So, newly released Unh polls show politically diverse Vermonters support Governor Scott.

And that voters generally exhibit party affiliated economic beliefs.

As the president switches from a Republican to a Democrat.

Perceptions of the economy's flip.

So if you have a Democratic president, Democrats think the economy's great.

Republican thinks it's terrible.

it's when the Republican comes in, suddenly the Republicans think everything's great and the Democrats think everything is terrible.

Plus, a look at health insurance costs in Vermont compared to the rest of the country.

And we'll dive into concerns surrounding Vermont's health care system at large.

That more ahead on Vermont this Week.

From the Vermont public studio in Winooski, this is Vermont this week, made possible in part by the Lintilhac Foundation and Milne Travel.

Here's moderator Mitch Wertlieb.

Thanks so much for being with us.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

It is Friday, August 30th and joining us on the panel today, we have Mark Johnson from WCAX, Peter DiAuria from VTDigger and Calvin Cutler from WCAX.

Thank you all so much for being here today.

We have an interesting show today.

We are graph heavy.

I want to let people know about that.

Just right out of the gate.

We're going to be talking about some really fascinating polls at the University of New Hampshire came out with.

In fact, let's start with that.

Calvin, we're looking at, first of all the news.

It's not very surprising.

Governor Phil Scott still getting, great support through this poll from across the political spectrum.

Democrats, independents, Republicans, also the, congressional delegation, those who are up for reelection, Becca balanced and Peter Welch kind of doing just fine.

When we dig into some other results from this poll that are really interesting, it's about how people feel about their household finances, for example, from a year ago.

And while it breaks down to some really interesting, factions here, what can you tell us?

Yeah, you bet.

I mean, when you talk about the issues that are on voters minds ahead of the November elections, I think it was Bill Clinton maybe, who said, it's the economy, stupid.

Right.

And so this really gives us great data into just granular data, how Vermonters are thinking about, issues of taxation and spending and how it's affecting their bottom line.

And what it shows.

I think the top line number is about 4 in 10 Vermonters, are struggling to meet basic necessities in some way, shape or form bills, groceries, 4 in 10 are basically saying that they're being squeezed by, you know, taxes, inflation, the cost of living.

and when you break that down by party affiliation, which is even more interesting to about 60% of Republicans are, laying out these pretty dire economic conditions in people's households.

60% of Republicans say that compared to about 20% of Democrats.

you know, as we know, we have a Republican governor, we have a Democratic legislature.

But, you know, I spoke with the folks at the University of New Hampshire Survey Center who conducted this poll, and they say this is, something that we see more nationally.

And we've been seeing this, this phenomenon in polling for decades, where you know, how you view the economy and your place in the economy, really depends on your partizan political affiliation.

Whereas we heard there, if there's a Democrat in the white House, Democrats, by and large, feel good about their personal finances and the direction of the economy, where Republicans feel that inflation and, you know, the cost of living and others are bringing people down and it can flip, if there's, you know, a Republican in the white House.

So the numbers are the same.

Yeah, exactly.

Just about.

Yeah, it can be a little, near the edges, but it it just shows, you know, from the authors of this study, it shows how polarized we are and how your perception of the economy really depends on, you know, where you get your news from, where you get your your information about the economy and etc..

So it's a really fascinating stuff.

I think it's actually James Carville who is the one that they came up with that line.

And then Bill Clinton kind of exploited it.

You know, at the same time, the the numbers are heavily weighted politically, but I don't really know anybody out there of any political stripe who could argue that costs have gone up significantly in the past couple of years.

I think there are a lot of people out there that are feeling insecure financially, whether it's housing, trying to buy a new house, health care costs, you know, which we'll talk about.

it just seems as though everything is going up.

Well, also, businesses are feeling the pinch, too.

And the Unh poll also took a dive into this, and it kind of breaks down, sort of the same way, over the next 12 months, you know, by party identification, how you're feeling about things.

is there anything we can read into how small businesses and how they're feeling about how things are going?

Yeah, I mean, my again, by the party breakdown, it seems like right now Democrats are more optimistic about the direction in the future of of businesses, small businesses, the direction of our of our economy, where Republicans are a little bit more, have a more contrary view to that and say that, you know, we could potentially still be coming up on a recession.

I think it was last year, maybe, or earlier this year, we did have two, quarters of negative GDP growth.

