Theo Wells-Spackman is a Report for America corps member who reports for VTDigger.

The manufacturing industry generates billions for Vermont’s economy each year — but jobs in the sector are on the decline.

That’s according to state Chamber of Commerce President Amy Spear, who spoke to a packed room of lawmakers and business leaders at the Statehouse during manufacturing industry day programming Thursday morning. Manufacturing employment has fallen more than 11% since pre-pandemic levels in 2020, she said, and a recent long-term study on the industry returned a pessimistic outlook for the rest of the decade.

In general, Spear and her colleague Megan Sullivan said in an interview, manufacturers create relatively high-paying jobs with significant upward mobility in Vermont. They also form the backbone of a crucial facet of the state’s economy, Spear said: exports.

Manufacturing brings “new money” into Vermont, Spear told lawmakers Thursday. “It grows the economic pie rather than redistributing it,” she said.

Sen. Alison Clarkson, D-Windsor, chair of the Senate Economic Development Committee, echoed Spear’s comments.

“You are our partners in economic development, and we depend on you,” she told business leaders. “We are your cheerleaders in the Statehouse.”

But while manufacturers in the room applauded several recent legislative efforts to ease financial pressure on companies — including Covid-era relief and research and development tax credits in a bill currently under consideration — several expressed anxiety over the rising cost of doing business in Vermont.

Dave Laforce, who owns Built By Newport, a furniture manufacturer in the Northeast Kingdom, said the combination of electricity costs, property taxes and health care premiums had been crushing in recent years. But passing costs on to consumers isn’t an option when you’re facing international competition, he said.

“In my 35 years of being in this business, I have not seen the escalation of fixed costs that we’ve experienced in the last three years,” he told lawmakers.

In particular, Laforce joined Janette Bombardier, an executive at Chroma Technology in Bellows Falls, in raising concerns over the burden of the payroll tax lawmakers recently imposed to support child care growth. Many of Chroma’s employees live in New Hampshire and therefore cannot access the subsidy this tax pays for, Bombardier said, and even those on the Vermont side live in an area where the need for child care still far outstrips available slots.

“I’m not sure it’s doing what we’re all hoping it would do in terms of creating spaces,” Bombardier said of the payroll tax.

Recruiting an adequate workforce was perhaps the largest headwind that business leaders cited.

Ben Bristow of Nolato Vermont, a plastic and silicone molding company in Royalton, said his Swedish ownership had considered opening a new facility in the area several years ago. But when it became clear that hiring a 200-person staff in a short time would be difficult, the project abruptly moved to Hungary, he said.

Lt. Gov. John Rodgers concluded Thursday with a plea to strengthen and expand the state’s technical education centers and the apprenticeship programs that connect them with local manufacturers.

“If we’re going to encourage the next generation of builders, we need to get them involved in hands-on learning early,” he said.

— Theo Wells-Spackman

In the know

Testimony to lawmakers last year revealed that gaps in state alerts to crime victims sometimes caused them life-altering harm. After learning about those gaps, lawmakers on the House Corrections and Institutions Committee assembled a task force to improve the state alert system. 

On Thursday members of that task force reported back with their most recent recommendations. 

Victims have long asked lawmakers to make the automated alert system customizable. For example, someone might want to be alerted if the person who harmed them was released from prison. But they might not want to know if their abuser was merely transferred from one prison to another. Victims might also want to change the types of information they receive over time. 

Kelsey Rice, a survivor of domestic violence who sits on the task force, told the committee that as more time passes after the moment when someone’s abuser is arrested, victims might want to change the types of information they receive. “The choices and decisions I made in that moment were not the same choices and needs that I identified needing later on,” Rice said. 

Current state law leaves no room for that choice, task force members told the committee. They asked lawmakers to draft changes to Vermont law allowing victims to opt out of certain notifications. 

— Charlotte Oliver

Gov. Phil Scott had harsh words at a press conference Wednesday for the House majority that voted last week in favor of the chamber’s budget proposal. 

The Republican governor read aloud a letter he said he’d received from a Vermont-born man who wrote that he’s now leaving the state because his taxes have gotten too expensive.

“Apparently, the majority of House members have been hearing something different from their constituents,” Scott said before criticizing how the chamber is “proposing to increase property taxes by an average of 7%.”

The governor has proposed a plan that would increase property taxes too — by 4%. Ultimately, the size of the projected tax hike will depend on how much money legislators and the governor agree to use to buy down tax rates in the upcoming fiscal year.

Scott also said he disagrees with the House’s decision to draw on $9.5 million in interest from the state’s Technology Modernization Fund to pay for a number of one-time initiatives that weren’t part of his budget proposal. And he wants the Senate, which is now reviewing the budget bill, to back an idea he initially proposed to eventually send all of the state revenue from taxes on vehicle purchases to the Transportation Fund.

The Scott administration also opposes a portion of the House’s budget that would require detailed information about the state Agency of Education’s operations in some of the agency’s future spending proposals. 

In testimony to the Senate Appropriations Committee later Wednesday, Adam Greshin, Scott’s commissioner of finance and management, called that language “basically a middle finger to the agency.”

— Shaun Robinson

On the trail

Attorney General Charity Clark is weighing in on the race for Chittenden County’s next top prosecutor. 

On Thursday, Clark endorsed Bram Kranichfeld, who currently serves as Franklin County state’s attorney. 

Kranichfeld, a Democrat, is running to the right of current Chittenden County State’s Attorney Sarah George, who is seeking reelection. 

“Bram is incredibly caring, moral, and thoughtful. He is an excellent lawyer, someone whose judgment I trust. I believe he’s the change Chittenden County needs,” Clark said in a statement. 

Some have said the race is off to a “spicy” start.

— Ethan Weinstein