Per today’s Rutland Herald:

Larry Smith, spokesman for Entergy Nuclear, said Monday that the hole was located in an elbow in a 1-1/2-inch pipe, and he said the company was investigating what caused the hole and whether to replace the elbow or patch it.

[…]

The water coming from the hole is not reaching the environment, since it is in an underground pipe tunnel and the water goes into a drain, where it is eventually treated, Smith said.

So just to make this clear: there is a hole in this pipe, but there is no danger to “the environment” because the liquid goes through other underground pipes before being released into “the environment.”

Anyone else see the… hole… in this suggestion?

UPDATE: The Free Press reports this deal is off. Cool. Wonder if that means they’ll ask for their contribution back from the Governor. -odum

The Free Press takes note today for Vermonters of the imminent arrival of approximately 33,000 tons of contaminated soil. This hazardous soil will be shipped to Interstate Waste Service’s Moretown landfill. The dioxin-contaminated soil is coming from a Massachusetts Superfund site where wood was treated chemically. This ARRA funded cleanup will make way for a 120 space parking lot. According to a Foxboro Ma. Newspaper, it will take roughly one thousand round trips and 100 work days to haul it away.  

Vermont Powerless unless the soil is reclassified?

The soil is a hazardous “substance” according to Federal EPA and must be removed from the Massachusetts site. However, in logic that’s worthy of Catch 22, the soil is not a hazardous “waste” and therefore can be dumped in Vermont. A manager at Interstate Waste’s Moretown site couldn’t say “offhand” if they tested leachate for dioxins.[to clarify: leachates at the Moretown Landfill]     Vermont’s ANR Dave DiDomenico says unless the Federal EPA reclassifies the soil as hazardous, it can do nothing to stop the dumping in Moretown.

“They are private landfills. We can’t force them to take a waste, and we can’t not allow them to take something that isn’t hazardous,” he said.

 

Douglas’ Waste Service Donations

In July last year Seven Days and Green Mountain Daily noted that among other donations   Governor Douglas had received large (by Vermont standards) $2,000 campaign donations from the Interstate Waste Service Moretown landfill and a small landfill in South Hadley Mass. The South Hadley landfill is owned by the town and operated by Interstate Waste Services.  

Is there a group that it's still socially acceptable to attack, stigmatize, and stereotype?

Apparently it's people with psychiatric diagnoses.

You can't turn on a crime drama on TV without seeing the guilty, or scary, mental patient. YOu can barely go to the movies without  finding a psychotic killer, or a heartwarming story of a mental patient overcoming adversity. Either way, the underlying thread is that those people are not like us.

We see it in Vermont, too. You probably remember a few years ago, when the Vermont Teddy Bear Company decided to make a profit by mocking mental patients with their Crazy For You Bear. They actually seemed surprised when people were offended.

Now, those lovely folks at Vermont Commons, sponsors of the Second Vermont Republic and their neo-confederate buddies, are  helping advertise for a play called Mixed Nuts.

Mixed Nuts, a screw-ball musical comedy by Jim Hogue, will be performed at the Unadilla Theatre from August 24 – 31 (and later at the Vergennes Opera House).

The play is about 6 inmates from the Vermont State Hospital who escape to make Vermont an independent Republic.

Yup, those madcap Vermont State Hospital inmates–always good for a laugh.

Keep it up, guys.

Cross posted from the Worldwatch Institute’s Nourishing the Planet.

Care International’s work in Zambia has two main goals: increase the production of staple crops and improve farmers’ access to agricultural inputs, such as seeds and fertilizers. But instead of giving away bags of seed and fertilizers to farmers, Care is “creating input access through a business approach,” not a subsidy approach, according to Steve Power, Assistant Country Director for Zambia.

One way they’re doing this is by creating a network of agro-dealers who can sell inputs to their neighbors as well as educate them about how to use hybrid seeds, fertilizers, and other inputs. At the same time, “we are mindful” of the benefits of local varieties of seeds, says Harry Ngoma, Agriculture Advisor for the Consortium for Food Security, Agriculture and Nutrition, AIDS, Resiliency and Markets (C-FAARM). Care and C-FAARM are working with farmers to combine high- and low-technology practices.

Care thinks that this “business approach” will help farmers get the right inputs at the right time, unlike subsidy approaches that give farmers fertilizer for free, but often at the wrong time of year, making the nutrients unavailable to crops. And Care’s focus on training agro-dealers and giving them start-up grants allows the organization to remain invisible to farmers. Power says that Care wants to be a “catalyst to the market” and help transfer resources, without distorting the basic pricing structure.

Another component of Care’s work is improving the production of sorghum and cassava. “Zambia is as addicted to maize as we are to Starbucks coffee,” says Power. But by encouraging the growth of other crops, including sorghum, which is indigenous to Africa, Care can help farms diversify local diets as well as build resilience to price fluctuations and drought.

Care is promoting conservation farming in Zambia as well. The organization has been working in six districts since 2007, reaching 24,000 households. In addition to promoting minimum tillage practices and the use of manure and compost, Care is helping to train government extension officers about conservation farming so that eventually they’ll be responsible-instead of Care-for training farmers.

According to Power, the key to Care’s work is promoting business-like approaches to agriculture alongside more traditional ones, so farmers don’t become dependent on the organization for gifts of fertilizer or seed. These sorts of programs, according to Care, will be more effective at feeding people and increasing incomes than traditional food-aid projects that rely on long-term donor support. This is a big challenge in a country-and a region-facing the impacts of both climate change and the global economic crisis.

Stay tuned for more blogs about how farmers are linking to the private sector.

To learn more about Care’s work in Zambia, visit www.care.org/zambia.

