Author Archives: John S. Walters

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About John S. Walters

Writer, editor, sometime radio personality, author of "Roads Less Traveled: Visionary New England Lives."

Big ol’ lead airliner

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There’s an absolutely devastating piece on VTDigger this morning. If you haven’t read it, go. Now.

For those who didn’t immediately take my advice, the story outlines the role Governor Shumlin played in holding a pillow over single payer health care’s face until it stopped breathing. Or, as the headline says, “Shumlin built ‘lead airplane’ for single payer.”

If the story is true, here’s basically what happened. At some point, the governor decided that he couldn’t win on single payer. Then, rather than face the music directly, he larded his single payer proposal with assumptions that added to its cost and suppressed its revenues. As the story says, “he cast the program in the most negative light possible.”

And then he walked away.

How did he do it?

Well, first of all, he presented only one plan, when he’d promised a menu of options.

Aside from that, his plan offered top-shelf coverage, paying for 94% of clients’ health care costs — a 94 Actuarial Value. He could have gone with a lower figure; “Act 48, Vermont’s single payer law, directed the administration to shoot for a plan that covered 87 percent of costs.”

So he ignored the law. Not much new there.

The 94 AV added $300 million a year to single payer’s cost.

He also chose to add out-of-state residents who work in Vermont, which added another $200 million. And he called for the elimination of Vermont’s provider tax, which cut $160 million in revenue.

He also chose to assume the new system would yield no administrative savings — which had been one of his big selling points for single payer.

You can see where this is going. Shumlin projected a first-year cost of $2.6 billion, but he could have brought in a perfectly acceptable plan for well under $2 billion.

And he knew it. And he chose not to tell us.

The massive report released by the administration at year’s end included not one, but 15 plans. But Shumlin chose to present only one.

Among the 15 different models in the document dump is Financing Concept 12, which uses an 87 percent actuarial value and would require $1.6 billion in state revenue for the first year.

It excludes out-of-state workers and does not offer supplemental coverage to federal employees or people with employer sponsored coverage, all of which is contained in the plan Shumlin chose.

It’s hard to read that and feel anything other than betrayal.

Maybe there were perfectly sound reasons for Shumlin’s choices, but he didn’t give them and he didn’t provide any options. Instead, he “buried” them in his pre-holiday document dump.

So, Vermont misses a chance at single payer. Even worse, the entire idea of single payer has been significantly set back, perhaps by decades. Because now we have a liberal governor, a strong advocate of single payer, concluding that it’s not practical.

This hurts.

Hey, Burlington Free Press: Meet your new boss!

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Al Getler

The Burlington Free Press today announced the hiring of this man as its new President and Publisher.

No, this is not a joke. Do Not Adjust Your Set. Al Getler is a former newspaper executive who’s lately been seeking work as a “media consultant” (i.e. unemployed newspaper executive) and as a ventriloquist for hire. He mainly sells himself as talent for corporate events:

In addition to being a performer, Getler has worked for two Fortune 500 companies as an executive and knows what it takes to entertain all types of audiences while meeting the required standards of acceptability.

In other words, toothless comedy for corporate audiences. But hey, maybe he could bring a little fun to the lately-joyless Freeploid newsroom:

Looking for a unique idea for your next show or event? Have Al create a puppet character in the likeness of your CEO, your product, or that special person in your audience.

Oh, I’d pay to have him show up for his first day on the job with a Michael Townsend puppet. Can we make that happen, Al?

Aside from his services as an inoffensive mainstream humor provider, Getler also bills himself as a “marketing, management, and media” consultant, touting his “30 years of experience in the media, as a leader, executive running companies and as a serial entrepreneur.”

Is “serial entrepreneur” how you describe yourself if you’ve run multiple enterprises into the ground?

Somehow the Free Press’ story announcing Getler’s hiring doesn’t mention his current status as a self-employed ventriloquist/consultant. They say, circumspectly, that he “previously was group publisher of the North of Boston Media Group.” In fact, he lost that job almost two years ago.

