Photo by Donna Waiter
by Rep. Jim Harrison
A final compromise on education reform proved elusive late Friday and at about 11:00 pm the Senate adjourned followed by the House at about 11:30 pm. As late as 10 pm, legislative leaders were still hopeful that the six conferees (3 House and 3 Senate members) could reach a deal sometime before midnight that would have paved the way to session adjournment sometime in the early morning hours.
When that wasn’t apparent, House Speaker Krowinski announced the full House would come back on June 16, which was the date previously put on the calendar for a potential session to address any bills that the Governor vetoed. The plan is now for the education conferees to continue meeting over the next few weeks to hammer out an agreement that can also satisfy Governor Scott. Stay tuned.
The closing days of the legislative session are often referred to as the “hurry up and wait” period. The full House and Senate meet multiple times each day in their respective chambers in the final week, waiting for various committees to consider changes that the other chamber may have made to their bills. Scheduled times to meet may get changed multiple times. Friday night in the House was a good example where reconvening at 5:30 pm became 7:30 pm which became 8:15 pm and then 8:45 pm, etc. If you are not on one of the committees working on a few of the remaining bills to be passed before adjournment, downtime is often spent cleaning out your session files in your committee room, taking a walk, or catching up with colleagues.
On Friday alone, ten bills received final passage from the legislature, with several others waiting for one more vote. One of those is S.51, which includes several targeted tax breaks, including an income tax exemption on military pensions for families with total incomes up to $125,000 and a partial exemption for those up to $175,000. The House approved it late Friday and the Senate is expected to pass the measure as soon as it reconvenes.
Issues of interest last week:
- A significant housing initiative with a financing tool to help with the necessary infrastructure for new developments passed by both chambers and is expected to be signed into law by the Governor.
- New healthcare bills approved include S.126, which gives the Green Mountain Care Board additional authority to control hospital budgets and pricing and H.266, which puts a cap on how much hospitals can charge for prescriptions beginning next January. H.266 is expected to help Blue Cross lower their proposed rate request.
- While the legislature never took up a repeal of the Clean Heat Standard, the Public Utilities Commission issued a statement indicating that because the legislature never approved the rules to fully implement the law this session, it will not move forward with the potentially costly program.
- Legislation that contained several miscellaneous changes to Vermont’s cannabis statues was approved, but not before a provision that would have allowed new permits for cannabis “farmers markets” was removed from the bill.
- The House and Senate agreed to expand the list of prohibited products containing PFAS, a potential cancer causing chemical.
- S.69, better known as the “Kids Code” bill was approved. It is intended to force social media businesses to adjust their design codes for those under 18
- A transition to regional governance of the hotel and shelter program for the homeless was approved. However, it is unclear whether the Governor will sign or veto the bill because he has concerns it may cost more the current hotel voucher program.
On another note, we have an annual adjournment pool where we can guess the date and time of the session adjournment. It’s $2 an entry and the proceeds benefit the Vermont Foodbank. When the deadline closed for entries, I couldn’t help but call out one of my committee colleagues from Waterbury as a “Debbie Downer” for selecting June 6 at something like 11 pm. Most of us assumed we would be done on or before May 30. And now as we are not going to adjourn before June 16, it looks like “Debbie” will win this year’s contest and get the last laugh!
Unless there is a new development, I may not publish another update for a couple of weeks. Thank you for your continued interest in the work under the Dome.