On Tuesday, 180 lawmakers converged on the Statehouse after a seven-month hiatus for Round 2 of the 2011-2012 biennium.
Judging from interviews with committee chairs, the upcoming session will be fast and furious. Lawmakers have an impressive array of complicated issues to address in four short months, and there is little expectation that the session will drag past the first week in May (this is an election year, after all).
Long-term recovery plans post-Irene will figure prominently on the docket.
Expect to see lively debate on proposals for the new state psychiatric hospital, the state office complex, a reordering of transportation priorities, and legislation to address property losses, flood insurance issues, municipal borrowing and tax abatements.
The latter is already in motion; lawmakers are expected to forgive about $2 million to $4 million in property taxes to the state Education Fund in the first few weeks of the session.
There are a number of old business items that must pass through the belly of the snake no matter what. The biggie here is the budget (the 2013 gap between revenues and expenditures is $75 million, plus $25 million worth of budget adjustments for fiscal year 2012), closely followed by the miscellaneous tax bill, the fee bill, and the capital bill. The latter will earmark how much money the state will borrow to pay for new state offices and the replacement for the Vermont State Hospital.
As for new business, brace for emotional discussions about reapportionment of House and Senate districts, plans to crack down on an explosion of prescription drug abuse, proposals to limit the federal health-care exchanges to large businesses, and a so-called “Death with Dignity” bill, which would allow a patient with a terminal illness to take prescription drugs to end his or her life.
Members of the Senate, who have to show their cards first in the game of poker with the reps in the House, have already submitted 140 bills for review. That doesn't include the legislation that has yet to be proposed by each of the Senate's 12 committees. (There's a reason why reporters who cover the Statehouse feel perpetually overwhelmed.)
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It's also Round 2 for first-term Gov. Peter Shumlin, a Democrat.
In his first session as governor, Shumlin handily won support for nearly all of his initiatives - including passage of the single-payer health-care plan, a fiscally conservative budget, additional health care provider taxes, and a small electric rate increase to support a solar tax credit program.
He lost out on a hike in the cigarette tax, cuts to Catamount Health, and further reductions in programs for Vermonters with developmental disabilities and mental health.
His plan to tax dentists was scuttled, as was a proposal to reduce funding for Choices for Care, a program that keeps elderly Vermonters at home and out of nursing homes.
Some of the unfinished business from 2011 will be addressed in the opening days of the Legislature. The green cleaning products bill, which requires the use of non-chemical cleansers for schools, was the last bill the Senate passed last session, and it will be the first piece of legislation in the House this session. The environmental review public participation bill and the childcare unionization legislation, both of which were passed by the House last year, will move on to the Senate.
Some of the political baggage is also likely to carry over.
Last year, Shumlin's shadow loomed large in the General Assembly. Shap Smith, in his third session as Speaker of the House, continued to maintain party discipline among the Democrats and hewed to an agenda of fiscal centrism that dovetailed with Shumlin's views.
Meanwhile, John Campbell, the Democratic President Pro Tempore of the Senate, struggled to master the big personalities under his purview - and to maintain distance from the former Pro Tem, (Shumlin).
This year, Campbell appears to be sending a message to the Fifth Floor on the opening day of the session: The Senate is holding a veto override vote on a well testing bill that was nixed by the governor last summer.
Internal dissent will be more difficult for Dems to squelch as members likely begin to chafe at the bonds of intra-party loyalty.
With Sen. Randy Brock, a Republican candidate for governor, leading the way for the GOP, expect to see the loyal opposition make inroads on the right as they exploit the mistakes of their major party counterparts and cry foul when Democratic leaders ignore their attempts to shape legislation.
Meanwhile, the Progressive Party, which has two senators and five reps, will attempt to pull the debate on taxes, the budget, and human services issues to the left.Here's a rundown on some of the issues and legislation that will be front and center in the 2012 session:
Budget woes, part 5
It looks like legislative budget writers will have to wield axes again this session to balance the state's General Fund budget.
Even though revenues are beginning to regain ground lost over the recession, the steady increases aren't large enough to fill the structural, ongoing gap between tax receipts and the rate of state expenditures, especially in the area of human services programs.
This year's budget gap is about $75 million, in addition to a $25 million budget adjustment for fiscal year 2012, largely due to the financial impact of Tropical Storm Irene.
The latest shortfall comes on top of four years of budget gaps that together total nearly $1 billion - $753 million from 2009-2011, $150 million in 2012, and $75 million in 2013, according to data from the Joint Fiscal Office.
On Tuesday, the Emergency Board reviewed revenue projections for the coming year. The following week, Gov. Peter Shumlin will present his budget proposal for fiscal year 2013.
Once lawmakers on the House and Senate Appropriations committees have this information in hand, they will begin the laborious process of combing through every major line item to determine how they can bring the budget into balance.
A surcharge on the rich?
Will the Blue Ribbon Tax Structure Commission's recommendations be resuscitated in the next session? Or will the state's tax code be left to lie, as it were, as centrist lawmakers wait in hope for tax revenues to recover without the intravenous fluid of reform? Or will the more liberal members of the House and Senate insist on a surcharge on the wealthy?
Though Vermont on paper has the highest marginal income tax rate in the region, the state's average effective rates are at or below those of other New England states. Taxing residents based on adjusted gross income instead of taxable income would enable Vermont to lower the marginal income tax rates, while keeping the effective rate - the amount residents actually pay - about the same.
Rep. Janet Ancel, D-Calais, chair of the House Ways and Means Committee, said her committee will continue to study the adjusted gross income option, but the major obstacle for legislative approval, in her view, is public relations.
Committee members would have to educate the rest of the House members about the intricacies of Vermont's rather complicated progressive tax system in order to generate the necessary consensus for passage.