The NoBMG includes the daily papers in Lawrence, Newburyport, Salem, and Gloucester, Massachusetts, plus some weekly papers and a few ad-friendly glossy magazines. Getler lost his gig in March 2013 when NoB’s out-of-state ownership imposed some big staff cuts.

According to ace Boston media watchdog Dan Kennedy, the Eagle-Tribune had a long and distinguished reputation as an independent weekly. That changed, however, with its corporate acquisition in 2005. Since then, it’s been cut, cut, cut, and cut again.

Getler was hired in 2007, and imposed quite a few of those cuts before feeling the blade himself. In 2008, for instance, he slashed “at least 52 jobs” at NoBMG, which got him this plaudit:

“This was a CYA situation,” one Eagle Tribune employee told The Valley Patriot. “Al Getler is trying to save his own job because his management of this newspaper has cost us millions and the only way he could show the company [in Alabama] that we could be financially viable was to immediately cut jobs to balance the books to meet the company’s financial goals.”

Hmm. Maybe he’ll fit right in at Gannett’s Incredible Shrinking Freeploid. At the very least, he’ll Bring the Funny in ways that Michael Townsend could only do by butchering his Twitter feed.

And there’s a bit of thematic consistency here. The man Getler is actually replacing is Jim Fogler, who left the Freeploid last year to take a job with Party City. Hey, balloons, noisemakers, and puppets! It practically screams “quality journalism,” does it not?

The current bee in Mike Donoghue’s bonnet

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There was laughter in the room, I’ve been told, when the Burlington Free Press’ Mike Donoghue asked Gov. Shumlin about the possible removal of Rep. Mary Morrissey from a House committee.

HIs question came near the end of Shumlin’s Monday news conference. The laughter came from several other reporters, who saw Donoghue’s question as basically irrelevant, and just another example of his dogged pursuit of a story he’s decided is important. Sometimes he’s right, sometimes he’s wrong.

In this case, yep, he’s wrong.

Undeterred by the audible scorn of his colleagues, Donoghue wrote an article about Shumlin’s Monday presser — an event that produced actual news — that focused primarily on his prefabricated Morrissey “controversy.” Of all the stuff going on this week at the Statehouse, it’s a sad joke that Donoghue and his paper have devoted so much time to such an insignificant story. And provided so little coverage of anything else.

For those just joining us, Morrissey has been an unproductive policy scold as a member of the House Health Care Committee. Apparently, House Speaker Shap Smith is considering a reassignment. As is his right: the Speaker makes the committee assignments, and reshuffles are commonplace.

But Donoghue has fixed upon Morrissey as a champion of transparency because once, at a committee hearing, she asked a question:

… Morrissey questioned Health Access Commissioner Mark Larson [about security breaches in Vermont Health Connect] and was told, “We have no situation in which someone’s private information has been breached.”

The problem was there had been a serious breach of information. Larson later offered an apology to the Health Care Committee.

Her questioning was standard practice for any committee member. But because of Larson’s misleading answer, Donoghue is now crediting Morrissey for “helping expose a major security breach… in the Vermont Health Connect computer system.” If she played any role beyond asking her question, Donoghue does not so inform us.

He also takes some groundless shots at Morrissey’s critics (including me, I guess):

Morrissey been criticized for not buying into all the health care plans rolled out by Democrats.

Not quite, Mikey. It’s not that she failed to buy into “all the health care plans” from Democrats; I wouldn’t expect any Republican to do so. The truth is that she routinely slammed any Democratic plan. There was no thought, no discernment; just a consistent, unproductive, ideological gainsaying.

Only after Donoghue thoroughly explores the subject that prompted his colleagues’ laughter does he actually report the substance of Shumlin’s news conference: a new survey has found a sharp drop in uninsured Vermonters.

The Vermont Household Health Insurance Survey found that about 19,000 of the 43,000 Vermonters without insurance during the 2012 survey now are covered, Shumlin said.