So that's worth pointing out, which can be defined as a recession.

But I think, you know, when we look at what the data is telling us about, the direction of businesses and how people are feeling about it as well, that's also reflective of your party affiliation and your your ideology.

When we get to the question of Vermonters feeling, are we on the right direction or are we on the wrong track?

we're looking at 50% of Republicans saying that, we're on the wrong track.

49%.

it looks like a Democrat saying that.

So, you know, it evens out a little bit more there.

But I think, Mark, this is to what you were talking about with household issues.

You know, people are just looking at their own situations.

And in Vermont things are very expensive.

It could be difficult.

Well, you know, housing is one that I think is really been dramatic.

Vermont has like several states in the area, seeing this just huge increase in the amount of housing with people wanting to move up here during the pandemic.

And it's continued, if you go out there and look to purchase a house, there is so little out there on the market and everything is getting snapped up so quickly.

Often there's a bidding war, so you know, it's a supply and demand problem, which of course raises the price and that is the number one issue that, according to this Unh poll that, most people feel is the biggest problem facing Vermont right now.

It is housing followed by taxes, then cost of living, which is more of a general thing.

Interesting.

you know, you don't get to climate change until, down 5% there.

Yeah, that is interesting.

I've heard from a lot.

I mean, we haven't done any internal polling ourselves, but, you know, I hear from time and time again and within the state legislature as well, and in local communities that climate change and, climate resiliency, especially given all of the flooding and the catastrophic damage that we've seen that, you know, climate is a really big issue for Vermonters.

But it was really surprising to see, you know, this data.

But to Mark's point, you know, the housing crisis really is the root of so many challenges that Vermont faces from our demographics, affordability, health care, being able to recruit doctors and nurses, the property tax issue, and funding our education system so that really is sort of the, that's that's the main point.

We are going to dig into health care in just a moment.

some really interesting graphics there as well.

But first I want to ask you, Calvin, because you've had sort of a whirlwind trip.

You were out in Chicago at the Democratic National Convention.

And I want to ask, you know, having been there in person, we saw it on television and we've read all the analysis afterwards.

And what we're hearing is that the Democrats were really highly energized by Kamala Harris now taking over, you know, the nomination to be president, for the party.

did you feel that in the room?

Was it palpable?

Did it feel real to you in indeed, in talking with so we we sort of embedded with Vermont's 24 delegates that we sent to the DNC and speaking with many of them, they had told you, you know, right before President Biden had dropped out of the race, many Democrats in Vermont, but also nationally were feeling lethargic, were feeling not really motivated, were just not very enthusiastic about the state of the race or the candidate at the top of the ticket.

And now that there's been this, you know, potentially historic shift and, and the switch, with Vice President Harris now at the top of the ticket, I mean, the excitement in the room, the excitement, you know, in, in the convention center at the United Center was really palpable.

you know, a lot of people especially, are excited to see a new generation.

And, you know, there's a generational shift, happening nationally, but also within Vermont politics, too.

a lot of our delegates are younger.

you know, that's that's happening, too, I think.

Yeah, it definitely was, really, really remarkable to see.

I think one of my biggest questions was the question about democratic unity and about, you know, the more progressive wing of the party or the left flank of the party.

in 2016, Senator Sanders did not get the nomination.

Hillary Clinton did at the time.

And so I was curious as to how is, you know, the Sanders wing of the party feeling?

they are also, by and large, on board with Vice President Harris.

The Democratic Party really is united against trying to defeat former President Trump in the polls, in November.

But I think that's the big kind of outstanding question for me is especially for young people in the party, you know, who do not agree with the, Biden and Harris administration's policy towards Israel in Gaza.

How much of a wedge issue will that be and will that play out electorally?

Know we're going to find out and go ahead.

Mark, I think you're right.

I mean, I think that's really sort of the one thing that's remaining that's going to get young people really fired up.

you know, I don't spend an enormous amount of time with young people, but it really has been this sort of whole re-energizing, whereas I think a lot of younger people might have just stayed home, and now they do seem to be interested to go out to the polls.

You know, I was really struck watching it.

Bernie Sanders gave a speech that he's one of the most dynamic speakers that that I think all of us know.

it was a it was one of the sleepier speeches that he gave.

