 Good morning, everyone. It is Wednesday, April 6th, 2022 in this house of agriculture and forestry. And we are going to have potentially every three, I don't know, we'll see what we've got in the discussion. Just regarding things in general where we want to go with this and then attend the team will be hearing from folks about local food security. So that should be interesting. And ties in with our overall meeting of how important agriculture is to save a lot. So committee members we had some conversations yesterday about about various things and I'm also thinking about the two bills that are under law. And I'm wondering if there is anything we need to hear. We're going to hold on to those bills in case something comes up that we need to attach to them, but anything that you thought about regarding our accessory on our businesses, the house that we've helped in the Senate for the cannabis bill. And I want to hear from any of those topics. Heather, you are going to try and line up some smaller research. Yes, yes. It wasn't quite enough time I'm still being here. Okay. Yeah, great. So we get to hear from them about right to farm and we heard some interesting testimony yesterday from Heather Darby about someone who had a small farm and was, you know, selling products. They had a little hard was that then when they had chicken manure delivered to the farm to fertilize their fields. The neighbors started throwing rocks at the truck. So that's a warming. And again, if you live in an extreme farm, you'd better care just know the world. So, any thoughts about any of that. Yeah. Yes, and I do think that it's obviously important to acknowledge folks next to a farm that they're going to be certain elements that are not to be residential. However, I do find it to be somewhat valid, if there are certain alarming practices that are happening and I want to draw a really clear distinction between something that might not be a sustainable industry sound or something that is clearly causing issues and they shouldn't be so an extra focus on what the RAPs are, what is protected within them, and then really acknowledging that the right to farm bill, as we are looking at it isn't going to give farmers absolute free reign to be reckless. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that actually is a good point because, as I said yesterday, I don't think farmers should just be doing anything right now they want. So the farmer question in that lawsuit was apparently meeting the requirements of the RAPs. And so, but there was no clear, no clear way to define whether they were in compliance. And I don't know whether that's something that the agency of agriculture should be doing or, you know, what so could be heard of Petro, maybe Brian Hatch, although he's not actually in a position to let us know about those issues. Yeah. I have somebody that tells me a constituent about the right to farm, and they're concerned about basically kind of what Heather was saying about giving too much power, if you will, to farms. They had instance we could ask them to testify. You guys want to hear from. Sure. Just make sure we're hearing both sides. Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, that would be great. And then on the other, on the other bill on 188, I didn't have that person that I had talked about before, testify, reach out again and longer. They haven't heard anything about testifying or sort of be planning on hearing testimony at some point on that. Sure. Yeah. And they were concerned about smaller growers. Yes, they were. It was a little bit similar to what was his name Sam. About the out of state. People being able to grow cannabis in Vermont that are not local and because they can get through all the regulation and everything. People certainly more in favor of lenience for allowing anybody to grow cannabis and stuff. And what I heard on that bill was that they were really focused on smaller. Yes, right. So it's also interesting, and I haven't verified this, but I did, I did send it on as a repair. What if like, it's not such a friend who lives in town sent me an email saying that two large companies that are moving in, or trying to anyway. So who knows. But he sent me an article that I'll forward to you. I'll forward to the email and take a look at that. So, yeah, so cannabis and small, smaller growers. I think there's a real dividing line between the indoor cannabis growers who seem to be more corporate out of state and yeah, and the small Vermont farmers you want to do outside. Yeah, and that that would certainly tie in the right to farm because if there's endless complaints about outdoor cannabis and harassment and Yeah, it's interesting because when I was in Colorado several years ago with sorrow. We visited one row. That was huge and at the time I said well it's coming to Vermont I recommend that you have any extra cash to buy any warehouse in the bus. Most of the growth was done in the worst. There was one. One. Yeah, that may have changed over the last several years because, because the indoor real estate, incredible amount of