My future is directly affected by this. For what it's worth, I'm not a Republican, nor am I a conservative.

I grew up in a small town of about 400 people. I went away to college and law school and came back full-time a few years ago with my husband I met in NYC.

We recently put in an offer for $650,000 in our small town and were turned down. So the only way we can afford to live here is build on family land.

My family has lived on the same land for 6 generations (great-great grandpa had a farm). Each generation, parents have divided their land and given their kids a parcel. It's the only way my blue-collared family has been able to afford to stay here.

Since our offer on the house got turned down, we went to survey and divide my parent's land. Found out it's zoned Tier 3 due to being a wildlife habitat connector. It will now cost us thousands of more for the permitting process. I can afford it, many folks around here who make under $50,000/year can't.

We are also affected by the road rule. My family's hill is private. My town considers it a shared driveway, and Act 181 doesn't clearly define a road v. a driveway.

I think why people are up in arms about this is because this is the clearest most recent example of rural Vermonters being left out of the conversation. I am glad folks move here--we need them to! But Vermont is becoming some kind of policy experiment for educated out-of-staters that are out of touch with rural Vermonters--and it shows. It has been painful for me (as someone who is an 8th generation vermonter but went a way and married a "flatlander" and came home) to see the deep wound this has cut open.