Thanks for being a subscriber.
Sorry, your subscription does not include this content.
Please contact your publisher to upgrade your subscription.
Commentary
Webster: Climate effect on election
My father always argued U.S. elections take too long, distorting discussion of real issues. I think he was mostly right. Every day, more than 10 months before the elections, we hear too much the latest poll numbers from the media. But I have given up arguing that case and am just going to pile on the issue that concerns me most as well as relate it to the 2024 election.
Despite poor poll numbers, President Biden, I believe, or hope, will win, but even more importantly, that Congress will radically change with legislators who are serious about governance gaining a meaningful majority. In fact, without having to worry about another election, President Biden in a second term might become more and more focused on the climate emergency.
I do believe the issue of preserving democracy will continue, in fact, be an increasingly potent issue. I believe most rational people deep down value democracy and the lengthy period of elections may help bring out that vote and most will realize the current favorite for the Republican nomination is strongly anti-democratic. I also believe the pro-women movement supporting their right with the help of a doctor to decide whether they should bear a child, will help President Biden.
There is a third reason why I hope a rational decision to elect more serious candidates for the president and Congress will occur. I haven’t heard this following source of hope articulated well, if at all. The election of the current frontrunner for the Republican nomination and his MAGA supporters will be a disaster for the worldwide fight to save life on Earth and reduce carbon emissions.
Think about this reason, the IPPC, Paris Accords and the general U.N. consensus set two target dates by which to reduce emissions sufficiently to save the world from disasters, 2030 and 2050. Even with real, relative carbon reductions recently, the world is behind schedule for meeting the 2030 goal. If the current favorite for the Republican nominee for president is elected, his term of office runs from January 2025 to January of 2029. In that case, the prospects for the U.S. tradition of world leadership in dealing with this world emergency, are dismal at best. The former president bowed out of the Paris Accords, shut down 125 government sub agencies dealing with climate, and gutted by executive order, many regulations limiting emissions, etc.
Recently, I spent an afternoon ‘googling’ the former president’s words and actions. Try it. From a ‘Chinese hoax’ through ‘dig baby dig,’ this self-proclaimed greatest environmentalist who values clean air and water, lowered regulations on fossil fuels, etc., and argued climate change did not increase forest fires, raise sea levels, make hurricanes more powerful, etc.
My hope for defeating the former president comes from a coalition of Earth lovers, youth from primary school through graduate school, young and older parents and grandparents, especially those who experienced World War Two. This coalition will vote for those who sense there is a climate emergency, which requires politicians and governments to take it as seriously and effectively as we did the challenge of fascism. This commentary is dedicated to Seth Klein’s “A Good War, Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency” based on how Canada and eventually, America, responded to the fascist challenge.
Harris Webster is a retired teacher, member of Vermont Interfaith Power and Light board of directors and lives in Montpelier.
Commentary
Our Turn: Inspect VTSU mismanagement
Since the spring 2020 announcement of the imminent closure of three of our five Vermont State Colleges System colleges by then-Chancellor Jeb Spaulding, Vermont’s state colleges have endured tumultuous program changes and closures, numerous layoffs and firings of faculty and staff, the expansion of high-paid administrative positions at the chancellor’s office, and the resignation of two chancellors, two interim presidents and the selling of assets, including land and two FCC licenses.
In that time, the Legislature voted to increase funding for the VSCS by over $200 million yet there has been no public accounting of how that investment has been spent. Program changes and eliminations continue.
Layoffs continue and lack of accountability continues to reflect a system and leadership in disarray.
This has damaged student life, the livelihoods of dedicated employees, the greater community’s connection to the colleges, and has placed the colleges in greater jeopardy.
“Concerned Alumni Faculty Staff & Students of the VSCS,” or, “CAFSS-VSCS,” gathered numerous times to address the failure of the board of trustees asking that they manage the state college system with full transparency, and inclusion of constituent voices. There has been no public voice in the “transformation” plan provided. Trustee meetings have been held in executive session. Consultants hired to aid in the transformation predominantly reside out of state with little real connection to Vermont, its students, families or communities. The VTSC board of trustees and its administration has failed to create a clear plan of how it will recruit new students, retain students who are currently enrolled, and who have been told their degree programs would be sustained while, at the same time, the administration has accepted the resignations of faculty critical to sustaining many of these programs.
