Letters to the Editor (4/12/23)

State Should Step Up

[Re “No Return,” March 22]: Chelsea Edgar’s recent article on motel owners failing to return security deposits to people already facing unpredictable shelter illustrates that the Vermont legislature and Gov. Phil Scott’s administration urgently need to provide adequate funding for emergency shelter until housing is actually available.

As of January 2023, the state has been spending $6 million to $7 million a month to provide hotel housing for 1,800 households (2,800 individuals), among them 600 children. But now the legislature and the Scott administration are on track to allocate less than half that amount in their current budget plans for July 2023 to July 2024. The outcome: People will be turned out onto the streets … again. For the past three years, the state has had no plan except to jerk people out of emergency housing with no assurance of continuity.

Imagine the anxiety of being homeless, not knowing where you’ll go next, where your children will sleep as winter comes round again. This is outrageously irresponsible behavior that adds to the trauma homeless Vermont residents already face. The Berlin police chief is quoted in the article: “You’re placing people here with a lot of needs, and you didn’t put any kind of support structure in place, which is a real burden for the municipality.” If the state doesn’t provide adequate funding for supports like mental health services and interim housing, it will fall on towns and maxed-out nonprofits. What does it say about our values if we don’t support the most vulnerable?

Joey Corcoran

Burlington

PCB Panic

Kudos to Seven Days for tackling the hydra-headed story of Vermont’s PCB journey [“Chemical Crossroads,” March 22] and the panic and stampede started by Department of Health Commissioner Dr. Mark Levine, best summed up by Sen. Martine Gulick saying, “Sadly there’s been no acknowledgement of wrongdoing or mistakes made, and there’s been no attempt to speak to the harm caused.” Exactly.

Add to this the quote by parent Dan Cunningham: “[There was] a tremendous amount of medical fear in the air … due to COVID.” Instead of publicly owning their self-induced panic, Levine and co. “quietly released” new action levels, going from 15 nanograms to 30 to 100, and then to 90 to 180 to 300. How can they still keep their jobs?

Enamored of their new celebrity in 2020 by a virus with a confirmed fatality rate slightly higher than the flu, highly inaccurate PCR tests, outright censorship of any and all countervailing opinions, and rules promulgated by a panicky administration under the cover of an “emergency and all-hazards event,” we now see the wreckage of an economy wrought by the advice of unelected bureaucrats.

There needs to be a reckoning now, both state and federal, and a major housecleaning so it never happens again.

Steve Merrill

North Troy

Raise Minimum Wage

[Re “Hot Tips,” March 29]: Bravo to the restaurants named in this article that pay employees adequately to live in Vermont. Some even pay benefits. However, there are so very many workers here who cannot make headway due to the poor minimum wage of $13.18 an hour. This is barely adequate for a young person still living at home.

On March 29, our senior senator, Bernie Sanders, was grilling the former Starbucks CEO, Howard Schultz, due to the union-busting activities utilized by that company. Schultz, in order to try to embarrass Sanders, shot back that Vermont had a paltry minimum wage of $13.18 an hour. His company paid more.

The Vermont legislature should have raised that minimum to $15 an hour several years ago. Now, it can at least start there on its way toward a wage that allows a family to live without deprivation today.

Geoffrey Cobden

Weybridge

Tips for All

The article Seven Days published about tips in Vermont is awesome [“Hot Tips,” March 29].

I pay everyone over full minimum wage, do a 10 percent service fee and still allow tips for all the reasons explained.

I am European and hate all about the tipping system, but after trying many years ago (when I was more European than now), I decided I could not change the United States.

The only part you didn’t mention is how the labor laws leave out tipping everyone who has a managerial responsibility, tiny as it might be.

So it is not just about the kitchen staff; it is about everyone.

I use the service fee to reward the bakers but also the managers (who are making drinks and serving customers, like the plain baristas), the driver (who delivers pastries all over), and the person in charge of maintenance.

Everyone in the company deserves a piece, in my opinion.

