That's their prerogative. They're allowed to do that, and if they would like to do that, then they're in the process of doing that. Now, they're given that authority. As with Danbury, Torrington, Waterbury, they've decided -- their mayors have voted, and they've decided that they want to merge.

Our mayors have decided that we don't want to merge with anybody else. And it's interesting that the state will respect the views of the mayors when they're willing to push towards their agenda, but not respect their authority when they don't want to go with what they want. So, with that, I would urge you all to vote in favor of HB6617, as the Attorney General of the state of Connecticut has concluded, they should be given that authority. And I'm happy to answer any questions.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mr. Trueworthy. I think you've done a good job. Any questions? Representative? No? Thank you very much. Is Angelo D'Alfonso here? Mr. D'Alfonso?

ANGELO D'ALFONSO: Finally, last but not least. Thank you. My name is Angelo D'Alfonso. I'm also with Toby Rhinesmith and Mike Trueworthy from our office. I was asked this morning to read testimony from the director of the Association of Elected Officials from the mid-Connecticut Workforce Investment area, and also from Mayor Frank McCastro, Sr., city of Bristol, and chairman of the mid-Connecticut Workforce Investment area.

I'll read Mr. Reznicki's testimony first. Normally, I would like to have attended today's hearing that deals with HB6617, AN ACT CONCERNING THE CONNECTICUT EMPLOYMENT AND TRAINING COMMISSION, regarding the designation process of regional workforce boards. Unfortunately, this meeting has been short notice, which prevents me from attending, due to a scheduling conflict which I have for personal health reasons.

Your correspondence of support reached all of the mid-Connecticut elected officials late last week, many of whom were informed of this public hearing a day or two ago. Mayor Frank McCastro, city of Bristol and chairman of the Council of Chief Elected Officials of the mid-Connecticut region, normally would have changed his schedule due to attend today's hearing.

Regrettably, an interview process (inaudible) hire a new city personnel director conflicts with today's hearing, and that this interview process cannot be changed, since people are coming to the city from out of state.

The mayor, however, has prepared a memorandum addressed to the various state senators and state representatives, which contains the support of the existence of the mid-Connecticut region. Hopefully, we can be afforded time in the future to discuss our position. Thank you for your consideration.

Now I'll read Mayor McCastro's testimony. To begin with, I am taking this opportunity to express my appreciation and that of the 22 elected municipal leaders that govern the mid-Connecticut Workforce Investment area, for your continued support and effort on behalf of our region.

As you are aware, the mid-Connecticut area has strenuously differed with the state of Connecticut relative to the approach that it adopted regarding the re-designation of workforce investment regions in the state. Clearly, the state and our local elected officials have been at opposite ends of the table regarding this issue.

In short, the state maintains that the governor can re-designate as he wants to, and on the other hand, we have maintained that local elected officials have a material role in the re-designation process. As cited in your March 12^th, 2003 letter to the mayors and first selectmen of the mid-Connecticut area, Attorney General Blumenthal's office concluded that our opinion was consistent with federal law, and subject to any appeal to the U.S. Secretary of Labor, whom the Attorney General described as a final authority on the matter of designation.

Both our region and the state received this opinion last February, 2002. Although hopeful regarding our continued future as a region because of the Attorney General's opinion, our optimism was soon tempered with the state's action that it disagreed with the Attorney General, and that it would take any and all legal or administrative measures to implement a re-designation plan of regions in the state of Connecticut.

Since the state clearly was well under way to implement its plan of re-designation, which would divide up our region, we filed an appeal to the U.S. Secretary of Labor last September 5^th, 2002. As of this writing, neither we nor the state have heard from the U.S. Secretary of Labor.

Admittedly, we are disappointed with the lack of timely response from the U.S. Department of Labor. During the latter part of the fall of 2002, both our council of elected officials and our board of representatives (inaudible) as to protect the interest of our constituents in terms of services, as well as that of our grant recipients in the city of Bristol, and the corporation we put in place to administer our programs.

This was predicated on the fact that by July 1, 2003, we no longer would be receiving state or federal funds, and that the state has already established new regions, and we are not one of them. Indeed, we were forced to exercise our contingency plan, and that is to accept the state's action, and attempt to negotiate the best possible deal with our constituents with the new regions.

