Dear Constituents -

The Legislature is digging out from under the backload of bills passed ahead of the policy and money crossover deadlines. The week began with a Joint Assembly for Judicial Retention and a ceremonial reading of the Medal of Honor Resolution. Throughout the course of the week, the House passed the following bills to the Senate: H.612 (miscellaneous cannabis amendments); H.622 (Emergency Medical Services); H.655 (qualifying offenses for sealing criminal history records and access to sealed criminal history records); H.702 (legislative operations and government accountability); H.878 (miscellaneous judiciary procedures); H.877 (miscellaneous agricultural subjects); H.585 (amending the pension system for sheriffs and certain deputy sheriffs); H.630 (boards of cooperative education services); H.880 (increasing access to the judicial system); H.721 (access to Medicaid and Dr Dynasaur); H.546 (miscellaneous tax bill); H.873 (testing for and remediation of PCBs in schools); H.687 (community resilience and biodiversity protection through land use); H.833 (the Budget) is concerning because of the amount of money contained within other bills isn’t found in this version! You can see the text of these bills in the online Journal of the House, with any amendments and roll call votes. A hotly-debated bills was H.687, aka the Act 250 bill masquerading as a housing bill.  This bill and its 14 individual amendments spurred 5 hours of debate, with members from rural Franklin Co speaking out against the overly-restrictive new triggers and the lack of incentives to build new housing. The number of amendments alone tell a story – the bill came out of committee through a top-down process that was not inclusive of folks who advocated for Act 250 reform. My remarks on the Floor captured the frustration of the Rural Caucus: “We convened this session with the affirmation by all parties that Vermont has a housing crisis, and finding a way forward to building more housing would be of the highest priority. We had a tripartisan housing bill that pulled together the goals of all of our constituencies across the state. It got no attention. To that end, over the Fall, driven by the need to modernize ACT 250 jurisdiction and governance, three crucial stakeholder groups met and did the work to form a coalition that prioritized a fragile balance between land conservation and increased housing construction; the housing bills put forward did just that. The committee almost exclusively focused on H.687 this session, and it fails to honor the provisions of that hard-earned collaboration that the three published reports represent. Instead, the bill disregards the laudable progress made by those study groups and a request by the Rural Caucus to streamline and modernize the process to make it simpler to build housing, and significantly expands Act 250 triggers to impact over 97% of Vermont land. This new map shows that our state’s most rural towns will be disproportionately penalized, and these new triggers will stunt the economies of those communities by making it nearly impossible to build much-needed housing to support the workforce of local industries and public services. Our rural communities do not have the resources to jump through the hoops that are being proposed to enable significant housing development, and without that infrastructure, nor will they be able to adequately respond to what is required of them. I urge members to join me in voting against this bill and standing up for all Vermont communities that have been waiting decades for the opportunity to bring their economies into the 21^st century”.

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango

Dear Constituents –

Vermont is unaffordable, and this Legislature is making it even more so. Despite efforts by a minority-led coalition voting against legislation that contributes to the creep in new programs and government positions, study committees, task forces, and increased costs for anyone who pays for utility rates, insurance premiums, DMV fees, payroll taxes, and property taxes, this a burden that Vermonters just cannot sustain. Much of the legislation passed affects all of us in our day-to-day lives, and Vermonters are making it known that they’ve had enough. The minority in the General Assembly hears this loud and clear – we vote against tax and fee increases, but the supermajority hasn’t gotten the message. Their agendas must be passed, regardless of the effect on constituents from all walks of life.  Vermonters need to stay informed and use that knowledge to inform their actions when they choose their government officials, at all levels.