The state’s uninsured rate dropped from 6.8 percent to 3.7 percent, the second-lowest rate in the country. Only 1 percent of Vermont children under age 18 are not covered, the lowest rate in the country, Shumlin said.

Those are some very encouraging figures about the first year of health care reform. But somehow Donoghue concluded that this development was less newsworthy than the routine reassignment of a legislative backbencher. But he has already elevated her to the lofty position of Public Interest Whistleblower, which she is not. I fully expect more breathless Morrissey coverage when the committee assignments actually come out.

Because boom or bust, Mike Donoghue sticks to his guns.

Suddenly, everybody wants to amend the Constitution

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Funny thing has happened in recent days, as we approach the legislature’s vote for governor:  Everyone’s talking about a Constitutional change to make sure this never happens again.

Bill Doyle must be enjoying a quiet “told you so” moment, considering that he first proposed such a change in 1974.

Nineteen seventy-four. Hell, a lot of you whippersnappers weren’t even born yet.

But did anyone listen to The Perpetual Senator? Nope, this is Vermont; we don’t fix things until they convincingly prove they’re broken. As the joke goes,

“How many Vermonters does it take to change a light bulb?”

“Change it? That was my grandfather’s light bulb!”

There are many ideas for a new way of electing a governor when no candidate receives a majority. Doyle would lower the threshold for election from the current 50% plus one to 40%. Some, including Sen. Joe Benning (on VPR yesterday) would prefer a runoff election. Some see an opening for Instant Runoff Voting, to avoid the hassle of a second vote. Some, such as outgoing State Rep. Tom Koch, simply say “We’ve gotta change this” without endorsing a new course.

The common ground, after weeks of uncertainty? We can’t let this happen again, ever.

Even those who’ve supported Scott Milne’s stubborn refusal to concede have concluded that We can’t let this happen again, ever.

Does that seem the least bit contradictory to you? People who are encouraging and enabling Milne’s pursuit of the governorship don’t want anyone else to do what he’s doing. Perhaps they’ve realized the slow corrosive effect of such machinations.

The system, as outdated as it is, was working fine as long as there was a tacit understanding among Vermont politicians: I’ll concede to a plurality winner if you will. Former Gov. Jim Douglas realizes the expediency of this approach, and advised Milne to concede the race after the election results were made official.

But Milne, stomping to the beat of his own drummer as always, forged ahead. Which has forced the state’s political class to confront a flaw in our system, and contemplate changing the Constitution.

Which brings up another contradiction. Milne supporters have carefully parsed every word of the Constitution in search of the hidden wisdom of our predecessors, in much the same way as federal Originalists treat the U.S. Constitution as a sacred text dictated by God himself. But now that they’re facing the consequences of a rickety process created in very different times* — a process that puts us in a class with only Mississippi in how we settle majority-free gubernatorial elections, and that’s a class you never want to be in — they want to tear that bit out of the Constitution and, as Rep. Heidi Scheuermann would say, bring it into the 21st century. I guess that bit wasn’t so sacred after all.

*Tom Koch’s opinion piece, posted on VTDigger, nails the anachronistic character of our current process. “Relic,” he calls it. 

Well, it’s progress, and I’ll take it.

However, I’m doubtful that the legislature will greenlight a Constitutional change. Tempers will cool after Milne has been dispatched back to the business world. There will be squabbles over the best process. There will be many whose knee-jerk reaction to change is “But that was my grandfather’s light bulb!”

And that, combined with the Legislature’s tendency to postpone action whenever possible, will kill any and all amendments.

And we’ll go back to living with a bad process and hoping we never get another Scott Milne again.

 

Somebody get Heidi Scheuermann to a Toastmasters meeting, STAT

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I’ve often mentioned State Rep. Heidi Scheuermann (R-Stowe) as a potential rising star in Vermont politics. She’s got a lot going for her: a high profile among Republican lawmakers, strong connections to the now-ascendant moderate wing of the VTGOP, co-leadership of the putatively bipartisan Vision to Action Vermont (V2AVT), and founding membership in Campaign for Vermont, presumably giving her an in with CFV moneybags Bruce Lisman.

