We're definitely at this point in the end game on heritage funding, but no one knows how the game will end....

In a nutshell, the regular legislative session ended without action on House Deputy Speaker Melody Currey's cultural reorganization proposal. That document, developed over several weeks by a bi-partisan group of representative and senators interested in cultural matters and in continuing discussion with the Coalition, had substantially modified Governor Rowland's
original proposal. It retained the idea of a merger of current state agencies involved in cultural tourism into one super commission, but made the legislature a more substantial player in its composition and oversight. Melody's proposal added the Connecticut Humanities Council and the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation to the Commission as equal
partners for strategic planning purposes and restored current funding levels for both CHC's and for the state's threatened historic properties.

The Governor's budget veto has opened the game again, and Melody and her legislative allies have been hard at work over the past two weeks refining her proposal to accommodate objections from the Governor's Office and from OPM and put it back in play. The Council's funding and administrative and fiscal autonomy have been retained in this latest version, as has
restoration of funding for the Historical Commission, but the new bill does not now specifically address the need for an independent commission to oversee the state's preservation regulatory process, a key objective of the Heritage Coalition all along. Melody has assured us that she is fully aware of the need for such a process and that the bill remains a work in progress.

Whether all this effort will survive and in what form remains unclear. Legislative leadership and the Governor's office remain far apart on both taxation and spending, and earlier in the week decided to table a discussion of cultural tourism reorganization and funding until larger issues of revenue and reduction are resolved. We're monitoring the situation closely and will keep you posted. At this point, how things end up is anyone's guess.