 Welcome to the candidates forum here on Orca Media is presented also by the bridge to help voters know their candidates better. I'm Linda Radke this evening's moderator and these forums are intended to provide candidates with the opportunity to share their views and explain why they think they should be elected. It's not a debate so they will not question each other. These forums are unique in that we've invited all candidates who are in the November 8th ballot not just those from major parties. Before introducing the three candidates we have with us I'll go over the format. We asked the public for questions in advance and we use them to help us develop a list of questions for the candidates. During this program we also call use call-in questions. A volunteer will write down the questions and pass them on to me the moderator will fit as many questions as we can. Questions were not given to the candidates in advance. First every candidate will have two minutes to introduce themselves, explain why they're running and to make opening remarks. After that candidates will have one minute and a half to answer each question and at the end one minute for closing statements. Let's start first with Gina Galfetti from Berrytown. Good evening and I'd like to thank the bridge in Orca Media for having me on tonight. It's a great chance to see what everybody has to say and their thoughts. I'm running because when I moved back to Vermont after a 15-year absence I saw a place that had greatly changed and not necessarily for the better. I realized that as a Vermonter who was born and raised in Berry it was my duty to run for public office. The high cost of living, the lack of trade and vocational training and the push of the green agenda no matter what the cost are all issues that I feel strongly about. I'm an average Vermonter who owns and works a small blue-color painting business and I feel Vermont needs more people like me in the legislature because I experience the issues that average income Vermonters experience. I think it is very important to have folks in the legislature who are not people that aspire to be career politicians. I want to see more balance in Montpelier and provide Phil Scott with an offensive and defensive line. As it stands Mr. Scott is like a quarterback without either. With the supermajority in Montpelier pushing an agenda that is not right for Vermont we need to push back against policies that are harmful to Vermonters and as a representative of Berrytown I want to protect Berrytown from the Chinden County agenda. Thank you Tidio Golfetti running for representative and now from the Republican Party Topper McFawn. Well first of all I would like to thank the Bridge and Walker for having this forum today. I think it's a great way for people to get to know the candidates. A little about me. After I finished college in Massachusetts and get out of the service I married a girl from Vermont. We decided to raise our children not in the city but in Vermont. So shortly after that we moved to Vermont and we live on Sunset Road and we've lived in that house for 54 years. I've spent my working life in Vermont with my wife Marianne and three children who grew up here went to school here went to college here and now they live in Vermont with their families. My career has been public service starting with building the first neighborhood youth core employment program in the country. I moved on from there to direct the State Office of Economic Opportunity. From there I went to the State Office of Manpower Services as the assistant director and then I went on to manage the Barry and White River offices of the Department of Labor. After I retired I was elected to the legislature. I currently serve as the ranking member on the Human Services Committee. I've served as a volunteer on many Barry Town community boards. Currently I'm on the Central Mon Home Health and Hospice Board and the Central Mon Economic Development Board. In the past 12 years in the town I've served on the Budget Committee, the Board of Civil Authority, the Select Board for 12 years 10 years as chair on three terms on the school board. As an aside if you look at Barry Town Elementary School there's a big recreation area beside that. When I was working with the Department of Labor I ran a training program for the operating engineers union and we leveled that whole ground. That's how that recreation area is there. Another thing that people will remember is when I was on the Select Board when I was chair there was a dump being planned for the Vermont I mean for Barry Town on Quarry Hill and I worked with the Select Board. I led that fight to defeat that that dump. So you can see I've served many years in Barry Town. I've served the people as well as I could and in many ways as I could and I'll continue to do that as long as I'm I feel that I'm effective and it's gonna be fun. Thank you. Tapper McFawn from Barry. Next Melissa Bata. Hi there. Thank you so much Linda and thank you Orca Media and the bridge for hosting this forum tonight. My name is Melissa Bata. I'm running to be your next state representative in the Washington Orange District. My family and I moved to the area eight years ago. We were looking for a house to buy for our kids to be able to put down roots to raise our family and we found Barry Town after searching several areas in the surrounding area and said that that was a place that we felt we could call home and it's been amazing. We have a great community off of the Silver Circle Cherrywood area with lots of kids for our kids to play with great school system as someone who has worked in the nonprofit industry for the last two two decades. I feel that I can bring my experience with nonprofit management to the state house in a way that hasn't necessarily been there in the past. You know as a nonprofit manager I have to take very tiny budgets or very