Bill language can be read by typing the bill number into the bill tracker on the General Assembly website.  As of Thursday, March 21, bills that passed the House and will go to the Senate for further consideration: H.279 (Uniform Trust Decanting Act); H.350 (Uniform Directed Trust Act); H.868 (2025 Transportation Program); H.794 (services provided by the VT Veterans Home); H.741 (health insurance coverage for colorectal cancer); H.667 (creation of the VT-Ireland Trade Commission); H.644 (access to records by individuals who were in foster care); H.614 (land improvement fraud and timber trespass); H.606 (professional licensure and immigration status); H.173 (prohibiting manipulating a child for purposes of sexual contact); H.233 (pharmacy benefit management and Medicaid wholesale drug distribution); H.867 (miscellaneous amendments to the laws governing alcoholic beverages and the Dept of Liquor and Lottery); H.664 (designating a State mushroom); H.10 (amending the VT Employment Growth Incentive Program); H.621 (health coverage for diagnostic breast imaging); H.661 (child abuse and neglect investigation and substantiation standards and procedures); H.704 (compensation disclosure in job advertisement); H.289 (Renewable Energy Standards); H.878 (miscellaneous judiciary procedures); H.706 (banning the use of neonicotinoid pesticides); and H.121 (enhancing data privacy). There is not enough space in this column to describe each bill, but it is imperative to call your attention to H.289, the Renewable Energy Standards, which would require utilities to use 100% renewable sources by 2030 (2035 for smaller utilities), necessitating upgrades to transmission lines and infrastructure, which costs would be passed on to rate-payers; I urge you to learn what this legislation could mean for you. Please don’t hesitate to reach out to your Representatives and Senators about any of the bills that you are hearing about. You can locate their contact info by typing your town into the Legislator tracker on the General Assembly website. I can be reached at [email protected], and I am honored to represent you.

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango

Dear Constituents -

Friday, March 15 marked the midpoint of the Legislative session with crossover day, and all bills with viability, unless they contain appropriations, have moved to the other body in the Legislature for further review. Those that do require appropriations have an extra week to pass to the other chamber.

This week in House Government Operations & Military Affairs, we continued to take testimony at a frantic pace, producing draft after draft of legislation as we tried to keep up with all the changes generated from committee members’ questions, wording gotten “not quite right”, and outside meetings that happened after hours to rework the language to try to “get to a yes vote”. Bills that passed out of the committee just this week are: H.702 (legislative operations and government accountability); H.872 (VT criminal justice council amendments); H.606 (professional licensure and immigration status); H.644 (access to records by individuals in foster care); H.622 (Emergency Medical Services); H.140 (state-funded grants); H.845 (designating November as Vermont Month of the Veteran); H.585 (amending the pension system for sheriffs and certain deputy sheriffs); H.875  (State & Municipal Code of Ethics); and H.626 (Animal Welfare).

On the House Floor, we had an extended debate on S.18 (banning flavored tobacco products and e-liquids) and a long debate on H.645 (expansion of approaches to restorative justice); we also passed H.534 (retail theft), H.870 (professions and occupations regulated by the Office of Professional Regulation); H.766 (prior authorization and step therapy requirements, health insurance claims, provider contracts, and collection of cost-sharing amounts); H.856 (medical leave for a serious injury). We also had the distinct pleasure of honoring Torpedoman Henry Breault, on the 100^th anniversary of him being awarded the Medal of Honor; he was the first enlisted man to have ever received the Medal, for saving the life of his fellow submariner while in the Panama Canal.

If you would like to read more about these bills (and those passed by the Senate), you can type the bill number into the bill tracker on the General Assembly website and click on the most updated version of that bill (“As passed by the House” or “As passed by the Senate”, official or unofficial).  You may also explore that webpage further and click on “details” below the passed bill language for any roll call votes to see how your Representative or Senator voted on that bill.

The next steps for these bills will involve taking more testimony in sister committees in the other body. They stand to be changed in many ways. You can follow the progress in the committees where the bill is assigned by viewing that committee’s posted agendas. All committee hearings are available recorded on YouTube through the General Assembly website. Please reach out to me at [email protected].

