By Keith M. Phaneuf

Legislators will open the session’s final week Monday expected to pass a new state budget that keeps income tax rates flat, expands the sales tax and raises levies on prepared foods, e-cigarettes, plastic bags, alcoholic beverages and the sale of expensive houses.

The tentative agreement between Gov. Ned Lamont and leaders of the Democratic majority boosts funding for education grants and nursing homes, expands Medicaid eligibility for working poor adults with children and settles a long-standing funding dispute with Connecticut’s hospitals.

The $43 billion, two-year budget does not include a proposed tax hike on sugary drinks or on capital gains earnings of the rich. Also absent are electronic tolls, though leaders said that issue could be revisited in a special session.

It also refinances future contributions to pension funds for teachers and state employees, shifting billions of dollars in costs — plus interest — onto taxpayers after 2032.

By By Mark Pazniokas and Maya Moore

Bipartisan legislation approved on a busy Saturday by the House of Representatives cuts a path through a thicket of Connecticut liquor laws and regulations with roots reaching back to the repeal of Prohibition. An overhaul of the bottle bill did not fare as well.

On a vote of 140-5, the House gave final passage to An Act Streamlining the Liquor Control Act, a compromise produced by legislators and lobbyists over beers at a meeting hosted by a Hooker.

That would be the Thomas Hooker Brewery at the Colt complex in Hartford. Lobbyists and legislators crowded into a conference room at the brewery, negotiating the bill page by page.

“We’ve really dragged this industry into the 21st century with this bill,” said Rep. Mike D’Agostino, D-Hamden, the co-chair of the General Law Committee, which oversees liquor laws.

By Keith M. Phaneuf

Gov. Ned Lamont and Democratic legislative leaders today announced a tentative, two-year $43 billion budget deal that does not contain the income tax hike on the wealthy sought by progressives in the General Assembly.

Despite this, House Majority Leader Matt Ritter predicted that liberal Democrats would back the package.

“It’s a budget I’m proud of on many fronts,” Lamont said during a late afternoon news conference in his Capitol office, flanked by Democratic legislative leaders. “We’re going to get this vote on … early and on time, a budget that shows we’re living within our means and a budget that invests in our future.”

Neither the Democratic governor nor legislative leaders disclosed all the details of the agreement, most of which had been hammered out late last week.