 We're not starting yet. Sorry. I'm asking if, if I can do the co-host and share my screen. Is that what you want? Or do you want to. Yes. Yes, please. So Ron will set that up. I've made him co-host and the document he sent me. Went someplace. I'm going to have to do it again. So. Right. But he can share. He can share that document from his screen. Yes. So I will. Welcome everybody. It's Tuesday morning. We are the general housing military affairs committee, the Vermont general assembly. We are here today to continue talking about. This COVID-19 recovery bill. As it relates to housing, specifically housing. The homeless individuals. The individual, the families and households that have been experiencing homelessness in Vermont. Specifically since the advent of this emergency, which was the middle of March. For our edification, basically we. Housed up to 2,000. Vermonters, including approximately 300 children. Into motels across and some, and some shelters across the state. And these, this recovery package is very much part of the next steps. We've talked about this a lot over the last month or so. And. And we just did a carve out of some of the money that's been allocated to our housing from the COVID funds. These are proposals that were being put together by the general assembly. Of $23 million. We agreed last week to carve out $23 million to go to VHCB and include that language in an amendment. That was presented on the floor today in the Senate. And I believe they passed their, their fast track bill. So we should be seeing that relatively soon over the next couple of days, depending on the situation. So we should be seeing that relatively soon over the next couple of days, depending on how fast the process works with them. I will echo. Something that I had heard from Senator Sorotkin over the weekend is just that this is, you know, I just want to spend a moment and reflect on how long we usually spend on legislation. This is a lot faster than we ever do. And we're, we're here trying to alleviate a problem that we think is the right thing to do, which is to get Vermonters into homes, especially during a public safety and public health crisis like this. You can't be safe at home if you don't have a home to go to. So this is a David Hall has put together this. It's a fairly bare bones structure. And I think it's a little bit of, of, of allocations or appropriations that we are, that we would suggest it is a, using numbers that I provided to him that we've heard from advocates, but they are, I would consider them in draft form. These are a little bit lower than we may have heard from advocates because I split these into tier one and tier two. So we're going to get to that later on in the summer, if the general assembly is, is withholding expenditure of 400 million in order to see if it can be spent on purposes that are not currently allowed. And if in between now and sometime in the summer that those, it's clear that those are, those purposes are not going to be allowed. Then. case in this tier two spending proposals that I shared with you this morning. So with that, David, I'm going to pass you the microphone. And I would just ask if people have including some of the guests that are here, but if you have a comment, please let me know either by raising your hand or sending me a note. And I will try to get to those concerns as they are developing in front of us. But we have a lot of we have a lot of stuff to go through. It's only two page bill right now. So two pages, we're going to spend $50 million. And on this. But before before I pass the microphone over, I will go to Representative Hanco. Thank you. Can we see this on the website now, Ron? Ron, did you catch that? Yes, I was trying to get over to my screen. Yes, it's been posted and is visible. Okay, thank you. All right. Thank you. David, please go ahead. Sure. So good morning to all of you. David Hall, legislative council. Glad to be able to be with you. I have been quite busy with economic development stuff as well. So I apologize that I'm not always able to join you when you're having your discussions. It's definitely an unusual time for everyone. Just so you're aware this morning, the Senate Economic Development Committee made its report to the Senate on $70 million of economic development grants and then your $23 million proposal to VHCB and others for emergency housing assistance that was amended was adopted. So it is on third reading should pass tomorrow, I believe. And you'll see it from the Senate. On this bill you have in front of you is a chair indicated right now. This is basically a framework. It's a skeleton of what your proposals are for this sort of major tier one round of housing COVID dollars. And before I turn to language, I just want to talk much bigger picture with you for a moment. So myself, my colleagues, we are all working on or most of us are working on something similar right now in committees of jurisdiction. And, you know, as you're probably aware, different pots of money have been allocated to different subject areas for expenditure. And all of this will be pulled together, my understanding into one bill for the coronavirus relief fund expenditures within our office and working with JFO. We have adopted sort of a sort of a proposal for the committees, I believe the appropriations committees ultimately for language that sort of governs the whole spectrum of grants and programs that are funded through coronavirus relief fund. And those sort of stock provisions will govern things like conditions for grants and the necessity of the expenditure, the requirement that recipients and also administering agencies adopt procedures and keep and maintain records to ensure compliance with the CARES Act. What happens if you have to authorize temporary positions? What happens if you have to do an RFP and whether that's going to be subject to underlying laws about competitive bidding? The answer is no. Things for committees to consider as far as, you know, eligibility to the extent it's necessary. Reporting requirements, all the usual things that you, you know, would think would go along with the expenditure of money. These provisions, the aim is to treat at least those components of this fund as identically as possible. So there is one standard across the board for how long you have to maintain records, et cetera. So what's specific to your work and to the other committees, of course, is how you are proposing to spend your allotment of the money. And I want to stay big picture here for a moment and talk about the scope of what these proposals are, can be, should be, et cetera. The first governing principle is there's no right or wrong way to do this, right? If you think of spending a lot of money to get money out the door through some process, there is a continuum. And on the most general end of the continuum is just an appropriation. It's a one line appropriation that says, you know, how we normally do it in fiscal year 21, the amount of X is appropriated from to or the purpose of. And that's it. And, you know, that obviously relies on the recipient of that money to execute the program. And whether it's through adoption of rules or guidelines or programs and procedures, processes, however you want to structure it, it's a very deferential approach to spending money. And frankly, that is what the economic development bill and the housing bill that's just adopted this morning does. It says that the Department of Taxes and the Agency of Commerce are going to come up with the process through guidelines and get this money out the door. And not much more than that. And, you know, for people like you and me who are used to spending a lot of time on periods and commas in particular words, that can be uncomfortable. I understand that. And it's just a balance, obviously, that you have to make this policy makers. On the other end of that spectrum, of course, is, you know, a very prescriptive program design with all the details about how many days until this has to happen and days until that has to happen and who does what and what the criteria are and what uses are eligible and uses are ineligible. And, you know, you can define it to death and beyond. And that's the far other end of the spectrum. And then, you know, of course, I'd say the usual practice is to land somewhere in the middle, where the General Assembly does its due diligence and work to iron out tons and tons of details through long committee process and then leave some discretion, of course, to the executive branch to execute the laws, which is its job. So no one way is right or wrong. All have been used in the past, I would say, in the context of the coronavirus relief fund. Most people are airing on the side of deference to the administration, because that is what's necessary to get the money out the door. And they have a great deal of flexibility. And with that comes a great deal of responsibility as well, of course. So with all that said in preface, let me just turn to the language here. You know, essentially, this is a list of appropriations from the coronavirus relief fund. And you'll see in line 12 that all of the money actually goes to the Department of Housing and Community Development to provide funding to housing partners and service providers for the purposes specified. I've written it that way right now, and that's not the only way it has to be, but right now I've written it that way for two reasons. First, so that it's less complicated to just give the money to GACD and then sort out exactly who gets what right now. Second, it allows them, the Department to administer funds in the normal way, which is basically through subgrants that come with grant agreements, gives them some measure of control and responsibility for the payment of funds and to ensure that the recipients comply with all the requirements related to the CARES Act and whatever else goes along with the administration of grants through various administrative bulletins that the executive branch has. And third, again, it allows the Department to design the process, the eligibility criteria for recipients and for uses, et cetera, that will be used when ultimately the rubber hits the road. So with that, we go to the categories, basically one, legal services, $550,000 to provide legal and counseling services to persons who are or at risk of experiencing homelessness or who have suffered economic harm due to the COVID-19 crisis. Obviously, the overarching rule governing this bill and this expenditure of funds is that it has to comply with the CARES Act. So remember that these expenditures have to be determined to be necessary by the state. They have to be due to the public health emergency. They have to be incurred between March and end of December and they cannot have been budgeted for in the most recent budget adopted by the state. Other than that, we can use CARES Act funds to administer programs in response to the crisis and for the cost generally of administering those programs. So that's why it says, you know, harm due to COVID-19 crisis. Subdivision two here, shelter rehabilitation, $9 million for the rehabilitation of homeless shelters to achieve compliance with guidance of the Centers for Disease Control and to ensure public health. Under three here, foreclosure protection, $5 million to provide assistance to persons who are or at risk go foreclosure due to the COVID-19 crisis. Four is rental assistance and addiction protection. That's $30 million to provide rental assistance to persons who have suffered economic harm due to the COVID-19 