By Guy Page
Last Thursday, it was thunder and lightning in the House Housing and General Committee as members complained bitterly that chair Tom Stevens wouldn’t let them vote on relaxing Act 250’s new housing construction regulations.
As reported by VDC this week, Caleb Elder (D-Starksboro), Rep. Ashley Bartley (R-Georgia), and others last Thursday impatiently urged that Vermont needs new housing. They feared the ‘Act 250 committee’ (Environment and Energy) would block any amendment of S100 to raise the Act 250 exemption from 10 to 25 units in rural areas. Chair Tom Stevens said he was under House leadership orders to not allow a vote on Act 250 but that he would try to get a meeting with E & E – which he did.
By contrast, peace and quiet reigned over this morning’s joint meeting, held on E & E’s home turf and chaired by Chair Amy Sheldon (D-Middlebury), the architect of attempted Act 250 reform (as yet unsuccessful).
Sheldon also introduced and shepherded through the House H.126, which would conserve against most forms of development 50% of total land area in Vermont. H.126 is scheduled for Senate Natural Resources and Energy Friday morning.
Elder was not in attendance, or at least was not visibly present, in the joint hearing broadcast via Zoom. After discussion of the history of the bill and the housing programs approved by House Housing and General, Rep. Bartley addressed the elephant-sized issue in the room by asking Sheldon: “How do you plan to address Act 250 reform?”
Sheldon reminded Bartley – a freshman lawmaker – that Sheldon and her committee have been working on Act 250 reform for five years. “I can share that [work] with you,” she said.
Then Sheldon said she is waiting on “two important reports” on the impact of Act 250 reform due out next year. “But this bill has brought it forward, so we’re going to take it up,” Sheldon said. But she didn’t say how.
Stevens turned the focus to helping the currently homeless. In July, he said, between 2,000 and 5000 Vermonters will be leaving subsidized housing. “Zoning won’t help that,” the sponsor of the Homeless Bill of Rights said. “We have to buy tents and sleeping bags for Vermonters, because it’s summer. …. For my personal morals, that’s a difficult thing to hear. That’s what keeps me awake, that’s what keeps me focused.”
Sheldon’s committee is scheduled to discuss S.100 all week.