Some folks had demurred from my view that she’s a rising star because of her shortcomings as a public speaker. Well, based on today’s appearance on VPR’s “Vermont Edition,” they’re right. Scheuermann simply isn’t ready for the spotlight.

Scheuermann appeared on VPR with Senate Minority Leader Joe Benning to discuss Republican legislative priorities for the new session. Here’s one of her answers, faithfully transcribed, including all the um’s, repeats, false starts and pauses. The question, just so you know, concerned the possibility of raising taxes to help balance the state budget. Also, just so you know, there was often a discernible quiver in her voice, revealing an unexpected degree of nervousness in a veteran politician.

Well, um, I guess I would say first and foremost, um, for the past, uh, we sort of have a new normal, uh, in the legislature, and that’s unfortunate. And that normal is the budget deficits, extremely, um, large budget deficits. Every year we come in, ah, we have budget deficits. And that tells me, uh, that we, um, are… that the, the Governor and the legislative leadership and those who support these budgets are doing so, um, w-without an eye on the future and exactly how, how we’re going to pay for it.

Um, so when we come in with a budget of fi — with a five, four or five percent increase and, and tax receipts of, or an economy growing at two percent, um, that’s, you know, that’s a real problem and I think we should, we need to, like Joe said, really, uh, really concentrate on, on where we go from here, um, and understand that this can’t be a new normal, and that we have to address it in a comprehensive and fundamental way, and that is bringing the government into the 21st century, in my view. I think we are still stuck in a, um, 19th and 20th century state government, um, and I think we have to move it into the, into the 21st century with, um, with, ah, services being provided more efficiently and effectively, um, with… um… with m-more, um, communication with the outside instead of this internal sort of, of, functioning government that we have, with, with people in the offices, ah, five days a week, um, reading reports. Um, again, they work hard, our state employees work hard, but, ah, but I think we need to move the government into a, into um, into the 21st century.

That said, um, I also think we need to focus first and foremost, um, on our economy and the health of our state’s economy, and we have neglected that for years, and, um, and that’s why we’re in the position we’re in.

Scheuermann has now spoken for almost two minutes. She tries to continue, but host Jane Lindholm interrupts with a redirect. She asks what Scheuermann would suggest in terms of streamlining government or making budget cuts. The answer?

I guess I would say, well, again, um, ah, I wouldn’t propose specific cuts right now until we really get into it. It’s really, it’s very difficult as a legis — as a citizen legislature, um, to get into specific departments and micromanage those departments. I think it needs to come from the administration and the leadership of the administration to set a, uh, to set an agenda for how exactly we’re going to do this, and streamline, and um have more effective and efficient services. I would say for example, again, when you’re talking about economic, the uh economy, and really trying to grow our economy, um, so that it is long-term sort of um… uh… laser-like focus on the economy, I think for example the Agency of Commerce, um, people should be in their offices once a week, [chuckle] one day a week. And they should be out in the fields four days a week and really just talking to people, seeing what businesses need, seeing what our, uh, small employers need, um, and what their challenges are, what their opportunities are, and where we as a state might be able to help.

So that is just one example. Again, I’ll go back to the economy. When you have, we have personal income tax — the reason we’re in these… in the situation we’re in is our personal income tax receipts are down. Um, and that, and that’s due to payroll and, and, and that our economy is stagnant. And, um, so we really need to focus on growing our economy. I hope that that will be, uh, the number one priority for our legislature.

Holy Mother of God. That’s almost Milnesque in its cringeworthy awkwardness. Although admittedly it’s not nearly down to Milne level in terms of positional confusion. It also took three and a half minutes of radio time, including Lindholm’s interjection.

