Vermont’s environmental community, notably the Vermont Natural Resources Council and VPIRG (Vermont Public Interest Research Group), supported a recently-passed bill providing certain advantages to producers of “sustainable” or “renewable” energy produced by sun, wind, water or biomass (largely a polite way of saying manure).

The green groups endorsed the legislation though they didn’t like the provision including power produced by the massive Hydro-Quebec dams in Canada in the same approved classification as power produced from local renewable energy sources.

Obviously, power from Hydro-Quebec is sustainable and renewable. Those rivers up there will keep flowing. And the power they produce does not create an ounce of greenhouse gas, the avoidance of which is the crucial argument for renewable energy in the first place.

But, explained VPIRG Executive Director Paul Burns, to his organization and other environmental groups. “mega-hydro projects were not considered green energy” in the same way as the power produced by wind, sun, or smaller hydro plants. Burns agreed that the Hydro-Quebec power is “renewable in a sense,” But he insisted that the environmental damage caused by building the massive power-generating dams has to be included in the equation.

“You quickly get into a… public policy definition,” he said. “In defining what is a renewable energy project and then defining which projects receive financial benefits. We think there’s a greater rationale to providing those benefits to smaller projects.”

That seems a perfectly consistent and reasonable policy position. If anything, Burns understated his case; those dams caused social as well as environmental damage, disrupting the traditional culture of some 5,000 native Cree. In that context, it makes sense to provide public benefits (in the form of guaranteed higher prices) to smaller wind, solar, and other renewable projects.

As it happens, the more public support those small projects get, the better it is (at least potentially) for, among others: Matthew Rubin, David Blittersdorf, Leigh Seddon, Mark Sinclair, and perhaps Greg Strong.

These people are in or associated with the renewable energy business. The first four are or recently were on VPIRg’s Board of Trustees. Strong, the president of Spring Hill Solutions, LLC, “a clean energy and carbon reduction consulting firm,” is on the Vermont Natural Resource Council’s board.

Neither VPIRG nor the Conservation Law Foundation, another important Vermont environmental group, make public the names of their contributors. VNRC does, in its annual report, reveal the names of all contributors of more than $100. One of them was Greg Strong and his wife, but they were not in the list of the biggest contributors.. Eight of VNRC’s contributors asked to remain anonymous, mostly, according to Executive Director Elizabeth Courtney, because “they don’t want to be solicited.” The one business contributor which asked to remain anonymous was not, she said, a renewable energy firm.

“It is absolutely true that people who have been or are in the renewable energy business have served on VPIRG’s board,” Burns said, agreeing that it was “not an unfair question to ask” whether their financial interests influence VPIRG’s policy positions.

Not surprisingly, he said it did not.

“We have conflict of interest policies,” he said. “Whenever an issue comes up for consideration by the board in which a board member has a financial interest. that board member would recuse him or her self from that vote.”

Merely suggesting that  the leaders of Vermont environmental organizations are in it for the money seems preposterous. Many of them are attorneys who could easily double their incomes by moving to a law firm. One of them, VNRC’s Jon Groveman, said he stays where he is because “it feeds the soul.”  It is easy to make too much of these connections.

As did John McClaughry on the Vermont Tiger web site last month when he cited Dartmouth Professor Robert Hargraves saying that the Conservation Law Foundation, like most Vermont green groups a supporter of wind power and an opponent of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant “has a for-profit consulting subsidiary called Conservation Law Ventures….(which) is providing strategic advice to a company…that is working to build a 720 Megawatt natural gas fired electric plant in New England.”

Except that the subsidiary is really called CLF Ventures, it’s a non-profit, and its association with that gas company ended eight years ago. At any rate, Hargraves said that he was not implying that CLF officials were influenced by the income their subsidiary might have earned from a potential competitor to Vermont Yankee, Instead, he said, he wanted to suggest that “the fossil fuel industry is supporting opposition to nuclear power.”

A plausible if unproven suspicion. But it isn’t likely that coal, oil, and gas companies are secretly supporting wind development. Wind developers are supporting wind development, but they have allies. Some of those allies are environmentalists, who support wind power because it can reduce the climate-changing greenhouse gasses emitted by fossil fuels.

But maybe also for other reasons – political psychological, and – yes – financial.

CLF Ventures, for instance, has a web site on which it lists its clients. But not all former clients, one of which was First Wind, the company developing a wind power facility in Sheffield in the Northeast Kingdom.

Jo Anne Shatkin, the CEO of CLF Ventures, who in an earlier conversation did not reveal the First Wind connection, said when asked, “we were working for First Wind,” in facilitating community meetings in Brimfield, Massachusetts, abut a proposed wind energy development there. “We told the community. We served as a neutral facilitator. Our goal was to facilitate a process where people could understand the issue. We facilitated the meetings that First Wind sponsored.”

