 I thought we could have just a short discussion on elections and where we are with that. The secretary of state met with the governor the other day and the the governors from what I understand is that the governor isn't particularly worried about fraud. I know there was some discussion of that and I think that he feels that that isn't an issue. It hasn't happened in Vermont and it isn't likely to and we have a very different setup than the other states because we have town clerks that are kind of integral to this this system. So he wasn't worried about the fraud and what he really wanted was for us to be back to normal in November so we could have a regular election. But I have major concerns about that because even Dr. Levine said we're likely to have a resurgence in October or November. So I have I have written a letter to the governor asking him to please make a decision and come to an agreement with the secretary of state. I think that he he actually does not want to be in the middle of this but we made him by saying that it had to be in agreement with instead of just in consult consultation with which is what we originally had. So they I don't know how much of this we went through before so stop me if we've already gone through all of this but there they expect to have about 500,000 voters registered by this fall. The plan is to in August to send out a postcard and you return the postcard asking for an early ballot. That for the primary and they all it's less usually less than 25% of the people who vote in the primary and people don't consider the primary as important because you're not actually choosing your leader you're just choosing your party candidate. So they're not going to do a mail out this is their plan not do a mail out for the primary. Then in sometime in it would be the mid mid-september they also are going to do a postcard mailing to everybody just and lots of lots of public relations. They have a whole campaign set up to do public relations about how it's going to change this year and on social media and in the newspapers and mailings and through the bca's and they have a whole plan for that. But anyway then sometime in September like when you have the 45 days when it has to go out to the overseas people they would then send a ballot to every registered voter. The lists and addresses should have been somewhat cleaned up because when they send out the one in August there will be return address on there and say return to the town clerk and they can clean up the the lists. So and it's a very very complicated I didn't realize it was quite so complicated but there are 246 different return addresses on there and 275 completely separate ballots that have to be printed and then collated into the right envelopes to be sent and then they will be returned to the town clerk. The town clerks will be given the option to either have the secretary of state send them all out from the state but with the town clerk's return address on them or the town clerks can do them themselves and apparently a number of town clerks have already said it would be great if the secretary of state sent them out. So because this is so complicated and they need to as Carol Dawes pointed out in her letter if they're going to send it out in mid-September a project that big and to get local vendors as much as possible we need to sign be signing contracts now so that they can get the postcard stock that they need or a card stock is not a postcard card stock that they need to print the ballots. So we need to have a decision quickly and I have written a letter a number of town clerks have written letters a number of groups around the state have our writing letters to the governor just urging him to come to a decision right now and I don't know where we are. I Carol I mean Sarah Copeland Hanses and I are as chairs are going to write a letter but I don't know how the committees feel about it so Chris Bray you had a question and then Allison. Thank you for the update. I guess what's a little confusing to me is to hear you know I can fully appreciate and understand that governor not wanting to make our elections political that sounds but one way to do that is simply and not to be sort of somehow he's now in the middle of it because we put him there I think we added we changed in consultation to with to in agreement with I don't know that they origin anyway to give him a room on the playing field or something like that but if he really doesn't want to be there he could simply say I'm going to defer to the chief elections officer and follow his recommendations and judgment because this is in my bailiwick so I don't I don't quite understand how not wanting to purchase be in the middle of it also means holding up you know getting to a decision and so that's one observation slash question and the other thing is I would think even though we all wish we could vote in person in November the most prudent thing to make sure that we have a sound election is to plan for the contingency that we can't and and then it could well come off without a hitch because we'll have gone through this careful wind up as opposed to being a little tight on time and maybe surprise that there's a flare up and all that kind of stuff so that's just two thoughts well the timing is we we have to if we don't make a decision now we won't we won't be able to do it that's the bottom line and if we do make a decision now we're going to have to go through with it because we we will be signing contracts with a mailing house and a printer the and polls will still be open that but they will be limited they're expecting I don't know maybe 80 of the people or more to to mail in their ballots so the person when you get your ballot you'll have the option then of mailing your ballot back taking it to the the time some of the town clerks are considering having safe drop boxes that you can put it in by the town clerk's office so you can do that or you could just hold on to your ballot and go to the poll and vote there because your name won't have been checked off on the early checklist so you can go there and do it and if you lost your ballot and you show up at the poll and your name is not checked off on the list you can vote there they'll have extra ballots there and they so the polls will still be open but very limited and town clerks are already getting um information from their usual core of people that work on the election saying they don't feel safe doing it the other thing let me throw in before I go to you Allison is that one of the things that governor suggested was going back to the legislature for a vote and we we've already voted and given that authority there and clearly on the first list of options that we all accepted and voted for