Candidate Statement – Amy Moore, Vermont State Senator

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Transcript

[00:00:19] Speaker 1: Hi everyone, my name is Amy Moore and I'm running for the
[00:00:22] Vermont Senate to represent
[00:00:23] the Bennington District.
[00:00:25] Many people in the district know me from a variety of places,
[00:00:28] teaching computer science
[00:00:29] at CCV, Sue Z Cues the Pool Hall in downtown Bennington, and
[00:00:34] Southshire Roller Derby which
[00:00:35] competed at Riley Rink.
[00:00:37] In my more private life, I've lived in Vermont for 50 years
[00:00:40] and lived and worked on my property
[00:00:42] in Pownal for 32 of those.
[00:00:45] My husband and I run Muddy Paws Farm, we're farmers and
[00:00:48] homesteaders we make and sell
[00:00:50] about 30 gallons of wood -fired, non -reverse osmosis syrup,
[00:00:54] and we know what it means
[00:00:55] to make a rural Vermont life work, season after season, while
[00:00:59] working full -time jobs.
[00:01:01] I joined the Navy in 1989 because I wanted
[00:01:04] to serve my country.
[00:01:05] Now that I've retired from teaching at the Community
[00:01:07] College of Vermont, I have the
[00:01:09] time to serve my community and I feel strongly that Montpelier
[00:01:13] needs more strong, rural voices.
[00:01:16] This is why I'm running.
[00:01:18] Bennington and Windham Counties and all of Vermont are facing
[00:01:21] real pressure right now,
[00:01:22] rising costs, strained school budgets, housing that's harder
[00:01:26] and harder for local families
[00:01:28] to find and afford.
[00:01:30] These aren't separate problems, they're connected.
[00:01:33] The Senate needs someone who understands that connection
[00:01:35] because she's lived it, not just
[00:01:38] studied it.
[00:01:39] A little bit about where I came from because I think it
[00:01:41] matters for the job.
[00:01:43] I earned my degree in radiography through the Navy's
[00:01:46] Reserve Allied Medical Program
[00:01:47] at Champlain College, and later my degree in business
[00:01:50] management from Southern Vermont
[00:01:52] College.
[00:01:53] From 2002 to 2025, I taught computer science at CCV in
[00:01:58] Bennington, Brattleboro, Rutland,
[00:02:00] and online.
[00:02:02] And I served on the Vermont State College
[00:02:03] System's AI committees.
[00:02:05] So I've had a front -row seat to how fast technology is changing
[00:02:08] the world we and our children are
[00:02:11] all growing up into.
[00:02:13] I'm a curious person and my personality thrives on digging
[00:02:16] deep into questions, gathering
[00:02:18] information from different and reliable sources, and thinking
[00:02:21] and acting outside the box.
[00:02:23] I love to listen to people and hearing their needs and
[00:02:27] questions and working to get answers.
[00:02:30] I spent my life in this community in ways that go
[00:02:32] beyond the classroom.
[00:02:34] I represented Pownal on the Bennington Regional Planning
[00:02:37] Commission through the 1990s and
[00:02:38] 2000s, and was elected chair in 2007.
[00:02:42] I served on CAT-TV's board during the early days of the
[00:02:45] World Wide Web when we were all
[00:02:47] figuring out what that shift would mean for local media.
[00:02:50] As I mentioned earlier, my husband and I own Sue Z Cues, a
[00:02:53] pool hall and arcade in downtown
[00:02:55] Bennington, and I co -founded Southshire Roller Derby, a
[00:02:58] league for men, women, and children
[00:03:00] from 6 to 60.
[00:03:02] I'm a small business owner, a farmer, a teacher, and a
[00:03:05] neighbor, and every one of those experiences,
[00:03:08] shapes how I see the challenges facing this district
[00:03:11] and our beloved state.
[00:03:13] My first priority is representing the needs of rural
[00:03:16] Vermont honestly and directly, and
[00:03:19] that starts with how land use decisions get made.
[00:03:22] Vermont is living through this with Act 181.
[00:03:25] I care deeply about conservation,
[00:03:28] protecting our forests, our farmland, our water, and
[00:03:32] I care just as much about housing, because families can't
[00:03:35] stay here if they can't afford
[00:03:37] to live here.
[00:03:38] Those two goals aren't in conflict, but Act 181 was
[00:03:41] written by urban and suburban NGOs
[00:03:44] without enough input from the people who actually work this
[00:03:47] land every day, and that's exactly
[00:03:49] why rural Vermonters organized, pushed back, and want to repeal
[00:03:53] of at least the road rule
[00:03:55] in Tier 3 this spring.
[00:03:56] That's not a failure of conservation,
[00:03:59] that's a failure of the process.
[00:04:01] Sure, there were public input opportunities, but the sheer
[00:04:04] length of the bill required
[00:04:06] practical application to see where it fell apart.
[00:04:09] My second priority is breaking the cycle of interconnecting
[00:04:12] costs that's squeezing families.
[00:04:15] Property taxes are strained by how we fund education.
[00:04:19] Rural health services are stretched thin and in some cases
[00:04:22] non -existent.
[00:04:23] Driving up family health care costs, housing costs, insurance,
[00:04:27] energy efficiency, and utility
[00:04:29] costs are all tangled up together.
[00:04:32] In Montpelier, these issues often get split apart into
[00:04:34] separate committees, separate bills,
[00:04:36] separate conversations,
[00:04:38] and that's part of the problem.
[00:04:40] When you separate them, you lose sight of how one decision
[00:04:43] ripples into the next.
[00:04:45] My life hasn't been lived in one lane.
[00:04:48] I've been a teacher, a small business owner, a re -next -rate
[00:04:51] tech, a sailor, a farmer, and
[00:04:52] a planner.
[00:04:53] I'm used to looking at a whole system, not just one piece of
[00:04:57] it, and that's exactly
[00:04:58] the approach these interconnected concerns demand.
[00:05:01] I want to make sure that when the Senate takes up education
[00:05:03] funding, transportation, health
[00:05:06] care, or housing, we're thinking through and know how every
[00:05:09] decision affects families,
[00:05:11] businesses, and communities before we vote.
[00:05:15] From all my years of teaching and farming, I also know how to
[00:05:17] explain things in different
[00:05:18] ways to help people understand and be engaged with
[00:05:22] these complex problems.
[00:05:24] I'm Amy Moore and I'm asking for your support to represent the
[00:05:28] Bennington District in the
[00:05:29] Vermont State Senate.
[00:05:31] Check out my website at amydmoore.com and
[00:05:34] thank you for watching.