But I think it's really all about being against Trump.

you know, I think everybody's going to be able to put aside whatever differences they have, even on Gaza, because there's certainly not going to be any great policy coming out of Trump on that either.

Right?

I mean, there's this thing that, as you saying, you know, the kind of wings of the party coming together.

Obviously, Senator Sanders spoke at the DNC, I believe, followed directly by, if I'm not mistaken, Illinois Governor JB Pritzker.

Right.

Sanders is up there talking about millionaires and billionaires.

And then we have the billionaire governor of Illinois that he even cracked a joke about that, saying, I'm the real billionaire here.

But it was it was you're right.

It was very interesting to see that come right after Bernie Sanders.

Yeah.

Let's, show something that's pretty scary right now.

We're going to turn to health care.

And I want to show this graphic here, showing that Vermont right now is one of the most expensive states in the country when it comes to health insurance premiums.

Peter Doria, you were writing about this recently in vtdigger health insurance cost.

What is happening here in the state of Vermont?

Yeah.

So you can see this very, very scary graph here.

the good news is that it's not quite so bad as that may look.

So this is the sort of, the sticker price for a very particular health care plan, a health insurance plan, individual, insurance.

But on the health care marketplace for my Health Connect.

And you can see over the years the sticker price of that plan is going up very, very high.

the good news is that there's a lot of public money, a lot of federal money, and some state money that will help you if you're an individual buying this plan on the marketplace, sort of bring that cost down.

so you know, that plan is somewhere close to $1,000 a month for the premium.

once you add in all this, you know, tax credits and this sort of state aid, the average, drops pretty significantly to around 210 something dollars a month for a premium.

The bad news is, it's still very expensive.

And even that figure is more expensive than something like maybe 40 states in the country.

Yeah.

So it might not be as bad as that chart makes it look.

As far as, like what amount of money is coming out of your pocket every month.

It's not great.

And and to Kevin's earlier point about small businesses, this is just an individual plan.

there's you know, if you're a small business, you can buy a small group plan on the health care marketplace, and you don't have access to nearly the amount of subsidies of tax credits of, you know, state assistance for paying those premiums.

as if you're an individual.

And so really, these small businesses are really, really kind of bearing the brunt of these cost increases to a very large degree.

I want to remark, too, that, you know, as you said, there are there is a lot of help in the state of Vermont, state subsidies and what have you.

But it is still, for individuals, the sixth highest insurance premium, in the country.

that's that's pretty high in a small state that's only aging more.

I'm just wondering, you were looking in your article, Peter, about this.

the Green Mountain Care Board approves premium rate hikes.

They have approved hikes for, you know, Blue Cross Blue Shield MVP that keep going up.

Why do they say they keep greenlighting these hikes.

So that's a great question.

there are a lot of reasons why health care in Vermont is really, really expensive.

And sort of when health care, just like the cost of care in Vermont, going to a hospital, going to a doctor, you know, the more that costs go up, the higher the premiums are.

so, as you mentioned, Vermont is sort of an older state.

older folks have more and more complex health needs.

They go to they need more medical care that drives up prices.

there's so many factors.

Housing, as you talked about, there's so many stories of, you know, a health care professional, a nurse, a doctor, you know, getting a job somewhere in Vermont.

trying to move to the town, staying the hotel, not being able to find housing and leaving.

and that, you know, will often force, hospital or health care facilities to rely very heavily on traveling nurses or traveling health care professionals, which cost a so much more money.

Vermont does.

Go ahead.

Mark, please.

You know, to answer your question, the reason why the Green Mountain Care Board approved these increases is because they had to.

Their choice was to either not approve them and basically put the insurance companies out of business who are really in a precarious position.

Blue Cross Blue Shield has got 60 plus percent of the market.

They are looking for help in building up their cash reserves.

You know, that is a huge red flag.

And you've got the head of the Green Mountain Care Board, Owen Foster, who's saying that basically their approval of these insurance rate increases for the third year in a row is a fundamental failure.

That was that was his direct quote.

So, you know, we're really at a point here with health care where, you know, people are using the word crisis.

It's sometimes overused, but I don't think it is in this case right now.

And talking about some of these costs, you know, Senator Sanders put together this group in a roundtable of people, head of Blue Cross Blue Shield, head of UVM hospital that Greenmount Care Board had and, you know, kind of banged all their heads together and, you know, it's frightening the amount of money that the UVM is spending on prescription drugs alone is, you know, 20% of their budget.