crisis, including for rental arrearages incurred since April 1st, 2020 and for security pauses and expenses to secure new rental housing. Number five, capital expenses, $2 million or I'm not sure yet. I think we need to fill in some blanks here. I have some questions about how that money might be used. Yeah, off the top of that was kind of the balance of the $25 million we originally, not originally, but that we had come to for BHCB capital expenses and then we cut $23 million for the fast track. So that was the original thought of that figure. Right. And then six, rehousing investments, $5 million to assist landlords with the cost of renovations necessary to provide housing to persons who are or are at risk of experience homelessness or require rehousing due to the COVID-19 crisis. And it's effective on passage. So that's sort of the framework. You know, and from here, I suppose it's time to discuss whatever questions you have and what direction you want to go. And just as a reminder to the committee, this was this was considered tier one spending. So the numbers are lower than they were in some of the recommendations from the advocates. So for instance, we heard as late as last week that $10 million to $12 million might be appropriate for shelter expenditures that $42 to $45 million might be appropriate for rental assistance and a re-erages. And the reason that I split them like this over the course of was that was that there was two tiers. And so getting this up and running, standing up these these grant proposals, standing up these ways of getting money to for monitors, will a will take some time and be, you know, in terms of things like rental assistance or foreclosure assistance, I think that there's a thought in general that if the people who have been unemployed are the most likely to need this, and they've been receiving $600 extra dollars a week on top of their unemployment, that there's a real, you know, there hasn't been an indication yet of a real run on on any of these issues yet. But there will be in time in time to come. And so that's why the money was split. So you're going to see when I believe I shared a tier two document that we can put up on the put up on the website, that so if it says $30 million for rental assistance in tier two, there's another $15 million expenditure, because that would take care of what would have been happening in the summer in the fall. So we have two questions, three questions lined up right now. Representative Kalaki and then Triano. Thank you, Chair. And thanks for this great work here. David, I have a question regarding number four with the rental assistance and eviction protection. I want to make sure I think it's in here, but this is not just for people who are housed. This is also for people who are homeless so they can apply for security posits and expenses to secure new rental housing. Is that correct? Yes. Okay. I mean, that's my understanding is this is both for people who are in rental situations and they have back rent that's due. Right. Right. And then also for people who either don't have housing and need to acquire it or people who for some COVID related reason need to change out. Okay. Because I think there's a lot of flexibility there. It's definitely retrospective and prospective. Okay. And then the second part of that, my question is that for instance, in my district as a women's prison and 58 women have not been released from the prison really because of the whole COVID crisis, but they were not given support to come out of prison. And so could the department, people leaving the department of corrections, could they also then apply for security posits and expenses to secure new rental housing under the way it's phrased? I think they certainly could apply. Okay. Let me just be clear that again, if we're on the deferential side of the end of the spectrum here, what would happen in real life is that $30 million will move from the coronavirus relief fund to the department of housing. And the department of housing will look at this and say, we have $30 million to provide rental assistance for back rent and for people who need security posits or other expenses to get into new rental housing. To whom they gave that, how they give that, how they apportion the money between those two populations. All of that is left to the discretion of the executive branch to execute. So I can't tell you that those people or any people would get any particular kind of assistance or what amount because I don't know. But at some point, the department of housing would have to figure that out. And whether they do that directly or whether they do that with partners and subgrants, I don't know. They have the discretion to do that. I mean, the governing principle here is that $30 million has to be spent for these purposes and it has to comply with the CARES Act and the guidance and the FAQs. So would it be too prescriptive to have a comma at the end of that sentence and saying including the homeless and those leaving, I don't know how to say it appropriately, those leaving the correctional facilities? I mean, from a drafting perspective, you can put in a policy perspective, of course, you can put whatever you want here. There's different constructs, you can say including, which means including but not limited to ABCD, ENF, or you could say which may include doesn't necessarily have to. I mean, again, this is the conversation as policy makers, how far down the prescription rabbit hole do you want to go? Okay. Well, those are my, so currently, those two populations are eligible. So I'm good with that. I just wanted to make sure I understood. Yes. I think definitely eligible. Thank you. Representative Trana. Thank you. I'm not sure whether this would go to David or to you, Tom. What is, well, for one thing, I wanted to mention in relation to what John was just asking, I see Kimberly Jessup is on the phone and on the online here. And I had a conversation with her last week about some funding that exists in the appropriation budget, I believe, that would be directed toward transitional housing away from, for inmates that are being released from jail. So maybe we would briefly like to hear from her. But my question is, what is the $9 million for shelter renovation look like? Does anyone know how that will happen? I mean, will we be creating rooms in these shelters so that people can isolate some more and they're not living in close proximity to each other? And we know how many shelters around the state and what areas will be covered by this $9 million. And I understand, Mr. Chair, that you have related to us that that could turn into consuming more money. But I'm just curious as to how that figure $9 million came about. Yeah, the figure of $9 million came out as Michael Montee from Shemplin Housing Trust came here. And I'll pass the microphone to Chris Donnelly from Shemplin Housing Trust who's here as well. They've identified in Chittin County alone $5 million worth of upgrades that would be needed. I think the question about, yes, Good Samaritan Haven, for instance, and Barry has bedrooms that have 10 or 12 people in them or could have 10 or 12 people in them. Those do not pass the CDC guidelines for social distancing. So this money would be spent to really work on each of these shelters across the state Michael estimated $10 million or so. He knows $5 million for Chittin County. But let me pass this over to Chris Donnelly for an answer from the Shemplin Housing Trust perspective. Chris, if you're there. Yes, thank you, Chair Stevens for the record. It's Chris Donnelly with the Shemplin Housing Trust. You are correct. We've done an assessment here for about $5 million in Chittin County. I've had some conversations with some shelter providers around the state, and they're not ready to take people when the weather starts getting colder and people start coming out of the motels. So I do think that there needs to be quick assessments of the needs. But if it's $5 million in this part of the state, then we think it's going to be probably at least double that. Most of these funds in the past and perhaps Gus Sealy can talk to this. VHCB has supported the capital needs of shelters throughout their history. And so it would make sense that these dollars get consolidated in one place so that we are making decisions in the most appropriate way. And Gus, do you want to chime in? I can't see you from where I am on my screen right now. But we agree with Chris that there is a need. We will begin in earnest and we're about to issue a letter of interest both for the funds that you are fast-tracking as well as this to just to begin to get our hands around what the need is statewide. I think I would probably suggest that you make the language a little broader because we just don't know how much will be shelter rehab and how much will be other kinds of rehab. But we certainly understand the need to address the shelter situation. We just got a note from a letter that I think you passed on from pretty much the whole Franklin County delegation asking for help for the shelter up there. So we will certainly have that at the top of our list of things that we are trying to get our hands around. I would say to you that as you just indicated, Mr. Chairman, whatever fixes we make to a place like the Good Samaritan Haven, they will have a smaller capacity in the future than they have currently. They cannot continue to house as many as the 30 or 40 people in that facility as they were once housing. So how much it will make sense to invest in that particular facility as opposed to others to make them CDC compliant and how much people can get this work done by December 30th, we still have to figure out. All right. I'll set chip. Yeah, for now that's good. Thank you. Great. Thank you. Representative Hango, then Walsh. I had another comment that I wanted to make, but I just want to follow up on what Mr. Selig just said about Samaritan House. That's a little concerning to me because it is the only shelter in Franklin County to my knowledge and to not invest in that would be rather disastrous. So I'm wondering if you're foreseeing that broader language being shelter rehab and or rehab of other types of units to be used on a temporary basis. Is that what I'm hoping I'm hearing? Yes. There's absolutely the letter you and your colleagues have sent makes clear that something needs to happen there. And we just would like to make sure that investing in any particular facility and I was actually talking about the good Samaritan Haven, not Samaritan House. Oh, sorry. Just to clear up any confusion. I have not been in the Samaritan House and I just don't know and my staff has not in many years how much to invest there or how much to help them buy an additional building and that that's why we just want to have enough flexibility that we're not limited only to fixing facilities that will still be inadequate if what they need is to buy another building. Okay, so thank you. Thank you for that. I missed the Haven part of that. So I think definitely broadening the language to allow for creative uses of that funding in whatever way a regional organization deems the best solution to their individual unique problems. I think that's the best way to go. So I definitely would be supportive of a little bit broader language to include other types of dwelling units other than shelters in that nine million dollars. My other concern that I was going to bring up before that is in regards to section four with the rental assistance. I've talked at length about supporting landlords and