For now, I’ll pass by the policy howlers (Empty out the Agency of Commerce four days a week? Not a single idea for budget cuts, after eight years in the legislature? Content-free references to the 21st century? A transparently token sop to state workers?) and keep my laser-like focus on her delivery. Heidi Scheuermann is an unpolished and unappealing speaker who can’t fight her way out of a sentence.

If she wants to stay where she is now — representing a safe Republican district and being one of the more prominent voices in the legislative minority — she can keep on doing what she’s doing.

But if she wants to be taken seriously for a leadership position or as a candidate for statewide office, then she needs to clean up her rhetorical game big-time.

For an example of how to do it right, just listen to her fellow guest, Joe Benning. He was comfortable and articulate, he got to the point, he kept things simple, and was very quotable.

One protip for Scheuermann: Don’t be so afraid of dead air. Don’t fill up every available space with “ums” and repeated phrases. Let it breathe. It takes some time and practice, but it’s a worthwhile investment. I’ve never been to Toastmasters, but I hear it’s a great place to hone your public-speaking skills in a friendly environment.

Postscript. One unrelated piece of advice. In the process of writing this post I Googled “Heidi Scheuermann” and this is a screenshot of the second match:

Scheuermann Google

Yeah, I don’t think that’s her real nickname.

Intrigued, I clicked on the link to her campaign website, and saw several porny inserts in green type scattered around her “About” page. If you roll your cursor over the site, the porny inserts all disappear. If you exit the site and then go back in, the green inserts reappear. They remain on the page as long as you keep your cursor outside the frame.

This doesn’t look like an ideological attack, because the inserts are so random. But the good Representative may want to check on her website’s security.

The Legislature’s vote for governor will not be close

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The Man Alone, Scott Milne, briefly emerged from his hidey-hole a few days ago to tell the Associated Press’ Dave Gram that his chances of being elected governor “are getting better on a weekly basis, if not a daily basis.”

Curious thing to say, with less than a week until the vote. Speaking calendrically, there ain’t no more “weekly” left. But if you think that’s a bit confusing, wait till you read what he told VTDigger’s Anne Galloway: 

Milne said on Sunday his “chances are improving.” When asked how many lawmakers support his candidacy, he said his statement was “non-mathematical.”

“I’m not counting votes, and if I was, I don’t think I’d have close to 91,” Milne said. He said he could get 25 or 100 votes, but “more likely I’m going to lose, I don’t really know.”

Scott Milne, the lone constant in an ever-changing world.

Scott Milne, the Man From Another Dimension.

I make that a quintuple spinaroonie: up, down, down, up, down. Whatever happens, he’ll be both disappointed and vindicated, I guess.

Anyway, if he thinks he’s gaining ground, he’s wrong. The Legislature’s vote will not be close. Gov. Shumlin will win, with perhaps a handful of Democrats crossing party lines to vote for Milne.

At this point, the cynical among you might be saying, “Hey, didn’t you predict an easy win for Shumlin in November?”

Yup, me and every other pundit and politico in Vermont. But I feel confident enough to tiptoe out on a limb once again. The Legislative vote is a whole different animal than the general election.

In November, a whole lot of liberals and card-carrying Democrats voted for someone other than Shumlin or simply left their ballots blank. There’s substantial evidence that the Democratic vote was far smaller in the gubernatorial race than elsewhere. It was easy to cast a protest vote when “everybody knew” that Shumlin would win. I certainly believed that Shumlin didn’t really need my vote. After the results came in, a liberal friend who voted for Milne swore never to cast a protest vote again.

The ironic but unmistakable conclusion: if people had thought the race was close, Shumlin would have done better. To put it another way, if voters had thought they might actually elect Scott Milne, he wouldn’t have done so well.

In the legislative vote for governor, there’s no kidding around. When you’re one out of 200,000, you can tell yourself your vote doesn’t count that much. When you’re one of 180, you really can’t. Each lawmaker is going to take the vote seriously.

