A big legislative pay hike and hefty benefits package are on tomorrow’s Senate agenda.

A bill prohibiting biologically-male transgender students from playing school sports designated for girls or women has been introduced into the Vermont Legislature – and immediately labeled as “hate” by transgender activists.

The Vermont House of Representatives voted to give $16 million of state funds to the new BHS demolition and construction project and rejected a lawmaker’s request for a refund if Burlington wins its suit against Monsanto.

The bill sets goals for conserving 30 percent of Vermont’s total land area and waters by 2030 and 50 percent by 2050. This would include all state, federal, municipal and private lands.  

The optimistic name is gone, but the controversial contents remain: S.5 is now in the House.

“Anybody who was ever in the military or the Boy Scouts probably has marched to that song,” lead sponsor John Arrison said yesterday.

Like baby sea turtles that must run a gauntlet of predators before escaping into the sea, hundreds of bills in the Vermont General Assembly face legislative ‘death’ this week – at least for this year.

These products pose increased health risks for women because they are used in close proximity to skin tissue that can more readily absorb chemicals.

The Party of Equity decided it’s not an issue when it comes to deceptive contraceptive practices, Republicans charged Friday.

The chair of the Cannabis ‘Control’ Board is taking the marijuana industry’s side on raising the THC potency cap. A medical advocate said, “We know that we are speaking against an industry, and this is a billion-dollar industry, and similar to big tobacco they’re huge and it’s very difficult for lawmakers to vote against them. It’s very difficult for people to not want that revenue.”

A strong supporter of Vermont’s renewable power industry has introduced a bill to require utilities to buy less and less power from Hydro-Quebec every year.

This year’s big Climate Bill now has a required two-year study.

Rodent’s posteriors came into play in a lively committee discussion about a condom stealth bill.

Love and marriage won’t go together like a horse and carriage for Vermont teenagers. But at the school meals will be free (for them) and DMV won’t suspend anyone’s driver’s license for not paying a speeding ticket.

Senators spar over the costs, straightforwardness, and even the name of the controversial Affordable Heating Act (AHA).

Bills to repeal state law prohibiting prostitution and disorderly conduct and mushroom hallucinogen have been introduced into the Vermont House.

S.5, the Affordable Heating Act, goes to the ‘how much will it cost the taxpayer’ committee this afternoon.

Youth leaving foster care often struggle on their own. A Windsor County senator wants the State to provide them with a monthly stipend.

Two epihanies, actually. A senator admits the Senate doesn’t do things to help poor people, but must save the world instead. And, there just aren’t enough workers to weatherize, etc. enough to meet self-imposed carbon reduction mandates.

Recent laws have improved telehealth, but improvements could be made, a recent study says.

A Senate bill would deliver what the holy grail to Vermont abortion providers: free abortions to all, required to be paid for by Medicaid and private health insurance.

Xusana Davis: “It’s now my third or fourth session in the state and one of the things I often hear from legislators is, oh yeah, sorry, the equity piece isn’t quite there but we’ll fix it in January. We’ll fix it later. And what that says to me is there is something that motivates us to do this that is more important to us than justice. So the justice will have to wait.”

A bill that could add up to $4 to the cost of heating fuel passed the Senate Natural Resources and Energy Committee this morning.

Vermont lawmakers are seeking to outlaw efforts to counter the pro-abortion agenda.

Legal protections now enjoyed by police and crisis pregnancy centers are in the crosshairs of two House bills introduced Tuesday.

H251 would add the issuance of a Brady or Giglio letter as a basis of law enforcement misconduct under the jurisdiction of the Vermont Criminal Justice Council, the state’s police disciplinary board. 

In a speech on the floor of the House, a Northfield lawmaker decries the abortion shield bill’s lack of conscience protections for health professionals.

Now the House also has a bill to study whether the Legislature should meet year-round.

Secular private schools now receiving public tuition could suffer financial harm under a bill meant to stop tuition to religious schools.

More than 400 emails opposing H113 have already been sent to lawmakers.

Bills establishing vaccination freedom and fetal personhood were introduced Tuesday in the Vermont House of Representatives.

A controversial pro-LGBTQ bill has been approved by a House committee.

The paid family and medical leave bill also would give time off for sexual and domestic abuse victims.

New bills continue to flood into the Vermont House of Representatives.

When Democrats won super-supermajorities in both chambers of the Vermont legislature in November’s election, they brought with them a host of legislative priorities that come with massive price tags for Vermont taxpayers.

Congress seems unwilling to impose term limits on itself. So a growing number of Vermonters are joining with citizens across America to call a Convention of States.

State law already provides health insurance for illegal immigrant children. A bill in the Senate would extend Medicaid coverage to all regardless of age and immigration status.

Vermont taxpayers are on the hook to pay both the defense and (likely) the prosecution legal bills for the inevitable lawsuit for not meeting carbon reduction goals. Yet at least one state senator has given that potential lawsuit a big thumb’s up.

Vermont senators want to group discrimination against obesity and ethnic hair styles in the same category as race, gender, religion, etc..

A Vermont Climate Council spokesperson saying it’s impossible to put a pricetag on the new Clean Heat Standard was met with bobble-headed agreement from lawmakers.

A Republican lawmaker has introduced legislation which, if acted on, would change how Vermont regulates carbon emissions reduction.

A Washington county senator wants to ban shooting guns within 500 ft. of an occupied building, and has proposed a Purple Paint hunter/trapper posting.

Priests who violate the confidence of the confessional are breaking church law. Now a Vermont state law could compel them to do so.

Number, sponsor and a plain-language description of every bill introduced into the Vermont House of Representatives in 2023 to date.

Should the law require solar panel installers to have a recycling plan? And do the Capitol grounds need a 24/7 restroom? These questions and others raised in proposed House legislation.

Big bills come out of small committee rooms.

One of the silver linings of the pandemic: the Vermont State House is now more accessible to people who can’t or won’t visit in person.