I know that this money can be used towards to go directly towards landlords. However, I'm a little bit reluctant to be very specific about it but I do feel it's very important to name landlords as recipients of these funds if appropriate in terms of rental arrearages and even subsidies etc to keep landlords whole. So I think I'll stop there and pass it along. Thank you. All right. Representative Wallace then by wrong. Thank you. Yeah. Representative Torano asked my original question but I'd like to expand on it a little bit and what Gus asked me about goods, Merit and Haven and Berry. That would be quite difficult to rehab according to distancing procedures and if we did do it obviously would cut down conservatively on the capacity and so that's something I think I'm not sure we we've got a good enough handle on is what our total capacity is going to be here and I'm thinking now when we get into cold weather then we get into the overflow shelters in the churches for example you know that they're not going to meet the distancing standards and so I don't know if we need language in the bill about this but I think we really need to look at the expansion of capacity and I guess that's kind of a balancing of rehabbing the shelters creating more rehabbing apartments and houses especially for the homeless but I think there's got to be a target number maybe that's the way to put it and I would caution all of us to to consider that to make sure that we are we're trying to get as many of the homeless as possible thank you yeah and I think a representative Wallace I think that's that's that's true and you know the goal is to lessen the reliance on shelters what we've seen over the last however many years is that with the with the economic downturn affecting people at that level at that economic level where people are so precariously housed that the numbers have grown and the use of the shelters that we've taken testimony for the last several years about how much the use of the shelters has grown and and and they're used for a longer period of time and you know hopefully I think the goal here is that if we can provide that other housing to get you know to create the spaces within the shelters that are appropriate for CDC compliant that we take you know that it doesn't it won't take care of itself I was about to say that and that's not that's not the case at all but I think that it would address what you're talking about like what are the numbers of the people who will absolutely choose to be in a shelter under the worst possible case scenario representative Byron thank you my question is around sort of the like timeline on the the work and scope of this was the the number calculated with the help of contractor estimates or input from them and the just the the period of time for the scope of work it has me curious and I'll pass that to to Gus ceiling I think that that's going to vary from one region of the state to another and we'll also depend upon the relationship that a facility may have with both maintenance staff and contractors as we've been surveying people across the state we know that a certain amount people believe can be done by December 30th and then there's more work that may not get done until then and we know we will then have to use state funds or some other source to finish work that can't be done so but we have not done the full kind of surveying particularly of the shelters that we've done in looking to stand up other facilities around the state and that's really going to be our next step and it starts with issuing a letter of interest to all the providers asking them what kinds of projects they want to undertake and what they think they can get done by December 30th so we're gathering that information as quickly as we can now but we don't have it at our fingertips okay thank you so David a quick question for you well it's not gonna I'm sorry it's not gonna be a quick question but the so the idea of saying that we're going to grant this money to the Department of Housing and Community Development who then under their normal course of grant processes are going to receive applications for this for these funds from from the agencies that we like VHCB in particular that would be responsible for further disseminating the money distributing the money or the services that were that we're talking about where does where does being prescriptive fit in for instance for instance if we wanted to say this following up on what Representative Kalaki was saying that if we wanted to say that this rental assistance money you must include this this this this and this and that this process must include this this this and this where is is that is that something that we should be doing here being that prescriptive or is this something that happens within the normal grant process that the grant you know the grant says you know that that this money is for that I mean do we have to tell the Department of Housing who this money is for or do we is it better for us to leave it a little bit more general and let the parties negotiate the different you know the the the prescriptive nature of what the money goes to further than what we say here I mean again there is no right or wrong way to do it and there's precedent for always I mean you can I'm sure you can all think of our you know grant programs I I don't know if any of you have ever had the pleasure of filing an application for historic barn preservation grant but I have working with my in-laws and their dairy farm and it's a it's a very lengthy process and the the the administering department has a healthy application that requires all kinds of information um that takes a while to put together and then they have their criteria and then they make their decision the statute that authorizes that program is not nearly as detailed obviously as um as as you know the the criteria and the guidelines for actually applying for and receiving the grants so that's normal uh but it's also normal because I'm sure you've all read the budget that sometimes you know you get as deep down into the weeds as you can imagine and say there will be five grants for this much money for this or that and sometimes sometimes appropriating legislation specifies that it's a pass through so the money will go to the department to be granted to this entity for these three things and so I can't tell you that one's better than the other it's a just a policy choice uh for you to make but I guess the factors that you need to weigh are um sort of the uh how how what are the you know how much of the minimums how many boxes do you want to force them to check here in this legislation versus how much discretion are you going to give them to expert exercise their expertise in um implementing a program I guess I'll I'll say by analogy think of what we call at this point the administrative state right and so many agencies and departments since the 1930s both the federal and the state levels have been created to implement authorizing legislation and you have things like the clean water act and the clean air act which sets sort of the minimum standards but then gives money over to subject matter experts like scientists who decide how many parts per million of this particular chemical can go into this particular body of water and then you have more prescriptive legislation that tries to lay out the whole framework in statute the benefits and costs are a balancing act how much flexibility and discretion and timing do you need to preserve in the legislation how much do you need to delegate to the executive branch to execute the law and so those are just those are balanced questions that there's no right or wrong answer one but there are questions that you have to answer okay representative collacky thank you chair I I thought Josh was going to send us what the administration uses for the language so it's not an open-ended RFP for these things but it would be they kind of frame it so it's it's it's clear what while we don't say um for the the legal stuff we don't say the organization but it would be clear that there's only one organization and that is right for so we don't yeah and I think I think I did receive that John and I can just share that with um I'll send it to Ron to post it um I think I received that late last night let me just go through my emails and um send that around he did he did send something um so we'll try to get that posted in the next few minutes um it just might give guidance to the agency um about what are the appropriate organizations without naming them but we'll see it might not thank you okay um representative triano yes thank you um David I have applied for a barn grant and you're right it took me two tries actually but uh but um so when you mentioned um uh the conservation housing uh the department of housing and community development administering the grant is that will that include um identifying whether or not expenditures are are compliant with the COVID relief money absolutely yes and and also as I said uh at the top of the meeting there um there there will be sort of across the board provisions that apply to all of this money as far as record keeping and compliance with the act and the guidance impose both on the administering authority and on the recipient so um all of that will be baked into the larger bill okay great thank you all right um next up I have representative tango thank you I have a couple of questions just for clarity and a comment my comment is that I would really prefer this to be a broad and balanced bill um particularly because it's this language is going out tomorrow at noon is that correct that's our deadline for this well that's to get it to the next committee right so I feel like um narrowing it at this point we all have special interests that we'd like to see taken care of but narrowing it down is going to take up a lot of time um so that's my comment my question another question um is the accd bill language that you sent us mr chair um does that address the question that representative clacky had about various agencies being named no I just actually found um commissioner handford's email from um anyway it should just be in your email box it was from a day ago yeah it has um language that says along the lines of the program shall be administered in partnership with a Vermont-based statewide organization with expertise in partnering with private landlords nonprofits and other statewide agencies etc etc so it's it's written pretty um it's pretty tight towards which administrator um it would be geared toward and there's one in there for the foreclosure information and and Ron and Ron mentions that they are both posted and visible now so um okay thank you for that because you did send us another document earlier today towards the end of the house floor session um that was listed as accd bill which yeah that was that was legal aid's proposal for um some uh prescriptive language about how the program would be in in session law because that's what we're working with is um is how the program would be would be administered okay that was from vla because um there was no designation who it came from so yeah okay um and I just want to be extremely clear that this this wording that we're sending out by tomorrow at noon or later today or whenever we send it is strictly for tier one funds and that's approximately 75 million minus the 23 million that we already talked about yeah I think the processes would would would also apply to the tier two money um and there's also the question that I have for David uh when we talk