Facing pressure, Orleans County Senator Samuel Douglass officially resigns.

Plus, the UVM Health Network aims for a course correction and a Texas company eyes the former Vermont Yankee site.

All that and 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 joining us.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

It's Friday, October 24th and with us on the panel today, we have Kevin McCallum from seven days, Olivia Geiger from Vtdigger.

And joining us remotely today Howard Weiss-Tisman from Vermont Public.

Thank you all so much for being here.

We're going to start with a story that we have been talking about for a couple of weeks now.

And, Kevin McCallum, this is about Sam Douglas, who got himself into some pretty hot water taking part in a racist, misogynist, anti-Semitic text group chat.

He has now officially resigned.

There was a little bit of confusion at first over whether he had technically done so.

And now there's a new candidate who said he wants to take that seat.

But let's not get too far ahead of ourselves.

What do we know about Douglas's resignation and what's going to happen next?

Right.

So there was some question immediately after the publication of, these stories about the text messages that he had been involved in, about whether and, whether and when he might resign.

So there were several days when everyone was kind of wondering and speculating about is he going to is he going to what is this statement mean?

And he had said, I'll have a statement for everybody by the end of the week.

And so but he didn't immediately resign.

And so it really raised a lot of questions for people about what was he going to dig in?

Is he going to make them remove him from his Senate seat?

And under intense pressure from, several prominent Republican officials in the state, including Governor Scott.

Right.

He, made the decision to step aside.

And he basically it was interesting, though, because he made the decision less, because he was taking responsibility for the things that he said, and more because he was saying essentially that he's he was in danger, that he has a young child and that there were all these comments that were made about him and to him that were vile.

And so he kind of turned this story around a little, that was about vile comments made by young Republicans around the country.

And he kind of made it about the vile comments that people were saying about him as the reason that he resigned, And so there was a little confusion about when in fact he would be stepping down that got resolved.

And I think part of the confusion, Kevin, I just interrupt for a moment is because Paul, deemed the chairman of the Republican Party, was one of the outliers who did not call for his resignation, saying that, you know, he should apologize for this.

He should address the comments.

But he didn't think he should step down.

That had me wondering, is he starting as you were implying?

Maybe he's thinking this over instead, but that was not the case.

That's exactly right.

For a while there are people were going, if this is what the chair of the Republican Party is saying he should do, which is apologize and move on, then maybe he's going to take that advice to heart, and maybe that's exactly what he's going to try to do.

Turns out, not the case.

The pressures were too great.

And so he, he did step aside.

And of course, what happened immediately was that Democrats saw the opportunity to make sure that they told the world that they have a candidate that they think would be a better fit for Senate in the state of Vermont.

He's from Troy.

He's a select board member.

He's a retired army general.

His name is, Gaston Beth Allen.

We don't know much about him, right?

He hasn't been in statewide politics.

But he, he did a pretty good job of getting a press release to the world and a picture of himself, letting everybody know that he was going to try to restore public integrity.

To the institution.

And it was probably a good move on the Democrats to put that marker down now, because Governor Scott is almost certain to be appointing a Republican to replace, Sam.

And so the Democrats wanted to plant that seed for everybody to say, just because there's a, a Republican is going to be replacing him, doesn't mean that that's the end of the story.

Yeah.

And it's pretty important now for Democrats because, as we know, in the last election, there was that red wave that really took away their supermajority.

So now these seats become more critical when you're talking about these things politically, I find it really interesting what you mentioned there, Kevin, about, Sam Douglas saying, you know, he was receiving threats.

He got some, some vitriol directed at him.

You know, I suppose we have to take him at his word for that.

But this brings us to a story.

Howard Wise tells me that you reported on recently, and it has to do with, you know, sort of the the poison political environment throughout the entire country right now.

But we're not immune to it here in Vermont.

What were you seeing happening?

What are some of the things that you saw in some of the smaller places here in Vermont?

Yeah.

So this is one of those stories that just kind of kind of kept building on itself.

The original news story was that the town of Strafford, which is a very small town in the upper valley, the town clerk there, was threatened by, someone in town.