And it's, you know, it's just unsustainable.

That's let's pause right there.

Because that's my big question.

I'm throwing this out to everybody here in Mark.

You've covered health care for a long time in the state.

This does not seem sustainable to me now.

Years ago, you remember when then-Governor and Peter Shumlin talked about having Vermont go to universal health care that quickly was shot down that plan.

But is that something that Vermont is going to have to seriously look at?

I don't see how this could be sustainable.

Well, I'm not so sure that it's going to be single payer health care, but one of the ideas that I'm hearing is this whole idea of take the map of Vermont and start over.

We've got 14 hospitals and say, all right, we've got X amount of money.

We can have a big hospital in Burlington.

What are we going to do with the other 13 hospitals?

Nobody's talking about closing them.

But I think they're talking about saying this is just an example.

Copley, you're in charge of orthopedic surgery.

And instead of having all these hospitals compete with one another, that they collaborate.

I mean, it's it's actually absurd, the idea that they're all fighting with one another over these, over business.

And instead of looking at it, you know, as a system and as a state, you know, and I will tell you one thing that came out of this hearing that Bernie Sanders had, you know, he's talked a lot about the cost of prescription drugs, and it just seems amazing.

You know, we all turn on the TV and it's just one pharmaceutical ad after another.

And, you know, you say to yourself, sure, it's keeping, you know, TV stations in business.

But at the same time, do I really need to know is a consumer about this?

Isn't this something that my doctor should know about?

And you know that right there is not going to solve it.

There's no one thing that's going to solve this.

It's all going to be kind of around the edges.

But that's, you know, that's just seems ridiculous.

I think you bring up a great point about regionalization.

I mean, whether we're talking about health care, whether we're talking about education and property taxes, whether we're talking about public safety in dispatch and law enforcement, you know, how do you deliver these really complex and very expensive systems in a rural state with a declining demographic?

I think that's really the question here.

And, I mean, you're right, the hospitals sustainability conversation, they're having these community conversations about what does rightsizing our health care system look like.

But if you did have to close beds or cut jobs or shift resources around, those are very difficult conversations to have.

Just like when we talk about right sizing a school, right.

You know, Gifford has been very outspoken of, you know, we need to keep all of our services.

And so those are really thorny conversations that that are going forward, because these hospitals are also major, economic, employment drivers in each of these schools.

And who wants to live, you know, hundreds of miles away from a hospital.

But at the same time, it all kind of comes together.

Going back to the the poll that you had, you know, housing is the number one issue and property taxes are a big issue.

One of the reasons why property taxes are going up so much is because of these health care costs going up, and the teachers, you know, health insurance plans, I mean, you know, all of this comes together.

Yeah, it is absolutely looking at Peter.

Go ahead.

Well, I just going to say I think, there's a often a desire to sort of find like a villain in this system.

And one of the things that I keep coming back to is that, all of these players, the, you know, Blue Cross, Blue Shield of Vermont, MVP of Vermont, every hospital, they're all non-profits.

and it's not like someone's like skimming a lot of money off the top and, like, you know, like sending it to their shareholders or something, like everyone kind of as people are saying, it's like it's this interconnected system, you know, no one's trying to, you know, mess with anyone else.

But reimbursement rates, all those things, it all comes into play.

And to your point about prescription drugs, of course, now everyone wants ozempic.

So that's another thing that's driving up cost.

It just keeps continuing.

And I just I worry about the sustainability of it.

I want to move on to another issue now.

And this is we are getting a lot of emails at Vermont Public about this because people are concerned about eastern equine encephalitis.

there was one gentleman, unfortunately, who died from this.

This is a, disease.

It's carried by birds, but mosquitoes who, pick it up can then potentially send it to someone.

What do we know about Tripoli right now in the state of Vermont?

And what are health officials saying about it?

Sure.

So, triple E, has been detected in, you know, mosquitoes in a few different communities in Vermont.

There's, a, you know, a few of those communities in Burlington, Colchester, Swanton, all burg that are sort of considered high risk.

And the health department is saying, you know, thinks this is a high enough risk that it's asking people in these communities to, you know, minimize the time they spend outdoors at night from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m., again, as you said, this is transmissible via mosquito bite.

