Rep. Anne Donahue

Legislative Update

April 27, 2008

Last week was action packed, maintaining a schedule that may bring the session to a close late this week, a week earlier even than the session is budgeted for. Many bills are already now in conferences between House and Senate representatives (three from each) to attempt to resolve difference versions of language.

The trade-off comes in rushed bills. Even some of the supporters of a bill to ban phthalates (a potentially suspect chemical that makes plastic flexible) in children’s items in my committee hesitated on acting without fuller testimony, but it passed with only two votes in opposition, mine included.

We were unanimous, however, in passing restrictions on the clear importance of reducing lead in the environment, particularly in the sale of children’s toys. These were our final bills of the biennium.

The most contentious bill on the House floor addressed Vermont Yankee, its corporate reorganization, and whether its reserve funds for eventual costs of decommissioning would adequately protect Vermonters from being left with the cost of cleanup.

The issue was not as simple as it sounds. Nuclear plants are regulated by the federal Nuclear Regulatory Commission, which sets standards for decommissioning funds.

In addition, through an agreement with the state, Vermont Yankee accepts the jurisdiction of the Vermont Public Service Board. That board is a non-partisan body that has expertise in energy issues and takes extensive, sworn testimony in its deliberations.

The Yankee bill would have intervened in a Public Service Board docket item for the first time ever. Additionally, the amount of money that the bill wanted committed “up front” could risk Yankee’s continued existence.

Those presenting the bill on the floor acknowledged that the cost would eventually be passed on to ratepayers when our contract is renewed, perhaps as much as doubling costs from what is currently our lowest cost source of energy and the producer of one third of our electricity.

I hope we press aggressively for creating alternative energy sources that have the combined benefits of nuclear’s reasonable cost and least impact on greenhouse gasses, without the perpetual risk of its spent fuel rods.

Not only are we not there yet, but we can’t even agree on a single alternate source: someone is against each available option. Hydropower, as just one example of a clean, renewable power source, is opposed by some due to its impact on water habitats.

Businesses from around the state came to lobby against the bill, concerned about the economic impact to jobs and the overall business environment, which is at greater risk today with a recession underway than ever before.

The most persuasive testimonial influencing my vote came from the state’s Auditor, Thomas Salmon, a Democrat, who wrote to the full House on the day of the vote.

Noting both the tight time frame and the fiscal status of the state, he urged that we “remain calm and unemotional in pursuing the best options for the State of Vermont and its citizens.”

He wrote that he was “concerned that the bill S.373 could add undue risk to the state,” and raised questions about the adequacy of the understanding of the “fiscal impacts and consequences of this bill.”

Although I was part of a minority in voting against the bill, enough Democrats also expressed reservation that the final vote was 82-62 (there are only 49 Republicans.) Since at least 100 votes are required to overturn a governor’s veto, this action may not go forward this year despite passing the House and Senate.

However a related bill, S. 364, carried a strong message about accountability and safety, and I supported it. It requires a thorough and independent audit of the reliability of the nuclear facility this year supervised by an independent panel, at Vermont Yankee’s cost. We owe it to Vermonters to ensure this protection.

Other environmental protection votes were prominent during the week. I voted in support of the protection of groundwater as a public trust. Now that we know how aquifers function, it no longer makes sense to consider the water a private well can access as belonging only to the landowner, when it actually is drawing from a far wider underground area.

Home and agricultural use are exempt; this bill focuses on large withdrawals for commercial uses.

I also supported the updating of our “current use” program that gives tax credit for land that is preserved.

A constituent in Roxbury recently observed that new environmental restrictions often amount to public “taking” of land without compensation when the property becomes no longer unusable. Wetlands or river buffer areas are now added in eligibility.

Finally, I also supported a wide-ranging “energy independence” bill that focuses our goals regarding renewable energy as we work towards reducing greenhouse gases by 25 percent by 2012 and by 50 percent by 2028.

