The Vermont House gave preliminary approval Tuesday for the state to join the worldwide 30 by 30 movement — a goal to conserve at least 30% of the state’s land by 2030 and 50% by 2050. The target includes state, federal, municipal and private lands.
More than 70 countries have signed on to the 30 by 30 goal, including the United States. President Joe Biden signed an executive order during his first week in office to conserve 30% of U.S. ocean area as well as 30% of the land by 2030.
Scientists say the 30 by 30 goal is an important tool to protect the Earth’s biodiversity.
Vermont’s 30 by 30 bill, H.606, also states that increased land conservation would lower flood risks, mitigate drought and generally help with resilience against climate change.
Vermont is much closer to meeting the target than the United States as a whole. Currently, about 22% to 24% of Vermont land is conserved in a way that aligns with this bill, Rep. Amy Sheldon, D-Middlebury, said on the House floor.
Across the United States, only about 12% of land is permanently conserved, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. To make the 30 by 30 benchmark, the U.S. would have to conserve an additional 440 million acres — more than twice the area of Texas, according to National Geographic.
A handful of lawmakers stood to voice their opposition during debate on the floor. Rep. Rob LaClair, R-Barre Town, expressed concerns that more conservation would worsen Vermont’s housing crisis and cost of living.
Rep. Arthur Peterson, R-Clarendon, asked where the state planned to find additional conservation areas if landowners did not want to participate.
“I see this as somebody usurping private property rights,” Peterson said.
Sheldon said landowners’ interest in conservation projects currently outpaces the funding to do so.
The vote was generally split down party lines. Rep. Anne Donahue, R-Northfield, and Rep. Mary Morrissey, R-Bennington, broke with the Republicans to vote in support (though several members of their party were missing during the vote).
The tally was 98-42, and the bill is likely to pass on third reading.
— Riley Robinson
IN THE KNOW
Thirty-five Republican legislators want to wave goodbye to face masks in the Statehouse — or at least have the option.
Led by Rep. Heidi Scheuermann, R-Stowe, the group sent a letter to legislative leadership on Tuesday requesting an end to the Statehouse mask mandate.
The letter comes one day after the Vermont Department of Health, in step with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, relaxed its statewide Covid-19 mitigation recommendations. State officials now say that masks are broadly optional indoors, except for federally required settings such as health care and public transit spaces.
As of Tuesday, the Legislature still requires all members, visitors, reporters and lobbyists to don surgical-grade or higher face masks at all times while in the Statehouse. The Joint Rules Committee at its Tuesday afternoon meeting declined to take up the letter for discussion, or any changes to its Covid policies, instead deferring to another day yet to be scheduled.
— Sarah Mearhoff
The House Appropriations Committee will need to make some tough decisions this week on how to prioritize federal funding from the American Rescue Plan Act.
At lunchtime, Rep. Mary Hooper, D-Montpelier, said lawmakers were “about $60 million in the red” in their American Rescue Plan Act spending proposals as of last week.
Later Tuesday, Rep. Peter Fagan, R-Rutland City, estimated the current proposals have overshot the budget by about $80 million to $100 million, but said he felt confident they could close that gap in the next few days.
The state had approximately $1 billion in federal funds to spend over the next four years, according to the governor’s budget proposal.
Rep. Diane Lanpher, D-Vergennes, chair of the House Transportation Committee, said she is now “anxiously awaiting” to see how the funds are appropriated. Her committee unanimously voted out the transportation money bill Tuesday afternoon, which includes requests for several American Rescue Plan Act-funded projects.
Lanpher is pleased with how her committee maximized federal transportation dollars this year, she said, but noted that as gas and labor costs rise, funding large construction projects is a race against time.
“Those projects might cost way more than they would’ve a year ago,” Lanpher said.
Both Lanpher and Fagan said they’re optimistic that American Rescue Plan Act proposals left out of the budget this year can be funded later with federal money from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.
— Riley Robinson
Gov. Phil Scott wants to send half the $95 million surplus in the state’s Education Fund back to property owners in the form of a tax rebate averaging between $250 and $275. The other half, he argues, should go to career and technical education. Under the governor’s proposal, $28 million would fund a grant program for career and technical education facility and infrastructure upgrades, and another $15 million would seed a loan fund for students to buy, renovate and flip properties.
But lawmakers, as they often do, have their own ideas. The House Ways and Means Committee, the chamber’s tax-writing panel, on Tuesday took a first look at a proposal that anticipates putting $36 million of the surplus toward keeping universal school meals in place in Vermont if the federal government stops picking up the tab, as it is expected to do.
House Ways and Means Chair Rep. Janet Ancel, D-Calais, said lawmakers still need to figure out a long-term plan for feeding all K-12 kids for free if the Legislature decides to go that route. (S.100, a school meals bill that passed the Senate last year, is receiving hearings in House Education.)
“My feeling is that we shouldn’t ask property taxpayers to pay for that — that we should find another source of revenue. We haven’t done that yet, because we haven’t taken (S.100) up yet. But this bridge money gives us a chance to do that,” Ancel said.