was a mail out um ballot so anyway I just wanted to throw that in Allison yeah no I I think we're pretty clear I I think we're wise to hope for the best but prepare for the worst I I think we absolutely have to do this and um it would be great if if we're open in November but as a committee member I fully support and would love to have the committee support the two chairs and have it be from the whole committee in addition and from all of us because you know we've learned that that is a good modus operandi is hope for the best and prepare for the worst yeah so basically what what the letter says is just some of the details that about how complicated this is and that it really doesn't change it it still puts the decision of how to vote in the hands of the voter because the voter can mail it in just just like now the the only difference the only difference in this is that everyone would get a ballot not just those requesting that's the only change um the what you do with your ballot afterwards and is all up to the individual voter right and I think the key difference is every voter will they're more likely to get the ballots because we will clean up the mailing list with the August work and I think that's critically important it's not like we're wasting money there won't be a lot of wasted money in that it's important I think for the administration to understand that is that that's part of the objective within August primary postcard mailing is that we will have a much better a much cleaner better stronger mailing list yeah I think that um I mean I I feel very strongly about this um me too but um but I don't know where the rest of the committee is and I I do know that um and the governor was not he wasn't worried about fraud he wasn't worried about partisanship in the election at all he he mainly just wanted to to be back to normal so that we could hold a regular election which I completely understand I think that is the ideal but even if we're back to normal people poll workers are saying I'm not going to feel comfortable even in November coming there because they get I mean I don't know about our poll and polling place in Putney doesn't get that crowded because it's a great big gymnasium and it's just a you know some boxes but in Brattleboro it is really crowded and you have to go in and and the same thing in bellows falls they're in small areas and um would be a massive um the project to change the polling place so that they could be far apart and have people standing far apart so oh and he wasn't money is not the issue because there is federal money that can be used for us but if we if we use the federal money and then didn't do it then there's the possibility we'd have to pay it back so anyway it sorry Jeanette sounds like we'll use it I mean we'll use it and people will just have one more option if they yeah yeah and then we'll use it all the envelopes all the return envelopes to the town clerks will have a postage paid on them yeah so yeah we will have used it yeah and there just may be one more option which is more people may be willing to vote in person by number that yeah maybe chris my if i had a guess and it's only a guess it's that if we do it this way many people may like it so much that this becomes uh the new normal way of voting well i don't want to go there until we have that discussion mainly i think this is a one one off yeah and we'll have to have that discussion later because i mean we have to see how it goes i'm not i don't think i don't want to think beyond that this election because i think that raises more questions than we're prepared to answer around this one sure i guess i'm just saying it's a bit of an experiment right yeah yeah but a good that's it that anthony well i don't want to be redundant i was going to ask about the money so i'm glad that money's not an issue because i had friends asked me about who's going to pay for all these mailings and whatnot but i think the bottom line is if the committee agrees i think it would be really good for the committee to sign on to the letter i mean because putting off the decision is going to be a real problem the decision will be made for us if we don't make it soon and i the feeling i get is the governor didn't say no but the voice reservations which is holding things up and i think he needs to get on board as soon as possible so that we can get this going otherwise it'd be too late just for your information the change from in consultation with to agreement with did not come from the governor he was actually i think a bit surprised when he heard that that that was the language i can't say that for sure but it did not come from him that's it do you have anything to add so carol dos do you have anything to add um yeah i was i was going to say uh you talked about um the concerns about election workers i think another thing that that even if we're they're predominantly back to normal and i don't think anybody thinks we will be but even if we were predominantly back to normal by november i think we also need to be really cognizant of voter fear of people being afraid of coming to um to large crowded areas uh and that that's a a probably a huge barrier to participation and so the more of those barriers we can we can break away we can push away on the the better we'll be serving the voters and it'll just create more peace of mind for the voters that they know that they don't have to go to the polls thank you brian well i've waited till uh most of the others have spoken uh i remain concerned about the situation in november i'm curious why since the results of the august primary won't be known until after august 11th why we need to make a decision now to pull the trigger and mail the ballots in november i understand about printing them and but you can't print anything until you have the winners so there's already a date at which you sort of have to take a pause and i would prefer that we not make a final decision about mailing the ballots in november until after the august primary and if we do and i realize i'm in uh you know minority position here um i would like the secretary of state to make it clear that it has to be the voter him or herself that either mails the ballot back or brings it to the polling place that you can't have someone else collect them for you and mail them you know three or four at a time or or bring them back i think that there there was some discussion about that when i met with the secretary of state's office and um and in fact i believe on our joint meeting jim harrison brought that up like could he yeah take your wipes back yeah and i i think that there has to be some flexibility here for the um woman who is pretty feels pretty compromised and doesn't want to have to go down to