Vermont Press Bureau

Updates from the Legislative Joint Fiscal Committee on Thursday:

-WATERBURY – The Legislative Joint Fiscal Committee signed off on the Modified Option B plan for the Waterbury state office complex Thursday. The current project cost presented Thursday was $124,655,000, and it will provide space for 974 occupants.

-REIMBURSEMENT – The state learned last week that the Brooks Building and an annex at the Waterbury state office complex is eligible for repairs by the Federal Emergency Management Agency at the 500-year floodplain level, not just the 100-year floodplain, Agency of Administration Deputy Secretary Michael Clasen said.

The state plans to demolish both buildings, but the increased threshold means more money for the state.

-COMMISSIONER – Department of Mental Health Commissioner Patrick Flood, who plans to pursue other options, will have his last day Friday. He plans to take two weeks of vacation. His deputy will fill in as acting commissioner.

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Posted in State Government

Tagged FEMA, Michael Clasen, Patrick Flood, Waterbury state office complex

Peter Shumlin

Gov. Shumlin announced the following second-term staffing changes in a press release today:

Chief of Staff Bill Lofy will leave the administration to take a position with the Democratic Governors Association, which Gov. Shumlin is expected to chair in 2013. Lofy will step down as chief of staff at the end of the year; he will work for the DGA primarily from Vermont. Lofy formerly worked for U.S. Senator Paul Wellstone of Minnesota, and held senior positions at the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee.

Alex MacLean, Secretary of Civil and Military Affairs, will leave the administration in early 2013 to take a position in the private sector. MacLean staffed Gov. Shumlin during his tenure as President Pro Tem of the Vermont Senate, and has run his two successful gubernatorial campaigns. Continue reading →

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Posted in Elections, Governor, Politics, State Government

State budget talks begin tomorrow, and the state wants your input. A draft copy of the presentation is available here, and an edited press release follows:

The first of two public forums occurs tonight to discuss the state budget process, revenues and expenditures.

As required by state legislation, public participation is required in the development of budget goals and general prioritizing and evaluation of spending and revenue initiatives.

“We hope to engage the public in a discussion about the goals, opportunities and complexities of putting together the State budget,” Finance & Management Commissioner Jim Reardon said in a statement. “We’ll discuss revenues and expenditures and conduct a budget exercise about priorities for how state funds might be directed.”

The meetings will be held from 5:15 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. today, at various sites around Vermont, through Vermont Interactive Technologies (VIT), including Montpelier and Rutland.

Another session will occur from 4:45 p.m. to 6:45 p.m. Monday.
For more information on Vermont Interactive Technologies, a list of all the sites, and directions, go to www.vitlink.org/.

Administration Secretary Jeb Spaulding will moderate the forums.

Reardon will begin each forum with a 15- to 20-minute presentation about funding sources, revenues and how funds are currently spent. He will also analyze budget challenges.

The public’s comments will be considered as the governor prepares the upcoming budget recommendations, which will be submitted to the General Assembly in January.

Both meetings will have live streaming. The link will be posted on the Department of Finance and Management’s main webpage, finance.vermont.gov/.

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Posted in Budget, State Government

Tagged budget, Department of Finance and Management, governor, Jeb Spaulding, Jim Reardon

BURLINGTON — Vermont’s lone member of the U.S. House of Representatives is going to be talking about his priorities for the lame-duck session of Congress.
Rep. Peter Welch is planning to discuss the issues in his Burlington office on Monday before he returns to Washington.
The Norwich Democrat will outline his efforts to pass a farm bill and the need to avoid what is being called the looming fiscal cliff of tax increases and dramatic budget cuts.
Sen. Bernie Sanders, fresh off reelection, will also be holding a press conference at his Church Street office at 10:45 a.m. to discuss the budget deficits. Sanders as well will return to Washington in time for the start of ‘fiscal cliff’ negotiations between both houses of Congress and the White House, which are expected to start  Tuesday.

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Posted in Budget, U.S. Congress

Tagged Bernie Sanders, Peter Welch

MIDDLESEX — State officials trying to resolve the psychiatric patient housing shortage have come into conflict with a Middlesex couple seeking to protect their children and avoid depreciation of their property.

The state is seeking to construct a seven-bed secure residential facility near a State Police barracks and state archives and records offices on Route 2, but a neighboring couple has turned to the state’s environmental court to intervene.

The state has gone so far as to consider buying the couple’s property in order to move the project forward, but legislators rejected the proposal.

The state believes it will prevail, but the court could take months to resolve the issue.

The state is trying to expedite the matter, citing the emergency need of housing for patients after Tropical Storm Irene flooded the Vermont State Hospital. Following the storm, the state dispersed VSH patients to facilities across the state, which has overtaxed emergency rooms at hospitals.

Two conference calls with legislators and state officials have sought to address the situation, but representatives said buying the property was an unfavorable solution, a stance led by Sen. Dick Mazza, D-Colchester, and Sen. Bob Hartwell, D-Dorset.

