Stonington ―State Rep. Greg Howard, R-43rd District, who sits on the General Assembly’s Judiciary and Education Committees, and is a ranking member of the Public Safety Committee, said he has a lot of important items he would like to address in the current legislative session.

“When you come in to your second term, you start with unfinished business,” said the two-term legislator and Stonington police detective who represents Stonington and North Stonington.

He explained that bills that passed out of committee unanimously or with strong bipartisan support during the last session, did not have enough time to make it through both chambers of the General Assembly, and that he would be focusing on those bills, securing bonding for projects in Ledyard, North Stonington and Stonington, as well as some new legislation.

Among the bills from last session is legislation increasing protections for Police K-9’s, an issue Howard feels strongly about as a former K-9 handler, which would increase penalties for crimes involving injuries to police dogs.

“In Connecticut, if you injure an animal, that’s a crime. If you injure a police dog, it’s the same crime; there’s no enhanced penalties,” he said.

Other bills from last session would eliminate state income tax on stipends paid to volunteer firefighters, provide an appeals process for police officers terminated for “malfeasance,” or serious misconduct, give police officers the right to ask for consent to search vehicles if they have reasonable articulable suspicion of a crime and allow the police to transport individuals, who are a danger to themselves due to intoxication from drug use, to the hospital.

Currently, officers can force an individual who is a danger to themselves due to alcohol or psychiatric illness to be transported to the hospital, but there is no similar law applying to individuals intoxicated due to drug use.

He said the legislation would, “tidy up officers’ ability to get people who are incapable of caring for themselves due to drug overdose to the hospital.”

New legislation he is working on this session includes expansion of the definition of municipality to include “any village,” under the Affordable Housing Statute.

He pointed to Stonington as an example, saying that if Pawcatuck was considered separately from Stonington, it would probably meet the 10% threshold required to be able to reject affordable housing development applications. Because the town as a whole does not meet the threshold, he said Pawcatuck ends up with a disproportionate share of affordable housing developments in town.

Under state law, if less than 10% of a municipality’s housing is legally deeded as affordable, an application can only be denied if the town can prove the project poses a threat to public health or safety which cannot be rectified through design changes.

Housing is considered affordable when a household does not pay more than 30% of its income on expenses including mortgage or rent, utilities and taxes.

He is also pursuing legislation that would change the way child pornography cases are handled by adding language that would include the victim’s age as a factor when prosecutors determine what charges to bring. Howard also proposes changing the term “child pornography,” to “child sex abuse material,” in state statutes.

“Call it what it is. And hopefully that’s more shocking to prosecutors and judges, and they’ll take appropriate action,” he said.

In his first year as a member of the Education Committee, he will address the issue of unfunded mandates placed on school districts and pursue creation of a task force to look at state testing and its impact on education.

“Most teachers I’ve talked to don’t like it. It’s disruptive; they’re teaching to the test; it’s not the best gauge of enrichment. I’ve heard a lot of complaints. So, I’m not an expert. I’d like to see a task force of experts to take a look at that,” Howard said.

“I continue to look at local control. I think that communities know their community best and they can run it. I think we just need less legislature involvement,” he summarized.