Trump and Obama Justices Condemn Actions of Vermont State Employees
One Trump Supreme Court appointee joined two Obama Supreme Court appointees in condemning the actions of Vermont state employees, suggesting that the rule of law can overcome the partisan divide.
Poll: Majority of Vermonters Oppose TCI Tax/GWSA Lawsuits
According to a poll of 600 Vermonters, majorities oppose key components of environmental legislation, the recently passed Global Warming Solutions Act (GWSA), and the pending Transportation Climate Initiative (TCI).
Scott’s Improbable New Idea for Affordable Electricity
On October 14 Gov. Phil Scott and four other New England governors – not including New Hampshire’s - announced their support for major changes in the governance of the New England electricity market, which is conducted by the Independent System Operator ISO-New England.
Commentary: False Alarm, The Supreme Court and the Affordable Care Act
U.S Senate Democrats are claiming that a conservative Supreme Court will end Obamacare coverage for 20 million Americans. This is shameless fearmongering. The horrors they so stridently predict will simply not materialize.
Commentary: Vermont, the Only State Seeing No Need for Election Safeguards
By avoiding best practices in a vote-by-mail effort practiced in other states, our Secretary of State Jim Condos is opening Vermont up to questions of electoral fraud.
Vermont Accidentally Demonstrates “Trickle Down” Works
Seven Days recently ran an article asking, “Has Phil Scott Made Vermont More Affordable.” The story cites the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy which notes that Vermont has “one of the most progressive, or equitable, tax systems in the country.”
Report Ranks Scott as 7th Most Fiscally Responsible Governor in US
The Cato Institute gives Governor Phil Scott high marks for his fiscal stewardship. It recently published the “Fiscal Policy Report Card on America’s Governors 2020” which uses publicly available data to assess the fiscal performance of the governors and how they restrained or grew the size of their state’s government from January 2018 to August 2020.
Union-backed bill would impair employee rights and jeopardize state’s Medicaid funding
By Maxford Nelsen
The legislative process can be quite effective at screening out bad ideas, but sometimes, by accident or design, flawed policies still make it through.
Burlington “Heat Fine” Shows Where GWSA Is Heading
As the Vermont legislature shepherded the Global Warming Solutions Act into law, we at the Ethan Allen Institute pointed out some of the many possible places the law could lead: the banning of ATVs, snow machines, and other fossil fuel burning recreational vehicles, the banning of gas powered lawnmowers and lawn maintenance equipment, fireplaces and barbeques, etc. One of the red flags we raised concerned oil and gas heating systems and the possibility that they could be banned from new construction, renovation, or with the sale of a property. Well, on that front Burlington has fired the first shot.
Speaker of the House: GWSA means LESS accountability to meet climate goals.
For the past two years, how many times have we had to hear from Global Warming Solutions Act (GWSA) advocates that Vermont’s 2005 goals to reduce greenhouse gas emissions “lack teeth,” and this dentally challenged nature of our policies is why Vermont has consistently failed to meet those goals. We need big, sharp, serious teeth! And those teeth were going to be the citizen lawsuit provision of the GWSA. This allows that if Vermont isn’t on track to meet the targets in the law, “any person” can sue the state at taxpayers’ expense.
Here’s just a sampling of the bicuspid obsession from the last biennium…