tiny resources and make sure that those resources stretch to meet the budget to provide good quality services. As a homeowner in Barry Town we see the cost of owning a home, the cost of maintaining a home just going up and up and I want to make sure that we can make housing affordable especially when I look at having housing for young Vermonters, my own children in the future hopefully. We want to be able to make sure that they can afford to live in Barry Town and as a mother I really want to make sure that we continue to have good quality education, safe neighborhoods and a place for my kids to call a future. I've served on the board of the Good Samaritan Haven for the last six years so the past two years have been as chair of that board. I've served also as a reparative board coordinator for the Greater Barry Justice Center and I've volunteered in money areas including with the youth soccer program and at my local church and I'm just really looking forward to this evening to share a little bit more about why else I'm running. Thank You Melissa Bata. I'm Linda Radke with the candidates forum and now we start our questions. Every candidate has a minute and a half to respond and we're going to switch up the order so we'll start with Topper first. When you are in the state house how are you going to use your role to improve things in your district and what do you think is the most important issue in your district right now? Well I think the most important issue that I've heard as I've been around campaigning is the cost of living and I feel that there's not a heck of a lot that we can do on the state level above the cost of living but we can do some things like for instance the gas tax. We can put a moratorium on that. That would be something that would help people. Something else that would help people is not taxing Social Security. We can do that in the legislature. As a matter of fact I introduced a bill to do that. I didn't get as much as I want wanted but at least we've started on the path to reduce taxing Social Security. We should reduce it completely. So there's a couple of things that I think are important. Housing is going to be important. Rebuilding the daycare of the child care system will be very important because without that people aren't going to be able to go back to work. So I think I'll leave it at that health care. I could go on and on about things that are going to be important but I don't know if we're going to be able to solve them all. Thank you. Next we'll go to Melissa Vata. Yeah Topra I agree with you. At the state level there's really not a lot that we can do about the rising costs. This is a global phenomenon. This is happening all around the globe and there's a couple of different reasons why. Number one there are a lot of corporations that are profiting at exponential rates. You know the Albertsons Foundation at Own Shaw's they've had a 671% profit margin this last year at our expense right. Like I go to the grocery store and the cost is really high. But when I look at what we can do you know some of the things that we have done this last year in the state legislature and I continue to advocate for are things like a Vermont child tax credit that has really helped a lot of families in our area. You know making sure that we have grant programs for the types of skilled workers that we need such as childcare workers and trade scholarships. Those are really important and so I see investing in the lives of everyday Vermonters is the best way to help with the rising costs that we see all across the globe. Thank you. And the same question that you know Gulletti. I think that the number one issue that I'm hearing about when I'm out going door-to-door is affordability for sure. And something that people are particularly concerned about is the rising cost of fuel in the state of Vermont. Folks are worried the cost of fuel has nearly doubled since last year and as they're getting ready to fill their tanks for the winter they're wondering what they're going to be able to do to afford that. Something that we can do at the state level is be aware of the types of legislation that we're passing. The clean heat standard was defeated last session. It was part of the Global Climate Solutions Act and if it hadn't been for one brave Democrat that was willing to vote Vermonters would have a tax on home heating oil right now. That carbon tax would increase the cost of fuel universally. As your next state legislator I will work hard to make sure carbon taxes continue to be examined critically. The conversation surrounding green technologies such as heat pumps and solar has a lot of upfront costs. This penalizes lower income and middle income Vermonters that can't necessarily afford to convert to these expensive technologies. We need to remember that a majority of homes are still heated with fossil fuel and given that situation we need to make sure that we're investing in technology that streamlines those types of heating solutions so that we can continue to make home heating oil and other fuels affordable quote unquote for Vermonters. I think one way that would be good to strike a balance is to look at using force products such as wood for heating albeit wood has a negligible reduction in the amount of carbon output because it uses because if we manage forest reasonably we'll be able to take advantage of trees before they die because once trees have actually died they start rotting away and producing an excessive amount of carbon whereas if we're more managing the forest and using it for things like home heating we could capitalize on reducing the the carbon output that we have for home heating costs it would be almost carbon neutral so that's that's what I'm really hearing about from folks. Thank you so much GDL Fizzi here for the Washington Orange District. I'm Linda Radke with our moderator forum and another