Vermont Legislative Update 2023: Week 13

The Legislature is working towards adjournment, with only about 14 legislative days left for the Senate’s morning committees to finish their business before shutting down. Traditionally, that puts the adjournment about two weeks after or around the 12th or 13th of May this year, however, the discussion is starting to foreshadow a slightly later adjournment. 

As we’ve highlighted in previous updates, this session is unprecedented in a number of ways. It has the largest class of first-year legislators in history, and it likely also has the highest number of new committee chairs the Legislature has ever seen. These circumstances necessitated legislative work to start much slower than a typical session, leaving less time for deliberation of massive legislative changes. Despite this, the Legislature is looking to tackle and tame numerous thorny issues that the seasoned legislatures before them have not been able to address, such as housing, childcare, and paid family medical leave, just to name a few. 

As if this weren’t enough, the House, Senate, and Governor could not be far enough away from each other in the positions they’ve staked out on nearly every issue thus far. These are just a few glaring examples of the divisions between the two bodies, and with much deliberation still ahead on items such as the HOME Act, we haven’t seen the full chasm yet. 

• Housing bill discussion begins in the House
• Homeless Bill of Rights could exacerbate community relationship rifts
• Committee advances cloud tax; looks to tax other services
• “Right to repair” bill advances too late for this session, conversation alive
• Clean heat standard deliberation continues in the House
• Senate gives green light to municipalities to implement their own local option tax
• The Laundry List