Vermont

In Orange County Senate race, Vermont GOP tries again to unseat Mark MacDonald – VTDigger

Published

1 week ago

October 23, 2024

In Orange County Senate race, Vermont GOP tries again to unseat Mark MacDonald – VTDigger

Larry Hart, left, and Mark MacDonald. Photos by Glenn Russell/VTDigger

ORANGE COUNTY — Prominently displayed on the campaign website for Larry Hart, an Orange County Republican candidate for Vermont Senate, is an endorsement from an unnamed community member: “nice guy, reasonable and calm.”

It’s a distillation of the image that Hart, a salesman at a building supply store and former Topsham selectboard member, is seeking to project to voters in his bid to unseat the longtime incumbent Democratic Senator, Mark MacDonald.

“I don’t get angry. I like to help other people,” Hart, 60, said when asked about that slogan in an interview. “You try to find the good in everybody, even if somebody might be treating you bad at that moment.”

Meanwhile, MacDonald, 81, who has served in the Legislature for a combined total of roughly 35 years, is counting on his constituents’ familiarity with him and a rigorous door-knocking regimen to return him to office.

“I was in Corinth again yesterday — 86 doors,” MacDonald said in a phone interview Tuesday. It’s not an all-time best, he admitted: “I don’t get in and out of the car as fast as I used to.”

MacDonald has represented the Senate district for a total of 23 years, from 1996 to 1998 and then again from 2003 through today.

But Republicans have long eyed the seat, which represents about 22,000 people in 13 towns, including Randolph, Williamstown, Bradford and Tunbridge. It’s one of five Senate districts that the Vermont GOP is targeting in an effort to topple the Democratic supermajority in the statehouse.

Now, buoyed by an endorsement from Gov. Phil Scott and a surge of campaign contributions — largely from Chittenden County donors — Hart hopes that voter frustration over tax and cost-of-living increases will be enough to finally flip the seat.

Achieving affordability

The two candidates agree on the primary issue animating the campaign and others around the state: Vermont’s high cost of living, particularly the dearth of affordable housing in the state.

MacDonald has floated the idea of raising taxes on second and third homes owned by part-time residents to fund affordable housing.

“A lot of people go to Florida,” he said. “They go, you know, six months and a day, and they come back and don’t pay any income taxes in (Vermont).”

Hart, meanwhile, declined to provide specific legislative proposals to address affordability, saying only that policies would need to be hashed out through collaboration with other lawmakers and the executive branch.

“We need the Governor’s team involved in it,” he said. “We need us involved in it. We need some people in the House that have common sense.”

Republicans have pointed to legislation supported by MacDonald that they argue is making Vermont less affordable, like this year’s yield bill, which set out an average 13.8% increase in property taxes to fund school budgets for the next fiscal year, and the clean heat standard, which, if implemented, would require fossil fuel importers to offset their products’ emissions.

Hart has also said he would like to see tougher penalties for petty crimes and to bolster Vermont’s substance use recovery system — a goal motivated by his daughter’s death of a fentanyl overdose. He’s also expressed opposition to an overdose prevention center, also known as a safe injection site, in the state, something MacDonald voted for in the most recent legislative session.

And although his campaign has taken some jabs at MacDonald, Hart has professed a commitment to running a polite race.

“I’m not going to slam Mark. I’m not going to do that. That’s not who I am,” he said.

‘Longtime ties’

“This is a seat that we’ve been focused on for a while,” Paul Dame, the chair of the Vermont Republican Party, said in an interview. “We think this is going to be a pretty competitive race this year.”

Hart is a departure from the last Republican to challenge MacDonald: John Klar, a firebrand writer and farmer who leaned into culture war issues in his 2022 campaign. MacDonald won that race with a ten-point margin of victory, even after he was sidelined by a stroke just weeks before the election.

Dame said that Hart, who owned auto parts stores in Randolph and Bradford and spent nine years on the Topsham selectboard, was recruited in large part because of his longtime ties to the area.

“In the past, sometimes we’ve had people who tend to be more ideological,” Dame said. “They get involved, and they have a very narrow sample of what quote-unquote Vermonters think. And then they go out and campaign and realize that they don’t really know the district that well.”

Asked if he was referring to Klar, Dame said, “Nobody specifically.”

MacDonald, meanwhile, charged that Hart, despite his moderate image, “holds pretty much the same views as my opponent a few years ago, but he doesn’t go around and broadcast it.”

