Empowered by the Black Lives Matter movement and its focus on racial justice, the long-stalled effort to address Connecticut’s legacy of geographic segregation is gaining fresh attention at the Capitol.

“Housing policy is at the nexus of so many other policy outcomes,” House Majority Leader Jason Rojas said. “It is ... central to the larger debate we’re having right now about equity and racial justice in the wake of the murder of George Floyd and also in the wake of the disproportionate impact COVID has had on lower income communities and communities of color.”

Rojas, a Democrat from East Hartford, joined other advocates at a news conference Friday to promote House Bill 6611, one of several proposals to overhaul local zoning policies that are under consideration by the General Assembly this year.

The measure, which will be the subject of a hearing Monday at the Capitol, is built on the concept of “fair share zoning” and would require communities to develop a plan to ensure they have an adequate stock of affordable housing.

“Towns with greater means and less of a track record of contributing to a solution have to do more,” said Erin Boggs, executive director of the Open Communities Alliance, a civil rights research and advocacy group and the host of the press conference.

Advocates say proposed zoning measures offer Connecticut a chance to ‘right historical wrongs’; opponents say they eliminate local control, Daniela Altimari, Hartford Courant, Mar. 14, 2021, available here