This cannot transmit human to human or animal to human.

Other mosquito.

it most people infected maybe aren't going to notice are going to have pretty mild symptoms.

But there is a chance that this could become very, very severe.

And of the cases that do become very severe, this can be quite dangerous.

it just I mean, this is like more of a personal opinion, but this is like the last days of summer.

in Burlington particularly, you know, the UVM students just showed up, asking folks to stay indoors from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m..

It's just it's almost heartbreaking.

Yeah.

The other thing I didn't quite understand is, you know, you've got these warnings being given for Albany and Burlington.

So do the mosquitoes know where the line is with Grand Isle and North Hero in Colchester?

I mean, that seemed confusing to me.

Yeah.

And to say to folks, you know, wait till the first hard frost, then you can go outside after 6 p.m..

It's just very difficult.

And yet another thing that folks have to worry about.

We also have to talk about public safety concerns now in the Queen city and elsewhere.

Here's what, Governor Phil Scott had to say recently about some, upticks in violence, particularly in the Burlington area.

It's not just in Chittenden County is everywhere.

And we need to do more.

People need to be held accountable, for their actions.

And I don't think we've done that as well as we should.

I think it's important for people to know that while there was, concentration of violent incidences in these last couple of days, it's important to kind of zoom out a little bit and know that overall, Burlington does not have a troubling increase on violent crimes happening in the city.

We are, though, still taking this very seriously.

any violent crimes are not okay.

All right.

A couple things, to to pass over there.

Governor Phil Scott saying it's not just Burlington, it's everywhere.

People need to be held accountable.

I think the mayor of Burlington, there was saying that, yes, we take violence against crime seriously, but let's not overreact.

Calvin, you've certainly been covering this for a while.

how are people feeling?

in and around Burlington about, you know, the crime issue.

And I'm putting that in quotes.

Yeah.

I mean, it really depends on who you ask, but I think it's fair to say everybody you talk to, there has been a massive shift in in, I'll call it the vibe, the feeling like Burlington just wasn't always like this.

And, you know, to put it in context, you know, violent crime is still proportionately very low.

Burlington is a very safe city, but there's a lot of really visible issues of gun violence, of homelessness, of of drug use.

And so, you know, this among some has created a sense of unease, maybe I'll call it in the community.

and then we had several high profile incidents.

There was a homicide on Church Street.

I'm at a bar.

we've had several armed robberies.

There's been incidents where there's been groups of young people concealing firearms that are walking around on Church Street at night.

And so all of these, these, you know, vignettes put together are painting somewhat of a concerning picture for Burlington.

But to Governor Phil Scott's point there, you know, these are challenges that are faced by communities across the state, and really across the country.

In some ways, it's just more pronounced in Burlington because it's a per capita issue.

but, you know, a lot of this too.

It's not necessarily homicides, but it's really these quality of life questions.

So, you know, we've seen this incredible increase in the number of bikes being stolen, cars being stolen out of people's driveways.

There's just people having in their driveways, somebody shooting up.

I mean it's and these are not necessarily crimes like that.

They're not reported to the police per se.

But it's just this feeling of, you know, can I walk downtown safely?

Do I have to always be, you know, vigilant about locking my car even in the afternoon?

And, you know, these are this is just not an issue that was there before.

There's always been disputes between people.

There are these assaults now, that video that ran of these, these packs of kids sort of wilding situation.

Now that was really troubling.

I think it comes down to, to that, what you said about the feeling of versus the statistics you were talking about.

If you do look at the statistics, yes, crime, you know, is not it's not spiking.

And certainly the state of Vermont, statistically speaking, is still one of the safer places.

But it's that feeling that people often have, I think that, can can change perceptions about the way crime is looked at.

Well, in the media and very briefly, police media gets, you know, grief for reporting this.

But on the other hand, we would be irresponsible to not talk about it.

Yeah, that's fair.

And that is our job for better or for worse.

And I'm afraid that's where we're going to have to leave it today.

We have so much more to talk about.

We'll do it in the future for sure.

Thank you to our panel today, Mark Johnson from WCAX.

Peter DiAuria from VTDigger.

And Kelvin Cutler from WCAX.

Thank you so much, everyone, for being here.

Thanks to you at home for watching and listening.

And we'll see you next week on Vermont this Week I'm Mitch Wertlieb.