[00:00:02] Hello, everyone, and welcome back to our weekly webinar series that occurs here on our Facebook page every Friday at 12:00. Today we have with us Rob Kidd, who is the conservation program manager at Sierra Club for the Vermont Chapter qnd he's going to be talking about the transportation bill that's extremely relevant right now in the state House. Rob, thank you so much for being here.
[00:00:26] Thank you very much. I appreciate being able to talk about the transportation bill. Actually doing these live webinars is kind of a pleasant event because, you know, we're normally out there talking with people individually one on one and doing different group meetings. So at least we're still being able to communicate with the populous as a whole. Actually, I want to introduce a term that we've been using within the advocacy world. We now have what's called democracy by Zoom because our legislative process is happening on Zoom meetings. So it's kind of a new world we're facing right now.
[00:01:06] And just speaking about the advocacy world, do you mind talking a little bit about what your work is at Sierra club and just how you are the only person staffed in Vermont for them? I just wanted to know if you could talk a little bit to us about your experience with that and your role.
[00:01:25] So, OK, I will actually reference reference, first off, the Sierra Club for those who don't know who we are we are the nation's largest and oldest conservation based organization we originally formed in California, advocating around the access to the outdoors with John Muir and it was more of an outings club and evolved into protecting natural landscapes. And so we have and then it basically came further east. There's chapters all throughout the country. We have over 4.3 million members and supporters. Right now in Vermont we have about 14000 members and supporters. So those who contribute to us are very vital to us. But unlike a lot of other organizations, a lot of people look at Sierra Club as being a big green. But we're very dependent on our grassroots nature. In the chapter levels, there's a lot of volunteers.
[00:02:19] We have an executive committee that. It's supposed to be 10 members. Right now we're down to down to nine because somebody else left, but we have the All Volunteer Executive Committee who makes the policy decisions and does a lot of the advocacy work that I'm working on. Because as a lone staff person, I can't be involved with everything out there. So volunteers in the grassroots is a very key point of what the Sierra Club does. Now for my program area, as the staffed person we looked at it and reviewed different issues over the last few years to see where the Sierra Club in Vermont could put the biggest bang for our buck. Where can we make a difference on? And we looked at transportation issues. And basically the reason why we chose to start working on transportation is because between 43 and 47 percent of our carbon emissions are coming from the transportation sector. So how are we going to address climate change here in Vermont if we don't address what we're doing on transportation? So we prioritize my campaign work to work on that, to look at that, how can we move, move forward? So some of my program areas has been focused on a vehicle electrification, advancement of public transit. That's been a complete street policy's advancement of rail. There's a whole gamut of things that you can work on in transportation issues. So it's not just a one size fits all. There's all of the above. Got to be done to fix our the world we're in.
[00:04:01] Definitely. And I think this rolls perfectly into just you explaining everything that's going on in Vermont right now with the transportation bill that the Transportation Committee is currently fast tracking. So before I send it off to you, I just want to remind anyone, if you have questions or comments for us, please put them in the comments section below. And yeah, I'm really excited to hear what Robb has to say.
[00:04:27] So, yeah. So you invited me to primarily talk about the transportation bill.
[00:04:32] So I want to give full credit to the Vermont House Transportation Committee on March 13th. The Transportation Committee passed out what was known as the transportation Bill. H 942 and it had a lot of really good measures in there to kind of invest in vehicle electrification. It created transportation demand management program, invest in the downtown development and explore ways that we can address carbon emissions. But unfortunately, the COVID19 crisis came along, the legislature shut down and the the state's finances dropped dramatically. You know, actually the transportation budget dropped by forty five million dollar shortfalls just for the fiscal year. So they've had to kind of reveal and revamp and look at things, how things can be evolved.
[00:05:39] At first there was a lot of uncertainty. What was going to happen? How are we going to continue this? How are we going to vote? How are the committee's is going to meet? How are you going to respond to the needs of people who are taking public transit?
