[domc]

This is interesting in today's new. At least VT joins the others.



Only three states score higher than D+ in State Integrity Investigation; 11 flunk | Center for Public Integrity

[thunderkat59]

Originally Posted by domc

This is interesting in today's new. At least VT joins the others.

Attachment 160894

Only three states score higher than D+ in State Integrity Investigation; 11 flunk | Center for Public Integrity

In my last days of VT, a hiding Rutland sheriff pulled me because he thought my back lights were burnt out. Back lights OK, but I had a registration issue. I Was 50 yards out of my driveway. He wouldn't let me back the car up, he called a friend of his with a flatbed and took me to an ATM were I had to empty it and pay them or "my car would be lost for a very long time". During this exchange, he was going to insane lengths to provoke me for some reason, but I didnt bite on it. Not one of my most pleasant memories of VT.

[jackmccullough]

If you read the report you know that your title, "Vermont Corruption", misrepresents what the report found.

While the report found essentially a lack of formal requirements and procedures deemed to be necessary protections against corruption, it also found the following:

Despite its abysmal score — a 60, or D-, 39th in the country — in the latest State Integrity Investigation, an assessment of state government accountability and transparency conducted by the Center for Public Integrity and Global Integrity, Vermont’s state government may be among the cleanest in the land. No one alive can recall even a whiff of suspicion — much less an actual allegation — of high-level bribery.
Vermont gets D- grade in 2015 State Integrity Investigation | Center for Public Integrity

Would I like to see greater protections? Sure. On the other hand, I've lived here thirty-two years, I have dealt with government at all levels, and the implication that corruption is rampant in Vermont government is ridiculous.

[cgregor]

We really have to keep our radar on for the encroachment of corruption.

Jack Abramoff (see the movie, "Cactus Jack and the United States of Money") said, "... so at some point we'd say [to a congressperson or a Capitol Hill staffer], 'When you're done with this job, why don't you come to work for us?' From that point on, we had him."

The CEO of VTel did pretty much that with one of our telecommunication regulators, Karen Marshall, who (some weeks or months after voting a $5 million contract for VTel) quit to go to work for him. She is now one of their lobbyists, apparently.

The statehouse code of ethics needs to be strengthened to prevent this. First: Any company that hires a person within two years of that person's leaving state employment will have all its current and pending contracts suspended until a review has established their propriety Second: Any person so hired, when representing within two years of such hire any entity with a stake in legislation, shall identify themselves before any committee as such a hire, giving details of the relationship between that person and the entity which hired him/her during that person's service in state government.

Make it clunky enough for staties to sell out to the private sector, and we will continue to have legislators and administrators who work for the good of Vermonters, not for their career and financial advancement.

[URob]

There is certainly corruption here but it is not nearly as bad as traditional mafia states like New Jersey or corrupt machine states with party bosses like New York and Pennsylvania. Not sure either about Florida and Louisana, both supposed to be among the worst. Miami area has had a bad reputation for a long time (in terms of corruption). The real estate developers control Tallahasee, regardless of citizen initiatives, not to mention old Cuban mafia interests that set up there and in Nevada after the Castro revolution kicked them out. I don't think there has been a sustained federal effort against organized crime since the Kennedy brothers, who ironically were of course elected in 1960 with mafia or machine help in Chicago.

Vermont is a small state and in spite of Montpelier's continuing consolidation of power, there is still the tradition of local town meeting government. There are also state laws like Act 250 that were originally designed to provide significant citizen participation & empowerment in development decisions. Developers reacted negatively and they have diluted it over time. For example, the Planned Unit Development (PUD) law passed at the bidding of the realtors and developers to increase density & get around local zoning and dilute Act 250. Also, the total exemptions from both Act 250 and all local zoning for industrial wind and solar energy projects to reward crony campaign donors like Blittersdorf. The law was passed to require the so-called "Public" Service Board to green-light nearly every project. But this has still all been mostly transparent, i.e., an open debate.

In South Burlington, there has been ferocious opposition from Chittenden County's Chamber of Commerce crowd against citizen attempts to examine the impacts of turbo-charged growth. Former City Council chair did the bidding of Chamber of Commerce & Homebuilder's lobby until her illegal campaign finance violations temporarily seemed to catch up with her (strangely said she was resigning to take a job out of state when it became apparent the Attorney General was investigating her; and then she never did leave the state or take such a job; and has now "coincidentally" been rewarded by those same Chamber of Commerce folks with board memberships at Vermont Public Television; executive position at the Burlington YMCA, etc.)

Seven Days alternative weekly newspaper has some decent political coverage and is willing to raise the questions and point out the ugly conflicts of interest or at least appearances of conflict of interest that occasionally arise all over the state.

So anyway, I think yes, there is corruption in Vermont. It is human nature and money talks everywhere. But because Vermont is one of the smallest states by population, I think it is not nearly at the same scale as many other places.

[cgregor]

The late Joe Bageant wrote in Deer Hunting for Jesus, It is in the interest of these well-heeed conservative provincials to maintain a feudal state with low taxes, few or no local regulations, a cheap school system, and a chamber of commerce with the state senate on its speed dial. . . Members of the business class, that legion of little Rotary Club spark plugs, are vital to the American corporate and political machine. They are where the institutionalized rip-off of working-class people by th rich corporations finds its footing at the grassroots level... Serving on every local governmental body, this mob of Kiwanians and Rotarians has connections.... When it comes to getting things done locally for big business, these folks, with the help of their lawyers, can raise the dead and give eyesight to the blind." (pp. 44-45)

While Bageant was profiling his hometown of Winchester, Virginia, Vermonters have to be wary that the Vermont Chamber of Commerce is just as likely to aid in corrupting the state government.

[cgregor]

Another instance of how corruption creeps in:

Boston (well, Cambridge, but close enough) lawyer Jack McManus decided to run for governor back in the day and brought in $800,000 of his own money to do so. He was defeated in the primary by farmer Fred Tuttle.

But no mind. The next gubernatorial race involved both candidates spending more than $1,000,000. It was not only remarked as a first ever for the state, but one VPR commentator said it would be hard to "get those worms back into that can," and so it has proven.

One of the Democratic contenders for the 2016 race, Matt Dunne, raised $100,000 from out-of-state donors in one week. Phil Scott, the Republican contender, will owe a lot to the Koch brothers' allied groups (think: Americans for Prosperity and American Legislative Exchange Council, for just two of the 450 in their high-capacity clip).

We could have a campaign finance regulation system that would end this dependency upon and obligation to financial backers, and we could install it one race at a time.

[Biker53]

Originally Posted by jackmccullough

If you read the report you know that your title, "Vermont Corruption", misrepresents what the report found.

While the report found essentially a lack of formal requirements and procedures deemed to be necessary protections against corruption, it also found the following:

Despite its abysmal score — a 60, or D-, 39th in the country — in the latest State Integrity Investigation, an assessment of state government accountability and transparency conducted by the Center for Public Integrity and Global Integrity, Vermont’s state government may be among the cleanest in the land. No one alive can recall even a whiff of suspicion — much less an actual allegation — of high-level bribery.
Vermont gets D- grade in 2015 State Integrity Investigation | Center for Public Integrity

Would I like to see greater protections? Sure. On the other hand, I've lived here thirty-two years, I have dealt with government at all levels, and the implication that corruption is rampant in Vermont government is ridiculous.

I agree. The devil is in the details as they say and the ranking comes from the definition used for the ranking, not actual history of corruption. I think they are penalizing VT for not having as much bureaucracy as other States in this regard.