When you call Governor Ned Lamont’s constituent services line, you are offered the opportunity to transfer to 211, the state information line, or to send an email to his office. There’s no one to answer the phone and you can’t leave a voice message to register your suggestion or complaint.
“He needs to understand what people are feeling in that situation,” Hartford Activist Gannon Long said, talking about the unemployment crisis. “You know poverty is an urgent issue. When you have to choose between prioritizing the limited resources you have.”
Long has been trying to call the governor’s office to express her concerns but has been unable to leave a message.
“It’s 2020. I think there’s a lot of different ways to get in touch with people," she said.
She said it's reasonable within a week or two of you contacting your government to get a response.
Max Reiss, Lamont’s communications director, said when the pandemic hit, calls were forwarded to the joint information center and to 211, as just about every single call that came in was COVID-related.
As that begins to change, the office is beginning to catch up.
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In a statement, Reiss said: “In the last ten days, we have caught up on both email and regular mail. Over the course of the pandemic, we have responded to thousands of emails from constituents directly from our office, and that has accelerated in the past two weeks. We’re in the process and planning phase of making the office more nimble for the next possible wave, to ensure we’re as responsible as possible to our constituents.”
