Bill eases dissolution of regional school districts

Citing the recent failure of a public referendum to dissolve the Central Regional School District, despite a majority of the towns in the district voting to exit the district, Senator Andy Ciesla and Assemblymen Dave Wolfe and Jim Holzapfel (all R-10) have announced their plans to introduce legislation that would make it easier to dissolve regional school districts.

Under current law the dissolution of a regional school district can only be achieved through the adoption of a question on a public referendum. For the question to be deemed adopted, voters in a majority of the towns must support the dissolution and an overall majority of all votes cast in every district must support dissolution.

Under legislation that the tenth district legislators have drafted for introduction, public questions for the dissolution of a regional district will be deemed adopted if they have received an affirmative vote in a majority of the individual constituent districts. The legislation removes the current requirement that an overall majority of all votes cast support the dissolution.