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."

The Honorable Member From Lyndon Would Like Some Cheese to Go with That Whine

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First-term state Rep. Charles Wilson (R-Lyndon), seen here doing his level best to stay awake during a budget hearing, has established himself as one of the most complainy of the House Republicans’ infinitesimal freshman class. He’s right up there with Barre Town’s Gina Galfetti for writing op-eds about how badly House Republicans are mistreated by the majority caucuses.

WIlson has characterized global warming as “a hoax“ and the majority Dems and Progs as “tyrannical.” Which only means that he has never experienced real tyranny, but let’s keep moving. He also sees organic farms as “failing” enterprises that are a waste of farm aid programs, and the state budget as an “obnoxious and unsustainable” document that “tempts unconscionable spending on policies set by unelected consultants and boards of California Dreamers.”

His latest commentary complains that Vermont has a “one-party system.” Which, ahem, Phil Scott. But yeah, the Dems and Progs have built up historic majorities in the Legislature — thanks to the VTGOP’s descent into incompetence and extremism.

One of WIlson’s complaints is that “many Republican bills are never even put forth for discussion — only Democrat and Progressive bills.” Well, sure, that’s what legislative majorities do. But let’s be fair and take a closer look at these “Republican bills” that are languishing in the circular file. I’m sure they’re top-flight examples of deep thought and creativity, right?

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Our Little Gift to the Catholic Church

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Suresh Garimella’s neutron bomb approach to the humanities notwithstanding, sometimes a professor of religion comes in very handy. Take Friday, March 3 for example. On that day, the Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony on S.16, a bill that would require clergy to report cases of child abuse and neglect even if they learned of such crimes in confidence while acting as a spiritual advisor. Like, say, a Catholic priest hearing confession, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.

Lined up to testify were not one, not two, but three Catholics, including Bishop Christopher Coyne of the Diocese of Burlington. You can guess what they had to say: Removing the confessional exemption would force priests to choose between state law and canon law. It would infringe on Catholics’ First Amendment right to free expression of religion.

After all of that, the committee heard from Tom Borchert, chair of the Department of Religion at the University of Vermont. And boy, did his testimony make my ears perk up.

The two big takeaways: First, the “spiritual advisor” exemption describes one and only one religious practice: Catholic confession. Second, the law as currently written creates a First Amendment issue on its own.

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Housing the Homeless as Economic Development Strategy

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We could view homelessness as a moral failure… or a failure of capitalism… or a failure of individuals to live productive lives… or a problem in need of resources we can’t afford to commit…

Or… just spitballin’ here… a waste of potential and precious human capital.

For this discussion, we’re leaving out the moral and ethical dimensions of the issue. We’re not declaring an obligation to protect our most vulnerable. We’re putting on our green eyeshades and considering homelessness from a purely bottom-line point of view.

To hear the Scott administration tell it, extending the emergency motel voucher program is kind of like taking a pile of money and setting it on fire. It produces a bit of transient warmth, but it’s otherwise a waste of resources. Legislative Democrats and even some housing advocates often fall for this: They tacitly accept the premise instead of making the economic case for (a) giving everyone a roof to sleep under in the short term and (b) ending homelessness in the longer term.

When you look at it that way, you find that we can’t afford not to end homelessness. There is abundant evidence that addressing homelessness is an economic winner — not just in the long term, but almost immediately. So let’s stop talking about whether we can afford $72 million for another year of motel vouchers or $31 million for a stripped-down version of the program or a few hundred million to provide enough housing for all. Instead, let’s talk about the economic positives of a humane policy choice.

(I don’t pretend that any of this is my idea, but it ought to be more of a factor in our policy debates.)

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They’re Just Going to Beat This Crypto Bro Thing Into the Ground, Aren’t They?

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I don’t know what U.S. Rep. Becca Balint did to so mightily offend the journalistic nabobs at VTDigger and Seven Days, but our two most prominent political media outlets seem bound and determined to lash her tightly to disgraced crypto king (and long-lost Fourth Stooge) Sam Bankman-Fried. Hell, they’ve probably started pre-writing her obituary with the headline “Balint, Beneficiary of Fraudulent Crypto Bro Wealth and Vermont’s First Woman in Congress, Dies at [insert age here].”

Digger’s been at this for a while now. Every time there’s a fresh development in the downfall of Bankman-Fried, Digger’s political team cranks out a story that reports said development and fills out the space by recapping all the old stuff about his million-dollar donation to a political action committee that then spent it in support of Balint, and hinting at a deeper relationship between the two.

It’s a nice way to fill the news hole, but c’mon.

Digger’s latest breathless retelling of the same old story refers to Bankman-Fried as “Balint’s $1 Million Benefactor,” which is about the most sinister possible way to characterize the situation. “Benefactor” implies two very untrue things: That the two had some sort of undisclosed relationship, and that he straight-up gave her a big bag of cash.

In truth, Bankman-Fried gave a bunch of money to the Victory Fund, a political action committee that supports LGBTQ+ candidates. The Victory Fund then spent it, almost certainly at SBF’s behest, on a last-minute ad blitz supporting Balint’s bid for Congress.

