OFFICE OF FISCAL ANALYSIS
Legislative Office Building, Room 5200
Hartford, CT 06106 (860) 240-0200
http://www.cga.ct.gov/ofa
sHB-6448
AN ACT CONCERNING ACCESS TO LOCAL GOVERNMENT, THE
MODERNIZATION OF LOCAL GOVERNMENT OPERATIONS,
REGIONAL COUNCILS OF GOVERNMENT AND THE PROVISION
OF OUTDOOR DINING.
AMENDMENT
LCO No.: 10507
File Copy No.: 542
House Calendar No.: 386
Primary Analyst: DD 6/8/21
Contributing Analyst(s): (FN)
OFA Fiscal Note
See Fiscal Note Details
The amendment strikes the underlying bill and its associated fiscal
impact.
The amendment makes a variety of changes regarding the process of
state and local governance and regionalization. The impact of these
changes is described below.
Electronic Access to Public Hearings and Documents
The amendment requires that state agencies provide electronic access
to members of the public when holding meetings under the Freedom of
Information Act.
The amendment results in a potential cost to state agencies to the
extent that information technology equipment and software licensing
will need to be purchased to ensure that the public have access to
meetings, as required by the amendment. The Freedom of Information
Commission (FOIC) will need funding of approximately $110,000
annually for a Staff Attorney position to handle an increased caseload.
Several additional complaints brought to the FOIC are anticipated
dealing with the new rules around conducting remote meetings. 2021HB-06448-R00LCO10507-FNA.DOCX Page 2 of 3
The amendment requires that town clerks provide a website to accept
online payments for certain fees, allows municipalities to post certain
notices online instead of in local newspapers, and permits
municipalities and state agencies to provide electronic access to public
meetings.
There is a cost to municipalities to providing websites for online
payment of fees to the extent that they do not already have the capability
to do so. There is also a savings from permitting municipalities to post
certain notices on their website instead of in local newspapers. As the
bill allows, rather than requires, state agencies and municipalities to
provide electronic access to public meetings, the amendment is not
anticipated to result in increased expenses for information technology
or software licensing above each entity's current capacity.
Regional Performance Incentive Account
The amendment changes the current distribution formula of $4.1
million in regional services grants-in-aid to COGs. The total amount of
funding for such grants is not anticipated to change.
The amendment removes a provision of $7 million in funding to
councils of government from the Municipal Revenue Sharing Account.
This funding has never been provided. The bill's outdoor dining
provisions are not anticipated to result in a fiscal impact to
municipalities.
The amendment allows COGs to submit proposals to OPM, as part of
the Regional Performance Incentive Program, to redistribute certain
types of grant funding. The impact of this would depend on the
provisions of such proposals and the extent to which OPM chooses to
implement them.
The amendment makes a variety of other changes concerning the
types of projects that are eligible or RPIP funding, and the application
process for such funding. These changes have no fiscal impact as they
are not anticipated to change the amount of funding awarded under 2021HB-06448-R00LCO10507-FNA.DOCX Page 3 of 3
RPIP.
The amendment makes several other changes that have no fiscal
impact. It 1) requires municipalities to allow restaurants to offer outdoor
dining until March 31, 2022, 2) requires the Advisory Commission on
Intergovernmental Relations to conduct a study, and 3) makes technical
and conforming changes
The preceding Fiscal Impact statement is prepared for the benefit of the members of the General Assembly, solely
for the purposes of information, summarization and explanation and does not represent the intent of the General
Assembly or either chamber thereof for any purpose. In general, fiscal impacts are based upon a variety of
informational sources, including the analyst’s professional knowledge. Whenever applicable, agency data is
consulted as part of the analysis, however final products do not necessarily reflect an assessment from any
specific department.