Last month’s devastating floods washed away jobs along with homes, cars, crops, office equipment, and documents. Job Centers serving areas hit hard by the floods saw a jump in regular jobless insurance claims. At the Barre area office, which also serves Montpelier, the number of people receiving benefits nearly doubled from early July through the week that ended Aug. 12. The Newport area saw a similar rise.

Montpelier – Janet Ancel has been unanimously elected to the board of Public Assets Institute.

A nonpartisan nonprofit in Montpelier, Public Assets Institute is Vermont’s independent research organization on state budget, tax, and economic issues and the source for timely and in-depth state fiscal and policy analysis.

Ancel was the chief architect of Vermont’s groundbreaking state Child Tax Credit, which became law in 2022. Ancel’s state credit was modeled on the pandemic-era expansion of the federal child tax credit, which successfully reduced child poverty by more than forty percent nationwide, with even larger reductions among Black and Hispanic children.

“We are delighted that Janet Ancel has joined us,” said Board Chair Steve Gold, “her leadership on the Vermont Child Tax Credit exemplifies precisely the type of equity-focused, data-driven innovation that Public Assets strives to bring to statewide policy conversations. We look forward to the contribution her leadership and vision will make to our work in the coming years.”