During Wednesday nightโs Democratic congressional candidate debate (co-moderated by yours truly, full disclosure), Senate President Pro Tempore Becca Balint, D-Windham, posed to Lt. Gov. Molly Gray a question only a former teacher would ask: What is a mistake you have made, and how did you make it right?
โI think itโs not unknown to Vermonters that there was a period in my life, Becca, where I was not a consistent voter, and that was a mistake,โ Gray replied, referring to a six-year gap in her voting record between 2010 and 2016 (including the 2016 presidential election).
To make it right, Gray said, sheโs made it a priority to implement universal vote-by-mail in Vermontโs elections in hopes of increasing voter access and turnout.
And then Gray challenged Balint: โMy concern is that we are, what, a month out from the end of the legislative session. There still isnโt vote-by-mail for this primary. Weโre still in a global pandemic. So my question and my concern is: What are you going to do, commit to tonight, to make sure that Vermonters have access to vote-by-mail in August?โ
In a statement Thursday morning from the Office of the Lieutenant Governor, Gray doubled down.
โWe need to ensure Vermonters have every tool to safely participate in the August 2022 Primary,โ she said. โThe legislature has my full support in taking steps to fully authorize and fund vote-by-mail for the August 2022 Primary.โ
Hereโs the thing: Secretary of State Jim Condos doesnโt want that.
In an interview Thursday afternoon, Condos explained that when a Vermont voter requests an absentee ballot for the primary election (which they can still do this year, and have been able to do for decades), they are sent three ballots: Democratic, Republican and Progressive.
From there, they need to fill out one of the three ballots, and mail back all three (two of them blank) for tabulation. Itโs a different, more complicated vote-by-mail process that ultimately leads to the highest mail-in ballot rejection rate of all elections in the state due to voter mistakes, Condos said.
Mail-in primary ballots also happen to be much more expensive than the single ballots sent to voters in general elections.
โTo make a long story short: Weโre not ready for putting in place universal vote-by-mail for the primary,โ Condos said.
What was different in the leadup to the 2020 primary was that the Secretary of Stateโs Office mailed postcards to registered, active voters instructing them how to request their absentee primary ballots. The postcard included a tear-off ballot request form with prepaid postage.
Those postcards were paid for using federal CARES Act pandemic relief dollars. Asked if his office had requested funding from the Legislature this year for similar postcards, Condos said, โNo, because we really didnโt think we were going to need to do it.โ
After Grayโs comments, he wants to set the record straight with Vermont voters, but thereโs limited time before Aug. 9. His office hopes to determine by early next week whether itโs even possible to send out mailers with absentee ballot instructions in time.
โI just want to reiterate that what weโre doing for the primary is the same for 2020 and the same for the past 25 years,โ Condos said.
Asked Thursday afternoon whether she has made specific bill recommendations for the August primaries this legislative session, Grayโs spokesperson Andrew Gillespie said the lieutenant governor is โadvocating for that in her public statements.โ
Last year, when the Legislature passed a bill establishing universal vote-by-mail for general elections, Gray said in a statement at the time that she โlook(ed) forward to working with Vermont policymakers and our Congressional delegation to further expand the vote-by-mail process to all elections.โ
However, Balint said in a Thursday afternoon statement that she had not heard from Gray on the issue of universal vote-by-mail for the August primary.
โI share the goal that Vermont will continue to do all we can to make it easier for people to vote. I appreciate the Lieutenant Governorโs newfound passion on this issue,โ Balint said. โThat being said, prior to last night at a campaign event, I have received no communications from her about passing further legislation or appropriating funds for the August primary, neither during debate of S.15 last year, nor at any point this session.โ
โ Sarah Mearhoff
IN THE KNOW
Vermont hospitals have received more than $301 million in state and federal aid since the coronavirus pandemic began in 2020, according to new data from the Vermont Agency of Human Services.
The data reflects money from three sources:
- The largest chunk โ $184 million โ came from direct payouts from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services for Covid-19 care, vaccinations and testing.
- Eight of the stateโs 14 nonprofit hospitals also got a collective $105 million in one-time grants from the state.
- Eight hospitals got more than $12 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to handle the health care staffing crisis.
The vast majority of that taxpayer money โ roughly 60% โ went to the University of Vermont Health Network, the largest hospital operator in the state. Thatโs almost $180 million to three hospitals: University of Vermont Medical Center in Burlington, Central Vermont Medical Center in Berlin and Porter Hospital in Middlebury.
The hospitals in Burlington and Berlin recently got the green light from state regulators to raise prices of services midyear after network leaders argued the one-time federal payouts canโt make up for ongoing inflation and personnel costs.
โ Liora Engel-Smith
The Senate plans to shrink the Houseโs proposed child tax credit โ potentially by more than half โ to include other kinds of credits in its version of a tax relief package.