Leaked Plans by Republican National Committee Show Intent to Aggressively Capitalize on Fears of ‘Socialism’ Under Obama to Raise Money for GOP in 2010 Election Cycle; Meanwhile, Group Led by Ex-VP Cheney’s Daughter Comes Under Fire for Web Ad That Attacks Patriotism of Justice Department Lawyers Handling Terrorism Cases

“I have here in my hand a list of 205 people that were known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party, and who, nevertheless, are still working and shaping the policy of the State Department!” With those words, Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) plunged the nation into a near-panic with his infamous anti-communist “Red Scare” campaign from 1950 to 1954, when McCarthy was ultimately exposed as the fearmongering demagogue he really was. Now, 60 years later, The Republicans have been caught plotting a McCarthy-style “Red Scare” of the 21st century, with revelations of GOP National Committee plans to launch an aggressive fundraising campaign by stoking fears of “socialism” under President Obama and the majority Democrats in Congress. (Archive Photo courtesy Wisconsin Historical Society)

(Posted 5:00 a.m. EST Monday, March 8, 2010)

By SKEETER SANDERS

Having lost control of both the White House and the Congress — and under mounting pressure from the Far Right — the Republican Party has been caught plotting to launch an aggressive campaign of stoking fears of the country moving toward “socialism” under President Obama and the majority Democrats in Congress to raise money for the upcoming midterm election cycle.

At the same time, a conservative group with ties to former Vice President Dick Cheney’s daughter Liz has come under fire for launching a blistering Web ad that questions the patriotism of seven Justice Department lawyers assigned to handle the cases of terrorism suspects — branding the unnamed attorneys “the al-Qaida 7” and mocking the DOJ as the “Department of Jihad.”

These two developments have prompted fierce accusations by liberals — and even some former Bush administration attorneys — that the GOP is stooping to outright fearmongering reminiscent of the infamous “Red Scare” whipped up in the early 1950s by late Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin).

PLANS USED CRUDE IMAGE OF OBAMA IN WHITEFACE AS THE JOKER

The Republican National Committee was forced into damage-control mode after plans to raise money for the upcoming midterm election campaign by aggressively pursuing a drive to “save the country from trending toward socialism” under Obama were exposed by Politico.com, which obtained a copy of the plans.

Incredibly, the confidential 72-page document, which was prepared by the party’s finance staff, was left behind at the conclusion of a February 18 party retreat in Boca Grande, Florida. It was picked up by a Democratic operative, who furnished it to Politico.com.

“What can you sell when you do not have the White House, the House, or the Senate…?” the document asks. “Save the country from trending toward Socialism!” comes the reply.

Several of the document’s pages include crude caricatures of top Democratic leaders, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-California) as Cruella DeVille from the Disney movie “101 Dalmatians” and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nevada) as the cartoon character Scooby-Doo.

Most controversial of all, however, was a caricature of Obama as the Joker, the psychopathic nemesis of Batman in “The Dark Knight.” That caricature of the nation’s first black president in whiteface — employed frequently by Tea Party movement activists — has been denounced by critics of the Tea Party movement as racially offensive.

GOP FORCED INTO DAMAGE-CONTROL MODE AFTER LEAK

Revelation of the RNC fundraising document on Wednesday forced the GOP into full-scale damage-control mode, with RNC Communications Director Douglas Heye frantically issuing an e-mail to major Republican donors and to the media to downplay its significance and seeking to distance GOP National Chairman Michael Steele from it.

“The document was used for a fundraising presentation Chairman Steele did not attend, nor had he seen the document,” Heye wrote in his e-mail. “Fundraising documents are often controversial. Obviously, the Chairman disagrees with the language and finds the use of such imagery to be unacceptable. It will not be used by the Republican National Committee — in any capacity — in the future.”

By Sunday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky), confronted with the controversy, acknowledged that the fundraising presentation “was not helpful” to the party. Appearing on ABC’s “This Week,” McConnell said that he “can’t imagine why anybody would have thought that was helpful.”

McConnell refused to say whether he thought that Chairman Steele and others at the RNC should be held accountable for the document. “I don’t run the RNC.  That’s up to them.  But I don’t like it, and I don’t know anybody who does,” he said.

BAD NEWS FOR RNC WHOSE COFFERS ARE DRYING UP

For Steele, the leak of the controversial fundraising document could not have come at a worse time. The GOP national chairman has come under fire from major party donors unhappy with what they say is Steele’s lavish spending habits since he was elected party chairman 14 months ago.

The feud has led to major donors turning away from the RNC and toward other GOP committees. Politico.com reported February 23 that the RNC has raised $24 million since Steele took over as chairman — down significantly from the $46 million it raised in 2005.

To make matters worse, according to campaign finance reports, a $23 million RNC surplus that Steele inherited when he took over has shrunk dramatically to $8.4 million a year later.

CHENEY GROUP’S AD BRANDS JUSTICE DEPARTMENT LAWYERS ‘AL-QAIDA SEVEN’

Meanwhile, a growing number of critics on both the left and the right have denounced a vicious Web ad that attacks the Justice Department for its handling of terrorism cases.

The ad, posted by the right-wing group Keep America Safe — which is led by Liz Cheney and Weekly Standard editor-in-chief Bill Kristol — openly brands as “The al-Qaida 7” seven lawyers hired by the Justice Department to handle terrorism-related cases who previously did pro bono work for Guantánamo detainees.

The ad demands that the identities of the seven lawyers be disclosed — and even goes so far as to refer to the Justice Department’s initials, DOJ, as the “Department of Jihad.”

Posted on YouTube on March 1, the ad has triggered a torrent of angry phone calls to Justice Department headquarters. It came just days after Liz Cheney, appearing at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, unleashed a blistering attack on the Obama administration, openly accusing the president of pursuing a dangerously misguided and ineffective approach to national security.