Read today’s paper for a full report.

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Posted in State Government

Tagged Hartwell, Mazza, Middlesex, patients, psychiatric, seven-bed secure residential, Tropical Storm Irene, Vermont State Hospital, zoning

BARRE — Rep. Paul Poirier, a Barre independent, said Friday he’s planning to challenge House Speaker Shap Smith, a Morrisville Democrat, for the leadership post in January.
“I’m quite sure that is what I’m going to do,” said Poirier, who plans to make a formal announcement Wednesday. But leaving the door open to a change of heart, he said he’s about “90 percent” certain he’ll run.
A longtime Democrat who first ran as an independent in 2010, Poirier said he has been troubled by what he sees as Smith’s autocratic leadership style — a style he said has marginalized minority parties and chilled debate in Vermont’s House of Representatives. Continue reading →

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Posted in Elections, State Government, State House

Tagged Paul Poirier, shap smith

On Jan. 2, 2011, before their newly elected crop of lawmakers had even been sworn in, House Democrats hired a 24-year-old Harvard graduate to begin plotting a strategy for 2012.

On Tuesday night in Burlington, as polling results streamed in to an election-night headquarters in Burlington, the Democrats’ long-term investment yielded its dividends. A party that already held a near supermajority in the Vermont House of Representatives will see a net gain of two seats when the body reconvenes in January.

“It was an incredible amount of pressure and I was very prepared to lose seats,” says Nick Charyk, the man tapped by House Democrats in 2011 to run their political arm.

Democrats next year will see their numbers go from 94 to 96.

“The realist in me and the statistician in me understood how high a bar I was looking at,” he said.

In the face of a well-funded conservative super PAC, anxiety over single-payer health care and concerns over one-party rule, Charyk managed to fend off all but two Republican challenges to incumbent Democrats, and picked off a few GOP officeholders with candidates he began recruiting early last year.

“As it turns out, investing in the best candidate possible wins out over carpet-bombing the state with negative ads,” Charyk says.

In much the same way that a better-funded, better-staffed Vermont Democratic Party helped carry its slate of statewide candidates to resounding wins Tuesday, House Democrats’ field advantage likely proved the difference in close local races.

Continue reading →

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Posted in Elections, News, Politics

Tagged Don Turner, Nick Charyk, shap smith

State officials and the Vermont Community Development Board, which have more than $21 million in federal money to distribute, recommended approval of four projects across the state Wednesday and denied two Waterbury projects.

The unsuccessful projects included a plan to study reusing the flood-damaged heating plant at the Waterbury state office complex, which board member Sarah Carpenter questioned due to the delayed rebuilding there, and a local development corporation the town has been seeking to create.

A $100,000 grant to study options for building a new municipal complex in Waterbury and to help with pre-building site work was recommended for approval, though.
Another $100,000 grant to study rebuilding or renovating options that could affect three Brattleboro Housing Authority sites that involve elderly tenants or tenants with disabilities.

One housing site there, Melrose Terrace, is located in a severe flooding area that normally wouldn’t be eligible for rebuilding funds, but the federal government has given a special exemption.

Up to $509,000 was targeted for re-developing a supermarket in Johnson, which has been without one since May 2011 flooding.

The largest grant, $1 million, was for three regional business development corporations to help with business assistance.

The recommendations become final when the state’s Agency of Commerce and Community Development secretary, Lawrence Miller, signs off on the measures.

State officials soon expect 10 to 15 more applications. Nearly $10 million is already being transferred for home-related projects, such as commercial and residential buyouts of properties damaged by natural disasters.

See Thursday’s paper for a full report.

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Posted in State Government

Tagged 2011, Brattleboro Housing Authority, business, Community Development Block Grants, disaster recovery, flooding, grants, Tropical Storm Irene, vermont, Vermont Community Development Board, Waterbury

Republican candidate for auditor Vince Illuzzi moments ago called Democrat/Progressive Doug Hoffer to concede. Hoffer gave an extremely short victory speech, saying he’s a numbers guy, not a speechifyer.

We’ll bring you more tomorrow on Hoffer’s win, and how his tenure could make for an interesting one over the next two years.

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Posted in Elections, News, Politics

Tagged Doug Hoffer, Vince Illuzzi

In one of the more boisterous victory speeches tonight, incumbent Democratic Treasurer Beth Pearce celebrated a win in one of the most closely watched races of the 2012 campaign.

Pearce a short time ago received a call from Republican challenger Wendy Wilton conceding the race. Pearce, a former seven-year deputy treasurer appointed to the post when Jeb Spaulding resigned to join the Shumlin administration, thanks her “Vermont family” for delivering her a victory Tuesday.

The race was viewed in some circles as a referendum on super PACs. The conservative super PAC Vermonters First poured about $800,000 in the 2012 elections, much of it on behalf of Wilton.

“The super PAC lost,” Pearce said. “Vermonters won.”

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Posted in Elections, Politics

Tagged Beth Pearce, Wendy Wilton