And while leadership insists they aren’t twisting any arms, party discipline does — rightly — play a role. Parties are based on some sense of shared purpose and loyalty, which is why I’ve been so harsh on John Campbell and Dick Mazza for their open support of Lt. Gov. Phil Scott.

When push comes to shove, and all the cards are on the table, how many Democrats are really going to vote for the other guy? Even if the ballot is secret, it wouldn’t be hard to figure out who voted which way. I expect Milne to get a modest number of Democratic votes, but no more than that.

Besides party loyalty, there’s also Vermonters’ tendency to stick with the familiar. Shumlin may have lost a lot of voters, he may have cost some lawmakers their seats, he may have turned his back on his signature policy proposal, but he’s still “Our Guy.” If the Senate Democratic Caucus gave near-unanimous support to Our Guys John Campbell and Dick Mazza, how many would abandon Peter Shumlin, who’s another one of Our Guys?

There’s also this: Just about everybody in the Statehouse knows that Scott Milne would be a disaster as governor. Well, at best he’d be a two-year placeholder. At worst, Legislative leadership would work around him. But nobody except Scott Milne wants Scott Milne to be governor.

Including all the Republicans who’ll vote for him on Thursday. I’ve written this before and it continues to be true: do you ever see Milne and the top Republicans together? Do you see any mention of “Governor Milne” when Republicans talk about their plans?

Is Milne involved at all in Phil Scott’s little “pitch session” with business leaders on Wednesday?

Nope, nope, and nope.

If the Republicans believed that Milne had the remotest chance of winning, they’d have him out front at every VTGOP event. But they don’t, in spite of their utterances to the contrary, so he remains The Invisible Man.

And on Thursday, he will formally become the losing candidate for governor. As he should be.

(And if I’m wrong, I will cheerfully fess up.)

The Assassination of Mary Morrissey by the Coward Shap Smith

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The Burlington Free Press doesn’t have much time for state government these days, what with the dismissal of its entire Statehouse bureau and its obvious skeleton-crewing in recent weeks.

But boy, they’ve got plenty of time to spare for the potential reassignment of a single Republican back-bencher.

[State Rep. Mary] Morrissey, [R-Bennington]… confirmed Friday she has been told that House Speaker Shap Smith, D-Morristown has plans to reassign her to a yet to be determined committee.

… Morrissey said she sees the move as an effort to silence a legislator who has been forced to ask tough questions that Democrats are not asking themselves.

Or, to put it another way, it’s a routine committee reshuffle, the kind that happens every couple of years. A whole lot of others will be shifted around in the next few days. It is within the purview of the Speaker to make committee assignments.

Morrissey and her allies are depicting this move as an effort to stymie oversight of health care reform. Which, frankly, gives a hell of a lot of credit to Morrissey. In my brief exposure to her work, she seems to be a garden-variety naysayer on health care reform, ideologically opposed to Obamacare and Shummycare under any circumstances, and not offering any special expertise on the subject.

The Speaker himself put it this way:

“I’ve spent a lot of time looking at a group of people that will work well together to come up with policy,” Smith said.

“I want to put together people who will work effectively together and don’t have baggage from past fights,” Smith said.

Since Morrissey is toting a steamer trunk full of conservative dogma, Smith seems to have reason for her removal. It has less to do with the alleged danger she poses to Democrats, and more to do with her kneejerk opposition. She’s not a watchdog, she’s a fallen tree in the roadway.

Her possible removal from the Health Care Committee is standard operating practice. And, frankly, not that big a deal. It’s not like she’s the only one who can ask inconvenient questions, and it’s not like she has special knowledge of the health care system.

Well, if she does, she hasn’t shown it.

Our still-broken inpatient psychiatric system

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One of journalism’s highest purposes is to lance the boils of society — to expose unpleasant truths that everybody is doing their best to ignore.

A prime example appears on VTDigger today: a story by Morgan True about the continuing problems in the state’s psychiatric care system, and particularly the brand shiny new state hospital in Berlin.

Among the key points:

— Even after the facility’s opening, some psychiatric patients have found themselves parked in emergency rooms for days or even weeks.

