Voice from the Vault
By Gregory Sanford, State Archivist

Why, the student wanted to know, could he serve in Afghanistan or Iraq, but not be served in Vermont?

"Then what?" another student asked, wondering about women’s participation in politics following passage of the 19th amendment. What were people in our town like in 1800, asked a school class.

These students are part of on-going efforts to incorporate local history, and local records, into school curricula. Use of historical records in the classroom not only makes history come alive (history didn’t always happen somewhere else to someone else), but also encourages critical thinking beyond what textbooks can provide. How to locate, and interpret, historical records allows a student to participate in learning rather than merely memorizing pre-selected facts and interpretation. Using historical records can also open discussions on the nature of citizenship, or the nature of civic discourse, or on what it means to be a Vermonter or a member of your community.

The Vermont Historical Records Advisory Board (VHRAB) will be highlighting and promoting the use of historical records as teaching tools through Vermont Archives Week (November 7-13). VHRAB welcomes stories on the use of local records in your schools; please send the stories to me at gsanford@sec.state.vt.us or give me a call at 828-2369.

Several students recently contacted the Archives about the drinking age (in the interest of full disclosure, one of those students is my 13 year old daughter). One, a jazz

student, became interested when he was unable to see several acts during the Burlington Jazz Festival because they were held in bars and he was under-aged. He felt this was a barrier to his education since he believes live performances are an essential part of learning. Other students became interested as the result of current events and their awareness that 18 to 20 year olds could serve in the military, and possibly be put in harm’s way, yet could not be served alcohol in Vermont. They looked at committee minutes from 1973 that discussed lowering Vermont’s voting age and age of majority; they read Governor Richard Snelling’s two veto messages of bills that would have raised the drinking age in the 1982 and 1983; and they examined the arguments for raising the drinking age in Governor Madeleine Kunin’s records, including statistics on alcohol-related automobile fatalities. Interpreting the statistics, they discovered that while, based on number of miles driven, 18 to 20 year olds were the mostly likely to be involved in such accidents, overall it was the 21 to 25 year old bracket that had the highest number of alcohol-related fatalities (and that the problem persisted across all age groups). In looking at Governor Snelling’s vetoes, they were exposed to his concern that you could not create two classes of citizens, based solely on age, and that education, enforcement and treatment were better ways to address the problem across all age groups. Underneath that lurked the questions of what is a citizen; what are the distinctions between rights, obligations and privileges; and whether removing any of those rights and privileges changed the nature of citizenship.

The student looking at women in politics was not content with the normal brief notice that women gained the right to vote in state and national elections in 1920 and that Edna Beard was the first women elected to the Vermont House (1920) and Senate (1922). He discovered that the male legislators were initially reluctant to be Ms. Beard’s seatmate and that the first bill she introduced became a law raising the level of assistance to women with children whose husbands were incapacitated by catastrophic illness. He is now looking at what committees women served on, what leadership positions they held, and what bills they introduced in the 1921 to 1941 period.

I am just learning about other efforts involving the use of historical records in the classroom since they involve municipal, rather than state, records. In Woodstock, for example, students are using probate records to examine what town residents were like in 1800. These efforts, as I am learning, are taking place in everything from third grades through high school. There are several organizations, like the Vermont Alliance for the Social Studies (http://www.vermontsocialstudies.org/); the Flow of History (http://www.flowofhistory.org/); and Vermont Community Works (http://www.vermontcommunityworks.org/) that are encouraging teachers to use historical records through workshops and the posting of models and other resources.

Again, as VHRAB prepares for Vermont Archives Week we would love to hear from any of you who are working with your local schools to provide historical records for the classroom.

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Opinions of Opinions

1. Property tax exemptions for volunteer fire department property must be voted at town meeting. Property tax exemptions for volunteer fire departments must be voted at town meeting. The exemption can be voted for ten years and thereafter for five-year periods. 32 V.S.A. §3840. The Vermont Lister’s Handbook provides a good discussion of property tax exemptions including a chart giving the source of funding for education property tax liability for locally voted exemptions. The handbook also includes a chapter on properties that are exempt under state or federal law, and another chapter on exemptions that must be voted by the town.

