VTDigger posts regular coronavirus updates on this page. You can also subscribe here for daily coronavirus news. Please send your Covid-19 questions to coronavirus@vtdigger.org
A bill that would boost pay for essential workers on the front lines of the coronavirus crisis has stalled in the House due to concerns that it may not qualify for federal coronavirus relief money.
S.346, which the Senate passed in early May, would provide $60 million in additional pay to employees who were designated “essential” when the governor ordered the closure of most in-person businesses beginning in March. The bill provides grants that could be distributed to 33,500 people including grocery store and pharmacy workers, child care providers and nursing home staff.
The amount workers receive would be determined by how many hours they work. The maximum grant is $1,000 per month, and the minimum is $600.
But concerns have been raised over the timeline that the grants would be given out. The current version of the bill states that grants would be provided for the months of March, April and May.
Now that these months have passed, with only a week left in May, Rep. Mike Marcotte, R-Newport, who chairs the House Commerce and Economic Development Committee, said he thinks these grants would be more like bonuses than hazard pay.
Because the payments would be retroactive, Marcotte said he’s not sure the bill meets the definition of hazard pay, therefore making it ineligible for the $1.25 billion in federal CARES Act money the state received.
“We’re questioning whether the feds would say that’s more bonus pay than hazard pay,” Marcotte said. He’s worried that if the federal government determines a few years down the road that the program isn’t eligible, Vermonters will have a big bill to pay.
“If it was a million or two or three, that’s one thing. But we’re talking $60 million,” Marcotte said. “And the way our budget is going, it’s not going to look good the next few years because of decreased revenue coming in. We really can’t afford to make a mistake and have to pay that back.”
Marcotte said the committee does not feel comfortable moving the bill forward without confirmation from the state’s congressional delegation that it would qualify for federal aid.
Marcotte also doesn’t think the current version of the bill fulfills a central goal. When the idea was first pitched, a selling point was that the extra grant money would keep workers on the job when they could be receiving a higher wage on unemployment insurance because of boosted federal benefits.
“The whole premise was to allow employees to stay on the job instead of leaving for unemployment where they could make more money,” Marcotte said. “We didn’t see people leaving their jobs to get the extra unemployment pay from the federal government.”
Senate President Pro Tem Tim Ashe, D/P-Chittenden, a strong proponent of the legislation, pushed back on the idea that the central premise of the bill was to keep workers working during the pandemic.
“The question is should we rectify a situation where people are actually worse off financially for showing up in an essential job,” Ashe said, “and should we recognize the willingness to put themselves at risk, which these individuals did, for two plus solid months with a very modest grant.”
While no program is guaranteed to secure funding from the CARES Act, Ashe said that the legislative Joint Fiscal Office and the treasurer’s office have told senators that it’s likely the bill would qualify for funding. This gives Ashe confidence that the program is eligible.
“For me, what would be a huge injustice would be if people come up with reasons not to advance this and then four months later we look back and say ‘Oh yeah, we all said nice words for a little while about how we value people showing up at these jobs. Yeah we kind of forgot to recognize that with a grant. But that was nice of them to show up,’” Ashe said.
“I think this is long overdue and should be part of our total CARES relief package,” Ashe said. “Just because the work has been performed doesn’t mean it was any less hazardous or honorable.”
House Speaker Mitzi Johnson, D-South Hero, shares Marcotte’s concerns. She said the Senate received confirmation that the bill could qualify for federal money at a different time, when the program wouldn’t have been entirely retroactive.
“We have such poor, poor, poor guidance from the federal government — I cannot stress enough, how poorly that has been managed,” Johnson said. “We’re just sort of hanging in limbo about what we could or couldn’t use this money for. We need to get it out as quickly as possible into the Vermont economy.”
She said the future of the bill depends on the guidance the state receives from the federal government. If the state gets confirmation that the funding is OK to use, it could move forward, and the Legislature could consider broadening the bill to include other types of workers.
But without that confirmation, the future of the bill is murky.
“The hook here is that if we spend the money on something that the feds then come back and say ‘Nope sorry that was not allowable,’ we have to pay 100% state dollars for that,” Johnson said. “And we’re already looking at a substantial challenge for next year’s budget.”
Get the latest statistics and live updates on our coronavirus page.
Sign up for our coronavirus email list.
Tell us your story or give feedback at coronavirus@vtdigger.org.
Support our nonprofit journalism with a donation.