Laura Vilalta

Stowe

Vilalta owns Black Cap Coffee & Bakery of Vermont.

Educating Equitably

As an avid reader, I salute Seven Days and Saint Michael’s College — Seven Days for its feature on St. Mike’s Racial Equity & Educational Justice Graduate Certificate Program [True 802: “Life Lessons,” March 29] and the college itself for taking up the initiative of racial justice. This comes on the heels of two other institutions that I highly regard for their efforts along these lines, the Southern Poverty Law Center’s K-12 curriculum Learning for Justice — available for free at learningforjustice.org/hard-history-fall22 — and the publisher and advocacy organization Rethinking Schools. I appreciate the college’s sensitivities to an American history sadly whitewashed.

Russ Layne

Danby

Europe’s Got It Right

[Re Feedback, March 29]: I’ll try to kill two birds without bloodshed. Regarding “Shame on Us!,” about the sheltered who own shelters and the unsheltered who don’t, how many of us know that shelter is a right and is in the constitutions of European governments? Here, the reason for homelessness is “because they don’t want to work!”

And regarding paid sick leave [“The Problem With Paid Leave“]: Again, in Europe there are paid vacations, which are more than a token time before you have to repack your bags and get the next flight back. Do the citizens pay more in taxes for this generosity? You betcha, and they don’t want it any other way, or our way.

Tom MacDonald

Burlington

‘S.100 Is for Developers’

[Re Feedback: “End Act 250,” March 29; “S.100 Is Not the Answer,” March 15]: While it might be true that Michael O’Hara “literally spit out coffee while reading Ed Stanak’s response to the ‘Site Work‘ article” [March 8], the rest of his letter in the March 29 Feedback section made me wonder if he has a grudge against Act 250, since little else reflects an honest truth.

The law was carefully crafted to consider how to preserve what is most valuable to Vermont’s ecosystems and communities in the face of development very similar to that proposed by S.100. Act 250 has protected what we value most in Vermont, including democratic process and an enviable quality of life. These still-protected ecosystems will build a sustainable resilience in the face of extreme weather.

It is a false narrative that we can have only housing or intact ecosystems. We need both.

During Ed’s 30-year career as administrator for the District 5 Environmental Commission that implements Act 250 for the central Vermont region, he supported and guided all parties through the complex permitting process efficiently, effectively, and with kindness and complete professionalism. Of the permits representing hundreds of millions of dollars in development that he personally processed, fewer than 15 permits out of several hundred were denied. Ed’s career — based on in-depth knowledge of the law, people, fairness, ecosystems, communities and democratic protocols — should be applauded and emulated.

Moneyed interests generating false narratives implement typical tactics of “crisis capitalism” to hide the real truth: S.100 is for developers, with no assurances of affordability or managing carbon emissions.

Renée Carpenter

Plainfield

Churches Are for Church

There have been a few letters bemoaning the loss of buildings that were Catholic churches, with the tone tending toward the negative, including accusations of hypocrisy and name-calling. (See “The Church Forgets” in Feedback, February 15.)

The way to preserve our churches is to use them as intended — namely, as places of worship. So let’s fill the pews in our churches and continue to ring the bells and sing the songs of praise. Let’s hear God’s word and the good news, offer our prayers and gifts, and receive Christ in these consecrated spaces. It’s a taste of the goodness that is to come.

Our churches are the best places in town. Let’s not lose any more of them!

Alice Benson

Shelburne

Learn First Aid

The article entitled “Vermont’s Emergency Medical Services System Is Struggling to Survive. Can It Be Saved?” [March 1] painted a grim picture of workforce and capacity shortages for EMS in our state. While there is no single or easy answer to this complex issue, expanding access to training in CPR, automated external defibrillators and first aid can support the critical role played by EMS.

These trainings are designed to help community members recognize and appropriately respond to medical emergencies in the time it takes for EMS to arrive. When someone suffers a cardiac arrest, their chance of survival declines rapidly. Starting CPR immediately can triple the chance of survival. If an injury is bleeding severely, a person can die in as little as five minutes. Bandaging, applying pressure and applying a tourniquet can be taught in one hour. When EMS response is too many minutes away, trained community members can save a life.