about because the other the other thing that I do want to spend some time talking about in a little bit is the the enhanced fee hit money which is to because there's some issues with that that I really want to make sure that we shine a light on and really think about because uh in coordination with uh this question I'm going to have for David right now which is is there in the general fund the general writing of this bill this idea of flexibility we we heard from commissioner handford for instance last week that said well you know if we don't spend money here or if we find that there's not as much uptick there that we might be able to shift funds over for another use and is that part of the um is that part of the larger bills language uh I don't think so um because that's in the accd that's in the vla proposal when it came to how to deal with there is some language about sharing or about not sharing but about being flexible with some of this funding if it were available if we couldn't use it someplace so sort of those general uh app but generally applicable sections governing all grants to my knowledge does not address that issue um I don't think that by default they can move money around from one pot to another and um and the one piece I guess I would note about the stock language the generally applicable language is that it says uh basically if the money is not spent I believe the date they pegged was by December 20th then it would revert to the coronavirus relief fund um and then uh I'm not certain I believe the state would take a sort of last you know last 10 days default uh allocation of whatever monies were unspent so didn't revert to the treasury do you know what I mean yep yep no I'm just concerned that I'm just concerned that if we if we put in um so if we put in x amount of money for any of these line items you know say but talking about the enhanced fee hit program and we say we have five million dollars and it turns out that it is undersubscribed right then that money will be swept up on December 20th we don't we don't operate in a way that says oh look there's three million dollars there let's take it and spend it on we need this parental assistance um we don't we don't have the freedom to do that uh not by default I mean so obviously the general assembly just as a constitutional matter has the authority to appropriate money and when you say where it goes and what it's used for even if it's general like this that uh circumscribes reallocation I mean there's there's one statutory provision that allows a limited amount of reallocation of funds I'd have to look it up but it's not a lot it's like 50 or 75 thousand dollars something like that it's it's certainly not uh a free ticket to take five million from rehousing and put it towards rental assistance those there's a lot of overlap there so I don't know maybe maybe that's a bad example but you know what I mean if you're doing five million to prevent foreclosures uh so you know direct assistance to individuals to prevent foreclosure you can't say oh we didn't use that let's let's repurpose that over in the uh over in the rehab section and fix up some rental housing you would have to give specific authority to be able to move money around like that I will know though I I mean so for instance the the economic development bill this morning which includes in part your housing language does call for weekly reports and then another report on august 15th so I have to assume also that uh you will be apprised in a timely way before December 20th whether or not the money was used okay I'm just I mean right and I I mean because I on one hand there's a huge transparency issue I don't want to like I don't want it to be that we're gonna say that this money is for x and then really you know spend it on l or p or something like that and also um does the does this kind of funding uh if it's even this specific or this this broadly specific I suppose um come under the not what's my my least favorite thing about Vermont statute that says notwithstanding um anything that we say that we can use this money for any purpose so we determine and that that's how it's how it's applied to the property transfer tax in particular I mean another in others funds too but this is different money that that happens that happens because there is a statutory formula that must be not what stood in order to do something else I mean really it's we don't need to get into that but there's a there's a there's a statue that says here's gonna here's the breakdown of the property transfer tax and you know x percent goes here and y percent goes there z percent goes there and so we have that notwithstanding language every year because otherwise that statutory formula would govern the distribution of those funds that's not the case here there's no there's no underlying statute that would govern the allocation of coronavirus relief funds so whatever you say in this bill is going to be what that allocation is and again if if you did want to give somebody the authority to move money around from one allocation to another you would have to say it and and then you can put limits on that you know if the funds in subdivision six are not used by December 15th for the purpose specified the department may reallocate up to 10 percent or whatever is remaining or blah blah blah for x y z purpose or for any purpose I mean completely within your policy discretion on how you approach that okay representative collecting David I like the what you said about the senate having a not a weekly report I think that's a little too much but like an august report and then a december deadline and and I think it's saying that the agency itself can at the at those moments reallocate the money as needed because in the middle of december they have two weeks left to do it so it's a little hard excuse my phone behind me so could you could you say what the senate language was about the august bill the august report it's essentially a final report on or before august 15th concerning the grant guidelines that the agency in the department would adopt and the implementation of the act okay yeah that I that that I understand that now that wouldn't work in this but we could put in language of the december 15th that the agency has the authority to reallocate any unused dollars for the they'll have that I think the I mean the agent is it the agency or is it the the administration you know who who sweeps up the money to then try to spend it in the last 10 days of the year again I my understanding and I only have gathered this I don't know if a final decision has been made but the the bottom line is if the money is not spent by december 30th then it reverts to the US treasury so I believe the the approach is that there will be a general provision in this larger bill that says the administering authorities have through december 20th to use the funds for the purposes specified and if they are not then those funds will revert back to vermont's coronavirus relief fund okay and at that point there will be one or more sort of statute you know act-based default allocations that will happen more almost like the waterfall mechanism so that if we don't leave money on the table you know if people are not able to spend 400 or 1.25 billion dollars in time then there will be one or two or three places where that money will go out the door at the very end at the last minute to avoid just sending it back to the US government okay obviously it would have to be a purpose that's in compliance with the CARES Act and we'd still CARES Act funds thank you um ron can you put up on the screen um or i'm sorry david do you have it do you have the tier two um information i sent you or should i have ron put it up yeah if you if you give me just one second i can pull that out chair we will come back to this bill is correct yes this is all one bill because the thing about tier two is that we are going to have to put in we've been asked to put in tier two language as well with the proviso you know i mean that says in the event these funds are available this second tranche of 400 million is available that we are allocating the money to these for these purposes okay so that's something that we hadn't we hadn't gotten to because we were focusing on what tier one was but this this these elements here um are again this was just this is draft language if people have obviously ways to make this better i'm not this is this is how i was breaking it down um this weekend this this this past weekend and so you'll see 15 and a half million dollars in additional funding for um actually david if you can just throw out 15 and a half million dollars in additional funding for rental assistance which would bring the total rental assistance of fiction protection in the rearch program um up to up to 45 and a half million dollars um three million in additional funding for rehabilitation of homeless shelters which would bring that up to 12 um three million for the defense via p if the need is reflected three million for foreclosure protection if a need is reflected 500 000 for the development of the registry uh and and then we get into this this 25 million dollars these last two figures which are um which are unknowns but do we leave that out there and say well if if we get a ruling from the treasury from the federal delegation from joint fiscal council from legislative council that says oh actually we can use crf money for the wraparound services that we've been talking about including rental assistance um or run rental other rental subsidies that would allow these projects to be financially viable over a two or three year period so the numbers I just put in for placeholders was 15 million dollars for the service components if ruled eligible the the the service components would be budgeted in the tier two side and then that still left us short on our allocation and we've been asked to also consider if in this case um there was a request from excuse me there's a low flying black helicopter out guard helicopter outside um the there's been requests of course from social services across the board one of which is um from the food bank or from hunger free vermont and this would be a potential allocation to provide food for people who were experiencing homelessness during the covid crisis total placeholders you know in terms of what would be considered in august um other committees seem to have more black and white um tier two things I I'm looking at this as saying we're we're needing to see what the what the real world is in the first in that as we put that money out the first time to see if there's going to be um a run on any of these services which we think there's going to be um so anyway that's that's the tier two that's the tier two proposal which would get us up to 125 which fits our allocation but again we can we can lessen that allocation um if we want or we can shift money around to where we think it might be necessary representative hanko hey this is for clarification purposes will tier one and tier two be broken out in this bill draft request number 20 or will they will these numbers all be lumped together and we'll get it out the door that way uh the I originally thought it would be two separate things but I've been asked by leadership to put it all into one um proposal again with the with the proviso in there that says if funds are made available um and they're eligible that this is where we this is where we want to see these allocations made and for us again they're much more of a continuation of of the proposals in tier one