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By Guy Page
Sen. Chris Mattos (R-Chittenden) has introduced a bill that would give seniors who have lived in Vermont 10 years an exemption from paying property taxes.
S.315 was introduced January 27 and has been referred to the Senate Finance Committee, of which Mattos is a member. Mattos is a Milton resident and Realtor.
The bill proposes to exempt from the homestead property tax long-term residents who are 65 years of age or older. It would phase in the exemption over a four-year period, with eligible persons fully exempt from the homestead property tax beginning fiscal year 2030.
Eligible property owners would be 65 years of age or older as of December 31 of the taxable year; and domiciled in Vermont for at least 10 consecutive years. It would prohibit second home owners and people moving to Vermont to take advantage of the new provision.
House Education vice-chair: slow progress on education funding reform
The committee charged with planning Act 73 school funding reform is making some progress – but maybe not enough to confidently tell property tax payers there will be property tax relief this year, Vice-Chair of House Education Committee Rep. Chris Taylor (R-Milton) told VDC this morning.
Can Vermonters expect property tax relief out of the Legislature this session? “I don’t think I can give a definite answer,” Taylor said. “If it’s not relief, it’s stabilization.” When asked what legislative action would provide tax relief, Taylor answered, “For this session, I don’t know.”
Taylor said he is a ‘sponsor at heart’ of Rep. Gina Galfetti’s bill to freeze education spending for three years. The busy vice-chair and Milton Town Manager missed sending the email declaring his co-sponsorship, but said today “I believe that should be looked at.”
It is unclear whether the bill will progress in House Ways and Means. There’s more hope for Sen. Phil Baruth’s plan to cap spending, rather than freeze taxes.
Right now, House Education is working on establishing the super-school district map required by Act 73.
“I am really hoping this week that we do start talking maps,” Taylor said. “I think we’re going to see some movement. There’ s gonna be some difference in the size of the districts. There’s some discrepancy in the difference between four and eight.”
He said the idea of sharing services among school districts has merit. But it may not be necessary if the new districts are large enough. In general, Taylor said, “We are making progress. Starting to see some shifts in belief in outside organizations.” He said he is “hesitantly optimistic” about passing out a school reform bill this year.
New nuclear site in Vernon?
Sen. Scott Beck spoke approvingly this morning on WVMT’s Morning Drive about siting a new nuclear reaction in Vernon, former home of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant. The site still contains a transmission grid switchyard able to transmit huge amounts of power to Vermont and New England. Current legislation calls for a study of a modular nuclear reactor in Vermont.
Freshman Republican introduces nine bills
A freshman legislator from Williamstown has proposed legislation on issues he believes haven’t been addressed by the current Legislature.
“They’re all conversations,’ Republican Josh Dobrovich said. “There were things that were not being discussed.” The bill he most strongly hopes to progress is H.769, which would protect some parental oversight of children from DCF enforcement.
| H.754 | repeat violent offenders, assaults against a protected professional, and victim input on plea agreements |
| H.756 | termination of residential rental agreements based on criminal activity and increased penalties for crimes within a dwelling | |
| H.759 | flat income tax | |
| H.764 | inpatient psychiatric bed capacity | |
| H.765 | qualified mental health professionals | |
| H.769 | child welfare and appropriate independent childhood activities | |
| H.771 | exempting ambulatory surgical centers from certificate of need requirements |
| H.780 | establishing mandatory minimum sentences of incarceration for retail theft and drug trafficking | |
| H.781 | filing certain juvenile offenses in the Criminal Division |
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Categories: State House Spotlight
Boy that would be awesome, but I won’t hold my hand over my ___ waiting for it ! I’m 69 years old, born, and raised here, no children, never had any, and pay over $4,000 a year to educate someone else’s children. It’s about time that State government give seniors like myself a break on education taxes ! We’ve been taken advantage of for way too long !
If you don’t want to contribute and live as part of a community maybe a hermit lifestyle of solitude is the choice for you??
It sucks, but even us hermits have to pay taxes.
Will Bill allow for prorata sq foot exemption of tax bill for landlords renting to seniors and requiring to pass on savings to that senior tenant?
Yet another reason for young people to LEAVE VERMONT. Given that seniors take up the majority of the State benefits, they will all just move to a place that provides for them without even paying the taxes the State needs to afford them. This is almost the same issue as the current fiscal crisis around the homeless.
Excellent point.
