House Bill 338, which requires the state to work toward ensuring that all apparel purchases come from sweatshop-free factories passed a second reading and is likely to be approved by the House today.
The bill, if it passes in the House, will move over to the Senate Government Operations Committee whose chairman, Sen. Jeanette White, D-Putney, is expected to encourage its passage.
Members of the BUHS Child Labor Education and Action Project, or CLEA, traveled to Montpelier Thursday to sit in on the Legislature and watch as their school project made its way toward the governor's desk.
"It's empowering to go through this as a kid," Whitney Smith, a member of the group, said Thursday afternoon after returning from the trip to the Statehouse. "It makes us realize what we can do."
The idea was hatched in a special social studies program which had the CLEA group write a sweatshop free bill in a model Congress.
There was so much enthusiasm for the idea that it was taken to the high school board, which adopted it and required BUHS to seek out uniforms that were manufactured in factories that protect the human rights of the workers.
Last year, Rep. Sarah Edwards, P-Brattleboro, heard about the movement and contacted the students about the work they were doing. They worked together and in the last session the bill was introduced, but it never made it out of committee.
This week, with only a few days remaining before the cross-over period when bills are required to be approved by the House or Senate before moving over to the other chamber, the bill passed out of the House Committee on Government Operations and made it to the floor for consideration.
The bill passed on a voice vote Thursday and Edwards expects there to be little debate over it on Friday.
"These kids worked hard for two years on this bill," Edwards said Thursday afternoon.
"We've managed to work around a lot of obstacles and we came out with a strong Vermont rule."
If the bill is signed by the governor later this year, purchases of uniforms for corrections workers, state police and park rangers would have to come from suppliers who certify that the goods were produced in factories that comply with U.S. workplace laws.
The commissioner of buildings and general services would have to report to the Legislature every year on the compliance of the rules.
The high school students testified last year and this year and Edwards said they worked to find answers when she has questions, and did research to make sure the other lawmakers had their issues addressed.
"The other legislators were very impressed with their knowledge," said Edwards. "they had to face the commissioner of buildings and general services and work with lobbyists. They were able to field any question that came their way. It was a lot of work and they really got that."
"There was not much debate. It passed unanimously. We though someone would say 'no,'" Tess Knowles-Thompson, one of the students who went to Montpelier said. "Sarah looked at us and gave us a thumbs-up."
Hannah Viens, a CLEA member, said the bill was watered down at the end of the last session and the group kept in contact with Edwards to make sure that in the end there were enough details in it to make it effective.
"It's not perfect. It's not as strong as we would have liked and it's not a fool-proof bill," Viens said, acknowledging democracy's limits. "But it's important and in the end we have a pretty good bill."
Howard Weiss-Tisman can be reached at hwtisman@reform-er.com or 802-254-2311, ext. 279.