um for the most part there's others you know the the issue of the registry obviously is is something that this committee didn't feel was of tier one priority but I would still like to see it in tier two and obviously the service components are um the service components are ineligible right now so how do we differentiate that in in a bill because um if this bill is going out as this is what we want um with the exception of the service components that we don't know are eligible adding additional funds above and beyond what we thought was absolutely necessary at this point and adding in additional programs that could possibly uh make it more difficult for this bill to pass and to get hands into vermonters or get funds into vermonters hands sooner I I really don't want to see any roadblocks in this um I I'm not sure why we're having to pass one bill with tier one plus tier two in it um this is just this is the way that the the bill has been structured and the request from leadership has been structured this is something that you know the so so that's where that's that's why this is this is out there we were asked to do tier one is our major priorities um and tier two is our as our subsidiary priorities and or continuations of the um uh of the programs that we put forth in tier one which is why you see the split in the rental assistance and in the foreclosure in the rehab but if the language is if the language isn't going to be split like this it won't be clear what our tier tier one and tier two priorities are it's just going to be oh I no I think that I think that this is the prelude to this in the inside the bill would be to the extent that these funds are available which addresses the fact that we as a general assembly are temporarily holding back four hundred million dollars from the from the um 1.25 or what we're down to appropriation to because we're waiting to see if that money can be used for the general fund or the education fund or the transportation fund there's four hundred million dollars that they're waiting to hear from the federal as just as we're waiting to hear on the service component perspective if that money can be used if that money can be used for those purposes if there's not another recovery act that comes through the heroes act is not passed and money does not flow in a way that that we can use that money for those purposes and the crf money is all of a sudden allowed to be used those that those purposes those three purposes those three specific purposes of the transportation fund the education the general fund it is they're not allowed uses they're not eligible uses of the crf at this time if the if we hold if if if the decision is made that we're not seeking these funds for that purpose then that kind of opens the door to this expenditure so we would be saying in the case that you know at the time that these funds become available for these uses that this is how we would like to see that's expended but you told me in another breath that this these particular items that are on the screen right now would not be broken out separately just the service components would be broken out separately and we would indicate if there was money that became available that was eligible for service components so i still don't see how the rest of those numbers if they're combined with the first numbers that david showed us on the original bill how that's going to indicate to anybody reading this bill that we didn't originally want uh 15.5 million dollars plus 30 million so 45.5 million dollars for rental assistance anybody reading that bill would think that that's what we wanted to allocate right up front uh again i think that i think that if if you heard me that way i'm sorry i think i was clear in saying that the tier two numbers that are put here fall under a different line there's a thick there's a thick line between tier one and tier two and under that it will say in the case that these funds are available for these purposes this money will be expended in this way okay thank you because that's that's what i've been trying to get at all along and without seeing it like in black and white written i'm trying to envision it so i must have misunderstood thank you you're welcome um two is next representative zot i think you kind of addressed um what i was going to ask except the as it's now being relabeled contingent appropriations is there any kind of ranking within those or is it just a giant sort of pot that's sitting there to be allocated in this way or maybe there will only be x amount available to be allocated that way and that x amount will be allocated and who decides that is that a convoluted question or do you understand what i'm asking well it's a little bit of both i think it's because this is pretty a convoluted conversation at times um i did not put these in i did not put these in order priority um on purpose um there may be some priority simply by the way that it was typed but the um no it's a good question because in the way that this process has been described to me is that if again if we're not in session and the joint fiscal committee is in charge of uh me you know making the decision that those funds can be released for these purposes um this this is this represents like how we would spend what we've been allocated and again there's no priority that i've i've waited no priority i've called this a draft so how people would then spend it um and who would be making that decision is a good question um i think it would it would fall to the direction would be here in the statute and the um the actual release of the funds would be part of the responsibility of i mean we we are saying in the first half of this bill that this money is being granted to or appropriated to the department of housing and community development from where they would then be issuing the grants to the to the other organizations so um my guess is that if this money is available and if all of the money is available that it would be um that it would go to the department of housing community the way that we have this bill prepared right now it would be going to the department of housing community development to then be re-granted i uh does that come close to answering your question yeah yeah no it does it's uh it's you know it's a little unsettling like again i'm i'm weighing uh just like um uh david hall mentioned like you know the expedite you know expediting the process and making sure we get the money out the door but also wanting to have some kind of sense of what the priorities are you know so if i if i was in charge and i said oh do i want to spend three million on foreclosure protection versus three million for enhanced v hip i'd rather do the foreclosure protection but i don't know you know i don't know that we can micromanage all of that um in this process well it kind of it kind of you know what's interesting for me is that the phrase that came up for me while i was typing was if need is reflected which is kind of a tricky phrase and it's probably not very legalistic but it is i think it addresses what you're what you're concerned about is that is that is this and i mean another way that i can hear your question is is this an automatic um appropriation to a program that may not need it uh yeah although right the the the tricky part is who decides whether it's needed or not obviously right who decides if the need is reflected if it's if it if there's if there's a shortage if we see that there's gonna be you know that that by the time a decision has to be made that 28 million dollars out of the original 30 million dollars in rental assistance has been expended well somebody's gonna say well if we spent that in three months we're certainly gonna you know let's give them the 15.5 and and and call them hold the question then becomes well what if they need more but that's separate from what you're asking you know that's that's um so yeah i i don't have a good answer for you um we're very we're all very um curious as to as to how that is gonna work um come summer time i'm sorry but i also have a bigger concern about the i kind of hinted at it before but i'm a little concerned about this not being a fully holistic process like we're we're operating particularly with the service components we're making a decision that seems wholly predicated on crf money and i'm and i'm wondering how do we advocate that says even if we don't get the crf money we have to have a we have to have a commitment within the budget for these service components irrespective of crf and again if that means raising taxes on the top five percent of Vermonters in order to get that money you know for five years let's do it and get the money and it's just feels a little ham the process feels hamstrung to just say well we're only going to limit ourselves to this crf money and if not we'll just sort of wipe our hands and say well we'll just figure it out down the road i know that's not what anybody in this committee is necessarily saying but it kind of feels like in a process fashion um i i agree i think that um you know if the focus because of the limitations of the crf money if the focus is on capital expenditures let's just say on fixing shelters and creating at least 200 plus units through through the appropriations the 23 million dollar fast track and two million dollars elsewhere is um we've heard plenty of testimony that said well this isn't really going to be sustainable if the third leg the service you know the reference services and and and the second leg which is this rental subsidies no one's promising that that's going to happen i think everybody i've talked to acknowledges that that is necessary and is going to um is going to make the conversations that we have with the appropriations committee starting the summer um there we're going to have to we're going to have to make sure that there is follow-up services because we're not we're not promising it with the crf money and it makes all of these projects a little bit shakier um i they can get done i have no question about that but that that the sustainability i think you know is a big question for all of us to answer um both both in the legislature and and the administration so um what's next folks um do you want to see the language that josh handford shared with us does that make sense next because the the um and actually i'd like to kind of uh toss the microphone over to jeffrey pepinger from ahs who's here today um listening in just to just to um kind of address what um representative zot was was asking microphone is yours jeffrey for the record jeffrey pepinger is here at the commissioner for the department for children and families um i think this is something that we've been focused on within the agency uh understanding that the agency's role in developing any housing plan is really about trying to provide the services that can support the bricks and mortar that are coming from other proposals so we've been working internally to figure out what types of support we're going to be able to offer to uh households going forward the households in motels and i think that we'll be uh able to present something shortly regarding that but it's our thoughts have really been around how do we to um the point made how do we ensure that there are services and that there's housing navigation and the assistance needed to make sure that uh households are going to be successfully rehoused and stay in housing all right thank you jeffrey representative hango thank you i just um really will need clarity on i understand there are two different parts