by Rep. Ashley Bartley
On average it takes nine hundred gallons of propane to heat a home, in our great state of Vermont. This legislation will add at least $630 dollars to the heating bills of Vermonters every year.
Rebranding this bill as the “Affordable Heat Act” is disingenuous. Vermonters deserve better, they deserve transparency.
Let’s call a spade a spade, S.5 is a carbon tax.
A tax that is both harmful and regressive, adding 70 cents per gallon at a minimum to the cost of home heating fuels and will likely be more in the future. We know that the the provisions of S.5 will have detrimental effects on our low-income and rural Vermonters. For a majority of the State, this is not only the most affordable option but the ONLY viable option to heat homes in our frigid winters.
Vermonters are already facing volatile markets, effecting unsustainable increases in the prices of food, housing affordability and our most basic human needs.
I have heard from what feels like each and every one of my constituents who feel hopeless as Montpelier throws more obstacles in their path. They have pleaded with me to oppose this bill and I will.
Today, I will be voting no on S.5 and I urge all of you to contact your Legislator and tell them to vote no!
The author is a House member from Georgia.