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango

The Vermont Legislature is on Town Meeting Break. On everyone’s minds this week is affordability, housing, and public safety.  I have heard from constituents throughout my District and beyond with serious concerns about the shortage of law enforcement officers and first responders contributing to life-threatening situations, unaffordable housing costs, increased taxes, and escalating budgets. While these very concerning issues are brewing, the Legislature is addressing very few bills that get to the heart of these matters. Most of my committee time has been spent listening to hours of testimony amending cannabis statutes, standing up ethics policies for both state and municipal officials, and amending alcohol permits. Given the crisis that our state is in, every committee should be collaborating to solve the triple whammy of unaffordability, non-existent housing, and rising crime.  The majority party leadership is the driver of what gets taken up by committees, whether the House or the Senate will “take the lead” on developing bills, who is invited to testify, and how new drafts of legislation are presented. Regardless of who submits a bill for introduction or which committee does the hard work on the bill, who you know in this session is the determinant of a bill’s fate. I’ll point to housing as an example that everyone is familiar with: A tri-partisan housing bill H.719 was introduced into the House on January 10; it remains on the wall in House Environment & Energy.  A companion committee bill, S.311(BE HOME), was voted out favorably on February 20 after several weeks of hard work by that committee, only to remain on the wall in Senate Natural Resources, the sister committee to House E&E. During the summer, three separate study committees came together to produce three reports on ACT 250 reform that are interdependent (Natural Resources Board necessary updates to ACT 250, State Designation Programs, and Regional Planning Commissions). Those recommendations were published with the expectation that committees with ACT 250 jurisdiction would take them up concurrently, knowing that the reports represent a collaborative compromise. But House E&E has worked almost exclusively on H.687, an act relating to community resilience and biodiversity protection through land use, since January 9, without regard for the work of those three reports to advance housing goals, and despite requests from the Rural Caucus to do so. We now know that leadership is using the expected passage of this bill, which is centered on land conservation, as the vehicle for any and all housing legislation being taken up this session. In other words, whether or not housing advocates agree with the sweeping land conservation efforts being proposed in H.687, the only chance we have to enact legislation making significant investments in housing, something that hasn’t been done in over 40 years, is to agree with H.687 – that’s the train the housing caboose is being hitched to.  This Legislature needs to take a hard look at what the priorities are for Vermonters and how to achieve them in the most efficient, affordable way we can without creating overreaching and onerous regulations that drive away the people we most need to stay in our beautiful state.

Although I am not in person at meetings this week, I am always available at [email protected] and will respond within 48 hours.

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango, Berkshire

Dear Constituents –

The pace at the Statehouse is picking up – every Committee has its eye on crossover (March 15 for policy bills and March 22 for money bills) and is taking testimony fast and furiously.  The House Government Ops Committee heard brand-new bills (H.622 EMS, draft expansion of Optometric scope of practice, and recommendations from the Criminal Justice Council) this week – do we expect to pass those, too?? We continue to hear from the same witnesses repeatedly on H.612 miscellaneous amendments to cannabis statutes, miscellaneous amendments to alcoholic beverage statues, and both the State and Municipal Codes of Ethics, each time with changes to the proposed language – my sense is that none of these will be ready for prime time on March 15. The sponsors don’t seem to have vetted their proposals very thoroughly ahead of time. We have briefly touched on budget issues and education finance, which should be the major focus of every committee at the Statehouse this session: trying to solve the issues of how to build more housing, help more Vermonters live independent lives, and take care of the most vulnerable among us, while refraining from making Vermont so unaffordable and so unsafe that everyone who can moves away.

The House Floor saw little action again, passing H.861 an act relating to reimbursement parity for healthcare services delivered in person, by telemedicine, and by audio-only telephone, H.132 an act relating to discrimination based on housing status, and H.745 the Vermont Parentage Act.

Our VT Rural Caucus heard from the sponsor of S.55, which is an act relating to the Open Meeting Law, and Commissioner Danielle Fitzco on the Forest Futures Strategic Roadmap, a look-ahead to where the forest economy can thrive and how to get there. To that end, the Rural Caucus has been talking about Act 250 regulatory reform and how that could positively affect rural Vermont communities.  We are actively engaging with House leadership to put forth an agenda to relax reform where development makes sense and to protect land reasonably while allowing for economic growth, such as we see with forestry and farming-related businesses.

