Scott Milne’s first campaign finance report is in

Leave a reply

Drumroll please…

Milne raised a total of $20,420 so far.

(Apparently he needs a little practice with the form; he reported $20,420 in gifts over $100, and another $20,420 in gifts under $100, for a grand total of, yep, $20,420. Oh,well.)

The fundraising total includes $900 from the candidate or immediate family. And $355 in loans forgiven.

The good news is, he’s only spent $600 so far (printing and T-shirts), so he’s still got some money left.

Odd factoid: Pretty much half of his total comes from a single, out-of-state family: the Boieses. David II, David III, Robin, Mary, and Jonathan Boies gave $2,000 apiece to Milne for Governor. Boies II is the famous lawyer of marriage-equality fame; the others are his wife and children. Go figure.

And only $1800 of his campaign kitty came from Vermont donors. $1200 of that is from people named Milne. Let’s say the candidate has yet to establish broad appeal, shall we?

Odd factoid #2: Virtually all of Milne’s donations came in on the same day: last Friday, July 11. Until then, his campaign had raised a mere $5,100.

Milne fever… catch it!

Early afternoon thoughts on campaign finance filing day

Leave a reply

First, a couple newsworthy Tweets from VPR’s Peter Hirschfeld. He reports that the Scott Milne campaign will report roughly $20,000 in contributions, and that Phil Scott will report about $50,000. Milne’s total is awfully pitiful; Scott’s still got a ways to go to catch up with Dean Corren, who qualifies for up to $200,000 in public financing.

As of 1 p.m., neither candidate had actually filed. Other notes:

— The aforementioned Corren reported just under $20,000 in donations from 862 donors. No single donation is worth more than $50. That’s an impressive show of organization and appeal.

— If you want a snapshot of the relative financial pull of the Democrats and Republicans, take a look at their respective House campaign operations. The Dems have raised a daunting $108,000 for their House campaign kitty and spent almost all of that. Notable on the expense ledger are salaries for two campaign staffers — just for the House campaign. (The Repubs, at last check, had one paid staffer for the entire state party. Might be two.) The Republicans’ House campaign operation has raised a paltry $12,000 and spent about 5K.

— Most of the House Dems’ money has come from two sources: State Representatives financially supporting a joint campaign, and corporations and their PACs. Big bucks from MVP Health Care, the Association of Vermont Credit Unions, the Vermont Realtor PAC, New England Cable and Telecommunications Association, and the Corrections Corporation of America (yuck), among others.

— You know which PAC has taken in more money than the Republicans’ House campaign? The Common Sense Leadership PAC, the brainchild of House Minority Leader Don Turner. He’s raised $26,000 for this cycle and spent $12,000. None of it on donations to House candidates. He has paid $2700 to consultant Shayne Spence, and $900 to Johnston Consulting. Why he’s wasting money on Darcie Johnston’s “expertise” only he can say. Turner raised $10,000 of his money in $2000 increments from two stalwart Republican families: the Vallees and the Pizzagallis.

— In the closely-watched State Senate race in Windham County, Joan Bowman has reported donations totaling $1500. But about three-quarters of that is from herself or her family. Bowman is one of four Democrats running for two Senate nominations in August: the others are incumbent Jeanette White, former Douglas Administration cabinet member “Artful” Roger Allbee, and newcomer Becca Balint. It’ll be interesting to see how much Balint takes in; from the outside, it looks like she and Bowman are in a face-off for the non-White, non-Allbee votes.

— Bill Doyle doesn’t have to lift a finger, and isn’t. He’s sitting on a balance of $6,500 from previous campaigns. He’s raised $100 this year and spent nothing. I think he’s rightly confident.

— Pat McDonald, the former Republican State Rep who’s now running for one of Washington County’s three seats, has racked up a noteworthy $10,000 in donations. She’s spent about half of that.

— Doug Hoffer has raised a modest $4400 and spent most of it. Well, he is essentially unopposed in his bid for a second term as Auditor. The bulk of his spending was in two contributions to the state Democratic organization: $1500 to the party, and $2250 to the Dems’ “coordinated campaign.” I guess Doug’s taking this “Prog running as a Prog/Dem” thing seriously.

— Former Republican Representative Oliver Olsen, on the comeback trail as an Independent, is raking in the cash (by House standards). He’s raised $5,700, and spent almost nothing.

— Who hasn’t been a candidate in four years, but keeps on filing campaign finance reports? Matt Dunne, that’s who. He filed as “not a candidate” and reported a carry-over surplus of $2,856.54.