“We’ve learned he [Obama] wants to go around the world and apologize for this great country of ours,” the daughter of the former vice president said. “We’ve learned he wants to give rights to terrorists, including the right to remain silent. We’ve learned he wants to move dangerous terrorists from Guantanamo onto the American homeland while he investigates and possibly prosecutes the CIA officers who interrogated them. That is not change we can believe in.”

LIZ CHENEY ACCUSED OF JOE MCCARTHY-STYLE SMEAR

Such attacks by Cheney drew an equally blistering counterattack by Ken Gude, a national security expert at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank. “It’s not kind of like McCarthyism,” wrote Gude in an e-mail to TalkingPointsMemo.com, “it is exactly what Joe McCarthy did with his anti-communist witchhunts. Cheney accuses the Attorney General of the United States of being a supporter of al-Qaida and running the ‘Department of Jihad.'”

But Gude isn’t alone. Several prominent lawyers who worked for the Bush administration also blasted Cheney. Former Solicitor General Ted Olson called Cheney’s attacks “outrageous” and fiercely defended the DOJ lawyers handling the terror-related cases, saying they were acting “consistent with the finest traditions of the legal profession.”

GOP TRIPS BACK TO MCCARTHY ERA TO REVIVE BLATANT FEARMONGERING

Devoid of fresh ideas to compete with the Democrats and to restore their own credibility, the Republicans — under growing pressure from Tea Party activists and others to move even farther to the right — appear to have decided to go “back to the future” sort to speak — only in this case, back nearly 60 years to the fear-plagued 1950s.

That the new GOP aggressiveness would evoke memories of McCarthy’s demagoguery should surprise no one who is well-versed in American history. The Wisconsin Republican’s career had been marked by making accusations without providing a shred of proof to back them up, according to author Arthur Herman’s 1999 book, Joseph McCarthy: Reexamining the Life and Legacy of America’s Most Hated Senator.

Even before his infamous anti-communist witchhunts, McCarthy came under sharp criticism in the late 1940s when he lobbied for the commutation of death sentences given to a group of Nazi soldiers convicted of war crimes for carrying out the 1944 Malmedy massacre of American prisoners of war.

McCarthy was critical of the convictions because of allegations of torture during the interrogations that led to the German soldiers’ confessions. He charged that the U.S. Army was engaged in a cover-up of judicial misconduct, but never presented any evidence to support his accusations.  Shortly after this, a poll of the Senate press corps voted McCarthy “the worst U.S. senator” in office.

McCarthy shot to national prominence on February 9, 1950, when, while delivering a speech to the Republican Women’s Club of Wheeling, West Virginia, he produced a piece of paper that he claimed contained a list of known communists working for the State Department.

MCCARTHY EXPLOITED FEARS GENERATED BY THE COLD WAR

From 1950 until he was censured by the Senate in 1954, McCarthy continued to exploit the fear of communism and to press his accusations that the Truman and later Eisenhower administrations were failing to deal with communists within its ranks. These accusations were made without McCarthy furnishing a shred of evidence to back them up, yet they received wide publicity, increased his approval rating, and gained him a powerful national following.

It was Herbert Block, the longtime editorial cartoonist for The Washington Post, who coined the term “McCarthyism” as a synonym for demagoguery, baseless defamation, and mudslinging. Later, it would be embraced by McCarthy himself and some of his supporters. “McCarthyism is Americanism with its sleeves rolled,” McCarthy said in a 1952 speech, and later that year he published a book titled McCarthyism: The Fight For America.

By 1954 — his demagoguery exposed by the legendary CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow and the televised Army-McCarthy hearings that same year — many of McCarthy’s fellow senators had had enough. On June 1, Senator Ralph Flanders (R-Vermont) blasted McCarthy, comparing him to Adolf Hitler and accusing him of spreading division and confusion. “Were the junior senator from Wisconsin in the pay of the Communists,” said Flanders, “he could not have done a better job for them.”

It was Flanders who introduced the Senate resolution that called for McCarthy’s censure. The resolution passed on December 2, 1954 by a vote of 67 to 22, a greater-than-two-thirds majority in the then-96-member Senate (Alaska and Hawaii had not yet been admitted to the Union). McCarthy never recovered from his rebuke, either politically or physically. He plunged into alcoholism and died from cirrhosis of the liver in 1957.

# # #

Copyright 2010, Skeeter Sanders. All rights reserved.

So here’s something interesting:

Federal Waiver

In order to derive maximum benefit from the redesign, the state will seek a Global Commitment-style super-waiver from Washington that covers all human service programs across a number of federal agencies, including HHS, USDA, and HUD.  The waiver will provide for unprecedented flexibility from federal requirements.  The state will pass the flexibility granted by the federal government through to its service providers.  Additional flexibilities should not be construed to release the state or providers from obligations to ensure that consumer rights are protected and payments are appropriate.

While a federal waiver is preferable, the overall redesign should not be contingent on the waiver.  In fact, the overall project should be structured on independent tracks, so if any one track fails, the other tracks would be unaffected.  As tracks ultimately intersect and join together, the whole of the project will be greater than the sum of its parts.

I recently posted about the Challengese for Change document which the legislature placed into law without any real notification or warning to the general public.  Today, I’d like to focus on the section quoted above.

So this concept of a “federal waiver” intrigues me.  It specifically intrigues me because federal requirements for social services tend to be there for specific reasons.  Given that the section immediately following that piece is about technology as preferable to “the old service paradigm of a client waiting in a line, finally talking to an agent across a desk or counter, and the agent doing data entry.”

Another aspect of what that agent does is to help people who do not understand or comprehend what it is they are being asked.

