Connecticut Commentary: Red Notes from a Blue State

Managing Editor of the Journal Inquirer Chris Powell , the George Patton of the reality movement in Connecticut politics, examined a report issued by Governor Dannel Malloy’s Brain Trust and found it “shocking for its obliviousness.” The report, Powell argues, renews commitments to failed programs and did not recommend “a single important change that might save big money and help restore solvency to state government.” While the report acknowledges that Connecticut’s formula for municipal educational financing is broken, “… the formula, while often adjusted, has accomplished exactly what it was created to do: send more money to poverty-infested cities. This has achieved only prosperity for city school employees, not any improvement in educational outcomes." There is little direct connection between money spent on education and educational outcomes: “But then the problem with educational outcomes has never been the aid formula. The problem has always been the premise that st...