energy. This was even a greenhouse right it was a warehouse. Yeah, yeah, in the middle of it like an industrial car. And, and the Dixie was sort of processing facility was also in a similar kind of building. And also that Dixie was also had the retail space. Remember, I think one side, yeah, one side was medical and one side was referees. So, yeah, Terry. Do you think they grew inside and like that for security or just because it's easier to keep an environment and more controlled environment. Because obviously they could lock the doors at night. Yes, nobody would know that. Nobody problem over the fence together. Yeah, yeah. Little advantage to it maybe but might not be the reason. Well, I think that's, I think that's probably exactly right. Better security, all of these places of course in Colorado at the time was all cash economy. They deliver, they made deliveries of products. This is just a little tour made delivery of products and basically brings our cars. And they usually had to go at a time. So, kind of like, you know, the president goes someplace to helicopters to planes. So, also I think controlling pests and disease was part of it as well, which they could do more effectively inside. They could control the photo period. I think, not that I know much about this, but Katowice is reliant on a photo period and Vermont has had a really good photo period for growing and flowering. What does that mean? What do you mean? Photo period? It means the amount of sunlight during the day. And the angle and heat. I don't know about the angle. But the amount of sunlight we get, very conducive to, you know, the flower, because it's amazing that plants will be growing, growing, growing, then all of a sudden they start to flower. And I'm told that it has to do with the sun. So, yeah. And I don't know in Colorado if it's available there, but that's the control. You know, they have a mother plant that you close from it. It's pretty amazing. I think that humidity would be a big deal because, I mean, once it gets right in the fall. So it's going to be very low in the fall. But, you know, it's going to be a little bit more than that. So it's going to be a little bit of a hole. It's going to be a hole, right? It's going to be a hole. It's going to be a hole that's going to be a hole that won't get done to save us that. was, and we had had some very late process in the last few years, unbelievably late and not until October, that year, you know, the plants were out there and it was getting on to September, I don't know what, and I called up Gary Jr. and I said, you know, we're supposed to see a parade this coming week and watch them do, he said, come down, because if you go too far into the cold, rainy thing, it's not good, yeah, right? When a frost hits them, they freeze and then in that fine process, is where that extra moisture gets trapped in the heads and then they rot, I think that's the worst, you know? Yeah, I'm not that happy with this, yes, yeah. Well, you know, it's interesting, but also with indoor, I think that the history of the black market cannabis is almost all the indoor, so it probably wasn't kind of easy transition for a big, big time legal, and I think even if we're not, there's that thought down. Well, I think you're right, yeah, but people are allowed to grow six in their own place, to mature or immature, so, you know, that's adult use cannabis, not hanging. Yeah. So. That's funny, like I'm not driving up around Vermont, I've never seen like your neighbor, I've never seen a whole field of half driving up around Vermont. Yeah. Do you have some near you? I have, and I'm trying to remember where it was, but I'm thinking more like when I drive down to my branch in New Levin, and I drive down route 20, go to Bennington, Oh, right, yeah. And down along there, Cherry Lane, somewhere in there. In New York. In New York, driving south on the left, there were whole fields. Interesting. So there was a few, nothing in our, there was, in the kingdom, there was quite a lot there, it started out real strong, and then everybody was a poor, there was just no, it didn't go well for a lot of people, and then the next year you saw it back in corn or grain or something like that, but there was that year, what was it, two or three years ago where it just started out, everybody got in deep, but a lot of people most didn't stick with it. If you didn't have a contract. Yeah, even if you did have a contract, there was a number of people in our area that had a contract, but yeah. Yes. And there wasn't processing, there wasn't, people couldn't take it, they put the cart before the horse. Yeah, it was like, yeah. There was no place for it to go, so people were trying to, you know, round bail it and do things like that, which works for maybe some of the fire stuff, but they were trying to do it for CBD, and then it was molded, and it was just asking for a lot of people. Yeah. Sort of for a song, that's good. Yeah, yeah. That sounds good to be true. Yeah, but it was nice to be here, you know. Yeah. From a couple of customers who seemed to be here for the