MacDonald’s pitch is that, effectively, his outreach to and familiarity with constituents gives him an intimate understanding of their concerns.

“Folks who I interrupted (their) dinner, or when they’re picking potatoes, or combing out the dog hair on the front porch, or having a beer in the door yard, leaning against the back of the truck on a Saturday afternoon,” MacDonald said. “That’s how you see people where they are, and hear what they’re thinking.”

Until Election Day, of course, it’s also impossible to say how much frustration over property taxes will translate into votes in the district.

But homestead tax rates in the Senate District are not going up as quickly as in other parts of the state — or at all, according to preliminary data compiled by Vermont Public in August.

Between the 2024 and 2025 fiscal years, Tunbridge and Strafford are projected to see homestead tax hikes of 11.2% and 9.7% respectively, the largest in the district. But in other towns — Topsham, Vershire, Corinth, Fairlee and West Fairlee — tax rates are actually dropping. Fairlee and West Fairlee will see the district’s largest decreases, of roughly 20%, among the largest drops in the state, according to the data.

That’s in part due to recent reforms intended to direct more school funding money towards districts that need it more — such as rural and low-income parts of the state.

‘Good discussions’

MacDonald, in an interview, pointed out that Hart’s campaign has been funded almost entirely by donors outside Orange County.

According to an October campaign finance filing, Hart has raised roughly $25,000, the vast majority of which has come in increments of $1,000 or $960 from addresses in Chittenden County: Burlington, Shelburne, South Burlington. Most of that money has gone into postcards and advertisements online, in newspapers and on the radio.

Hart attributed those donations to frustrations over liberal Chittenden County representatives in the Statehouse and what donors see as the impact of their policies on Burlington: drug use, violence, homelessness.

“They’re like, this isn’t the Burlington we knew,” Hart said. “And so they’re frustrated with that.”

According to his most recent report, MacDonald has raised a fraction of that haul, with only about $3,300 in contributions.

But Jim Dandeneau, the executive of the Vermont Democratic Party, said that the party is optimistic that MacDonald’s “tireless” campaigning and years representing the district will pay dividends on election day.

“Mark has deep relationships in the community,” Dandeneau said in a brief interview. “Mark has people who are very loyal to him because he’s done a lot to help them.”

On Tuesday, MacDonald estimated that he has so far visited around 2,300 houses during the campaign.

“I got to go and pay for a radio ad today,” he said in an early morning interview. “And at 10 o’clock I’ll be knocking on doors.”

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Vermont

In Vermont’s most competitive Senate races, 10 wealthy families contributed one-third of GOP candidates’ donations – VTDigger

Published

6 hours ago

November 1, 2024

Press Room

In Vermont’s most competitive Senate races, 10 wealthy families contributed one-third of GOP candidates’ donations – VTDigger

In Vermont’s five most competitive state Senate races, 10 generous families contributed more than one-third of all campaign donations to the Republican nominees, as of an Oct. 15 filing deadline.

Democrats in those five races, by comparison, can thank their top 10 highest individual contributors — among them, the candidates themselves and their family members — for one-fifth of their total fundraising numbers as of mid-October. That’s according to a VTDigger analysis of campaign finance data for the Caledonia, Chittenden North, Grand Isle, Orange and Orleans district races.

None of the five Republican nominees — Scott Beck, Chris Mattos, Pat Brennan, Larry Hart and Sam Douglass — are Senate incumbents, who historically have steep advantages, both at the polls and in fundraising. Beck, Mattos and Brennan are, however, current members of the Vermont House.

These races are widely seen as the GOP’s best opportunities to flip Democratic districts in the Senate and crack the latter party’s two-thirds supermajority. There are currently 23 Democrats and Progressives in the chamber and just seven Republicans.

GOP Gov. Phil Scott has been campaigning to support these down-ballot Republicans, telling Vermonters that his agenda depends on denting the Dems’ numbers. To reliably sustain his vetoes, Republicans would have to flip four seats.

For 10 wealthy families, that potential outcome is worth dropping a substantial amount of cash.

Take, for instance, the five Republican candidates’ greatest familial benefactors: the Pizzagallis, who made their fortune in construction and real estate development. Four members of the family — Angelo, James, Jon and Remo Pizzagalli — each contributed about $1,000 to all five of the Republican Senate candidates. (Nineteen of the family’s 20 contributions to those five faces were for $1,000 exactly. The sole exception was the $960.60 Jon Pizzagalli donated to Hart of Orange County.)