— Former Democratic State Senator Bill Carris, who resigned for health reasons in 2012 (Eldred French was appointed to fill out his term), has liquidated his campaign funds. He had $9400 on hand, and distributed it to a variety of candidates and the state Democratic Party. Notable gifts: $2000 to Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell, $1000 to French’s re-election campaign, and $1800 to his son William Tracy Carris, who’s also running for a Democratic nomination in Rutland County, which has a total of three Senate seats.

— Perhaps the most active of Republican groups so far, at least in terms of supporting candidates, is the Green Mountain Republican Senatorial Committee, which has raised over $15,000 and given healthy start-up contributions of $1500 each to Senator Kevin Mullin and Senate candidate Brian Cullamore, both of Rutland county; and $1,000 apiece to Senator Norm McAllister and Senate hopefuls Dustin Degree, Pat McDonald, Joy Limoge, and Bob Frenier.

I’ll be watching the filings all afternoon. (What a life.) More updates later. Stay tuned!

 

Is the VTGOP broke?

Leave a reply

Click the link to see the Vermont Republican State Committee’s campaign finance report for July 15. Do you see what I see?

I see a party with a negative balance. More expenses than revenues for this campaign cycle so far.

Yikes.

The key numbers:

Total contributions, campaign to date: $61,367.32.

Total expenditures, campaign to date: $62,523.00.

Negative eleven hundred bucks, amirite?

Now, the VTGOP also files with the Federal Elections Commission; its most recent filing came in mid-June, and showed a balance of $36,430.25. I’m not smart enough to know the difference between the state and federal filings; I can say that either way, the bottom line is kinda pitiful. Still gonna be a long slog for “Super Dave” Sunderland as he tries to rebuild from the inglorious days of Angry Jack.

Also, there’s a curious fact in today’s state filings: while the state GOP is bereft of funds, quite a few local and county GOP organizations are rollin’ in it. Well, by Vermont Republican standards anyway. There seem to be a lot of die-hard Republicans who are supporting their local colleagues/cronies, but aren’t doing so for the state organization.

I’m still pondering the meaning of that. And I’ve got some other notes on deadline day coming along shortly. Stay tuned!

Only in #VT: Military Vets for Namaste

Leave a reply

You probably wouldn’t ever see this story in, say, Texas or Mississippi.

A large donation from Manchester Veterans of Foreign Wars Post 6471 has enabled the Vermont Veterans’ Home to expand its Namaste program.

This included buying furnishings for the Namaste room, which has a scenic view of the landscape and pond in back of the home.

The Namaste program is aimed at “giving non-pharmacological intervention to anxiety, dementia behaviors,” according to Vets’ Home CEO Melissa Jackson. She reports “incredible success” with the program.

Still, for most VFW chapters, I suspect the name itself would be a deal-breaker. Somebody’d think it was Muslim; others would blanch at the idea of inculcating ideas from Eastern religion into our troubled vets. Hey, whaddya doin’ in that Nam-assty room — training American double agents?

Instead, when presented with the idea, the Manchester Post responded with a $40,000 donation.

Hats off to VFW Post 6471 for their generosity. Maybe in the future I’ll be a little less quick to judge, or dismiss, “old-fashioned” community groups like theirs.

You know, sometimes Them Damn Bureaucrats come in real handy.

Leave a reply

The daily work of government is unremarkable, in the literal sense: it’s not worth remarking on. The roads are plowed, the mail is delivered, services rendered, benefits distributed, contracts are signed and executed. We don’t even think about the vast majority of what government does.

It’s only on those relatively rare occasions when government (1) fails to function properly, or (2) impinges on something you or I want to do, that we notice. And take umbrage.

Which is how government bureaucracy, which does many things quietly and well, becomes a symbol of dysfunction and denial. I’m not saying it’s perfect by any means, and there ought to be a constant striving to make it work better. But it works pretty darn well most of the time. And once in a while, its quiet function becomes very loudly and obviously useful.

Case in point: one of this summer’s construction projects in Montpelier is a reworking of the sidewalks around the intersection of Elm, Court, and School Streets. This is the corner where the Uncommon Market, that fine little grocery/deli, plies its trade. The main goal of the project is to make the intersection ADA-compliant; it will also make the Market itself more accessible.

But the project’s been put on hold because a routine inspection found something unexpected. The city’s Assistant Public Works Director (now there’s a grand old bureaucratic job title) Tom McArdle explained in a letter to all concerned parties:

Soon after the project was begun, we were made aware of a potential public and contractor safety issue concerning an adjacent brick building housing the Uncommon Market. …the brick wall appeared to be pulling away from the structure and may come tumbling down.