— There have been 59 documented attacks by patients on hospital staff, some resulting in significant injuries.

— The hospital houses a couple dozen of the most severely ill people in Vermont. Many have been convicted of violent felonies. One doctor told True that the hospital is “one of the most dangerous workplaces in Vermont.”

— State law strictly limits the restraint or medication of patients against their will. Even the most violent.

— In part because of this dangerous work environment, the hospital has been consistently understaffed since its opening. As a result, it has yet to operate at full capacity.

Which brings us back to point one: several months after the hospital’s opening, severely mentally ill people are still being warehoused in ERs.

This is a whole lotta bad stuff. It shows a mental health care system that’s still functioning poorly even after the Shumlin Administration’s entire plan has been put in place.

The Department of Mental Health, for its part, seems to be taking a remarkably lax and unforthcoming attitude toward the situation. DMH knows the total number of attacks on staff, but it won’t release any information on staff injuries.

And according to DMH Deputy Commissioner Frank Reed, the department “has not tried to compare the number of violent incidents at VPCH to other psychiatric hospitals.”

Well, why the hell not? I’d think you’d want to know whether our problems are unique, or simply the natural consequence of caring for the most severely mentally ill.

Reed also flunks the transparency test when it comes to waiting times in hospital emergency rooms. He says average wait times have decreased, but…

Reed was unable to provide documentation of average wait times, saying those figures are still being “pulled together.” The numbers will be presented to a legislative oversight committee in January.

Perhaps Mr. True should apologize for inquiring at an inopportune time. But it shouldn’t be that hard to assemble those numbers. Indeed, I’d expect a Department that’s doing its job to compile those figures on an ongoing basis.

In fact, I’d be very surprised if DMH doesn’t have the numbers already. It’s Management 101, isn’t it? Keep track of your most important statistical markers?

True’s report raises all kinds of questions about state law, the Shumlin Administration’s concept of a mental health care system, and how many resources were spent trying to develop a system that was undersized from the start. DMH officials are talking about supplementing the system with a new 14-bed secure residential facility, but acknowledge that it’ll be a tough sell when lawmakers are under the gun to cut the budget. DMH may have already squandered its best opportunity to create a good system.

And please don’t insult me with the “No one could have foreseen” excuse. The people responsible for inpatient care were all saying the same thing after Irene: the Shumlin Administration’s plan was so bare-bones that it was almost doomed to fail. While their advice was ignored, how many millions did the Administration spend on inadequate plans, patchwork facilities, and extra costs? (One example: according to True, the state has paid more than $1 million since 2012 for sheriff’s deputies to monitor psychiatric patients in hospital ERs.)

And it turns out, to the surprise of no one who works in the field, that a 24-bed hospital costs nearly as much to run as the old 50-bed facility, and costs more on a per-bed basis because the foundational staffing needs are so high.

And, given that the new hospital has some of the same kinds of problems as the old one, I have to ask if our laws are out of whack. I mean, look: We’re talking about the two dozen  sickest people in Vermont, many of them violently, dangerously sick. The restrictions on restraint or medication without patient approval may be the best thing for the vast majority of patients; I believe different standards should apply to the very sickest. They are the ones least capable of exercising sound judgment, and most capable of inflicting harm on staff or fellow patients.

One commonality between the old hospital and the new is our strongly patient-centric laws. It seems clear to me that those laws are on point for the vast majority of patients, but that there should be a different standard for patients in the state hospital.

Woman, ever the nurturer

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Odd experience today.

A bit of background first. We have an older car that we’ve been taking to the same independent repair shop since we moved here. Never been to the local dealership.

Until today, when I wanted to replace a burnt-out headlight before the weekend. So I called the dealership (which shall go unnamed), and got an incredibly chirpy female who answered the phone with a clearly rehearsed, boss-mandated greeting. I asked for Service, and she sent me to voice mail. I left a message.