At this juncture, we are waiting the finalization and execution of our memorandum of understanding with the Hartford and New Haven regions, which we believe protects the interest of our constituents' service for the upcoming transition year. Obviously, we would have rather remained as a region, however we have to accept the reality of the situation, and move forward and plan the best (inaudible) future constituent services in our region.

Clearly, we still remain the highest performing and best administered program in the state. A very large part of this success can be attributed to the leadership of our director, George Resnicki, who has given guidance to our area for the past 20 years. Although George will have a lesser role in the job training in the future, we are hopeful that his innovative ideas and commitment to the educational job skills development of our constituents will continue to be recognized and utilized.

The last year of the House, a representative introduced a bill which is similar to HB6617, that is currently being advanced. Our area encourages and supports any and all endeavors that continue to improve upon the quality of workforce development in the state of Connecticut, undertaken by our legislature.

In closing, we trust that you will continue to do what is in the best interest of workforce development, and that of the constituents of the state of Connecticut, which the system is ultimately accountable to. Thank you very much.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, sir. Any questions from members? Representative McCluskey.

RP. MCCLUSKEY: Just really quickly, for the record. I think maybe it's important for people to note, the proposal is that your area would be cut in two apparently, and part of your region would go in to Hartford and part would go in to New Haven?

ANGELO D'ALFONSO: That's correct.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Okay. And you would say that since the New Britain and Bristol areas are unique, it's labor market, and has unique things, that if it's cut up in two, that the interests of those areas are going to get submerged by the bigger areas of New Haven or Hatrford?

ANGELO D'ALFONSO: I would concur with that, yes.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Thank you very much.

ANGELO D'ALFONSO: You're welcome. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, sir. Next up, Bev Brakeman, followed by Frank Salls. Excuse me?

: Frank already went.

REP. O'ROURKE: Frank went?

: Yeah, he's --

(gap in testimony, changing from tape 3b - 4a)

BEVERLY BRAKEMAN: -- national organization for women in Connecticut. We're here to support raised bill HB6653, AN ACT PROPOSING COMPREHENSIVE CAMPAIGN FINANCE REFORM FOR STATE-WIDE CONSTITUTIONAL OFFICES AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY. In Connecticut, we rank 10^th in the nation for women serving in the legislature, with four of our six constitutional officers being women 29% percent female membership in our General Assembly, and the only woman speaker of the House in the country.

This is good, but not good enough. Nationally, less than 2% percent of the 12,000 people who have served in the U.S. Congress since 1789, have been women. Today, women represent 52% percent of the population, voting greater numbers than men, but still hold only 13.6% percent of the seats in Congress, and 22% percent of the seats in state legislatures.

We also know that women legislators are more likely to sponsor bills that focus on children, families, and health care. In 1996, for example, women made up 11% percent of Congress, but sponsored 48% percent of the women's health bills, and 40% percent of the child support bills proposed.

Additionally, according to the Center for Policy Alternatives' 2002 Progressive Agenda, American voters think the political system is broken, as a result of special interest money giving unfair advantage to wealthy and well connected candidates.

The amount of soft money coming in to political campaigns has grown 1,400% percent between '92 and 2000. Campaign finance reform is especially critical at the state level, to insure that citizen legislatures remain within the control of average citizens.

One way to address these issues and increase the number of women in political office is to develop and implement a system of public financing that allows more people access to elected positions in their communities and states.

Connecticut now supports this bill because we think it begins to address the five major principles of true campaign finance reform, that have been identified by the Connecticut Citizen Action Group, a Connecticut leader in the campaign finance reform movement.

These principles include reducing campaign spending, giving regular people the opportunity to run for and win election to offices, stopping the flow of special interest money, stopping the endless money chase, and restoring the principle of one person, one vote.

We urge you to commit to a system that is truly democratic, and gives all citizens a real and significant voice in the political decision making process. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Bev. Any questions? Thanks a lot for your patience, and for sticking with us. Next up, Frank has left, Frank Salzman. Chris Phelps? Not seeing him, Tony Stelek? Tony? Welcome.

TONY STELEK: Good afternoon. My name is Tony Stelek. I live in Southington, and I'm talking on behalf of myself, however I am a member of the Libertarian Party. I would like to favorably address bill HB6087, AN ACT CONCERNING THE DEFINITION OF A "MINOR PARTY", to change the minor party definition to the across the board for 1% percent of the vote for the government -- Governor, or 1% percent of enrolled party members.

