Friday, May 4, 2018
The funding plan, crafted in the House Ways and Means Committee, would collect an estimated $4.55 million annually from the rooms and meals tax increase and an additional $1.94 million from unclaimed bottle deposits.
The House approved the bill, S. 260, in a 92 to 48 vote.
Ways and Means Committee chair Janet Ancel (D-Calais) said her panel added the funding mechanisms to spur action by the state on clean water funding — an issue that’s been the topic of multiple studies since the Vermont Clean Water Act passed in 2015.
“The studies have been helpful … but at some point rubber hits the road,” Ancel said. “It typically hits the road in the House Ways and Means committee.”
Tags: clean water , environment , water quality , Lake Champlain , Lake Carmi , tax , Phil Scott , Cynthia Browning , Heidi Scheuermann , Image , Web Only
Thursday, April 19, 2018
Scott vetoed the bill, S.103, on Monday due to his concerns that the legislation would make the state less business-friendly without substantially improving public health. He specifically objected to a section of the bill that would give the commissioner of the Department of Health — a gubernatorial appointee — expanded power to require labeling or even ban the sale of products determined likely to expose children to harmful toxins.
Tags: toxics , consumer protection , Tim Ashe , Phil Scott , veto , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, April 17, 2018
The legislation, S.103, would have given the commissioner of the Vermont Department of Health expanded power to enter products into a state-run database if they contain toxins that may harm children. It also would have made that database publicly searchable by products’ bar codes.
In a statement announcing his decision Monday, Scott said he opposes the bill because it wouldn’t improve Vermont’s already high consumer safety laws, which were last updated in 2014, as well as put a harmful burden on businesses and manufacturers.
“These [proposed] changes, in my opinion, have no practical impact to how my Administration regulates these chemicals,” he said.
Tags: Tim Ashe , Phil Scott , toxic , toys , consumer protection , S.103 , Brian Campion , Bennington , Image , Web Only
Thursday, April 12, 2018
The Clean Energy Development Fund is a state-administered initiative within the Department of Public Service that offers financial incentives for homes, businesses and other institutions to reduce their reliance on fossil fuels.
Andy Perchlik, the fund's manager, said that it has focused primarily on “advanced wood heating” in recent years. Unlike old-fashioned wood stoves and early pellet stoves, according to Perchlik, such systems have the convenience and technological sophistication of fossil fuel-powered heating systems but run on wood fuel that can be purchased locally.
The Scott administration’s proposal to remove $500,000 from the fund would effectively end that work, Perchlik said.
Tags: renewable energy , wood heat , heating oil , climate change , Phil Scott , Adam Greshin , Andy Perchlik , Department of Public Service , budget , Clean Energy Development Fund , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, April 4, 2018
The Vermont Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee is demanding to know why Gov. Phil Scott's administration has missed deadlines and outright opposed planning efforts as the state works to meet federal water quality requirements.
Committee chair Sen. Chris Bray (D-Addison) has called on Secretary of Administration Susanne Young to testify Thursday before his panel. The senator also sent a letter to Agency of Natural Resources Secretary Julie Moore asking for five months of the agency's records.
The requests are part of the legislature’s efforts to spur the administration to lay the groundwork for new clean water efforts in Vermont. Bray also seeks answers about the administration’s outright opposition to even consider a plan for clean water funding.
Tags: Lake Champlain , Lake Carmi , TMDL , water quality , phosphorus , Phil Scott , Julie Moore , Chris Bray , Image , Web Only
Thursday, March 22, 2018
S.260 is one of 13 bills that Scott named in a letter to the legislature as “problematic,” mostly on the grounds that they would raise taxes or fees.
“My request is simple,” he wrote in the letter. “[L]et’s work together to find ways for many of these proposals to advance, while respecting the need to provide Vermonters with another year of relief that begins to moderate the burden of taxes and fees.”
Tags: environment , clean water , fee , tax , Phil Scott , Image , Web Only
Thursday, February 22, 2018
State biologists proposed the dramatic drop from 70 permits issued last year. Since 2005, the moose population has shrunk from about 4,800 to 1,700. Tick infestation, warmer winters and other factors are believed to be harming the population of the lumbering creatures.
Tags: moose , ticks , hunting , Louis Porter , Fish & Wildlife Board , Image , Web Only
Tuesday, February 13, 2018
The Vermont Agency of Natural Resources has refused environmental groups' request for a key document related to the state's ongoing water quality efforts, even after officials shared the same document with Seven Days.
ANR's top attorney launched a review of the denial after a reporter pointed out the agency’s uneven application of state law.
The document in question — a 108-page draft of Vermont’s stormwater management rules, developed last fall — is full of dry, technical jargon. But to environmental advocates, it promises answers. The finalized rules were due by the end of 2017, but the agency missed its deadline.
Tags: Agency of Natural Resources , Conservation Law Foundation , Lake Champlain Committee , Vermont Natural Resources Council , Jared Carpenter , Rebekah Weber , Julie Moore , environment , water quality , public records , Lake Champlain , Image , Web Only
Friday, January 19, 2018
The event included environmental advocates, municipal leaders and two of the most well-connected members of the Vermont business community. They were there to declare unified support for creation of a state Clean Water Authority and establishment of a per-parcel fee to fund water cleanup efforts that have been mandated by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
They stressed the need for a nonpolitical, independent, expert panel to manage a long-term cleanup program.
In the past, "We've allowed the polarization and the demagoguery to get in the way," said Tom Torti, president of the Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce. "We are very proud and pleased to stand here with a cast of characters that, 10, 15, 20 years ago you would never see standing together, to put something forward that we think is monumental in the history of Vermont."
Tags: Tom Torti , Ernie Pomerleau , Jon Groveman , Dominic Cloud , Clean Water Authority , Phil Scott , Image , Web Only
Wednesday, January 17, 2018
Natural Resources Secretary Julie Moore told lawmakers on January 3 that the state’s standards to reduce polluted runoff from large developed sites should be changed in favor of more “environmentally efficient” regulations.
Moore also sought another year to finalize permit requirements that were supposed to be finished by January 1.
Lawmakers, frustrated that the agency has already missed its deadline for the permitting requirements, want to be sure that they aren't being asked to weaken environmental protections.
Tags: Julie Moore , Agency of Natural Resources , David Deen , Trevor Squirrell , James McCullough , Lake Champlain , Lake Carmi , water , Conservation Law Foundation , Rebekah Weber , Image , Web Only