The Ways and Means proposal also would offer relief to taxpayers by using another $36 million to buy down next year’s property tax rate. And it concurs with Scott’s offer to put $15 million toward a career and technical education loan fund. (The career and technical education loan fund idea originally came from Ways and Means, Ancel informs us.)
As drafted — but neither finalized nor even voted upon in committee — this year’s education property tax bill would see the average homestead tax rate go down to $1.368 per $100 of assessed value. This year’s rate is $1.523.
— Lola Duffort
ON THE MOVE
The House Judiciary Committee approved S.4 on Tuesday, a bill that strengthens firearm background checks and bans guns in hospitals.
Earlier in the day, Sarah Robinson, deputy director of the Vermont Network Against Domestic and Sexual Violence, testified that it takes on average nine to 10 days for background checks involving misdemeanor domestic violence cases to be completely reviewed and denied.
S.4 allows only seven days for the completion of a background check, a number chosen by Gov. Scott, who vetoed S.30, legislation that would have given as much time as necessary for a background check to complete.
“I would rather be voting for a compromise that’s more aligned with the research that we know about the average time for the resolution of those domestic violence misdemeanor cases,” said Rep. Selene Colburn, P/D-Burlington.
S.4 will now go to the House floor for further consideration.
— Ethan Weinstein
After its unanimous committee approval last week, the House’s once-per-decade reapportionment bill, H. 722, is heading to the House floor on Wednesday.
The bill started out with a bang early in the legislative session, with House Republicans crying foul over Vermont’s continued use of multimember House districts. The final version, as drawn up by the committee over the course of several weeks, has 68 one-member districts and 41 with two.
Conor Kennedy, spokesperson for House Speaker Jill Krowinski, D-Burlington, said lawmakers are not planning to expedite the bill’s floor votes via rule suspensions. The Vermont Secretary of State’s Office has said it needs the new maps by April 1.
— Sarah Mearhoff
IN CONGRESS
President Joe Biden on Tuesday signed Congress’s $1.5 trillion appropriations omnibus, roughly $200 million of which will go directly to Vermont via earmarks.
Senate President Pro Tempore and apparent shutterbug Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., “couldn’t resist” whipping out his camera to take some photos of the moment.
One thing notably missing from the omnibus? Roughly $22.5 billion in Covid funding. After Senate Republicans blocked additional funding, NPR reports the White House is preparing to wind down a program that pays to test, treat and vaccinate people who are uninsured.
The federal government plans to cut back shipments of monoclonal antibodies to states by 30% next week, per NPR, and the nation’s supply of those treatments could run out as soon as May.
— Sarah Mearhoff and Lola Duffort
ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL
Sianay Chase Clifford — a former aide to U.S. Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass. — announced Tuesday she is jumping into the hotly contested race for Vermont’s sole congressional seat and hoping to win the votes of progressive Democrats.
ON THE FIFTH FLOOR
Gov. Phil Scott appears hesitant about the clean heat standard, a proposal that’s working its way through the Legislature and is set to land on the House floor on Wednesday.
The clean heat standard is the centerpiece of Vermont’s Climate Action Plan, and without it, the state won’t be able to meet the emissions reductions required by the Global Warming Solutions Act.
At his weekly press briefing Tuesday, Scott said he opposes the Public Utility Commission’s proposed role as drafted in the bill, H.715, as the administrator of the law.
Legislators are looking to “abdicate their authority” by handing certain decisions about the bill’s implementation to the commission, Scott said. Decisions made by the PUC should be approved by lawmakers, he said.
Members of the PUC are not elected or “beholden to anyone,” Scott said, and he wants to make sure the body does “what we want them to do.”
“If they take a position that’s going to be counter to the affordability of Vermont … then we owe it to Vermonters to vote that up or down,” he said.
Ben Edgarly Walsh, climate and energy program director for Vermont Public Interest Research Group, said the Legislature’s delegation of authority to the commission is appropriate and well precedented. The same process took place with the renewable energy standard and net metering, for example.
“It’s been that way for decades,” he said. “I don’t know why that’s a surprise to the governor.”
— Emma Cotton
WHAT’S FOR LUNCH
Today’s special, for those who missed it, was mac and cheese with ham, vegetables and a biscuit. Tomorrow there will be chicken and biscuits, chef Bryant Palmer said.
WHAT’S ON TAP
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 16
9 a.m. — The House Energy and Technology Committee will consider amendments to H.715, or the clean heat standard.
10 a.m. — The House Education Committee is slated to hear S.100, an act relating to universal school breakfast and the creation of the Task Force on Universal School Lunch.
11 a.m. — The House Education Committee will also consider S.139, an act relating to nondiscriminatory school branding, aka the school mascot bill.
WHAT WE’RE READING
Watered-down qualified immunity bill advances after facing ‘unified front’ of opposition (VTDigger)
Correction: An earlier version of this article incorrectly stated how many acres would need to be conserved in the U.S. to accomplish 30 by 30 goals.
