I’m a Gen Z CT resident. What 2024 bills should I care about?

Compiled by Kat Struhar.

As the 2024 legislative session approaches its end on May 8, the days before are expected to be buzzing with bills either passing both chambers to get to the governor’s desk or dying on the Capitol floor.

Though the youngest members of Generation Z — also known as Gen-Z, iGen, and Zoomers — are too young to vote (being born in 2012), plenty of bills this year could impact high school- and college-age residents in Connecticut. Since the session began on Feb. 7, the legislature has weighed initiatives on education, housing, money, and more topics that are pertinent to the state’s youth.

Here are five bills that young adults in Connecticut should be paying attention to.

Legacy admissions ban

What it does: Senate Bill 203 would ban legacy admissions, which is a practice that gives college admission preference to applicants who have a familial relationship to alumni.

Similar legislation across the country, including in states like Virginia , California and Maryland , is being considered on the heels of the Supreme Court decision last year that ruled that race-conscious admissions were unconstitutional .

Support: Because legacy students are disproportionately white and wealthy, banning legacy admissions helps to put other college applicants on an even playing field, supporters say.

“The United States Supreme Court, as we all know just last year, took away certain preference and said ‘You cannot give preference based on race,’” said Sen. Derek Slap, D-West Hartford, co-chair of the Higher Education and Employment Advancement committee. “I think it’s outrageous though that this preference — the one for wealthy folk — remains.”

Opposition: Many concerns about the bill revolve around how it would affect alumni of color and siblings attending the same college. Other, stronger, criticisms are about the state’s imposition of regulations on private colleges.

“I think it’s one thing for our state government to put these rules and regulations on public institutions like UConn and the Connecticut State College and Universities system,” said Sen. Kevin Kelly, R-Stratford. “I think it’s quite a different issue when we start interfering in the relations of private institutions with their students.”

Tipped minimum wage

What it does: Senate Bill 221 would eliminate the lower minimum wage assigned to hourly employees who earn tips — establishing instead a single minimum wage that would apply to all workers.

Connecticut’s minimums for tipped workers remain where they’ve been since 2017: $6.38 for wait staff and $8.23 for bartenders. If there was a single minimum wage for all workers, this would ensure that tipped employees always earn minimum wage rather than relying on tips.

Support: Advocates for eliminating the tipped minimum wage often point to the historical origins of the system.

“The subminimum wage for tipped workers was a direct legacy of slavery,” Saru Jayaraman, president of the national One Fair Wage campaign, said at the press conference. “It was created after Emancipation to allow restaurants to hire newly freed Black people — Black women in particular — not pay them, and force them to live entirely on this new idea … called tips.”

Opposition: Representatives from the restaurant industry argued that servers prefer the tipped-wage model as it is. A survey of servers and bartenders conducted by the Connecticut Restaurant Association found the average hourly wages for these positions, including tips, came out to more than twice the statewide minimum wage.

Read the full story here.

Work Live Ride

What it does: House Bill 5390 , known as “Work, Live, Ride” encourages transit-oriented development — the building of housing near public transit stations — in an effort to build more housing and alleviate the lack of supply that experts say has pushed housing costs up the past few years.

The bill would offer towns that opt to create transit-oriented districts priority for certain state infrastructure funds.

Support: Advocates say that transit-oriented development would help address a dire lack of housing in the state and help the environment by encouraging people to use public transportation.

Supporters told members of the Planning and Development Committee that transit-oriented developments are the kind of neighborhoods people — particularly young people — want to live in. They want to be able to walk to businesses and take the bus or train to work.

Opposition: Opponents expressed concerns about a loss of local control and that smaller towns without transit or towns that don’t opt to rezone for transit districts will be deprioritized for infrastructure funding.

Additionally, critics of the bill want to ensure that towns have the infrastructure in place to support the increase in population “Work, Live, Ride” could bring.

Read the full story here.

Disconnected youth

What it does: House Bill 5213 calls for an advisory board to develop a plan to identify and re-engage students at risk of dropping out of school and “disconnected youth,” defined as 14- to 26-year-olds who are neither in school nor working.

This bill seeks to expand data gathering on disconnected youth so that the state is equipped to help at-risk young adults trapped in cycles of poverty. It will improve connections between service agencies and young people — for example, providing youth with access to public transportation — and establish additional academic credit opportunities and work programs for youths facing economic disadvantages.

Support: Sean Tomany, principal of University High School of Science and Engineering, brought several students to a public hearing on the bill, all of whom supported free transit.

And while transportation is key to keeping students engaged, it’s not the only problem, officials say. The larger issue is poverty.

“We know that there are many root causes for a young person to become disconnected, most aligning with the impact of malignant cycles of poverty,” Treasurer Erick Russell said in testimony before the committee. “Our response to this crisis and our scope of study should be commensurately expansive.”

Opposition: Though several educators said the problem of disconnection for students often starts earlier than age 14, strong opposition to the bill was not voiced.

Read the full story here.

H igher education funding

What it does: As federal COVID-19 relief funds expire, the University of Connecticut and Connecticut State Colleges and Universities system are facing budget deficits of $70 million and $140 million , respectively.

Gov. Ned Lamont’s budget for the upcoming fiscal year does not include additional funding for the state’s higher education institutions, beyond the levels lawmakers already included last June in the preliminary state budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year.

Support: Lamont has expressed support for maintaining the approved higher education funding, remaining adamant that higher education systems should have been preparing to live without the temporary money.

Opposition: Advocacy for more state funding into the public higher education realm has remained ongoing for over a year and ran for hours at a public hearing in February .