And no matter how long our political media keep chewing on that dry old bone, they can’t prove that Balint knew about any of this, that she’d made a deal of some kind with SBF, or that the money made any significant difference in Balint’s primary win over then-lieutenant governor Molly Gray. They continue to hint at it whenever they can, but that’s as far as they can get.

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Supermajority Disappoints on Housing Crisis

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Yesterday will go down as a case study in how legislative realpolitik works — or how Democratic supermajorities shoot themselves in the foot. Choose your own adventure.

In two separate venues yesterday, majority Democrats negotiated against themselves instead of flexing their political muscle. And the real losers were the thousands of Vermonters experiencing or facing homelessness.

In the early afternoon, the House Human Services Committee approved a memo to House Appropriations spelling out its underwhelming version of a plan to try to avoid an explosion in homelessness. A few hours later, a House-Senate conference committee approved the 2023 Budget Adjustment Act, with House members agreeing with the Senate version that cut $3 million from the emergency motel voucher program. The program would continue through the end of June, but with reduced eligibility after the end of May. More than 750 households would lose their eligibility a month early.

The conference committee move was a master class in keeping away from prying eyes. The House named its three members last week; the Senate followed suit on Monday. The very next day, the committee met with effectively no advance notice and quickly approved a “compromise” that favored the Senate on every area of disagreement. The meeting was over in less than 25 minutes. And only afterward was there any public disclosure of what the committee had approved.

This is all according to procedure, mind you. Conference committees don’t have to give advance warning of meetings. They often fit in their business when the opportunity arises. But usually their meetings include at least some debate. In this case, there was little to none. The deal was done behind closed doors.

This may be within the rules, but the lack of transparency is galling. As was the committee’s acceptance of the Scott administration’s assertion that cutting eligibility is actually the charitable thing to do. The argument goes that there isn’t enough capacity in the program so we should focus the available space on those in the direst straits. Some would say there’s a difference between sticking to the state’s roster of motel units and making a real effort to expand the pool, but I quibble.

House Human Services shared an unfortunate process with the conference committee. As far as I can tell, the proposed memo to Appropriations wasn’t posted online before it was approved by Human Services — and still hasn’t been, as of this writing.

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Hey Vermont, Meet Another Homegrown Hatemonger!

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I don’t know how this guy escaped my notice before this, and now that I know I’ll try to forget as soon as possible. This is Joshua Slocum, resident of Winooski and presenter of a far-right YouTube series called “Disaffected.” On a recent episode, Slocum spewed some thoroughly toxic slime about transgender folk and gender affirming medical care. He also betrayed his utter ignorance of Vermont’s legislative process but, you know, baby steps.

Slocum is, I guess you could say, an aspirational Christopher-Aaron Felker. (Which might be the saddest sentence I’ve ever written.) He was one of those involved in last year’s Felker-led protests against Outright Vermont. Like Felker, he is a very conservative gay man. Like Felker, he wants to pull up the gender-inclusive drawbridge after “LGB” and deny the legitimacy of “TQIA+.”

Unlike Felker, who is STILL the chair of the Burlington Republican Committee, Slocum’s extremism cost him his job. He was, for 20 years, the head of a teeny-tiny organization called the Funeral Consumers Alliance. How tiny? A staff of two. Last fall, Slocum resigned his post, presumably under heavy pressure, due to his public expression of racist, misogynist, and transphobic views.

Which gives him plenty of free time to post more hateful content! A recent episode focused on H.89, the so-called Shield Bill that would protect medical personnel from prosecution for providing abortions or gender affirming care. He posted after the House voted 130-13 in favor of H.89.

Let’s cover the stupidity before we get to the toxicity. Slocum aimed his remarks at the House Republicans who voted for H.89. (Only 12 Republicans voted “Nay.” The 13th “Nay” was cast by Democrat Dennis LaBounty. Feel free to ask him why.) Slocum pleads with those Republican “Yea” voters to reconsider.

Uh… problem is, the House has voted and the bill is on to the Senate. There is no mechanism for a lawmaker to change their vote at this point. This is, like, kindergarten-level knowledge of the legislative process.

Slocum also offers House Republicans an excuse: “I know that many lawmakers are very busy and rely on aides to relay information to them.”

Uh… Vermont lawmakers don’t have aides. They have no staff whatsoever. They do depend on caucus leadership for guidance and, of course, leadership was in support of the bill.

And now we get to the putrescent red meat of Slocum’s argument.

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Green Mountain Care Board Prepares to Punt Away an Investment in Inpatient Mental Health Care

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Our health care guardians at the Green Mountain Care Board are trying to sneak through a bit of business that combines bad policy with questionable procedure.

Well, I guess that explains the “sneak through” part. They can’t be proud of this.

Six years ago, the GMCB ordered the University of Vermont Medical Center to take $21 million in surplus revenue and spend it on developing a plan to boost inpatient mental health care, which has been abysmally lacking since Tropical Storm Irene wiped out the old state hospital in 2011. We’re now in our twelfth year of inadequate inpatient care that has left severely mentally ill patients languishing in emergency rooms and frontline providers dealing with the consequences.

