Biography
I grew up in Montpelier (Montpelier High School class of 1982), graduated from Dartmouth College in 1986, married my MHS classmate Mary Greiner, and together we served in the Peace Corps in Paraguay from 1987-89. We settled in Cornwall in 1990 and have lived there ever since, raising three sons. I worked as a reporter and news editor of the Addison Independent from 1989 to 2004, then spent the next decade as a dairy labor specialist working with farms throughout New England. In 2015, I started my own business as a move manager. I served for 17 years as a school board member in the Addison Central School District, and have been a volunteer firefighter in Cornwall since 2005. In 2016, I was elected to the Vermont House representing Cornwall, Goshen, Leicester, Ripton and Salisbury, and have served on the Education Committee since then, the last two years as chair.
Candidate occupation
Self-employed move manager
Why are you running for office?
Vermont faces many challenges that have only grown since I was first elected. We now face the daunting task of preserving what makes this state great – what drew my parents here, what kept me and my wife here and what my sons want to come home to – while needing to have a state that welcomes new and younger residents. This work requires a broad vision, a willingness to listen to a range of opinions, and feet firmly planted on the ground of what is possible. I believe I bring those traits to the job, backed up by a lifetime of experience deeply connected to the people and institutions around me. I want to continue this work that is so important to the future of our state.
Issues in brief
Do you believe Vermonters are better off now than they were 10 years ago?
No
Do you believe Vermont needs a new education funding formula?
Yes
Do you support imposing new taxes on the wealthiest Vermonters?
No answer
Do you support the establishment of overdose prevention centers?
Yes
Do you support a ban on flavored tobacco products?
Yes
Do you support increasing penalties for property crimes such as shoplifting?
Yes
Do you believe Joe Biden won the 2020 presidential election?
Yes
Issues in depth
What would you do to help grow Vermont’s economy?
Vermont has a demographic problem that is further hurt by a housing problem. Our economy can grow, strongly, if we can attract and retain people to fill the jobs. We can’t do that without housing people can afford, and building affordable housing can’t happen without government help. The cost of labor, materials and meeting environmental requirements such as adequate septic is simply too much to expect the private sector to solve this problem. Vermont’s statistics for homes with one or two older occupants, for second homes, for lack of inventory proves there is a bottleneck that we need to solve or our economy will stall.
What changes, if any, would you make to the way Vermont funds its schools?
Despite one of the fairest funding systems in the country, we still have a wide disparity in what communities are willing to spend on their students. We need a system that assures all Vermont students are educated equitably, and that may mean moving to a system where the state decides what is a fair and adequate funding amount per student and school districts manage to that amount. This must go hand-in-hand with structural changes in our education system so those dollars are invested wisely in a right-sized system that reflects our demographics and what a 21st century learning environment should be. It is hard and complicated work that must focus on the students and what is best for them.
Is Vermont doing enough, too much or not enough to address climate change? Please explain.
It is hard to declare that anyone is doing enough as we watch climate change unfold before us every day. Vermont is doing a very good job of balancing climate goals with helping Vermonters prepare for a new technological future. Creating a program that helps all Vermonters afford weatherization and heat pumps, for example, not only benefits our efforts to reduce CO2 emissions, but, more importantly, assures that all Vermonters have access to the assets that will assure a resilient future as climate change continues to affect us.
Is Vermont doing enough, too much or not enough to regulate gun ownership? Please explain.
Vermont has implemented very commonsense gun regulation. It is clear that red flag laws, for example, have probably saved lives, and waiting periods likely have too. There is probably not much more Vermont can do without hitting constitutional issues. Our country, however, simply has too many guns in circulation, has become desensitized to gun violence and gun use, and continues to celebrate gratuitous gun violence in movies, video games and other media. We are now at a point where police must treat every person and every call as if getting shot is a possibility, where children grow up training for mass shooting events, and where our culture leads people to go for a gun first rather than last.
What would you do to help ease Vermont’s housing crisis?
Unless the cost of materials, labor and regulatory requirements such as adequate septic systems moderates, easing this crisis is going to take government to act as a partner in building housing people can afford. It is going to take money, and perhaps new taxes to make that happen. I supported raising income taxes on incomes over $500,000 and on high end home property transfers as long as that money was targeted toward our housing crisis, and I continue to support that. We need clustered smaller homes for seniors that would free up the many, many homes occupied currently by just one or two people, we need workforce housing and we need low-income housing that addresses our homeless challenge. All of that will require some government alliances, for sure.
How would you address rising homelessness in Vermont?
No answer
What would you do to increase access to health care services for Vermonters?
Until the United States has a universal health care program, Vermont will continue to struggle to solve this challenge. We currently operate a very expensive system of small hospitals, we pass enormous costs on to those of us with private insurance, and we struggle to have an adequate number of primary care physicians. Just ask how many practices are taking new patents, especially those on Medicaid. We have an aging population that requires a greater share of our health care costs. Unfortunately, if the federal government does nothing, the challenges in Vermont will likely grow, not shrink. A report released this summer clearly points to a need to rethink our system of so many small hospitals doing so many of the same services. That is going to require a paradigm shift in our expectations to shore up the financial stability of our system as a whole.
Financial disclosure
Candidates for state and legislative offices are required to submit a financial disclosure when filing to run. These disclosures include each source, but not the amount, of personal income of each candidate, and of their spouse or domestic partner, that singly or jointly totals more than $5,000 for the previous 12 months. The information provided is an opportunity for voters to learn about candidates’ potential conflicts of interest.
You can find Conlon’s financial disclosure here.
Disclaimer
We emailed a questionnaire to every candidate with a valid email address. The responses provided by candidates are in their own words. VTDigger has not edited or fact-checked information provided.
If this is your candidacy and you’d like to fill out the questionnaire or report an error, please contact us at voterguide@vtdigger.org.
