Category Archives: Statehouse

MONTPELIER — Vermont lawmakers are expected to meet again to try to work out their differences over Gov. Peter Shumlin’s proposal to let police get information from the Health Department’s prescription drug database without first getting a search warrant.
A House-Senate conference committee has met repeatedly this week, with the House side insisting on search warrants and senators saying they’ll make the process too cumbersome for police.
Rep. Ann Pugh, the lead House negotiator, has cited the U.S. and Vermont constitutions as requiring a search warrant before police can check the database for someone’s prescription drug records.
Sen. Richard Sears, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said Thursday that he was very disappointed with the House’s unwillingness to budge.
The conference committee plans to meet again on Friday morning.

MONTPELIER — Vermont is poised to become the first state to ban a natural gas drilling method known as hydraulic fracturing or “fracking.”
Geologists say there appears to be little if any natural gas under Vermont, but lawmakers have been pushing to get a handle on the technique that is criticized by some because chemicals are injected into the ground to free gas that is trapped there.
The Senate passed a ban on the practice while the House voted for a three-year moratorium.
A conference committee agreed to an outright ban.
Vermont Public Radio says the measure still needs final votes in the House and Senate before going to Governor Peter Shumlin for his signature.

MONTPELIER — The Vermont Senate has rejected another attempt to pass a bill authorizing child care workers to set up a union to negotiate industry rules and subsidies with the state.
But the leader of the effort says he’ll keep trying. Sen. Richard McCormack says Senate President Pro Tem John Campbell is blocking two labor bills from coming up for debate because he doesn’t want to see the child care union provision attached to them.
Campbell says he opposes the child care union because it would not set up typical labor-management contract negotiations, but a new sort of labor organization that could set a bad precedent for other groups of people who work under contract with the state.
McCormack says he’ll keep trying to attach the measure to various bills.

MONTPELIER — The Vermont Legislature is headed into the home stretch.
The major, must-pass pieces of legislation, such as the budget, have either been passed or are in conference committee. Both the House and Senate held sessions over the weekend to push through bills that must be passed.
But many threads remain to be tied up to adjourn as expected on Saturday.