This week, the sunshine has returned, and with it, thoughts of adjournment. That brings me to the Education Transformation Bill – H.454 – which returned to the House on Tuesday with changes significant enough to require a committee of conference. The House Committee is comprised of Representative Emilie Kornheiser (chair, Ways and Means), Representative Peter Conlon (chair, House Education) and Representative Chris Taylor (vice chair, House Education); the Senate Committee is Senator Anne Cummings (chair, Finance), Seth Bongartz (chair, Education), Senator Scott Beck (Finance). I am hopeful the conference committee can agree on enough of the House bill to allow the work of creating new school districts to begin this summer, which will inform our work next session.
Other bills still in process include:
(S.123) – Department of Motor Vehicles Bill, which passed second reading in the House on Tuesday. The House then voted to suspend rules to vote on third reading the same day, and sent the bill directly to the Senate for acceptance, or Committee of Conference.
Significant additions to the bill include: the allowance of renewal at any time of an operator’s license, privilege card, or non-driver identification card; the clarification of a municipality’s right to maintain or not maintain Legal Trails; the rights of bicyclists to use pedestrian crosswalks.
S.126 – an act related to health care payment and delivery, including granting authority to the Green Mountain Care Board to create a system of reference-based pricing, and budget review, for Vermont hospitals. This bill is currently in a Committee of Conference.
H.266 – an act relating to the 340B program in health care, capping prescription drug markups by hospitals. This act is estimated to drop health insurance costs by 4%.
S.53 – an act related to certifying community-based perinatal doulas, and Medicaid coverage for doula services.
S.63 – modifying regulatory duties of the Green Mountain Care Board.
H.401 – licensing exemptions for food manufacturing establishments w/ gross income of less than $30k
S.127 – an act to encourage the rehabilitation and development of mixed-income housing, including: the creation of a tax-increment financing program for municipalities and private developers, the removal of permitting hurdles and frivolous appeals for homebuilders, financing options for low- and middle-income Vermonters, and protecting the immigrant population from housing discrimination.
H. 91 – relating to the Vermont Homeless Emergency Assistance and Responsive Transition Housing Program. Currently in Committee of Conference (including Representative Wood of Waterbury, chair of Human Services).
S.69 – relating to age-appropriate design code, which mandates the discontinuation of online predatory practices directed at youth.
Highlights of bills recently signed by the governor.:
- H.98 – an act relating to confirmatory adoptions and standby guardianships.
- H.461 – An act relating to expanding employee access to unpaid leave
- 493 – The Budget Bill: An act relating to making appropriations for the support of the government (including a $120 million buy-down of property taxes).
- H.491 – The Yield Bill: An act relating to setting the homestead property tax yields and the non-homestead property tax rate. * Note the accompanying message from Governor Scott: “. . . buying down rates year after year isn’t good fiscal management and we should only view this as a bridge to the real education transformation our system needs. . . ”
- S.51 – an act relating to tax cuts for military retirees, veterans, social security recipients, and unpaid caregivers. (tax cuts total an estimated $13.9 million).
2025 End-of-Legislative Session Discussion
Representative Torre and I are working to schedule this during the week of June 23 details to come.
