“Challenges for Change” Swings and Misses…Again

There’s still more devil in the details of Challenges for Change.  One of the proposed “efficiencies” is to eliminate the practice of inserting paid notices in 16 local newspapers whenever the state wants to change the Wetlands rules.  These notices serve to inform the public and offer them opportunities to participate in the process.  The cost for advertising, per rule-change, averages $2,000.; and last year, there were 60 occasions when these notices were required. The CFC proposal is to restrict notification to posting on the internet.  According to the Free Press, the annual savings is estimated at $100,000.; and Tom Evslin is quoted as saying:

The more accessible the rules are, the better chance people will see them.

Who could argue with that logic?  As is well-known by Mr. Evslin, we live in a state that is still famously underserved by high-speed internet; a state where a huge segment of the population still relies on newspapers to know what is happening locally.  It is true that, once high-speed internet is universally available in the state, and Vermonters evolve with the available technology, there may come a time when newspaper notifications become unnecessary; but to eliminate them now, when we know the population is demographically aging and therefore more inclined to get their news in traditional ways, will reduce the number of people who are engaged.  How many people in Vermont are going to make a daily visit to the State website to see “what’s new?”  If openness and accessibility are what we expect from our state government, this is a move in the wrong direction.

Like much of the number magic in “Challenges for Change,” the suggested savings of $100,000. is deceptively simple.  Even assuming the figure is accurate, it completely ignores the collateral losses of taking that $100,000. investment away from local newspapers.  That’s what advertising is, essentially: investment.  More small newspapers are succumbing to market pressures every year; and our communities are impacted by those losses.  We may not always like what we read in our local papers; but they still play an important role of connectivity in Vermont.   We can’t afford to lose that any more than we can afford to lose the associated jobs and tax dollars that those 16 local papers mean for Vermont.

About Sue Prent

Artist/Writer/Activist living in St. Albans, Vermont with my husband since 1983. I was born in Chicago; moved to Montreal in 1969; lived there and in Berlin, W. Germany until we finally settled in St. Albans.

6 thoughts on ““Challenges for Change” Swings and Misses…Again

  1. We are at bat and Douglas is trying to slide another one by us. They are masters of “mushroom management.” They keep us in the dark and feed us crap.

  2. “Challenges for change” is one more example of the capitalist disenfranchisement of democracy for anyone except bankers, developers, moguls, kings and thieves. Without great wealth, you are “statistically insignificant” as coal baron Don Blankenship, CEO of Massey Energy and board member of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, said of two his miners burned alive and to death in a fire in one of his mines. Are you wealthy enough to count, democratically?

    witchcat

    Capitalism does not include democracy!

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