RAT Changes Torrington Transfer Station Sale
Rep. Maria Horn, Chair of the Finance Committee, was unaware that the rat had been added to the bill she sponsored. Photo by Yehyun Kim / CT Mirror
On June 2, as the Connecticut legislature faced end-of-session chaos, a 77-word provision quietly made its way into the 745-page, $55.8 billion budget implementer bill. The language, arriving via email from attorney Joseph Mazzarella, was designed to benefit two of his waste hauler clients: Country Holdings, trying to reopen a Wallingford transfer station, and Enviro Express, seeking to keep control over a Torrington transfer facility.
Aided by Democratic Party insider Vincent Mauro Jr., who works at Mazzarella’s law firm, the proposal reached the inboxes of high-level staffers—including Courtney Cullinan, chief of staff to Senate President Martin Looney, and Franklin Perry, chief of staff to House Speaker Matt Ritter—just a few hours before the House was set to debate the bill. How it was drafted into the final bill is a process few are willing to describe.
Known at the Capitol as a “rat,” such narrow, last-minute provisions routinely bypass public hearings and scrutiny. Nobody in legislative leadership would admit to authorizing it; Looney and Ritter both said they were unaware of the amendment’s full consequences when the bill passed. Republican leaders also said they had no knowledge of the provision until after the fact, and local officials whose communities relied on the Torrington transfer station were caught off-guard.
Rep. Maria Horn, D-Salisbury, whose district includes many towns that use the Torrington transfer station, was nominally the amendment’s sponsor, but even she struggled to explain it when questioned before the vote. “I thought I knew what was in it,” Horn later admitted. “I had notes as to what was in it, but they were not complete, I regret to say.”
The amendment directed the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection (DEEP) to issue a temporary permit for Country Holdings’ Wallingford facility, bypassing usual environmental review. According to DEEP, such a legislative order to issue a permit was unprecedented; ultimately, the attorney general’s office advised the directive was unenforceable. Meanwhile, the amendment also mandated that the Torrington transfer station’s permit be kept in public hands, preventing it from being sold to USA Waste & Recycling, a large private company.
This legislative move upended ongoing negotiations. Municipalities in northwestern Connecticut, led by the Northwest Hills Council of Governments, had been working to finalize a public acquisition of the Torrington station after ownership was transferred from the soon-to-be-defunct Materials Innovation and Recycling Authority (MIRA). However, MIRA’s board accepted a $3.25 million offer from USA Waste & Recycling in late May, believing it provided both stable trash rates and a contribution toward environmental cleanup costs at an old Hartford facility.
The sudden amendment derailed the sale. Local officials like Elinor Carbone, mayor of Torrington, and 1st Selectman Todd Carusillo of Goshen, supported keeping the station public, fearing eventual price hikes if a large private company gained control. Still, municipal leaders and legislators—including those whose districts would benefit—were blindsided by the process. Some, like Rep. Joe Canino, thought the ownership dispute was over until alerted to the measure’s impact only hours before the vote.
No one in leadership has taken responsibility for inserting the “rat.” While occasional last-minute favors like this have appeared in previous budgets, those typically carried at least some acknowledgement from the sponsoring caucus. In this instance, the lawyer, the lobbyist, and two powerful legislative staffers were all linked—though all sidestepped the label of direct involvement.
Mayor Carbone summed up the confusion, saying, “I think it had something to do with the attorney for Enviro knowing somebody who through the political framework was able to draft that legislation and get it in. I still don’t even know all the names involved.” Similarly, Hartford Mayor Arunan Arulampalam described the Capitol as being busy with “chasing this rabbit around.”
In the end, the last-minute insertion left winners and losers: two small waste companies got regulatory relief and public control of a valuable facility was preserved, but the episode cast a new spotlight on how, in the frenetic final hours of a Connecticut legislative session, major policy and financial changes can occur with minimal transparency and accountability.
