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Upset by an Associated Press account of alleged cost overruns in the relocation of a state agency, Gov. Peter Shumlin ripped into the story Wednesday during his weekly press conference.

"Let me just say every once in a while there is something that is printed that isn't true," Shumlin said. "And that story is not true."

AP Statehouse reporter Dave Gram wrote Monday that members of a House committee were told last year that the Agency of Natural Resources' move to the National Life building in Montpelier would cost roughly $2 million. Recent estimates peg the cost of relocation and renovation at closer to $8.7 million — $3.5 million of which would be covered by National Life.

But according to Shumlin, that original estimate was never uttered by his administration.

"We never said that it would cost $2 million," Shumlin said at the press conference, which was attended by Gram. "I don't know where that number came from. I don't deny it might've been said to the committee, but all I can tell you is it wasn't said by us."

Clearly prepared for the push-back, Shumlin then summoned Secretary of Administration Jeb Spaulding (pictured above at right with Shumlin) to the podium to deliver a blow-by-blow account of the state's cost estimates. Spaulding said the administration's earliest expectations last spring ranged from $6 to $10 million. A written estimate provided to the House Committee on Corrections and Institutions in July pegged it at $7.5 million, he said.

Happy Monday, news and politics geeks. We're getting to crunch time in the Statehouse, Burlington's mayor is going back to school, and Seven Days is running this year's Vermont Brew Bracket — a subject near and dear to many of your hearts, we know. Here's what you should add to the calendar.

If you have an event you want to see on next week's calendar, email Andy Bromage with details.

Monday, March 18

9:45 a.m.: As I write this, Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger is moving his office to Burlington High School. He'll be there all week to connect with students and teachers and promote something called the Partnership for Change, and we'll highlight more of the interesting events in this here post.

6 p.m.: The Burlington Board of Finance and City Council hold their Monday meetings at Burlington High School.

Vermont's cities and towns will see a few newcomers taking office this week after Town Meeting Day. Here's to small-town democracy. It's also gun-control advocates' turn to rally at the Statehouse on Wednesday, and the week ends with St. Patrick's Day on Sunday. (Here's a reminder that you shouldn't drink green beer and you REALLY shouldn't drink Irish car bombs on Sunday.)

Andy Bromage is off this week, so send your submissions for next week's political calendar to me instead.

Monday, March 11

7 p.m.: The Burlington City Council meets for the first time since Town Meeting Day. See the agenda here.

The House Agriculture Committee this morning approved the GMO labeling bill by a vote of 8-3. H.112 would make Vermont the first state to require food manufacturers to label products that contain genetically modified ingredients.

As reported in this week's print edition, GMO labeling has broad support among grassroots activists and legislators (a third of lawmakers have signed on as cosponsors for the House bill and its Senate counterpart). But the GMO bill still faces an uphill climb. Lobbying from the biotech industry, not to mention the looming threat of a potentially expensive court challenge, could hinder the bill's chances of success beyond the house ag committee.   

The marked-up bill heads next to the House Judiciary Committee. House Agriculture Committee chair Rep. Carolyn Partridge (D-Windham) says she'll be asking for an exemption to the mid-session crossover deadline when bills normally have to pass from the House to the Senate, and vice versa.

"We’ve really put together an excellent bill," says Partridge, a cosponsor of the bill. "I think it’s ultimately defensible when and if it goes to court."

Voting yes on the bill in the House Agriculture Committee were Reps. Carolyn Partridge (D-Windham), Will Stevens (I-Shoreham), John Bartholomew (D-Hartland), Cynthia Martin (D-Springfield), Kristina Michelsen (D-Hardwick), Tess Taylor (D-Barre), Tristan Toleno (D-Brattleboro) and Teo Zagar (D-Barnard). Voting no were Reps. Harvey Smith (R-New Haven), Dan Connor (D-Fairfield) and Richard Lawrence (R-Lyndonville).