And paid for. Shatkin would not say how much.

First Wind also contributed more than $10,000 to the Nature Conservancy chapter in Maine, where the company is putting up wind power facilities.

Chris Kilian, the head of CLF’s Vermont operations, said he had not known that First Wind had been a CLF Ventures client. Kilian said CLF had “very vigorous internal controls” to make sure its subsidiary’s contracts don’t “influence our policy positions.” But he acknowledged that the connection could raise questions.

So while  there is no evidence that Vermont environmentalists are being “bought” by contracts or contributions, there are institutional connections between wind power developers and what might be called the environmentalist establishment. Some of those institutional connections are financial. However honorable the green group officials may be, like the leaders of  all other non-profits, they have to keep raising money if they are to perform their mission. It’s close to impossible to conclude that consciously or not so consciously, their awareness of where this money comes from has no influence on them.

This doesn’t mean their support of wind power has been bought. There are legitimate reasons to support wind power. But it does complicate the situation.

This fact does not solve – but it may help to begin to solve – a political-environmental puzzle in Vermont: why has wind power faced almost no opposition? Or, more precisely, why has it faced nothing but very localized and politically inept opposition?

After all, the wind projects have to go where the wind blows, which in Vermont means remote, high-elevation ridges on land where the ecological balance is delicate. The towers and the roads needed to build and maintain them pose obvious threats to unspoiled, swift-flowing mountain streams and to habitat for bears and maybe even (if they are anywhere) catamounts. If ever there were a recipe for opposition from environmentalists, this would seem to be it.

Yet just last week all the “mainstream” green groups in the state reiterated their support for wind power. That leaves only the not-so-mainstream Vermonters for a Clean Environment to oppose the wind projects in Sheffield, nearby Lowell, and other ridges.

Asked why she thought her group was alone in opposing wind development, Annette Smith of VCE said, “follow the money.”

Come back Wednesday when this site will follow the money – but also more than the money – to try to solve that political-environmental puzzle.

Meanwhile:

Correction of self: For the second time in a couple of months (clearly there is a synapse out of kilter here) the News Guy said “Hartland” last Friday when he meant “Hartford.” Accchhhhhh!

Correction of other: In Sunday’s Burlington Free Press appeared the headline, “Environmentals look ahead with optimism.”  There is no such thing as an “environmental,” much less two or more of them. The word is an adjective. It can not look ahead with anything. Yes, making the headline fit can be a challenge, but that’s no excuse.

Considering that they are…well, you know…Democrats, Vermont’s leading Democrats are acting awfully grown-up.

It isn’t just that they’re not being petulant, a surprise in itself, petulance being what the computer nerds would call a Democrat’s default position.

Instead all five candidates for governor have been exuding graciousness and good humor in this post-primary period, none of them more than Peter Shumlin,  the certified leader (by 197 votes) if not yet the final winner of the primary.

But he would be the final winner had runner-up Doug Racine not demanded a recount.  It would be no surprise, then, were Shumlin a might miffed at Racine.

If he is, he’s not showing it; to the contrary, he said the recount was the right thing to do. Meanwhile, Racine keeps acknowledging that Shumlin is likely to end up as the nominee after the recount, and the other three have joined the top two on the campaign trail.

Under the circumstances, this is just what the Democrats should do if Shumlin (or Racine) is to have a chance to beat Republican Brian Dubie. But Democrats do not always do what they should do.

Republicans usually do, and Dubie is. He’s being aggressive and energetic, yesterday announcing a 26.2-hour campaign marathon scheduled to start  early Tuesday and go nonstop into the following morn.

“Vermonters work hard for their money, and they deserve a Governor who will work hard for them,” said Dubie, firmly if not originally, in a campaign press release.

For two reasons, this is just what Dubie ought to be doing. First, he’s taking advantage of the Democrats delay. Second, he’s trying to do what Gov. Jim Douglas did in his last two elections – create the appearance of inevitability, make it the conventional wisdom that “Dubie can’t lose.”

Harder to do against either Shumlin or Racine than against Douglas opponents Gaye Symington and Scudder Parker, two of the more inept statewide candidates (and not just in this state) of recent years. But that doesn’t mean Dubie shouldn’t try. For him, the effort is like chicken soup; even if it doesn’t help, it couldn’t hurt.

Perhaps more amazing than Democrats acting like grown-ups, so are the Progressive Party leaders. Party Chair Martha Abbott abandoned her own candidacy for governor to support…well, to oppose Dubie, though she was apparently not quite grown up enough to endorse anyone, or even, in her statement on the party’s web site (and in the Burlington Free Press) to mention the word “Democrat.”

