As the Speaker of the House of Representatives in Connecticut, Chris Donovan (D-Meriden) is a powerful man. Elected to the position in January, Speaker Donovan had previously served as Majority Leader for two terms and has been in the General Assembly since 1992. Donovan's lengthy tenure and ascent to power is a credit to his leadership skills - skills that he displayed while participating in the first cycle of the Citizens' Election Program in November.

In his first run with the state's new public financing system, Donovan found that the process was very straightforward. "It felt very local. I actually completed my campaigning early on in the year...it was a lot of small contributions, people in the community got into it and I found it relatively easy." However, as a leader in the House Democratic Caucus, he and others were there to ensure that members of the party were well equipped to run under the new system. "We would have consultants - our own people running around making sure - ‘Hey, did you get this done in time? Hey, here's the things you need to do.' So providing a kind of technical support to candidates out there so they can take full advantage of it [the program]...kind of making sure everybody knows how to fill the forms outs and advice along the way."

And many candidates did take advantage of the Citizens' Elections Program and the resources being offered. To use Speaker Donovan's words, "Participation [was] great. Tremendous." In total, 75 percent of candidates in the General Election used the Program and 81 percent of the General Assembly is now comprised of elected officials who ran and won using the Connecticut Clean Elections program.

Part of the allure of the Citizens' Election Program is that it brings candidates back to their roots by having them raise the majority of their qualifying contributions in their own district. "I think the best thing about it is it makes elections closer to home...It's just you and your district and your community, and people feel good about that," Donovan said.

Community involvement has played an important part in Speaker Donovan's life. After receiving his bachelor's degree in biology from Villanova University, he went on to complete a master's in social work from the University of Connecticut School of Social Work, where he specialized in community organizing. As a community organizer, Donovan focused on environmental, energy and housing issues, but has also been active on family leave and pay equity issues. Speaker Donovan presently serves as an adjunct faculty member in the sociology and political science departments at the University of Hartford. [1]

In his role as Speaker, Donovan is focusing on making healthcare more affordable for all through new healthcare reform legislation. Passage of the Connecticut Healthcare Partnership is a priority that Donovan sees as within reach. Though healthcare reform has been a divisive issue in the past, with the influence of special interests vastly reduced through the implementation of the Citizens' Election Program, members of the General Assembly can now vote freely without worrying about repercussions from big-moneyed donors. Donovan notes that since the program's inception, the perception of the public has been altered as well. Constituents no longer think, "Hey! You're getting money from this group and you're voting for this issue," said Donovan. "So it removes that [perception of possibly impropriety] and makes people feel more at ease."

As a leader in the General Assembly who helped push for the Citizens' Election Program, Speaker Donovan is very proud of its accomplishments. "It works here in the state of Connecticut. I think the model worked very well. I think the system we put together was a really good system." Connecticut's success with the Citizens' Election Program was the result of hard work by many activists and state leaders, and Speaker Donovan's devotion to Clean Elections is certainly one of the reasons for that success.


[1] http://www.housedems.ct.gov/Donovan/bio084.asp