And there's a long story behind that.

I won't get into, but they had a lock their town office store and only make the office open by appointment, so I thought that I was interested.

I started calling around.

I found out that the town of Mendon dealt with a similar, situation.

I was hearing from other town clerks.

I talked to someone up in Albany who was saying that they had peopl at their Selectboard meetings.

So, as you said, it really falls into this whole narrative of our country.

We're all have our heels dug in.

We're all yelling at each other.

We're not listening to each other enough.

And it really is playing out in these small towns.

And the big challenge, of course, is that our participatory democracy is all about showing up.

We have our small selectboard meetings, we have our town meeting.

It's all about going down to the town office, hashing out our differences and then ideally moving along together.

But that's happening less and less and, I spoke to Ted Brady at the Vermont League of Cities and Towns.

They just held their annual meeting, and they actually brought in a national expert on this who was talking about the same thing.

This is a national problem.

Obviously, we're hearing a lot about it.

And unfortunately it's showing up more here in Vermont.

It's, very unsettling.

And really it comes down to it's not this side or the other side.

We're all, I think we all need to listen to each other.

And, see our similarities.

Listen to the other side and try to move forward together.

That's ideally, I feel like that's a really important point, Howard, because, you know, again, if, if Sam Bellows is to be believed, you know, he was receiving a lot of a lot of vitriol towards his family, he felt that was part of the reason he had to step down.

So this is not, something where it's just people on the right who make threats.

It could be people on the left.

The point is, it's people that are overstepping their bounds and this is a bad kind of new normal, if that's what it is.

Is that what people were telling you?

It is.

And a lot of people, we didn't lean into this too much in the story, but a lot of people did talk about the message that is coming down from the top, from President Trump, questioning the integrity of elections, talking about, the patriots who stormed the Capitol on January 6th and that whole idea that it's okay to show your anger, it's okay to yell at people.

People down here are trying to say that it's not okay that that that we need to, tone everything dow and try to work together more.

All right, well, thank you for the update on that, Howard.

As sad as the story is, and, you know, this transitions into something as we're talking about President Trump, we're talking about, the relationship between the feds and states throughout the country.

And Kevin McCallum, you've been writing about, this really sort of amazing story here that's affecting, Governor Phil Scott, you know, back in August, he willingly gave information to the federal government, for people receivin Snap benefits here in Vermont.

About 140,000 Vermonters sensitive personal information was given at the time.

The attorney general, Charity Clark, did not want the governor to do this.

He went ahead and did it anyway.

What did a federal judge recently say about Scott's move?

There?

Right.

So, this case did move forward with, I think 22 other states suing the federal government to block the data from being demanded by the federal government by the USDA.

And even though Vermont was not part of the state of the of the of the lawsuit, the lawsuit went forward and it made some significant progress.

Earlier this week or last week here.

Quite remember.

But, a judge there basically said, look, the federal government may have a right to some of this data and it may be able to prove that down the road.

But at the moment where we stand now, it looks as though the states are going to prevail in their argument that they did not do it properly, like there is a way to go about getting the data from the states that the states have about the federal program, and they just didn't.

They don't appear to have done it properly.

So she imposed what's called a preliminary injunction, which basically makes sure makes it for the moment.

While the case proceeds, that the states do not have to comply with, with the USDA order.

So what that means is that Phil Scott made a decision on his own back in August about this being something that he was going to follow the request by the federal government.

And that request may, in fact, have been illegal.

And so Democrats have just been fierce, in pouncing on this, on this development, they were they were pretty sharp about it a couple months ago.

But now that the judge has, essentially temporarily ruled that it looks as though this may have been illegal.

Yeah.

Democrats have been pretty tough on one in particular, the treasurer of the state treasurer is, Mike paycheck is, a, seen by many people as the most likely, gubernatorial challenger to Phil Scott next year.

And he was he said something to me just the other day or he said, this is an example of how when Governor Scott doesn't fight, Vermonters lose.

And that was that was kind of rough.

I mean, he he's a pretty general.

He's a pretty mild mannered guy.