question coming up it's about elections much in the news these days do you believe the Vermont legislature needs to focus more attention on election security and if so what actions do you propose do you believe that do you believe the 2020 presidential election was stolen so start here with Melissa. Yes so I'll start with the second part of your question first I do not believe that the 2020 election was stolen you know we have had over a hundred some odd years 150 years plus of elections in our country and we have had the same system and the system has served us well as far as here in Vermont you know we have one of the lowest I think this last election cycle there was maybe one ballot if I remember correctly that was questionable and and I think that it's because the Secretary of State's office over the decades has really allowed and ensured that we have safe and secure elections and we have a system in place that has really enabled that to just be fostered I don't really see much of a need to change that at this point and I think that that having open communications with the Secretary of State's office does allow us to just monitor that and keep up to date but for right now I don't really see a need to change anything thank you we'll go to Gina Galfetti yeah I believe as Melissa said that President Biden was indeed legitimately elected while there might have been some isolated incidents of voter fraud across the nation I believe as Melissa stated that there was only one incident of having a questionable ballot in the state of Vermont so that's an extremely good track record in fact you know one of the things that we think about when we think about voter fraud was the GOP's demand for an audit but in states like Arizona that audit actually proved that Biden had won by a greater margin than originally first thought the integrity of Vermont elections is something that the rest of the nation could learn from I think that Vermont elections are generally well run and albeit legislators and candidates should always be open to new ideas I'm certainly not an expert in election policies so I would examine election reform policies listen to various viewpoints coming out of election policy experts and listen to my constituents and decide based on what I find out thank you the election questions at upper McFawn thank you as far as president Biden being elected I believe yes that he was elected fairly as these two women have said they probably was some irregularities but not to the extent that it was going to change the election at all we know that approximately 60 cases were brought to court and from those 60 cases there there wasn't enough evidence presented there to show that the election should be reversed so I think that was fine as far as changing the way things go in Vermont I know that all the ballots have been mailed out from the Secretary of State I know that there's about 200 ballots that are in the clerk's office that were undeliverable those the people in the office are working to get that straightened out to see if they can find good addresses for those people and I'm pretty sure they'll they'll figure something out now the one thing that I think needs to be done is the checklist the voter checklist has to be updated frequently because I think that's what the problem is in terms of those undeliverable ballots so that's the big thing that I think needs to be changed thank you we're going to move on to the next next questions submitted by the community but take a break take a little water if you'd like it's going to be about housing certainly very top of mind for our Vermont people do you think the Vermont legislature should do more to afford affordable housing as well as housing for the missing middle the moderate income for modders and if so what should be done and we'll start with Melissa Bata all right so I want to first tell a story about my housing situation when when my husband I first married we he was not yet a citizen of the country so we were living off of my income and when we found out they were going to be pregnant we knew that we had to really look at the housing situation that we had so we ended up applying for housing and were able to live in an apartment in Montpelier through Down Street now over the course of us living there over a couple of years we took the homeowners course and we were able to qualify for a federal loan to buy our first house together we had a lot of support and we had some great programs both from the state and federal government we were fortunate enough though to get by our housing before this housing crisis has really ballooned and I think that at this point if we were to try to do that all over again now there aren't enough supports there and we would be defined as your typical middle income from honor right and so no I don't think that we have done enough in over the last decades for housing and that's why we're seeing ourselves in this housing crisis now in terms of measures that we can take I know that I've worked on a couple of measures such as getting just cause eviction right now folks can be evicted with no reason whatsoever and I know I've heard of folks right I also think that we need to do something about about rental registries as well you know when you come to an area we hear Governor Scott all the time wanting to you know say hey we need more folks who are working folks to come to Vermont because we have an aging population and we need a larger tax base it's very hard as someone coming from out of the state to find rental housing sometimes there's not really a central location so doing something like that would help ensure that we have quality units on the market and that they can be affordable as well thank you very much next on the housing question Tapper McFawn thank you it's clear that we have a housing crisis in Vermont the legislature has allocated a ton of money