An hour later, I called back. Got the same chirpy greeting from a different female. She checked around a bit, and told me I could come in anytime today. And informed me that “Jim” hadn’t had time to return my call because they were short-staffed. Okay.

So I go in. The gents on duty in Service are old-school Grunt ‘n Scratch types. The one who didn’t return my call is clearly just a little bit pissed that I made a second call. But what do I know? The longer I waited, the less chance I had of getting the headlight replaced. On a Friday.

The guys are all either staring at their computer screens or talking on the phone or both. They don’t tell me Jack Squat, so I hang around the desk. Waiting for, oh, maybe a time estimate? An invitation to sit down and have a cuppa joe? I don’t even know whether they’re taking action on my car or just typing stuff into their computers.

About ten minutes later, Randy the Service Guy tells me it’s all set and charges me sixteen bucks.

That’s nice, fast and cheap. But it left me wondering: if the dealer took all that trouble to train his female receptionists to be cheerful and order them to use an overly chirpy rehearsed greeting, then why doesn’t he send his Service Guys to charm school? Whatever good will the female receptionists may have created with their obviously canned greeting was more than undone by the Service Department’s complete lack of communication skills.

And, more broadly, why is it the gals’ job to be the business’ smiley face?

I look forward to returning to my independent garage, where the owner is a woman and the female receptionist actually knows quite a lot about cars. And everybody is equally polite and businesslike.

A Fair Point

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A top Vermont pol not known for podium-pounding or rabble-rousing has sent some unusually fiery language in the direction of Vermont’s leading telecom provider.

House Speaker Shap Smith says he has doubts that FairPoint Communications will continue to provide telecommunications services to Vermonters for the long term as its workers continue to strike and service complaints pile up.

Smith, a Democrat, said he believes the company is looking to shed labor costs in order to sell.

You may have missed that little New Year’s Day newsflash, because it was written by the Mitchell Family Organ’s Neal Goswami, and appeared in the paywalled Times Argus and Herald. Nobody else has reported it so far.

FairPoint workers have been on strike since mid-October. Top Democrats have pressured the company to settle, but it has refused to budge. In fact, CEO Paul Sunu recently sent a response to those Dems, portraying his company as the willing negotiator and the unions as the hard-heads.

Smith told Goswami he was “insulted” by the letter, and said FairPoint was putting itself “in a tough place.” And he’s got capitalism’s weapon of choice in his pocket: money.

Smith said the state has provided subsidies to FairPoint in recent years to help it deliver service to rural areas. But the company is not likely to receive a warm reception from lawmakers in the new session, he said.

He accused FairPoint of “trying to basically bust [the] union[s],” and added that “they’ve got a real problem on their hands in the Legislature.”

FairPoint may also have “a real problem” with state regulators. It has proposed a new rate plan that would cap rates for basic phone service (the loss leader) while allowing FairPoint to raise other rates (advanced phone packages, business phones, Internet, satellite TV) without seeking regulatory approval.

Gee, that’d be a big fat giveaway, wouldn’t it now?

At a time when service problems have spiked since the unions walked out, and FairPoint has had one major interruption in its E-9-1-1 system, you’d hope that state regulators would be keeping an eagle eye on these mooks instead of giving them open access to non-basic customers’ wallets.

Beyond the immediate situation, Smith questioned whether FairPoint would still be in Vermont five years down the road — and whether it would be able to find a buyer for its northern New England business. And he’s got a (cough) fair point: the landline business is shrinking everywhere, and rural phone service means high maintenance costs and low profits.

That’s why Verizon dumped our business on FairPoint a few years back.

Smith wants state government to be proactive about the situation, rather than wait for FairPoint to bleed us and its workers dry and then dump the business entirely.

He said the Legislature should begin exploring options with the Public Service Department to ensure the state has quality telecommunications services in the future.

What might that mean? A quasi-public Vermont Telecom? Or a fully public one? Not sure what Shap has in mind, but it’s an important issue we should face before it turns into a crisis.