The Vermont Legislature is a part-time citizen legislature that begins its session in January and ajourns in May. Legislative pay is not that high, there aren't a lot of legislative staff, and many times legislators come to rely on lobbyists for expertise when it comes to certain legislation.

Many of the legislators are retired, have the flexibility to hold a legislative position while having another job or some other circumstance that allows them to serve in the legislature. This in itself is not a bad thing, but I view it as holding back many people who would otherwise be interested in a career in politics.

The barriers to entry are high. How? The pay is low enough that it turns off many people who would otherwise be excellent legislators (people need to make a living) and the part-time aspect of it disrupts schedules for many citizens. Most people don't have the flexibility required in their lives (whatever they may be). Most jobs I know of certainly wouldn't allow you to take off months at a time to serve as a legislator in a part-time capacity.

This bothers me tremendously. While the commitment of our current legislators is commendable, I see that the challenges the state faces might not be adequately met by the current system. How so? The state faces many funding challenges, an aging population and high costs of living and an increasingly complex set of issues that require full-time commitment from the people's representatives. The fact that we have a citizen legislature is an anachronism, a half-assed measure that seems outdated.

A Burlington Free Press article describing how Vermont is unable to escape a tech albatross is a perfect example. After the fiasco that took place with Vermont Health Connect, many legislators feel ill-equipped to vet computer technology overhauls and there is no committee to handle technology issues. 

Hmm, well of course they are ill-equipped. They lack a sufficient number of professional legislative staff. Their primary focus most of the year isn't on serving in the legislature, it is on other things. They're bringing a water bucket to a forest fire.

So what do they do? They kick the can down the road, even when many important government programs handing out benefits are operating on computer systems dating back to the 1980s and for which they can't find sufficient staff or parts to keep it going. Are these guys for real? The article states there are many federally mandated programs which are on hold in Vermont (about 50) and the state is facing hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines. Are you f*cking kidding me?!

A profession legislature brings many benefits. Among them, it attracts more qualified members, more time for policy development and DELIBERATION, increased ability to influence the policymaking process and an increased ability to focus on legislative issues. There are downsides to it of course, namely that it COSTS MORE MONEY. 

If legislators aren't up to the task, then they should resign, or even better yet, vote to reform the legislative branch and transform themselves into a professional body that will give themselves the time to actually tackle these issues. For the moment, all I hear is the clattering of a can hitting the road.  

As Town Meeting Day is just a couple of weeks away, I have decided to preview some of the ballot items and races. I will start with the mayor's race.

There are 4 candidates for mayor:  Weinberger (Democrat), the incumbent; two challengers from the left, Progressive Steve Goodking and Independent Greg Guma, and one challenger from the right, Libertarian Loyal Ploof. I haven't followed the mayor's race that closely and I don't feel that there is much of a race to begin with. There had been recent demonstrations about the selling of land from Burlington College to a private developer, and of Weinberger's close ties to real-estate developers. In times past, I would have been a proponent of the Progressives, but after the Burlington Telecom debacle and the fiscal mess the Kiss administration left behind, I have few qualms with incumbent Weinberger. There is some anger in the community about the pro-development agenda of his adminstration, but I can only see the left splitting the vote and leaving him with a relatively comfortable path to victory. Loyal Ploof might be the best positioned to end in second place. 

Now on to some of the ballot items:

School Budget: It increased again, and there were findings that the school district was still in the red. I know it's going to pass, but I'm going to vote no. It increases my rent and this city is unaffordable as it is. 

Pledging city credit to downtown TIF district: Yes. Weinberger has done a good job restoring the city's credit rating, and I'm willing to give his administration a chance to improve the downtown district.

Allow noncitizens to serve on city boards and as department heads: Yes, there is nothing wrong with that as they are residents of the city and deserve to have a say about it.

Non-citizens to vote in municipal and school elections: I've thought about it, and I am voting no. Even though there were instances in the past where non-citizens were allowed to vote, all I have to say is that it is one of the few rights that separates lawful residents from US citizens. I say, become a citizen and vote. Many people would feel differently about that idea though. 

Board terms for three years: Yes, there is something as voting too often for people. I feel that voting for federal representatives every two years is too much. I feel the same about elections on the local level as well.

Eliminating requirement to political affiliation for certain city boards: Yes.

What do you guys think? I don't feel that invested in the items coming up this Town Meeting Day, but I have given my take on them and I will go and vote. 

( – promoted by Sue Prent)

1. School Budget for FY 2015. Convincingly defeated and it seemed to be a theme across many towns across the state. The property tax formula that comes from the Legislature probably has to change, as is argued in another post.

2. TIF District. The Moran plant demolition scenario. It passed and I'm glad it did. One hopes there is a finality to this. If not, the Moran plant redevelopment could take on as a pun to Groundhog Day.