And also HB6099, AN ACT CONCERNING THE EFFECT OF REDISTRICTING ON BALLOT ACCESS, to maintain the ballot access when redistricting, of course. There is need to reform ballot access in Connecticut. Connecticut is the only state concerning minor party status under office by office basis.

Prohibitive requirements limit the chance for the third parties to take part in the election process. To be on a ballot, the third party needs to collect excessive numbers of signatures on the petitions. These signatures on the petitions don't even reflect the support of the candidate, whose worthiness is determined by the votes cast.

In such, the petitioning process is a wasteful one. If after a lot of support, the third party collects required signatures on the petitions for the ballot access, there is lots of work to be done by the town clerk, to validate the signatures. Referring the ballot access will save her so she has office time and money, which is of great importance in our state's financial situation.

To major parties do not necessarily satisfy many of Connecticut residents. Existing burdens placed on the parties, except incumbent major parties, is political discrimination. Reform of the ballot access process would encourage challengers in political (inaudible). This is in the best interest of constituents.

Incumbents should have the interest of the constituents and not support statutes that inhibit challengers. Constituents deserve their choice. Having no other options to vote, many do not vote at all. Passing HB6087 and HB6099 allowing third parties easier participation in elections, would encourage highly diversified Connecticut voters' participation in elections. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mr. Stelek. Are there any questions from members? If not, thank you, sir, for your patience and testimony.

TONY STELEK: Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Is Azam Said here? How about John Green?

: (Mike not on).

REP. O'ROURKE: Excuse me?

: (Mike not on).

REP. O'ROURKE: John Green is now, followed by Bart Russell left.

JOHN GREEN: Thank you, Chairman O'Rourke, and members of the committee.

REP. O'ROURKE: Good afternoon.

JOHN GREEN: Good afternoon. Thanks for staying so late. I wish I had taken the opportunity when the formerly absent Green was called, but nevertheless, you know, play by the rules. And I guess I'm here to talk about changing the rules, too. I'm here on HB6087, AN ACT CONCERNING THE DEFINITION OF A "MINOR PARTY".

But before speaking to that, I do want to just quickly say something on HB5335, AN ACT PROHIBITING A CANDIDATE DEFEATED IN A NOMINATING PRIMARY FROM RUNNING AS A MAJOR PARTY, MINOR PARTY, OR PETITIONING CANDIDATE FOR THE SAME OFFICE IN A GENERAL ELECTION.

I'd just like to say that this bill strikes me as an infringement on the rights of minor parties. It shouldn't be the decision of members of one party to decide who another party can or cannot nominate. That strikes me as unfair. So, hopefully the committee will reject that bill.

On HB6087, an act concerning the definition of a minor party, I think this is -- I think the legislation has a very slight unintended technical problem that I think other speakers have spoken to, and I'll be sure to do so, but the purpose is certainly a good one.

And I think the purpose is not as much to ease the burden of minor parties. It strikes me the purpose here is to simplify the process in some ways. Let me just begin briefly by speaking about what I believe is sort of the important historic significance that minor parties have had in America.

I think minor parties are often, you know, considered to be a nuisance or a waste of effort, or an effort in futility. But, in fact, minor parties have been successful in substantially influencing public policy, even when they don't success in winning a significant political office in the winner take all world of American politics.

Just a couple of examples. In the 1880s and the 1890s, the Agrarian Reform Movement was able to win substantial agricultural and monetary policy changes through the Populous Party. Much of FDR's agenda in the New Deal reflected elements of the Socialist Party's platform in 1932, when Norman Thomas received about 2.5% percent of the vote for president in that election.

More recently, Ross Perot, I think, has made the issue of fiscal responsibility a priority for Republican and Democrat elected officials, alike, and sort of shone a light on that and brought some attention to some issues.

So, the point is that whether a nuisance or an exercise in futility, you know, these efforts do have -- they offer an avenue for dissent that enhances our democracy, and can, in fact, enable dissident voters to have a meaningful voice in some public policy decisions.

And I just want to say that I think these examples also remind us that parties serve a function beyond just electing people. It's not just an instrument to enable people to run and get elected to office. In fact, many county and municipal offices throughout the country are elected in a non-partisan fashion. We don't, strictly speaking, need parties to elect people, but parties, I think in addition to being the way that people can be elected, also enable voters to express opinions about policy, about government, about their values.