“Vermont State University does not belong to a board or a chancellor, a president or a campus. It belongs to Vermont. It belongs to everyone who is in the process of becoming. It belongs to everyone who imagines, discovers and is curious about themselves and about the world. It serves no one in particular and everyone all at once. It is the best of us, and we have a charge and an obligation to work in transparency, offer access and support, and to put our students first for the benefit of all Vermonters.” — Cathy Collins Printon, Johnson State College, Class of 1985.
For these and other reasons, we have reached out to the Vermont Legislature to ask it address the failure of the board of trustees to operate with transparency, fiscal responsibility or to manage these important and necessary educational and community assets for the benefit of Vermont.
We are asking for a full investigation of the management of the colleges, reform of its leadership and authority, and support of Sen. Brian Collamore’s Bill dr req 24-0248 — draft 3.1 which reflects many of the points we have raised in our letter.
We will join the Vermont State Colleges Faculty Federation at the Vermont State House 11 a.m. Thursday, Jan. 4, 2024, for their press conference and lobby day. We invite you to join us there. Alternatively, you may contact us here: Concerned Alumni Faculty Staff & Students of the VSCS, in care of Mary L. Collins, Johnson State College, Class of 1981, P.O. Box 26, Lake Elmore, VT 05657, or call 802-730-0289.
CAFSS-VSCS signatories include: Beth Clay, Mary L. Collins, Adriana Eldred, Paul Langevin, Blythe Leonard, Helen Mango, David Mook, Linda Olson, Denise Rhodes, Jackie Stanton, Julie Theoret.
This is what the Bangor Daily News in Maine had to say about a simple federal change that can help states better support asylum seekers:
Some of the many needed changes to America’s immigration system require large shifts through an act of Congress. Others, however, can be done administratively and in a fairly simple way.
One such change is available to the Department of Homeland Security, and it should be quickly implemented in order to better support people arriving in Maine and the communities welcoming them.
Three of Maine’s federal representatives — U.S. Sen. Susan Collins, U.S. Sen. Angus King and U.S. Rep. Chellie Pingree — have called on Homeland Security to provide increased flexibility in the Shelter and Services Program. This program provides funding to organizations and municipalities that provide shelter and other services to people who aren’t American citizens, like asylum seekers. The Maine lawmakers have argued, convincingly, that the program’s 45-day limitation on funds fails to match the current migration realities in Maine and other so-called destination areas far away from the southern border. They have asked for that limitation to be changed to 180 days.
“The SSP (notices of funding opportunities’) 45-day limitation is inappropriate for migrant destination locations like Maine,” Collins, King and Pingree wrote in a Dec. 6 letter to Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. “Maine immigrant services groups struggle with the 45-day limitation because migrants arriving in the state have typically been released from DHS custody many days prior, reducing the period in which these individuals and families may receive support. This reality makes it impossible for many Maine programs to access SSP funding that they have depended on under the (the Emergency Food and Shelter Program for humanitarian relief) to support and assist migrants.”
Portland officials in particular have raised concerns about shifts in the availability of federal aid, and the way this 45-day threshold could limit access to funds for non-border cities. “Forty-five days works mostly for a lot of folks along the southern border,” Aaron Geyer, Portland’s director of social services, told the Portland Press Herald.
“For destination cities away from the border, that’s where the negative impact comes in. The length of stay is often much greater than 45 days,” Geyer added.
In November, then-Portland Mayor Kate Snyder sent a letter to the city’s representatives in the Maine Legislature, asking for assistance finding state or federal support for the city of Portland’s Resettlement Program. Shifts in federal programs and funding sources put the 45-day requirement in play, threatening the longer-term services provided to asylum seekers here.
The simplest solution would be for the federal government to acknowledge the realities on the ground, make sure the intent of this program matches those realities and make the necessary administrative adjustment. As the Maine officials have suggested, 180 days would be more workable and appropriate. “We understand that DHS can revise (notices of funding opportunities) through administrative action that does not require further legislation,” Collins, King and Pingree continued in their letter. “The 45-day requirement does not appear in the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2023 (Div. F, Title II of P.L. 117-328) that created the SSP. DHS created the requirement of its own volition, and DHS has the ability to amend or remove the requirement going forward.” Homeland Security has the ability, and it should do so without delay. Geyer explained the need clearly to the Portland Press Herald. “I can’t stress enough the negative impact it has on cities and municipalities away from the border because of the 45-day limit,” Geyer said. “The work that could be done within 180 days, it just can’t be done within the 45-day limit.”
Do you have thoughts in this issue and others? Feel free to submit a letter to the editor or commentary for consideration. Go to our website, and click on the Opinion tab to make a submission.