of money parts of money that we're talking about one of them is to rehouse individuals or families and the other is the ongoing services to keep them in that housing so i really need to know what a hs is thinking about in terms of keeping those people in homes because in my in my short time on the housing committee i feel like we're the housing people we need to get people into housing but i feel like human services should be the organization that keeps people in that housing and maybe i'm i'm drawing too thick of a line between the two but i don't see how our proposal you know much to representative zot's point i don't see how our proposal is going to keep those folks in housing and i'll go one step further and say i don't even think that it's our jurisdiction to keep them in housing um we've provided we will provide for them and we'll get them the navigation services to stay in in the short term but beyond that i'm very concerned about that part of the budget okay um representative triumph it was my understanding from your first memo mr chair that um services money uh or clarification on the ability to use money for these services would come out of the second year is that accurate to say that's what i heard um i i by putting the component services and the second tier it's basically saying maybe in the next few weeks there will be a different interpretation or there will be an allowance of the use of this money that that from the that the treasury will say oh okay i get it you know it so that's that's why i that's why i would have that's why put it down in the second tier okay that was my understanding as well i just once again i mean i have to think in terms of caledonia county which again has a disproportionate number of homeless families and children um and is without a shelter and how funds may come to this county i mean the royal county does have a shelter but again there's a substantial number of families there and i just i'm unsure um as of the reading of this and this discussion is to how assistance might come to the families uh the homeless families in counties uh up here in the kingdom i don't know that because well i i'll ask us if he can tackle that question a little bit but also to answer or to address the services issue because we talk about in affordable housing and specifically um with respect to housing homeless families and how homeless households we we talk about the three-legged stool and that it's not separated out but i just wanted to discuss i don't know if if if you can address the concern that representative hango um brought up about about well who quote unquote who takes care of the the services um when it comes to housing well i i think that the representative is correct that we really need a partnership and we work at this at the community level between the service provider community whether that's a cap agency one of the designated agencies to take care of folks who are struggling with uh mental health or have developmental disabilities um parent child centers so their ability to be that service partner um the homeless service agencies themselves whether it's you know the good samaritan haven samaritan house um committee on temporary shelter so the levels of support they get from the state of ramon that they raise from community donations that they get from the philanthropic community are critical to the long-term success of these endeavors um in some communities we are confident that um in the way that people are working together that they will realign existing resources to make sure people are supported in housing uh who need that that's not true of the whole homeless population but it's true of a portion of them and i think the estimate has been about one third are going to need some intensive ongoing support other people will need less intense support for a year to two years and then other people simply with some financial assistance such as in the rental assistance packages are going to be able to get back on their feet um so there really is a variety of different need um and i'm confident that in some parts of the state we will find resources or get organizations to reallocate resources to keep people housed we may without the financial assistance for services find other parts of the state say we simply can't stand up a 20 to 40 unit facility and have to raise the money in our community for those services and we're so we are waiting for as all of you have been to see what the agency's plan will be going forward and i'm just hopeful that in the same way that sarah philips and her crew rose to the occasion to get 2000 people housed who did not have housing over the last three months that they will be figuring this puzzle out but it's a difficult one um whether for some clients uh they are and these might be clients in the designated agencies uh with significant enough conditions you can uh they are Medicaid eligible and that can help cover the cost of services may be a part of the how this all fits together but but it is a significant unknown and risk that we all collectively need to address it was part of why our original proposal to you called for capitalizing a fund for reserves and we have the similar concerns about the availability of rental assistance without which people some people cannot be successful there are people in the motels today who do actually have employment income and again if they can get their credit straightened out they get some assistance from your rental assistance program that helps them get back into housing they're going to be fine but there are other people with much more significant needs that will need to be addressed as we move forward jeffrey i just wanted to thank you guys for saying that it's just it's worth remembering that there's a range of supports that are available uh to folks who might be experiencing homelessness and who might be in the motels or in shelter or somewhere else that there are some folks who might need a light touch who might need short duration supports then there are other folks who might need housing retention services to keep them in get them adjusted to be in a permanent housing situation or help them develop additional skills and then there are some folks who might need much more intensive services who are experiencing complex situations and we're talking family support housing permanent support housing so to discuss this point i think that there's there is a range of when we talk about services we should just remember that we're not talking about services it's a whole gamut of uh different supports that we can offer to folks based on their situations frankly thank you representative kalaki then hanko all right thank you chair there's two things you would ask us if we could look at josh's uh language and i like it very much i have to say because it doesn't it kind of helps the agency pick the right organizations to regret this money too without naming them and i think that's going to streamline the process so i quite in favor of if the committee can look at that to look at that and then the second thing is um the vermont legal aid when the thing that's on our website there's an interesting part in there about the timing and that's um about reports due on october 10th and then there's one in september that's f and g on the second page of their thing and i think that was what i was struggling with earlier is how do we give the agency enough flexibility to understand how to move these dollars and real real allocate them if necessary so i think that language is it's pretty good guidance as well for the community to consider so those are the two things josh's language and then f and g from the vermont legal aids look interesting to add into our our bill language to me all right thank you representative hangar um this question is for gus can you talk about that um capital reserve fund i believe it's 14.4 million dollars is that what you were referring to can you tell us what that can be used for the well at this point i think the conclusion is that we cannot do that but it was for two things and it was basically to capitalize a fund that would pay for rental assistance and services for a three to five year period a different version of that might be to think about having an organization in the community by an annuity if that would pass muster but there have been enough questions about that that that's why the chair has put it in tier two it is not unusual as i said a few weeks ago for us to capitalize funds at the beginning of a housing development um what would be unusual here is the size of the capitalized fund so i know that's something that that your council has uh thought about and considered i think you know maybe at a one or two year level it he's beginning to think about whether or not that might be more doable but um but it would be both for services of a variety of types that include clinical services and it would be for rental assistance that was the purpose of that proposal so thank you for that and that is in the the the 25 million possible service components in tier two that was incorporated into that i think that's where the i think that's where the chair has put it but i'm not you'll have to ask him that question that's the 15 million the 10 million the 10 million right now is um is relative surplus it has you know we've addressed um and that's the wrong word for it um but it's we've addressed a lot of the issues that have been brought to our table um we've we've we know that without the matching service components and everything else that there were limitations on what kind of capital expenditures we can make um and that so that 10 million dollars can be used i mean if if there's a project or if there's a way to use it then we will but also we've been asked to consider you know again maybe this money goes to provide food for the people who are who are homeless who have been experiencing homelessness and trying to get into a new place and um but that's something that we can consider it a bracketed thing or a draft thing right now um before we go and put up josh's language gus did you have a follow-up well this goes both to josh's language and and and the tier one allocations and i guess i would just say that i think josh's language will be helpful in moving things along um and similarly i think having thank you for having put us in your fast track bill and be named i think it would be a little bit easier and a little faster for everyone if you're asking us to spend nine million dollars on the shelters with a little bit more breadth and flexibility uh to name us there rather than have it have a have that money travel through the department to us and have them have to go through a process sure and that can go to the that extra two million dollars or that unknown two million dollars in capital as well um but before before we look at the language um and when we do look at the language i do want to bring in um mora collins in a minute mora um about the about the notion of the your agency dealing with the foreclosure portion of it in in conjunction perhaps with the homeownership centers across the state but i come here in hand for it i wanted to spend a little bit of time on the enhanced v-hip program um there are some questions about um i mean as you know we've dealt with this this program and it's non-enhanced state you know for well over a year now and so we pretty much i think this committee has shown its support for for what we would be trying to do with with this money there is a question now about this idea of forgivable loans and