long haul. Yes, yes. There's something to it. Right. Right. So I'm hearing about rats. I wanted to hear that from Lord of Petro. I want to know what meeting requirements means. Is there some way, you know, in future farms are verified it's having meat at the rats easily, and then care for cannabis related issues for small farms, smaller growers. What else? Are rats almost primarily about water used on farm or management of water? I think it's manure management, fertilizer, nutrient management, and as, you know, as a concerns water, but you can ask more for a more detailed answer, but yeah, I think it's mostly on a really large quality. That would be where water is sort of referred to like your water. Yeah. Connections. Yeah. Right. And is it, do you have a nutrient management plan as a connect, are the rats connected to that? Something? Yeah, I think so. I mean, it's kind of complicated, but as far as the, there's kind of a bunch of different interests as far as like there's state regulations, whether there's like NRCS, which is federal, and they kind of all link together, but they're not always the same thing, but it has to do with, yeah, it seems like everything always, being that we're a certified small farm, we do have to have a nutrient management plan on our own farm, but there's a lot of things that's tied, yeah, I'm trying to think it's mostly around water, but I would say manure, fertilizer, and an erosion, you know, and if you're doing anything that would trigger like something in certain areas that would trigger an erosion concern, that's, but there's, yeah, yeah, I think it all really connects to water. Really visit your farm. Yeah, small farms, I think ours is every, we get inspected every five years or something. Yeah, I think, yeah. What do they find in your farm? We didn't have any issues, but they look at sensitive areas, I think is the term they use, like anywhere, like, they kind of look at the manure bit and barnyards where all that stuff, manure runs, and then they look at wetlands, we have wetlands, a class two wetlands, below our farm, so anything that might end up there for any reason they look at and they look at everything, including like what you, if you have a dead animal, where that goes, what you do with it, you have to have a plan for that. So, and yeah, pretty much anything that could be a concern, a sensitive area, they look at your nutrient management plan. I think your calculating, you know, they look at our records for how much manure we spread and where we spread it, and make sure we're putting it on the correct places at the right rate, so we're not over-applying things like phosphorus. Where does your manure go in winter? We have a storage, but it's NRCS designed, so it's a little bit of anxiety. To this fact, or again, you already left and spread commercial fertilizer over a, you can use commercial, organic commercial fertilizer, they do make, I don't know what it's called, it's commercial, they make like, forget the name of it, I tried it one year, it's, they use it a lot on golf courses and stuff. It's made from fish and different things like that. It does not affect it for us, and it's very expensive, but I can almost take the name of it, but yeah, you can use anything as long as it's certified or organic. If you manage your manure correctly, you probably know your grass. Yeah, sometimes there's, like any wood ash or pot ash to increase certain things, and we've used chicken manure in the past to try to earn a supplement. There's phosphorus is actually an issue for us not having enough, because we know not high grain, not high corn, rations are pretty much all grass based, so we don't have the amount of phosphorus that's actually needed to grow really high quality grass. You ever tried chicken manure? Yeah, and something or, yeah, I believe you. It's high in phosphorus because the chicken's diet is primarily grain, and so that it all feeds through, and we have used that, and I haven't been luck with it. It's the issue of its capacity in our neighborhood. I actually had an issue with a neighbor about it, and it doesn't really bother me, but it's not the most pleasant thing to deal with, and it's hard to truck, it's hard to get in there, because it's very, there's certainly different times you can get stuff that's dry litter, but that usually comes out like names, so it's really expensive to truck, and then we always got it from a fairly local place in the Hampshire, but it was very liquid, and so it's hard to truck it, and I don't just get into my dump truck and haul it, because it's in a slosh or something. You're sprayed on by the big trucks? No, we spread it ourselves, we either put it in our pit and mixed it in, or we spread it, I've got a spreader that'll handle it, but it's nasty and it smells, and it works good, but it's, and then there was a time when it was contracted by a large farm that took all of it, so we couldn't get it, and it's just been one of the most challenging things that if you had it and it didn't smell really bad, it would be really good, but it's got its