Oopsie. A structural engineer was summoned. The findings:

… it was determined that the brick exterior wall had partially detached from the building and separated from the underlying structure. From that inspection, the structural engineer reported that the wall is in imminent danger of at least a limited collapse and recommended the public sidewalk and parking lane remain closed with fall protection. The engineer further advised that any significant vibration from construction activities could trigger a collapse.

Double oopsie with nuts.

So the project is on hold and the area near the wall has been blocked off. The building’s owner will have to arrange for repairs, and then the project will be rescheduled.

And the lesson, my children? If it wasn’t for this routine inspection by some damn government bureaucrat, that wall most likely would have collapsed on its own. It could have caused injuries or even deaths, and it would have mightily inconvenienced the building’s occupants — the Market and the apartment dwellers on the upper floors.

Instead, we should see an orderly, preventive repair.

The bureaucracy. It works.

The day before campaign finance report deadline day

2 Replies

Tuesday July 15 is the deadline for the latest round of campaign finance reports. We’re still waiting for the big ones — Shumlin, Milne, Phil Scott, et al. But there are some early filers worthy of note.

“The Artful Roger” Allbee, Republicrat for State Senate, pulled down $1,350 in donations, including two $500 gifts from out-of-staters and $250 from himself. (His only expenditure is to the state Democratic Party for voter lists. After all, he’s gotta get to know the Democrats in his district. Being a longtime Republican now running as a Dem.

A few PACs have filed reports. Perhaps most noteworthy is the MVP Health Care PAC (an arm of the health insurer), which split its early gifts: $1500 to the Vermont Democratic House Campaign Committee and $1000 to the VTGOP. Covering the bases, I suppose.

The state troopers, on the other hand, are all-in with the Dems so far. The Vermont State Troopers PAC gave $3000 to Shumlin for Governor (coals to Newcastle, that), $500 to the Vermont Democratic Party, and interestingly, $3000 to TJ Donovan for Chittenden County State’s Attorney. I doubt he really needs the money, so I presume the troopers want to stay on the good side of our Attorney General In Waiting.

The Patient Choices for Vermont Victory Fund, a pro-health care reform group,* has amassed roughly $23,000 in donations and spent a “mere” $2,500 for Democratic campaigns: $1,000 each for Governor Shumlin and the House Democrats, and $500 for Senate Democrats.

*Update: As a reader has kindly informed me, Patient Choices’ core issue is not health care reform; it’s death with dignity. It’s kind of interesting that they’re still being fairly active considering they got their bill through the Legislature last year. Maybe they’re ensuring against a counter-attack?

Of the few state senate candidates to have filed so far, Alice Nitka has a respectable bankroll. The Democrat still had almost $3,500 from previous campaigns and added another $500 this time, for a total of just under $4,000.

Joy Limoge is doing substantially better than that. She’s the only Republican State Senate candidate in Chittenden County aside from perpetual incumbent DIane Snelling. Limoge, previously known for her cheesy, ungrammatical campaign website, took in a cool $10,000 this reporting period for a total of $14,000 overall. Notable donations include $1,000 from Randy Brock, $1,000 from the Green Mountain Republican Senatorial Committee, and $2,000 from IpCapital Group, a consulting firm.

Margaret Cheney, former State Rep and current member of the Public Service Board, disposed of her remaining campaign funds from 2012, giving $100 to Tim Briglin (who’s running for the House seat she formerly held) and $1,294 to the Vermont Food Bank. Nice touch.

Martha Heath, retiring State Representative, cashed out her campaign fund and gave the proceeds, $483.14 in all, to Liz Subin, the Democratic candidate in Heath’s district.

I’ll be watching for more filings between now and tomorrow afternoon’s deadline. Watch this space!

 

 

 

 

Oh, what the hell. Let’s judge a book by its cover

1 Reply

September 3, 2014: Vermont’s bookstores are certain to crack open their doors at the stroke of midnight, in anticipation of an overwhelming response to Jim Douglas’ three-years-in-the-making autobiography. Yeah, it’ll be just like the Harry Potter release crowds.

Well, maybe not. But while we still have almost three months to wait for St. Jim’s tome, we have gotten a gander at the cover.

And boy howdy, is it ever a… er… well… a thing. Jim-Douglas-book-released-Sept--3---img

The picture, title and subtitle, taken together, paint a broad-stroke portrait of arrogance in exile.

