Vermonters for Economic Health

(Thanks to Vermont Chamber of Commerce for this item)

The Senate Economic Development Committee has scheduled two hearings on the state's Unemployment Insurance Trust Fund to hear from Vermont businesses about the impact proposed changes would have on employers. The first hearing will take place on Wednesday, February 3 from 9 am to Noon in the Board of Alderman Chamber, City Hall, in Rutland.
The second hearing will take place on Thursday, February 4 from 9 am to Noon at Contois Auditorium in Burlington.

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Gordon Winters, owner of Swanton Lumber, presented his views about Vermont's business climate and the  issues he faces as a small business owner to a Legislative Business/Jobs forum at the Statehouse on January 21, 2010. We could not have said it better! (used with permission)

January 21, 2010

Senator Shumlin, Speaker Smith and distinguished legislators, thank you for allowing me to speak with you today.

I am the owner of Swanton Lumber Company and two ACE Hardware stores that employ 30 Vermonters. My third hardware store is under construction, and when it opens this
spring, I expect to hire 10 more people. As a lifelong Vermonter there is no place I would rather grow my business than Vermont because I know what a unique place it is.

VEH - Douglas Budget Proposal

Warning! Prepare for the wailing and gnashing of teeth. Why?
Governor Douglas has proposed a balanced budget for Vermont that will
eliminate a $150 Million budget shortfall for Fiscal Year 2011. Why the
wailing? He proposes to cut $53 Million from the Agency of Human
Services and to accept the Treasurer's pension and post-retirement
healthcare benefit proposals. In addition, the Governor also proposes
to shift the cost of teacher pensions and benefits to the Education
Fund (where it belongs) from the General Fund. In addition, Gov.
Douglas proposes to roll back the tax increases the Legislature enacted
last year when overriding his veto of the Legislature's budget.

At VEH we support these proposals as a reasonable approach for legislative
consideration. Balancing the budget is of paramount importance and Gov.

I recommend this Seven Days ( January 13-20, 2010) article by Ken Picard. With good questions and salient responses, it's well worth your time to understand the issues that form the debate in Montpelier this session as the Legislature wrestles to close the $150 Million deficit for FY 2011.

It's clear that Cillo (Public Assets Institute) advocates raising taxes as well as cutting expenses while McClaughry (Ethan Allen Institute) believes it's high time for a structural overhaul of what government actually does and the services it provides.

The link to the interview: http://www.7dvt.com/2010sizing-vermont

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Closing Vermont Yankee is a very bad idea. For the Legislature to do so on emotional or ideological grounds is the epitomy of irrational public ploicy.

Willem Post, an engineer with the time and talent to examine the economics of closing Vermont Yankee, offers a rational economic analysis for relicensing Vermont's cleanest and least espensive source of baseload electricity.  The "top line" reality for closing VY and replacing it with other 'renewable' sources in Vermont would be very costly to Vermont electric ratepayers. He summarizes:

While the news is good that Governor Douglas and Legislative leaders have agreed to accept "Challenges for Change," we doubt that all the estimated savings will be realized in FY2011. We want to know who will be responsible for tracking the progress and quantifying these savings. State government has only a few months to implement these recomendations in order to allow time for them to be in place long enough to realize the assumed savings.The devil is always in the details.

This is the report from the Lake Champlain Regional Chamber of Commerce:

"The big news this week aside from Governor Douglas’State of the State address was an announcement by Governor Douglas, Speaker Shap Smith, and Senate President Pro Tem Peter Shumlin that they had agreed on a plan to save more than $38 million.