to this problem before we do anything what we need to look at is how that money was spent and we have to evaluate that and make a decision in terms of whether we were on the right track or do we need to do something different that's number one number two if we're on the right track then I would suggest we do more of that one of the things that we need to do is not give all that money when we send it out the door to just nonprofit organizations we need to involve the developers in a bigger way a lot of those developers have projects that are ready to go and if they're involved in the planning then they can tell you what we need to do to get to the point where we're producing a lot of housing units so it's going to be interesting to see what happens I know that I know already that the cost of some of the housing units that we've developed with that money is very high and it's it's it's not we don't have that kind of money in Vermont we have about 630,000 people half the people don't pay taxes so we don't have the money unless the federal government dumps it here we have no way to to get that money so that we can build a whole bunch of units so thank you but we have to do something in the legislature every year about it thank you very much genie go fettie housing this is an issue that's very close to me I live in a multi-generational household and the reason that I am doing that right now is I need to save money to afford to buy a home and I'm fortunate that I'm able to do that as it stands we've got a lot of agency overlap in the permitting process and the permitting process has become very expensive as a result builders aren't building lower-cost homes after they've made the investment in the permitting process and as Topper said we need to bring in private builders to meet with us and understand the hurdles that they're facing to building more affordable homes you know again as Topper mentioned a lot of money has gone to nonprofits to building house and supporting down payment assistance which is great but we need to carefully monitor these projects so we can determine if the money is being spent efficiently to see the greatest returns in housing I also think that Act 250 could be overhauled to promote downtown development and to reduce the restrictions on large projects you know we want to continue protecting Vermont's amazing beauty but we also need to have development that's going to move forward and creating more affordable housing thank you very much our next question was submitted by the community about Act article 22 so we'd like to know from our candidates where do you stand on article 22 that finalizes a four-year process of amending the state constitution to guaranteed reproductive autonomy to pregnant women and for this one let's start with Topper let me start first by saying that I believe in a woman's right to choose the legislature over the past couple of years has spent a tremendous amount of time on this particular issue what they came up with is article 22 which will amend the Constitution if you read that the personal autonomy piece of it is not well-defined and it's ambiguous and I think it is going to cause problems right off the bat and even the people who drafted it and who sponsored it felt that that was the case I in the beginning I tried to get that changed was to no avail so that it was people could understand it now I think you're going to have a lot of court cases and that's not going to bode well in terms of what they really wanted to do with that amendment so I have a record of voting on that in the committee I voted against it the way it's written and because of that reason the way it's written it's ambiguous and I voted against it on the floor thank you very much next you don't go Fetty first off I'd like to lead out with I to support a woman's right to choose however as Topper mentioned the constitutional amendment that's being put forth is needlessly vague article 22 was poorly written and even its authors at the time couldn't define it clearly and basically stated that they would pass it back down to the courts to make a clear decision on what reproductive autonomy means I think that as a result of that men could potentially have increased reproductive rights and that would be to the detriment of women for example what would happen if a man brought a suit in a conservative court in a state of an abortion was issued you know things like that are frightening and we also have to be concerned with the fact that medical providers may face lawsuits as well given that reproductive autonomy could be ruled on to state that medical abortions or abortions that are not medically necessarily seri could happen after 23 weeks right now the current policy of the UBM health network is to not perform abortions unless they're medically necessary after 23 weeks and I think these issues would call anybody into question on an article 22 but I'm going to ultimately it's ultimately going to be left up to the people and all support whatever the people decide on this issue thank you mrs. Vita the question again please sure the effects of sorry what do you stand at article 22 which finalizes a four-year process of amending the state constitution to guarantee reproductive autonomy to pregnant women yes so I I stand in full support of proposal five article 22 I feel that as a woman no one should have any say least of all elected officials over my medical decisions and I feel that in light of what has happened at a federal level with the overturning of Roe v Wade that we are in danger of having as many other states have done having legislators make decisions about my medical decisions and my daughter's medical decisions and my son's future partner's medical decisions and what that does is like there are there's no other segment of population where we say and make medical decisions for just a particular segment when