Who is John Rowland? Flash Uganda Media looks at his biography, age, wife, family, tribe, achievements, and relationship with Patricia L. Rowland, Kirsten, Ryan, Robert John, Scott, and Julianne, Lowell P. Weicker Jr., the early life and education of American politician, author, and Republican.
John Rowland also known as John Grosvenor Rowland is an American politician, author, and Republican.
From 1995 through 2004, he served as Connecticut’s 86th Governor.
Governor Rowland was the only governor of Connecticut to serve more than two terms since Wilbur Cross, who served four consecutive terms in the 1930s.
Early Life and Education
John Grosvenor Rowland was born in Waterbury, New Haven County, Connecticut on May 24, 1957.
He attended Holy Cross High School in Waterbury, Connecticut, and graduated in 1975.
In 1979, he earned a bachelor’s degree from Villanova University in Villanova, Pa.
Rowland worked as an insurance agent before entering politics.
He is married to his second wife, Patricia L. Rowland, and the couple has five children: Kirsten, Ryan, Robert John, Scott, and Julianne.
Career and Professional Work Experience
John Rowland’s political career began in 1980 when he was elected to the Connecticut State House of Representatives at the age of 23.
He retained his post until 1984 when he was elected to the United States House of Representatives to represent Connecticut’s 5th congressional district. He was consecutively re-elected in 1986 and again in 1988.
John Rowland served on the Armed Services, Intelligence, and Veterans’ Affairs Committees during his time in Congress.
After losing the governorship to Lowell P. Weicker Jr. in 1990, Rowland worked as a consultant for United Technologies Corp.
He was elected governor of Connecticut in November 1994, making him the state’s youngest governor ever.
He was re-elected to a second term in 1998 and a rare third term in 2002.
Rowland prioritised smart budgeting, economic growth, and enhancing the quality of life for Connecticut families.
Year after year, business and income tax rates were reduced, and the welfare rolls were the lowest in a decade during his term in office.
He strove to develop the state’s education system from the ground up, investing heavily in public schools and institutions.
He also made a historic commitment to protect Connecticut’s natural resources, acquiring 455,000 additional acres of open space and ensuring vigorous Long Island Sound cleaning.
During his governorship, he served three times as chairman of the New England Governors’ Conference.
He also served on the Executive Committee of the National Governors Association.
After a state Supreme Court order, Rowland resigned less than halfway through his third term as governor in July 2004 rather than testify before a special House Committee of Inquiry.
In December 2004, he pled guilty as part of a pay-to-play scam that involved $90,000 in luxury flights from Oxford-based Key Air to Las Vegas and Florida.
Rowland was sentenced to ten months in federal prison on February 10, 2006, followed by four months of house arrest in West Hartford, Connecticut, with an electronic ankle band monitor until June 2006.
Rowland’s lieutenant governor, M. Jodi Rell, succeeded Rowland and led the state legislature to ratify the state’s 2005 campaign finance changes.
Career after First Imprisonment
Rowland was hired as an economic development advisor for the city of Waterbury by Republican Mayor Michael Jarjura in January 2008.
He began working as the city’s economic development coordinator in February and was paid $95,000 per year. Rowland’s tenure as Waterbury’s economic development coordinator came to an end in 2012.
Rowland then moved on to anchor the afternoon show on WTIC (1080) in Hartford from 2010 to 2014.
On April 1, 2014, Connecticut Governor Dannel P. Malloy requested that Rowland be removed from the air owing to his involvement in a corruption case involving former Congressional candidate Lisa Wilson-Foley.
Achievements and Awards
John G. Rowland has a long history of public service, including two stints in the Connecticut State Legislature from 1981 to 1985 and three terms in the United States House of Representatives from 1985 to 1991. From 1994 until 2004, he was Governor of Connecticut for almost three terms.
Rowland was the recipient of numerous public service honours, including the Malcolm Baldridge and Ella Grasso awards.
In 2001, he earned the Women Executives in State Government Excellence in Leadership Award and the Americans for the Arts Outstanding Arts Leadership Award.
In 1995, he earned the Ripon Society’s Jacob Javits Excellence in Public Service award.
Rowland was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in 2003 and won the Outstanding American Award, which recognises those who have used wrestling techniques to establish remarkable careers in other fields.
Rowland advised the Bush Administration on various panels, including the Advisory Committee on Trade Policy and Negotiations and the State and Local Senior Advisory Committee of the National Homeland Security Advisory Council.
Rowland also worked as an afternoon drive-time personality for Farmington’s conservative WTIC-AM radio station.
Controversies
John Rowland was indicted on seven counts of election fraud on April 10, 2014, for his role in an election fraud case in which former congressional candidate Lisa Wilson-Foley, current vice chair of the Bushnell Centre for the Performing Arts, and her husband, Brian Foley, pleaded guilty in federal court on March 31, 2014, to illegally paying Rowland $35,000 in campaign consulting fees.
Rowland was charged with two charges of falsifying documents in a federal inquiry, one count of conspiracy, two counts of false statements to the FEC, and two counts of illicit campaign contributions.
In September 2014, he was found guilty on all seven counts.
Rowland was then sentenced to 30 months in prison by U.S. District Judge Janet Bond Arterton on March 18, 2015.
Rowland was also fined $35,000 by Judge Arterton and forced to serve three years of federal probation monitoring after his release.
Rowland was released from federal custody on May 26, 2018, after serving less than the entire 30-month sentence.
Rowland’s stay in prison, on the other hand, began in 2004 when he was questioned about a hot tub and other work at his lake property in Litchfield.
He claimed he paid for it, but the hot tub and other improvements were presented by state contractors.
Rowland resigned on June 21, 2004, effective at noon on July 1, 2004, facing a substantial chance of impeachment.
He pleaded guilty to depriving the public of honest service on December 23, 2004.
Rowland was sentenced to one year and one day in prison, four months house arrest, three years probation, and community service on March 18, 2005, in New Haven, Connecticut.
On April 1, 2005, he was admitted to the Loretto Federal Correctional Institution in Pennsylvania. His federal inmate identification number was 15623-014.
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