And parties provide an easy label, to some extent, for voters to understand where they believe their elected officials are coming from. And our organization in New York, we've sometimes said, you know, Good Housekeeping does it for floor wax, we do it for politicians.

Connecticut's system for qualifying as a minor party is sort of oddly complicated, in that it currently requires minor parties to qualify on a district by district basis, for literally each separate office in the state, separately one at a time. Many think from Governor all the way down to dog catcher.

This has been seen as not only burdensome to minor parties, but I think unnecessarily burdensome to major party candidates, who face, in some cases, a minor party opponent in their race whose primary or only purpose of being on the ballot is to retain their party line, or secure the party's line.

The method proposed in this bill, I think, helps to streamline and simplify that process, and potentially reduces the degree to which minor parties are unnecessarily competing against major party candidates, without a particular reason to do so.

New York State, I think, offers an example of similar, in fact, almost identical to the method proposed here. To secure and maintain party status, a party must receive 50,000 votes for its candidate on its ballot line in the election for Governor.

New York gubernatorial elections typically have about 4.5 million votes cast, so 50,000 is a fraction over 1% percent, which is what's being proposed here. And -- I'll stop.

: (Mike not on).

JOHN GREEN: I'll briefly just conclude. I don't think that's a low -- that's not considered, in New York, a low or easily attainable threshold. Representative McCluskey eluded earlier to the multiplicity parties that exist here, and the most recent gubernatorial election, several of them failed to exceed the 1% percent -- the 50,000 vote threshold, including the formidable Liberal Party, which had been a real player in New York politics for awhile, and more recently had evolved in to a petty patronage machine, and mercifully ended its existence this past election.

But the small technical change I would like to suggest is, as I think Mr. DeRosa spoke to earlier, what this bill does is it changes the definition of a minor party in a way that would prohibit parties or eliminate those that were formed on the existing -- under the existing guidelines of a district by district basis.

And I think it's an unintended consequence. I think if this bill were to pass as written, every existing minor party in the state would cease to exist, and I don't think that's the intent of the bill.

REP. O'ROURKE: Thank you, Mr. Green, for your testimony. Are you a -- have you been a third party candidate or a minor --

JOHN GREEN: I apologize for not (inaudible). I'm the director of the Working Families party, which was established in this past election cycle by petitioning 25 candidates on to the ballot, and securing 1% percent of the vote in 25 state rep and state senate districts.

REP. O'ROURKE: Okay, yes, Senator Roraback has a question.

SEN. RORABACK: Hi. Mr. Chairman, good afternoon, Mr. Green. Did you receive 1% percent of the vote in all of the elections in which you fielded candidates?

JOHN GREEN: Yeah, we received actually an average of about 3.5% percent of the vote in those 25 elections. Every one of them received over 1% percent of the vote.

SEN. RORABACK: Even though you were down what, like six or eight spots on the ballot, how low --

JOHN GREEN: Yeah, that's correct.

SEN. RORABACK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thanks, Mr. Green.

REP. O'ROURKE: Representative McCluskey.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: Just one quick -- what -- I know you said that reform in the statute gives the voters choice, but I've got to ask the question. We had an election for state representative in, I believe, it's the 30^th district, where the Working Families Party candidates number of votes cast exceeded the margin of victory, and what do you say to that, in terms of if that third party person was not on the ballot, perhaps the person who lot narrowly would have been the choice of the majority of the voters?

JOHN GREEN: Right.

REP. MCCLUSKEY: I mean, if you have a runoff system, then I kind of get it, but sometimes choice has adverse consequences, and in the instance where perhaps those Working Family people, their second choice, would have been the democratic candidate, as opposed to the one who ultimately won.

JOHN GREEN: Yeah, I think this bill -- the value of this bill is that it helps avoid those kinds of situations. I think the point here is to simplify the process so that the district by district system is -- so we're not forced into an unnessecarial adversarial situation. That's, I guess, is the part we're coming from.

REP. O'ROURKE: Well, Representative McCluskey brings up a more negative aspect of minor party candidacies, when they're simply playing the role as a spoiler.

JOHN GREEN: Right.

REP. O'ROURKE: How does this bill, you know, help avoid that?

JOHN GREEN: I think the current system for securing ballot status in Connecticut is that one has to run ones own candidate for each and every separate office in the state of Connecticut, and receive 1% percent of the vote in each of those situations, to become a minor party.