2. Property purchased by exempt entity retains non-exempt status until April 1st of the next year. When a church purchases property after April 1st, , the date when the grand list is lodged there is no mechanism in the statutes to grant a tax exemption until the following year. When the listers prepare the next year’s grand list, the property can be listed as exempt under 32 V.S.A. §3802(4) and 3832, but until then taxes are due from the owner.

3. Towns cannot abate taxes of nonprofit based on change of ownership. The board of abatement can only exercise those powers specifically delegated by statute, and cannot exceed those powers. 24 V.S.A. § 1535 provides the complete list of reasons for abatement of local property taxes, including when a taxpayer dies insolvent, or a person has left the state, or when a person is unable to pay. These are the only reasons that local property taxes can be abated. The change in status of the owners of property to nonprofit is not one of the permissible reasons to abate taxes.

4. Taxes from prior years may be abated. The board of abatement may abate, in whole or in part, taxes from prior years so long as one of the statutory reasons for granting abatement applies. If taxes from a prior year are abated, the board of abatement may choose to give the taxpayer a cash refund, or the board may provide a credit towards the current and future year’s taxes. 24 V.S.A. § 1535.

5. Successful tax appeal for current year does not mean abatement of prior years taxes. An appeal by a taxpayer of his or her appraisal is a challenge of the current year’s tax bill. A successful appeal which results in a lower appraisal for the current year’s taxes does not entitle the taxpayer to a refund of taxes paid in prior years, even if those payments were based on an appraised amount which has now been reduced. While not entitled to a refund, there is nothing to stop the taxpayer from seeking abatement of the taxes paid in the prior years at the higher appraisal amount; however, the board of abatement is not required to grant an abatement.

6. Board abatement cannot abate only interest and penalty. 24 V.S.A. § 1535 contemplates that the board of abatement may only abate interest and penalty proportionately to the taxes abated. Abatement should not be used to remove interest and penalty from a late payer (even one who had a very good excuse for being late) unless tax is also being abated.

7. Selectboard can appoint BCA members to create balance for elections. Upon request of an underrepresented major party, the selectboard can appoint additional members to the board of civil authority to bring the major party membership up to three. 17 V.S.A. §2143. However, these appointees can only participate in activities relating to elections. The appointees are not Justices of the Peace and have no authority to act with respect to functions of the board of civil authority that are not related to elections, such as tax appeals, tax abatement, or performing marriages/civil unions.

8. Selectboard can appoint an acting zoning administrator to act when the administrator has a conflict of interest. When a zoning administrator has a conflict of interest, or needs a permit for his own property, the planning commission, with the approval of the selectboard can appoint an acting zoning administrator for the limited purpose of handling the matters in which the zoning administrator feels he/she has a conflict. 24 V.S.A. §4442.

9. Municipalities should adopt policy governing use of public buildings. It is a best practice for each legislative body, selectboard, school board, or other public body that owns buildings, to adopt a policy outlining its requirements for use of town or school property by other groups. It is constitutionally permissible for a board to prohibit any and all use by outside groups. However, it is not good policy, and may cause discrimination claims, to allow use of the buildings by certain categories or types of groups and not other groups, unless there is a real difference in the type of use being requested. For example, it is reasonable and acceptable to limit use of certain rooms or spaces to groups of less than 30, or to meetings ending not later than 9 p.m. However, it may be discriminatory to allow the boy scouts to meet in a room, but to turn down a political caucus or a religious organization.

10. Villages generally use town grand list. Most villages in Vermont set the tax rate for the village using the grand list assessments prepared by the town listers. If a resident grieves his taxes, and the listers or BCA make an adjustment lowering the property assessment, the grand list will be adjusted and the village must also lower the assessed amount.

11. Taxpayer must permit inspection committee to visit property as part of an appeal. An inspection committee is required to inspect the taxpayer’s property as part of the tax appeal process. The committee must then report back to the full board of civil authority that is hearing the property tax appeals, but if the taxpayer refuses access to the property, his or her appeal is deemed withdrawn. 32 V.S.A. §4404. All three members of the inspection committee must inspect the property but it is not mandatory that they inspect it at the same time, although this is the best practice. If the inspection committee does not see some part of the property that the appellant wanted it to see, it can return to the property a second time within the 30 days. The inspection committee then gives its report to the full board within 30 days from the hearing. The board of civil authority must hear and consider the report, but it also considers all of the evidence presented at the hearing, so that the final decision may differ from the inspection committee report. If, after notice, an appellant refuses to allow the inspection committee to inspect whatever parts of the property (both outside and inside) it wants to inspect, the appeal shall be deemed withdrawn.