In an election in which Vermont’s rising cost of living and tax burden have dominated campaign trail rhetoric, Vermont Democratic Party executive director Jim Dandeneau said that these high-dollar donations suggest it’s Vermont’s wealthiest who are driving the conversation — not everyday Vermonters.

“The Republicans have tried to portray this as some kind of organic uprising about Democrats in Montpelier, and that’s not the case,” he said. “Democrats have spent the last eight years talking about building a Vermont that works for everybody, and not just the wealthy few. And the wealthy few are pretty upset about that, apparently.”

Scott’s campaign manager, Jason Maulucci, said he disagreed. “Talk to almost any member of their caucus,” he said of the Democrats. “Many of them have said it’s the number one issue they’re hearing when they’re going door-to-door.”

“To suggest that regular Vermonters aren’t feeling the pinch from higher property taxes and a new payroll tax, increased DMV fees, potentially seeing their home heating fuel costs go up billions of dollars — to suggest that they don’t care would be pretty tone-deaf,” Maulucci said.

Vermont’s campaign contribution limit from a single source, meaning an individual or a political action committee, is $1,680 for state Senate candidates, according to the Vermont Secretary of State’s Office. But that doesn’t mean families can’t coordinate their efforts to maximize their impact on local races.

The Pizzagallis are not alone in seeking to change the balance of power in the Senate.

In its data analysis, VTDigger cross-referenced identical last names and addresses (as well as a number of common spelling irregularities) in campaign finance records to calculate the impact of Vermont’s wealthiest individual donors on the most closely watched legislative races. The totals may undercount total donations from these families, since not all members may share the same last name.

Five people with the last name Tarrant — related to Richard Tarrant, the founder of health care technology company IDX, philanthropist and 2006 Republican Senate nominee — donated more than $14,000 to four of the five Republican candidates. (To date, Mattos has not received a single check from a Tarrant.) Beck received the greatest amount of support from five members of the family, totalling $5,000, though none of them report living in Caledonia County, where Beck is running.

In total, the 10 families contributed 34% of all individual contributions to the five Republicans, as of October 15. The families’ cumulative contributions ranged from the Pizzagallis’ near-$20,000, to roughly $5,000 from Mark and Rick Bove, whose family operated the since-shuttered Bove’s Cafe in Burlington, owns the eponymous pasta sauce company and whose real estate empire has drawn negative headlines in recent years.

Several of the major donor families are involved in Vermont’s real estate industry, but not all.

The Ortons, who contributed nearly $7,000 to four of the five GOP candidates as of Oct. 15, founded the Vermont Country Store. The Dubruls, who distributed $5,000 among three campaigns, own and operate the Automasters car dealership enterprise. Paul Plunkett, a veteran executive of Hickok & Boardman Insurance Group, is the New England manager for the national insurance company Acrisure; he and his wife, Gina Plunkett (whose maiden name is Pizzagalli), together donated a total of $5,000 to Beck, Brennan, Douglass and Mattos.

As of Oct. 15, half of the 10 families had donated to all five Republican candidates; four donated to four; and one to three.

Another round of campaign finance reports were due to the Secretary of State’s Office by midnight Friday, after this story was published. The reports filed by publication time suggested that the families still had more cash to spare. In their Nov. 1 filings, Hart reported receiving $1,000 from Steele Dubrul of Shelburne and $960.60 from Eliot Orton of Steamboat Springs, Colorado.

To Dandeneau, the pattern of giving suggests some level of coordination between these high-rollers, a situation that is hardly uncommon. Maulucci, too, said, “It’s clear that they’re talking to each other.”

“There’s a group of those business folks who are upset with the direction that the state’s going,” Maulucci said. “Not all of them are Republicans even, and they are trying to make a difference and give support to candidates they think will be more focused on making Vermont more affordable.”

What is different this time around, Dandeneau said, is Scott’s involvement in down-ballot races.

“This is Phil Scott making a play for a more pliable legislature, and he’s tapping into the folks who have historically funded his races,” he said, adding, “If we had 10 ungodly wealthy families on our side, I’d be doing the same thing for our people.”

Maulucci acknowledged that the Scott campaign had been in contact with some of the families, noting that many of them had contributed to his campaign, as well.

