1'reasurer’s Primary Race Pits Gay-Friendly
Ex-Legislator Against Gay Former Auditor.

BY EUAN BEAR

mary contests within the Vermont

Democratic Party, former state
Senator Jeb Spaulding and former
state Auditor Ed Flanagan are com-
peting for the chance to run as the
party’s candidate for State Treasurer.

The office of state treasurer
is being vacated by Republican
James Douglas, who is running for
governor.

Since Ed Flanagan is open-
ly gay, and Jeb Spaulding is not, the
primary poses a potential question for
Democratic GLBTQ voters: how
much weight should a candidate’s
sexual identity or orientation carry in
an election?

As a state Senator and
chairman of the Senate
Appropriations Committee.
Spaulding came out early in favor of
full marriage rights for gays and les-
bians. As it became clear that the
Civil Union language was the best
compromise that could be achieved,
he gave that his support. Spaulding
left the Senate after the 2000 session.

Flanagan was elected
Auditor in 1992 and came out as a
gay man in 1995. He was re-elected
in 1996 and 1998, then left the

Auditor’s office to runiagainst then-
Republican US Senator James
Jeffords. Flanagan was defeated by a
better than two-to-one margin.

Both candidates were con-
tacted and asked two questions: Why
should GLBTQ Vermonters vote for
you? What will you do to ensure that
the treasurer’s office will be able to
balance the books in a timely fash-
ion? Balancing the books has been an
ongoing problem for the Treasurer’s
office for several years, according to
numerous reports.

“GLBTQ Vermonters
should vote for me for the same rea-
sons any Vermonter should,” said
Spaulding. “They have the same eco-
nomic and financial issues and con-
cerns as all Vermonters — retirement
security and a need to know that the
Treasurer’s office has prudent poli-
cies and is being well run.”

Further, he said, “I have
demonstrated an interest in ma.king
the world a better place, and I think
the Treasurer’s office can provide
avenues for more inclusiveness. For
example, we could be more active
shareholders by voting our proxies
and initiating shareholder resolutions
in support of companies enacting

In one of the few statewide pri-

domestic partnership policies. I
would like to push for Vermont to be
more active.”

The Treasurer does not
make such decisions unilaterally,
Spaulding clarified; he or she is one
member of a board that manages
teacher and state employee pension
funds. And, he hastened to add, he is
advocating prudent and responsible
investing for the best return and the
lowest risk.

Spaulding did not avoid
using the term “socially responsible
investing,” though be extended the
definition. “There are two angles
here,” he said, “screening for finan-
cial practices — not investing in com-
panies that reincorporate offshore,
who have a diverse board of direc-
tors, including members from outside
the company, and so on — and using
our investment dollars to encourage
socially responsible policies."

“Screened investments,"
Spaulding concluded. “offer as good
or better returns as non-screened
investments. I would push for includ-
ing a segment of our investments that
was socially screened."

Flanagan suggested that on
September 10, GLBTQ voters should
vote for him, “for a couple of rea-
sons. I have shared the experience
that many of your readers have lived
through, growing up gay in America,
going through the ordeal of coming
out, and feeling like an alien.” But,
he added, “I would not ask for their
vote just as a gay man or as a straight
man. That experience is just one asset
and I have others.”

Flanagan went on to list his
accomplishments as the State
Auditor, beginning with reforming
the office from “a silent cave in the
bureaucracy” to a watchdog for
Vermonters, suggesting that the
Treasurer’s office could benefit from
similar treatment. “While other can-
didates may talk about the need to
stand up to the Enrons and the chief
executives,” he concluded, “I’ve
already done it. And I’ll continue to
do it. It is outrageous that Vemionters
are being deprived of their retirement
security because a few have exploited
the market for their own benefit. I
have the strength and the guts.”

On the second question —
about balancing the state’s books in a
timely fashion — Flanagan said, “I
was the one who identified the prob-
lem that the Treasurer’s Ofiice was
not balancing the books. I suggested
a remedy in our report, which I will
summarize and repeat here. Like any
other financial operation, whether it’s

 

a small business or a family opera-
tion, you’ve got to reconcile the
influx of cash with the outgo.

