Dems’ ‘Titanic’ Budget Sets Sail In The Senate, Bound For Veto Iceberg

It’s 11 o’clock, around the time that the Senate was scheduled to go into session. But it’s doubtful that the fractured caucus will start before 2 p.m. on this day where they’ll go through the charade of approving a two-year nearly $38-billion budget. With only 20 votes, tops, among the 24 Democatic senators, it means that Gov. M. Jodi Rell can successfully veto it, then we can move on to the next phase of the budget crisis: missing the start of the fiscal year July 1 and finally getting the Republican governor and Democratic majority to sit down together.

The package being tossed to the political iceberg today includes a 30-percent increase in the estate tax; a 25-percent hike in the tax on corporations; and higher rates for joint incomes starting at $500,000. A joint income of $600,000 would pay $24,600, plus 6 percent of the excess over $500.000. Joint incomes of a million dollars would pay $40,350, plus 7.5 percent of the amount of income over $750,000.

On the municipal aid side, Ansonia would get about $15 million in both years; Bridgeport, about $164 million; Danbury, $22.9 million; Derby, $6.9 million; Easton, $594,000; Fairfield, $3.6 million; Greenwich, $3.4 million; Milford, $10.7 million; Monroe, $6.6 million; New Canaan, $1.5 million; Newtown, $4.3 million; Norwalk, $10 million; Oxford $4.6 million; Ridgefield, $2 million; Seymour, $9.8 million; Shelton, $5 million; Stamford, $8 million; Stratford, $20.5 million; Trumbull, $3 million; and Westport, $2 million.