3. Increase in tax rate for the general fund. Narrow approval for a small increase. This felt more justified than the school budget. The narrowness of the approval might be something to consider. The mayor can't be guaranteed that he'll get approvals on more increases in the upcoming years if he comes back to the city voters to ask for more. A little bit of tax fatigue but not enough just yet.

4. Referendum on Issuance of Bonds to purchase Winooski River dam under bridge connecting Burlington and Winooksi. Burlington said yes to common sense.

5. Redefining Ward Boundaries. Approved and has to be approved by the Legislature. It won't be a problem. Now it's just a matter of seeing how it will be in practice and whether there is a lot of confusion for voters. 

6. Confiscate weapons in domestic abuse incident. Approved. Needs to be approved by Legislature. It isn't going to happen anytime soon.

7. Charter change to forbid firearms in any establishment with a liquor license. Approved as well. It won't get the Legislature's blessing. 

8. Safe storage of firearms. 3 out of 3 gun-related ballot items approved and by wide margins. There sure were a lot of signs pro and con that littered the lawns and sidewalks of the city.I'll be glad to see those gone. Now the question is, as Sue Prent asked, can an overdue conversation begin on this fraught topic?

( – promoted by kestrel9000)

There has been some controversy lately over some issues on the Burlington ballot and as a Burlington resident I’m offering my perspective on all the ballot issues this upcoming Town Meeting day.  

1. School Budget for FY 2015. The budget is increasing about 9% to $66,870,000 approximately. As a renter in the Old North End I used to approve the increases without much question as I’m sympathetic to a proper education for young people, which is increasingly under assault across the country. Much of the drive in the increase is a change in the formula to raise property taxes which has been mandated by the state legislature, so the school board really isn’t at fault for all of the increase, but after a year in which it had already increased 10%, it is hard to swallow another one, especially as landlords are using that as a reason to jack up rent. I’m going to vote it down. Even if it fails, another similar one will be brought up later with a lower turnout and relatively unchanged, except for a slightly smaller increase, and will eventually pass.

2. TIF District. The Moran plant demolition scenario. This is a complex item (refer to link above) with many pieces to it. The main portion deals with the Moran plant redevelopment. Most of the money will come from private funding, but the city will leverage a maximum of $9,600,000 issued in bonds and where TIF district tax increments will be used to pay for the repayment of said bonds. There will be Waterfront Park upgrades, a new home for the Lake Champlain Community Sailing Center, construction of a new marina on the northern portion of the Waterfront, construction of outdoor amenities around the Leahy Echo Center and improvement for northern parts of the Waterfront access. Most of the funds for the project should come from private funding, as this bond is only for the city’s part. If private funding fails to materialize, the Mayor and the City Council could use TIF funding to demolish the Moran Plant. After seeing the eyesore that the Moran plant has been for so many years and the inability to get something done about it, I think demolition is the best thing to happen to the Waterfront. My take is that the private funding (in the hands of 2 UVM seniors and a private business sector partner) will be insufficient and the Mayor will eventually get the Moran demolished. My vote is Yes, if nothing but for the hope that they demolish the Moran Plant.

3. Increase in tax rate for the general fund. Increase in property taxes for the general fund of nearly 3%. I have mixed feelings about this, but I could stomach it. This hasn’t been raised for a while (as far as I have been aware). I think it probably won’t pass, but I could tentatively vote for it (but then why am I voting for one increase and not for another?). Namely the increase isn’t as overblown as the other one. Tentative yes.

4. Referendum on Issuance of Bonds to purchase Winooski River dam under bridge connecting Burlington and Winooksi. This is a no-brainer. Yes, after paying off the bond and assurance from Burlington Electric that it won’t increase rates and it still has decades of service left, as well as being sustainable, baseload power right next door, it is in the best interests of the city and its ratepayers. Yes.

5. Redefining Ward Boundaries. Basically this is a two-tier process. There are four electoral districts electing one counselor each, and eight wards electing one counselor each, for a total of 12 city counselors. This is the best the City Council and the Reapportionment Board could come up with and bring to the city voters. If its makeup is confusing, well, it is. In my opinion, while they tried their best to do a fair job and get input from everyone, the need to have two tiers of districts just makes things more complicated than they should be. I’m not sure if it will pass. My vote is No. It’s not a deal-breaker for me and I could live with it without a major fuss, but I seriously don’t get the need to overcomplicate things in these matters.

