Vermont Business Magazine By vetoing a measure that would save millions of dollars in healthcare costs – and relieve pressure on the education property tax – Governor Phil Scott Wednesday showed his "affordability agenda is nothing but hot air," according to the state’s largest union.
“We can’t believe that after all of his platitudes about making Vermont more affordable, the governor said ‘no’ to saving Vermonters tens of millions of dollars and reducing pressure on education property taxes,” said Don Tinney, a high school English teacher who serves as the elected president of the Vermont-NEA. “He had a chance to show Vermonters he means what he says about affordability. He blew it.”
The measure he vetoed would have given hospital regulators a chance to lock-in savings for healthcare covering school employees, small businesses, and those Vermonters who buy their insurance on Vermont Health Connect a year earlier than anticipated. Estimates of how much money the measure would have saved beginning next year ranged in the tens of millions of dollars.
Because the measure would have cut costs for school districts and their employees, it would have reduced education property taxes by controlling one of the biggest cost-drivers school boards face every year, the VT-NEA said.
“The governor today showed that when it comes to reigning in out-of-control hospital and healthcare costs, he’s all talk and no action,” Tinney said. “Vermonters should ask the governor why he doesn’t want to save them money.”
For more details on the projected savings amounts, please read this study from the Green Mountain Care Board.
Governor Scott said in his veto message, in part, that, "The Department of Financial Regulation, those claims do not hold up. The GMCB has authority to control or reduce hospital prices and revenue, so this bill is unnecessary to achieve both." The GMBC, he said, controls costs for all Vermonters, not just those noted in the bill.
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Vermont Business Magazine