This commentary is by Rep. Scott Campbell, a Democrat who represents St. Johnsbury in the Vermont House of Representatives.
[A]bout 25 years ago, as a new Weatherization Program director at CVOEO in Burlington, I organized a tour for legislators to let them see what the program does.
We visited a house in Hinesburg, home of a family a lot like mine. He was a self-employed electrician. He had become stricken with Parkinson’s and could no longer work. His truck was on the front lawn for sale. She was a schoolteacher. They had built the house, but it was unfinished, and our crews were adding insulation.
I had been a contractor too. I took the job at Weatherization to use my skills and knowledge to help people, and because I was interested in the technical challenges of energy efficiency.
It hit me on that visit how I and my family were one serious illness or injury away from these folks’ situation. We were just lucky we didn’t qualify as “low-income” for Weatherization and other services. Just lucky.
A couple of years ago, a veteran Weatherization energy auditor described a recent visit to an old farmer. He lived alone. His wife had died some years earlier; his kids moved away. My friend, the auditor, sat at the kitchen table with this man going over what the program could do to help lower his heating bills and make him more comfortable.
The man had his elbows on the table, head in his hands. Presently he began shaking. My friend was puzzled — was he angry about something? Then he realized the man was weeping. He was so proud, so embarrassed to be receiving “assistance,” that he was distraught.
My friend, bless him, told him: Don’t be ashamed. You earned this. You paid for this. You’ve helped many people in your life. It’s my honor to be able to help you now.
Until January, I was director of another energy efficiency program, 3E Thermal, for affordable apartment housing statewide. One recent project was a privately owned four-story brick building with 18 apartments and street-level commercial spaces. It used over 13,000 gallons of oil each winter. The fuel truck delivered every second day during cold spells.
3E Thermal worked with the owners to understand the options and navigate design and program requirements. 3E Thermal partnered with the Weatherization Program, Efficiency Vermont, and the Clean Energy Development Fund to help the owners leverage their own sizable investment. The result was almost 50% savings, and more comfortable apartments with better indoor air quality.
I had these stories in mind as I considered a bill last week in my new job as a state representative for St. Johnsbury. The bill, H.439, proposed expanding the Weatherization Program by increasing the heating fuel tax that funds it by 2 cents per gallon.
Many, including this news organization, described the increase as “doubling” the tax — which it is, though it is doubling a very small number. The additional 2 cents costs a household using, to estimate on the high side, 900 gallons/year an additional $18 on a total annual cost of $2,475 (at $2.75/gallon, today’s price). That’s $1.50 per month. It’s not nothing, but it’s a pretty modest amount. Fuel prices often seesaw by 50 cents or $1 season to season.
Others said this is a “regressive” tax, meaning it affects rich and poor equally. In one sense that is true: the price per gallon is same for everyone. But, it’s also true that the entire amount raised goes to helping low-income households. And, higher-income households typically use more heating fuel and so pay more tax. So in terms of who pays and who benefits, it is on average “progressive.”
You will also hear some call this a “carbon tax.” But it is not, because the tax is on the volume of fuel, not its carbon content. A carbon tax is intended to include in the price of fossil fuel the costs of the damage caused by it — that is, climate change. If that cost were truly included, the price impact would be a matter of dollars not pennies.
I continue to believe a state carbon tax is not good policy for Vermont. But that doesn’t mean we don’t have to address climate change. Vermont can’t stop it, but we will be — and are already being — affected by it. This winter’s extreme freeze-thaw cycles have left craters in our roads. We are getting more frequent and more intense storms. Our climate zone is drifting south. Agriculture, ski, and maple industries will be challenged.
Wise policy takes steps to prepare for what we can see clearly on the horizon. If we continue to dither and put off small, strategic costs, we will pay much higher costs when the inevitable becomes a crisis.
That is why I supported the heating fuel tax increase to expand the Weatherization Program. It helps protect those most vulnerable to power outages and fuel price spikes (and someday a federal carbon tax). Not incidentally, it also makes more stable, more comfortable and healthier housing.
I should mention I also supported exempting dyed diesel, used in farming, logging and construction, which actually decreases the tax they’re paying now by 2 cents/gallon.
Doubling the Weatherization Program was the number one recommendation of Gov. Phil Scott’s Climate Action Commission last year. This modest 2-cent increase won’t double the program, but it will serve about 400 more households. It will also add about 40 jobs — good jobs with decent pay and benefits.
This is the direction we must take: transitioning our economy away from reliance on fossil fuels to keep more money in Vermont; training our workforce in the skills of the future; and improving affordability especially for those with lower or fixed incomes. This is the direction we must take, not because Vermont is going to stop climate change, but to keep climate change from crippling Vermont.