Still, it was a more politically productive maneuver than an actual Abbott campaign for governor would have been. Nor is Abbott the only Prog venturing into adulthood these days. Anthony Pollina, who ran for governor as a Progressive in 2000 and as a sort-of Progressive (technically an independent) two years ago, ran in the Democratic primary for a state senate seat in Washington County. He won.

Are these signs of a future rapprochement or even merger between the Dems and the Progs?

Not yet. It would be interesting to see, however, if a Governor Shumlin or Governor Racine would appoint Abbott or another Prog to a senior administration position. If that happens, rapprochement/merger discussions might follow.

And now for something that is not as completely different as it first seems. This little outdoor vignette will circle back onto policy and politics.

As has been noted before on this site, the News Guy likes to go fishing, and did so the other day on the Black River (the one in the Northeast Kingdom, not the one that runs through Springfield).

The Black is a beautiful River. There’s plenty of access. Most of it is easy to wade. It is, in short, almost the perfect river for state and local tourism officials to market to anglers in nearby states, and as far away as New York City and New Jersey. Come to the placid, pastoral, easy-going Northeast Kingdom, bring your money, and enjoy a great trout stream.

Just one little problem: the Black is not a great trout stream. Not any more. It was “once considered one of Vermont’s great brown trout streams,” according to Vermont Trout Streams, a guide edited by Lawton Weber and published by Northern Cartographic (2002). “Sadly,” the  guide continues,  “that can no longer be considered the case,” thanks largely to a ”combination of intensive logging and farming practices over the last 30 years.”

Another way to put it is that the fishery degraded because of not enough government regulation.

The Black, alas, is not alone. Most Vermont rivers contain fewer wild trout and other species than they did a few decades ago, and in most cases the main reason is that logging and farming polluted the water, silted over the spawning beds, or denuded the streambanks of the shade that kept rivers cool enough for trout.

There is an economic as well as an ecological price to be paid here. Mediocre trout streams draw far fewer visitors than good ones. That means fewer customers for hotels, restaurants, shops and gas stations. Some of those visitors might have decided to move into the state, bringing money with them, possibly hiring workers.

But in some cases, only if they could live near a great trout stream.

To be sure, maybe it was all worth it. Perhaps the lax regulation allowed farmers and loggers to produce more wealth than the state has given up by not being able to attract as many tourists toting rod and reel. That’s probably impossible to figure out. What is known is that logging and farming are an increasingly small percentage of the state’s economy while tourism and outdoor recreation are growing.

Either way, the point here is that regulation has its economic benefits as well as its costs, and de-regulating can entail an economic loss. For instance, if all those wind towers are erected near the Long Trail on Lowell Mountain, will some hikers from New York, New Jersey and Connecticut decide they’d rather backpack in Maine or the Adirondacks? Wherever they go, some of those folks spend lots of money.

Again, it’s hard to know. But maybe it should be thought about, especially as the candidates propose easing or at least streamlining the regulatory process. Dubie has taken the lead here, calling for less regulation. All three candidates say they’d like to speed up the permitting process for developers, and all say their proposed changes can be put into effect without hurting the environment.

Maybe they can, but it could well depend on just what they want to deregulate. And how they propose to deregulate it.

(Oh, like most Vermont rivers, the Black is not a terrible trout stream. The tally that day for four hours of fishing was one decent-sized rainbow, one smallish but feisty brookie, a few missed strikes. Fine when the river is a 20 minute drive from home, but not good enough to attract folks from away).

The News Guy will not take a Labor Day holiday, but will – appropriately — discuss some of the candidate tax claims and counter-claims, especially as they relate to who might get much and who might get little.

Can they do that?

Or, to be strictly grammatical,  the doer in this case being a single entity, if composed of several individuals, can it do that?

The “it” is the Executive Branch of the government of the state of Vermont, commonly known as the Douglas Administration. And the thing that it did was fire a state worker after the Legislature specifically told it not to fire that state worker, an instruction that Gov. Jim Douglas seemed to accept.

As with the grammar, the above description is imprecise. The Administration did not officially “fire” Jens Hawkins-Hilke, the scientist who provided expert advice to local planners involved in the Community Wildlife Program.

It just eliminated his position.

It did so even though the budget bill passed in late May stipulates with no apparent ambiguity that “(i)t is the intent of the general assembly that the fiscal year 2011 budget… funds two (2) limited service Fish and Wildlife Scientist II positions… The Scientist II positions shall continue to implement the landowner Incentive Program and Community Wildlife Program. “

A separate “Statement of Legislative Intent” filed by Appropriations Committee chairs Martha Heath (House) and Susan Bartlett (Senate) asserts that “the policy goal” of the provision is “to have continuity…for the wildlife related local municipal and regional planning…assistance these positions provide including wildlife crossing of roads in developed areas to improve planning for sustaining critical habitat for wildlife preservation.”