[00:05:54] So on the federal level, an act was passed called the CARES act, which fortunately if I am correct if I'm not exactly on top of the exact number, but over $20 million came to the state of Vermont to support our public transit and to make sure that the safety of the passengers and safety of the drivers were met. And one of the things we've responded is all the transit agencies in Vermont sarted actually by going fare free and creating protective measures for the drivers and sanitation program. I think you guys had Chairman Curt McCormack talk about some of these things a couple of weeks ago. So I'm not going to go into those details. But, you know, there's a lot of really good programs that they're trying to do and money that's going to help those particular programs. So the short end is the committee then the House Transportation Committee has been meeting a couple of times a week and doing it through Zoom meetings. And it's kind of really nice as you can actually access from the legislative website, the video recordings on YouTube. Now say if you missed the meeting, you can actually listen to it live or listen to it the next day.
[00:07:12] Yesterday actually I rode my bike while watching it, listening to it. So you can actually do it from home, too, from wherever you are. So it actually gives you maybe a little bit more access to it.
[00:07:23] So.
[00:07:25] What it comes down to the basically because the lack of money and the lack of time for the stae of transportation has now to work on other issues. They proposed back to the Transportation Committee a brand new bill, what they called must pass.
[00:07:44] And they went through it and they presented to the committee and then simultaneously the committee some of the committee members created alternate language because they want to keep some of their priorities in this particular bill. So I am curious, I am just going to reiterate the bill's number is H 942 and the way it's going to proceed is that already passed out of the House Transportation Committee and was reviewed by the House Appropriations Committee and the whole House was going to vote on this. But now the committee is going to introduce what's known as a strike all amendment, where they're going to just take place of that whole bill with practically a brand new bill so that the committee is going to finalize. I'm been told they're trying to finalize the document. So the committee can vote on the final product today at 3:00 o'clock. I was hoping they actually have the final words, but I'm going to do a quick little summary of the different components of that particular bill. So everybody sees the good work that the members, the members of the committee have been trying to do and how to respond. So actually so H942, the transportation bill basically covers all the funding of the Transportation Committee and all the different agency transportation, all the different projects related to transportation. Some of the good things actually in this particular bill. Basically, one of the things that's really important is, yes, they've had to cut some of the programs around electric vehicle incentives. But thanks to Representative Mike McCarthy from St. All Albans, they've added some language, giving the agency the flexibility to adapt to the crisis but also kind of making sure that they consider, you know, our climate measures like, you know, the state of Vermont in 2016 passed a comprehensive energy plan, adopted a comprehensive energy plan to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. And the committee has been working hard to do this. And so as a result, they've had to remove the electric vehicle incentive program, which is still going to be happening because there's still another million dollars in the
[00:10:11] revenues. But they're going to need to kind of hopefully maybe if they're the federal government, add a new bill that gives extra revenues or extra revenues come in a different source. The Agency of Transportation understands that the House Transportation Committee wanted the priority of these programs.
[00:10:30] So they have given this kind of the flexibility to make sure that we keep our eyes focused on creating these incentives and then also making sure that Vermonters are still employed.
[00:10:44] So that's one key area of the way they have changed that particular bill. Another actually one moment I'm just trying to pull up my document. Another key area on that actually public transit. The original public transit bill a section of the bill had 1.5 million dollars distributed to public transit. One was going to go to a fare free transit program and that was going to encourage that. They explore how to go fare free transit for everybody's reference in Vermont. Fare free the transportation revenues from fares
[00:11:31] Was about $2.2 million for Chittenden County and for the rest of the state was about half a million dollars. So they were gonna commit a half a million dollars to make sure that we explored the idea of fare free transit. But now, as a result of the Covid-19 crisis and the federal CARES money, they've been able to make sure that the Green Mountain trains and all the other transit agencies are operating as fare free. But then also we don't want to see that rapidly disappear. So more language in the committee will make sure that they kind of look at that. If it allows money to be spent, then they can continue having a fare free transit program. So it just gives accessibility to the transit programs even more. Then also in the current version, they now have five hundred thousand dollars going to two programs to increase the usage of public transit ridership. Last year, the Agency of Transportation from the director of the Legislature did a study on public transit on how to increase public transit and they created a huge report that they presented and gave up a whole list of suggestions of how the agency can continue promoting public transit in Vermont, such as fare free transit was included using transportation demand management programs, even increased marketing. Newer technology, all the working with different partners to make sure that people were aware of transportation. So this money directly goes to working on that and marketing and promoting. And there also was originally another five hundred thousand dollars that was supposed to go to possibly purchasing electric the electric buses. But because of the financial crisis, they are now be able to continue that. But like what I said, with electric vehicles, the same language about prioritizing our choices is included in that and so that way we can actually move forward with that, with these particular ideas are still out there on the table. And the agency of transportation has flexibility to move forward.
