Marcus Brown

Dear Neighbor,



I hope you are well.



The House is in full swing, with two session days last week and three this week. Below I have provided a legislative update.



You can email me if you have any questions or comments about any policy or the legislative process.



Have a great weekend!

Sadly, wrong-way crashes and deaths have been on the rise in Connecticut. Studies have shown that wrong-way driving crashes are 100 times more likely to be fatal than other types of crashes. Our own State Representative Quentin “Q” Williams of Middletown was killed by a wrong-way driver in January.  



The House of Representatives took action on Wednesday with the passage of HB 6746, which seek to reduce incidents and minimize fatalities from wrong-way drivers.

HB 6746 requires the Connecticut Department of Transportation (CTDOT) to expand its efforts to implement wrong-way driver countermeasures, including:

• Wrong-way driving detection and notification systems on at least 120 high-risk highway exit ramps
• A public awareness campaign to educate the public on ways to reduce wrong-way driving incidents and the actions drivers should take when they encounter a wrong-way driver

The number of people killed or injured on state roads is startling, especially because many of them were the result of preventable crashes. I am glad we passed this important legislation to help make our roads safer.

The House of Representatives passed HB 6918 on Tuesday that makes important clarifying and technical changes to the groundbreaking Clean Slate legislation signed into law in 2021, which can now be fully implemented and deliver on the promise of a fresh start for hundreds of thousands of people in education, employment and housing without the burden of a long-past criminal conviction.



Business organizations and chambers of commerce have lined up behind Clean Slate legislation in Connecticut and throughout the country, recognizing it as an economic driver by enhancing someone's ability to be gainfully employed, start a business and secure housing.

Outdated technology and outstanding legal and policy questions required updating in order to automatically erase criminal records of people seven years after the date of their conviction for a misdemeanor or 10 years after the date of their conviction for certain felonies if they have not been convicted of other crimes. 



No one's future should be limited because of mistakes made years or even decades ago.

Eversource and United Illuminating (UI), Connecticut's two electric distribution companies (EDCs), have filed new and lower standard service rates for residential customers from July 1 through December 31 with the Connecticut Public Utilities Regulatory Authority (PURA), and the average bills are expected to decrease significantly from current levels.



Eversource and UI file to change rates twice annually, with the rates going into effect on January 1 and July 1 of each year. The cost of natural gas, which provides the fuel for most of the heat and electricity across Connecticut and New England, is subject to continued market volatility and international factors like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. As a result, present bills were pushed as much as $80 higher on average since the beginning of 2023 and running through June 30.

While dropping electricity rates is positive news, PURA also recently took a significant step toward additional accountability for Eversource and UI by implementing performance-based regulation (PBR) starting in 2024. Connecticut is one of the first states in the country to establish such a system, which was part of the “Take Back Our Grid Act” we passed in October 2020.



PBR has the potential to align regulatory tools since there are certain goals Eversource and UI will be expected to achieve, including fulfillment of public policies, empowering customers, and providing reasonable, equitable and affordable rates as opposed to roller coaster increases and decreases.



Connecticut’s implementation of PBR signals a commitment to dually improving utility performance and customer outcomes. It is not an attempt to hurt the utilities. PBR will show residents, however, that the utilities will keep their best interests in mind within a specific operating framework.