It includes agriculture initiatives such as assisting in nutrient management and methane capture programs, ongoing participation in regional initiatives and creating broad-based inventories, and a number of transportation goals.

These include priorities on integrated public infrastructure that helps to reduce travel distances, supporting public transportation, and designing roads to encourage safe pedestrian and bicycle use.

Having suddenly lost public transportation access several years, one new statement is of iumportance to Northfield. It says that it is state public policy to “assure the rapid replacement of any unplanned decrease in service.”

That doesn’t make replacement likely in the near term. All policy is dependent upon financial resources and there are no new resources possible in this year of declining revenues. At least it recognizes the impact of such losses.

The conflict between goals and current financial reality had been crystallized just the day before by a revision to our transportation budget before it even became law, based on reduced revenue projections.

There was a time when I saw bicycle and pedestrian paths as frills. That was before the era of heavier traffic and kids glued to computers, indoors, as many of us grow more obese. But we are losing added investments in those areas this year, as crumbling roads and bridges must take priority.

The biggest transportation decision by the House was to reject the Governor’s special $3 million initiative, transferred from the overall funding passed on to towns, for an immediate response to this winter’s damage.

That much repaving money doesn’t go very far – 79 miles of road in the entire state. Northfield would be a big winner, in theory. Of the 79 miles, 9.1 miles (12 percent of the total) would serve the town’s residents in getting to Montpelier. Route 12 made the list as allegedly one of the very worst stretches of road in the state.

Unfortunately, part of that project would be torn up almost immediately, when Northfield extends its water mains to the Falls.

It certainly seems fairer to turn limited resources over to our towns, under the standard formula, to make their own judgments about where it the money is best spent. Northfield, perhaps, would want to use its state money to repave after the water main goes in, instead of before.

The outcome of many of these issues will be playing out in the conference committees this week.

At least one issue has been brought to a close for this biennium: the latest effort at campaign finance reform. The Senate voted to overturn the Governor’s veto of the bill, but the House rejected it by a single vote, 99-51 (two-thirds, or 100 votes, required.)

This effort, initiated many years ago with the intent to prevent potential abuses, was challenged up to the U.S. Supreme Court. Our defense of the law cost several millions in taxpayer dollars.

A key part of the court’s ruling was that there was no showing of existing improprieties, or even the appearance of them, to justify the recognized burden upon freedom of speech is created when persons or groups are restricted in what they can contribute to candidates. (The Vermont ACLU was one of those appealing the law.)

The new version sets higher allowable contributions, but the record to justify the caps was a fiction. The bill’s “findings” had limited actual testimony as a base. Instead, they were written in the direct language the Supreme Court identified as necessary elements to justify contribution limits. There would likely be another appeal, again at great cost.

The strongest reason for my opposition remains the eloquent explanation Rep. Tom Koch of Barre gave at the time of the original vote:

“I believe it is ethically wrong for me to sit here in Montpelier and decide how much someone who wants me out of office can raise, and therefore spend, on that effort. All that is needed is full disclosure. Then the voters can decide whether they approve of what a candidate is doing.”

The debate that closed out the week was whether Vermont should join an interstate compact that would cause the Electoral College to become a tool to recognize a national popular vote for the Presidency, instead of the current winner-by-state system.

Although the mechanism is more complicated than space here allows to explain, it would result in a system where the person receiving the most votes, wins. I am one of the tri-partisan bill’s co-sponsors.

It was refreshing to see a contested issue that was not voted 100 percent on party lines. I was among several Republicans voting “yes,” and about an equal number of Democrats voted “no,” resulting in passing it 75-35.

That only adds up to 110 votes. Many representatives – 40 to be exact – did not stay to the end of the unusually late (almost 6 p.m.) Friday afternoon session. They may have been saving their energy for the very long hours of the week to come.

Please stay in touch with any issues you have questions or concerns about. I’m here to listen to and serve you, even if we don’t always end up agreeing. Leave a message any time at my home (485-6431) or via email (counterp@tds.net.)