 Welcome to Senate Finance. Today, looks like it might be slightly less weighty than the last few days, but Catherine is here. As we've worked through and it's gotten worse as time has gone on and COVID hit, and the urgency of getting as much broadband out as possible for telehealth and remote learning and remote working has become very obvious. What also became obvious is when I have a tax bill, I have a staff person I can call up and say, explain this tax bill and why it's good and why it's not good to me. When it comes to broadband, the legislature does not have their own person to help them look at plans, look at proposals, look at criticisms of the plans and the proposals to help us do the evaluation that we need to and it's become just more urgent as we're working our way through if we're going to use any COVID money. It has to be up and running by December 31st of this year, which means we need to move for at least if we're going to use that grant. Joint Fiscal has been working and we have hired a consultant who is working under a very tight timeframe to get a report out on June 12th, so we haven't been able to get the actual consultant. But Catherine has been working with them and she's going to brief us on who the consultant is, what they're doing, what we can expect from them as we go forward. Because I know we're all sensing a certain amount of urgency to do something. We're just having trouble defining something. There are private area providers who have proposals, there are citizen members that have ideas, there are the CUDs that are struggling to get up and running. We're just trying to figure it all out. Catherine, the floor is yours. Sure. Well, it's good to see you all. I've seen some of you virtually, but not all of you collectively. You're correct. Broadband is a challenge. Everybody understands how important broadband is in the future of Vermont's economy especially with the COVID crisis. In light of the funds, so the CRF funds have to be spent, the work has to be done by December 30th. It's not clear, they pick the 31st, but they pick December 30th, so. They don't want to work on New Year's Eve. There you go. That is a challenge. In the light of all the desires to do something with broadband and in light of the changing guidance, we worked with Senator Jane Kitchell and Representative Tim Brighlin, and they interviewed three different consultants. We chose CCG and the main person that we're talking with is a woman named Dana McKenzie who ran the broadband in Minnesota for five or six years. She ran the broadband, I forget what the title was, the governmental organization that ran it. Doug Dawson is somebody who's been heavily involved in broadband discussions also. We're working with the two of them. I believe Faith, I sent you a scope of work. I don't know if you can pull it up. Catherine, it's on the website. I've made you a co-host and I'm hoping you can pull it up. Well, okay, I. Have you done that before? I have not, but I have it in the PDF. Can I just open that? Yes, you have to share a screen. I apologize, I'm doing 101 other committee things. That's fine, I can do this. Let's see if it works. There we go, does that work? You have. I clicked. You have to hit share screen, the green button on the bottom of your screen. A bunch of things open, so I don't know. I'm clicked share screen and then. And then you choose which one you want to show. Okay. Why does it not? We won't spend long doing this. I'll do it if you. Here we go, I think I found it. There we go, can you all see that now? You're awesome. Yeah, we're up. Okay, learn something every day. So this is the scope of work that we worked out with CCG and we'll get to the bottom of it. The report is due June 12th. So that is a very quick turnaround. And it's a $14,000 contract. So it's not gonna answer everybody's question, it's not gonna cover every single base in broadband. This is sort of a quick, let's get some information and get some assistance on this. So I'm gonna hit the highlights on the scope of work. All of this work is gonna be done in the context of improving Vermont's broadband capacity in light of the COVID-19 public health issue and preparing also for the second wave within the state or resurgence. And now let's get into the specific details of the work. A is the area that they have focused on first and primarily is a review and identification of ways that we could spend to the CRF funds. I know they've been talking to other states, they've been reading the guidance. And I think you all know the guidance has changed and become actually, since we've hired them, the guidance has become more restrictive. So that's an ongoing challenge. It's just a fact of life on this, but we'll be coming back with some specific ideas about what we could do that would address immediate needs but also keep in mind the long-term planning and policy goals. So the thought here is that you don't wanna spend money on something that isn't gonna help keep you moving towards your long-term goals. The second piece that they're working on is a review and assessment of the state emergency