“When you don’t, it
increases the potential for theft, inad-
vertent misapplication of funds, a
lack of compliance with internal con-
trols that should guarantee that
Vermonters’ tax monies are being
spent the way they were intended to
be. It’s basic bread and butter
accounting,” he explained.

“I can’t say that there’s
been a conscious, deliberate effort to
camouflage the state’s books, but
there’s been negligence. If there are

OITM Volunteer Maria Gentile Dies in Car Accident
Lack of Legal Documents or CU Leaves Partner in Limbo

aria M. Gentile, age 35, died in a
car accident on July 23, accord-

ing to her partner, Kathy Pettinato, who I

survived the crash with minor injuries.
Pettinato, who was driving, was wear-
ing a seatbelt, Gentile was not.
Pettinato said their 1986 Chevy Blazer,
rolled into a ravine when she swerved
to avoid hitting a deer.
A report in the Rutland

Herald said that according to police,

Pettinato was “processed for drunken
driving alter the accident.”

The two women had been
together for four years and had moved
to Vermont from Connecticut in
December 2001. They had begun vol-
unteering for Out in the Mountains dis-
tributing papers in the Manchester,
Vermont area in May.

Gentile, a former social
worker in Massachusetts, had helped to

found the consumer-based mental
health movement in Connecticut, said
Pettinato. Gentile herself had been
diagnosed with major depression and
obsessive-compulsive disorder, accord-
ing to her partner. The two women met
as volunteers for the National Alliance
for the Mentally Ill. They had been
planning for a civil union in the near
future.

Pettinato said that at least in

above, Ed Flanagan (left) meets with constituents.

Left. Jeb Spaulding. -

“I have shared the experience that many of your read-_‘ ,_ » J
ers have lived through, growing up gay in America, _
going through the ordeal of coming out, and feeling like

an alien. [But] I would not ask for their vote just as a

gay man or as a straight man. That experience is just

one asset and l have others.” Ed Flanagan

“GLBTQ Vermonters should vote for me for the same
reasons any Vermonter should. They have the same
economic and financial issues and concerns — retire-
ment security and a need to know that the 1reasurer’s
office has prudent policies and is being well run.” 3

Jet) Spautding

contributing causes — a new computer
system, too few personnel — it’s up to
the Treasurer to blow the whistle and
explain what’s going on and why.”
On balancing the books,
Spaulding declared that he would
take three initial steps to make sure
the Treasurer’s office was providing
timely and accurate information.
“First, I’d hire an outside manage-
ment consultant to evaluate current
practice and recommend changes,” he
said. Asked whether the Auditor’s
report already did that, he said,
“What we_get from the Auditor is
facts and figures, not an actual man-

part because of her partrier’s disability,
they had no legal documents to provide
for each other in the event one partner
died. “The house is in probate,” said
Pettinato. “I guess her parents have
hired an estate lawyer. But her parents
are supportive —- they told me to take
whatever I wanted. I don’t want any-
thing, but just to have my friend back.”
While Gentile’s parents, siblings, and
nieces and nephews were listed in the
obituary in the Brattleboro Reformer,
Pettinato was not.
Pettinato said she doesn’t

know whether she’ll stay in Vermont —
in part it depends on what happens

agement review.”

Spaulding’s second step
would be to “strengthen the depart-
ment’s ability to attract and support
quality employees through training
and education.”

Ensuring that the
Treasurer’s office is using the most
up-to-date information technology,
and if not, upgrading it, was
Spaulding’s third step toward timely
financial reports,

Whichever set of answers
appeals to you, act on it — vote in the
primary September lO. V

when her partner’s estate is_settled. “I
just don’t want to end up like that
movie — If Walls Could Talk 2.”

Gentile was buried in
Brattleboro, said Pettinato, because her
family knew she was very happy there.
“They allowed her to be buried with the
rings that I gave her,” Pettinato said in
a phone interview. But Pettinato doesn’t
have the rings that Gentile gave her. “I
took them off when I was trying to dig
her out and they were stolen.”

Donations in Maria Gentile’s
memory can be made to any animal
welfare organization in honor of
Gentile’s work with animals. V