granting and also in potential uptake i mean i just i want you to go be able to like let us know i mean i've been using this example when i was on the board at downstreet housing we we had when we opened a building in berry we we needed to fill 15 of those units with with homeless formerly homeless people people who were going to be formerly homeless if they got an apartment there and we entertained 20 applications before we could find four folks to fulfill our 15 percent um reiterating that this is a difficult population to house even for non-profit housing agencies that whose focus and whose mission is this so my concern for the v-hip program right now is is and i and i'd like to get some some thoughts on your part about what you anticipate the uptake the subscription to this this money and to these renovations will be and have you been able to refocus from them being forgivable loans to being straightforward grants and how do you and how do you really envision that going i guess not really envision i don't you know but just to like in the last few days has anything become clearer about how you think this program might be functional at the level that you're proposing it at sure good morning um or i guess it's afternoon now um the switch to forgivable loans and grants to all grants is is not a challenge in my view i mean we were already anticipating more than half being grants um if they're all grants we could increase the size that go to commitments of housing homeless folks or um the challenge of of of moving uh homeless folks into these units is not much different in my mind um than the the the new units acquisition and light rehab that vhcb and their partners are going to have to experience um on those units we're going to have to work with local partners that continue of care you know we can ensure that the affordability and the intent that they serve homeless folks is is capture that with a coveted on the property you know some sort of um you know lean that they make that commitment to to fill those units with with families in need um i think that's going to be a challenge for all the units that are either newly created or made available with these funds that matching up the long-term services and rental assistance is what we're all struggling with but uh the same resources will be available for these units as the other units out there um many of the rehousing of homeless folks today are going into private properties you know every day um matching up rental assistance and those support and services that's the the go-to with many of these service providers because that's where there's available units the network in the affordable housing community there's virtually no vacancies so this is how it happens today we're just trying to bring some more units online and make them available you know at a reasonable cost and um you use partners to help us in that work and um you know not a problem in my mind at all to shift to all grants so we were just trying to stretch the money and trying to build a even longer incentive by turning those um forgivable loans to stretch out a commitment of affordability you know for 10 15 years by having it um forgive a certain amount each year but with a grant we can still have a um a length of time that they have to remain affordable and a commitment to serve homeless people um with support and services matched up and you know put restrictions on that property that if they um aren't successful you know those funds are redistributed somewhere else we stagger the release of those funds there's mechanisms we can employ um to to ensure accountability so I don't know if that sort of hits the what what you were um wondering but it's it's going to be with all of these funds what I'm concerned about with seeing sort of the tier two if we don't know for sure if we can use that money until later in the year it's going to be hard to deliver on any of those items you know whether it be the rental registry build out or other capital expenses that we don't get to go ahead to to to go forward until the fall and leaving little time to be successful that that's of concern um you know the v-hip investment amount um I I'm um okay with it being scalable like if we want to trim back and reduce the number of units you know we were talking 250 units with eight million dollars some of the other commitments for capital out there have been less you know units and you haven't had as many prescriptions around how many you want to get or the or the length of affordability commitment if we can have some of that same flexibility and um have a slightly less to work with I think we'll be successful there's been surveys of landlords done um that represent about 4 000 units out there and um there was about 1300 that would take up a program like this from an initial survey um that was put out you know if you were provided you know a grant or a resource of this level would you make it available could you get the work done by December 31st and um out of those 4 000 units surveyed there was over a thousand that were um willing to take this up and had no problem would even commit to a very low rental rents you know below what you would would typically see as a typical affordable rent in order to get their units um back online and out there and available but I'm not gonna um suggest like everyone has said this that the ongoing commitments for support and services is going to be the challenge with this program just like the other capital we've put out there it's different for the shelters you know and we're putting money into expand shelters maybe open up new ones um that those same challenges aren't aren't quite the same there but we're not really solving um the real needs for for this homeless population by just adding shelter capacity so we're all on the same boat with that challenge so so when you talk about all the covenants and all the all the all the strings that might be attached or all the you know the bars that someone would have to reach you know you're you're reporting that you're reporting that um a substantial number of people have said yes even with those in place that they would submit to those in order to get apartments online that would in you know for for their for their purposes would improve their properties and for the society's purpose would provide an apartment for people to to to not be homeless in um right so so this gets to the question and and you came on a little bit later where we were perseverating a little bit over the how how deep do we need to write this legislation you know or are you going to be cutting and pasting and lifting from existing programs these covenants that that are satisfactory to the committee that says well we do want we don't want this to be perceived as free money you know because there's a lot of work that has to be done it's not free money it's a lot of work to take on a homeless family it's it's a it's a lot of work to have someone come into your house that may you know that but but if you're if you're making the commitment to bring it forward so that it's habitable you know here is a grant that's going to do that so you know do we do we rely on the Department of Housing and Community Development to set up these to set up these this contract if you will that's going to make sure that there's a real balance there that people will take it and not feel like they're overly stringed because we hear that a lot you know it's more trouble than it's worth we don't want to make it more trouble than it's worth right you know first i'll say you know we have systems in place to to develop these covenants and put every cdbg grant and the path through that those go to has a minimum five-year covenant and change of use provision so this is pretty standard you know we would put that for affordability period regardless if the homeless tenancy didn't work out after an initial period they would still have to have an affordability a component to it that would be lasting what we heard from the surveys response that that i've seen is that many of these landlords are saying this unit is vacant it's in need of repair i'm still paying property taxes on it if i could collect half of the standard rent but have a grant pay to fix it up and make it available i'm in sign me up tomorrow i mean they're sitting on property that they're paying property tax on no rents coming in and there's you know dozens of them in some of these portfolios you know four hundred dollars a month is better than nothing when they're putting out you know near that a much in property taxes each year it just the the model for privately owned affordable rents in tight markets is broken you know there's no value in reinvesting in the property that they can't raise the rents the property taxes go up and the tenant and there's still challenges with with rent collection and tenant issues so in many cases without any support we know from the affordable housing work we do we have to provide some capital to make any housing affordable to folks that are low income we're just not putting it towards this segment of the market in any meaningful way and there's thousands of units out there that could serve this need with some investment and you know it's if thirty thousand dollars is you know we think that that's what it takes to bring a unit and rehab it to help safety standards bring some weatherization and that that's a pretty fair bargain if you think you're going to get five year if we're going to require five years of affordability out of it do the math on the rent that that's a pretty um pretty good uh sort of return for that many years of affordability based on the investment per unit um you know knowing that there are you know even in even in projects that we fund um and great work that we all participate in with the affordable housing we have to reinvest in those properties every so often it's not a one time and we're done so we're constantly reinvesting in our in our network of affordable housing and that you know for that price per unit for five years at a minimum that's a pretty good bargain i'm not going to say it won't be a challenge to get this done in five months um but we're going to try as hard as we can like everyone else and line up as much as we can in advance and give signals if we can to the folks that have indicated they want to do this work that to start lining up this is looking like it's going to happen be prepared um and you know remove as many of the strings that have gotten in the way of this these programs when they're funded with um very limited federal funds you know a seven thousand dollar grant that has to be matched three to one with their own private funding those don't move very fast when you still have to have a environmental review and historic preservation inspection and you know um this would be a very different emergency rehab effort to be successful so two quick questions um for i move on to mora so so would you be able to in the in over the next x number i mean we're we're we're aiming to be finished here by june 20th you know we're going to pass a bill on covid recovery before then um again i'm and the committee can weigh in on this if they like i am what i'm concerned on in terms of the language of a contract that you have with an individual landlord is that we know what you're what you're asking them to do because if if in fact all of these things that you've just mentioned are part of their contract with you in order to receive the grant those are all things that i don't you we don't have the time to spend writing that