broadband action plan that I think you all have had presented to you by the commissioner. And then the third is sort of a little bit of a broader, the implications for the development of the 10-year plan and other planning efforts for expanded access. So they're touching on those three particular items. I know they've talked to the commissioner of the Department of Public Service and they've been talking to other people across the state. The final work to be conducted, D, is just was a catch-all that as needed, it wasn't a specific work, but that they can brief people on broadband issues and other things that just come up. So that gives a little flexibility on the work they were gonna do. And the format of the deliverables, both oral and written materials, including interim communications, both written in oral, to discuss specific issues as they come up. And then one or more reports do on it before next, it's next Friday, I think, is that right? So they basically have a week and a day from today to just pull all this together. And they are, I think they're gonna be talking to House Energy and Technology this week. Maybe tomorrow I'm not positive about that and we could certainly have them available for your committee as well if you want to and especially as ideas come forward. I think you'd wanna talk to them. Time tomorrow, do you know, are they talking? You know what? I don't know. Let me go see if I can find it. Because we might be able to join them. At least some of us might. Yeah, I do know. Catherine, I'm staffing that meeting tomorrow. It's from one to three. Okay. Okay. So perhaps we could ask Representative Briglin if we could do that as a joint meeting for those that are free here. Thank you, Madam Chair. We could, okay. The only, I think you would wanna check out with the chair because I know they have also issued their own, I think that is issued a memo of ideas, specific ideas they have. And I, so they may wanna be focused on, I don't know what, I don't wanna speak for the chair. So I think. Yeah, no, we'd have to ask them, I think. Yeah. We can always watch the link after. You can, I just don't know how much of the conversation is broader picture versus they're specific. So I'll let you all work that out. Yeah. Madam Chair. Yes. In terms of this contract that Catherine went over with us, what's the parameter around how much money, what's the structure for how much money could be spent? You mean when they, when we said, can you figure out what we can spend CRF funds on? Exactly. Yeah. Because they could make different proposals based on how much money they had to work with. We were like, go figure it out. I'm just gonna tell you that the opportunity has shrunk tremendously with the latest guidance from the feds. So, I think we were all thinking, I don't know. I wanna say a hundred million dollars. I don't know if it was gonna be a hundred million dollars, but we're thinking big, what would the options be? And I think with the latest guidance, it's going to be smaller that would qualify under the CRF guidelines. So that's one of the moving constraints is a moving goal post. So we did not give them, we did not give them a guideline. We said, think about what, go tell us what other people are doing and what would be useful and how can we make it work. And just a quick follow-up. Terrible. Did you said that you were... Yes. Number other than 150, 100, and that part we missed, I think. Oh, I'm sorry. Is my cells coming, cutting in and out? My... A little bit, your voice does. Okay, you know what? I'm gonna stop my video then, okay? And we'll see if that's better, can you hear me now? Yeah. Not better, okay. So I'm not saying, we didn't give them a number but I'm just saying in my mind, I was thinking, you know, what can we do with, if we had a substantial amount of money? If you could do a lot of different things, that would be great to know. I think that amount of guidelines have vastly limited how much money we're gonna be able to spend on broadband with the latest guidance. So while there was no guidance given to CCG because the goal was to sort of, let's figure out what our options are, I think the federal guidelines have greatly reduced the options that we can spend it on. Do you know what, and based on the current guidelines, how much money we're talking about? No, I'd want CCG to come. I don't wanna get out ahead of them. So I'm gonna let them speak to it because they're still working through it. So I don't wanna get out in front of them. But I would say... I have asked, I just sent an email off to Representative Briglin asking if it would be possible for us to join them tomorrow. So we get the opportunity to hear from the consultants without having to take another hour or so of their time. Senator Pearson, have you got a question? Yeah, just Catherine, did you... Can the money be spent and the wires up but not sort of filled with live internet? I'm wondering if there's a decision that you made there up and running, I think. You know, the answer... Well, that's an interesting... I would say that the federal guidelines have, has to be worked