As a health workforce development organization, the Vermont Area Health Education Centers network is prepared to help. This summer, Northern Vermont AHEC will offer 70 Vermont teens the opportunity to qualify for the Vermont EMS First Responder certification as part of the Governor’s Institute on Health & Medicine. This is a basic credential intended to engage Vermonters to begin work in EMS. It prepares one to respond effectively to the most common life-threatening medical emergencies. For students interested in emergency medical professions, this opportunity opens the door to becoming the next generation of EMS providers in Vermont communities.

Nicole LaPointe

St. Johnsbury

LaPointe is the director of the Northern Vermont Area Health Education Center.

Banking Green

[Re “Senate Committee Advances the Latest Clean Heat Bill,” February 17]: Thank you for your article covering the recently signed-off bill in the state Senate. It is heartening to see that our legislators are taking seriously the rising cost (dollar-wise to us and planet-wise) of fossil fuels from heating in a state with a notoriously long winter. But as dire news story after dire news story comes up, I’ve found myself asking: How can we do more?

Vermont is uniquely equipped to take advantage of a little-known program within the federal Inflation Reduction Act, passed last year. This is called the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund — an allocation of $27 billion to help finance clean energy. It is intended to go to institutions called “green banks” that work to fund clean energy projects. Vermont has four green banks — more than California!

These projects might not be funded without a green bank, because traditional banks may view them as “risky.” But with the green bank model and this infusion of cash from the government, Vermont can be at the forefront of developing new technologies beyond fossil fuels to help keep our citizens warm in the winter.

To Vermont’s green banks — Vermont Bond Bank, Vermont Economic Development Authority, Vermont Housing Finance Agency and Vermont State Employees Credit Union — the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is opening the application this summer. Everyone else: Spread the word about the Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund. This funding could be instrumental in finding alternatives to fossil fuels to offset the climate crisis.

Lauren Ebersol

Burlington

‘Keep the Books’

[Re “Battle of the Books,” February 22]: It is an unwise action to eliminate Vermont State Colleges System libraries and restructure athletics; these are the heart and soul of any college campus.

President Parwinder Grewal, formerly of Texas, may be unfamiliar with the history and culture of our Vermont college system. Castleton University student Allison Fiske was right in stating how the entire community needs and uses books. Any survey results during the pandemic are questionable.

Digitize specific curriculums. Keep the books and librarians! And athletics in real leagues, with uniforms and team competitions, provide a structure of learning like no other. Please reconsider, and thanks to Anne Wallace Allen for her excellent article.

Ruth Furman

Jericho

Support Students

[Re “Battle of the Books,” February 22]: I assumed the impetus for gutting the physical collections of the libraries of the soon-to-be Vermont State University must be buried in a strategic plan. I easily found the 2021 “Final Report of the Select Committee on the Future of Public Higher Education in Vermont” from the National Center for Higher Education Management Systems.

I recommend reading this well-researched report by a nonprofit consultancy. The descriptions of the challenges faced — and possible approaches to save what was described as a “system in crisis” — are enlightening.

Interestingly, I found no proposal to move to digital libraries and discard most of the physical collections. A reference was made to saving money by repurposing buildings to “better support student learning and engagement with employers and the community.”

The report does lean heavily toward needed workforce development. Unfortunately, it gives short shrift to the VSC Thrive! proposal to “Reinvest heavily in the liberal arts. Implement SHAPE (Social Science, Humanities, and the Arts for People and the Economy) and MESH (media literacy, ethics, sociology, and history) education alongside STEM.”

It is clear from this report that our legislature must increase its investment in our long-underfunded system even as the system addresses its deficit. Vermont students deserve access to an affordable Vermont State University with strong liberal arts programs. They also deserve libraries worthy of the word “university,” with the professional staff to support all majors.

Susan DeWitt Wilder

Perkinsville

Wilder is a graduate of Johnson State College, class of 1978