issues, and I've got a lot of neighbors, so I'm really like, I'm just thinking of the organic barn and shorn that used to have them. All right, so we probably go to Hashi from the power plant, so we've got an Adelon, which is good, it's got more of a high school risk. Yeah, Whitefield, New Hampshire, I think, O'Reilly, the Berlin, I think there's a little maybe. Yeah. But yeah, that's probably what that is. I don't remember. Is it nice to have it over? No. I doubt that they called it chicken manure, but there's people that don't know. It may have been, it may have been the litter of the chicken, what they call chicken litter, but the name is like, I don't know if it's composted or if it's very dry, it doesn't have as much of an odor on it. Yeah, I think so. I think I'm not sure of the process of it, but the problem is it comes out of the name and it's expensive, and it's not as potent, it takes more of it to do the same thing. Like the chicken manure, when we used to spread that liquid stuff, you can see where you spread it, like the grass would be green and taller, and that's where this stuff works. That's part of the area. Yeah, that's a lot of the area. And that's what it smells like. But it is unpleasant. Chicken and that pig. Yeah, yeah. It's cow manure like birds do. Yeah, exactly. I don't have very few complaints over the year about, about over the years about, cow manure, which there again, our cow manure, not to say our food doesn't smell, but it's grass-based. It's got less of a potent smell to it than a lot of other manure. So when we spread it, it doesn't smell as bad. But I've had very few complaints or concerns about that, but as soon as you start messing with chicken manure, there's definitely bodies in there. What did you just spread? Next time you do that, tell us because we're leaving. I have a neighbor with two golden retrievers. And they went out and rolled in it. And they came in. I mean, that's sad. Yeah. Well, the dogs were trespassing on them. Well, actually, they were not, because this was her property. Right. She was the only animal that's pretty poor. I hate her property, but it was not my property. She just didn't know you were going to do chicken manure. Right. And after dogs were enrolled. Yeah. And I think it was more of the dogs were only in it. I was like, sure. Yeah. Does anybody know about, there was an organic farmer in terms of selling some seeds, like myco seeds that, it sounds like myco, M-Y-C-O something. It sounds like the organic industry is treating and stacking seeds in the same way. We're hearing, you know, about the, like they, they can put on. Like organic. Right. Yeah. Yeah. So I wonder, any carry can tell us about that sometimes. Interesting. Yeah. He's away this week. Yeah. Just what's happening with that. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So it's sort of organic. If the organic industry is doing it in the same way. It's in gentile. I don't understand what everybody else is doing. Yeah. It's essentially BT. Right. Yeah. You could hear the talking about. Intaginistic. One guy. And how they're using that. As opposed to a chemical. Yeah. So. Right. Right. As part of. Riverside in. So. I find that really interesting. As long as. Well, similar to like. Predator pest control. Like when you bring in. Species of someone. Yeah. Organic farms do that for the client. They bring in. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's all good until they cause a problem. Yeah. Do they. I don't know. I don't think so. But. You never know. Yeah. Yeah. They're trying to something or bringing some. Yeah. Yeah. It's not natural. Yeah. Other thoughts about. Any of the bills. John. Do we ever wanted to find what. Well, I think it was tough. And I think there's a reason why it has not been defined. Because like Rusty said yesterday. Anytime you could find it, somebody comes up with some. New creative idea. And then you change your law. To include that. The problem is if it's not defined. And it could be a broad definition, but. If it's not defined, it could be a broad definition, but if it's not defined. Then things like right to farm. You know, can come down on those very creative farmers. Because somebody could say that's not farming. That's. Something else. Maybe it's not. Right. Well, we can. But. Is that the course of farming? Going out of the other way. Well, we want our partners to diversify. But then you hit that. Fine line where. Even if 250 permit. Shooting. We can't. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Like our corn maze is considered. I think they're considered. Especially through our farm. There has to be two parts. I feel like it's agriculture and tourism. And there's two parts. And there has to be some sort of. Yeah. So what would you say? In my mind. It has to happen. Like you're going to do a corn maze. And you want to consider the agriculture. And you would have done it from. The perks of being a farmer. And it has to be on a farm. The maze has to be on a farm. Not like somebody. