Vermont Governor Phil Scott focused his weekly briefing today on what he says is the need to increase housing across the state.
At the beginning of this legislative session, Republican Governor Phil Scott stood with a tri-partisan group of legislators to promote a bill that included regulatory reforms and incentives that would help increase housing construction across the state. But as the session nears its midpoint, Scott is disappointed that there has been little action on the bill.
“To date that bill has received no attention in the House,” Scott said. “The Senate Economic Development Committee move forward with the BE Home bill, which has been stuck in the Senate Natural Resources for weeks with no discussion. What we're hearing is they're waiting for the conservation bill in the House, H.687 to pass, which has little to do with housing, and then they're going to lump it all together. If we truly have a housing crisis, we need to start treating it like one. So I'm asking the legislature to send me a real housing bill. One that has tools to fix our housing problem and the BE Home bill in the Senate is a very good start.”
Department of Housing and Community Development Commissioner Alex Farrell citied building permit data showing that since 2008 Vermont has produced an average of just over 1,700 units annually. But Farrell said in the short term about 6,800 housing units are needed and then between 4,000 and 4,500 units must be built on an ongoing basis.
“We're still far behind,” reported Farrell. “We developed a plan to meet this need and that plan formed the basis of the priorities that we've worked with legislators to advocate for this session. Initially captured in H.719, and now largely captured in S.311 the BE Home bill over in the Senate, these bills represent a comprehensive approach to housing that builds on recent successes, corrects historic flaws, and empowers communities of all sizes to create housing. All the tools in those proposals are needed to meet this challenge and any effort to reduce or diminish those tools will simply inhibit the state's ability to catch up on housing production.”
Fairfax House Republican Ashley Bartley was among the legislators to introduce H.719 to address the housing crisis, and also lamented the measure’s slow progress.
“Since mid-January when it was introduced, H.719 remains untouched in the House Committee on Environment and Energy and has subsequently died on the committee wall despite being sponsored by over 30% of the House,” Bartley said. “Simultaneously, another crucial piece of legislation took shape in the Senate Economic Development, Housing and General Affairs Committee. The committee did great work. H.719 and S.311 represent collaborative efforts towards comprehensive housing reform offering effective solutions. Neither bill will meet crossover.”
Crossover is the midpoint of the Vermont legislative session where bills must pass in one chamber and then cross over to the other to remain under consideration for the remainder of the session.
Governor Scott could declare a State of Emergency regarding the housing crisis, but says he is hesitant to use that option.
“I don't want to abuse that power and if we can do something legislatively that's the preferred track,” asserted Scott. “But as I've said if this is truly the crisis everyone is saying it is, and I believe it is, then that is on the table. Again no, no plans at this point but it's always on the table and it's not something that I've put aside.”