And so for him to say that, the Democratic Party was even rougher I'm going to have to make sure I get this one accurate.

They said the Trump administration is driving a dangerous mass surveillance effort, and Phil Scott's cooperation has made Vermont part of it.

I mean, so that's always been the problem with this issue about sharing the data was like, well, what's the problem with sharing the data?

Right?

The people get the benefits.

We know what they're names and addresses, and Social Security numbers are what's the problem with sharing that with the federal government?

And the critics have said, you don't know what they're going to do with that information.

You don't know what they're going to do with a massive database of people, like you said, 140,000 people.

What are they going to com through that data looking for?

So that's where the real the real difference of opinion here lies is, is the intent.

If you assume ill intent on the part of the federal government, you might want to fight and block this information from being shared.

If you think it's the federal government's data to begin with, and we don't have a right to stop them from having it, then you might give it to them.

So very different opinions on a, on a on a potent subject.

All right.

Thank you for updating us on that particular story.

Olivia Jaeger, I want to turn to you now because you had a really fascinating story about something happening with the UVM Health Network.

Largest health network, of course, in the state of Vermont.

And this has to do with some course correction as far as saving money.

And we're hearing about layoffs, at UVM Health Network.

When I hear about layoffs, I immediately think, oh, it's got to be workers.

Not the case here.

Who's being laid off?

Why is this happening?

Not the case here.

What we're seeing at UVM is these top executives are leaving, and it's, as you said kind of a course correction to what we saw this summer, late, late kind of September with the Green Mountain Care Board decisions where they were really adamant that the really high cost of executive compensation to this hospital network is what's driving a lot of the high costs at UVM Medical Center and its its affiliates in the UVM Health Network.

So one of the the big things we're seeing is, as Steve LaFleur, th new CEO of the Health Network, takes his his new position at the helm of UVM is this was the first Monday of his time here.

He's kind of laying down a new and new direction for for the health network.

And really, what that's looking like is something that's much more focused on the hospital level.

He's shifting the power back to having hospital presidents report to him, instead of report to some of these kind of mid-level execs at the the network.

He's something that I think is actually really interesting.

That's a little wonky, is that he has also as part of that decision to make these layoffs.

He's also kind of he's shifted some governance structures so that the chairs of that affiliate hospital board of trustees now have voting positions on the network board, which I think is all part of this vision that he's voiced to say the hospital network really got a lot of scrutiny during those those care board decisions and all of the conversations surrounding it.

We saw even Phil Scott in this kind of unusual press release.

He released surrounding the care board decisions.

He specifically called out just the high executive compensation, which I think really hit home there.

The other line that just rings in my ears from the care board conversations was, the board chair, Owen Foster, called these these executives at the network level physicall and spiritually distant, which although I think is pretty strong wording that I think has really has really hit home.

And we see now the the network is responding.

Sonny, even the former CEO and president of the network stepped down.

Steve LaFleur is taking hold.

He's coming from UVM Medical Center.

He's this E.R.

doc.

He's focused on the hospitals.

And that really is the the vision.

It sounds like he's trying to to push forward.

Is this this much more network light version?

Yeah.

And the Green Mountain Care Board must, must be happy with this, this movement.

It's something different, that that we seen usually, you were also reporting on another thing that's driving a lot of the rise in health care costs.

And this is the effect of state level lobbying that's going on.

What did you speak with about that?

We may have spoken to the same person, I suspect, on this because I found this really fascinating, a UVM professor who we can tell us about.

Yeah, yeah.

You had a great conversation with him that I, I listened to, but this is Alex Garlick.

He's a professor of, of policy at UVM, and he specifically just wrote this book called Preexisting Conditions about really the influence of lobbying and health care policy.

I actually think it came out the same day that Steve Leffler was officially became CEO of the The Hospital Network.

So kind of a nice correlation there.

Yeah.

But he, he opens this book with this great anecdote of working as a congressional staffer in, Joe Kennedy's office, and he watches Nancy Pelosi take off her shoes on the Capitol Hill line and, like, literally jump for joy when, the effort to repeal and replace Obamacare failed.