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. But it's a really good plan. It's not like somebody. Who has, you know, a big yard. Besides the plant. You know. A whole field of corn. And then calls it. Well, It feels like the lines is. For me, would be based in principally produced. Like what's. That's something you're producing. that's something you're producing on a farm. And if you're bringing people in to enjoy an agricultural asset, then that's still agriculture. But if you are bringing people on into a farm that has a corn maze and doing ATV rides through the woods as part of your corn maze and you're generating a large amount of profit off of that ATV part, that's not agriculture. In my opinion, but yeah, I think it has to do with what you're, like if it's supporting farming or agriculture, like something growing that you're growing, basically producing on your farm, if it's a support structure to that, if it's bringing value to that, then it's agriculture. If it's not, it's tourism, right? And that's just my thought. And there it, I think, was the problem. I thought 1889 already somewhat defined what that meant within parameters of what the definition of farm was and how a advertorism spec would intersect with that. I thought there was already some kind of understanding of what an advertorism business was in relation to a farming operation. Okay, accessory on farm business is right at that. Yeah, intersect, yeah. Yeah. Well, I think limiting liability for advertorism related to this whole thing around right to farm in that folks who might be coming from somewhere else, where could be the advertor, who knows? I'm not going to pass the surgeons here, but my classic example is somebody comes to the farm wearing high heels, and then twist their ankle and he wants to blame the farmer. That's kind of excessive, but when you come to a farm, you have to wear good footwear, not high heels. Those heels are going to stick right in the ground and if you twist your ankle, it's your own darn fault. Right? So there, I didn't, I was almost tempted to ask Rusty yesterday, because this was something that was going on when I went to that CSG seminar in Providence, Rhode Island. He spoke about agriturs and where to farm. He actually was spoken at different conferences, but he's dressed both. And at the time, there was, and I think it was interesting that he was talking about Florida, but at the time, there had been an incident I believe was in Florida, where there was a heading zoom and there was a horse there that had been very tame and you're always friendly, never a problem. And the horse ended up biting a young child in the face. And it was a horrible thing. Don't know if the kid did anything or who knows, but the circumstances were, but it was a terrible thing. And it was a big loss because of it. And so the question was, you know, is that agritura, I feel like it just brought to light. So the potential litigious problems around having agriturism sort of event, and I don't know how that ended up, but you know, it's complicated. And I think it was one of the reasons we haven't defined agriturism. Right, but some states it sounds like there must be have. So you just don't look at those. Yeah. Just because it, I think it would help farmers in some ways have some theory about, you know, where am I crossing the line into just tourism? So if I, you know, I'm a teamster and I collect sap with my, you know, perchirons. And then I also give slave rides. Is that tourism or is that agriturism? Well, you know, I'm thinking about, say, my farm in legendary. Yes, they do exactly that, or they haven't passed. I don't know if they're still doing it, but yeah. Slave rides, pay rides, but they also in the passive collect that, I think, exactly. It's on the farm, right? On the farm, yeah. But there's so many services. It's not just like what we make in the farm. It's like a lot of agriturism is sort of on the service side or, you know, experiential side, like you stay in the cabins and you can help make cheese. Yeah, exactly. Right. But the question is, is it on the farm? So. Or the scrolling of the heifers. Is that like an agricultural, is that agriturism? Well, that no longer happens, unfortunately. That was a flood event. I don't think they're going to do it anymore. But is that because of COVID or was there an issue? COVID complicated it. There was some concern from, I think, animal rights folks about marching in the North Africa. I mean, they were marching. Kids were basically walking in the main street for overall. But also, they might still be doing it. Or they might say, there was the original, they're like the founder of it, decided she was no longer going to do it. And so they sold the river garden place and I'm not sure what's going on with it. But I haven't heard anything about it in a while. Yeah. Can we circle back to the question about the agriturism piece being on a farm? Yeah. It has to be on a farm. But yeah, yeah, like in statute, it has to be on a farm. Yeah. Yes. Is that what we're? But that's, you're talking about accessory on a farm business. No, I'm talking about agriturism. It has to be on a