When Joshua Hall left his teaching position at Hartford's Weaver High School in 2008 to work for the Hartford Federation of Teachers, he didn't give up his salary. Instead, Hartford schools continued to pay him as vice president of the union, with the union only partially reimbursing the schools.
The practice of Connecticut's near-bankrupt capital city paying union workers attracted little notice until April when Hall won a seat in the state house by special election as a member of the Working Families Party.