it comes to this certain proposal the ambiguity that topper and Gina have referred to is actually put in there to help give the strongest legal defense should anybody try to come after our constitutional right the whole the strict scrutiny is actually a well-known standard in U.S. constitutional law and it's really hard for for to overcome that in a court of law so I actually feel like this enshrines my rights and the rights of every Vermont are in in making sure that we are protected and being able to make our own choices thank you very much sure we're not supposed to be debating right no and what just happened is my name and Gina's name were mentioned and the statement was made that it's not so I think that would you like 30 seconds yeah I'll take 30 seconds there's a bill that was in my committee that it gives the least restrictive abortion rights to women in Vermont and now we didn't need the constitutional amendment and if you're going to do a constitutional amendment you better do it right that particular bill I voted for and I said on the floor and gave a speech about it and I also introduced contraceptive legislation on the heels of that bill and with my committee we got it passed and that was to get to a point where an individual a woman would not have to be subjected to that kind of decision it allowed women to get contraceptives for nothing thank you and that was my bill yes go ahead yeah at this point in time Vermont already has some of the most permissive abortion laws in the country and I don't see that changing it's been codified in law that abortion is protected in the state of Vermont up to the time of birth if a medical provider can be found that would perform such an abortion so I don't see the ambiguous language in article 22 being a good way to tinker with the Constitution thank you now we're moving on to a global question but affects Vermont a lot that has to do with climate change the effects of climate change are already being being felt across the world do you believe Vermont should take additional steps to limit carbon emissions in the state we'll begin with Gina Glutty Gelfetti so I'll get it I certainly do believe that the climate is changing we've had record flooding heat waves and a global drought so there's no denying that the climate is changing however I do think that there's a problem with climate change modeling despite extensive modeling scientists still don't know the full extent of the impact of clouds for example on their climate models and the computing power that's necessary to do to conduct some of this research is not even available to program in all of the variables that are present in climate modeling so I asked the question of what what is the impact that we're having my other thing is that I think that climate solutions especially in the state of Vermont need to be sustainable and attainable and have demonstrable results we need to develop a grid that can support an electric initiative we don't have that right now we've got a deficiency in the ability to use electric cars effectively I think that we need to keep investing in weatherization small scale solar and electric vehicles where it makes sense and that's basically how I feel about climate change thank you was a bit ah yeah so if there's no doubt that there that climate change is a real struggle a real issue it is something that many folks that I've been listening to as I go out knocking doors has affected even the reason why they're moving to Vermont they're saying that the places that they had called home for however many years before were the reasons why one of the main reasons why they relocated to Vermont I'm actually really concerned that we don't have not just the infrastructure for things such as electric vehicles but we don't have the infrastructure for the the income of folks from out of state who are going to be moving to Vermont because climate change is not going away we the legislature has done a lot over the last decade in helping to mitigate this we're not going to solve it all on our own just from our policies in Vermont however we need to continue to strive to find solutions that will be accessible and affordable to Vermont and at the same time help mitigate climate change but also make it so that you know our cost of energy can be more affordable when we talk about having finite resources such as oil and gas and that's what we base our energy in our heating and how we are transportation on well it's finite resource so as it diminishes it's going to cost more and more for us to access those but if we have the willpower and and the community will to be innovative and move forward in that not only will it create more jobs for us but it will also help us be able to kind of have a better idea of what the actual costs are going to be on folks individual budgets thank you very much and now often in the news guns I knew that that's good climate change yes yes I believe that climate change is here there's no question about it it's real but what I don't know is how much is caused by human activity how much is the natural the earth's natural evolution so that that's one thing I don't know I know that Farson Vermont observe a lot of carbon I know that we're developing solar arrays on a very organized way that's very helpful I know that we've got some wind power that's very helpful I know we're we're supporting electric vehicles that'll be helpful one of the things that I worry about with the electric vehicles is the batteries what are we going to do when the batteries have to when we have to get rid of the batteries that's going to I think that's going to turn into a problem what I do know for sure is I will not support a common tax by any name I believe that the residents of Barry town of Williamstown are paying too much money now in taxes and they don't need to have to pay higher costs for their fuel whether