[00:14:00] Now, unfortunately, I actually reference that the electric vehicle incentive program is basically being cut, but the revenues, the program revenues are not being added to at this particular time.
[00:14:15] But there are some key programs. A lot of people don't realize if you go to the Drive Electric Vermont Website and as a tracker of the different incentives that are going on and look on to that, because the latest information I've heard is, even though car sales are dropping because people aren't going out buying cars. The greatest percentage of car buying right now is a much higher percentage is electric vehicles because those who are really shopping for electric vehicle are going to buy one now even more. So it's a really good program to continue, but we don't have the particular money. Also on the regional proposal, there's also $750000 that was supposed to go to electric vehicle charging infrastructure. That is not in the House transportation bill, but it's in another bill in the legislature called the capital bill, which is through bonding for infrastructure programs.
[00:15:12] So it is there, but it's not within the transportation bill. And a lot of people wonder why, like, you know, electric vehicle charging that actually just makes sure that the fear of people not being able to charge the vehicle they can travel further distance. They can go that extra mile and not worry about getting a charge on their vehicle. But still, with around charging, 90 percent of charging for electric vehicle takes place at the person's home. So it is helping that fear of being rural. Another really good point on this is there's a fund called the Downtown Development Fund and I don't know the exact numbers, but I think it's been underfunded for the last number years.
[00:16:04] And the committee wanted to make sure compared to the governor's request, that they add an additional hundred thousand dollars still to this program. And I think that's a really important program to focus, because you see a lot of our downtowns are now going to be suffering because of the lack of economic activity. So we can invest some money into the downtowns and develop programs that help people and help the communities make better, friendlier, passive, pedestrian and bicycle friendly communities, other economic act drivers that help downtowns. It could be a really good import measure.
[00:16:42] And then one other kind of key point I want to actually reference is on the last transportation bill, there was a section about transportation demand management and this is how you would work with employers to reduce the demand of transportation and working with employers to incentivize different programs. And the legislature worked really hard, thanks to Representative Rebecca White from down in Hartford or White River Junction im not sure exactly I think White River Junction she represents to look into creating a pilot program, how they would work with key larger employers to make sure people had access to alternative transportation measures and kind of incentivized. Unfortunately, because of budgetary constraints, that program was kind of scrapped by the agency in Transportation in their request. But the committee decided upon today about looking into the idea of telecommuting now with covid 19, there are so many of us out there working from home. I'm working at home right now. My wife is working at home. My neighbors.
[00:18:02] All of them who still have employment are able to do their work at home. So what they're going to do is kind of look into and study the impacts of telecommuting and look at how much it saves different employers, how much it saved our carbon emissions, how much is it saving in people's times?
[00:18:23] A lot of Vermonters spend a lot more time trying to get to work and money and their income, getting to work but if all of these jobs where we don't need to be in a building all the time, it can be really helpful as a benefit for people to be able to work from home. So that's something really we've moved forward in looking into. And obviously, you know, its worked. Telecommuting and also, I'm going to give a little plug for sustainable transportation group here.
[00:18:53] I know you guys, you all were working on some type of survey about telecommuting, about people who've been doing that. So if you, Brianna, if you have information regarding that. But I think that's a really good thing we can think about in the upcoming future.
[00:19:10] Now, there are also there was other talk in the particular legislation, but it didn't happen about making sure that, you know, that they were going to get extra revenues coming in, that maybe those projects where they were looking at paving roads and making them the buffer zone and bike paths a little bit wider. Maybe they should consider that to make sure that there's extra room for bicycle's on the side of the road. And it's going to cost a little bit more money. But we have federal money coming in to support something like that. I think that would be something really good for us to proceed forward.
[00:19:51] Forward with.