And so he starts with this big national picture of health care.

But really, he, he ends up narrowing down and giving all these really rich examples of state by state policies and efforts to influence policy.

At a local level.

And he really talks about the influence that lobbyists have in, in governments where we're we may not really be thinking or looking for these big picture things like repeal and replace.

Obamacare is such a famous one.

But oh yeah, he really argues that a lot of these kind of health care reforms, or more so these attempts to reform health care that get stymied, are happening in state governments.

Yeah.

You've seen this before, Kevin.

Two under the Golden Dome, in Montpelier, right?

For sure.

And one of the fascinating things that I liked about the reporting on his book was that he appears to be pointing out that the more complex the subject is, the more likely that lobbyists haven't a tremendous amount of influence on it.

And the way he explains that, I think very well is that, look, lawmakers are busy.

They are regular folks often who often, especially in the state of Vermont, they're part time legislators who are, you know, they're not paid very well.

They don't have any staff, and they have sometimes struggle to keep up with the complexity of some of the legislation that's before them.

And lobbyists always positioned themselves as the person who can help, like, oh, here's a here's a little bit of information for you, Senator, about how you, how this complicated issue, affects Vermonters, which may or may not come with an agenda.

It may or may not come with an agenda.

And so I really like the fact that the professor pointed out that the more complicated issue, the more influence lobbyists have, because I'm someone who likes to try to write about the things that are going on in Montpelier that are complicated, that need a little bit more insight into what's really happening.

And so, yeah, there's a lot of lobbyists crawling around, Montpelier on a regular basis.

And it bears it bears repeating that they have a tremendous influence on policy.

And now we know the cost of some of the fundament, the underlying policies.

And I'm really glad you spoke with Alex Garlick.

I feel like that book sounds fascinating.

So for anyone who didn't read his book, you know, read the article that Olivia wrote about in Vtdigger because it's really interesting and it'll give you some perspective on just how complex these issues are.

How do I choose?

But I want to bring you back into the conversation because this feels like a blast from the past to me.

The Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant at one point, this was the topic in Vermont, the dismantling of it to decommissioning of it, etc.. This is back in the news now because there's a Texas company that is eyeing the former site.

What is going on there?

What do they want to do with it?

Yeah.

Well, yeah, it's interesting that you, put it that way, because one reason why we're going to start hearing more about it i the decommissioning process is it's not quite winding down.

It's a year or two out.

Remember the company North Star purchased the whole property, and they're a kind o commercial demolition company.

So they've been tearing it all down, getting rid of the low level, radioactive waste.

And there are about a year or two out from that.

And so the big question has always been, what is the next thing that's going to happen on the site?

They have the, electric grid infrastructure there.

They, company, updated the rail system there.

So it's a really important piece of property.

And I think, like in the next year or two, we're going to be hearing a lot about it.

So this company, Power Transitions this is a Texas based company.

And that's what they do.

They go to ol electric generating facilities and either turn them into sustainable solar fields or figure out other ways to hook them up to the grid.

So this idea they've been floating in Vernon is to build a really large battery storage, facility, which has some controversy, added to it.

These are not the smaller Green Mountain power has been putting up some battery storage, 2 to 5 megawatt, kind of things around the state.

We've heard a lot about that, but this is much bigger.

This is like 15 or 20MW, very large.

They can catch fire.

They're very hard to put the fire out.

And when these lithium batteries, if they, if they, catch fire, they give out terrible gases.

Some might question the wisdom of putting a facility that could catch fire or near high level radioactive waste, which is being stored in Vernon.

So, yeah, it's a fascinating subject.

This company had a couple of meetings with the Vernon Planning Commission, and when I called, Kirk Johnson, the commissioner of Public service, I said, do you know anything about this?

And he said, yeah, I actually have a meeting with them next month.

So they're going to come to Vermont and talk about their project.

And, we're probably going to hear more about it over the next year or two as that site gets ready for redevelopment.

There are going to be a lot of ideas floated.

Again this is a couple of years out, at least two probably more between the permitting and the building of whatever ends up there.

