Vermont’s Republican state senators have elected Scott Beck of St. Johnsbury as their new caucus leader. Republicans ousted longtime Senator Randy Brock of St. Albans. Beck has served as a state representative since 2015.
This comes as Republicans flipped six seats during the November election, which significantly narrowed their margin with Democrats.
Beck outlines his goals as lawmakers head into a new session in January. This interview was produced for the ear. We highly recommend listening to the audio. We’ve also provided a transcript, which has been edited for length and clarity.
Mikaela Lefrak
Senator, let's start with some news out of the Vermont Department of Taxes. There was this annual analysis published yesterday that some of our listeners might have already seen that found that property taxes will likely need to go up by about 5.9% to keep pace with rising school budgets. And this is, of course, on the heels of a nearly 14% average increase that we saw this year. Now you and other Republicans campaigned hard on this issue and the overall need for fundamental systemic reform to the Education Fund, which is in large part what's driving these property tax increases. What are your first steps going to be toward delivering on this promise of reducing the tax burden?
Scott Beck
Well, I think the first thing we need to do is we need to take our existing education fund, and we need to make get something, one that is more transparent, more understandable, and there is a closer connection between local school district spending decisions and local tax rates. And I think if we can do all three of those things, and I think we can, then I think that a lot of the decisions that we want to be made will occur organically at the local level.
Mikaela Lefrak
In Vermont's schools, staffing has increased by 5%, in I believe that's the past four years, enrolled students has dropped, and Vermont schools currently have one staff person for every 3.63 students, which is the lowest ratio in the country. I'm curious to hear more of your thoughts on how to address that issue. If you see it as an issue, do we need to decrease staffing, close schools?
Scott Beck
Well, it is an issue. I mean, at 80% of the schools operating expenses are personnel. So if your staffing ratio is 3.63 to one, that's, you know, that's going to drive a lot of spending. I believe the next closest is main at 4.8 so we are an outlier, really far out there. Why are we an outlier? A lot of it is because of our funding formula. Our funding formula has a very loose connection between the local spending decision and the tax rate, I equate it to somebody going into a store and this and everything's discounted 70% and when things are discounted 70% and that's the perception that our school districts have, they tend to spend the money, And there's also a disincentive to find savings. And so I think more closely connecting our school districts to their spent, their tax rate to their spending decision, will force some organic change at the local level.
Mikaela Lefrak
So just to be clear, there are you saying that there are school districts that are spending without regard to the increase in taxes it's causing on their communities?
Scott Beck
I wouldn't say, without regard, but when your average school district knows that if they spend another dollar, that the local people are only going to come up with 30 cents, I think that's a pretty good incentive to spend. I wouldn't say there's no connection, but it's a pretty loose connection right now.
Mikaela Lefrak
Now, you served on the House Education Committee and Ways and Means, and you floated your own plan for how to shift the education formula earlier this year, and I believe you also proposed a pretty similar idea back in 2018 but didn't go anywhere at the time.
Scott Beck
It passed the House.
Mikaela Lefrak
It passed the house. Okay. Are you going to return to that same formula this year in your new role as Senate Minority Leader? Is that something you're going to be pushing again? Or have you reformulated this plan to be potentially more amenable to other lawmakers?
Scott Beck
Well, I think, you know, I think the basis of it is, is that all the different plans, there is a very generous grant provided to every district based on the number of weighted students they have. And I think that's a consistent part of every plan, because that's what connects more closely connects the school district to its spending decision. Now what happens beyond that grant is up for some discussion right now. Some people want to continue to fund that additional amount that school districts might need with a statewide education fund. Others argue that we should return for that extra amount only that we should return to local education funds. And both are possible. Both are doable. I think it's going to be a question for lawmakers to decide which is equitable, which is going to lead to the best results, and. what is fair.
Mikaela Lefrak
Now the head of the Vermont Teachers Union, the NEA, is advocating for a shift towards an income based financing system for education. They said that that would shift a larger share of education taxes to higher income households. Is that option on the table right now for you and fellow Republicans in the Senate, or no?
Scott Beck
No, it's not, you know. Simply changing where the money comes from is not systemic reform to the system. And also, I mean the income tax, it is, it's, it's always been with the general fund and whatever income tax capacity there is, if there is any, that is the general funds tax capacity. And I don't think that the Education Fund, which is looking for more tax capacity, because it hasn't controlled its spending, should go over to the general fund and take their tax capacity. I don't think there's much support for that idea.
Mikaela Lefrak
Let's turn from education to housing. How do you plan to address the housing shortage alongside your colleagues in the Senate without making a major investment in building affordable housing that could cause another increase in Vermont's tax burden?
Scott Beck
Well, I think that you know, public spending of public dollars on affordable housing is always going to be a part of the landscape, and I acknowledge that, but pouring more public dollars into housing isn't going to get the isn't going to get the cost of housing down. What we need to do is get the cost to construct housing down. That's the problem is that developers and builders, when they come in, renovation projects and new construction projects, especially for middle-class type of homes, do not make sense given the cost to construct. Pouring more public dollars doesn't help that situation. And so, what we need to do is we need to look at the permitting, look at the regulation, look at everything that's adding to these developers' costs, and get that down to a level where, again, in the past, makes sense for a developer or a home builder to start building homes for our middle class. If developers think that they can make money building middle-class homes, this problem will get fixed real quick. But right now, it doesn't make any sense for them to build middle-class homes or renovate middle-class homes, and so they're not so the problem is the cost of housing. The problem is not how much public dollars we are putting into the affordable housing system.
Mikaela Lefrak
Question for you here about about the situation facing renters and landlords in Vermont. Now last session, some of our listeners might remember there was this proposal to bar landlords from evicting tenants for ‘no cause’ as it's called. It died in the state house. You opposed that ban on ‘no cause’ evictions. Meanwhile, you also received some pretty significant donations during your campaign for Senate from pro-landlord groups and individuals. I'm talking the Vermont realtor PAC, Chittenden County landlords like Mark Bove what would you say to renters in your district who have seen their rents rise and are really afraid of eviction in this tight rental market? How are you going to stand up for them?
Scott Beck
I think their rates will come down if we have more inventory. And I think what a lot of people in the state are saying is that it doesn't make any sense to increase our inventory of apartment and rental housing because of, in many cases, the landlord tenant relationships that exist. And this hypothetically, if a landlord can't decide to move on from a property or repurpose it or do whatever they want to do, that's going to restrict the opportunity in that market. It's going to restrict the number of offerings. And when you restrict the number of offerings, prices go up, and more people find themselves without a home. So, you know anything that comes across the legislature that would restrict the amount of housing that's available out there, especially to renters, I'm not going to probably be supportive of those ideas.
Broadcast live on Tuesday, December 3, 2024, at noon; rebroadcast at 7 p.m.
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