"The committee did an excellent job identifying the key issues that indicate why the people of Vermont have a right to know how their food is produced," the bill's lead sponsor, Rep. Kate Webb (D-Shelburne), wrote in am email Friday. "We have a formidable opponent in the biotech industry. We believe we can ultimately prevail. Remember with David and Goliath, David won."

File illustration by Tim Newcomb

It's the event you've all been waiting for! No, not Burlington's Mardi Gras parade. That's tomorrow. (Look for a passed-out Andy Bromage atop the Seven Days float.)

It's this week's Scoreboard! Our regular accounting of the winners and losers in this week's news cycle. Did you make the list? Keep reading...

Winners:

Castleton Polling Institute — Vermont's fledgling polling outfit dominated Vermont political news for a week as it dribbled out results on hot-button topics from guns to wind to end-of-life choice. Finally, Vermont reporters and lawmakers alike have some data to work with as they consider a slew of tough issues.

Miro Weinberger — As Green Mountain Daily's Jack McCullough pointed out this week, both Progs and Dems are claiming in campaign messages that their respective candidates in a hotly-contested Burlington City Council race would help Mayor Miro Weinberger advance his agenda. Dude must be popular. (For the record, the Democratic mayor backs the Democratic candidate. Big surprise.)

Reporters — The fourth estate may finally get its hands on criminal investigative records, thanks to the Senate Judiciary Committee's move this week to adopt federal disclosure standards. Watch out, cops. The Burlington Free Press' Mike Donoghue's gonna getcha!

Losers after the break...

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OK, I mean, not that I think Gov. Peter Shumlin would run for president. Nor do I think he'd stand a chance. 

But during Shummy's jaunt to Washington last weekend, Politico's otherwise generally astute Jonathan Martin seemed to put Putney Pete on a short list of 2016 presidential contenders.

To be more precise, Martin pegged Shumlin as one of several Democratic governors who are "ambitious politicians boasting records that would probably play well with primary voters in 2016." Folks whose presidential ambitions would be stymied by another run by former secretary of state Hillary Clinton.

Martin writes:

"[Martin] O’Malley is the second-term Maryland governor who has been perhaps the most open about his 2016 ambitions, but whose prospects are largely out of his hands as long as Clinton looms on the horizon. Count New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Delaware Gov. Jack Markell, Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon, Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin and [Colorado Gov. John] Hickenlooper himself on that same roster of accomplished Democratic governors who are younger than the 65-year-old Clinton but could find themselves stuck in their state capitals for another decade-plus should she be elected president.

Later in the piece, Martin writes this:

Shumlin, without fully denying his own ambitions, was blunt about what Clinton meant for the Democratic race.

“Let’s be candid about this: So much depends on Hillary,” he said. “If Hillary runs, you’re going to see fewer candidates. If Hillary does not run, you’re going to see more candidates.”

Without fully denying his own ambitions?! OMG! Sounds like he's running for prez!

Um, not quite.

But at Shumlin's first press conference since his D.C. trip wound down, we couldn't resist giving Shummy a chance Wednesday to definitively put to rest such fanciful rumors.

And he did.

Leaders are cloistered under the ornate, marble dome. Everyone outside is anxiously awaiting the puff of white smoke that will signal consensus.

No, not the election of a new pope in Vatican City — the pot bill in the Vermont Statehouse!

A bill to decriminalize possession of “small” amounts of marijuana — two ounces or less — is one of the most hotly anticipated of the year. That’s because after a messy showdown in Senate last year, the bill’s main obstacle — House Speaker Shap Smith (D-Morrisville) — agreed that he would allow the legislation to proceed in his chamber this year.

But with two weeks to go until the mid-session “crossover” deadline — the lawmaker equivalent of an all-star break — the bill hasn’t made an appearance. There's been no sign of it in committee and no word about a hearing. You’d have better luck finding a bag of Cheetos in a UVM dorm room at 4:20.