Alabama has such a law exempting people over 65 from property taxes. People are flooding in along with industry, from Navy ship building, Airbus manufacturing, foreign car manufacturers, climate, German steel plant and all are expanding. People are leaving VT because of the financial situation and being axed out. People have to expand their knowledge and see the whole picture and not just in one small area. View why people are leaving CA, IL, MN, NY, same situation, hard to live there. I’m in Al most of the time, planning to get rid of my VT property. VT sucks.
When you do sell I hope a growing family is able to purchase. Not just some second home owner looking to add another AirBnb to their portfolio.
Fifty percent would be nice. Just saying. You don’t want seniors passing school budgets just because they have no pony in the race.
They already do.
Wealthy and second home owners don’t need this…the rest of we seniors do
Property taxes are unconstitutional. Should be abolished for all age groups! That will fix a whole load of goverment waste and make schools more affordable for those of us with kids that would have to school tuition. I’d rather pay tuition directly to the school, than to entitled, nasty attitidue taker in the goverment.
It’s about time!!! let’s hope it makes it through.
As seniors we all continue to use public services in our communities. I’m not rich by any means, but I don’t want to saddle my children with higher taxes when they are working to make ends meet. And I have to continue working due to our high tax rates. However, education is a civic institution which has an impact on all our lives well beyond the time that we spend in the classroom. The ongoing life of a civil society is dependent upon the knowledge and education passed on through generations. What do I believe is important for good education? A quality education steeped in strong academics and the classics – great books on virtue, inclusive of history and classical languages. We also need to have skilled tradespeople to contribute to the productivity of our society. This is the reason you should also be concerned about the dismal condition of the VT education system even after you and your children have exited the system. Are you aware of what is being taught in our VT schools? More spending will not fix the dismal proficiency scores. We need to take a deep look into how the education cost increased since 2020 due to many new policies and the results the school closures. Let’s decrease the spending so that taxes can be decreased. Wouldn’t that be a great incentive for young people to stay and build businesses in VT? SPEAKVT for Parents in Education is non-partisan grassroots organization that aims to restore excellence in education. We inspect policies and curriculum, inform and advocate for students, parents and educators, to achieve academics free from political and sexual persuasions. You can follow us on SPEAKVT.org and X.
Show me the tax that will pay your road crew at the local level without the property tax????????
There are many states with different programs to help seniors. Look at Arizona, Oklahoma or Louisiana.. they freeze the tax amount when your reach 65.
Other states like CA or Washington or Oregon defer your taxes until the property is sold or the person passes. Alaska exempts the first 150K of the homes value.
There are many options out there if your legislators really wanted to take care
of seniors. It seems that Vermont does not have those caring types in the legislator.
Our house and senate members are too busy trying to figure out how to extract more and more from our retired folks. Shameful and pathetic.
Traveling through PA over the past week, several times we noted that In Vermont
we get a breakfast for 2 for $40… that same breakfast in PA was $26. Some serious mismanagement of our economy is going on here.
Is it not enough that the Boomers bought their houses for $40 and a carton of Marlboros? Now they want the youth to subsidize their property taxes while they continue to cry poverty? Sounds about right from the most arrogant generation ever….
I bought my property when I was 30 yrs old – after three deployments on Navy ships. I never spent a single night in the house for the next 18 years in the Navy. If you’d like to see arrogant, I suggest you find a mirror.
If you are 60 years old and If you own your house for ten years, get 5% off.
If you are 65 and own your house for twenty years, get 20% off.
If you are 65 years old and own your house for thirty years get 50% off.
If you are 65 years old and own your house for forty years, pay zero taxes.
Dan, When you say “own your house” do you mean after the mortgage is paid off?
Why not work to lower property taxes for all Vermonters. When my kids were in school, retirees help pay for their education. It would be irresponsible for me to not do the same for todays kids. But the yearly double digit increases are not affordable, especially for seniors. It can force some people to sell their houses that they might have lived in for most of their life. As long as property taxes pay for education, we have to negotiate contracts with the NEA that Vermonters can afford. The legislature needs to negotiate for us, not for campaign contributions.
Re: Bill would exempt seniors from property taxes. Don’t get your hopes up. The Commiecrats will never vote for not taking money away from people.
If you find a house with a town appraisal of $150,000 and buy it for $375,000 because you just love it here so much, then your taxes should be based on the $375,000 because that is what you felt it was worth. This should not affect the value of other houses in the neighborhood. Why do I have to pay more because someone else over paid.
Well written article, Guy. Thanks for covering this story. Finally some relief for seniors. Unfortunately, I don’t see a snowball’s chance in **** , oops, I mean Vermont, that this will get passed in our “tax and spend” ultra-liberal political environment.