Tag Archives: Bram Kleppner

A Happy Little Primary Night Cash Fire

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Tuesday’s primary election turned out to be a snooze. The most interesting development was how much money was wasted trying to unseat a small number of Democratic incumbents. They all won, as far as I can tell.

Firmly atop the Futility Rankings is former TV anchor Stewart Ledbetter, who finished fourth in the race for three state Senate seats in the Chittenden Central district. He raised almost $60,000 and spent a bit under $40,000 (tentative). He “earned” 3,159 votes, which cost him and his well-heeled donors about $12.56 apiece. Bargain!

Elsewhere in the “beat the Democrats” game, House Ways & Means Chair Emilie Kornheiser brushed off a challenge from business-backed Dem Amanda Ellis-Thurber, while the Waterbury duo of Reps. Tom Stevens and Theresa Wood defeated “affordability” Dem Elizabeth Brown, who spent gobs of cash and didn’t really come close to pulling off an upset.

Two quick takeaways: If there’s an anti-tax revolution brewing in the hinterlands, it did not show itself in the results. At all. And those allegedly smart business leaders just squandered a whole lot of money trying to push the Democratic caucuses toward the center. They might have scored one small victory, as Danforth Pewter chief Bram Kleppner took a Democratic nomination for House in Burlington. But that’s about it.

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Sooooo Many Campaign Finance Reports

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Well, I didn’t really want to wade through all the campaign finance reports filed by House candidates on July 1. But there were questions I wanted to answer, so wade through them I did.

Actually, not all. I didn’t pay much attention to incumbents. I was mainly interested in new candidates. What follows is a daunting amount of detail, so let me give you some topline findings right away.

  • A lot of candidates, both new and incumbent, are having trouble complying with campaign finance law. Fortunately for them, the penalties for noncompliance are minimal to nonexistent.
  • There’s been a lot of talk about centrists running as Democrats with financial backing from rich folks and business leaders. What I found, to my mild surprise, is that there aren’t really that many of ’em. Hardly enough to qualify as a trend. But it is worth focusing attention on those trying to poach Democratic seats.
  • The Republican field of new House candidates is pretty much a financial wasteland. With a few exceptions. Emphasis on “few.”
  • One of the most successful funders of Republican House candidates is the Rutland GOPAC. But they operate on a modest scale, and aren’t likely to move the needle appreciably.

Okay, on to the details, whether you want them or not. But hey, this is a place for political sickos, so on we go.

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Panel Recommends Complete Overhaul of State Tax System Yada Yada Yada

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Best: Durfee, meh background but great lighting, sharp business apparel. Worst: Tie between The Invisible Mattos and Breakfastin’ Jim Masland.

A major study of Vermont’s entire tax system, two years in the making, had its debut Friday morning before the House Ways & Means Committee. The panel recommended wide-ranging reforms, each of which would be a very heavy political lift. These include shifting education funding from property tax to income tax, eliminating virtually all exclusions from the state sales tax (which would mean a lowering of the tax rate), imposing an annual registration fee on electric vehicles to replace lost gas-tax revenue in the coming transition to electric transportation, and replacement of the Telephone Personal Property Tax with a comprehensive levy on all telecommunications.

The Tax Structure Commission’s report was labeled a “draft.” It wasn’t made clear how much work remains, and how many changes might be made, before a “final” report is released. (The report can be accessed through the Ways & Means website.)

Commission member Deb Brighton began with a cheery reminder of the typical fate of tax-reform panels. “Every five years or so, the Legislature decides it wants a fresh, hard look at taxation,” she noted. Left unsaid was the fact that these reports are usually consigned to a dusty shelf, because real tax reform means a whole lot of sacred cows get whacked. In light of this SIsyphean history, one can easily conclude that this report is also destined for the dustbin of history.

The most recent tax panel, the Blue Ribbon Tax Structure Commission, delivered its report in 2011. Many of the TSc’s bullet points are strikingly similar to the BRTSC’s. The earlier panel’s fate was partly a matter of realpolitik, but each commission, coincidentally, faces competition from a natural disaster. The Blue Ribbon report was issued less than eight months before Tropical Storm Irene devastated Vermont. The new report, need I say, comes in the middle of a pandemic and resultant economic devastation.

Any tax reform is a complicated, time-consuming process. When it has to compete with a natural disaster, it has almost no chance of getting through. Not that this report is doomed. Just that I’m not sanguine about its chances, even though reform is badly needed.

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