[00:19:53] There is another key component in this particular bill it is funding towards Lamoile Valley Rail Trail. For those who don't know, that trail is currently operating in different points between Mooresville and Jeffersonville and between Danville and St. Johnsbury. And there's different components where they're trying to connect to go all the way to St. Alban's. I think it's a one hundred mile thing and there's been a lot of microbusinesses popping up alongside the trail, creating an economic activity, but it's actually encouraging biking opportunities. So there is some money in that particular bill to go towards that. I think it's seven hundred thousand dollars is the exact number. So there's actually some actually good movement that is passing out there.
[00:20:49] And then further, like another $2 million to the capital bill is for long term infrastructure to support that particular program. There also is for those in your area. So for those in your area of the Burlington, there actually is some money and directive to the Amtrak station that they're hopefully going to be online by December 2021 and so that's going to actually be moving along that project, even though right now currently Amtrak is not operating in Vermont. It's going to return. So maybe we've got to make sure we have the proper infrastructure for the return to these particular mechanisms. And that's going to be the key point of all of this group Sustainable
[00:21:46] transportation of Vermont about the transportation bill. There's a whole line of other things in there, like the central garage and maintenance programs, there's even the thing about a new thing called Portland Cement to which actually is a much more environmentally friendly cement, but still I am not going to say, it's our top priority, but it's something that can move the envelope alowing something and there's a lot of other things that I am not going to go into talking about that now. I just see one question on the side here somebody is questioning about how nonresidential vehicle chargers are mainly financed to placate the E.V. owners. Actually, it actually will help those in a lot of rural communities because the more electric vehicles out there, it will actually add extra money to the local economy. For every dollar you spend on gasoline. Eighty five cents of it. Eighty five cents leaves the state of Vermont comparatively. Every dollar you spent on electricity in in Vermont about sixty five cents stays within Vermont. So it's helpful. It's a helpful keeping money within the state. And actually, the more electricity we use, the most electricity that's out there in the public sphere for electric vehicle charging is done at night so the more we can vehicle electrification, it will actually cause the demand at the middle of the night to use excess energy. So then actually lower electric vehicle, lower electricity rates because the electric utilities who are going to be able to bring in extra revenues that they weren't basically on electricity that they weren't using. So this is basically supporting the electric vehicle infrastructure. Helps get over those particular fear range anxiety, helps make sure that other people are coming and traveling within Vermont have access to charging. So it's helpful for the whole economy as a whole.
[00:24:00] So actually, I see Jack also threw in a question here about do you think the state will work to keep transit free beyond covid? No, actually, that was a big point of discussion yesterday with the Transportation Committee and this language that they indicated that it is a priority for them to move forward for free transit.
[00:24:22] And it's something that we need to go ahead with and we'll look at. Continuing that program right now, the federal Covid 19 money is actually helping finance it, but we can look at it as a way to
[00:24:41] explore those particular issues and making sure that people have access and it's not a barrier to getting on the bus.
[00:24:53] I like this one, how do you think most legislators get to the statehouse?
[00:24:57] Do they carpool or bus? Well, during the legislative session, I think Montpelier's population goes up because a lot of the legislators during the session who live further away or rent that rent apartments or rent a hotel space so a lot of them will stay here but those who live in Chittenden County, you know, they will who don't live far enough away. I know. Curt McCormack actually does take the bus himself. He's actually one of the few legislators that does not even own a car. Representative Mary Sullivan, she'll try to carpool and bus with people. There's a lot of others who do that in other parts of the state they will come up with other people from their delegation, maybe further up. But not all, there is a lot of things that I think they can improve upon, but I think a lot of them are mostly cognizant of that now. And, you know, then busing from other people. It's like it's not easy to get to Montpelier on a bus. And so we're going to have to maybe explore those particular options and.
[00:26:07] And Brianna, do you have something to ask me here?
[00:26:11] Yeah, I was just going to talk a little bit about how sustainable transportation Vermont really values and thinks behavior change is something really important. But before that, you know Sustainable Transportation Vermont is also a huge supporter of TDM and Richard Watts, who is the co-founder of Sustainable Transportation, Vermont asked something about what was happening with TDM legislation.
