By Alma Graham, CT State Grange Legislative Director

During these unforeseen troubling times, we all have been struggling to maintain some sort of normalcy. So far Connecticut is doing a good job at monitoring the spread of this virus. The state legislative issues so far have been concerning the adjustments that have been required due to the virus. In reality the Governor has been running the state with his Executive orders while trying to maintain the safety of the state without destroying its economy. He has set travel restrictions to assist with controlling the spread. What is good is that the states in the northeast have been working together in many instances keeping this area as stable as it could be.

I have had one person mention to me: where is the legislature in all this? Why have they not been involved with monitoring this crisis and addressing issues to maintain the stability of the state? The Legislature never did go back to a special session to address the 2020 adjustments to the budget. The legislators were called into session by the Governor to approve changes in absentee voting, pricing of insulin and issues concerning the unrest happening at the time. My local representative has been sending out daily emails with COVID statuses to keep us informed on how the state is doing. We need to remember that if we have concerns or need assistance on any State issue, we should be contacting our local Senators or Representatives to express our concerns.

We are only a few weeks away from the elections so many legislators will now be focusing on their reelections. This campaign season has been fairly quiet, sitting in the background for the last few months. Now campaigning has become more active with the two parties finishing their conventions to choose their final Presidential candidates. We also will be electing our National Representatives as well as all of the State Senators and Representatives. Campaigning will be quite different from past years. I don’t expect that you will see the large gatherings that usually occurred. Regardless of how the campaigning goes, we still must remember that it is important to vote for whichever candidate that you support.