I’ve blogged previously about my trouble simply applying to Catamount.  A lot of the issues I had with those applications had to do with the fact that everything was done remotely.  Simple paperwork requirements took months to complete because they did not tell me everything they needed.  They kept telling me one thing they needed, then the next, and so on, until I finally ended up finding a full time job which insured me without Catamount.

But if we rely on technology as a substitute for this human contact, where does this leave us?  I’ve been hearing stories about people trying to work with economic services who are having an extremely hard time making their way into the system.  What I’ve been hearing specifically is that those who are already in the system are fine, but getting into the system at all is a nightmare.  Not as in “it’s a little tricky,” but as in “no, we can’t accept your paperwork in person at this office.  Here’s a number you can call,” which leads to a number that no one answers.

So are these requirements for providing proper, good and acceptable service, that we’re seeking to get a waiver from?  Are we looking for “unprecedented flexibility” to dramatically reduce access for the disabled or illiterate?  Are we looking to be able to avoid “obligations” to provide fair and reasonable access to our most vulnerable members?

I don’t know that the people involved in this decision making process even know the answers to these questions.  I don’t see any indication that there’s been the proper amount of time to assess these issues in a reasoned and deliberate fashion.  This vote came fast, too fast, and our legislators and other candidates for higher office need to go on the record as to exactly what they expect this legislation to do and how they expect it to happen.

Will the State of Vermont suffer a population decline if Phil Scott loses his race for Lt. Governor? Writing in the Free Press, a fellow from Lamoille County applauds State Senator Phil Scott. He also declares his intention to leave Vermont if any Democrat becomes governor.  

The writer praises Scott’s “measured” and “old fashioned common sense approach” on trying to stall the vote on Vermont Yankee. I want to congratulate Sen. Phil Scott for separating his campaign for Vermont's lieutenant governor from the issues at hand. Oddly though, the writer takes a less measured approach than the one he claims Scott might possess. The writer declares his intention to leave Vermont if any of the five Democratic gubernatorial candidates win office. [emphasis added]

I have lived in Lamoille County all my life and have always loved Vermont. However, I have made a promise to myself and my wife that come November, if any of the five announced Democratic candidates for governor wins the election, I cannot stay in this state.

You know maybe old-fashioned-measured-common-sense isn’t what you think it is.  My guess is this urge to flee may be inspired by the example set by Scott’s campaign manager Glenn Wright of Ocala, Florida.

Wright very publicly moved from Vermont to Florida last year based on financial considerations. At the time,waggish rumors circulated that some top Vermont Republicans helped him pack-up his portfolios. He wrote movingly of his financially fueled anguish at the time

we can’t take it any more and are taking the only possible alternative: leaving Vermont.

Could one man’s actions have set in motion a broadly based, formerly latent, Republican flight instinct? Have the persistent yet unproven folk tales of upper bracket flight  fueled a generalized Republican exodus threat? Vote down this school budget or we all leave the town. Vote down this highway bill or we leave. My way or I pack it up and leave.

Old fashioned measured common sense or tough going.  

We spent a couple of days in Durban which is the third largest city in South Africa. We arrived exhausted from Maputo, Mozambique after a 24-hour bus ride on Intercape (gotta love when they breakdown for hours in the middle of the journey and you have to jump on a replacement bus seven hours later).

Durban has a population of almost 3.5 million, and is a major domestic tourist destination, close to national parks and the historic sites of Zululand and the Drakensberg. Similar to our experience in J’burg, people kept warning us about the crime rate due to the economic crisis that resulted in very high rates of unemployment, reaching over 30% in many parts of the city.

Again we felt pretty safe, never felt threatened in any way or scared, despite staying at a hostel right in the city center, where we took advantage of all the terrific hi-speed wi-fi spots, nightlife, and affordable restuarants in walking distance.

We want to share with you the terrific site visits we had there…

We met with Richard Haigh, who probably doesn’t look like your typical African pastoralist. Unlike many Africans who grew up tending cattle, sheep, goats, and other livestock, Richard started his farm at the age of 40 after quiting his 9-5 NGO job and buying 23 acres of land outside Durban, South Africa. Today, he runs Enaleni Farm, raising Zulu sheep, which are considered endangered, and Nguni cattle, a breed indigenous to South Africa, which is very resistant to pests, as well as a variety of fruits and vegetables. Richard is cultivating GMO-free soya, as well as traditional maize varieties-“all the maize,” says Richard, “tells a story.”

Like the sheep and cattle, many maize varieties are resistant to drought, climate change, and disease making them a smart choice for farmers all over Africa. This sort of mixed-crop livestock system is increasingly becoming rare in South Africa, according to Richard, because of commercial farms that rely on monoculture crops rather than diverse agricultural systems.

But perhaps the most important thing Richard is doing at Enaleni doesn’t have to do with the different agricultural methods and practices he is using, but with the “stories” he’s telling on the farm. By showing local people the tremendous benefits of indigenous breeds of cattle and sheep and sustainably grown crops can have for the environment and for improving livelihoods, he’s putting both an ecological and economic value to something that has been neglected. “Local people don’t value what they have,” says Richard, because of extension agents who promote exotic breeds of livestock and expensive inputs.

And Richard is also helping document the diversity on his farm. He’s been sending blood samples to the South African National Research Foundation in order to help them build a DNA hoofprint of what makes up a Zulu sheep. This sort of research is important for not only conserving the sheep, but also helping local people by increasing their knowledge about the breeds they’ve been raising for generations.

