Jane Kitchel, left, and Diane Lanpher. Photos by Glenn Russell/VTDiggerLast week’s election, and the resulting power shift in Montpelier, will also reshape some of the Vermont Legislature’s most powerful committees — and who will lead them.The heads of two panels, the House and Senate appropriations committees, which steer the state budget-building process each year, won’t be returning. One is gone due to retirement, but the other to an election result few political observers saw coming.On the Senate side, Caledonia County Democrat Jane Kitchel — long regarded as the leading voice on state spending in the Legislature — did not run for reelection this year after serving for two decades in the chamber, more than half of it as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, plus six years as the panel’s vice chair before that.While Kitchel’s planned departure has been known for months, that of Rep. Diane Lanpher, D-Vergennes, the House Appropriations Committee chair, was not. Lanpher, who was first elected to the House in 2008, lost her seat last week to Ferrisburgh Republican Rob North. (Lanpher’s Democratic district-mate, Rep. Matt Birong, did win reelection.)Lanpher said in an interview that widespread voter concerns over state spending — stoked, she said, by misunderstanding about her role in the Statehouse — likely contributed to her loss. She said that voters are feeling “a lot of pain” over property taxes, but she saw a disconnect on the campaign trail between local school boards’ role in setting education costs and the Legislature’s responsibility to determine how to pay the bill.“When people are that angry, it’s really hard to say, ‘Here, let me talk to you about how this really works,’” Lanpher said Tuesday. “Especially when they see you as the problem — and how it’s also being fanned as, ‘You’re the problem.’” Still, Lanpher said she had few, if any, regrets about her time in the Legislature. “We’ve got a lot to be proud of,” she said. “And, there’s a lot of work ahead. As it always is.”READ MORE After a career in public service, Jane Kitchel to retire from the Vermont Senate by Shaun Robinson May 17, 2024, 11:39 amMay 20, 2024, 1:05 pm In a commentary published in VTDigger last week, Kitchel sounded a similar tone, writing that “political messaging has overshadowed” what she called substantial progress in “getting the state’s fiscal house in order,” as well as increasing access to childcare and improving the state’s transportation infrastructure.“I know that I have been described in the press as one of the most powerful legislators in the Statehouse,” Kitchel continued. “Be that as it may, like Cincinnatus who left power behind to go back to his farm, it is time for me to do the same.”Any legislation that would lead to state spending must make it through the House and Senate appropriations committees. The panels are also responsible for writing — and rewriting — the state budget, often referred to as “the Big Bill,” which is universally seen as the most important legislation of the year. Veteran Statehouse lobbyist Adam Necrason said that Kitchel and Lanpher will leave behind large shoes to fill in the Legislature’s budget-building process — just as their party’s power has been diminished. “It’s a major loss of experienced leadership,” Necrason said, “at a time when the election shifted the dynamic to more power-sharing between the Legislature and the governor.” Both appropriations committees will also see turnover down their rosters next year, though it’s more pronounced in the Senate. Two of the Senate panel’s seven members, including Kitchel and Orleans County Democrat Bobby Starr, are retiring. Meanwhile, a third, Bennington Democrat Dick Sears, died in June.On the House side, four out of 12 committee members, including Lanpher, won’t return. Two Democrats — Rep. Kari Dolan of Waitsfield and Rep. Tristan Toleno of Brattleboro — did not seek office again, while Colchester Republican Rep. Pat Brennan is moving to the Senate after winning the Grand Isle seat held by the late Sen. Dick Mazza.Lanpher said that’s a reversal from two years ago, when it was the House panel that saw greater turnover, meaning the Senate panel had the advantage of experience. Now the House committee has a larger share of returning members, she said, though acknowledged the impact could be relatively subtle.“So the dynamics in that room are going to be different,” she said, recalling the many times she would visit the Senate Appropriations Committee during the session. Sen. Andrew Perchlik, a Washington County Democrat/Progressive who serves as vice chair of the Senate appropriations panel and is among the most likely names to replace Kitchel next year, said he expects that political headwinds will make the room feel different, too.Perchlik said that he anticipates fewer bills carrying expensive appropriations to make it to the committee next year — and, almost certainly, no bills to make it there that don’t have some indication of support from Republican Gov. Phil Scott, who no longer faces a veto-proof majority. In fact, after the GOP gained six seats in the 30-member Senate last week, Perchlik’s coalition can lose just one vote on party-line issues. That’s because the chamber will be split between 17 Democrats and Progressives and 13 Republicans — and any ties could well be broken by newly elected GOP lieutenant governor John Rodgers. “When we had the ability to override a veto, people would put forward proposals that they knew the governor would veto — but they were like, ‘Hey, well, we should override it and ask for bigger things,’” Perchlik said this week. “I’m just expecting less of that.” Another of the Legislature’s “money committees,” the Senate Finance Committee, which oversees tax policy in that chamber, will also see a shakeup. Two of its Democratic members — Orange County Sen. Mark MacDonald, the panel’s vice chair, and Addison County Sen. Chris Bray — lost their seats to GOP challengers, too, while Windsor County Sen. Dick McCormack is retiring. The panel has seven members overall.The greatest turnover, though, is expected to hit the fourth money committee, the House Ways and Means Committee, which is on track to lose seven out of 12 members. Two were defeated, Reps. Carl Demrow, D-Corinth, and Julia Andrews, D-Westford, while the rest gave up their House seats, in some cases to seek higher office: Reps. Scott Beck, R-St. Johnsbury; Chris Mattos, R-Milton; Katherine Sims, D-Craftsbury; Curt Taylor, D-Colchester; and Peter Anthony, D-Barre. The chair of that panel, which writes tax policy in the House, Rep. Emilie Kornheiser, D-Brattleboro, took over just two years ago — succeeding former Rep. Janet Ancel, D-Calais, who ran it for a dozen years before that. Both appropriations committees will likely have more Republican members than they did at the start of the last biennium, Perchlik added. After the 2022 election, the House committee’s membership was split eight Democrats to four Republicans, while the Senate’s panel included just a single Republican. Brennan, who continues to be the House Appropriations Committee’s highest-ranking GOP member until his move to the Senate in January, said he thought Lanpher “did a great job” running the panel, though thinks that having a more balanced party split will ultimately produce more balanced legislation.“Don’t get me wrong, we’re still in the minority. But I think we’ll have more of a voice,” he said. “When you come to the table and start tinkering with a bill, maybe doing an amendment or two, we might have a little more success than we’ve had in the past.” Read the story on VTDigger here: Election to spur shakeup on Vermont Legislature’s powerful money committees.