The next few weeks promise to be a roller-coaster ride! If you have questions or concerns, please reach out at [email protected].  It is an honor to serve as your Representative. Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango, Franklin-5

 Dear Constituents -

The biggest Statehouse news of interest to constituents this week is H.850, a bill developed by House Ways & Means and House Education to “fix” a loophole in Act 127 from 2023.  When the implementation of the new pupil weighting system formula that determines the tax capacity of a school district with respect to the needs of its individual student population was enacted, a 5% cap was included for certain districts that needed a “soft landing” for a few years because they would be losing tax capacity.  Keep in mind that as a result of Act 60 in 1997, Vermont has a statewide education fund that all taxpayers pay into, and all school districts receive funding from. Also, not all students cost the same to educate (for instance, students who are multi-language learners or who live in poverty are are more expensive to expensive to educate, as are high schoolers vs preschoolers). Unfortunately, there were some districts across the state that submitted budgets over the 5% cap “because they could”, and that resulted in warned budgets that greatly exceeded education spending from last year and could cause all of our property taxes to rise, regardless of how many fiscally frugal districts submitted reasonable budgets. H.850, which passed the House and is in the Senate, seeks to remedy this by allowing for school districts who wish to re-work their budgets to hold that vote up until April 15. It also provides a discount for those districts that lost tax capacity due to the aforementioned changes in the pupil weighting formula.

Also on the House Floor, we passed: H.247 the Occupational Therapy Licensure Compact; H.563 an act relating to criminal motor vehicle offenses involving unlawful trespass, theft, or unauthorized operation; H.649 amendments to the VT Truth and Reconciliation Commission; H.801 amendments to the Town of Waterbury charter; and S.154 an act relating to the Vermont State Plane Coordinate System.  We sent H.839 the Budget Adjustment Act (BAA) to a Committee of Conference and elected two trustees of the Vermont State College System and the Adjutant and Inspector General of the Vermont National Guard.  Of note, we are the only state in the US that still elects the TAG.

In Committee, we continued our work on: H.612 miscellaneous amendments to cannabis statutes; a state and a municipal code of ethics; H.626 animal welfare; miscellaneous amendments to the Department of Liquor and Lottery statutes; H.794 services provided to the Vermont Veterans Home; and H.641 authorizing boards of abatement to hear like cases as a class. I spent some time in House Appropriations hearing about the military budget.

In Rural Caucus this week, our NRPC Regional Planner presented a model of smart development based on the village of Richford VT that could be replicated throughout the state in communities whose downtowns lie in river corridors. We also heard from a local forester about development in rural areas outside of downtowns and the VLCT on Act250.

It is an honor to serve – [email protected]

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango

Dear Constituents –

Committee work kept us busy at the Vermont Statehouse this week.  The House Government Operations and Military Affairs Committee dug into several bills: H.549 siting of cannabis cultivation; H.726 compliance checks by the Dept of Liquor and Lottery; H.426 creation of new cannabis licenses; State and municipal ethics committee bills (not numbered); H.730 uniformly removing members of State Boards and Commissions; H.667 Vermont-Ireland Trade Commission; H.801 Town of Waterbury charter change; miscellaneous Committee Dept of Liquor and Lottery bill; H.641 authorizing boards of abatement to hear like cases as a class; and S.154 VT State Plane Coordinate System. Our portfolio is wide and varied; if you would like to learn more about these bills, they can be found by using the bill tracker function on the General Assembly website or looking at our Committee webpage.

On the House floor, our business was completed quickly. We passed H.666 an act relating to escrow deposit bonds; H.751 an act expanding equal pay protections; and H.849 the annual Technical Corrections bill.

Of note, the Senate passed H.839 the Budget Adjustment Act, with further amendments, so that bill will now go to a Committee of Conference, which will result in a compromise bill to send to the Governor.

At the Rural Caucus this week, we heard presenters from two perspectives on how Act 250 appeals should be heard. Act 250 is our 50+ year old land use law, and it is long overdue to be modernized. Without reforms to the statutes, creation of new housing for all Vermonters will continue to lag far behind demand for housing.  For more information on proposed changes to the law, the VT Natural Resources Board website is a good place to start with the results of the “Necessary Updates to Act 250” study. H.719 and the Senate Economic Development Committee bill, the “BE HOME” bill are two pieces of legislation addressing housing needs that are getting a lot of airtime in Montpelier. H.687 in House Environment & Energy is a bill that is also getting a lot of attention, which is concerning to me. The proposed changes to the law that this bill would implement can be seen by looking at these two maps of Act 250 triggers: currentlyhttps://anrmaps.vermont.gov/websites/public/SecretaryRequest/02072024_ACT250Existing.pdf

And if H.687 were to pass   https://anrmaps.vermont.gov/websites/public/SecretaryRequest/02062024_ACT250Triggers_rev2.pdf

It is an honor to serve as your Representative. 