The image, Douglas in a suit w/obligatory flag pin, is a reproduction of his official state portrait. Next to him is the title: “THE VERMONT WAY.”

Oh dear.

The unspoken, but clear as day, message: Jim Douglas is the embodiment of the Vermont Way. He is the quintessential Vermonter, the carrier of Vermont values into a new and uncertain century.

And then the subtitle: “A Republican Governor Leads America’s Most Liberal State.” Underscoring what, I fear, will be one of the book’s central messages: Jim Douglas was a uniquely talented politician — the only person who could lead a constituency largely inimical to his party’s policies.

Which omits the fact that Vermont wasn’t nearly as liberal when Douglas took office as it was when he departed. During his eight years as Governor, the Republicans lost ground everywhere else in state government. By the end of his tenure, he could do little beyond castigating the Democrats for overriding his vetoes and ignoring his wise counsel.

Douglas definitely deserves some credit for passing a conservative camel through the eye of a liberal needle. But doesn’t he also deserve blame for the leftward shift of Vermont politics while he occupied our highest office? Doesn’t he deserve blame for leaving his party in shambles, with scant resources, no grass-roots organization, and a nearly complete lack of up-and-coming talent?

And doesn’t he deserve blame for leaving a legacy so pitiful as to be virtually nonexistent? How did he shape Vermont politics during his tenure, and how have his policies influenced post-Douglas political discourse? The answer, it seems to me, is not very much at all.

So he managed to “lead” America’s most liberal state, if only in the sense that he occupied the corner office. But while he was Governor, and even more so since he retired, his state did not follow him. In fact, it moved steadily in the other direction. It’s a severely limited kind of “leadership.”

As for the book cover’s visual equation of Jim Douglas with The Vermont Way… well, if that were true (which it’s not), we’d be well and truly fucked.

 

Vermont Republicans quickly becoming incoherent

2 Replies

Looks like the Vermont Republican Party has decided a guns-a-blazin’, all-out hysterical attack on “the stagnant Shumlin economy” is their ticket to the meager legislative gains they’re hoping for in November.

And, naturally, they’re doubling down on the “F” grade supposedly given Vermont in a national survey of small business owners. Not only are they repeating their earlier claims, they’re getting the facts even wronger.

The VTGOP’s latest news release again refers to “a report by highly respected national magazine The Economist which ranked Vermont among 5 states receiving a grade of ‘F’ for their small business friendliness.”

Okay, where do we begin.

It’s not a “report,” it was a survey. An unscientific survey in which thousands of questionnaires were sent to business owners nationwide.

It wasn’t by “The Economist,” it was by Thumbtack.com.

The Economist isn’t a “national magazine.” It’s a global one, and its headquarters are in Great Britain.

And, once again, Vermont did not receive a grade — at all — in this year’s survey. The “F” came out of the 2012 survey. Thumbtack didn’t receive enough responses from Vermont businesspeople to include the state in this year’s grades.

This is like a game of telephone with only one player — who, even so, manages to thoroughly garble the message as it passes from mouth to ear and on to brain. Ironically, the VTGOP’s news release includes this line:

The first step in solving a problem is recognizing and accurately defining the problem itself.

Uh-huh. And by “accurately defining the problem,” the GOP apparently means “relying on two-year-old figures from an unscientific survey.” Not to mention “exaggerating the issue with overheated rhetoric.”

This whole schemozzle shows how desperate the Republicans are for messaging material, that they have to keep on hammering over and over again on a discredited talking point. It’s embarrassing.

The news release goes on to depict Vermont’s economy as in “crisis,” which it clearly is not. We have our troubles, but crisis? No — “crisis” is what George W. Bush left us with. And President Obama and Governor Shumlin have been trying to dig out from under the Bush rubble ever since.

The Republicans also assert that “Vermont Democrats denied there were any problems with Vermont’s… economy,” which is also patently untrue. I don’t think there’s a Democrat in the state who would argue that we don’t have our share of problems and issues, and the Shumlin Administration has been trying — in its own way, whether you agree with it or not — to make things better. When you consider how awful things were in 2008-09, plus the severe blow of Tropical Storm Irene in the summer of 2011, things in Vermont have gotten a whole lot better.

Republicans are already in danger of losing touch with reality, and losing credibility with undecided and centrist voters. Hysterical, over-the-top rhetoric won’t convince anyone that we’re on the cusp of apocalypse.