We also met with Dr. Raymond Auerbach, the founder of Rainman Landcare Foundation, who nearly bursts with enthusiasm when he talks about the growth of organic agriculture practices in South Africa over the years. The Rainman Landcare Foundation (located outside Durban) is training farmers living outside of Durban on how to grow food without the use of artificial pesticides, insecticides, or fertilizers, as well as permaculture methods that efficiently use water and build up soils. The Foundation recently had to discontinue the trainings at its headquarters, which is also the home Raymond shares with his wife, Christina, because of lack of funding. Now, the Foundation works with farmers at their own farms, teaching them how to build swales to prevent erosion and runoff, use mulch to help protect soils, and make and utilize organic compost. “Compost is very much the heart of the farm,” says Auerbach, referring to how compost can eliminate the need for many expensive outside inputs, such as inorganic fertilizers.

Organic farmers in South Africa share some of the same problems as their colleagues in the United States, says Raymond. While Raymond and others fought for organic certification standards for farmers in the 1990s, the requirements are usually too expensive and cumbersome for many small, rural farmers. Certification can cost anywhere from 10,000-20,000 Rand (about $1,300- $2,600) and requires complicated paperwork, which can be difficult for semi-literate farmers. But by developing Participatory Guarantee Standards (PGS) for Organic Agriculture, which includes developing local standards and training local inspectors, while eliminating expensive certification fees for small growers, Raymond believes that poor, rural farmers can benefit from the growing demand in South Africa for organic food.

Other things we recommend while visiting Durban:

1. Have breakfast or lunch at Earthmother Organic (134 Davenport Road) where you can choose from delicious salads, sandwiches, and hot meals with very healthy organic ingredients. For vegans this might be your best option in the city, and we highly recommend anything off the menu of freshly squeezed juices. Raymond is a supplier to them as are many of the local farmers outside Durban.

2. Whether you like walking along the beach, surfing, swimming, or all of the above — Durban’s “Golden Mile” boats warm water all year round.

3. Go check out the Durban Botanical Gardens, a beautiful get-away, with free live concerts on Sunday afternoons, and a laid-back atmosphere (they let you bring in groceries to have your own picnic).  

Today’s Reformer has a piece: Hole found in VY pipe could be source of leak.

A hole discovered in a pipe in Vermont Yankee’s off gas building could be partly to blame for the leakage of tritiated water into the ground beneath the nuclear power plant in Vernon, said Bill Irwin, Vermont’s chief of radiological health.

Now, as you may recall, this particular set of pipes, according to Yankee officials during their actual testimony to the public service board did not exist.

But… really… who are we to judge?  Who hasn’t, on occasion, lied to state regulators and accidentally released large amount of radiation into the surrounding environment?

And really– it’s not the pipes that are the problem.  It’s the hole.  What’s a hole?  It’s a part of something that does not exist.  And they did warn us, at least about the part of the pipes that don’t exist, by telling us it didn’t exist.

Honestly, we’ve just got ourselves to blame here.

The following are notes from the legislative forum that took place at Bradford Academy in Bradford, VT on March 4, 2010.

In the interests of time, not all questions were answered by all legislators. The legislators at the meeting serve on different committees in their relative legislative bodies, so each has different areas of expertise. In general, they answered based on their personal areas of expertise.

Note:  ALL NOTES ARE PARAPHRASED, because I can’t type as fast as people speak. Thus, any inaccuracies are my fault. (From the Orange County Democrats blog)

Moderator: Brian Emerson, Wells River

Legislators:

Chip Conquest, State Rep., Wells River

Phil Winters, State Rep., Williamstown

Susan Davis, State Rep., Washington

Matt Choate, Senator, St. Johnsbury

Sarah Copeland-Hanzas, State Rep., Bradford

Opening Question:

What do you see as biggest challenges in VT in your district in the near future?

Much More Below the Fold….

Answers:

Sarah: Everybody is probably feeling the same crunch: local towns and family budgets. We’re focused on how to pass a balanced budget in the face of $150 mil in shortfalls. Easy cuts and reductions/inefficiencies have already been done. So this year, we have some really tough decisions to make. Passing a balanced budget that helps VT be sustainable in the “out years” is our biggest responsibility. I work on health care and can talk later if folks want to talk about saving dollars in health care.

Matt: We’re all worried about the budget this year. We’ve not seen a recession of this size scope and length since the great depression. We’re concerned about employment and prolonged unemployment that we’ve seen. Ag and Health care:  Families are struggling to hold onto their farms; how do we get a handle on the cost of health care while maintaining our quality?

Susan: Deals with community grant funds, etc. Looking at the whole district: health care, jobs, retraining for jobs. Many may not have the skills for the next generation of jobs in VT. Biggest across the community: health care, affects household, town, school, and state budget.

Phil: We’re all singing the same song. We all realize that the budget is probably the number one issue. It was an issue last year, it’s an issue this year, and even if we address the shortfall, we;re still looking at $100 mil short fall next year.

Chip: Property taxes. This year the school districts managed to reduce their budgets by .2% and still property taxes went up in most places. How do we make that system function going forward? We need to provide the kind of education we want for our kids, but we also need to make sure the people who pay can afford to pay for it.

Question 2:

Tell me of something you feel good/positive about in your tenure in Montpelier.

Answers:

Chip: Feel positive about most of tenure so far. Really I’m pressed that everybody over there, even though we disagree about a lot of things, everyone is doing what they think is the right thing. I can’t think of one person who’s there for personal gain. After an intense floor debate, where rhetoric gets sharp, when you leave the floor, that gets left behind. That’s been a great revelation to me.

We passed a bill that will help the Ag agency set standards or get help in understanding livestock care standards. Sure everyone familiar w/the Bushway plant issues in the islands. We’ve had a great tradition of farming, raising, and slaughtering livestock, providing food for ourselves. There are groups that would like to see that come to an end. This new council has people from all across the spectrum to bring a lot of experience and perspectives to make recommendations for agency of agriculture to determine whether statutory changes are needed. In order to make sure we’re treating animals humanely with local vermont solutions rather than having them imposed from outside.

