Tag Archives: David Glidden

“Let’s Go to Work and Let’s Win”

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You’d probably have to be pretty deep in the weeds of Vermont politics, or perhaps a resident of Manchester, to recognize the name “Jim Ramsey.” (Pictured above with a slightly better known figure.) He’s only been involved in #vtpoli for a few years, but he’s been on a sharp upward trajectory that culminated on Saturday with his election as the new chair of the Vermont Democratic Party, replacing the prematurely departed David Glidden.

Well, technically Ramsey is the interim chair, filling out the remaining months of Glidden’s two-year term between now and November, when Ramsey will doubtless be elected permanent chair.

Members of the party’s state committee held a special meeting via Zoom on Saturday morning to choose Glidden’s replacement. Two people were nominated: Ramsey and former state senator Andy Julow, who was a late entry in the race.

If you needed any evidence that Ramsey had the inside track, you got it from VDP state committee member Susan Borden. In formally nominating Ramsey, she noted that he’d been endorsed by Treasurer Mike Pieciak, Attorney General Charity Clark, and Secretary of State Sarah Copeland Hanzas. The vote wasn’t close; Ramsey took 38 of the 45 votes cast. Julow received the other seven. In pre-vote remarks to the committee, Julow more or less acknowledged his longshot status. But even so, it’s telling that a former officeholder from the most populous region of Vermont finished a poor second to a guy from Bennington County who’d only been active in state party politics for about five years. It seemed clear that Ramsey was the choice all along.

And having heard his pitch to party leaders and learned a bit more about him, I can understand why.

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Turnover at the Top of the Vermont Democratic Party, Again

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Last week, VTDigger reported that Jim Dandeneau will resign next month as executive director of the Vermont Democratic Party, the top paid staff position. Well, now I can report that David Glidden is also resigning next month as chair of the VDP, its top unpaid position.

Glidden told me his resignation will take effect on February 22, when the party’s state committee will meet to elect his successor. “With Jim exiting, it made sense for the party to have a transition and give the new team a long runway [to 2026],” Glidden said.

The departures were probably inevitable following the Democrats’ historic losses in the legislative elections, although Glidden downplayed any link. “There were bigger issues outside of the party structure that impacted the election,” Glidden said. “The core party functions were decently successful. It was just a really tough environment.”

You can’t really blame Glidden or Dandeneau for the Democratic Legislature’s failure to communicate its successes or find a way to message the property tax situation, Gov. Phil Scott’s effective anti-tax campaigning, or the VDP’s failure to field slash support a competitive gubernatorial candidate, which meant there was no one on a platform prominent enough to counter the governor’s attacks. But there were signs of trouble in the VDP’s finances, and party leaders are responsible for that.

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Dear Democrats: Congrats on Your Quick Dispatch of the S.5 Veto. Now, Could You Spare a Nickel of Your Political Capital for the Homeless?

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This was the happy scene yesterday as Senate Appropriations Committee chair Jane Kitchel peremptorily ended discussion on the housing portion of the FY2024 budget, which makes no provision for extending the motel voucher program that currently shelters 80% of Vermont’s unhoused. Kitchel herself seems excited; the rest of them look like they’d rather be anywhere else.

This morning saw a much more celebratory occasion, as the House quickly dispatched Gov. Phil Scott’s veto of S.5, the Affordable Heat Act. And much as I hate to rain on the majority Democrats’ victory parade, I have to wonder why they couldn’t spare just a tiny bit of their abundant political capital to avoid the imminently avoidable humanitarian crisis that will unfold if the voucher program ends on schedule.

The 107-42 override vote in the House was an impressive display of political power. The Democrats easily walked over a governor who, at last check, enjoyed a 78% approval rating among the voters.

And yet, on the voucher issue, legislative Democrats made common cause with the Scott administration and threw 1,800 of our most vulnerable households under the bus. It’s a point of comparison that cannot be ignored.

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The Empire Strikes Back

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Apologies for the mixed metaphors, but I’m so mad I can’t write straight.

The House-Senate budget conference committee has yet again refused to extend the motel voucher program that’s currently sheltering 80% of Vermont’s unhoused. In so doing, they ignored the pleadings of a small group of determined small- and capital-P progressives who say they won’t vote to override a gubernatorial veto of any budget that fails to address our crisis of homelessness.

And in so doing, they worked hand-in-glove with the Scott administration. I can say so because conference committee member and, God help us all, chair of the House Human Services Committee, Theresa Wood, said so: “This has been a collaborative process with the Agency of Human Services and the governor’s office.”

Great. No collaboration with housing advocates, then? No contact with the lawmakers threatening to withhold support for a budget plan that manages to combine the cruelty of Ebenezer Scrooge with the unctuousness of Uriah Heep? Nope, they confined themselves to working with an administration that has been adamant about its intent to kill the voucher program and damn the consequences.

And at almost the precise moment when this “collaborative process” came to fruition in the discussion-free approval of the new housing budget, I got a fundraising text from Vermont Democratic Party chair David Glidden urging me to support their fight against “Phil Scott and extremist Republicans [who] ae determined to sabotage us at every turn.”

Well, at every turn except when the Democrats eagerly collaborate with “Phil Scott and extremist Republicans.” If I harbored any notion of opening up my wallet to the VDP, it vanished instantly. I hope anyone else who was thinking about a donation will instead make a gift to their local homeless shelter. Fuck the Democrats.

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Lezak to Depart as VDP Chair

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Anne Lezak is about to step aside as chair of the Vermont Democratic Party after a very consequential year-plus on the job. She’s doing so of her own free will, in order to carry on with her work in Uganda. She and her husband Dr. Harry Chen, currently interim commissioner of the Department of Children and Families, spent a year in Uganda in 2017. He helped establish the country’s first residency in emergency medicine, and she worked for Hospice Africa Uganda, one of the continent’s leading training centers and providers of palliative care.

Lezak recently became chair of the board of HAU’s American arm, Hospice Africa USA. She and Chen have been aiming to return to Uganda for some time, and they plan to do so in early March. They will leave their current positions by the end of February. “We are both returning to beloved organizations we were working with,” Lezak said. “It was amazing. It was life-changing.”

Still, she wouldn’t leave the VDP if she wasn’t certain that it was “in very good hands.” She pointed to numerous accomplishments: a historically successful 2022 campaign season, the building of a strong and cohesive party staff, and party vice chair David Glidden, “a great partner throughout,” whom she has endorsed as her successor. That will be decided at a state committee meeting in late February. Lezak calls Glidden “the future of the Vermont Democratic Party in every good way.”

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