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango, Franklin-5

Dear Constituents –

At the Statehouse: This week brought more bill introductions in our committees and very little action on the House Floor. Committee Chairs are trying to hear from sponsors of as many of the almost 900 bills that have been introduced as they have time for. Based on whether they think the bill will have traction to last the session, they will then take the bill off the wall, and the committee will hear testimony from various witnesses and subject matter experts. If there are bills that constituents have an interest in, you are encouraged to reach out to the Chair and Committee Assistant of that committee to ask to submit written or oral testimony. This information is found on the General Assembly website, on each committee’s webpage. Examples of bills of interest from the House Government Operations and Military Affairs Committee: siting of outdoor cannabis cultivation, cannabis special events permits, miscellaneous amendments to cannabis statutes, municipal and state codes of ethics, and amendments to statutes relating to the Office of Professional Regulation. Committees also spend much of their time listening to summaries of reports mandated in previous legislative sessions.  This week, we heard from the Vermont Veterans Home on how their facility in Southern Vermont is faring during this time of healthcare worker shortages and nursing home closures (I am happy to report that they are doing very well!).

On the House Floor, we passed one bill of significance, H.363, an act relating to prohibiting discrimination based on certain hair types and styles.  This bill takes language from the national CROWN (Creating a Respectful and Open World for Natural hair) Act and was passed out overwhelmingly by a 132-5 roll call vote. You may notice that some of the roll call votes don’t add up to 150 – there are times when representatives are absent from the Floor, and these names, along with the yeas and nays, may be found on the General Assembly website after typing in the bill number and clicking on “Roll Call Votes”.

The VT National Guard completed their four-part series of presentations on the mission and vision of the Guard.  These recordings may be found on the General Assembly website under “Announcements”.  The depth and breadth of what this organization does for the State of Vermont is profound, and we are grateful for their service.

This week’s Rural Caucus meeting focused on the health of our rural hospitals. We heard from several CEOs around the State, and their presentations were starkly realistic:  they painted a picture of people living in hospitals because there is nowhere else in the community for them to live; patients with mental health challenges who need specialized treatment yet have no physical symptoms; transportation challenges on weekends and after-hours being met by EMT services that should be responding to emergencies. It is an honor to serve our rural communities.

Reach out at [email protected].

Stay well,

Rep Lisa Hango

Dear Constituents

The rhythm of the Legislative session has set in as we complete our third full week back in Montpelier. The House floor continued to be mostly uneventful, with more municipal charter changes and a captive insurance bill (H.659) passing. We heard the Governor’s Budget address, where he laid out his priorities within the confines of the resources we currently have without raising any new taxes or fees. The House passed H.839, the Budget Adjustment Act (BAA) late Thursday, on a roll call vote of 112-24. This Act is the traditional “truing up” of last year’s budget, whereby any remaining funds are re-distributed, and any emergent issues are taken care of. In the past few bienniums, more and more policy decisions have been inserted into the BAA, without the benefit of robust committee hearings throughout the session to vet those changes to statute.  This year, the House Human Services Committee, requested through the BAA an extension of the hotel/motel program until June 30 and a reversion to the pre-pandemic “adverse weather” sheltering  policy, a discussion that at the very least should have happened within the committee hearing process (it didn’t) and the opportunity for the House to vote on this policy separately from the rest of the BAA (it didn’t). For that reason, I and 23 of my colleagues, voted no on this important mid-year bill. H.839 as written without this very late in the day change was a reasonable bill, containing many good funding decisions.  I am grateful to my colleagues on the House Appropriations Committee for working so diligently to produce what was a bill worthy of a yes vote until the last-minute addition of $5M for this program extension and change in policy.

In the House Government Operations & Military Affairs Committee, we have had several new bill introductions and taken up some complex legislation: Two draft bills on Ethics, dr 24-0461relating to a Municipal Code of Ethics and dr 24-0229 relating to a State Code of Ethics; and H.626 relating to animal welfare. All three of these bills are long and contain many issues that will need much committee time to hear from witnesses.