6. Confiscate weapons in domestic abuse incident. Oh dear, the City Council and Mayor, as well as many fellow citizens decided to open up this can of worms. There has been a serious and passionate debate on this blog recently over this issue. Personally, I find myself aghast and puzzled by the passion for weapons in this country, but then, I'm not a native, so it will always be a bit of a mystery. I personally think they should be completely banned for personal use because there is no need to have a gun. There are many responsible gun owners, but there are also many irresponsible ones. Guns are also used as a way to threaten people, and in this scenario, women who are the victims of domestic abuse often stay in relationships because they are intimidated with the use of firearms. This should be a simple Yes. There is one big problem though: the US Constitution and the Vermont Constitution. I have read the Vermont Statutes and only the state has the right to regulate firearms, not towns. This item would ask the Legislature to allow Burlington to have an exception. That is not going to happen. It also makes the town ripe for lawsuits. That costs money. Burlington has already lost a lot of money in lawsuits. There is no need for more needless lawsuits. I like the US Constitution and the Vermont Constitution, but there are aspects of it that I seriously disagree with. Will I vote Yes or No? To be honest, I just might abstain on this one.

7. Charter change to forbid firearms in any establishment with a liquor license. Do we really need this? I agree firearms don’t belong in said establishments except for law enforcement. Why not just engage the establishments directly and ask them to forbid it on their own. It is in their best interests not to have people with guns in them and I don’t think it would take much persuasion to do so. I’m leaning No, but I might abstain also on this one.

8. Safe storage of firearms. Third gun charter change proposal and last ballot item. Again I agree with the proposition. Common sense, which I know many gun owners already practice, but some don’t. I won’t rehash arguments here, except for lawsuits and approval from the state. Do we need the state to dictate what to do on this? This is a tentative Yes, but I’m leaning towards abstention.  

Update: Terje was kind enough to correct my mistake. The list I have linked to was incomplete and the Secretary of State will have an updated list and should have 2 Democratic candidates represented in Chittenden 6-3. My bad.

Vermont Digger finally has the complete list of candidates who have filed to run for office in Vermont. I happened to notice that for the two seats in Chittenden 6-3, represented now by Jill Krowinski and Jason Lorber, has 4 candidates, 2 Progressives, 1 Independent and 1 Democrat. Krowinski is running for reelection. Lorber is not. It was mentioned in the Seven Days blog, Blurt on June 8th, about a week before the filing deadline.

I was surprised that the Dems hadn't filed two candidates for this district because they pretty much have a lock on it at the state level. However, with Lorber's late announcement, either no one was interested or the local Dems were caught unexpectedly by Lorber's announcement. I would think that Lorber would have had the foresight to tell local Democratic leaders that he wouldn't run again so that they could have time to draft somebody else to run and get the necessary signatures to run for the seat, and would have had a good chance at being elected, considering Obama is at the top of the ticket this November. 

The Democrats aren't in any danger of losing control of the Vermont House this November, but carelessness like this, combined with the not giving a damn about his House seat  Lorber, does them no favors as well. I thinks it is akin to shooting yourself in the foot for no reason whatsoever. One must concede that a Progressive would have a very similar voting record to a Democrat, if not even more leftist at that, but I think this is a stupid mistake to make under any circumstances. It might be more Lorber's fault or the local Dems, I'm not sure, but it would be nice if they paid more attention to such details. The only way to remedy it would be to draft somebody as a write-in, although that would be hard to do. If anyone can shed light on this issue and why such a mistake took place, I would be glad to know and be enlightened about it. 

So in one week's time there will be both the Progressive and Democratic caucuses to nominate candidates for Burlington mayor. The Progs had originally planned their caucus for December 11th. As we know, Burlington Dems held their caucus last month and ended with a tie between Tim Ashe and Miro Weinberger after several rounds of votes. Only people who registered for the original caucus will be able to cast a ballot in the subsequent one. The Democrats then determined to hold their caucus on the same day as the Progressives and at nearly the same time.

There is still bad blood between Dems and Progs here in Burlington. Even if Ashe has done a good job representing Chittenden County in the Vermont Senate, his pursual of the mayoral nomination has raised divisions in Burlington Dems. To judge by comments on Blurt, the Seven Days blog, Dems who are supportive of Miro or other defeated Dem candidates might be ready to jump ship if Ashe wins the nomination and back Wright. This is despite the fact that both Wright and Ashe were on the Board of Finance when Burlington Telecom was going through all of its problems. Ashe is being haunted by some comments he has made in the past, while Kurt is benefitting mostly by not being a Progressive, having a high profile in the city for years and having the backing of the New North End, which turns out heavily to vote in local elections.

The fact that both caucuses are the same day rankled Progressives in Burlington and if Ashe isn't nominated, along with Progressives electing to nominate somebody would mean a 3-way race that could easily hand Wright the mayor's office. This is made even easier after IRV was repealed, as we reverted to the old system of just needing to get above 40% to win. I didn't participate in the Dem caucus and I'm not about to attend the Prog one either. I will vote for the Dem nominee, but observing all the snipping at each other will just make Wright's life a lot easier. The messy Dem caucus not ending with a winner definitely didn't help, but the subsequent caucus to be held at the same time as the Prog's was like rubbing salt in a wound, it stings.