it's in their car or choose to eat at home or cook their food thank you very much and now moving on to guns what are your thoughts on an assault weapons ban and do you believe we should have air 15s without regulation and what about a ban on motivation modification devices such as bump stocks that increase the capacity of non-automatic weapons a big issue here in Vermont and we're going to start with you okay can you just repeat sure sure three or four what are your thoughts what are your thoughts about an assault weapons ban and do you believe we should have air 15s without regulation and what about a band on modification developed by such as bump stocks that increase the capacity or firing speed of non-automatic weapons are you talking about nationally or you're talking about in Vermont in Vermont okay in Vermont I don't think that we have to do anything with the gun control laws laws in Vermont let's make sure we enforce what we have on the books first I think another thing that we could do to help the situation is rather than talking about and doing deep defunding the police departments maybe what we should be doing is providing more training and getting the police departments up to a full capacity that may help us with in terms of the crimes that are being the crimes that are happening because of the use of guns you talked about the AF-15 a complete ban on them I don't know how I feel about that to tell you the truth I do a lot of hunting I don't think you have to have an AF-15 in the woods to hunt but I don't think that we should be making laws that say to people who are 18 years old and can go in the service and use one of those guns that they can own one I think that if they're old enough to go in the service and defend the country that they should be old enough to own one of them they know how to use it and it's not going to be a problem the problem is not guns it's the problem is the people that use those guns to commit crimes thank you well this is about time guns yeah so this is definitely a topic I've thought about a lot you know I I happen to have some really personal connections when it comes to to assault rifles and assault weapons in terms of how they can negatively impact one's family I have a dear friend who was who actually became a paraplegic because of because of a gun a gunshot wound and so I have conflicting ideas because on the one hand I love going out and and shooting targets I'm not big of a hunter I don't like to kill animals if I don't have to but I also have a lot of friends who who enjoy hunting for sports and and I want to be able to support them but I really question whether assault weapons of any form have a place in our society and if they do have a place because I know that some folks like for them for collections and whatnot you know I would want to have thoughtful dialogue with my constituents about what can that place be where you can still have access but we do it safely you know we we've made decisions about access to different things in the past such as you know cars vehicles there are certain laws and regulations that we have when it comes to vehicles certain licenses and operations that you need to take place in order to operate them but we still have that privilege and I think that I would have I take a similar sand when it comes to gun regulations it's there but we have to think about the safety of the community as well thank you Gina Gelfetti sure what are your thoughts on assault weapons ban do you believe we should have AR-15s without regulation and what about a ban on the modification devices such as bump stocks that increase the firing speed of non-automatic weapons well first off I'd like to say there's a lot of misconceptions about the so-called assault rifle people consider a number of guns besides the AR-15 assault rifles when they're actually no different than a traditional hunting rifle other than the way they look another misconception is that AR stands for assault rifle when in actuality it stands for armor light the company that makes the AR-15 impose I actually own an AR-15 and I own it for hunting purposes and the reason I own it is because it's considerably lighter the stocks adjustable for somebody that's my size and I find it to be a very efficient method of hunting as far as the bump stock question goes I don't think that we need to control bump stocks and other things that simulate automatic fire because what we need to do is be educating people on the safe use of firearms in general the Constitution Second Amendment guarantees us the right to bear arms and it's the responsibility of every citizen to understand how guns are used and at the very least render them safe the purpose of the Second Amendment it was not to guarantee hunting rights but to allow people to protect themselves from both others and tyrannical governments thank you now we're moving on to something really important to all of us about Vermonters the governor of frequency says we need to attract new families and workers to Vermont while keeping our own young people at home what can the Legislature do to attract and keep workers in Vermont we're gonna start with Melissa Bata so in order I'm one of those folks that the governor talks about right I came to Vermont for grad school and it reminded me of my hometown village in Florida and only with much nicer weather because as much as Florida is great when it's you know middle of February it's really cold here for a visit I I really didn't like having the heat year round I love the seasons here and and the community is just the type of community that I enjoy but in order to be able to attract more folks like me who are have a young family or our young folks we need to make sure that we have things like affordable housing we need to have livable wages so that people can actually afford to live here we need to have infrastructures like child