Phil: Things can get “kinda hot” on the floor, but of the 150 people in the house, I have no problem sitting down to have a cup of coffee after the debate. Important votes in my tenure: for some, it was voting against Act 60 way back when. But if i had to say one thing, I’d say that over the years I have tried to be business friendly. Some don’t like that, but i really believe that without jobs, what have we got? So we have to be business friendly. My goal for this year is to come out of this with a balanced budget.

Susan: I listened to the folks in my district when campaigning and introduced a single-payer health care bill in the leg. I’m from a 3rd party, which is interesting, because I get to present a different view sometimes. Like shifting cost from state to local communities. I feel positive that we are interested in supporting moving the property tax system to an income based on vs current system.

Matt: 2 items: I agree that in the Senate I have not experienced a hugely partisan debate, but it’s not at the level we think of when we think of the Washington presented by the media.

Last year introduced a bill that had local impact: maple sugaring on state forest lands. This gives authority to open certain parcels of state land for sugaring. This will have a $500k impact on local economies this year, and over the next few years, could be a several million dollar impact.

Despite showboating last year, we passed a balanced budget, while keeping services intact for the worst economic times we’ve seen. We didn’t leave any one out in the dark.

Sarah: Pharmaceutical marketing bill – prescription drug pricing board of legislators from various states. SHaring ways we can save money in pharma costs. It’s one of the fastest growing health care costs. ANd health care is one of the fasted costs in country.

Limit pharma marketing to doctors. We see the tv ads for celebrex, etc. We can’t touch that, since it’s marketed toward consumers. We can curb the marketing in doctor’s offices. This marketing is 30% or more on the cost of your drugs. They market the new drugs to try to get doctors to shift prescribing patterns. Pushing the doctors toward new one that costs 10 times as much, even if it may make no difference in your care. Doctors can do their research. They don’t need to be given a fancy trip or expensive lunch by pharma reps. We banned gifts to doctors and allow only legit trips to real conferences to be paid for by pharma reps

Audience Q&A Session

Q:

Why spend time on health when we have the federal govt. coming out with a new one that will change whatever you’re doing now, and you’ll have to start over. Wouldn’t that be a waste of time?

A: Matt: We have 2 offices that help us, they research and draft our bills. Joint fiscal office does money analysis. When fed health care was announced last fall, they did analysis on what that would mean for VT, it was presented as fairly damaging to VT, because we already have good coverage for uninsured. Our state would have been damaged, and this analysis has been avail since before we convened for the session. We think something will pass, but we don’t quite know what, but we’ve had analysis of every single change. What helps us is the pilot tests for states to implement different models, so states can find best practices. No one seems ready to run ahead with one model nationwide. So, with those pilots, we’re in a good position to head along the path we’ve been on. It’s not a waste of time. We’ve assumed something will pass with waivers and pilots allowed, or it won’t pass, then we can do what we’re doing under a different path.

Q:

I’ve seen lots of money wasted on pie in the sky schemes on what we do with waste in town leading to shut down of waste handling. Have you considered ways to reign in local district committees, letting state handle this.

A: Phil: We haven’t passed much at the state level, but have passed an e-waste bill. Guidelines are being set by the legislature and will require manufacturers to take your e-waste at certain depots to take this stuff off your hands.

Q:

Isn’t state policy to get to zero waste? If so, and there isn’t a market for recyclables in US, what can VT do to create a market or deal with recyclables?

A: Sarah: None of us sits on the natural resources committee, and it would be good if we had someone with that experience. Local communities are focusing on composting, which takes much out, but if we are aiming for zero waste, then we do have to do something for the recycling stream. Nothing’s going to happen on that this year. While that sort of investment is the direction we should go, it’s not something we have money for right now.

Q:

Jobs and business friendly: creating jobs or giving a tax credit is not the answer at this point. I could hire 10 people, but they’d be sitting twiddling their thumbs. What is the state doing to help business get the customers through the door? 80% of business customers are other businesses. When is the state going to lower taxes to bring business into the state?

A: Susan: Institutions and corrections looks at dollars for binding and maintenance of assets. Building in Essex in negotiations with a solar company to bring business into the essex junction to create 400 jobs to make solar panels, hiring lad off folks from IBM and others. This means more dollars going into businesses. Every dollar paid to new employees brings customers through the doors, buying clothes and houses, etc.

A: Phil: I think over the past few years the state has done a lot to encourage businesses to expand, I do think the state has pretty much said the business will help them expand w/tax breaks, but not much thought re: where this production is going. Sales and other taxes in the state, if there’s any discussion to reduce those, I’m not aware of it.



A: Matt: Sen, Illuzzi on economic dev committee, to readdress the estate tax. The current model is a negative impact on large farms and some large businesses.  Property taxes are looking at education spending. Much is being discussed in education committee right now. There have been many reports. If we address the costs of education, we can reduce the related taxes. General fund spending last year was 2006 level. In order to take advantage of ARRA funds, we had to maintain taxes at 3 years back. The stimulus money is going away, so we need to deal with how to cope with that loss.  There is a restructuring of state govt to reduce spending on just how we do business as a state. Will take effect this year. There are efforts afoot to get spending down.

A: Susan: Sales tax is a regressive tax. I am more interested in an income tax increase instead of huge fees on small businesses or a hike in sales tax. It hits the poor, and prevents people from coming through the door.

Q:

Let’s talk about Joint resolution 33 (tolls on VT highways)

A: Phil: on transportation committee, our interstates were built with federal money and there are federal issues with putting tolls on federally-financed highways. Those with toll booths were state highways built with state money.

Q: (followup):

if we do have tolls, can we have a sticker w/VT registration so voters won’t have to pay it?