The failure to address this situation ought to be a source of embarrassment if not shame to Our Political Leaders.

Anyway, it seemed like a decent idea: Let UVMMC use the surplus to tackle a challenge that nobody else would.

Well, now the GMCB is about to let UVMMC off the hook, further delaying any meaningful response to the shortage of inpatient care. And the Board trying to rush it through with the least possible fanfare.

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House Panel Dials Back on the Self-Dealing, Approves Election Bill

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In a fairly quick hearing on Friday, the House Government Operations and Military Affairs Committee voted 9-3 in favor of a package of election reforms. It was a party line vote with all Democrats in favor, all Republicans opposed, and no Progressives on the committee.

The changes in H.97 (as it is now called) make the package less overtly Democrat-friendly, and add an important improvement for those who need to vote remotely. (Text of bill downloadable from the committee’s webpage.)

The latter first: The bill would allow people to deliver their completed ballots electronically by “a secure online portal developed and maintained by the Secretary of State.” This would make it easier for those who have trouble delivering a ballot in person, including some people with disabilities and — especially — military personnel stationed overseas.

The original bill had drawn criticism for advantaging Democrats largely at the expense of the Progressive Party, but two pro-Dem changes were removed or watered down before the committee vote. The original bill would have barred candidates from running under multiple party labels, which is exactly how many Progressive candidates have won office. It would also have removed limits on donations by a candidate to a political party.

As approved, H.97 would allow candidates to run with multiple labels, but it prescribes the order in which the party names would appear next to the candidate. And donations from a candidate to a party would be capped at $100,000, an increase from the current $10,000.

But the bill, as a whole, remains Democrat-friendly.

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Hang On, Female Inmates, We’ll Get You a New Prison In Maybe Less Than a Decade

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This charming space, with its comfy chairs and natural lighting and complete absence of books, is either a prospective rendering of Vermont State University’s new “library” or a possible concept for a new women’s prison in Vermont.

Spoiler alert: it’s the latter. On Thursday morning, the House Corrections & Institutions Committee took the next small step toward building a new facility to replace the inadequate and unsanitary mess that is the Chittenden Regional Correctional Facility, a.k.a. Vermont’s women’s prison.

I say “small step” because, as the hearing revealed, it’s going to take — maybe — five to eight years to complete the process of designing, siting, and building a new facility. Or possibly longer. There could be roadblocks, and everything is dependent on a solid funding commitment. I’m sure the inmates can be patient about this.

The hearing centered on a presentation by HOK, an architectural firm that’s best known for building sports stadiums but has also designed more than $4 billion in what it euphemistically calls “justice facilities.” HOK’s Justice Division, so they say, “focuses on designs for human rights and a more just world as a whole.” By building prisons. (It received $1.5 million from the state for doing the research that led to Thursday’s presentation, which can be downloaded from the committee’s website.)

In the first phase of its study, commissioned in 2020, HOK unreservedly recommended closure of CRCF and replacement with a new facility. The state is committed to do so, but that’s about as far as it’s gotten. Veteran C&I Chair Alice Emmons said this year’s work will focus on finding a location for the new facility. “You don’t do nothin’ without land,” she said. The 2024 session will focus on moving from the concept-idea stage toward an architectural design. After that comes project bidding and selection, construction, and making the transition from CRCF to the new place.

There was no attempt to determine how large the new facility should be, but there was plenty of discussion on the subject that broke down into two camps: We’ve got to build it as big as it might possibly need to be, or we can take a less maximalist approach because we’ll continue on the path of justice reform because incarcerating large numbers of people is fundamentally inhumane and counterproductive.

Sorry, couldn’t resist.

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I Don’t Know What This Is, But It’s Not “Fantastic”

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The political leaders of St. Albans have reacted enthusiastically to a report from the city police department indicating that there were 15 internal investigations of SAPD staff in the year 2022.

That’s 15 investigations in a department with 18 staffers. You do the math.

I have a hard time being “impressed” by that (Alderperson Marie Bessette), or viewing it as “fantastic” (a member of the city’s Police Advisory Board). They are taking the report as a sign the department is unafraid to ride herd on itself. Sure, but I think it’s more like getting a fence around a toxic waste pit and starting the cleanup. I mean, if the SAPD is averaging almost one internal investigation a year per employee (which they did in the previous two years as well), there’s clearly a lot of work left to do.

VTDigger has a lengthy piece giving as much detail on the investigations as the city will release, which isn’t much. It’s still worth reading.

This is one more sign of a big problem with oversight of city and town police agencies. Civic leaders and top cops are often in codependent relationships (See also: Weinberger, Miro). I think it’s safe to say the police chief is the most influential figure in a city or town government. Not necessarily the most powerful, but the most influential. You see it in town after town: Even when a police chief or department alienates the public and stains the community’s reputation, civilian leaders are eager to close ranks with them.

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