What's important to understand is that Connecticut, New York, and a handful of other states allow that once you have a party, you can, in fact, cross nominate, as was done here in Connecticut, with the ACP. That you don't have to run a separate candidate.

I think that's an important tool, because it gives voters a way to express their values and express where they stand on certain issues, without the danger of spoiling, while still supporting a candidate who has the opportunity to win.

I think what this bill would do is it would -- parties would no longer have to go through the process of running a separate potential spoiler candidate, in every single district, in every single office in the state. Rather, one would simply have to -- there would be two options, as I understand it.

One could run a candidate for Governor, and get 1% percent of the vote, and there, in that -- for that one office, there would be the danger that Representative McCluskey describes, that in the effort to secure the ballot line, the votes cast on a third party might tip the scales.

But once having done that, this bill would then give that party ballot access for each of the offices in the state, rather than having to secure that by running a separate candidate each and every time. For example, I'll just speak in our case. We might have, in a variety of the 25 districts that we were in, we might have been willing to cross nominate one of the candidates who was running as either of the major party candidates.

The current law prevented us from doing that because we have to first run our own and get 1% percent of the vote. Next time out of the box, we can do that. It's confusing, I know. It's confusing to us, but that's sort of how it works here.

So, I think that by simplifying the process such that there's one election, or even easier, the process of registering 1% percent of the voters in your party, which doesn't create the spoiling dynamic that's been described at all. It's simply a matter of can we register 1% percent of the enrolled party members in the state.

And at that point, you'd have ballot access and the ability to nominate any candidate you wish, including the candidate of another party.

REP. O'ROURKE: So then are you opposed to the other bill that lowers the petitioning threshold, and encourages or makes it easier for spoiler candidates to run?

JOHN GREEN: I don't think that we feel that strongly, one way or the other. You know, frankly, it would seem that -- in my experience, 1% percent as a petitioning threshold or as a vote threshold was relatively achievable, so I don't know that it matters a whole heck of a lot, in my view.

SEN. DEFRONZO: I wanted to ask you, you commented on HB5335, prohibiting candidates defeated in a nominating primary from running as another -- this goes to somewhat of the discussion we're having here, the -- in this case, now you have a candidate who selects to run, say, the democratic primary, loses the primary, and then opts to run as a minor party candidate or a petitioning candidate.

JOHN GREEN: Right.

SEN. DEFRONZO: You don't feel that that's taking some liberties with the system? I mean, we're not objecting to anyone running here. We're just saying make your choice. You want to run as an independent, run as an independent. You want to run as a working party candidate, run as a working party candidate, but don't take two or three bites of the apple along the way.

JOHN GREEN: Right. And I think that makes sense, and there's a certain logic to that, particularly from when one thinks of it as sort of a candidate centered or candidate oriented policy. We want to prevent candidates from sort of running off from one party to the next in a seemingly opportunistic way.

But at the same time, I mean, parties also are organizations that I think have rights to nominate a candidate of their choice, so it just seems to me that if there's a way to accomplish what you're trying to accomplish with that at the same time enabling one group of voters who are organized in a party, to dictate to a different group of voters organized in a different party, who they can or can't nominate, that's, I think -- does that make sense that that's, I think, where it's troubling?

From the point of view as a party, to be able to be told we can't nominate someone because they were defeated by a different party's primary.

SEN. DEFRONZO: Yeah, except that the candidate is making that decision. The candidate knows in advance that he or she can only opt for one party's nomination.

JOHN GREEN: They can't only opt for one party's nomination.

SEN. DEFRONZO: That's what I'm saying here now is what's being suggested in here is that if a candidate opts to run in a major party primary, or a minor party primary, and is defeated, that's his or her shot at the office. If he or she wants to go on and run for some other office, that's fine, but you know, it just seems that it's a -- yeah, double exposure, double jeopardy situation.

JOHN GREEN: Right. But if the candidate won that primary, he would be able to be the nominee of a minor party. So that's the point I'm making, is that it seems to me that for -- let's just speak in, you know, real or hypothetical terms, but if the Democratic party in the 30^th state representative district nominated a candidate who was also the nominee of the Working -- there was a primary, and one of the people in the primary was also the nominee of the Green Party or Working Families Party, that if that candidate was defeated in that primary, why should the members of the Working Families Party not have the right, through their own process, to nominate that candidate as their own?

