Act 73: The Law That Disappeared
Vermont lawmakers passed Act 73 in 2024 with a clear premise: restructure the state’s education system around larger, consolidated school districts, and tie a new funding model to that restructuring. The law laid out a conditional chain—new district boundaries first, then funding reform. It was the legislative equivalent of putting the foundation down before you build the house.
The foundation was never built.
Less than two years later, the Legislature is advancing H.955, a bill built around regional cooperative service structures that closely resemble proposals debated before Act 73 ever existed. Vermont’s education reform effort has come full circle—after multiple rounds of legislative action, failed implementation, and hundreds of thousands in taxpayer spending.
Before Act 73: The CESA Push
Prior to Act 73, the dominant policy conversation around education reform centered on Cooperative Educational Service Areas—CESAs. The model emphasized regional service-sharing without requiring districts to formally consolidate. Supporters argued it was practical. Skeptics argued it avoided the structural change needed to meaningfully reduce costs.
That debate consumed legislative time, agency resources, and taxpayer dollars before being superseded by Act 73.
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Act 73 Sets a Different Course
When Act 73 passed, it moved Vermont toward a consolidation-based model. The law was explicit: a new funding system would take effect only after new, larger school districts were created and assumed operational control. To advance that work, the Legislature created a Redistricting Task Force charged with recommending new district boundary configurations and producing detailed maps.
The task force met. Members received per diem compensation. Estimates based on legislative pay rates and meeting frequency place the direct cost of that process at approximately $100,000.
No maps were produced.
The central condition of Act 73 was never satisfied.
Who Ran the Process
The task force’s composition has drawn scrutiny. While the group included both supporters and opponents of Act 73, its two co-chairs—Sen. Martine Gulick and Rep. Edye Graning—had both voted against the law when it passed.
Legislative leadership made the appointments, as is standard practice. Placing opponents of a law in charge of its implementation created a structural tension that is reflected in the outcome.
Rather than delivering the district boundary proposals Act 73 anticipated, the task force advanced a framework built around regional cooperation and service-sharing. The same model that lost the policy debate when Act 73 passed emerged from the implementation process as the recommended path forward.
The Funding Question Nobody Is Answering
Act 73 was designed sequentially: structure first, funding reform after. The law explicitly conditioned its financial overhaul on the creation of new districts.
Those districts do not exist.
Yet current legislative discussions around H.955 include funding mechanisms tied to Act 73’s broader goals, including school construction aid linked to the new regional service structures. The Agency of Education, testifying before Senate Finance in late April, acknowledged that H.955 asks the agency to build a construction program while the governance structure beneath it remains unresolved. A deputy secretary noted that the agency does not have the staff capacity to execute the work as currently written.
The prerequisite was not met, yet the funding conversation is moving forward anyway.
H.955: Back to the Beginning
H.955 formalizes the CESA model that the task force advanced. It creates seven regional Cooperative Educational Service Areas statewide, funds facilitators and study committees, and requires districts to participate in merger studies over a multi-year timeline. Actual consolidation remains voluntary.
Key elements of Act 73’s funding reforms are pushed to 2030, conditioned on future legislative action.
House Republican Leader Patti McCoy, speaking in opposition to the bill, argued it continues a decade-long pattern of delay framed as reform. She cited structural changes proposed by Gov. Phil Scott—spending caps, staffing ratio adjustments, and targeted tax relief—that were not adopted. She also pointed to Act 46, passed in 2015 with consolidation incentives, which the Legislature later weakened.
“We are in the same place we were then,” McCoy said.
The Ledger
The cumulative cost of this cycle is difficult to reduce to a single figure, but the layers are clear: pre–Act 73 CESA policy development, the legislative work of passing Act 73, agency planning and implementation efforts under Act 73, the $100,000 redistricting task force, and now the infrastructure costs of standing up H.955.
Hundreds of thousands of dollars across several years of education policy churn—arriving at a destination Vermont was already considering before the law that was supposed to change direction ever passed.
That is the outcome.
Full Circle
Act 73 is still on the books. Its central requirement—new school district boundaries—remains unmet. H.955 does not enforce it. The law has not been repealed. It has simply been bypassed.
For Vermont taxpayers watching property taxes climb while the Legislature revisits the same structural debate it has been having since at least 2015, the question is straightforward: how did all of that work—and all of that money—lead back to the same place?
Dave Soulia | FYIVT
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