But, there will be a lot of, interest in that property for sure.

Yeah.

And I would I would imagine that meeting you're talking about is going to be, a lot of focus on those safety concerns, because as you were describing that, that immediately got me a little bit nervous.

And again, I' not an expert on these things, but I think a lot of people might feel the same way.

Another story you've been working on, Howard, has to do with the Hyde Park Electric department, and they have found themselves in some pretty hot water.

Are are they out of money?

What is going on there?

They are.

Out of money.

Yes they are.

I've been told that the people, the customers, they have about 1400 customers in, in Johnson and Hyde Park.

There's no, threat right now.

They're going to lose their electricity, but they've made a bunch of really bad decisions as far as anyone can tell right now.

There was no malfeasance.

Nobody stole money.

It just sounds like this i a very small electric utility.

We have a lot of these in Vermont.

17 small electric companies, and a lot of them were built when, you know, they were bringing electricity to rural Vermont.

So it made sense for, for a small town to have its own utility.

But the whole business is just getting so much more complicated now.

We know that climate change bring in more intense storms.

It's more expensive to keep the lines up.

So they made some bad decisions.

They took some money from they took from their ratepayers that paid into the efficiency Vermont and use that to pay some of their bills, which is might be illegal.

They owe money to GMP and, Valco.

So it's not a good situation right now.

The Department of Public Service is trying to unravel the whole thing, find out where the money is, how much is owed, what is owed.

What's probably going to come out of this is that ratepayers, for Hyde Park Electric are going to probably see their rates go up to cover part of it.

But, we're at the beginning of this kind of untangling i and trying to figure out just, where all the money is and how bad it is and sound a little bit familiar.

Kevin McAllister in Burlington.

Situation there it does.

Burlington Electric Department is nowhere near as as bad off as that utility, but, Burlington Electric Department is facing a management audit, run by the PUC after concerns have been raised about some mistakes that they've made with ratepayer money and, a complicated situation involving renewable energy credits according to lose more than a million bucks.

And so I think it shows that the PUC is much more and the Department of Public Services, much more willing than they have been in the pas to publicly point out problems with, utilities because rates are going up and, utility rates across the state are going up.

And so I think they feel the need to be a little more, a little tougher.

Okay.

Olivia Geiger, very quickly, you wrote a really fascinating article about a woman in New Hampshire who, her daughter wanted to have some, trans, affirming care.

Can't get it.

Has to come to Vermont to do that.

Yeah, I think the upshot of what I want to, to stress about that is that care for young tran people in Vermont is protected right now, and it remains accessible for now.

For now, of course, we're seeing our neighbors in New Hampshire that it's not the case that they passed two really restrictive bills this past summer that essentially banned access to any type of gender affirming care for anyone under the age of 19, who isn't already receiving that care.

So a lot of the providers that will take place, that will start in 2026, bu a lot of the providers here in Vermont are like really preparing themselves for the response to that here in Vermont, and not just from New Hampshire, but Connecticut is restricting care.

And we're seeing just the impact.

And it's a very powerful story.

You had a very personal story that you can read about in Vtdigger.

Now, before we go, we need to make a correction to a story that we discussed last week involving the resignation of Northfield Police Chief Peter Gomes.

In that discussion, a reporter stated that former Northfield Police Chief John Helfand had asked a question about the purchase of hoodies during an October 14th selectboard meeting though that question was posed by Northfield Select Board member John Stevens.

And I want to quickly mention that if you happen to be in Ward's borough tomorrow, go to the Guild Feather Turnip Festival, because our own Howard waste is going to be one of the judges of that turnip festival there, along with Beck about, I believe Howard.

It's a big responsibility.

Pick the right term forward to it.

I think you'll do a great job thanks to our panel today.

Kevin McCallum from seven days, Olivia Jaeger from Vtdigger.

And joining us remotely.

Howard waste his been from Vermont public Eye, Mitch Leeb, thank you so much for watching.

I hope you'll tune in next week as well for Vermont this week.

And meantime, hope you have a great week.

Thank you everybody, and.

And.