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OLR Bill Analysis
sSB 5 (File 201, as amended by Senate "A")*
AN ACT CONCERNING SCHOOL RESOURCES.
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
SUMMARY
§ 1 — INCLUDING MEDICAID CHILDREN IN CARE 4 KIDS
Expands eligibility for the Care 4 Kids program to include parents or guardians of
children who are enrolled in Medicaid and adds them to the priority intake and eligibility
list
§§ 2-3 — OPEN CHOICE PROGRAM FOR NORWALK
Expands the Open Choice pilot program for Norwalk by making it ongoing and allowing
students who reside in Darien, New Canaan, Wilton, Weston, and Westport to attend
public school in Norwalk
§ 4 — MEDICAID ENROLLMENT DATA SHARE
Requires the social services and early childhood commissioners to enter into an MOU to
share Medicaid enrollment data for people applying to Care 4 Kids
§ 5 — WHOLESOME SCHO OL MEALS
Pushes out the start date of the grant to FY 25; specifies SDE may award up to five
grants; extends the deadline for the final report to the Appropriations and Education
committees
§ 6 — SCHOOL INDOOR AIR QUALITY WORKING GROUP
Extends the deadline for the indoor air quality working group; adds members to the group;
and expands the group’s mission
§ 7 — HVAC INSPECTION AND EVALUATION
Extends the deadline for school boards to complete an inspection and evaluation of their
HVAC systems from January 1, 2025, to June 30, 2031
§ 8 — STATE GRANTS FOR HVAC INSPECTIONS
Delays the start date, from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2026, for when DAS cannot award an
HVAC grant to an applicant that is not compliant with the inspection requirement
SUMMARY
This bill makes various unrelated changes to education law. A
section-by-section analysis follows. 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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*Senate Amendment “A” strikes all the provisions of the underlying
bill except for the one making children in Medicaid eligible for Care 4
Kids. It adds provisions:
1. expanding the Open Choice pilot program for Norwalk and
Danbury;
2. requiring the social services and early childhood commissioners
to enter a memorandum of understanding to share Medicaid
enrollment data for people applying to Care 4 Kids;
3. pushing out the start date for SDE’s wholesome school meals
pilot grant program to FY 25;
4. extending, from January 1, 2025, to June 30, 2031, the deadline for
local and regional boards of education (i.e., “school boards”) to
complete a uniform inspection and evaluation of their school
buildings’ heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC);
and
5. extending the deadline, from July 1, 2024, to January 1, 2031, for
the school indoor air quality working group to submit its final
report.
EFFECTIVE DATE: July 1, 2024, except that the provision on the
indoor air quality working group is effective upon passage.
§ 1 — INCLUDING MEDICAID CHILDREN IN CARE 4 KIDS
Expands eligibility for the Care 4 Kids program to include parents or guardians of
children who are enrolled in Medicaid and adds them to the priority intake and eligibility
list
The bill expands Care 4 Kids program eligibility to parents or
guardians of children who are enrolled in Medicaid and adds them to
the existing priority intake and eligibility list. Under current law, to be
eligible, a family must have a parent or caretaker who is working or
attending high school or enrolled or participating in (1) a job training or
employment program, (2) a Department of Labor -administered
apprenticeship program, (3) an institution of higher education, or (4)
one of several other education or career pathways. The bill makes the 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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parents or guardians of a child enrolled in Medicaid eligible without any
of the work, job-training, or education requirements.
Under current law, the maximum income level to be eligible for the
Care 4 Kids program is 60% of the state median income (SMI) and
income eligibility for Medicaid is 196% of the federal poverty level (FPL)
for a child. Therefore, on the income criteria, any family with a child that
qualifies for Medicaid would also be eligible for Care 4 Kids (see
BACKGROUND).
Care 4 Kids provides a child care subsidy to eligible parents and
caretakers.
Background — Income Eligibility
Table: Selected Annual SMI and FPL Table*
Family Size 1 2 3 4
60% SMI $41,553 $54,338 $67,124 $79,910
196% FPL 29,517 40,062 50,607 61,152
*SMI from CT Department of Social Services, September 2023, and FPL provided for 2024 by U.S.