specifically related to COVID health. It can't be just about expanding access generally to people. That can't be the goal. It has to be really about the pandemic and the health emergency. They wrote, I can pull it up, but they gave very limit, they really reduced the opportunity to use it in a way that I think we were all hoping to be able to use. And I... Here we go. Let me just read to you. This isn't a federal, let me find it, the federal guidelines. Hang on, sorry, just a second, let me find it. Because they spoke specifically to broadband. How did they define it? Okay, here was the question. This is a frequently asked question from the Treasury. May recipients use fund payments to expand rural broadband capacity to assist with distance learning and telework? How did they define broadband? Mark, one question at a time. Yeah. And then here was the answer. Such expenditures would only be permissible if they are necessary for the public health emergency. Projects that would not be expected to increase capacity to significant extent until the need for distance learning and telework have passed due to this emergency would be necessary due to the public health emergency. And thus would not be eligible for uses of fund payments. So they're basically saying if you're gonna give distance learning to people this fall right now, but you can't just use it to provide, to expand capacity generally. And I can get you, I'll send a copy of this to Faith and she can distribute it to you. So I'm just saying to you that we had lots of hopes and visions about spending this money and they keep narrowing the guidance from the feds. Madam Chair, I just find this so confusing because we wouldn't be in this situation where we had to do all the distance learning if all the schools hadn't closed, we're still in the middle of it. We don't have a vaccine. I don't understand. Catherine, can you help shed some light on this? Because it's all related to the pandemic. I don't disagree with you. I think, you know, they may also change the deadline on the December 30th. They may change it on this, but right now this is what's provided. And it's tough because it changes for us also. We think we're going to do one thing and then they put this thing out and they say, oh, you can't do that, but you can sort of do this other thing. So it's, I'm empathetic to your frustration. So Senator McDonald, I think since these are federal guidelines, you can assume that they are referencing the federal definition of high speed, which I believe is 25, 3, 24, 3. 25, 3. Yeah. And we've speculated here in the last 90 seconds on what they were up to. And it's in my opinion, pretty clear that they wish to restrict the use of that money to stuff that can be done at 25, 3 by profit, for profit stockholder owned companies because that's who they wanna send the money to, not because it provides broadband and not because it's gonna be used by school kids for COVID. It is an excuse to send the money to that group of people to do, to buy the product that they would like those people to be able to make money on. Well, I think these are some of the questions that we are looking to the consultant to answer. It seemed to me that if the focus, for example, is on telelearning, that if you design a program to get broadband to every kid who doesn't have good broadband right now, we'd accomplish the same thing that we were probably trying to accomplish, but it's the way we word it and our focus. That notion of identifying all of the kids who don't have broadband right now would take us to the areas that we wanna reach. And if our focus is, for example, no kid left offline, we could do that under these guidelines. And I think it might be more important than ever that we get the information from the schools about where were the clusters of their kids that they have only heard from once or twice in the last three months. And get that out. Senator Sarkin, did you have your hand up? You're muted, Senator. No, no. Okay, I got the thumbs down. All right, Senator Brock. Well, I mean, the one thing that I'm looking for and particular from the consultants to tell us is based on the plan as articulated by the administration, by the Department of Public Service, is it feasible to do what they wanna do within the timeframe and where they're talking about extending wires? To me, it's highly questionable, just given the fact that we aren't gonna be able to put up polls, for example, from November on. And I just have a question as to what are we doing? That's one of the things I'm looking for them to answer. The second is I'm looking for the feasibility of alternatives that would still give us the broadband and that is wireless to some extent. And we have this wireless proposal, we have a couple of wireless proposals. I wanna make sure that they look at that in terms of a sanity check as well. Katherine, I think they are, aren't they? Yes, they are. They are. That's what I remember. It's useful to hear you say that also. And I can also point them to this lovely YouTube video so they can make sure that they get it and capture all of