January 12, 2003 With the centuries-old revolutionary cry of "No taxation without representation," a Vermont ski town wants to hop the border to neighboring New Hampshire. Town officials in Killington, Vermont, say they pay the state more than $20 million in taxes each year, and see only $1 million in state aid. New Hampshire, 25 miles to the east, has no income or sales tax.
"It kind of reminds us of colonial days," Town Manager David Lewis told the Associated Press. "England wasn’t giving them any rights. They were treating the colonies as a revenue source."
Killington’s voters will weigh in on the secession plan in March.
In 1997, Vermont levied a property tax to help fund the state's public school system. The bulk of contributions from property-rich areas like Killington now pay to support non-local schools. The ski town’s state and business taxes also tally $10 million annually, according to Vermont’s Rutland Herald.
Killington (population 1,092) shares its representative in the state legislature with three other towns—making it difficult to get their local needs met, according to Lewis. "[The legislature doesn't] have to worry about 1,000 people here affecting anything politically. We’re a big meal ticket to them," Lewis told the Herald.
"I’ve been proud to be a Vermonter," Michael Miller, owner of a Killington cross-country ski business and member of the town’s select board, told the Boston Globe. "But pride doesn’t pay the bills."
Killington is not the first town in Vermont that wants out. A Lake Champlain town, Grand Isle, threatened secession about two decades ago. And New Hampshire’s towns have also tried to switch sides; nearly 40 New Hampshire towns along the Connecticut River tried to join Vermont in 1779 and 1781, according to the Boston Globe.
In Montpelier,Vermont’s state capital, officials aren’t too worried. "This is symbolic, clearly," said Secretary of State Deborah Markowitz, in an interview with the Associated Press. "Absent an armed insurrection type of thing, there isn’t anything a town can do to secede."