“Often they’re asking us who we think are in competitive races, so we point to candidates that the governor is supporting,” Maulucci said. “And obviously, there’s been a lot of public attention to the Senate being particularly competitive, and the governor’s been on the stump campaigning for those candidates. So folks who have given to the governor and want to help out the governor might put two and two together and support some of those candidates.”

The Pizzagallis have donated more than $15,000 to Scott this cycle. Former Wall Street executive and gubernatorial candidate Bruce Lisman has sent $2,500 his way.

Calls to members of several of the donor families were not returned.

VTDigger also analyzed comparable data from the five Democrats running for these seats: Amanda Cochrane in the Caledonia district, Irene Wrenner in Chittenden North, Andy Julow in Grand Isle, Mark MacDonald in Orange and Katherine Sims in Orleans. Wrenner, Julow and MacDonald are incumbents (though Julow was only appointed to fill a vacancy in May). Sims is a member of the House.

Excluding contributions from the Vermont Democratic Party and political action committees (the Vermont NEA Fund, for instance, provided the maximum allowable contributions to Cochrane, Julow and Sims), Democrats’ major supporters contributed noticeably less money to hold onto the five Senate seats. While the Republicans’ top 10 donor families contributed at least $80,000 across five races, Democrats collected just $22,000 from their top supporters.

“Not that our money came exclusively from small-dollar donations, but the bulk of our money was raised through nose-to-the-grindstone hustle, and not 10 phone calls,” Dandeneau said.

Four out of 10 of those top contributing families, however, were related to the candidates — or included the candidates themselves. Julow, for instance, donated or loaned himself more than $10,000 of his own money as of Oct. 15; his wife, Kim Julow, donated another $1,000 to his effort. Sims and her family members contributed roughly $4,500 to hers. Wrenner loaned herself $2,050. And Cochrane’s husband, John Raser, and her mother-in-law, Gail Raser, sent a combined $1,850 to the first-time candidate.

Republicans’ fundraising totals in the five races eclipse those of their Democratic counterparts when taking into account smaller donations, too. In total, Republicans raised $235,000 across all five races, compared to Democrats’ $166,000, as of the filing of their Oct. 15 reports.

One ripple effect of major donors’ input into these races is becoming clear: The grand total amount of money raised per state Senate race appears to be climbing.

In the Chittenden North district, first-term Democrat Wrenner raised $16,000 in 2022, and $18,000 by Oct. 15. By that time in 2022, her Republican challenger, former state Rep. Leland Morgan, raised a comparable amount: $17,000.

This year, Wrenner’s challenger, Mattos, raised more than twice that by Oct. 15: $41,000.

“It is surprising,” Dandeneau said of the jump. “It’s completely out of the ordinary.”

He added, “It remains to be seen if this is a blip or a trend. I would like to say that it’s a blip. I’m concerned that it’s a trend.”

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Vermont

Vermont to receive more than $20 million to help folks heat their homes this winter

Published

14 hours ago

November 1, 2024

Press Room

Vermont to receive more than million to help folks heat their homes this winter

Vermont will receive $20.7 million from the federal government for its program to help ensure Vermonters can heat their homes this winter without risking shutoffs, according to a news release.

The Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program also offers energy efficiency upgrades with the funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, according to Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vermont, who announced the funding on Thursday.

“In Vermont, the cost of heating a home in the winter can be a real challenge for families, and we want folks to know that there are organizations and federal programs available to help now before the temperatures really take a turn,” Welch said in a statement. “I’m encouraged to see Vermont has access to more LIHEAP funding this fall and will continue to fight for resources to keep families warm throughout the cold Vermont winters.”

To find out more about the program, go to the LIHEAP Eligibility Tool, from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, to determine if you’re eligible for assistance. Vermonters can also apply for heating help at Vermont Fuel Assistance.

Contact Dan D’Ambrosio at 660-1841 or ddambrosio@freepressmedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @DanDambrosioVT.

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Vermont

Championship Weekend 2024: Streaming info, schedule, scores for VT high school finals

Published

22 hours ago

November 1, 2024

Press Room

Championship Weekend 2024: Streaming info, schedule, scores for VT high school finals

For soccer, field hockey and volleyball, Championship Weekend of the 2024 Vermont high school fall sports season has arrived.

For links to streaming and to stay up-to-date on all the action, see below for matchups, sites and game times. Check back later for final scores and details/links to our championship coverage.

To report scores

Coaches or team representatives are asked to report results ASAP after games by emailing sports@burlingtonfreepress.com. Please submit with a name/contact number.