the polling place to drop off her ballot um there has to be some ability for people to deliver it for them but and i and the and i think the secretary of state in the town quirks were talking about how how you would um do that so that and that was um i mean the thing that happened in north carolina was it was it was it was a stupid thing to for whoever to do and i don't even know what exactly did happen i don't know that but i don't that's not going to happen here i don't we currently allow other people to bring them back i mean that's true we you know we currently allow i i you know i have delivered them the people who go to the old folks homes and to the assisted living places in the nursing homes they bring them back i mean we currently allow that the postman is another person who is brings them back i mean it's we currently allow that i don't see any reason to deviate from what we already allow that's true we do also when you when you go to there to the uh those places do you ever counsel people about the way that they're going to vote no i mean for example i picked up my mother's and took it back in uh march you know when we had town meetings so um she took a while to fill hers out they um the the some of the bca go to these places uh and help facilitate their voting and they bring them back i mean we allow we allow for this already and i there are people who bring their college kids back who they might be home for november for example uh or or they might be home for christmas holidays and they could early vote for town meeting or you know i i just think i think we already allow for that so how would you react if someone said well how should i fill this ballot out you you you would say i'm you know it's up to you i and i think the bca already does that with nursing homes where people don't necessarily know all the candidates and they they have a very thoughtful way that they counsel them and we should hear from the bca but you know that's already happening and i think that a lot of time i know that when my mother was um at an assisted living facility what they did is they brought the ballots over there and then the um the it wasn't the bca that came but the um activities director some there were a couple people there that met with people and helped them fill it out but as far as i know nobody ever i mean my mother said to me how should i vote and i said for me but um nobody nobody else worked with her told her how to vote or anything like that and ellison is right we do that now we allow that now so um if we and they're they're just um brian they're usually the assistant clerks or and or members of the bca and or and or family members i mean i i and you you know you take it into the clerk's office they check it off i mean it's you know it's a very formal process of it receiving it um but just like now when people get them at home family members can work with older people and people who are disabled to answer their to do their ballot i mean it this happens this is the joy of being able to vote at your kitchen table so what would be the problem with waiting until after the results of the august primary are known everything is going to have to be printed and the the postage is going to have to be printed on them before they we have to sign a contract they there is no way as a printer's daughter as a as a printer's daughter brian i can answer that which is uh the paper the paper the stock has to all be ordered now they're going to be probably a huge rush on this stuff so they have to get the paper you're absolutely right it isn't the final printing doesn't happen till august but that's the easy part it's securing the materials that it's going to be very hard for them if they wait that and the printing will all happen except for many the return envelopes and the the pieces that aren't going to be affected by the primary but right absolutely the stock is the big key issue here it is and the the envelopes will be can be printed yeah they don't have to wait they don't have to wait and you're talking about um if they're 500 000 voters i think that's what he said a lot you're talking about um one million envelopes because there's the outside envelope that they're going to send to them right no you're talking about 1.5 million because you're talking about the outside envelope that's going to go with the ballot and then there's an inside envelope that you put in your put your ballot in and then you put that in another envelope so they're like a million and a half envelopes i mean i it sounds horrendous to me and i just i can't believe that i just said that and i hope i'm not making it up but no there are three different envelopes with every every ballot so they're going to have to be printed and with the postage on there and the return postage printed on there and so what they have to do is they're going to have to go get work with the post office to get the permit the the mailing permit postage thing so that they can print that on there and then it's going to then they're going to have to figure it out with the town clerks when it comes back how all those permits so it has to be printed you're talking about a project if anybody's done any kind of a fundraiser with right a mailing list of 500,000 people you know that it's going to take you months and months to do that and that's that's essentially what we're talking about here except that it's not a fundraiser right right it's a big and also quite honestly i think all of us want this to be our local printing houses if you're going to have all the printing houses it's going to have to be done in stages so because it will overwhelm them otherwise betian i'm sorry i have to go to another meeting oh okay thank you thank you thank you i'll keep track of stuff for me thank you tucker okay thanks anthony did you have a comment i was saying goodbye to betsey oh okay well i but i but but i i mean i first when brian mentioned the idea of why not wait till after the primary i could see why on some level that makes sense but then when you think about the need to order the card stock the stock to get the paper all set up it doesn't you know you just can't do that you got to get that stuff ready now so it's a legitimate question but i think that when it comes to ordering so many pieces of paper getting such a large project organized i don't think we can wait i think we should have we should have done this last week or the week before quite honestly well they were they were hoping to but there there are now a week a little behind themselves and i i'm hoping they'll be able to come to a decision by the end of this week i guess i'm still not clear if they print a million and a half ballots no no not a million and a half ballots it'll be 500 000 