Rell, M. Jodi (Mary Jodi), 1946-

<p>Mary Carolyn "Jodi" Rell (born June 16, 1946) is an American former Republican politician and the 87th Governor of the U.S. state of Connecticut from 2004 until 2011. Rell also served as the state's 105th Lieutenant Governor.</p>

<p>Rell was Connecticut's second female Governor, after Ella Grasso. Rell did not seek re-election in 2010. As of 2021, she is the last Republican Governor of Connecticut.</p>

<p>Born Mary Carolyn Reavis in Norfolk, Virginia, Rell attended Old Dominion University, but left in 1967 to marry Lou Rell, a U.S. Navy pilot. The couple first moved to New Jersey, where Lou Rell took a position as a commercial airline pilot with Trans World Airlines. The family then moved to a 19th-century farmhouse in Brookfield, Connecticut in 1969. Jodi Rell later attended, but did not graduate from, Western Connecticut State University. She received honorary law doctorates from the University of Hartford in 2001 and the University of New Haven in 2004. In 2015 she received an honorary doctorate degree of humane letters from Western Connecticut State University. In her early career, she tutored and did substitute work for the Hartford Public Schools.</p>

M. Jodi Rell was born in Norfolk, Virginia. She attended Old Dominion University and Western Connecticut State University. She received honorary doctor of law degrees from the University of Hartford in 2001 and the University of New Haven in 2004. She served in the Connecticut House of Representatives, where she held key leadership posts including Deputy House Minority Leader and Assistant House Minority Leader. Rell served as Lieutenant Governor for over nine years, succeeding to the governorship upon the resignation of John Rowland. She was elected to her own full term as governor in November, 2006. As the first woman Republican Governor of Connecticut, Rell strengthened Connecticut’s’ economy by creating a skilled workforce, making Connecticut business-friendly, and providing incentives to encourage job creation. Rell made unprecedented investments in innovative early childhood programs to ensure that children begin school ready to learn. She also signed into law two balanced and on-time state budgets that honored the state’s spending cap, provided for the state’s “Rainy Day” budget reserve fund to be filled, and invested in other critical priorities.