Sen. Ann Cummings, D-Washington, is less sanguine about the prospects of any major changes to the income tax, because she says the models developed last year have a disproportionate impact on middle class taxpayers.
“In trying to bring Vermont in line with other New England states so it didn't look like we were higher, we haven't been able to do that without impacting the middle class,” Cummings said. “We're going to keep looking at it, but we probably won't be able to do that this year.”
Institutions: What to do with Waterbury
It's the $65 million (or perhaps as much as $85 million) question: What will the state do with Waterbury, a 700,000-square-foot state office complex rendered unusable by tropical storm Irene?
Create a mixed use office complex? Build a floodwater moat? Sell the buildings to a developer? Turn the site into a model of 21st century eco-rehab and reuse?
That looming issue faces lawmakers, who currently await a decision by the Shumlin administration on hiring architects and contractors to develop a plan for the historic Waterbury complex, parts of which back to before 1900. That hiring decision is expected this week as legislators return for the session.
What the state eventually decides will have broad impacts for some 1,200 dispersed state workers and the economy of Waterbury. It's an issue legislators are well aware is fraught with consequences and, as several have noted, is unusually open ended.
The House and Senate Institutions panels will be the focal point of those considerations, but any concrete proposals are not likely until late in the session in March, according to the administration.
Small employers defined for health care exchanges
Issues surrounding the state's health benefit exchange in 2014 will likely direct the conversation in health care committees this upcoming session.
Under the federal Affordable Care Act, states have to implement an exchange by 2014, or the feds will do it for them. The basic concept of the exchange is a marketplace where individuals and small employers shop for and purchase health insurance. Plans in the exchange will have to meet the requirements of an essential health benefits package for the individual and small group markets.
Sens. Vince Illuzzi, R-Essex-Orleans, and Hinda Miller, D-Chittenden, introduced legislation this fall addressing the two hot issues with the exchange: Who is in it and can people buy insurance outside the exchange?
For 2014 and 2015, states have the option to treat “small employers” who would be in the exchange as those with 50 or fewer employees or 100 or fewer employees.
The proposed bill would define small employers as those with 50 or fewer employees from 2014 to 2015, as 100 or fewer in 2016, and as an employer of any size in 2017, when the state plans to obtain a waiver from the feds to implement a universal health care system.
The state plans to use the exchange as a springboard that will send the state into its goals of health care reform and universal coverage.
Business groups and chambers of commerce have supported the idea of limiting employers in the exchange to 50 employees or fewer on the basis that many larger employers will be able to provide more flexible plans outside of the exchange.
Illuzzi's legislation would also require health insurance to be available for purchase outside the exchange in the individual and small group markets.
Redistricting, more single districts or status quo?
The Legislative Apportionment Board looked at Census data to redraw House and Senate districts, and recommended significantly increasing the number of single-member districts statewide as a way to improve voter representation.
The net effect, though, would pit Democrats against one another in many districts. And guess who has the majority in the General Assembly, and who ultimately decides what the map will look like? The Democrats.
Rep. Donna Sweaney, D-Windsor, said her committee, Government Operations, will look at the board's work, but her committee won't necessarily accept the map as is. Certain portions of it may work, she said, but “our own ideas are to make as few waves as possible wherever we can.”
“If it works, don't reinvent the wheel,” Sweaney said. “We know where the problems are and we'll go from there.”
Education consolidation bill to get overhaul
Vermont lawmakers who oversee education issues will find a lot of familiar subjects on their desks in the second half of the biennial session.
Among major priorities are likely to be amendments to Act 153, which was passed in 2010 to promote and enable school consolidation; weighing in on state efforts to move away from the controversial provisions and testing in the federal No Child Left Behind Act; passage of a bill that would mandate use of “green cleaning” materials in Vermont secondary schools; and deciding on a reorganization of the Education Department, which would make the Commissioner of Education an appointed position by the governor instead of a post chosen by the Vermont Board of Education.
The board of education opposes the bill now in the House Government Operations Committee (H440) that would make the education department a state agency and would allow the governor to appoint its secretary.
The bill would also alter the composition of the state board. The board argues that having governors chose the top education official would cause policy swings and inconsistent direction and move accountability from the general public to the governor. The board also noted the governor already appoints the board and has influence in that manner.
Environmental issues
Streambed management will be a dominant theme in House Fish and Wildlife. Many rivers and streams were armored and rechanneled after Irene by towns that were worried about future flooding. Environmentalists have called these streambed alterations a “manmade” disaster for the river ecosystem and fish habitat.
Rep. David Deen, D-Westminster, said his committee will examine the post-Irene response and coordination among the Department of Fish and Wildlife, the Department of Environmental Conservation and VTrans. In addition, new river and stream buffer legislation as part of flood hazard zoning will be on the table, he said.
“We're going to take a look at permit process review and environmental protections and speeding up and making the process more nimble as opposed to simply dropping environmental protections,” Deen said.
Economic development takes on telecom, workforce development
A hodgepodge of government agencies fall under the purview of economic development – the Department of Labor, the Agency of Commerce and Community Development, the Public Service Department, the consumer affairs division of the Attorney General's Office and the Department of Banking, Insurance, Securities and Health Care Administration. Hence, the broad swath of issues the two economic development committees – one each in the House and Senate – will take up this year.
Annie Noonan, commissioner of the Department of Labor, has been holding a series of meetings with employers around the state and will report out to lawmakers about workforce development programs and proposed legislation to redefine the term “employee” and “contractor.”
Rep. Bill Botzow, chair of House Commerce and Economic Development, said his committee will examine a soon-to-be-released report from the Post-Irene Property Law Task Force. He plans to discuss a risk management approach to natural disasters as a proactive means of mitigating future problems associated with flooding.