Q:

People come out for the little savings on the sales tax holiday day. When P&C closed we went down & filled our cupboards…. (asking for lower sales tax or extend free-sales tax day)

A: Sarah: In the CT river valley, we’re in different position than the rest in VT, because people can just drive across the river to not pay sales tax. We in this part of the state tend to be the champions for keeping sales tax low, or exempting things (like clothes and shoes), but we’re outnumbered. But we certainly advocate for and push for sanity and pause and “be careful” with respect to sales tax.

A: Chip: We also have to remember that sales tax reduction has to be made up somewhere else. 25% of general fund comes from sales tax, and we’ll still have to find that money somewhere else.

A: Phil: Under present setup, we transfer 107 million sales tax to education fund, which lowers property taxes.

Q:

In Lyndon on Tues local reps gave picture of fiscal problems in the state: “We’re 150 mil in debt now, will be 225 mil next year and will extend past 2014, and with closure of VT Yankee, $49 mil in direct tax payments and energy efficiency funds will be lost as well.

3 options: combo tax increases and service cuts, overhaul govt with only service cuts, or lots of taxes increased, or possibly hope for big fed money inflow.



A: Sarah: We started this yr w/150 mil hole. I don’t have projections for the out years. $38 mil this year is being filled through a bill we call the challenges for change. Asks areas of state govt to, instead of creating budgets based on last year, to throw away prior budget, ask core mission of dept, and what is absolutely needed to fulfill core mission – then eliminate the non-core elements. Through that process, which is very uncomfortable for those who have done the old process for years. If we can succeed in the areas we look at this year, we should be able to do the same in more depts and look more deeply next year. THe uncomfortable truth: we’ll pull back on services VTers rely on. Will make part of the state population more difficult. Even though it’s necessary, we need to be looking at living within our means. Need to be honest with what that means to real VTers.

A: Matt: Sarah hit the highlights. From my perspective, we have to live w/in our means. We’ve spent a fair amount of time discussing what’s best, and we are together on the fact that we’re over-stretched. Fiscal projections have assumptions built into them. There are COLA increases built in, and those don’t always materialize as expected. As far as the $150 mil, We’ve looked at $90 mil already. 2/3 of our budget = health care and education. The rest is being looked at as well. We are very much looking at living within our means without raising taxes.

A: Susan: I have not been in favor of challenges for change – after working for 31 yrs in state govt, there’s no short range or long range planning. We’re seeing the results of that lack of planning. While c for c is touted as cutting 38 mil, but I doubt we’ll actually see those savings. It’s an uncomfortable truth. I am not an economist. I know I have to pay my bills and balance my checkbook at home, but all research I’ve read I show no data that shows that raising taxes is actually detrimental when we’re in such hard times as this.

A: Phil: I can say I haven’t voted to raise a tax in 6 – 7 years. We look @ 150mil dollars, it’s a big figure, but keep in mind the total budget w/fed and state dollars, we’re talking $4,660,000 dollars. The $150 mil is not as big as you might think.

A: Chip: If we save $150 mil this year. I don’t think it’ll bee the 225 mil next year, but will instead be 100 mil. To make that true, we need to make sure that the cuts we make are ongoing ones, not short term ones. It gets to a point where you have to decide what the core, essential parts of state govt. is. If you get to that point and can’t cut any more, then you have to raise taxes to continue to support the essential core. We’re getting pretty close – into programs that some say we shouldn’t cut, but we will.

A: Susan: Challenges for change and efficiencies – we have commissioners and deputy commissioners, and highly-paid people who are supposed to plan and find efficiencies. They aren’t doing that planning. We can’t just make cuts without doing the planning. We’ll make cuts without knowing where we’re going.

Q:

Single-payer, nationally, saves costs. If we do this at state level what ware the pros and cons?

A: Matt: We have 7 bills in health and welfare. All have some variation on the theme. We have taken testimony: pro: simple admin structure, pone pot of money one payer (one entity). That payor makes all the payments. Payment is simplified. Nothing to do with cost is automatically in a single-payer bill. However cost controls can be included. Negatives: people go out of the state and come into the state for care. There must still be structure for out-of-state instances. (1% savings on one side, 30% savings on the other side) Probably both are right, and true number is somewhere in between.

If fed pilot or waiver comes in, that’s a model we could choose, but that’s not the direction we’ve gone in.

Q:

H382 – Jobs. None of these problems will go away until we get jobs in the state. Bill requires 56 hrs of paid sick time, whether business can afford it or not. I admin fed program to protect jobs if people can’t be at work. How will this help?

A: Chip: Wrote letter to chair of committee and said that while we should consider this in future, this is not the time. Asked for the bill to be withheld.

A: Sarah: The glory of our democracy is that anyone can any bill. Introduction doesn’t mean it will go anywhere. Chair of house general committee chair is very aware of the concerns. Instead of having more testimony on this bill, would like to have employees, employers, and health pros get together to propose something that will make sense.

Q: Comment re: H100, p 10, lines 10 – 14. Don’t require employers to contribute a fair share toward health care costs in VT (no question asked)

Q:

Number of bills to do something (usually reorg). how would you like to see it proceed?

A: Chip: Majority set a certain number of districts around the state, ranging from 9 to 16. There’s one that doesn’t mandate the districts, but provides incentives for districts to voluntarily join to make a larger district. Allows the districts to determine whether change would save money. Haven’t seen details on how these would save significant money. I don’t think that that’s the main part of the answer to how we’ll continue to afford education. We need to look at the hard questions: you can’t avoid the idea that we’ll have fewer teachers for the number of students.

Q:

Who is defining the core mission, and where is the info being captured? How uniformly is the vision shared across state gov?