those issues. That's what they did 10 years ago. They sent most of the money for wireless and it wasn't by any six months or eight months deadline. It took three and a half years to do it. Right. Well, we're gonna work on it this time. We're gonna learn. Center balance. It seems like an integral part of this to speak to both Senator McDonald's and Senator Brock's point is that we need to get the up-to-date data from AOE and I know we had asked them for that. I'm wondering where we are in that process whether they're in communication with JFO because that's gonna be an important piece of this in order to be able to craft it so that we can use the money for it. And then ask them who those families are. Yeah, that's part. I've asked Secretary French for that before. That's part of what I hope to hear from him yesterday. Unfortunately, we ran very late on the floor and we had a conflict. So I'm gonna try and get him back next week. Definitely. And see how they were going with collecting that data. And hopefully we can get this into something nice and tight and concise and make some improvement by the first of the year. Senator Brock, now I got Senator Brock then I'll get Senator McDonald. I think we need similar information and data from the health community. Now, whether that be through the Department of Health or otherwise, because as we start looking at using telemedicine, I have not seen any data that says where we're using telemedicine, how effective are there places that we need to extend telemedicine that we don't. I would think, for example, where we have people who live relatively far away. So you live in the kingdom, far away from a hospital. That the priority of getting telehealth to them because people who are living next to the medical center hospital in Burlington perhaps have less of a telemedicine need. But we don't have any information nor do I know if we've requested it. Well, health and welfare has been taking testimony on that. And again, I think that we can have and probably next week, Faith is listening, have the hospital association and the nursing home and it's the big three. They're all working together. The group, it's Jill Olson and they- Yeah, and they're finding like it's not like we can't meet this whole group. It's more sporadic and some of it is equipment. Some of it is education. It just doesn't fall in a nice straight line but we'll have them in next week because telemedicine is definitely part of this and there are other grants for telemedicine and for veterans getting them in touch with telemedicine which we, if we could get someone to coordinate all of this we might be able to put a nice creative package together looking at a couple of grants. So Randy, I'll let you finish and then I've got- Yeah, and just also for Catherine and the consultants that one of the things that's critically important and I'd like to just make sure this is done is that we take a look at all the various streams present already enacted and those that we anticipate that may flow into this looking at this year and also looking at the future because all of these things have to put together and they're critical for us to be able to design a strategy that makes sense. Yeah, we can come up with all the plans for where we wanna put poles and wires but we've gotta have a way to pay for them at the same time if we don't want the private for profits to be doing it. Sandra McDonald. One of the differences Madam Chair between this event and 10 years ago was the federal government made the decision on who got to where the money went and that's why VTEL got the money, it wasn't us. I do remember that. Oh yeah, anyway. The technology, they're different technologies that serve better in different places and the towers in places that are flat in the Northeast Kingdom is one that may decide that towers are best for them but that doesn't apply everywhere. If we had our choice of spending money on telecom or some other area that was equally needed, also needed money and we could only spend our money on telecom of 25.5 and we know that when you put up more 25.5 you make it more difficult to get a world-class broadband over the long haul, we might choose not to use it and we might choose to use the COVID money for other things that fit our long range solutions. But I love to rush down a path that goads us into spending money that's going to undermine our long-term goals and make it more difficult and more expensive to get these services to all of our monitors and I hope that our consultants and that would be, Catherine would be speaking to them now would be very clear about how the money would be, what the value we would get if we made the 25.3 or what the value would be if we went with Vermont State Policy and what we would win and what we would lose. