Lamont says vaccines may arrive by Tuesday

Gov. Ned Lamont delivered some good news this past week: Connecticut can expect to receive its first shipment of coronavirus vaccines in the coming days. But he cautioned that any impact of the vaccine might not be felt for a month, and that public health measures like mask wearing and social distancing remain vitally important.

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The big story

Coronavirus vaccines begin in Connecticut as early as Tuesday: In just a few short days, Connecticut hospitals plan to begin administering the state’s first coronavirus vaccines to their medical workers. Lamont said he expects those initial doses to be given out beginning Tuesday. Nursing home residents are expected to begin receiving the vaccine on Dec. 21. The state plans to receive 32,000 doses of Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine in its first shipment. Doses of Moderna’s vaccine will arrive in about a week. Both vaccines require two doses several weeks apart. By the end of January, the state expects to have roughly 240,000 health care workers and nursing home residents and staff immunized. From mid-January to May, about 1 million people including essential workers, those with underlying conditions and people over age 65 are expected to be immunized. The remaining state residents would begin getting vaccinated in June. The goal is to have everyone vaccinated by the early fall. “It’s going to be tough, but we’re going to do it, and we’re going to do it right,” Lamont said of the vaccine distribution. “And I think this is going to be a new spring for Connecticut and our country.”

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Lamont taps Boughton as state tax commissioner: Reaching across the aisle, Lamont has picked longtime Danbury Mayor Mark Boughton, a Republican, to be the next commissioner of the state Department of Revenue Services. “I firmly believe that a bigger table, open door and creative solutions will help produce the best outcomes for the people of our state, regardless of someone’s political affiliation,” Lamont, a Democrat, said in a news release. Boughton ran three times for governor, in 2010, 2014 and again in 2018, where he was the convention-endorsed candidate but lost in a five-way primary. Lamont was the ultimate victor that year. First elected mayor of the Hat City in 2001, Boughton served two terms as a state representative and before that taught social studies at Danbury High School. His father, Donald, was a former Danbury mayor and state representative. Boughton plans to resign as mayor before beginning the commissioner’s job on Dec. 18.

Tribes place plans for East Windsor casino on hold:

A long-stalled plan by the Mashantucket Pequot and Mohegan tribes to build the state’s third casino in East Windsor is officially being put on hold as consumers’ appetite for gambling has shrunk amid the ongoing pandemic. The move potentially paves the way for a broader agreement between the two tribes and the state on sports betting and possibly online casino games where wagers can be placed on an iPhone. Rhode Island and other nearby states have already legalized sports betting. The tribes said they still see the East Windsor casino as “a viable project” and have not totally written off its eventual construction. MGM Resorts International, which operates a casino in nearby Springfield, had threatened litigation if the East Windsor casino was built as it would be the first casino in Connecticut constructed off tribal land and without a competitive bidding process.

Connecticut to cast Electoral College votes Monday: The state’s seven electors will gather at the state Capitol on Monday to cast Connecticut’s Electoral College votes for Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, winners of the state’s popular vote. The event, largely ceremonial, will be held with masks and social distancing in place. Electors will place their ballots in a box made of wood from the historic Charter Oak tree. The electors are typically party loyalists. “I’ve done a lot of things in politics, and it’s just the most honorable thing to be there and to cast a ballot and to do what our forefathers set out for us to do,” said Nick Balletto, a former state Democratic Party chairman who is serving as an elector for the third time. Unlike some other states, electors in Connecticut must vote for the candidate they were picked to represent. And there is no mechanism for the state legislature to intervene and replace electors.

Teachers unions call for shutdown of K-12 schools: Unions representing teachers and other school staff gathered at the state Capitol on Thursday to present a petition to Lamont and education Commissioner Miguel Cardona demanding all schools in the state transition to online-only learning unless strict safety measures are met, including widespread testing of students and school staff. “There is no question about the importance of in-person education,” said Mary Yordon, president of the Norwalk Federation of Teachers and a vice president of AFT Connecticut. “Right now however, educators and support staff are … sometimes facing unacceptable risks.” Data released by the state show there were 1,296 new COVID-19 cases among K-12 students from Dec. 3-9. That figure includes 502 students learning remotely. Lamont and Cardona have resisted calls for widespread school closures, saying there is little evidence of transmission of the virus within schools. But many districts have had to close due to staffing shortages as teachers are forced to quarantine.

Tong joins 48-state lawsuit against Facebook: Attorney General William Tong has joined a lawsuit filed by 48 states against the social media giant Facebook, accusing the company of building a monopoly by illegally acquiring competitors like Instagram and WhatsApp. “Facebook has used its market power and trove of consumer data to unlawfully acquire and squash its competition,” Tong said Wednesday. “Their exclusionary and predatory conduct suffocates innovation, and stymies small businesses and startups from getting their apps off the ground.” The lawsuit claims Facebook has also done little to protect its users’ privacy and instead uses personal information to sell highly targeted advertising. The antitrust lawsuit is being led by New York Attorney General Leticia James. Facebook said in a statement that the Federal Trade Commission had cleared the Instagram and WhatsApp acquisitions and said the lawsuit represented a “revisionist history” seeking to punish a successful business.

Odds and ends

Rob Blanchard, Lamont’s deputy press secretary, tested positive for the coronavirus and will quarantine for two weeks. Blanchard announced on Twitter on Sunday that he had tested positive, noting that he has been “extremely careful and taken all precautions” when around Lamont and other staffers. Blanchard is the third member of Lamont’s team to test positive for COVID-19; his communications director Max Reiss and a state trooper on his security detail also contracted the virus. Lamont has not. … State Sen. Saud Anwar, D-South Windsor, has grown increasingly critical of Lamont’s reluctance to implement stricter COVID-19 restrictions, including closing indoor dining. “Dear Governor Lamont, what are we waiting for?” Anwar, who is a pulmonologist, wrote on Twitter after sharing a graph that showed Connecticut’s coronavirus hospitalizations per capita were worse than the nation as a whole. “Death is irreversible; economy is not,” Anwar said when asked about the economic cost of a shutdown. … Wallace Barnes, a former state senator from Bristol who was a Republican Party stalwart for decades, died Thursday at the age of 94. Barnes, a successful business leader who retired as chief executive officer of a large manufacturing company that has borne his family name for more than 150 years, attended eight national GOP conventions through 2008. Despite his accomplishments “he did so much in Bristol in a very low-key way,” said state Rep. Whit Betts, a Bristol Republican and Barnes’ son-in-law. … Sharon Palmer, who served as state labor commissioner under Gov. Dannel P. Malloy after decades as a leader of AFT Connecticut, the state’s second-largest teachers union, died Dec. 4 at the age of 77. Before joining union leadership, Palmer worked as a junior high school teacher in her hometown of Waterford. In a Facebook post, her daughter, Kerry O’Neill, described her as “a powerhouse, a woman that was a force to be reckoned with.” … Connecticut Voices for Children used its annual budget forum on Tuesday to call for an income tax surcharge on Connecticut’s wealthiest residents to shift tax burden from low- and middle-income households. The New Haven-based nonprofit said the most pressing tax issue in Connecticut is “not the overall tax burden but rather the regressive distribution of that burden, which contributes to economic injustice.” Lamont has repeatedly resisted calls to raise taxes on the wealthy, including this year as the state is facing a significant budget deficit due to the pandemic.