farm. Yeah. AJB9 says that it has an agriturism activity, means an interactive or passive activity that has carried out recreational, entertainment or educational purposes on a farm and includes farming. And then it goes on to define what a farm is and what farming practices are. What is the definition of farming? It says, farming has the same meaning as in these days, six years, there are 122. And a farm is a parcel or parcel of land owned, leased or managed by a person and devoted primarily to farming. That means the threshold criteria established by the required agricultural practices. What's the context of that? Where it says agriturism, what you just read. That's the definition of agriturism in that bill. That's what the entire bill was comprised of from saying that maybe we would have a limited liability for that activity. This is exactly what that activity is. And in order to qualify as that activity, these are the standards, the criterion that they have to meet. So we do have a definition. We do have a definition. Yeah, I don't think that it goes on to define specific practices, but rather what it does is says what practices aren't. So the lodging element isn't part of that, right? They had to go through their whole entire different things because there were matters of like food safety and other requirements, but it does define it in there. As far as I remember, as a person reported that. Right, like we studied it. Yeah, so I do think that there are portions of it that are pretty clear. But they don't say exactly what, which I think it is absolutely best. Yeah, yeah, I think that's the whole creativity. Yeah, right, yeah. But it says it has to be on a farm. It has to be on a farm and they have to have farming practices. And the farm definition is also how the agency assesses whether or not you're a farm. So you have to comply with the RAPC. Yeah, exactly. Yep. So don't feel you're high school as a corn maze. That's not every guy's on this farm, that is. That is, yeah. So the site is important. And I want to circle back to nuclear management plans. I think nuclear management plans are the plan that helps you meet requirements of the RAPC. Wow, mm-hmm. So that you don't have too much runoff, you don't need some more fertilizer than you need to pull those things. That's the goal. It's to meet the requirements of the RAPC. And Laura's division grant waiters to find the door where it's overflowing and it's marked still and there's a van. They can, they do have the ability to do that, the secretary does, but if the conditions are such, they will work with farmers to try and make it all work. But it might be conditions in March, it might be way different down in Southern Vermont than it is someplace else. And so they don't want to be putting you're on the ground if it's saturated, it's frozen, if it's still in the ground. But last week, they just did the van right in out of state-wide. Yeah, yeah. But even if it's, even in the past April 1st, if the conditions are such. Like now. Yeah, they don't want farmers spreading. So Henry, how's it going on your farm in terms of the spreading ban? Have you been able to work with that? Yeah, it hasn't been an issue for us mostly because we're in a climate where those bakes kind of work for us. I can see where, I know farmers, particularly down in your area, in Brattleville area too, and as in Terry's area, where there are many years where now, where you can still, the ground is thawed, the snow is gone, and it's, they should be able to, it would be good to get on the ground before we start getting a bunch of rain that we might get, you know, to help or make the ground difficult to get on or help incorporate from the water or whatever. So I, I mean, and then the winter or things that are worked, we're not having winter like we used to as far as as early on. So, yeah, to stop spreading, there are some years when you probably could spread, you know, past, past the ban. Where does it begin, or fall aside? Is it December 15th, April 1st? Yeah, I believe that. And so, I mean, there's certainly been years that there has been no snow and the ground's not frozen on December 15th, and I would think like the newer injection would be different than spreading it on the ground. Yeah, and we certainly have years where, you know, you could have spread in March if you were allowed to. So, I mean, it seems like it should be more specific to the soil and when it's ready to be spread on, but I realize that's a much more different. Things are regulated in the end, it's much easier to just put a data on rather than check every, I mean, it's been, you'd have to have staff or something. I don't know if there's a way to have, but I think the agency does grant some sort of waiver variance if you need, if you're, it's all or if the ground is ready or something, which I think is probably kind of the right thing to do with, I don't know. I've never had any trouble with it because we just don't have, we still, we do generally have snow and the ground is frozen by December 15th, and I have, you have to see a year for