Rep. Selene Colburn: Progs lay out Bold Policy Agenda | Feb. 12, 2021

Feb 12

Friend,

This is Rep. Selene Colburn, Progressive Caucus Chair, with your weekly legislative update. This week, the House Progressive Caucus laid out our bold platform for the current biennium during a press conference on Tuesday (you can watch the whole thing here!). I want to share with you a summary of the work we plan to do and some of the issues we hope to rally around. You can read a longer version of this here-- our whole caucus has been collaborating on this framework, and we’re proud of the vision that we’ve laid out.

But first-- we need your support! Please consider donating to the Progressive Party today-- we cannot do this work alone. Your donation will help us contine to fight for bold, progressive reforms in the legislature and create a more equitable society for all Vermonters.

COVID-19 Recovery with Equity and Justice

We’re centering our work around an equitable and just response to the COVID-19 pandemic for all Vermonters. This past year has only exacerbated existing inequities and torn apart the meager social safety nets that were in place. Each day, we learn more about the disparate impacts of the pandemic on BIPOC Vermonters, women, and people who were struggling economically before last March. We face pressure to return to “normal” as quickly as possible, but the status quo did not work for many people, especially underserved and undervalued members of our communities. We cannot simply go back to a status quo rooted in inequity. It’s time for bold, transformative policy work that moves us to a more equitable and just Vermont.

Public Safety & Equity

We are re-envisioning public safety as a framework of transformative, intersectional policies that build equity and fairness into all of our institutions, that guarantee access to healthcare, housing, and economic opportunity, and that redirect our justice system away from crime, punishment, and trauma towards accountability, healing and restoration of the social fabric. Progressives will support and introduce legislation to address indigenous rights and sovereignty, disparities in the criminal justice system, community oversight of police, the decriminalization of sex work and drug posssession, and much more. We understand the exacerbated impacts of the current pandemic. We also know that we have faced many epidemics over the years, and yet we only seem to address those that impact the majority of our communities; not those that impact the most vulnerable.

Economic Dignity

There have been major disparities in the economic impact of the pandemic between the wealthiest and poorest Vermonters. Vermonters in the top 1% of the population based on wealth saw HIGHER third-quarter profits in 2020, while Vermonters in the bottom 50% struggled to get the health and resources they needed. Women and BIPOC Vermonters were disproportionately affected by the economic struggles brought on by the pandemic. We need to move forward with policies that center working people and families, and those most in need of protection and help-- from paying livable wages to transforming our current unemployment system to one that centers workers.

Climate Justice

We know that another crisis that threatens all of us is well underway. Our planet is in dire need of bold, systemic changes to our ways of life. We need to act quickly to invest in regenerative agriculture, clean energy and transportation, and the protection of sovereignty of native lands, while banning the development of new fossil fuel infrastructure. Despite ambitious goals set forth in Vermont’s Comprehensive Energy Plan and our alignment with the Paris Climate Accord, greenhouse gases have actually increased 16% over 1990 levels. And 45% of those greenhouse gases come from the transportation sector. We need to create a plan for a just transition from an extractive economy to a regenerative economy, one that takes care of all people and the planet.

Access to Democracy

It is now more important than ever to ensure that all voices are heard and that our processes are transparent, accessible and fair. We are seeing our very democracy threatened and challenged and we must fight not only to protect our flawed system but to improve it. Our vision of an expansion of democracy includes long-held progressive issues such as meaningful campaign finance reform, ranked choice voting, all-resident voting, and newly arising issues like mail-in ballot curing.

Thanks for joining me this week! I’m excited to see what we can accomplish in this biennium with such a strong, committed group of progressives in the legislature.

In solidarity,

Rep. Selene Colburn, Chittenden 6-4

Progressives in the News

Progressive Caucus

Final Reading: Progs lay out an ambitious agenda- Kit Norton, VTDigger

Rep. Selene Colburn

Sexual assault bill would redefine consent in state law- Ellie French, VTDigger

Vermont House rejects executive order to form new law-enforcement agency- Kit Norton, VTDigger

Rep. Tanya Vyhovsky

Safety chief apologizes for describing exchange with female lawmaker as ‘uppity’- Kit Norton, VTDigger

Straw Men and Uppity Women- John Walters, The Vermont Political Observer

Rep. Taylor Small