Municipal leaders from the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities (CCM) will hold a press availability on Tuesday, March 4 at 2 p.m. to release a major new public policy report from CCM that debunks a conclusive medical justification to impose a huge new unfunded mandate on towns and cities. 

The press availability will take place on March 4 at 2 p.m. outside room 2E of the State Legislative Building, immediately prior to a major public hearing on the proposed mega mandate (HB 5629) set to begin at 2:30 p.m. in room 2E.

The press availability will take place on March 4 at 2 p.m. outside room 2E of the State Legislative Building

Officials who have been invited to testify, include

• Steven Werbner, Town Manager of Tolland
• John Weichsel, Town Manager of Southington
• Jim Finley, CCM Executive Director and CEO

The report is highlighted by (1) medical evidence endorsed by a certified medical epidemiologist -- Dr. Noel Weiss of the University of Washington -- that refutes the justification for the new mandates; and (2) a sampling of the current fiscal impacts in towns that still remain from heart disease and hypertension benefits for police and fire fighters that were ended a decade ago.

HB 5629 would unfairly and dramatically expand the workers’ compensation benefits system for public safety employees. These proposals would resurrect the state’s heart disease and hypertension mandate, and also mandate new benefits for cancers and infectious and contagious diseases.

HB 5629 would turn the workers’ compensation system on its head. Employees would not be required to prove the job-relatedness of their illnesses. The burden of proof would be shifted to towns and cities to show the illnesses are not job-related.

Mandating workers’ compensation benefits for certain illnesses for select employees may be politically attractive, but it is neither fiscally responsible - nor medically defensible -- public policy. Such unfunded state mandates are unwarranted, unaffordable, unfair and unnecessary.