Students from across Vermont converged Sunday on the Statehouse demanding lawmakers take action to combat climate change.
The state’s first Youth Climate Congress drew 171 student delegates, representing 43 middle schools, high schools and colleges. There was also a group of homeschoolers. The congress was organized by the Vermont youth lobby, which has held demonstrations before to urge Vermont lawmakers to produce climate change solutions. The declaration asked lawmakers to address climate change in a variety of ways, including banning fossil fuel subsidies from state tax codes, declaring a climate emergency and prohibiting development of any new fossil fuel infrastructure.
The declaration passed unanimously, but not in the legislative chamber. The vote was held on the steps of the Statehouse after a fire alarm triggered by a faulty sprinkler system pushed the congress outside.
The declaration will come before lawmakers when the session starts in January. A co-chair of the congress, Evelyn Siedner, a student at Burr and Burton Academy in Manchester, said the declaration will likely be symbolic with ambitious requests, but she said raising high expectations was intentional.Â
“We did that on purpose,” Siedner said. “As this declaration is seen by lawmakers, they’ll be able to see that this is what the generation of new voters feel that they need from their legislators.”
Throughout the day, delegates tackled big questions in smaller committee meetings: Can Vermont lawmakers block federal oil subsidies? How can marginalized groups be included in climate change solutions? Some questions stumped the Vermont Law School students who sat among committee groups to help guide policy construction as they amended the drafted declaration.
During the committee discussions, students picked apart the document, toiled over the language they chose and the consequences of the ideas they were introducing. As Rep. Sarah Copeland-Hanzas, D-Bradford, surveyed one committee’s conversation, and chipped in advice when students got stuck, she said the process looked “exactly” like the way she and her colleagues draft legislation. The scene gave her hope that these students can affect change.
“We’ve been frustrated by the inability to inspire our colleagues to action,” Copeland-Hanzas said. “We know that these young people are committed to demanding that action because it’s their world that we’re hurting by not doing the work.”
Some students, like Rayna Yahm-Halberg, a seventh grader from the Pacem School in Montpelier, said she wanted to become a delegate to make more tangible change. Yahm-Halberg said she’s been involved in a few climate change protests before, but wanted to create concrete results.
“You’re marching and you’re showing how much you care,” Yahm-Halberg said. “But I also want to be more official.”
Linnaea Shear, a ninth grader from the Pacem School, said the experience has made her ponder whether or not she wants to get involved in politics one day. But for now, being a delegate has given her a voice she felt she didn’t previously have.
“It feels like we’re being seen,” Shear said.
