Millions Restored To Charlotte Hungerford Hospital

December 14, 2015

On September 23, I pledged to fight Governor Malloy’s cuts to Charlotte Hungerford Hospital; in October we secured funding for small hospitals; and now the legislature has approved a budget reform package that restores most of the cut.

Democrats in the state House and Senate voted to restore $2.3 million to Charlotte Hungerford Hospital (CHH). The governor is expected to sign the bill.

Timeline

  • In June of this year, Democrats approved a state budget that included $5.8 million for CHH.
  • In September, Governor Dannel Malloy unveiled a package of budget rescissions that included up to $84 million in cuts to hospitals and reduced CHH’s state funding to $1.5 million.
  • I worked to ease the impact to CHH and by early October, Governor Malloy agreed to restore $14.1 million to the state’s small hospitals.
  • On Tuesday, the Legislative Democrats approved a bill that restored state funding for CHH to $3.76 million...All Republican state representatives voted “no”.

For the past two sessions I have maintained a 100% voting record, but unfortunately I had to miss the vote on this package. Weeks ago I was invited to the White House to meet with national education leaders, including U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. I learned a great deal about state education policy, and look forward to applying that knowledge to my work in the Education Committee and to improve education in Torrington.

The past several months since Governor Malloy made his rescission announcement, I have been working with legislative leadership to restore funding to Charlotte Hungerford. Thank you to Dan McIntyre, President and Executive Director of Charlotte Hungerford Hospital for your kind words regarding my efforts:

Although we would have liked full funding to have been restored, we acknowledge that some progress has been made. We will continue the drive for more state support. I want to thank Representative Cook for her continued push for state funding and the work that she has done advocating for Charlotte Hungerford Hospital.