ballots and then with some kind of an overrun if they have 500 000 registered voters they'll print the 500 000 plus maybe 100 000 extras for people who lose them or show up at the polls or whatever it's the envelopes themselves that have to be printed and have that a little indisha on them in the corner that from the permit from the post office right that that those have to they couldn't possibly print that million and a half between august um 11th and september 15th they just can't do it i find that hard to believe but well it isn't just but it isn't just the the printing remember that so you have 275 different ballots so the organizational skills of the printer and the mailing house here are going to be crucial because you have 275 different ballots because the towns have different ballots and the counties have different ballots and then you have 246 different return addresses because they're going back to the town clerks they're not going back to the to the secretary of state's office which is the way it should be they should go back to the town clerk's office because i think people will feel more feel more confident in the election if they know that it's going to their own town clerk instead of some state entity out there so you have those 246 return addresses and which of the 275 ballots goes in each of those it's a massive project yeah it's it's um i would not want to undertake this but we're glad that we we're glad that that the secretary of state's office it feels that they see a path forward and can manage it well we're glad that they there are some local vendors who who have the ability to do that but if if we wait they will not be able to get the card stock or the envelope stock and they will not be able to print it for us because um there's a lot going on so that's anyway i'm happy to write the letter um with just sarah if um committee members want to write as a committee member um to the governor and just say um i think the two things to say are that we need to make a decision quickly and and he if he doesn't want to make a decision he can just say i'm going to trust the secretary of state to make the decisions and do it and it should not have to come back to the legislature because that will hold it up a long time there won't be um no we voted we voted unanimously i believe yes and i do agree with that madam chair i don't have an issue with uh i don't remember what act number it is but back in the middle of march perhaps or maybe it was early April and we did there were six provisions as i recall right we gave the secretary of state the authority to consider as possible procedures and i was i was fine with that um and the governor uh i guess can do whatever he chooses to do and um um i feel badly i can't join you all um unanimously but i still i i did get a bunch of emails over the uh weekend from constituents that have concerns so i have to uh feel like i'm representing them too are there are there concerns about fraud well i don't know that anyone used that i think that's a strong term um i i just think sometimes that they're looking for safeguards um to prevent any sort of misadventure um i would phrase it that way and um you know i realized that it's probably going to happen the way the secretary of state is planning on it and that's fine but i just want to at least um express my uh feelings well brian um i think your your constituents have such a good our track record in vermont is so good on mail voting by mail i mean we've had almost no i mean we had no fraud as far as our testimony is gone and we've been doing this for years so um if ever there was a state that could in confidence move forward on this option i think we're in a position to to do that given our track record i agree but we are expanding the uh the universe of people getting the uh the mail-in ballots i mean they don't have to request them they're just going to get them so i do think it's a little different i'll be honest i'm still planning on going to the poll to vote i think that's the best way that we have to vote and i'm glad that they'll hopefully i guess i haven't heard for real for certain that there will be polls open but i'm hoping they will and i have all the confidence in the world that the clerks will figure a way to put people through the polling places in a safe manner and i have no no doubt that's how i'll vote you know that i i think that that whether the polls are open and how they're open and the procedure that they use is going to be up to the individual town clerks to decide whether they want to have a regular polling place or people come in and stand and do the check off or if they want to have drive-by voting um where you one car pulls up and you get your ballot and you see the other cars sit there and wait until just like you're doing at the bank now you can't you can't go into the banks you have to do everything by drive-up so you have to sit in line and wait if the person has a an issue in front of you that's going to take 20 minutes you're just going to wait 20 minutes and so there might be some town clerks where the um the voting workers the poll workers are nervous enough that they don't want to have contact at all with anybody and um they think that way so they might do it any or they might have um safe drop boxes that people can't but the polls will be open in some manner and people who choose to go there to vote I love going to the polls my guess is that candidates won't be standing at the polls this year I wonder that too you know are you going to stand out with your sign and I don't know I I have always hated doing that anyway half the half the people there are only a couple towns in my district that expect you to do that and half the people in those towns hate it and half the people love it so I I um I like seeing the people and standing there and stuff but I don't I think it's no I think that if we're going to have this election we're yeah if you want to stand all six feet apart and have a mask on and stand depending on the situation I don't know that's something that we will see we have we have many months to get there very true yeah those kinds of issues I think will be dealt with um I appreciate the community's understanding my position thank you yep we do thank you all right so commit Jeanette if um it could it be that that some of us the committee members who'd like to could just join you and and Sarah or you and Sarah I think it's stronger if you and Sarah is chairs of the committee send the letter and um uh maybe the Chris and Anthony and I write our individual letters should we just send them to Kendall I assume Kendall or Jay Johnson they're the two contacts I think Jay is the one that's mainly dealing with this issue but either one work okay