The House tax relief proposal, passed in February as H.510, would return $1,200 to families for each child 6 and under, affecting an estimated 34,000 Vermonters. It would also expand the Social Security tax exemption. In total, it would reduce state revenue by an estimated $49.7 million, with $48 million due to the child tax credit.
A competing proposal came from Gov. Phil Scott: smaller tax refunds, but to more Vermonters, not just families with young children.
The governorโs proposal would exempt all interest paid on student loans, increase the Earned Income Tax Credit for low- and moderate-income Vermonters, exempt military pensions and send flat $1,000 credits to nurses and child care workers.
Based on committee discussions from the past two days, it seems the Senate Finance Committee is trying to land somewhere in the middle: โmeaningfulโ credits to families, as Sen. Ruth Hardy, D-Addison, said to the committee, while extending some relief beyond just families with young children.
โI think we all agree with the concept of any child tax credit not being a silly little one, but sticking to the Houseโs construct of if youโre gonna do it, really do it,โ said Sen. Chris Pearson, P/D-Chittenden, to the committee on Thursday.
โ Riley Robinson
I heard there was a Statehouse shoe-dunnit yesterday: Rep. Jim Masland, D-Thetford, sent out an all-members email that he had dropped a shoe in the parking lot, and it was on the lam.
On the same day, Graham Campbell, an analyst at the Joint Fiscal Office, looked out a window of the Pink Lady to see someone climbing out of a dumpster.
โWe looked closer and it was Representative Jim Masland,โ Campbell said. โAnd so we were like, โWhat the heck is he doing?โ And we thought he’d lost his keys or thrown his keys out.โ
Since weโre here to ask the tough questions, and do real shoe-leather reporting, I had to ask if Masland found the footwear after all. He did, he wrote in an email, but wouldnโt confirm whether it ended up in the aforementioned dumpster.
โ Riley Robinson
ON THE MOVE
The House Committee on General, Housing and Military Affairs made changes to two Senate bills aimed at increasing the supply of affordable housing in Vermont.
The committee voted 7-2 to support S.210, but not before tweaking the legislation to make more landlords eligible for grants and loans to bring housing up to code or to build new units.
Lawmakers also shrunk the Senate versionโs $5 million for additional dwelling units to $1 million. That funding would help educate homeowners with designing, financing, permitting and building accessory dwelling units.
In a straw poll vote of 7-2, the House committee decided to keep a rental property registry, a provision that Gov. Phil Scott has called a โpoison pill.โ Scott vetoed a rental registry last year and recently insisted that the legislature split it from bills funding new housing.
The committee also made changes to S.226, which provides subsidies to builders when it costs more to build a home than it will appraise for. House lawmakers created an option for builders to, when selling a property, pass the subsidy on to a nonprofit that will preserve the homeโs affordability.
โ Fred Thys
A bill to amend Vermontโs medical-aid-in-dying law passed the House Thursday afternoon.
Vermontโs legislature was the first to legalize medical-aid-in-dying in 2013. The law allows someone with a terminal illness to request a prescription to end their life.
The bill, S.74, would allow patients to request the medication via telemedicine, and it would eliminate the final 48-hour waiting period before a patient can receive the prescription. Advocates have said these changes are important to make medical-aid-in-dying accessible, especially as advanced illness can make it painful and difficult for patients to drive for hours to see their prescribing physician in-person.
On the House floor yesterday, Rep. Anne Donahue, R-Northfield, said she was concerned that eliminating all in-person interaction would increase the risk of abuse. Her amendment would have required one in-person interaction with any health care worker โ possibly a home health aid, physical therapist or nurse โ who could confirm to a physician that the patient is โnot in a coercive or abusive situation,โ Donahue said.
The House Human Services Committee disagreed with the proposal by a vote of 8-3, said Rep. Anne Pugh, D-South Burlington, who presented the bill on the floor on Wednesday.
The House defeated Donahueโs amendment, with 98 โnoโ votes and just 41 โyeas.โ
Gov. Phil Scottโs office declined to state his position on the bill Thursday afternoon.
โThe Governor hasnโt had the opportunity to review the legislation yet,โ wrote Scottโs spokesperson Jason Maulucci. โHe will evaluate it once it is delivered and we receive input through our standard bill review process.โ
โ Riley Robinson
WHATโS FOR LUNCH
Seafood is the star of the show for Friday: The chefโs special will be fettuccine and clams, per Statehouse chef Bryant Palmer. The grill will have fried fish sandwiches and the deli line will have a Mediterranean tuna salad wrap.
โ Riley Robinson
WHAT WEโRE READING
Pair of employee lawsuits seek compensation for back pay at Vail Resorts๏ฟผ (VTDigger)
Stenger sentenced to 18 months in prison for role in EB-5 fraud (VTDigger) In Starksboro, Marijke’s Perennial Gardens Plus Spreads Passion for Native Plants (Seven Days)
