Governor Peter Shumlin’s plan
to finance a major expansion of child care programs is sharply dividing Vermont’s early childhood community. There’s nearly unanimous support for the proposal
to increase funding for child care subsidies. But there’s
disagreement over how to pay for the initiative.
Experts in child sex abuse want to shift the state’s conversation from how to punish offenders, to how to prevent these crimes in the first place. We find out what kids need to know to keep themselves safe.
Melissa Riegel-Garret is a child care advocate. Mary Powell is the
president of Green Mountain Power and the co-chair of Governor
Douglas’s Building Bright Futures Council. They spoke with VPR’s Jane
Lindholm about the challenges of providing
affordable, high quality day care.
Vermont students are better than average; two Vermont cities are working with other communities throughout New England to help control global climate change; Congressman Peter Welch says he hopes President Bush drops his opposition to expanding a national children’s health insurance program; the editor of the Brattleboro Reformer is joining the Douglas administration.
Wiretapping attorneys, political fundraising and hospital rates were only some of the stories that caught our attention this week. A college campus dealt with two assaults, California turned its eye to Vermont’s car emissions trial and some home owners felt the pinch of adjusted mortgage rates.
Last spring the Legislature passed a law instructing the state to cut childhood poverty in half over the next 10 years. The effort has brought together lawmakers, state agencies and non-profit groups to rethink how we deal with poverty in Vermont. We talk with some of the people behind this effort about the new approach they’re taking.
Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders serves on the committee that drafted a 35 billion dollar expansion of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. He says the bill would provide medical coverage to more than three million children who don’t have it now.