12. Tax appeals can result in increase or decrease in the appraisal. When considering appeals of property tax appraisals the Board of Civil Authority may increase, decrease or sustain the appraisal. (32 V.S.A. §4409.) Once the taxpayer raises the issue of the property’s valuation, the BCA must make findings to support what the BCA believes to be the correct valuation of the property, even if that amount is higher than the listers’ assessment. The same is true for further appeals to the State Board of Appraisers or the Superior Court.

13. A municipal ordinance cannot be adopted or established by vote of the electorate. With the exception of ethics rules and zoning and subdivision bylaws, only the Selectboard can adopt or amend an ordinance. Once an ordinance has been adopted the legal voters of the town can bring a petition signed by 5% of the voters within 44 days of the adoption of the ordinance to require the selectboard to warn a meeting to allow voters to vote to disapprove an ordinance. However, a petition cannot be used to force a town to vote to adopt or amend an ordinance. 24 V.S.A. §1972 and 1973.

14. Registered voters in Vermont shall not lose residency for voting purposes solely by living outside of the United States. Vermont law provides that Vermont voters who live outside the United States retain their residency for voting purposes. Until the voter returns to reside in the United States, the voter can remain on the checklist and vote by absentee ballot in the town in which the voter last resided, regardless of his or her reason for living outside of the United States.

15. A person who moves back to the United States must register to vote where he lives. Although a person retains their residency for voting purposes while living abroad, once they return to the United States they may only vote in the jurisdiction where they live. For example, when a member of the armed forces who has been in Germany for 20 years retires and moves back to the United States, that person must register to vote in the place in where he or she resides. If you send a letter as part of your purging process and the person returns your form giving another town or state as his or her residence, you can remove that person from your checklist.

16. Petitions for financial support of social service agencies can include more than one agency. Social service agencies can join together in circulating a petition signed by 5% of the legal voters to ask to have an article or several articles placed on the warning for town meeting. However, when using a joint petition, we strongly suggest that each agency present its request in a separate Article in the petition so that the votes for each agency will be taken separately on the ballot or during the floor town meeting.

17. Landowner will not be not liable for injuries of those who go onto the land for recreation. Unless the landowner is charging for access to his or her land, an owner of property will not ordinarily be liable for property damage or personal injury sustained by a person who enters or goes upon the owner’s land for a recreational use. An owner can be liable if the damage or injury is the result of the willful or wanton misconduct of the owner. 12 V.S.A. § 5793

18. Town manager may be removed for cause. The law provides that a town manager "shall hold office at the will of such selectmen, who, by majority vote, may remove him at any time for cause." 24 V.S.A. § 1233. However, once a manager’s contract has expired the board is free to hire anyone it chooses to serve as the manager for the town.

19. Boards and commissions may set up subcommittees. No law prevents boards and commissions from setting up subcommittees. This means that unless the board or commission was specifically prohibited from setting up subcommittees by the appointing authority that it may do so. Note that subcommittees must comply with the requirements of the open meeting law. 1 V.S.A. § 310.

20. Petition cannot require meeting on a particular date. A petitioned article for a special town meeting may not dictate the date that the meeting is to be warned for. The law gives the selectboard the discretion to warn the meeting at a date it chooses (as limited by the law). The law provides that the selectboard has 15 days from receiving the petition to set the warning. The meeting must be warned for not less than 30 nor more than 40 days before the meeting date. 17 V.S.A. § 2641.

On the Road to the Election
By Janel Johnson, Elections Outreach Coordinator

Tip of the Month

She has taken her large surveys to Reprographics and had them reduced onto 11 x 17" paper. She ordered mylar pockets and a special binder to put them in. This makes copying the surveys MUCH easier!

Thanks Susan!

Attention Clerks!  Training Video Available

For a copy of Serving All Vermont Voters please call 1-800-439-VOTE.

Mailing List Updates

October 2004 Calendar

November 2004 Calendar

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