Douglas signed the bill on June 3. The next day, Jonathan Wood, the Secretary of the Agency of Natural Resources eliminated one (1) of those “two (2) Fish and Wildlife Science II positions, Hawkins-Hilke’s, the one that “implement(s) the…Community Wildlife Program.”

Could he do that?

Obviously he could because he did, though Hawkins-Hilke and the state employees union have filed a grievance. Until the grievance procedure runs its course, then, it’s premature to conclude that the termination (reduction in force, or RIF, in government jargon) was completely on the up and up.

But it isn’t too early to conclude whether the Executive Branch has the power to terminate a position even after it agrees (as at least implied by the Governor’s signature on the bill) not to terminate that position.

Apparently it does.

“The Legislature can put in language that says ‘you shall’ or ‘you shall not,’” said David Coriell, Douglas’s spokesman. “But when they say what the intent of the Legislature is, that’s a little fuzzier. Intent is not a mandate.”

Coriell, of course, works for the Executive Branch, and could be expected to interpret law and constitution in its favor. But Steve Klein, the head of the Legislature’s Joint Fiscal Office, a lawyer as well as a numbers whiz, agreed that in general “I don’t think legislative intent has the force of law,” and Paul Gilles, the Montpelier lawyer who is recognized as one of the state’s leading constitutional lawyers, said statutes are often “not implemented the way (legislators say) they’re supposed to be,” but courts are reluctant to intervene in jurisdictional disputes between the other two branches.

At any rate, the Legislature does not plan to take this case to court.

“We’re just urging the governor to follow the full intent of the law,” said Tom Cheney of Speaker Shap Smith’s office.

When one side in a legal dispute decides not to go to court, it’s usually because it doubts it can win.

So Hawkins-Hilke’s termination, while perhaps less than noble, arguably even dishonorable, appears to be within the Administration’s constitutional discretion.

Whether it violates the state’s contract with the Vermont State Employees Association is yet to be determined, and Hawkins-Hilke, not surprisingly, asserts that it does, and is therefore illegal.

“According to the union contract, (the RIF) has to be on economic grounds and has to be in compliance with the law,” he said. “The budget bill is law. It was signed June 3, and on June 4 administration continued with the RIF. So it is not in compliance with statute. Nor is it an economically driven cut.”

Yes, it is, insists ANR Secretary Wood, even though it saved only $16,000, the state’s half of Hawkins-Hilke’s pay. The other half came from the federal government.

“I would love the people who are saying that to live a little bit in my shoes,” Wood said. “The agency has had to reduce almost 100 positions…in the last couple of years. Unless you’re in state government it’s a little annoying to cavalierly talk about amounts of money as though they’re insignificant. This has been the largest reduction of state government in history. Every dollar is important.”

But Hawkins-Hilke and others suspect that the Administration wants to weaken environmental planning as much as it wants to save money. After all, it increased spending on some of its preferred functions, such as economic development.

And one email released by Administration Secretary Neale F. Lunderville’s office indicated that at least one Administration official, Human Resources Commissioner Caroline Earle, was “very concerned about this move in the light of the legislative language.”

Other officials, though, were confident that Wood had the authority to terminate the position.

Hawkins-Hilke pointed out that he is not the only environmental planner whose job has been eliminated.

“The only planner in Forest, Parks, and Recreation was RIFFED last year,” he said. The head planner for the Agency of Natural Resources was RIFFED  last year. The Basin Planning Program (part of the Water Quality Division) has taken a substantial hit.”

Dana Farley, president of the Vermont Planners Association, had a similar assessment.

“The planning community’s a little bit perplexed by it all,” she said. “Resources for planning have been cut for many years. We aren’t getting the kind of technical and funding support we used to. The loss of this position really tipped over the cart.”

Wood insisted that ANR would continue to help localities plan for wildlife conservation, though he acknowledged that the service “may not be quite as robust without having an individual dedicated to it.”

Evidence as to whether the position was terminated solely to save money might be found in the emails the VSEA is seeking from the Department under a Freedom of Information Act filing. According to Hawkins-Hilke, Lunderville’s office has complied with the request, and the Agency of Commerce and Community Development replied that it has “no communications whatsoever” on the matter, an assertion Hawkins-Hilke does not doubt.

But ANR is balking, arguing that though the VSEA does not want copies of the emails, only the opportunity to look at them, it must pay for the staff time required for the search.

This, too, could simply be because the hard-pressed agency needs to find all the money it can. On the other hand, just as a decision not to go to court usually indicates a weak case, a reluctance to turn over documents often means that the reluctant party does not want the documents in question to see the light of day.