me when you can effectively spread manure before April 1st, but I'm in a different climate than a lot of them are on. Yeah, I mean, we're still there to frozen, normally though. But you're not cropping, really. There's no, that's different. And it's finally, it's now like we'll probably, we've got manure that's stacked in like, sort of her, you know, stored more dry stuff that we can get at and we'll start probably spreading maybe this weekend because the ground is finally drying out and we can go and not make a mess, but this is about on par for a normal year for us. Well, this is a raincast and dogs for the next few days. Yeah, exactly. So all, all subjects change. Who knows what, but yeah, there will go permanent. Yeah. Yeah. So anything else we want to look at in the next few weeks? If we come to a conclusion about the on farm fodder, as far as what we can and can't do from here, I think that we just proceed as we have been and we don't go there. There we actually yesterday, someone said you're working in conversation about this, but. So, you know, the memo that was kind of leaked or somehow got out just was not really meant to change things. But I think people were just going to continue with things as they are and do as we have been doing. And there's nothing we could do any longer than change the law to the reporting requirements. Well, there's that, but we could also say, yeah, no multiple orders. So, but I think just, we just sort of, even alone. Is there anything in the forest that we should be doing? Well, I think we're all waiting to see what happens with the Acton 50 bill, which is 235 to 234. Well, I think I'm actually going to have a meeting with someone tonight about that. I'd like to see some changes with hours of operation in terms of acknowledging the fact that there are certain times of the year when loggers have to work, typically when it's frozen and sometimes it's like a 24-7 sort of thing that happens. But we'll see. That's pretty bad, but we're still trying to get, basically to keep some life maybe through another study. Just to keep it at the forefront, which is not what we want, but at this point it doesn't feel like we're going to get anything else. So, that's still in the works in transportation. It's not dead, but it's creeped to a very slow, slow crawl. It's like life's playing. Anybody has any great ideas on how to breathe some life and do it? So, everyone, I just have a few more words about the truck. Is it to increase the upper weight? Yeah, basically allow for permitting of heavier trucks on class one road since we were starting. So basically trying to create a kind of weight. Yeah, create a similar rule or law as to our neighboring states or country, either going into Canada or New York, you can run a heavier truck on those roads than you can in Vermont. So, essentially we would like people to be able to at least load trucks. This is mostly for the forestry industry. Loan trucks, so there's the capacity that they can run in other states in Vermont. So, I mean, essentially as soon as you cross the border with your truck, you put some more load on, but you can't get there from here. So, I think it's a, I don't know if the permits are 107,000 and 117,000, depending on the amount of axles. Right now it's 99,000, I think it's actually to be permanent for, there's just a, as with everything we do here, there's an enormous amount of things that come into the discussion and things that will be affected. Like, I mean, all of our roads are engineered for a certain weight because that was, and it's not that they can't handle the weight per se, because in honesty, some of them are because people run overloaded right now. And so it's not that the roads maybe can't handle them, but the agency of transportation doesn't have a, you know, they're engineers and they need to, they work with facts of, you know, will this road handle this weight? If we, will these bridges handle this weight? And they don't know because they're not, they never, they don't have any studies or any information on it because they were engineered for a specific weight. So they're worried that they're concerned, which is a valid one, is that we're gonna do damage to the roads or there's a safety concern. And if we add, because if we add, if we allow people to run trucks at 117,000 pounds, are they gonna then overload them even more and it goes even higher than that? So that would concern us. And, but there's a lot of benefit too, as far as, you know, would mean potentially less loads, which is reducing a carbon footprint, you know, we can put, if you're, if the trucks are already going, you might as well maximize the amount on it and it would allow potentially more income, you know, for a forest economy for be more efficient. And we know that the roads can handle it. We just don't know what the overall impact is gonna be in safety and all those things. So it's kind of a, that's New York and engineering the roads for the higher rates, you know, I don't know that, I don't know if that's come up. I would assume, I guess, and I don't know if