Department of Health and Human Services
§§ 2-3 — OPEN CHOICE PROGRAM FOR NORWALK
Expands the Open Choice pilot program for Norwalk by making it ongoing and allowing
students who reside in Darien, New Canaan, Wilton, Weston, and Westport to attend
public school in Norwalk
The bill expands the Open Choice pilot program for Norwalk by
making it ongoing every year and allowing students who reside in
Darien, New Canaan, Wilton, Weston, and Westport to attend public
school in Norwalk. Under current law, for the school year beginning
July 1, 2022, up to 50 students who live in Norwalk could attend public
school in Darien, New Canaan, Wilton, Weston, and Westport. Under
the bill, which applies to the school year beginning July 1, 2024, and each
following year, up to 50 students from Norwalk can go to school in those
five districts and vice versa.
The bill also makes the program ongoing, rather than just the school
year beginning July 1, 2022, for 50 students from Danbury who can
attend public schools in New Fairfield, Brookfield, Bethel, Ridgefield, 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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and Redding.
Under the bill, school districts that receive students under this
program must allow students to attend school in their district until they
graduate from high school.
Open Choice is a voluntary interdistrict attendance program that
allows students primarily from the Hartford, New Haven, and
Bridgeport districts to attend suburban school districts, and vice versa,
on a space-available basis. By law, Open Choice state grants range from
$3,000 to $8,000 minimum per student, with larger grants for districts
that enroll a higher percentage of Open Choice students.
The bill makes conforming changes and removes obsolete language.
§ 4 — MEDICAID ENROLLMENT DATA SHARE
Requires the social services and early childhood commissioners to enter into an MOU to
share Medicaid enrollment data for people applying to Care 4 Kids
The bill requires the social services and early childhood
commissioners to enter into a memorandum of understanding (MOU)
to share, to the extent federal law permits, Medicaid enrollment data
between the Department of Social Services and the Office of Early
Childhood (OEC) for Medicaid enrollees seeking to enroll in Care 4
Kids. The commissioners must do this by January 1, 2026.
The bill specifies that OEC can only use the Medicaid enrollment data
to help people in the Care 4 Kids application process by minimizing the
information that these individuals must submit during the application
process.
Care 4 Kids is a child care subsidy program for low-income families
(see § 1).
§ 5 — WHOLESOME SCHO OL MEALS
Pushes out the start date of the grant to FY 25; specifies SDE may award up to five
grants; extends the deadline for the final report to the Appropriations and Education
committees
The bill pushes out the start date for SDE’s wholesome school meals
pilot program, which awards five grants to embed a professional chef in 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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five alliance school districts. Under current law, the pilot is
administered for FYs 24 to 26 and the bill changes this to FYs 25 to 27. It
also removes from law the October 1, 2023, deadline to apply for the
grant.
Under the program the chef must help school meal programs build
food service staff capacity, improve meal quality, increase diner
satisfaction, streamline operations, and establish a financially viable
school meal program.
The bill also specifies that SDE may award up to five grants. Under
current law they are required to award five grants. Unchanged from
current law, each grant recipient must receive an annual $150,000 grant
in each year of the pilot.
The bill also extends the deadline for SDE to report on the school
meals pilot program to the Appropriations and Education committees
from January 1, 2027, to January 1, 2028.
§ 6 — SCHOOL INDOOR AIR QUALITY WORKING GROUP
Extends the deadline for the indoor air quality working group; adds members to the group;
and expands the group’s mission
The bill extends the deadline, from July 1, 2024, to January 1, 2031, for
the school indoor air quality working group to submit its final report to
the governor and the Education, Labor and Public Employees, and
Public Health committees. It also requires annual progress reports from
the working group, with the first due by January 1, 2025, until January
1, 2030. The final report is due January 1, 2031, and the group terminates
on July 1, 2030, or when it submits its final report, whichever is later.
Additional Members and Additional Qualifiers
The bill adds two members to the current 23-member group. Under
the bill, the Senate majority leader, who currently appoints two
members, gets a third appointment who must be a school building
official with experience in operations and finance, infrastructure
renewal, and project management.
The House majority leader, who currently has two appointments, 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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also gets a third appointment who must be a representative of the
Capitol Region Council of Governments.
The bill replaces a representative of the Associated Sheet Metal and
Roofing Contractors of Connecticut with a representative of the
Connecticut Chapter of the Sheet Metal and Air Conditioning
Contractors’ National Association, which is one of the three Senate
president pro tempore appointments. It also specifies that the House
minority leader’s industrial hygienist appointment must be from the
UConn Health Center.