care our child care system right now is really abysmal and in Berrytown it's really hard to find a child care center on the bus route when you have school aged kids that are not old enough to take care of themselves yet and that impacts folks ability to be able to work full-time we also need to think about things such as as a paid family medical leave you know you want to have you want to attract folks to come to Vermont if we had a paid family medical leave that that's something that folks think about when they're considering their careers and where they're actually going to locate for work broadband I know that the the legislature has been working on that but we need to get that here if we want to be able to have folks that can work from home or or in office spaces and more rural areas thank you next top of McFawn I think the legislature has to have a comprehensive economic development plan we really don't have that now I think we have to support technical centers career centers job training programs so then individuals who choose not to go to college can see a path forward to good-paying jobs for example plumbers if you hire a plumber you're not much going to pay them electricians the same thing social media jobs the other thing I think we need to do is provide incentives to existing businesses that are here so they can expand we need to provide incentives to businesses that are planning to that would like to come to Vermont another thing that we could do is take military pensions and exempt them from the month the Vermont sales tax that would allow people in in their 40s and 50s who are retiring from the service to come to Vermont they're well trained they would be good they would be great as we rebuild the workforce so there's some things that I think that we we can do thank you so much Jean Galfetti so this is an issue that's very close to me I own and operate a small painting company here in Vermont and finding people that are ready to work is getting more difficult all the time I often have people coming seeking jobs that have little to no experience and if they're willing to work I'm certainly willing to put give them a shot at g-force but I believe if we aggressively promote the trades in schools and stop selling the college dream theology for everybody college isn't right for everyone and encouraging kids to get into trades education and other kinds of vocational training such as in the health care industry we'll have kids that are going into higher paying jobs that'll afford them the ability to stay in Vermont we've got a problem right now the average age of a carpenter is about 55 and without new blood coming in there to fill those positions we're not going to be able to sustain it another option that I think would be excellent is for the state of Vermont to eliminate or reduce taxes taxes on new businesses that are coming into the state you know if we could eliminate those taxes for a period of time and then gradually increase them I think we'd promote a lot of economic development and interstate commerce thank you now we're going to move on to a subject that's near and dear to all Vermonters which is education do we need to change the way we fund education less property tax more income tax Vermont is consistently ranked among states with the highest annual per pupil spending at more than $20,000 per student are we getting a good return on our investment and we'll start with Topper McFawn I think that we could do better in our higher education system I know that COVID-19 disrupted our education system in a big way was very difficult for the teachers and the children go to school do I think we're getting the best return for our money I'm a product of the public education system I did pretty well so I think the public education system for the most part is is functioning fairly well could it do better years one of the big things and I talked about this earlier was the the technical centers in the career centers I think we should do more there so that if people don't want to go to college they can get a good paying job I also feel that the apprenticeship programs that we have in the career centers we should use them more and that will that will produce a solid workforce in terms of changing how the education system is funded I think it's time to broaden the base of funding in our education system I look where would I get that money if I'm elected I would look at for instance the sales tax that way everybody pays even people that come into the state as tourists probably the rooms and meals taxes of there's a place that people might be involved I think we probably are going to look have to look at the income tax but the big thing is every one of these taxes that I've mentioned you have to reduce the property tax thank you next education is Gina Galfetti I got it I think that you know COVID definitely had a negative impact on education practices in the state of Vermont we've got a 41% proficiency in math right now so that means 59 percent of our students are not proficient in math and that's troubling one of the things that I think is a problem is the consolidation of schools in my opinion was a big mistake school consolidation and the big box approach to education has negatively affected students returning to smaller localized schools with the need for less administration would ensure that more money was available to retrofit schools and eliminate costly administration positions we're spending a lot of money on administration and not enough money on students when I was a kid walking to school uphill both ways schools were supported by their immediate communities and parents were more involved and I received an excellent education in the public school system however I do see that smaller private schools and people that are homeschooled are turning out students that are well-prepared to advance in school or vocational