The National Guard continued their four-part series, this week on Funding sources and Facilities. It is astonishing how much our VT Guard contributes to the State’s economy by bringing in federal dollars for construction projects, which in turn employ Vermont workers, who pay income, property, sales, and meals taxes.  These projects have a direct line to much-needed revenue growth for services and programs that benefit all Vermonters.

The Rural Caucus meets weekly, and this week’s discussion topic was community resilience and biodiversity protection through land use, as presented in bill H.687.  A priority for the Rural Caucus this session is to look at Act 250, its impact on rural areas, and the bills that touch on it, with this bill being the first of several that we will hear about.

It is an honor to serve. 

Stay well, Rep Lisa Hango, Franklin-5

Dear Constituents –

This week in the Statehouse felt more routine – bill introductions have slowed down, and we’ve begun our work on the issues before us.  In the Government Operations & Military Affairs Committee, that consists of diving into reports filed by the State Ethics Commission, the Cannabis Control Board, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, the Department of States Attorneys and Sheriffs, the Law Enforcement Advisory Board, and a joint hearing on the EMS Regional Coordination Study.  Each of these reports comes with recommendations for further legislation, which we must be diligent about researching and weighing the pros and cons within the construct of the State Budget. If you would like to learn more, these reports and the associated bills are on the House Government Operations & Military Affairs webpage under that day’s date or Reports & Other Resources. Resulting from this work, we are considering bills relating to a State and a Municipal Ethics Code, miscellaneous amendments to adult-use cannabis statutes, and further initiatives around public safety.  We also continued our work making recommendations to House Appropriations on the portions of the Budget that fall under our jurisdiction. While many are worthy, all programs cannot continue to be expanded in a year when taxes and fees are rising and the federal funding windfall is over; the Appropriations Committees have a monumental task ahead of them.  This Committee passed out one bill this week, H.649, an act relating to the Vermont Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  Readers may recall from 2021-22 our work on the House General Committee trying to bring a more specific focus to this bill; we were not successful in narrowing the scope of Act 128, which set the mechanism to stand up a Commission to gather information on individuals and populations that were historically institutionalized and overlooked during the era of the eugenics movement. That Commission commenced operations last Spring, but when a Commissioner resigned, there was no mechanism in place to replace a vacant seat.  This bill, H.649, came to us with the request that we set up that mechanism, which we were ready to do as guided by the purpose of our committee work. However, the bill contained some other pieces that were less palatable: a request for an additional $1.1M, an extension of 10 months to complete the Commission’s work, and an exception to the Open Meeting Law because of the sensitive nature of this work.  Ultimately, it was this last piece that tipped the balance in the room to vote 9-3-0 to pass this bill, with myself and two colleagues voting no out of concern for the expansive scope of the Commission and its timeline and potentially limiting public participation in these open meetings.

The House Floor was very quiet this week, as we passed only a few bills that made municipal charter changes (H.516 for Essex Jct and S.141 for the Fairfax Fire District), some technical corrections (H.560 to workers’ compensation rulemaking and H.599 reinstating a statute that was inadvertently removed last session) and heard commemorative Resolutions.

The National Guard continued their series called Guard 101, this week focusing on the Mission of the Guard, in their roles for the State, the Federal Government, and in Global arenas. This series is brought to us by the VT National Guard & Veterans Affairs Caucus, which I co-Chair, the VT National Guard, and the House Speakers’ Office as an educational resource for legislators who will be voting in the upcoming election for the Adjutant General of the VT National Guard.  Major General Gregory Knight will be running for re-election, and it is notable that we remain the only state in the United States that still elects our TAG; all other states’ Adjutants General are appointed by the Executive Branch. 

The VT Rural Caucus, which I also co-Chair, held its weekly meeting with presentations from the UVM Leahy Institute for Rural Partnerships, a USDA Rural Development specialist, and the VT Chief Recovery Officer, focusing on what those organizations can do for communities in recovery or revitalization mode.

Please do not hesitate to reach out to me at [email protected]. It is an honor to represent Franklin-5. Stay well, Rep Lisa Hango