Group Charge
Under existing law, the group must make recommendations to the
legislature on a range of issues related to school indoor air quality,
including (1) criteria for rating the priority of HVAC repair and
remediation needs, (2) optimal HVAC performance benchmarks to
minimize the spread of infectious disease, and (3) best practices for the
proper maintenance of HVAC systems.
The bill additionally requires the group to recommend best practice
and guidance for:
1. conducting HVAC system uniform inspections and evaluations,
including (a) the addition of appropriate professionals to do this
work, (b) which professionals may perform certain portions of
the uniform inspection and evaluation, and (c) the timing and
manner of the inspections, and
2. procuring these services.
The bill also requires the group to make recommendations on a
model request for proposals that school boards can use when procuring
inspection and evaluation services.
§ 7 — HVAC INSPECTION AND EVALUATION
Extends the deadline for school boards to complete an inspection and evaluation of their
HVAC systems from January 1, 2025, to June 30, 2031
The bill extends, from January 1, 2025, to June 30, 2031, the deadline 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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for school boards to complete a uniform inspection and evaluation of
their school buildings’ HVAC systems required by law (see Background
— School HVAC Inspections). Beginning July 1, 2026, school boards must
conduct the inspection and evaluation in at least 20% of their schools
each year until all schools in the district are inspected. It also requires
that each school building be inspected again every five years.
Current law requires school boards to complete the uniform HVAC
system inspection and evaluation in each school before January 1, 2025,
and then every five years.
Like current law, the bill allows DAS to grant a waiver from the
inspection requirement, upon a school board’s request, if the
department finds (1) there is an insufficient number of certified testing,
adjusting, and balancing technicians; industrial hygienists certified by
the American Board of Industrial Hygiene or the Board for Global EHS
Credentialing; or mechanical engineers to perform the inspections and
evaluations or (2) the board has scheduled the inspection for a date after
the inspection deadline. Specifically, the bill allows DAS to grant a
waiver of up to one year from the five-year deadline and the
requirement to inspect at least 20% of a district’s schools each year.
Current law allows a one-year waiver and requires that the inspection
be scheduled for after January 1, 2025.
§ 8 — STATE GRANTS FOR HVAC INSPECTIONS
Delays the start date, from July 1, 2024, to July 1, 2026, for when DAS cannot award an
HVAC grant to an applicant that is not compliant with the inspection requirement
Starting July 1, 2024, current law prohibits the DAS commissioner
from awarding grants for HVAC or indoor air quality improvements to
school districts that have not certified compliance with the law’s
inspection and evaluation requirements. The bill delays the start of this
prohibition to July 1, 2026. Presumably, if a district applies during the
2026 to 2031 time period, it will have to certify that it met the threshold
percentage of inspecting at least 20% of its schools each year (see above).
The law allows school boards or regional educational service centers
(RESC) to apply for the grants to reimburse costs for projects to install, 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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replace, or upgrade HVAC systems or related improvements. The
school board may receive a reimbursement grant for 20%-80% of its
eligible expenses, based on its town ranking among all Connecticut
towns using property wealth as a measure. As with the school
construction grant program, less wealthy towns receive a higher
reimbursement rate. RESCs are reimbursed under a similar method that
reflects the wealth of the towns served by the RESC.
Background — School HVAC Inspections
By law, the HVAC system inspection and evaluation must include
the following:
1. testing for maximum filter efficiency;
2. measuring outside air rate;
3. verifying ventilation components’ operation;
4. measuring air distribution through all inlets and outlets;
5. verifying unit operation and performance of required
maintenance in accordance with American Society of Heating,
Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE)
standards;
6. verifying control sequences;
7. verifying carbon dioxide sensors and acceptable carbon dioxide
indoor air concentrations; and
8. collecting field data (if none exist) for installing mechanical
ventilation.
The inspection and evaluation must identify the extent to which each
school’s current ventilation system, including any existing central or
noncentral mechanical ventilation system, is operating to provide
appropriate ventilation to the school building according to ASHRAE’s
most recent indoor ventilation standards. The inspection and evaluation
must result in a written report that includes any corrective actions 2024SB-00005-R01-BA.DOCX
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needed for the mechanical ventilation system or the HVAC
infrastructure.
COMMITTEE ACTION
Education Committee
Joint Favorable Substitute
Yea 43 Nay 1 (03/18/2024)