Well, stoners, take heart. Sen. Dick Sears (D-Bennington) let slip to Seven Days that House and Senate leaders have made a deal to grant the decrim bill an extension, allowing it to survive the mid-March crossover deadline. “If they were to pass a bill and it came over two weeks after crossover deadline, we’d still consider it,” Sears said this week.

Yesterday the Senate Judiciary committee voted unanimously to approve a bill making it crime to possess "or access with intent to view" lewd depictions of children and/or those under the age of 16 engaged in sexual acts. We wrote about the bill this week in a story about efforts to strengthen Vermont's child pornography statute. 

S.19, sponsored by the Judiciary chair Sen. Dick Sears (D-Bennington), now heads the Senate floor, where it's scheduled for a second reading today. "I don't anticipate much problem with it," Sears says.

The committee amended S.19 from its original version to remove one so-called "affirmative defense" that would enable those charged with the crime to escape prosecution. In Sears' original bill, a defendant could claim that he or she possessed "fewer than three depictions" of child pornography but made a prompt and good-faith effort to destroy those images and didn't share them with anyone but law enforcement.

But as Sears explained, setting a minimum number of allowable images was "problematic given new digital technology." As he explained, a single, downloadable web page or digital file may contain 50 or more illegal images but still be interpreted by a judge or jury as a "single depiction."

That said, the new child-porn bill will require prosecutors to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant actually intended to view or download the illicit images. The revised bill also leaves in place a potential loophole for offenders: Consumers of child pornography could still store illegal files in their computer's trash folder, then claim as a defense that they made a good-faith effort to delete those files but neglected to empty the trash.

In this week's issue of Seven Days, starring local musician Jim Rooney on the cover...

• A loophole in Vermont law means downloading child porn is illegal, but merely viewing it is not. Lawmakers are looking to change that.
• Two contests for the South Burlington City Council could determine the future of a number of big issues there, from the F-35 to a development freeze.
• Some local students are attending high school in Québec, with tuition assistance from Vermont.
• Trouble sleeping? Maybe you need to have someone watching you sleep at the Sheraton Burlington.
• In Fair Game: Doug Racine made his career on fighting poverty, but now he's the unlikely lead pitchman selling Gov. Peter Shumlin's welfare cuts. Plus, how can you fight the influence of super PACs? Give more money to the parties themselves, of course. 

Find your copy on newsstands, at sevendaysvt.com or in the App Store.

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Six weeks before he won reelection to a second term last November, Gov. Peter Shumlin rode a state-owned airplane to a campaign event and failed to reimburse taxpayers for the cost of the trip.

On September 27, Shumlin flew from Berlin's Knapp State Airport to Newport State Airport and then on to Lyndonville's Caledonia County Airport to take part in a series of economic development announcements, according to Shumlin chief of staff Elizabeth Miller. 

After completing his official duties, the governor was flown to Middlebury State Airport and then driven to a house party in Lincoln to raise money for his reelection campaign, Miller says. The Agency of Transportation, which operates the Cessna 182, billed the governor's office $332.76 for Shumlin's air travel that day.

After Seven Days inquired about whether Shumlin used the plane to travel to campaign events, the governor's office said it had decided to ask the campaign to reimburse taxpayers for the final leg of that day's trip, which the AOT says cost just $65.80.

"That seems to me to be the right thing to do," Miller says. "We've also asked AOT that in the future, should the plane be used by our office, to bill us by leg, so that if such expenses need to be reviewed, we can do that."

The September 27 trip was one of five plane rides taken by Shumlin since he was elected governor — all of which took place between August 30 and October 25 of last year, according to records provided by the governor's office. The total cost of the flights amounted to $1671.32.

Why the sudden uptick in plane travel last fall?

"The governor didn't know that there was a state plane for use until last summer," Shumlin spokeswoman Sue Allen said in a written statement.