[00:26:36] So the original House transportation bill, they had language in there for a pilot program on TDM. And the agency was agreed to the language in there and they were going to go ahead with it. But now with covid 19 there basically came back and saying we don't have the capacity to work on that particular idea. And they totally recommend scrapping that in the in the administration proposal. Representative Rebecca White, who was looking into that was kind of, I don't want to say, probably disappointed that that program was disappearing, but instead what they did is created this study on the telecommuting and that was what was mentioned earlier in the conversation that's now in the House transportation bill that will look into the measures about how we can foster to support telecommuting at this juncture, and the agency agreed to do that. And they'll agree to working with the Agency of Economic Development to create that report. And actually for also reference. Fifty thousand dollars they say it would cost to do that report. And they had the money in their budget basically on federal transportation research programs. So it's not coming out of any fund that would support another program. So I hope I answered that question well enough. Richard, it's not full TDM, but it's a movement forward based on the timeframe of covid 19.
[00:28:11] OK. Awesome. I'm sure Richard will come back if he has any other questions. But speaking about covid and how covid has shifted so many people to working remotely it's kind of sparked some sort of behavior change. Do you have any advice for people that are watching and want to start practicing more environmentaly friendly practices in their lifestyle? Do you have any advice for that? And how do you yourself incorporate your beliefs into your everyday lifestyle?
[00:28:45] Perfect. So actually myself, I live in Montpelier. I live a mile from the State House. And so I constantly have chose to live in a town where I could walk to work. I I can't stand commuting. I actually grew up outside of New York City. And most of the friends I grew sit in a bus train, drive in traffic and take some hours to get to work. I want to enjoy all the time I have free not working or not trying to get to work.
[00:29:19] So it's one of the things I purposely chose to do is live within town so I can work, walk to getting to work. It saves me on that. And I actually myself as well bike a lot.
[00:29:32] And I see a lot of people now even buying electric bikes because you can actually go those extra additional miles that even if you're not in the best shape, you can go that four miles to middle of town and catch a bus if you need to. So that's one of the particular areas we can do. And I also think, you know, this idea of telecommuting is really helpful. I was talking with some folks here in Montpelier who were trying to push parking charging higher rates for parking in town. And, you know, yes, it would cause people not to park in town if it costs more. And I went and talked to some of my folks in the union and talked about, well, you know, how would you guys feel that your employees need to pay for parking?
[00:30:22] And they said, oh, my God, we can't do that. And like, you know, but if you help us by getting us to allow greater telecommuting, doing things like that, you know, that would be it, actually. We'd appreciate that. So I kind of look onto what's concurs. The telecommuting portion. And then we can look at which make it more difficult to park. But once everybody is able to, they don't have a need to drive into town they're living close enough where they can walk to work. And we're doing the downtown development. We're doing those different things. That's where I see it evolving and that we can do that. Like even though I am fortunate before
[00:31:05] this happened
[00:31:06] I would work at home two days a week anyway, even though I live so close to my office where I work at half a day here, then walk to the office and a lot of our jobs, we don't need to be at an office anymore. You know, with virtual technology, we can access that. But not everybody has that. So we got to consider that. You know, not everybody has broadband access and strong enough broadband. And we have to kind of look on making sure that people do have the proper technology to access that stuff. So it's it's not as simple where we can just flip the switch and everybody can take part in this.
[00:31:41] Definitely, definitely. And I think Covid has totally changed people's mindsets on how they can help and change their lifestyle to help the environment. And I'm just wondering, looking forward and how this bill addresses our priorities and how the state will address climate change. Does this work in any way relate to your work with the Transportation Climate Initiative? And if you could just describe your work with that as well.
[00:32:11] Oh, good. The Transportation Crime Initiative. I was hoping that would be brought up for those who were aware that the Transportation Climate Initiative is a multi-state regional pact to basically put a cap in investment on transportation emissions in the whole Northeast. And, you know, they were doing some modeling programs to look into how we can do that program and they were originally were supposed to give what they call their final M-O. You know, memorandum of understanding was supposed to be out in April.
[00:32:51] And basically all the states would say, yes, no, whether they're going to participate. We were really hoping for that because a as I've already stated, 47 percent of our climate emissions comes from transportation.