A: Sarah: Each agency is asked to re-evaluate what  statutes require them to do. Might include agency saying we need these laws repealed because we cannot afford to regulate this or provide that. The folks at the agencies’ leaders are responsible for what the agency does. They need to work with legislature to determine what we should be doing. For example, agriculture dept. might come back & say “let agency of natural resources handle it all” and leg may or may not allow the merger. It’s not a simple blackboard drawing.



A: Susan: Commissioners and deputies coming back & forth with legislature, in this same year we’re looking for those cuts, we have a request for millions of IT infrastructure improvements. I managed the state network infrastructure, but they’re requesting without a plan or cost benefit analysis. If we want to come back with ideas, we need mission statement, how it ties to jobs, how it ties to economic development, etc.

A: Chip: This crisis is forcing me to struggle with the basic question of what are the basic core functions of state government? I don’t have a pat answer at this point, and I think that’s true of most in the state house. I imagine you’re all thinking about it, too. With the money that’s coming in, what are the things you think we shouldn’t be doing? People often think about social services when wondering what we ought to be doing, but we used to have the “overseer of the poor” in local government. It has been important to really and truly take care of people in need.

A: Matt: If I go back to the state constitution, I ran against a strict constitutionalist. Absent is what is the purpose of state government. It lays out the structure, but allows flexible government, because what the people need changes over time. We inherited

Q:

We’ve heard lots about infrastructure for a long time. What is the state doing to handle that?

A: Susan: Request for money for expanding broadband. We created telecommunications authority to look at expanding broadband. We talked about need for help in getting to the last mile, so Mrs. O’malley can get broadband. Now with fed stimulus money as a possibility, we’re talking about middle mile. It’s tied to smart grid technology, we need the middle mile to work. But the last mile was the most expensive piece. Hopefully, with this year’s legislation, we won’t forget that we’ll need to reach out to the last mile.



Q:

School board member: Gov often indicates act 60 and 68 are broken and irreparable. That being said, I do not understand how so much energy and time is being spent on the hill trying to turn the educational system on its ear, putting us out of work, and does not address the funding through property tax. It was never designed to deal with what it’s doing right now. Why aren’t we using income tax? When are you going to start dealing with the clearly broken stuff? When are 60 and 68 going to be looked at?

A: Susan: One thing I’ve been looking at. There was a tri-partisan bill a few years ago to change the school funding. Need political will, the will of you folks to talk to the political side to get them to do it.

A: Sarah: Funding education through property tax worked well when wealth and land were closely tied. VT has changed a lot in the last 200 years. Our education system is doing really well. I have 3 kids in the pub school system. We’re doing well compared to other places w/quality of education. When the big =shakedown came, a lot of people have thrown a lot of rotten tomatoes at Act 6o over the years, but it was a compromise. VTers were calling for change to be made, and that was the change that was made, and it stopped there. The more income you have, the more you can afford to pay. 70% of Bradford pay school taxes based on income, and other percentages in other towns. It’s a confusing system, but it’s a hybrid that is based on both income and property. People are not proposing the alternatives, while happily throwing stones.

A: Chip: Happy to consider income tax as source. Number of reasons why that may not work so well: easier to hide income than to hide your property. But whichever way it’s done, we need to figure out how to slow the rate of cost growth. Switching revenue source may make some difference to some people,, but without addressing the cost growth, it still has to come from somewhere.

Act 60 & 68 not totally broken. Can have a system that’s completely fair or completely simple, but can’t have both. So we’ve moved toward totally fair, but that makes it confusing, so people don’t trust it.

A: Phil: I think it’s broken and could carry on for 10 minutes.

Closing Remarks:

Chip: I plan to continue to keep the people in my district in mind. i do appreciate so much where I live, and like it very much the way it is. I want to work to make sure people can continue to live there, and to have the good life that they have there.

Phil: I think the fact that the current problems we’re having indicates that we didn’t do a good job of managing our job when we had money. I know it’s hard to say no when you have a dollar in your pocket. As has been pointed out, major dollars are education and human services. When talking about human services, you are indeed affecting people. To those who would say we cannot get into the human services, I think we should look back and remember the years when we thought we’d be short on LIHEAP and we heard people say people will freeze to death in their homes. Even if we make substantial cuts, I’m not at all convinced that we’ll see people who need our help sitting on the street corner. So I’ll go back & start work on the budget.

Susan: Will look at ways to reduce recidivism. It’s costly to keep people in prison. We can[‘t keep putting people in prison when it costs less to keep them out. Closure of Chelsea court and courthouse – will try to keep eyes on that, and look at the costs being shifted onto our communities as a result of these state cuts. We may not have any better support structure at local level to make up for these cuts.

Matt: Bring perspective of worker, younger generation who goes out of state. I appreciate my roots and community. You’ll have the opportunity to vote on whether or not I did a good job in November. I will work on agriculture and healthcare. Will really try to make something that saves on health care. I think we’re very close.

Sarah: What do these cuts mean? We’ve talked in general terms and I want to say, a lot of these final 21 mil in cuts (and some already made) will impact people’s ability to live with dignity, live in their communities. Some cuts will create immediate increases. For example, home health cuts will push people into nursing homes, which costs much more than if they stayed home. When you cut developmental disability services, that makes it harder for parent to work. In 2 parent family, 1 will have to cut hours or stop working to stay with child. That has terrible impacts on these families. These are services the state has provided with fed funding, and this is the kind of cuts we’re looking at. You have to put a human face on those cuts in order to do that with a good conscience. “By the time we get done here, everyone is going to hate us.” and this is why. I hear frustration about taxes and school funding. This is the human face.

I will continue to hold meetings like this, make a rotating circuit between school and select boards, and will continue to write in JO.

I will continue to answer your questions in person. Grab me where you find me, ask a question. I will be happy to answer. I’m also happy to answer emails.