And I think the intent of that is a good intent, and I would say if there's a way to do it that doesn't infringe of the rights of a minor party to nominate a candidate of their choice, that it would be a wise thing. Does that make sense?

SEN. DEFRONZO: If you could figure out a way to do it.

JOHN GREEN: Yeah. Right. (Laughter).

SEN. DEFRONZO: I don't understand, though. (Mike not on).

JOHN GREEN: Thank you.

SEN. DEFRONZO: (Mike not on).

REP. O'ROURKE: Arline, thank you for your patience. Welcome to the GAE Committee.

ARLINE DUNLOP: Chairman O'Rourke, is there anyone speaking after me?

REP. O'ROURKE: (Mike not on).

ARLINE DUNLOP: I was going to say, I hope that being last doesn't do the same thing as the last piece of cake, or the last candy in the box.

REP. O'ROURKE: As a bonus, I'm going to give you three and a half minutes. (Laughter).

ARLINE DUNLOP: I don't think I will need that many. I'm a Libertarian candidate, a dues paying Libertarian candidate, and I live in Meriden, and my name is Arline Dunlop, and I hope that Paul Hughes is listening so we see something in the paper on Monday, or he may not be back until Monday.

I'd like you to think of the last six words in the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. They are with liberty and justice for all, and I'm talking about valid access. I think that we need to somehow allow people to get on the ballot in a much easier and shorter and less expensive of time, energy, and money.

It is a hard job. My local station is in front of the post office, on Colony Street in Meriden. Because there's always a long line of people in there, and I have plenty of people to talk to to come out and get -- I have run for mayor, and I have run for -- now, twice, and I have run for state rep in the 84^th and the 82^nd. Of course, you know we have Mr. Chris Donovan, who is in the 84^th, and wouldn't have a snitch of a chance to win there.

And Walter Bell is in the 82^nd, and I just moved in to that district, which was across the street from where I lived before, and of course, he is entrenched, so there I was. But maybe a few more people know me because I go to the council every week -- every meeting, every other week, and they get to say, well, but you always ask why are you spending that money? What are you taking that money for?

Nevertheless, one of the things that bothers me is that the -- I think someone referred to the work that the city clerks had to do. Now, last year, the Libertarian Party ran a candidate for Congress, in the new 5^th. He couldn't announce his candidacy because he didn't know whether or not he was on the ballot, because it took them so long to get those things conjured up.

It's a lot of work and energy, and I'm sure it's very expensive for those people to have to do that. Maybe they even had to work overtime. But there's another thing that goes along with this. I'm not exactly sure, and I only thought of this when I was coming up here, and I don't have all the -- the whole fact together, our 5^th district candidate was not allowed at some of the debates, especially the AARP debate over in Waterbury.

Now, he was a senior citizen and a member of AARP, but he was denied, and maybe it was because they didn't yet have those votes counted, but I'm not sure. But the presidential election -- let me back up. The rules are made up by someone in Washington, for who was going to be on the presidential debate.

Harry Brown was a Libertarian Candidate, and Ross Perot was a candidate. They were not allowed to participate in the debate with Clinton and Gore -- Dole. It filters down to local level somehow. And this is unfair. I hate to use that word. With liberty and justice for all.

Because it negates that candidate's opportunity to be seen by the public. I went to the AARP debate in Waterbury. Mrs. Johnson and Mr. -- I've forgotten his name now.

: (Mike not on).

ARLINE DUNLOP: Who?

: (Mike not on).

ARLINE DUNLOP: Maloney, were the two candidates. Our candidate wasn't allowed to be there, and I think it was because they hadn't yet tallied the tallies. So, I think we need new rules, we need softer hands, and I would appreciate seeing the ballot access different than it is now. And now I hope I'm not going to get the same as I would get if I took the last piece of cake or the last candy. Thank you.

REP. O'ROURKE: Any further questions? Okay, thank you, Ms. Dunlop. Is Romulo Sameniego here? Anyone else wish to come before the committee and speak?

: (Mike not on). (Laughter).

REP. O'ROURKE: Yeah, this is probably not (inaudible). The Secretary of State, is Susan Bysiewicz here? No? Okay, she's really late today. If not -- (laughter). Remember, we're on TV here. But we'll call the public hearing to a close.

(Whereupon the public hearing was adjourned).