At his campaign kick off on Tuesday, Matt talked about the need to invest in our young people. Mat was inspired by Essex High School student Matt Breuer, who warned that unless we can find a way to grow jobs and opportunity for young people, Vermont risks creating a ‘lost generation’ of Vermonters who leave the state in their 20s and never return.

Vermont isn’t alone in the struggle to provide meaningful employment for young people. Last month, the unemployment rate for people between the ages of 16 and 24 topped 18 percent. It’s always been tough to get a first job out of high school or college. But the contracting economy and increasing costs for college degrees have made it especially hard on young Vermonters.

Young leaders in the legislature like Kesha Rahm, Rachel Weston and others are looking for solutions. And Matt has suggested some interesting ideas, including trading debt-free college attendance for 2 years of community service new building patterns designed to create the hip, fun downtowns that draw young people and entrepreneurs.

What are YOUR ideas for keeping young people in Vermont and getting more of them - especially young entrepreneurs with start up companies - to move here?

Despite being a national leader in access to health care,Vermont lags behind other states in requiring paid sick leave. It’s still legal in Vermont to get fired because you’re sick, and as a result many Vermonters go to work even when they are not well. That’s not just tough on workers, it’s a real danger in the age of swine flu pandemics. But some employers worry that if we require them to offer sick leave, productivity will decline and profits will suffer.

Some Vermont legislators are considering a paid sick leave law, which would require employers to give their workers a certain number of days off if they are sick or need to care for a dependant, and Congress is debating the same idea.

What do YOU think? Do we need to require paid sick leave in Vermont? What about in the Country? Can we trust employers to take care of their workers? And should the rules change when the government is telling us to stay home of we have flu-like symptoms?

Universal access to broadband coverage is a leading idea in our current list of visions for Vermont's Future. But how will we get there? And what do you make of today’s news that Fairpoint is declaring bankruptcy? 

Verizon promised to build more broadband access in the state, but sold their land-line and internet business before they could deliver. Now Fairpoint is considering how to re-negotiate their promise to expand broadband as they navigate chapter 11. In Burlington, there’s big scandal over whether Burlington Telecom received an inappropriate bail from the city.

So what’s the RIGHT way to get broadband to every corner, nook, cranny and gore of Vermont? Do we need a purely public system like in Finland – where the government pays for the service and guarantees a fast connection to every citizen? Or can we find a new company, or better relationship with Fairpoint and trust them to make good on expanding access?

Although right now the biggest problem on the employment front is simply too few jobs, if we look a little further down the road Vermont has a much bigger challenge: too few educated workers to carry the load.

 So you'll need a better education just to do the work of the state. But, "even if the high school graduation rates remain stable, the number of students pursuing postsecondary education will likely decrease," and "The problem will be exacerbated if large numbers of college- bound and college-educated Vermonters continue to leave the state and are not replaced by similarly educated out-of-state workers"

The Vermont Council on Rural Development did a great project this year through their "Council on the Future of Vermont". You can view their report here, which includes ideas about Vermont community, economy, youth and education, transportation, public safety and more. It's a great place to start when thinking about where our state is going, and where we could go.

As they say in their summary statemtent, "About once a generation Vermonters have paused from their daily concerns and seasonal politics to take part in statewide conversation that consider where we are, where we are going, and the realities and trends that will influence our common future."

We feel like this is definitely the moment in our generation to have that conversation, and to set off boldly toward that future.

The Vermont Public Interest Research Group has put together a detailed report on possibilities for Vermont's energy future. The Rutland Herald wrote that the report (available here as a pdf) "foresees a green future," and it does. The Vermont Business Roundtable agrees that the report paints an ambitious vision, but worries that the expectations are unrealistic. What do you think?

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce may still be debating whether the planet has a carbon problem, but The Energy Project, a parternship between ECHO Science Center and Burlington City Arts, is plunging ahead by imagining a low-carbon tomorrow. It's not some post-apocalyptic nightmare, though -- they're doing it with an art exhibit at the Firehouse Gallery on Church Street in Burlington, seeking to, as they say, "explore the future of the Vermont landscape as it grapples with the aesthetic challenges of a carbon-constrained world."

It's called the Human=Landscape exhibit. Check it out, and see some artistic answers to questions like 'What makes a landscape “beautiful” or “ugly”? What might a sustainable-energy rural landscape of 2020 look like?' It's certainly a refreshing break from tackling these questions with spreadsheets and GIS maps. And it could help us think big about actively creating a future landscape we want to live in.

 The exhibit runs August 14–October 24, 2009