"We're pretty confident it will be higher than that," he said.

Roy Occhiogrosso, Malloy's senior adviser, said the governor is hopeful the agreement will be ratified but is prepared to follow through with more budget cuts and 6,500 job cuts, including thousands of layoffs. Already, about 3,000 have received notices. Malloy has said that layoff notices issued to unionized workers will be rescinded if the deal is ratified.

The deal is expected to provide $1.6 billion in savings to help balance the two-year, $40.1 billion state budget. It also is supposed to provide future savings from proposed changes such as the retirement age for some workers, increased employee contributions for retiree health care, and mandatory mail order for prescription maintenance drugs.

Bob Alves, a mental health assistant at a state-run center in New Haven, said workers are better educated about the agreement this time. They've attended information sessions, read the tentative agreement on the Internet and talked to their union representatives about the deal. He said there was a lot of confusion in June.

"I would say it's different, definitely. I think this time around, I think folks have had the opportunity to digest the information and to sort it out from what was said to be negative interference that was out there and come up with a conclusion on their own," Alves said. "It's definitely different … more positive and more confident, I would say."

Rosemarie Tate, a registered dietitian at two Hartford-based mental health programs, said a lot of the misinformation and mistrust about the deal that hovered over the first vote has been cleared up in recent weeks. For example, there were concerns among some members that a proposed wellness-based health care program was actually a universal health care system, known as SustiNet, in disguise. The Malloy administration has since made it clear that state employees will not be placed into SustiNet, a long-debated concept that has not been approved by the General Assembly.

"Most of it has been dispelled," Tate said the rumors.

As of Tuesday, at least four unions reported voting in favor of the agreement.

Many workers were gathering at a Hartford union hall to pick up stickers and leaflets to bring back to their workplaces for a last-minute get-out-the-vote effort. Informational meetings were still being held on Tuesday.

Charlene Bell, a 15-year veteran direct care worker at the Southbury Training School, said employees at her work site voted earlier this month in favor of the agreement. Back in June, she said her co-workers voted against the deal, even though the majority of their overall union, the New England Health Care Workers, District 1199, supported it.

Bell said a better job was done this time getting information about the deal out to the rank-and-file members.

Also, she said the real-life ramifications of not ratifying the agreement in June became clearer after Malloy began issuing layoff notices and proposed a budget-balancing plan that included cuts to state vocational high schools, respite programs for families with disabled children, and substance abuse treatment beds.

"When you're start messing with the kids, people start changing their whole attitude and I think they realize the greater impact that it had and how the important the vote was and not to be so selfish," Bell said. "We've got to work a little longer for our retirement. At least we're getting a retirement."