[00:33:05] So we need to address that, but we need to take revenues and the profits from \motor vehicle fuels and RET and invest in other opportunities, invest in bike share, invest in train, invest in alternative programs and car pooling services we need and we don't have the money. We don't have the resources to do that. So those are a kind of a really critical way to do that is by getting dollars into the state that we're leaving here in the first place. Now, there are some estimates I saw you could have brought in, we could be in it, bring 10 million dollars additional a year from implementing that program just as a start. And now there's higher estimates. You could bring up the forty five million dollars a year so we can bring money in there. But but then use less gasoline, less oil. And Vermonters aren't paying their salaries to go to things like that. I think is a win for us. So I think it's all tied in together. Like, you know, we we do a program like the Transportation Climate Initiative. We can fund the programs to transition away to cleaner transportation system for all. So I told you it was going to happen on April 8. Now, they officially announced that November is the final memorandum understanding because the economy has changed dramatically. So they've got to relook at the numbers and reassess it.
[00:34:37] And we're hoping that maybe we can still proceed forward. And for those who are having some fears around gasoline and additional costs on gasoline, you know, it's something that we had to kind of maybe address and make sure that those who are more vulnerable to paying higher prices at the pump are helped in the process. So these programs aren't just going to help those wealthy individuals who can afford electric vehicle right now. These proceeds gonna go helping people who aren't being able to pay into programs.
[00:35:10] Definitely. Well, thank you. And I think that was my last question. One thing that I just I guess I have one more question. How can individuals show their support or concern for this bill? Like, for example, how TDM, it's kind of been scrapped. How can individuals kind of show the Transportation Committee in these last couple you said that it was going to come out with the final decision, correct?
[00:35:40] Yeah. So the final bill should be coming out sometime or close to it should be coming out. Well, I was told there was possibly going to be out by lunchtime. And I don't see the latest version yet. But, you know, the legislative process I want everybody realize legislators are even ones, even those that you may not necessarily agree with. And they put a lot of time and effort into it. And to learn and pick.
[00:36:11] Taken together, understanding of all these particular issues. It takes a lot of work. So I always encourage people to give gratitude for those, even if it's not the perfect bill. You know, Representative Mike McCarthy worked really hard to get this critical language to still consider our climate of priorities and our communication I had with him. He's kind of like frustrated that they actually had the same intensely gut the funding towards electric vehicle incentives. I told you about Rebecca White who worked really hard to get the TDM legislation and now has to bring it down to just this program is kind of you know, they're trying to make do with the best of the situation. They're trying to move forward with all these policy ideas. And what makes sense for our future. So the best thing I would say to do is everybody to contact their individual legislator and say thank you for your time. And I'd love to talk to you more or to give you some insights, because these are my priorities and this is the way I think about it. And so you're saying you didn't do enough?
[00:37:20] Yep.
[00:37:22] I mean, I do that, too, as well. I used to see some of my comments I've made about some of the legislators. I tell them as I do that at times as well. But doing the thank you goes a long way for them.
[00:37:35] Definitely. OK. I think that was my last question. Do you have anything else you'd like to say or anything?
[00:37:41] No, thank you very much. Thank you for the work you all are doing. Richard and Jack and Brianna, I appreciate being able to come on and to any people listening
[00:37:54] I'd like to talk if you haven't noticed that. Yes. So not being able to be on the street talking with people. It's kind of a challenge. So. So I appreciate the time.
[00:38:06] Well, thank you. And we hope to have you back here and to hear more. And definitely keep us updated. On what's going on in the bill and everything.
[00:38:15] Well, thank you.
[00:38:16] Yes. So now I'm just going to announce our speaker for next week as well as I just want to make a quick announcement about our YouTube channel. So we recently just created a channel that will have all of our videos from the past of this series that are posted and we'll post all the new ones as well. So if you know anyone that struggles to access these videos through Facebook now, they can see them on YouTube. We still haven't figured out really how to broadcast them live on YouTube. So they'll be able to access probably a day later then so Saturday, is usually is when they'll be available. But this is the page. And in the comments section, I added the link to the YouTube channel. So feel free to subscribe and like and post your comments and we would really appreciate your feedback on everything.
[00:39:09] So thank you all for joining us. And next, week definitely tune in next week. We are going to have.
[00:39:19] Kelly Stoddard-Poor, who's the director of The Livable Community Initiative, and she's going to talk a little bit about how to make downtowns work. So tune in next Friday, May 29 at 12:00.
[00:39:31] And thank you, everyone, for being here.