ORONO, MAINE — Former Gov. Dannel P. Malloy has spent much of his summer the same way as everyone else from Connecticut: sitting in traffic.

“Why don’t you tell them to widen I-95 down there,” he quipped during a walk through the University of Maine campus in Orono, where his new office is.

He was named chancellor of the university system in May, and has spent the summer getting to know the complex organization in the state that is, geographically, about six times the size of Connecticut.

In his free time — what little there is of it — Malloy makes the trek back to his home state where his second grandchild was born four weeks ago in Stamford. His wife, Cathy, spends most of her time at the home they purchased in Essex during the final months of his tenure as governor.

So he’s spent a lot of time on the road — paying tolls to every state except Connecticut, he notes — to visit them. Malloy himself is living in an apartment in Bangor, Maine, where he’ll spend even more time once the school year starts this week. Cathy will be the one commuting, then.

At age 64, after more than a quarter-century of holding and seeking prominent public office in Connecticut, it’s clear from visiting him in his new environment that Malloy has shifted his tenacious focus and self-described workaholic nature Down East.

He’s on a self-imposed sabbatical from thinking about, let alone debating, the problems that took up his days in his native state. Although he supported highway tolls, especially in 2018, his last of eight years as governor, that quip about the state’s most congested highway is the closest he comes to offering an opinion on the current state of Connecticut politics or policy.

“I think that the new governor, the newly elected legislature, don’t need to hear from me about what I think they should be doing,” Malloy said. “I have no plan on being dragged into anything for at least a year after I left office.”

He hasn’t reached out to his successor, Gov. Ned Lamont, who spent the past two weeks vacationing on a remote island off Maine’s coast, to offer advice. The last time they spoke was May 30 when Lamont called Malloy to offer congratulations on his new job. They’ve spoken generally a few other times, but Malloy is giving Lamont space to govern in his own way, he said.

Instead, the former governor known for information recall easily rattles off facts about the Maine economy, the state’s demographics and the challenges facing higher education there. It’s not forced — he’s not trying to prove anything. These are the issues on his mind.

When he speaks about how the tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump are affecting the lobster and blueberry industries in the state, it’s from a position of genuine concern. This is his new home, his new focus, and he’s developed a deep understanding of the demographics, culture, size and scope of a state where, until a few months ago, he really hadn’t spent that much time.

Malloy was hired to lead a university system that’s structurally much different than Connecticut’s, based on many of the skills and experiences he acquired as an elected official — his ability to negotiate with unions not least among them.

“We have completed our round of discussions with almost all of our unions,” Malloy said. “But it’s a very different system than the one we inherited in Connecticut. They don’t have mandatory arbitration procedures here. So you don’t have the right to strike or the right to compel arbitration ... It’s somewhat more akin to how we operated for municipal employees. When I was mayor, I was a trustee of a pension plan that was, at its peak, I think was 130 percent financed, as opposed to inheriting a state government that had a 37 percent funding ratio. So the circumstances are very different. But you use the skill set and the talent that you developed.”

As for getting to know the university culture, Malloy isn’t worried. He plans to take in a lot of hockey, as he did in Connecticut. The University of Maine is in the same hockey conference as UConn and his alma mater, Boston College. He claims, with a grin, that won’t be a problem when he’s cheering on the sidelines.

“If the game’s here, absolutely Maine,” he said. “I’m a Bears fan.”

His wife, Cathy, is still working as CEO of the Greater Hartford Arts Council, a job she has held since 2011, his first year as governor. And she’s still active on many of the same issues that were close to their hearts over the past two decades — prison and criminal justice reform, sexual violence and others — and is dogged in her reading of Connecticut news, he said.

She often keeps him up to date on the most important news from his home state, and his new colleagues share stories with him from time to time.

“Obviously Cathy and I have a big commitment to the state of Connecticut … we both care about Connecticut and the place where our children are all likely to live and our grandchildren live,” Malloy said, noting that though he plans to work as long as he can — into his 80s or 90s if he can, he jokes — he will one day retire to his home state, so, “It’s not as if we’re not mindful.”

He might skip a tie more often these days and tell a few more jokes, but he’s still the same guy that was twice elected to lead the state of Connecticut, who didn’t care if his popularity was low and who even reveled in being known for his sometimes-prickly nature.

He knows what he accomplished as governor — and what he didn’t — but of all the places he’s living these days, the past is certainly not one of them.

“When I was mayor I didn’t worry about being governor,” Malloy said. “When I was governor I didn’t worry about being mayor, when I’m chancellor I don’t worry about being governor or mayor. It’s all about what you do in the future, it’s not about what you did in the past … I loved being mayor (of Stamford) for 14 years, and I loved being governor, but I don’t miss being governor or mayor.”

kkrasselt@hearstmediact.com; 203-842-2563; @kaitlynkrasselt