by Don Keelan

Vermont is backsliding on six critical issues affecting all Vermonters: education, health care insurance, physical and mental health care, infrastructure, housing, and demographics. And it’s all interconnected.

Shortly, 150 State Legislators will reconvene in Montpelier, and I do not envy the tasks that confront them. They must realize that the crises are at a tipping point. For many Members, the issues may seem intractable; why haven’t prior legislative “fixes” resolved them?

The Legislature must not feel that it is the sole owner of the issues. Ownership also resides with the Administration, special interest groups represented by lobbyists and nonprofits, and all Vermont citizens.   

Prior administrations and legislatures have recognized the issues and put forth what they considered solutions, albeit at times quite partisan.   What was put forth, debated, and adopted has not worked, despite billions of dollars spent to achieve the legislation’s purpose. 

A summary places the crises in perspective, beginning with education:

A second round of double-digit increases in the education tax is looming; the enrollment population has declined by nearly 25% over the past 30 years; many school facilities require billions of dollars in building and infrastructure repairs; and most discouraging, Vermont has traded places with Mississippi in the national reading comprehension testing of its 4^th graders.

Then there is the crisis in mental and physical health care, cost, and accessibility. The December 22, 2025 VTDigger article noted: “Vermont residents spent 19.6 % of their income on insurance premiums in 2025; in New Hampshire, that number is the lowest in the country at 4%. The national average is 7.9%.”  Earlier in the year, the GMCB put several of Vermont’s 14 hospitals on notice that they are in precarious financial condition. Could closures be next? The lack of adequate mental health facilities and treatment is often highlighted by homelessness care organizations, the courts, the Department of Corrections, and hospitals’ emergency departments. It is only becoming more dire.

When it comes to the lack of housing, at all levels, no one can say that it has been unaddressed; it has, with extensive amounts in legislation reform and billions expended from the State’s treasury.  The goal, as expressed by the Administration, is for 40,000 new housing units by 2030. This goal will not be realized. This crisis is magnified as the dearth of young families grows.  

The Legislatures and Administrations have had to confront the ever-diminution of Vermont’s infrastructure, which was evident after Tropical Storm Irene and the summer floods of 2023 and 24. The funding battle was real. Costly and ever-increasing funding for social programs was stripping away State revenue. Addressing flood-resilience work and other infrastructure issues were not the priorities they once were; funding was not available.

If there can be a consensus that time is running out and 2026 is the year in which to get it right once and for all, then radical changes must take place, and they are:

Political self-interests and the desire to have one’s personal legislation put forward in this election year must be left at Montpelier’s entrance. We all own the problems. Not Covid-19, not the Trump Administration, not Climate Change, not the Democrats, Republicans, Progressives, nor Conservatives. The demands and priorities of special interest groups should be cast aside. They had their say, and if anything, too much of it.

The two questions I often ask: one, is Vermont as a state sustainable? Not just for the 16 million annual visitors and 58,000 second home owners, but for its 640,000 residents? Two, what are we not being told by our State’s leaders?

The Legislature is comprised of 150 well-meaning individuals. Therein lies the problem: they are 150 separate agendas that do not address the fact that time is running out to correct the above issues. 

If there was ever a time for the Legislature, the Administration, and all of us to reach back and adopt this Nation’s motto, now is the time, “E Pluribus Unum.”