Speaking of doubling down, the news release concludes with a challenge for a debate on the economy between party chairs “Super Dave” Sunderland and Dottie Deans “in a neutral forum.” This bit of red-flag theatricality is completely meaningless. The Republicans hope that Deans ignores the challenge, so they can accuse her of ducking the issues.

In fact, the job of the party chair isn’t to take part in debates; that’s what candidates do. Party chairs are supposed to spend their time managing and organizing their parties. And that, in itself, is at least a job and a half.

At least it is for Deans, who leads an active, vibrant organization. Super Dave, on the other hand, has a paid staff of ONE to oversee, a sickly grassroots network, and a meager budget. Maybe he has time for pointless media events, but Deans has work to do.

LeBron James and the pursuit of happiness

Leave a reply

It was only yesterday that I was taking Art Woolf, Vermont’s Loudest Economist, to task for belittling the financial impact of agriculture in Vermont. And, on top of that, closing his column with a cutting reference to farmers who “do it as much for their own enjoyment as for the monetary benefits it brings them.”

Of course. And as I said in response, almost everyone makes major life choices for non-financial reasons. They do things for family, for the mind, heart, and soul. Sure, money has its place; but if all of us made our decisions solely (or primarily) for the money, this world would be a sad, desperate place. That’s why our founders invoked “the pursuit of happiness” instead of “the pursuit of maximum profit.”

And now we have LeBron James ignoring all the pundits and the ass-kissers and the main-chancers, and going home to Cleveland.

Cleveland!

He could have gone back to South Beach, or taken his talents to Madison Square Garden, Chicago, or Los Angeles. He could have had his pick of major media markets, warm-weather destinations, and/or tax havens.

He chose Cleveland. The Mistake By The Lake. The place where the river caught fire. The place whose most famous celebrity, until now, was Drew Carey. (All due respect to Pere Ubu.) Inspiration for the Hastily Made Cleveland Tourism Video. 

Why? The title of his as-told-to essay for Sports Illustrated says it all: “I’m coming home.” And went on to explain that life is bigger than sport:

I feel my calling here goes above basketball. I have a responsibility to lead, in more ways than one, and I take that very seriously. My presence can make a difference in Miami, but I think it can mean more where I’m from. I want kids in Northeast Ohio… to realize that there’s no better place to grow up. Maybe some of them will come home after college and start a family or open a business. That would make me smile. Our community, which has struggled so much, needs all the talent it can get.

He made his decision because trying to win in Cleveland will be more rewarding than just plain winning anywhere else. Because he feels a deeper obligation to the place he grew up.

As a guy who comes from southeast Michigan, I can empathize. If I had the opportunity to do something special for Detroit, I’d pack up and move in a heartbeat.

Hardly anybody gets to make such a choice. I’m pretty sure I never will. But reading LeBron’s words made me happy inside. It affirmed my belief that, Art Woolf notwithstanding, there’s more to life than money.

Postscript. Yes, I know LeBron will be richly rewarded for playing in Cleveland. But he would have gotten just as much anywhere else — and he could have reaped far greater indirect rewards (sponsorships, endorsements, connections, post-sports opportunities) in a larger, more important city. But home was more important.

Nanobrew wishes and maple syrup dreams

Leave a reply

Ah, Vermont. Home of picturesque farms, covered bridges, general stores, and…

…private estates with their own tennis courts.

Vermont had the largest percentage of single-family home listings boasting a residential tennis court on the real-estate website Trulia.com as of May 30.

… The percentages in every state were small: In Vermont, 0.77% of single-family home listings mentioned a tennis court. In New Mexico, it was only 0.17%. And only 0.23% of the combined listings in the 50 states included a court.

So, Vermont, yay?

This is the Other Vermont, the one concealed at the end of long private driveways behind locked gates and groves of mature trees. The one that, according to Governor Shumlin, pays more than its share of our tax burden. It was only a little more than a year ago that Shumlin was hell-bent on cutting the Earned Income Tax Credit for the working poor, while insisting that the wealthiest Vermonters were ’bout ready to flee the state if they had to pay a penny more in taxes.

You could take this surprising tennis-court factoid two ways: On the one hand, it’d be awfully hard to pack up a tennis court and take it with you. On the other, hey, if there are a lot of tennis court-laden properties on the market, perhaps the Great And Good Of Vermont are already on their way out the door. Hard to tell.

Anyway, as I reported during last spring’s tax kerfuffle, Vermont imposes a relatively high 8.95% tax rate on top earners — but because of the way we calculate taxable income, wealthy Vermonters actually pay only 5.2%. Which explains why they can afford to maintain all those expanses of carefully-manicured lawn.