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. And I'm sure we will have that deduction or that discussion but to balance it, I'll have the lobbyist in who lives five miles from Montpelier and is just past the last poll and is working on 5.1 and she would give her right arm for 25.3 or 5. And we may be- I don't want to see the monitors walking around with one arm. I don't and I might want to spend my principles a little bit to get those kids hooked up and there's a lot of people in there and eventually we're going to make that value decision as to where is the best place to spend the money in the short run and in the long run. Okay, Sandra Pearson. It strikes me that there's not going to be one strategy. There will be some places where we'll be fine granting a little bit of money to give two more people some cable internet because they're half a mile too far. And this is why we're so dependent on a consultant because we can't possibly gain the expertise to do planning and we struggle because there's no larger plan that we can take off the first bite of here. And so I mean, if people want to hear from the various lobbyists, I think that's fine. I'd be more interested in waiting for the consultant who presumably has thought of all the clever questions that we can come up with and could give us something of a holistic view so that we can get our heads around it. That may be just me. I think the only lobbyist I'm going to invite in are the ones from the hospital and the visiting nurses to get some information on telemedicine for this committee. So because that's the other side of broadband. We've got distance learning. We've got distance working and we have telemedicine all of which are eligible, at least I think for some granting. So we should have a whole picture as to where the issues are and we have not heard on telemedicine. Senator Campion. Sorry if this has already been asked but what is the timeline for the consultants to get back to us, Catherine? June 12th, so next Friday. Wow, okay. So it's very quick. Like it's not going to solve everybody's things but this has actually been a very useful discussion for whatever everybody's sort of big picture thoughts are and anyway, yeah, next Friday. Which is why they haven't been spending a lot of time with us. And I'm hoping it'll be okay with the house. If not, we can watch the YouTube of it tomorrow afternoon rather than have committee and we get to see who they are and what they're thinking is at the moment. Senator Brock. I guess just the only concern that I have about the consultants and when Catherine and I talked about it is this is a $14,000 contract. And we're all used to dealing with consultants, particularly in the technology area. 14,000 buys very little. And that's a caveat that really does concern me that we made what we paid for. Yeah, I think we're, but we may get enough direction to know what we need to pay for again. And, you know, we'll see where that one goes. Okay, any other questions? Catherine, have you got anything else to tell us? Catherine, can you just respond to that? About the, what they know and what, what. Well, I mean. How much we can expect. Yeah, did they say this is the discount fee or was it just to reflect the fact that it's 10 days of work? I think they're working hard and they're talking like, they've talked to the secretary of education. They are talking to some, actually there was a, somebody who worked for the agency who's gone to work for district who actually knows a lot about the individual technological access in schools. They have been doing a fair amount of work on this and talking to people and talking to other states also to the ideas about what those states are thinking about doing. So the answer is, I think they're working hard, but I also, they're not going to answer every, it's not going to report itself, gives you a guide map to everything, to solve everything in broadband. It's, you know, it's a short-term quick project and we can see how the work goes with them and they certainly have expertise in this area. So hopefully it will be useful. That's my goal. And I think it's, you know, trying to figure out what you're going to do right now with, if you're going to do what you want, if you want to do something, what you want to do and how it makes sense is important and we don't have a lot of time to figure that out. So I think they will be very helpful in that context. And I'm absolutely hopeful that they will be, but, you know, I look at 10 days of work, eight hours a day for $14,000, that's $175 per professional hour and the typical lawyer in Burlington in a medium to large size practice charges between $300 and $500 an hour. The big four partners and senior managers charge in that range. And so the rate that we're being charged, frankly, is just so low, it makes me suspect. Maybe they're hoping we'll come back. The loss of lead. Yeah. So, okay, any other questions at this point? And where's my agenda? No. Has gone away again. Okay. All right. Yeah. And I think that's that for Catherine. We actually thought we might, we have a break scheduled at three, just because we're trying to schedule everybody. And at this point, mostly working with staff's time. I'm not sure how many committees faith is juggling as we speak, but more than one. So, I think Catherine, thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Yeah. Hopefully we can get into the meeting tomorrow.