Diana Stricker Photo
“It was an amazing moment when I stood up to speak, to bring up a bill for the first time,” said State Rep. Lonnie Reed (pictured), who just completed her first year serving Branford’s 102nd District.
Reed was recalling how the legislation she introduced last spring gained unanimous approval in both the state House and the Senate. That bill is now a law that helps protect senior citizens from unscrupulous investors.
During her freshman year in office, Reed helped secure passage of a law that removes dangerous chemicals from baby bottles, drafted legislation to regulate “entertainment” ultrasounds for expectant mothers, and worked to enable passage of the Bi-State Long Island Sound Commission.
She plans to keep going. “I’m going to be running again in 2010. Yes, definitely,” she said with a smile as she prepares for the opening of the legislative session on Feb 3.
Despite the long hours and occasional frustrations, she has a passion for government.
“You really do get caught up in a sense of trying to do more,” Reed said. “When you feel that you are fighting the important fight for issues that you care about — and if you don’t win this time, at least you made inroads and you’re building support — it rejuvenates and encourages your sense of purpose. And it’s really a privilege to feel like you’re giving back.”
Prior to entering politics, Reed was an award-winning investigative journalist and documentary producer. She served three terms on Branford’s Representative Town Meeting before running in 2008 for the state legislature. Those experiences gave her insight into the political arena, but actually participating in state government was a different matter.
“It was a dramatic epiphany that even as a news reporter reporting it, you are not really in it until you’re in that room where decisions are being made. It’s really fascinating to find out who your colleagues are and how that impacts what happens. I’ve used my journalism skills … all my skills …to try to find a path that really works for me and to pull together coalitions of like-minded people.”
Reed has served on three state committees during the past year: Energy and Technology; General Law; and Planning and Development. She anticipates continuing on those committees when the legislature resumes in February.
“I really want to work a lot more on figuring out how real change can happen. I have formed coalitions with a lot of legislators,” she said, outlining some of her goals.
“I would like to see lower energy prices, I would like to see regional cooperation and start looking at real ways we can put in regional efficiencies to save money for tax payers. I want to work on education issues … and I’m always involved in environmental issues,” she said. “But really restructuring the budget is on top of my to-do list.”
The economic crisis has taken a toll on the state budget, and Reed feels it’s important to develop a better budgeting process. “One of the frustrations that a lot of us feel is that our state budget needs to be restructured … the whole way we do it.”
She said a results-based accountability process could help determine which programs are effective and which are not.
“We are building a critical mass of people … who think we should bring a business model into the budget process. … This crisis is an opportunity to do things differently.”
Reed was recently appointed to a legislative advisory group to help the state develop new jobs in green energy industries. She was also appointed vice chair of a committee to help create incentives for regional cooperation among communities.
Another challenge she will take on is the cell tower issue, since the Energy and Technology Committee has purview over the Connecticut Siting Council — the agency which oversees tower placement.
Looking back over the past year, Reed talked about some of the legislation she took a key role in developing.
The first bill she wrote was triggered by a family experience. Her father, whom she describes as a “very shrewd, very astute” businessman was victimized by an unscrupulous financial advisor. “It was a serious fleecing of his retirement funds,” Reed said.
After researching the problem, she realized that any senior citizen could fall prey to the same type of investment fraud. Connecticut, like most states, did not have a law requiring that financial advisors be specifically certified to sell investment products to senior citizens. “My take-away message was that this is happening all over the country,” she said.
Reed drafted a law to prohibit financial consultants and life insurance agents from claiming to be certified senior citizen advisors unless their training is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. Violators can be fined up to $5,000, lose their license and face up to two years in prison.
“It was the first bill I had written and introduced myself,” she said. “It went through unanimously in both the House and Senate and was signed by the governor.”
She received the Outstanding Legislator award from the AARP for her work on the bill.
Melissa Ozols Photo
Reed, Widlitz, Heinrich
She credits two shoreline legislators for their help during the past year, Rep. Pat Widlitz (D‑Branford and Guilford); and Rep. Deb Heinrich (D‑Guilford and Madison). The three have joined forces on several pieces of legislation
While celebrating the success of her first bill, Widlitz advised her: “Don’t get used to this, it’s never this easy.”
The three-woman coalition were responsible for drafting the “entertainment ultrasound” bill which puts controls on non-medical facilities that offer ultrasound photos and videos to pregnant women. Reed said the issue surfaced when constituents contacted her about their concerns regarding health and safety.
“We thought there ought to be more oversight,” Reed said in regard to the ultrasound boutiques. The bill, which is now law, puts regulations on the facilities and requires a doctor’s prescription before a woman receives an entertainment ultrasound.
Reed said that’s just one example of how calls from constituents can lead to action.
“One of the things that I really, really found surprising is how much constituent work we do, and how much constituents depend on us. Some days it makes you almost weep at some of the problems they’re having.”
One day an elderly woman called Reed because she was having trouble getting the prescription medicine she needed. After several phone calls, Reed had cut through the red tape and solved the problem.
“There’s such a sense you’re really helping when you hear the sound of their voice. I feel privileged to be able to do that.”
Reed also helped steer legislation through the General Law Committee in regard to Bisphenol‑A (BPA), a chemical found in some baby bottles and in the lining of some food containers. A bill had been drafted to phase out BPA in baby products, but Reed learned the bill faced problems in the committee. She knew she needed to find convincing arguments and factual information.
“I went back to the research and talked to a lot of doctors and oncologists and pre-natal care people and I had new information,” Reed said. One of the things she learned was that lab tests indicate that BPA mimics estrogen in the bloodstream and can affect cancer patients.
“I’m a breast cancer survivor,” Reed said. “I know that anything that mimics estrogen in huge doses is a bad thing to have coursing through your system.” Friends advised her that telling the committee about her own experience with cancer would make her arguments more personal.
“So I told my story, and mentioned my breast cancer … I never talked about it (publicly) until that moment.”
Following her presentation, the BPA legislation regarding baby products passed unanimously through the committee and was eventually voted into law.
Now Reed and others want to expand the BPA ban to other food containers. “We’re going to be working on it in the coming year,” she said.
She was honored by the Coalition for a Safe and Healthy Connecticut for her work on the BPA ban, and also for her efforts to pass the Green Cleaning Bill, which protects school children from caustic cleaning products.
Reed was also instrumental in enacting the Bi-State Long Island Sound Commission, commission designed to handle environmental issues common to New York and Connecticut.
“That’s really an outgrowth of all the work we did,” Reed said, in reference to Broadwater and Islander East.
“I love being in a position to help,” she said. “To actually be in the mechanism where you can write legislation, you can build coalitions … and speak to the issues in a way that can hopefully build support. Just the ability to have a vote in the matter really feels good.”
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