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The Three Hs: housing, hunger and healthcare
Photo courtesy VTDigger A basic goal of civil government is that its citizens should have a secure place protected from the elements in which to live and perhaps raise… Read More
We need to rethink our systems of governing
Vermont State House On Election Day, as I confronted my voting ballot in the Hinesburg Town Hall, I was daunted to find that for the first time there… Read More
Real leaders don’t amplify differences, they bridge them.
Vermont State Capital Governor Phil Scott pulled off a trifecta win in the latest election. The “most popular” governor in the country, a non-MAGA, conservative Republican in a liberal state,… Read More
Preventing chronic toxic stress in our communities
Life is stressful. No amount of wealth or privilege protects us from stress. In fact, there’s reason to believe that privilege, insofar as it isolates us from a shared humanity,… Read More
Book bans, censorship… what’s next?
Courtesy Morrisville Centennial Library I oppose book bans. Having said that, I don’t believe freedom is an absolute. History has taught us that we need commonly agreed upon limits to… Read More
Rural Free Delivery (RFD)… Rest in Peace (RIP)?
Shutterstock I think the heat-drunk garter snake living in our mailbox is an omen. As I lower the dented cover and reach gingerly inside to get our mail, I wonder… Read More
The Arc of Aging and Leadership
Shutterstock image Like a good novel, our lives have a narrative arc, during which we are actively participating in and relevant to our world. We are born, rise slowly… Read More
School Budgets and Property Taxes
Champlain Valley Union High School Do we honestly believe we overpay our children’s teachers? There is a logical disconnect in our discussions about local school budgets driving property tax increases.… Read More
The Ghost Quartet: Part I
If we zoom out and look with cynicism at the health care crisis in America, we see a… Read More
Can We Get our Legislative Act Together?
Public domain image I don’t know whether it’s the natural wariness of Vermont’s early immigrants who succeeded the native peoples who had foraged and hunted here for millennia but… Read More
Save the Children: Eliminate Cellphones in Our Schools
Public Domain image Vermont Senate Bill 284, “Phone-free School Legislation,” now sitting in the House Education Committee is winding its way through the legislature and should garner the attention of… Read More
What are the dumbest things we do or don’t do in Vermont?
We like to think of ourselves as progressive, pioneering and aware of our neighbors’ needs. Why then do we have some of the worst socioeconomic benchmarks in America? Unsheltered: As… Read More