I have some popcorn on the shelf ready to watch the spectacle, if tempers and ego boil over come December 11th.

( – promoted by odum)

VPR came out with a report just shortly ago that the Senate Health & Welfare Committee voted the bill unanimously out of committee. It goes on to report on the key parts of the bill, mainly the creation of the 5-person GMC Board as well as setting up the health exchange. 

There is one piece of the legislation that does concern me a little bit. Even after the House had changed the name of the legislation and striken out the mention of single payer, the Senate Health Care Comittee added an amendment by Senator Mullin. Bob Kinzel reports that “the key to winning the support of everyone on the committee was a provision that calls for a comprehensive study before the state considers adopting a single payer system.”

I had to wrap my head around that for the moment and ask myself the question. Was this a bit of deja-vu? Hadn't we already done something similar in commissioning the Hsiao Report? (Update: DH points out in comments the difference between the Mullin amendment and the Hsiao report. Thanks for the correction) Isn't that a comprehensive study of different models of single payer systems for Vermont and have a recommendation for the model that would best serve the state? I gave the legislation voted out of the Senate Health & Welfare Committee a quick look (it's 135 pages) and I don't see a reference to a study, but I'm in a bit of a rush and haven't looked at it deeply, so correct me if I'm wrong about that.

Also, Sen. Baruth had a post a few days back relating to this problem. He says, “The first of these threats has been institutionalized by this point: the House and Senate have agreed to move the Administration’s single-payer plan in a two-stage process, with the empty structure and the resulting questions on the front end, and all of the details, figures and final answers on the back end. That leaves pro-reform elected officials defending against anything and everything for a period of 18 months, minimum.” 

The problem with putting in a study before adopting a single payer system is the delay that Baruth is worried about. I don't know about what others think, but this seems to be a strategy of a death by a thousand cuts, and the Senate Health Committee seemingly is going along with this. Delays and stalling tactics will increase pressure and doubts on the legislature and governor, imperiling the original intent of the administration and leaving us with just with a vastly diminished reform. Am I being a bit too worried here or does this worry have any merit to it?

President Obama is getting together later day with Congressional leaders in a last ditch attempt to avoid a government shutdown. Meanwhile, the administration is preparing for a possible government shutdown, as was revealed through a memo that was leaked to the Washington Post. If an agreement can’t be reached on continuing funding government activities through the rest of the fiscal year 2011(ending on September 30th), many vital government activities will cease, except those that are vital to national security, etc. I have been following the ongoing drama, and if this can be averted, there are still vital battles ahead on government funding: first, is the debt limit on the amount of money the federal government can borrow, which will be reached at some point this spring and if not increased, will cause at least a partial shutdown of government services and FY 2012 budget, with a first proposal being released today by Rep. Paul Ryan that proposes to phase out and slash Medicare, with the ever-ready voucher system conservatives profess so much love for to take its place.

As a federal employee I am disturbed at the lack of seriousness and dimwitted ideology that the Republican Party has wrapped itself merrily in and I am grateful knowing that at least initially I wouldn’t be seriously affected by the shutdown (working in an agency with its own source of revenue and only a relatively small supplement from Congress makes it easier). Republicans on the national level are pretty happy with a scorched earth policy and to hell with whoever gets caught in the way, as we are all just collateral damage. So far I’ve heard no serious debate on them cutting their own pay and benefits during a shutdown, even as some Congressional Democrats have been pushing for it. They truly know no pain because they don’t even bother to empathize. That’s what willfull ignorance does to you. I’m not very hopeful that President Obama and Congressional Democrats will have the spine to stand up to such nonsense and dare to put the Republicans’ feet to the fire. There will be a price to pay. If Democrats blink, it will be them and there will be more misery in the coming years.

 Know hope!

Hello,

This is my first diary on this website. I find myself today in the VT Statehouse on internship duty for a state Rep. I was in the middle of a couple of duties in the internship while I was listening to the Rep. Consejo’s speech on the floor on VPR. After the brouhaha raised last week by teabagger Rep. Burditt ranting that there is nothing compassionate about socialism, Rep. Consejo gave a heartfelt speech which I only half caught, and while some Reps were starting to come back into the Committee Room and listened to it. There were a couple of remarks approving his stand, giving his history of how he became a citizen, etc. Of course, this approval came from the Democratic members of the committee, who don’t seem to think very highly of teabagger friendly Rep. Burditt. It would be nice if someone could post the content of the speech on the website or maybe ask Rep. Consejo to provide something. I wasn’t expecting such a moment during a day when there was little business going on the House floor. But it’s nice to know that there are elected representatives out there courageous enough to stand up to speech-mongering and unsubstantiated accusations. Now it’s back to business.