Connecticut lawmakers have approved a new 4-year contract for 45,000 unionized state employees on Wednesday.
Governor Ned Lamont’s administration negotiated the contract with the State Employee Bargaining Agent Coalition (SEBAC).
It includes general wage increases of 2.5% retroactive to July 2025. There are also additional increases scheduled for July 2026 and July 2027.
The contract passed along partisan lines in both the Senate and the House, with Republicans criticizing the deal.
It's a billion dollars in wage increases for state employees at taxpayers’ expense, said House Minority Leader Vincent Candelora (R-North Branford).
“We have thrown billions of dollars at these contracts, and nothing has changed,” Candelora said.
"There are only certain people eating at the trough right now and everyone else is getting thinner and thinner,” he said.
The wage increases are needed especially for jobs where the state has had difficulty recruiting and retaining workers, like at the Department of Children and Families and the Department of Corrections, said Speaker Matt Ritter (D-Hartford).
“It’s hard to find people to do some of these jobs, admittedly not all of them, but some of them. You do have to pay people competitively to work at a DOC facility. And we’ve changed the pension schedule as well, so the increases matter more,” Ritter said.