or technical training so that's the reason I support school choice and I think it's important to really look at the way our education dollars are being spent thank you finally on schools Melissa Bata yeah so you know it's interesting because schools as we just had the question about how do we attract other folks to Vermont and schools is one of the main reasons why we chose to stay here and raise a family here you know I did I was schooled in Florida I went through public school I was homeschooled for a couple years and I went to a private Christian school and I have to say that out of all those school systems for me I feel like the public school education was the best education I received had more access to a variety of programs and enrichment activities that just the homeschooling smaller education in my situation didn't didn't help so I feel that the quality of education that we have in Vermont is actually really good it's why we chose to stay and and have our kids go to public school here but tying how we pay for schools and how we have our budgets for schools tying that to property taxes really is detrimental to certain folks especially like folks who are on fixed incomes once you get the property reassessed you know you're thinking my property tax is going to be this and then we have to change it and so you know I would agree that we need to look at other ways of funding education and broadening that base of who's actually supporting our school systems thank you lots more to say on that topic I can tell from all of you but I'm looking at the time and realizing we're we're time we're ready for closing statements so we'll take a few minute few seconds really and ask you to give us about a minute and a half to sum up closing statements and while they're doing that I'm Linda Radke and this is the candidate forum on Orca and also co-sponsored by the bridge and we're speaking to three candidates for state representative that's Melissa Bata, Gina Gaffetti and Topper McFawn. We can start with Gina. All right so as I mentioned in the beginning I'm a berry girl I grew up in berry I've built a life here and I want to see the berry town way of life protected in the future. I'd like to see people getting involved involved in the legislature such as myself who aren't aspiring to become career politicians and don't label themselves as such. We need to bring some balance back to the state of Vermont. The super majority in Montpelier is really forcing an agenda that isn't necessarily organic to berry town and I look forward to having the opportunity to serve as Berry Town's next state legislator and I would ask all of you out there to consider a vote for me please reach out to me via phone email Facebook my phone number is 802-461-3520 and I'd like to again thank Orca Media and the bridge for hosting this event tonight. Thank you. Melissa Bata your closing statement. Yeah so you know I just wanted to say that when it comes to being a state representative I feel that you need to represent the community and the best way of representing the community is by listening to the community. You know my years of being a community organizer gotten pretty good at listening. I enjoy having a cup of coffee I enjoy you know coming into the kitchens of the the folks that I've been knocking on doors on and chatting with them about you know the struggles the concerns where where you see the community going and I can pledge as your next state representative that I will continue listening. I will continue to reflect the views of the community in Montpelier and and support our community to be the strongest that we can so we can continue to grow and live and thrive in Berrytown and Williamstown. I thank you very much for listening tonight and hope that you consider a vote for me on November 8th or before and if you need more information Melissa Bata for vt.com has my contact information and I'd be more than happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you and finally Tapper McFawn. Thank you. In my opinion the legislature needs to be more moderate. It needs to be more balanced in its approach to solving the more problems. I also have some unfinished business in the legislature. I've worked for about two years now with individuals with developmental disabilities. Those people have problems even getting out of bed and I think it's about time that the state of Vermont takes a real close look at what those people need in terms of services so that they can live a life the best life that they can based on the disabilities that they have. I know that between the ages of 22 and 60 those people do not get the services that they need. I followed a family all the way through the process of trying to seek services for their children. They don't have them yet and one of the that's what I mean by unfinished business. I want to get in there and do that. I will listen to what people have to say. I have done that all the time. I've tried to represent the people of Barrie Town in a positive way. I will do that for the people in Williamstown in my last eight minutes. It's an honor to serve the people of Barrie Town. I look forward to serving the people of Williamstown and I would appreciate your vote on November 8th or before that. Thank you. Thank you to all our candidates on the candidate forum. We heard from Jeanette Galfetti and Melissa Bata and Topper McFawn both all running for that representative thing. This is our last forum of the series sponsored by Orca Media. You can find out more at orcamedia.net or the Montpelier Bridge. And by now you should have received your ballot for the November 8th election in the mail. And if you haven't, contact your city or town clerk. Thank you for joining us. The next thing, the best thing you can do really is to protect the democratic process and to vote. And we encourage you to do so. I'm Linda Radke. Thank you.