Candidates discuss Clean Heat Standard, substance abuse in final forum

November 3, 2024 | By Cheryl Casey | Correspondent 

In a final push to reach voters with their message before Election Day, the candidates vying for the Washington-Chittenden Vermont House district’s two seats held one last forum on Friday night.

Candidates for the Washington-Chittenden House district election at forum in Waterbury on Friday, Nov. 1. Left to right: Reps. Tom Stevens and Theresa Wood, both Waterbury Democrats; Waterbury Republican Jonathan Griffin and Independent James Haddad from Huntington. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti

Waterbury Democratic Reps. Tom Stevens and Theresa Wood joined their challengers, Jonathan Griffin, a Waterbury Republican, and Independent James Haddad of Huntington at the Waterbury Main Street fire station. Just four constituents were in attendance along with a reporter. Waterbury Select Board Chair Roger Clapp served as a non-partisan moderator. 

The high rate of return on mail-in ballots across the district, which encompasses Waterbury, Bolton, Huntington, and Buel’s Gore, likely contributed to the small turnout at the forum. According to the interactive map created by University of Vermont’s Center for Community News, 47% of Waterbury’s mail-in ballots, 37% of Bolton’s, and 34% of Huntington’s mail-in ballots had been turned in as of Nov. 1. Buel’s Gore data is folded into the Huntington figures. 

Questions posed to the candidates covered familiar ground from previous forums, particularly housing, property taxes, and school district structure, as well as legislation establishing a clean heat standard and strategies for addressing substance abuse and addiction.

Comments and questions regarding the Public Utility Commission’s recommendations on a clean heat standard came to shape much of the discussion. The Affordable Heat Act (Act 18), which became law in May 2023, enabled the commission to design a potential clean heat standard and submit its recommendations to the State Legislature by January 15, 2025. 

Bolton constituent Phil Harrington at the forum asked what the candidates thought about the commission’s recent report. “If the price is as high as they say it is, or perhaps higher…how high would be a ‘no’ vote for you?” 

Haddad responded first, saying his goal would be to repeal the clean heat standards and then go back to the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2020 (Act 153) and make adjustments “so those benchmarks aren’t such a steep climb for a state like Vermont.” He noted that too many people already can’t afford home heating fuel. “My line would be very close to the present cost,” Haddad said. “I have very little tolerance for increases in any of those kinds of fuels.”

Griffin admitted that this issue was key to his decision to run for a seat in the House. He acknowledged the “steep climb” that Haddad identified for meeting the standards mandated by Act 153: “We need to keep moving the needle in that direction [of renewable, clean energy], but not at the rate that’s set in the Global Warming Solutions Act,” he said. 

Griffin called the Affordable Heat Act “a bad bill,” asserting that the carbon credit system established by it is wrought with problems and unnecessary complexity. However, Griffin added, “the goal [of clean heat] is something we should keep working towards.” 

Wood explained her view of the issue. “The bottom line for me is it needs to be good for Vermonters. It needs to further our climate change goals, but it also needs to be affordable,” she said. The report carries a disclaimer, Wood pointed out, about using the report to estimate the cost to Vermonters. The anticipated detailed bill eventually drafted in the legislature will be informed by both the report and testimony from experts. 

“If estimates come in that are going to raise prices by what people are putting out there right now, it’s not something that I could support,” Wood asserted, admitting that she is otherwise withholding judgment “because we don’t know what the final bill is going to look like.” 

Stevens emphasized the advisory nature of the commission’s report. “This report, this push, is to start the process of conversation. We could never pass this bill in a year or two with the complexity that’s there,” he said referring to the highly technical information contained in the report. 

Stevens said he isn’t alarmed by the costs suggested in the report because “this isn’t everything that’s going to be discussed when we move it forward.”  

As the process moves forward, recommendations will be refined, Stevens noted. “I will not support it if I see the costs are way too high for everybody involved,” he noted. 

Candidates on addiction & Substance abuse

Another topic that hadn’t seen much traction in previous forums was substance abuse and addiction. One constituent asked the candidates how the state could best address this issue and target its spending productively. 

“Holding criminals accountable when they are repeat offenders is one thing we need to do, and treatment and prevention is the other,” Griffin answered, adding that he would “rather see the money go to the latter.” 

Haddad referenced Portugal’s 2001 groundbreaking decriminalization of personal drug possession and use as a noteworthy strategy for reducing rates of drug use and drug-related deaths. But, he insisted, “someone who commits a crime shouldn’t be given a slap on the wrist” if that crime was drug-related or the perpetrator was high when the crime was committed. “You have to put them in jail if they’re committing crimes,” Haddad said. “You can’t keep putting a revolving door in.” He also argued for providing counseling and treatment services that work in measurable ways. 

Wood, who chairs the House Committee on Human Services, spoke about her committee’s work to understand the dynamics of substance use and contributing factors including poverty, trauma, and physicians overprescribing. “You really need a wide cadre of supports,” she explained, pointing to Vermont’s Hub-and-Spoke system, which has been praised across the country “as being one of the premier ways to address this [substance use treatment],” Wood said. In an analysis of this model published in the Journal of Addiction Medicine in 2017, researchers concluded that Vermont’s system “may serve as a helpful model in other states.” 

Wood also pointed to the importance of early intervention such as through after-school programs that reach “kids at the youngest ages.”

“We have invested in afterschool programs and are doing that with the sales tax paid from the legalization of cannabis,” Wood explained. In addition, the state has an opioid settlement fund provided by drug manufacturers that has put several million dollars toward combating this epidemic.

Stevens compared the challenge of curbing substance use disorders to trying to get a firm grip on a slippery fish: “It changes every time we think we’ve solved the problem…something else always moves in,” he said. 

Stevens agreed with Wood’s observation that an extensive support system is crucial. “Recovery is hard and people fail—a lot,” Stevens said. “The reality is they have to have room to fail,” he argued, which costs money. He encouraged community members and service providers to find compassion for that process. “This is one of those things [where] government is not a business. There’s no money to be made, but this is something we have to do as part of our society.” 

In closing, all of the candidates thanked each other for participating in the discussion and summarized their positions. Stevens and Wood both referred to their years of service and accessibility to constituents to answer their questions, assist them with navigating state government or involve them to testify to legislative committees. Griffin and Haddad emphasized that they are running to be an alternative to the Democratic majority in the legislature, presenting themselves as candidates for change.

See more election coverage on the Waterbury Roundabout General Election page.