Ian Hefele wants the services people receive in his Brattleboro-area community to be culturally appropriate to the backgrounds from which they come.
Case in point, he told lawmakers earlier this year: he knows African refugees living in southern Vermont who travel to Springfield, Massachusetts, or Albany, New York, just to find a licensed hairdresser who is also accustomed to their hair types.
“As we are diversifying our population in southern Vermont, we need to apply that same principle to our service providers as well,” testified Hefele, community engagement manager at the Ethiopian Community Development Council in Brattleboro.
That’s why Hefele said he supports H.606 — a bill aimed at helping more Vermonters access professional licenses, regardless of their immigration status. The bill, which passed the House last month and is moving through the Senate, would allow applicants for state licenses to submit a form of identification for tax purposes other than a social security number, as Vermont law requires today.
Instead, the bill would allow people to submit a federal employer identification number or an individual taxpayer identification number when applying. Lawmakers have noted that many non-citizens don’t have social security numbers, but still have legal authorization to work.
The Senate Government Operations Committee passed out H.606 on Wednesday.
Supporters of the bill have framed it as a tool to address Vermont’s workforce shortage, particularly for in-demand professions such as nursing. As approved by the House, the change would apply to a wide variety of jobs including nurses, commercial drivers and substance use disorder counselors.
“We are in such a workforce shortage, that it is unfortunate that the (immigration) status of someone being on a spectrum will impact their ability to be a part of that workforce,” said Sen. Becca White, D-Windsor, just before voting for the bill on Wednesday.
The Senate panel added language to H.606 that would expand its scope to cover applications for state certifications, such as teaching and firefighting.
As it came over from the House, the bill would also allow the state’s Office of Professional Regulation — which supports the proposals — to require a social security number in certain instances where people are licensed as part of an interstate compact.
All members of Senate Gov Ops voted for the bill Wednesday except Sen. Robert Norris, R-Franklin, who said he did not support the bill because the committee heard testimony that it could allow undocumented people to obtain professional licenses and certifications.
Jill Martin Diaz, executive director of Vermont Asylum Assistance Project, previously told the committee that while measures in the bill would not confer immigration benefits on a non-citizen, that person’s history of business ownership — or paying taxes in a timely manner — could factor favorably into how the federal government handles their immigration case.
“Undocumented individuals … that’s my specific concern,” Norris said. “There’s a lot of talented folks out there who could be in Vermont, earning, helping Vermont out. But it’s just, that’s my one problem.”
White pushed back swiftly on Norris’ comments. “I respectfully disagree with Sen. Norris,” she said, later adding she would “proudly report this bill” on the floor.
— Shaun Robinson
In the know
As Vermont legislators filtered back into the Statehouse early this year for the 2024 legislative session, several set their sights on a new target for regulation: Big Tech.
With the federal government unable or unwilling to set parameters around the collection, sharing or sale of Americans’ data, state lawmakers said they would step up to the plate to establish state-level digital rules by which corporations would have to comply.
But stark differences of opinion between key players in the Vermont House and Senate — and ramped-up lobbying efforts by business interests and Big Tech — threaten to hold up the passage of two landmark bills this legislative session.
“Policy this big takes everyone in the building, chamber-to-chamber and administration, being united,” Rep. Monique Priestley, D-Bradford, told VTDigger in an interview last week. “It has not felt like we as a building are as united as we need to be to fight Big Tech.”
— Sarah Mearhoff
On the move
Members of the House Ways and Means committee voted out the annual yield bill along party lines Wednesday, 8-4-0.
The bill, which helps set property taxes statewide, this year includes a smorgasbord of education finance related tweaks.
Wednesday, lawmakers nixed a new idea they’d come up with to penalize spending increases in the next two budget cycles, instead pivoting to bring back the system once in place, the excess spending threshold, which will return next year.
The bill also includes a new process for applying the CLA to property taxes, one that lawmakers believe will decrease swings in district tax rates once they receive the town-by-town adjusting factor beginning in FY26.
“Time to send this baby to the world,” Rep. Peter Anthony, D-Barre City, said before casting his vote in support of the legislation.
— Ethan Weinstein
The Senate Committee on Health and Welfare advanced a trimmed-back bill Wednesday to expand access to publicly-funded health insurance programs.
When it passed out of the House last month, H. 721 would have allowed more young and pregnant Vermonters to get health insurance through Medicaid and increased access to Medicare Savings Programs, publicly funded programs that help older, low-income Vermonters pay for Medicare.
This week, however, lawmakers in the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare walked back some of those provisions, tightening income limits for 19- and 20-year-olds to get on Medicaid and for older Vermonters accessing Medicare Savings Programs.
Sen. Ginny Lyons, D-Chittenden Southeast and the chair of the Senate Health and Welfare Committee, said the edits were intended to trim costs amid concern over Vermont’s finances.
The House’s version of the bill was “very all-encompassing, trying to do as much as possible,” Lyons said at a committee meeting Monday. “And the reality of our budgetary place has hit.”
As it currently stands, the bill still expands subsidies for older Vermonters (though to a lesser degree than before) to pay for Medicare and allows more pregnant Vermonters to get on Medicaid. It also still directs the Agency of Human Services to study how to expand those programs further and includes a late addition that will help reproductive health care practitioners collect more money in Medicaid reimbursements.
H. 721 also still includes new corporate taxes to help pay for the expansions, though it’s unclear whether that provision will remain in its current form amid skepticism from the Senate Appropriations Committee, where the bill now heads.
Despite the trimming, Rep. Lori Houghton, D-Essex Junction and the bill’s primary sponsor, hailed its progress.
“I’m disappointed that it wasn’t, obviously, at the level of investment that we passed out of the House, but it’s helping low-income Vermonters and it’s setting us up for an analysis that we can dig into next year,” Houghton said. “So I think it’s great.”
— Peter D’Auria
Visit our 2024 Bill tracker for the latest updates on major legislation we are following.
Junk mail
Zombie invasion. Alien attack. Two things, I would guess, that are pretty bad to go through. Regardless, it seems Vermonters can rest easy — we’re the best state in union to survive an apocalypse, of those varieties and others.
At least, that’s according to my go-to source on Armageddon-related research: casino bonus guide NoDepositDaily.com, which put its findings in a press release this morning. The betting sages said Vermont ranked highest when considering factors such as the prevalence of weapons, population density, access to food and fresh water and the state’s climate.
A quick Google search shows that the deposit docs are far from the only ones to point to Vermont as a safe haven for the End Times. Says the writer “Rac Ward” on the website Zombiepedia: “The snow and cold would freeze any zombie until spring and even then Vermont has a season known as Mud season for a reason.” Honestly, it’s an infallible analysis.
I also noticed that those tote bag-wielding nerds over at Vermont Public took up this question in a 2022 podcast — and came to, essentially, the same conclusion.
Stay safe out there!
— Shaun Robinson
What we’re reading
Chelsea Green to be sold to international publishing behemoth, VTDigger
Joe’s Pond iced out early this year, but it wasn’t a record breaker, Vermont Public
Home is where the Target is: Suburban Sobu builds a downtown neighborhood, Seven Days