Statement from Gian-Carl Casa, President & CEO of CT Community Nonprofit Alliance, on Governor Lamont’s proposed budget:
“For more than a dozen years, community nonprofits have seen the need for services and the cost of providing them increase, while state funding fell behind. We understood the state was in difficult fiscal times, and community nonprofits stepped up to provide vital services with limited dollars. But it’s 2020 and Connecticut has had multiple years of surplus revenues, and projections show the coming years will be strong. The state’s savings account has more money than ever before.
“While we appreciate that the governor has not proposed spending cuts, and that he favors continuing the Nonprofit Grant Program, we are disappointed with the recommendation not to increase basic funding for vital community programs. Flat funding, when costs and demand rise, is the same as a cut – you simply can not provide the same services unless funding keeps up.
“We’re asking the Governor and the legislature to appropriate $461 million in new money over the next five years to restore funding that community nonprofits have lost since 2007.”