On Tuesday, Chairwoman Kornheiser asked Legislative Counsel to walk the House Ways & Means Committee through the draft language making changes to the two tax credit programs.

Legislative Counsel explained that the draft language which would amend the EITC and Child Tax Credit has lots of moving parts; part-time and full-time residents would both eligible. The Child Tax Credit was described as a “refundable credit” against Vermont income tax liability. Taxpayers receive $1000 per qualifying child five years old or younger. The payments will change, under this bill, from a lump sum payment (at filing) to a quarterly payment system that the tax department will create. This is similar to how the tax credits for individual health insurance plans work today.

This week we saw three major initiatives clear key votes on the House and Senate floors. The major housing bill this session, S.100, cleared the Senate floor on Tuesday, as did the bill divesting state pension funds from fossil fuel investments (S.42). In the House, the bill (H.483) tightening admissions and other requirements on independent schools that publicly tuitioned students choose to attend passed on a voice vote after passionate speeches from both sides.

Joan Goldstein (Commissioner, Department of Economic Development) joined the Senate Economic Development Committee on Friday, along with Abbie Sherman (Executive Director, Vermont Economic Progress Council).

On Tuesday, the House General and Housing Committee did a walk through of H.276 with Legislative Counsel. The bill essentially requires landlords provide identifying information on the owner, landlord, property manager and other identifying information about the unit, location of the unit, and construction of the unit by March of next year.

On Friday, Emily Simmons (General Counsel, Agency of Education) gave the Senate Education Committee an overview of the statutory obligations surrounding public tuitioning for independent schools.

On Friday afternoon, Representative Conlon (Chair, House Education Committee) provided the Senate Education Committee with an overview of their committee bill, H.461.

Christina Sivret presentation for the Vermont Ethics Commission budget to Senate Appropriations on Friday. The total budget came up to $190K, which includes two half-time personnel, plus a contractor. The Committee asked Sivret a number of questions, but they were very receptive to the presentation. 

She was able to present all her hopes relative to enforcement of the Code of Ethics and candidate disclosure requirements now being proposed to be added to H.429. She also spoke about the required training and the support they offer public officials through advisory letters.

The House Environment & Committee returned on Friday morning to hear from TJ Poor (Director of Planning, Department of Public Service). He was following up on a question from his last time in the Committee regarding the Comprehensive Energy Plan (CEP). The CEP actually calls for a full evaluation of the Clean Heat Standard (CHS) in terms of cost, societal impact, and equity. This didn’t happen in the Climate Action Plan (CAP) process due to the tight timelines.

The Senate Government Operations Committee resumed testimony on H.429 on Friday with Betty Keller (Member, Vermont League of Women Voters) who promoted Ranked Choice Voting as a solution to the “sore loser” issue this bill was trying to address. The Vermont League of Women Voters (LWV-VT) opposes the first two sections of the bill, which deal with the “sore loser” candidates. The legislature should not be limiting choices in the general election, she argued.