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Correction: An earlier edition of this story misidentified the committee in which this discussion was held. We regret the error.
By Guy Page
At the January 28 Senate Finance Committee meeting, Sen. Martine Laroque Gulick (D-Chittenden Central) pushed back against the idea that Vermont’s property taxes are too high.
“I would love to do a deeper dive when we say the Vermonters can’t afford their property taxes. I’d like to learn more about that,” Gulick, a Burlington resident and career educator, told her fellow committee members. “I have very high property taxes. I don’t like to pay property taxes, but I can afford them. And I know that many owners are income sensitized. So, I would like to dig into that premise a little bit more because we throw it around a lot.”
Gulick, a member of the Senate Finance Committee and vice-chair of the Health & Welfare Committee, is also on the School District Redistricting Task Force State Aid for School Construction Working Group.
According to her bio on the legislative website, Gulick is a high school teacher who taught French and English and served as Library Director in Vermont and overseas. She has been a member of the Burlington School Board since 2018.
As a member of the School District Redistricting Task Force, she was part of the effort to move away from Act 73’s mandated redistricting and towards sharing services among existing districts.
The comment drew a sharp reaction from a State House observer who requested anonymity: “I think it illustrates how one of the senators most oppositional to education transformation is not in touch.”
Finance Chair Sen. Anne Cummings (D-Washington) pushes back on her later, basically saying her and her husband don’t have pensions like a former teacher and need to live off what they saved.
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Very hard to comment and stay on this website.
I just emailed this to Sen. Gulick:
Sen. Gulick,
I just read about your comments regarding Vermont’s property taxes and their affordability. Your comments demonstrate how out of touch people like you are.
I too live in Burlington, the combination of the various State, local and education taxes are FRIGHTENING people!
We see no way out except for the growth in our taxes that is far outpacing our growth in income, many of us are on fixed and slow growth incomes whereas government growth in taxes continues to go in the 7-12 percent range every year!
Is your goal to impoverish people? Is it to enslave them to the State?
I would appreciate a response.
Thank you,
Tom Licata
Burlington
Here is Sen. Gulick’s response to me. Note the last paragraph, where she turns herself into “victim” status by falsely accusing me of trying to muzzle her. It’s absurd. I never questioned her right to make her comments, as she claims in the second paragraph. The general tone of her response is accusatory and generally… gaslighting.
And by the way, income sensitivity has not been indexed to the growth in government property taxes. If it was, government revenue would decrease which would then require greater tax increases.
——
Dear Tom,
Thank you for reaching out and sharing your thoughts. I appreciate you engaging in our democratic process.
It is completely within my right and scope as a lawmaker to ask questions in committee. What I was asking for was some data. It is not good practice to legislate on our feelings, emotions or anecdotes. I was asking the chair for some numbers, which is perfectly reasonable. I know that almost 70% of Vermonters have a property tax bill that is income-sensitized and wanted to know the percentage of income folks are spending on property taxes.
Please do not try and muzzle committee conversation and query. This is an important part of the work we do, and it is critical to ask questions.
Thank you again.
sincerely,
Martine Larocque Gulick she/her
VT State Senator, Chittenden Central District
Vice Chair Health and Welfare/Senate Finance
Judicial Retention Committee
Green Mountain Care Board Nominating Committee
Building Bright Futures
HSCP Student Access Study Committee
PO Box 3359 | Burlington, VT 05408
My direct emailed response to Sen Gulick:
You attempt to turn yourself into “victim” status by falsely accusing me of trying to muzzle you. It’s absurd. I never questioned your right to make your comments, as you implied in the second paragraph. The general tone of your response is accusatory and generally… gaslighting.
And by the way, income sensitivity has not been indexed to the growth in government property taxes. If it was, government revenue would decrease which would then require greater tax increases.
The percentage of people’s income going to pay property taxes is increasing every year. It’s simple math: Government property taxes annual growth has continuously far exceeded growth in people’s income.
A potential follow up question to Gulick might be whether the education property tax revolt – some towns voting down their school budgets multiple times – and the large turnover of legislative seats from Democrat to Republican was any sort of clue to her.
It costs more to run the state government, for some unknown reason, and there are less people here to pay for it so naturally, it costs more per person in the form of property taxes. I guess it’s just too hard for Sen. Gulick to see this.
The headline made me burst out loud laughing. That is a seriously sheltered and clueless legislator. People who can leave, should leave. Vermonters are being played for suckers by the wealthy, insulated political class and their NGO partners. After a lifetime in Vermont, I left for Tennessee 6 years ago. People down here are shocked when I tell them about the high property taxes, high income taxes, high sales taxes that Vermonters pay, and your ridiculously high electricity rates. Tennessee isn’t perfect, but I can assure you that life here is far more affordable, comfortable and comes with a scenic beauty every bit as lovely as the state I left.
We also left the state due to the inability to continue to pay property/education taxes. For many years we did not meet the income threshold to qualify for homestead exemptions. We paid the tax in full for many years. When we retired our fixed incomes did not increase by 7-12% to pay those taxes. Most Vermonters CAN afford the property tax portion of the annual bill. It is the education tax that is 4-6x the property tax that is unaffordable and unsustainable. Likely more than that since we left. Wealthy people do not understand that their lunch money is someone else’s annual income. How many of those progressives actually OWN their own homes? The majority of the younger ones rent. They have no clue how that affects low, middle income and retired seniors. There are many very poor seniors who need assistance on a monthly basis just to survive. There are many middle income people who are struggling because they have gotten 1% raises and then property taxes go up, medical insurance goes up and that pittance of a raise put them in a higher tax bracket, yet they qualify for no assistance whatsoever. Happy for Gulick. Hope she doesn’t break her crown when she gets her pedestal pulled out from under her feet.
PS isn’t it a conflict if interest to be serving on a school board while being in charge of school redistricting?