that works. Yeah, I'm not sure and there's some conflict between this, I forget what the word is, but basically allowing there's only a certain amount of permits that get permitted in New York. Like you can get a permit to run a higher weight in New York, but they don't give preference to people in Vermont because their drivers can't get a permit to run a higher weight in Vermont because we don't allow them. So there's kind of this, like, we're not gonna help you if you don't help us things. So it's, there's just a huge amount of issues that have come to the surface and we're trying to find some sort of compromise but it's difficult to believe. Right, and then there's all the, you know, you drive a truck to a town with old buildings right next to it and it shakes things or moves things. And then, you know, there's that aspect and the safety and there's, there's towns that have, you know, tight corners and things that there's, and then you get, you know, worried about more truck traffic if they increase these permits because maybe more people will hollow it because it'll be more profitable or, you know, and then there's gonna be more jade brick noise through towns and there's just so many, it starts to unravel. But, you know, that's like everything. So where's the compromise? And it's felt by the agency of transportation, I think, that, you know, allowing for the already heavyweight truck permits at 99,000 was kind of a gas door or it was pushing the limits. And now we're asking for more, maybe that. I can't remember that one. No, it hasn't been, it hasn't been that long, but there's been these studies done basically. So there's different schools of thought as far as folks that think that the roads can certainly handle it and it's fine. And then there's people that are like, well, you know, really, you think so, but you don't really know not everybody's agreeing on the right course as you should. Yeah, like I said before, there's, they asked me 200 semi-trucks or trailer trucks coming up through all the little towns in the Northeast Kingdom, up through Vermont, going to the landfill, the one landfill in the state. And the roads are crazy. When I drive here between Crosbury and Hardwick, they are so beat up. Yeah, yeah. I mean, we got a massive road problem in my mind, you know. Yeah, it's a big deal. What do you mean? So like, we're 14. Oh, so they literally come up, come up earlier, all the way up to Hardwick on the 14. And I heard they can split. And I don't know if Kisela's listening right now. They can split on route, continue up route 14, and it takes you through Crosbury, right through Alderney Village. And when Henry was mentioning the rumbling, I mean, there's just houses right along the whole way. And then or go to 16, I think, and it goes up to Glover into Barton. And then they all converge in Crosbury. I mean, sorry, commentary. But people accounted 200. I can't believe it by day. Oh, I can imagine. Yeah, sure. When you're going to build that, that wood chip plant in Springfield. Yeah. And I started going over there where they said, there's going to be 250 trucks a day going through here. That's loaded trucks. Then they got to come back. There's 500. I mean, it's crazy. And certain times of the year, it's more. They burn more in the winter than they do now. It's, you know, it was sure. North Springfield industrial fire. I thought that. I was just adamant about it. I lost a lot of friends over that. People in a logging business that people had landowners about they were going to sell some of their, their great woods to this chip. And they probably would have. But it was, it was good for economic development. You go for a lot of things. We said it was bad for all the towns with the pressure going through it, right? And it was, it's endless. It's not as though they're going to take 200 this year. And it's over for five years. It's just endless. Documentary about that very issue. I didn't have any strong feelings about it. Most of the folks I knew were opposed to it. But there's a, a documentary, I think it's called burned. And it's about what, what has happened in other places where they have wood chip factories. Power plants and, and it just, you know, the land around it just gets to new trees. Wow. It's potentially a problem. They claimed that wasn't going to happen, but they claim a lot of things, you know, and we know that our time is going to happen. This year, we're going to take it from here the first two years. Then we're going to take it from here. We're going to go to a browser on take these. There was a lot of discussion about that. Yeah. And it was a private developer. It was not a controlled developer. Like, like our company who's, you know, the state is in there looking all the time. But it was a private developer who was in the cell doing it to industrial customers. Yeah. Yeah. Well, this has been a great discussion. I've just announced some of your suggestions and we'll get to working on getting folks in here. But now we're going to take a break and then we're going to come back and talk about local food.