into statute nor do you really want us to because you're dealing with you're dealing with rules that you've worked with before so we already have a model i mean we've already we do these with the homeownership centers neighborhoods of western ramon that has the five-year covenant language that has all this stuff and so if you can share if you can share samples of that so that we know that that that this is what it's going to be then we're not reinventing the wheel on your back you know we don't want you to be doing the extra work but if you could share with us examples of of the contracts that you already work with understanding right up front that it's not going to be the contract that you're going to be working with in a break in an enhanced v-hit program also what i heard is that you would prefer to see more money up front for the enhanced v-hit program so i mean i've broken down i've made this proposal to the committee and to everybody and and it's it's just a draft but if i were to if i were to suggest or if someone in the committee were to suggest that we put more money into the v-hit program up front then where would i balance my where would i balance my think do you think the foreclosure program because of the nature of of one of the things that we chatted about a little bit earlier was that but because of the nature that the people the low income people that you that you were illustrating last week who might be the low income ownership people who might be the prime candidates for foreclosure assistance may not know that they're going to be going under foreclosure until august and so is it possible to you know in your mind to adjust that program so perhaps there's there's you know if we shift another million dollars or another whatever number to the v-hit program that there's you know that the balance here that we're that we're estimating is that there won't be a real rush on foreclosure money until perhaps later this summer does that make sense yeah i i guess what i would say in general all the tier two elements that i hadn't seen this sort of reworking and the additional detail until i logged on here i guess what i would say is for the tier two if it's a continuation of an existing program that you funded in tier one it's just adding more money that's easier to accommodate because we know it's successful we can keep it going shifting but if tier two is contemplating anything that we need to stand up fresh right from the beginning without knowing we can spend the money and it's possibly not going to be approved until later i don't think there's much chance those things are going to be successful so that's just a big picture way of saying if you want to break up the rental rehab money into two tranches um so we can get started and if it's moving we can access the second fine but if it's contemplating down here any new programs that would need to wait for that tier two approval at a later date we're probably going to be so in the thick of it that it's just it won't be time to successfully launch a new program well the only thing that i can think of off the top of my head is the um is the rental registry um the other programs are continuations at least in this proposal so right in the rental registry being an it you know project with the state that's the type of element that in order to have any chance that it's successful being i don't know what the rules are on that project like that with the corner relief money that it has to be up and running or just has to be paid for by the December but you know that needs every day available to us to be up and running by December 31st with with some major it projects the ads has already been committed to on the hook as of today so that that's a that's a concern of mine okay no thank you this is very that was very helpful i appreciate it um mora are you still with us um how are you i am so i asked mora i asked mora to come on because one of the the conversations that we've had in some of the language that josh shared with us in terms of in terms of specific things is this foreclosure program that was just brought forward really in greater detail just this past week and um as we had with the rental assistance program and the and the proposal from legal aid and and to to help facilitate and provide legal services to people who are who be utilizing that program it's clear that it it can be clear that from on housing finance agency is uh is it agency or authority i'm sorry um agency agency is um as a state agency is um has the connections and has the experience in dealing with foreclosure proceedings and um so mora i just wanted to get your thoughts on your agency's feelings about having the language that's been proposed to have you know to essentially um grant you the authority to set up this this foreclosure program um perhaps by yourself or with the homeownership centers across the state uh and just share your thoughts on it it's been pretty new to us in terms of it actually being on the table yeah for the record i'm mora collins i'm the director of vermont housing finance agency vhfa and um yes at one point this was um i believe i've heard josh say this was going to be proposed as a part of the administration's phase two request and then because of some of the issues you all have identified and and have been spoken about it made sense to group it in with the rental assistance requests and that reasoning is that um we are not all exactly clear what the future holds that may surprise you and uh we think that having some kind of flexibility in being able to um address the needs of vermonters whether they be in rental assistance through vhf or through the mortgage assistance or foreclosure prevention would be really beneficial and so um it made sense to put the foreclosure piece in now along with the rental assistance so that if um there is tremendous demand for rental assistance and really no um eligible need for um the foreclosure prevention then instead of losing those dollars um to housing and to this assistance it could shift a little bit and you all have talked about when should that shift happen what should be the triggers what reporting at what times um and so that's why this was a late addition but um thankfully due to the strong network that exists in this state it's not going to be a hard um it's not going to be an impossible program to stand up quickly and some of the things that we have going for us in the state are that vhfa as the proposed administrator is a statewide quasi um quasi public agency so the same as vhcb and a lot like the vermont state housing authority um we are in those ways um used to running state programs like your you are familiar with the state housing tax credit program that we've been administering since 2000 um and so we have the ability in relationship with the state to play this role and being a statewide lender um we know that we can meet the needs of the regions of the state equally um as opposed to divvying up money by county or city or something like that and then you may have um uneven availability of funds based on that kind of model so vhfa has been a mortgage lender since the mid 70s we have our own portfolio of mortgages that i don't talk to you all a lot about because uh the state is not a part of that program but um we have mortgages um that get serviced we sadly have do need to foreclose on people sometimes and work with servicers who service our loans and eventually um sometimes foreclose on loans and we're used to that entire process and so administering a program like this um for the state so that we'd be working with all the state servicers makes a lot of sense because we have a lot of those existing relationships so if you can imagine that your constituents have mortgages that may be serviced by any number of local banks credit unions maybe national servicers they would uh the homeowner and or servicer would would apply to vhfa for assistance to get right now it's written up as about three months of principal and interest payments um provided and we would work with the servicer of that loan to understand the situation of that borrower and what's needed um deem them eligible for the program looking at the cares act making sure that we're in compliance with the limitations of using crf money and um then uh look to make those awards and track all this information on a regular basis um I agree with Representative Kalaki that weekly sounds like a lot but we could do it um and uh more meaningfully come back to you all or whoever you deem to um to have these conversations about what has been the experience once the program um opened up and and what's the usage we'd need to stand up some um marketing and advertising and public awareness so that people knew that this program was available uh we would need to stand up a call center so that um people who you can put all the information on the internet you want but as we know from the unemployment experience sometimes people just want to get someone on the phone to answer their questions so um we would have we're looking to have that available uh we are talking with um the legal services of Vermont I'm not using I always call it Lawline I know it's not called that anymore but whatever Legal Aid's call center is to maybe think about um having them help with that program uh work with Legal Aid so that they get some money um to help represent the consumers who may um not be appropriately served by their loan servicer there may be especially I think out of state servicers who are not familiar with Vermont's program aren't paying attention they may tell their customer um that they're not eligible or you know I don't know anything about this program I'm not going to work with this VHFA because you don't have a VHFA loan and um Legal Aid would help represent those consumers to make sure that they advocate to get what they deserve um and then we would look to work with the state's home worship centers to provide the kind of financial counseling that they have long been doing um to support borrowers um whether they get this assistance or not but this is a way to work with borrowers maybe maybe there's not going to be enough money to go around maybe some people are going to get forbearance and not get financial assistance to help pay down that forbearance and having that link through the home worship centers that that gets us a foot in the door with that borrower so that we can then help them uh be successful long term so before I stop talking and open up to questions I just want to um clarify that uh even though I started by explaining VHFA's experience being a mortgage lender this is not a program for VHFA loans and that is going to be a point that we're going to have to um really clarify just like the state housing authority is going to have to really clarify that the rental assistance program is not just for voucher holders um this would not be a VHFA program in the sense that it's only for VHFA borrowers but this would be available to all eligible mortgage holders who have had a COVID crisis and David Hulk and then channel his voice here of saying you know those thresholds of COVID crisis between March and December all the money has to be spent by the end of December um and the other CRF limitations that are in the CARES Act um so we're happy to stand up and serve the state in this role we feel like this is why you have agencies like VHFA to turn to in times of crisis and I think we can really work with our home worship centers and Lee Glade and DHCD to put forward a quality program in a short amount of time. Okay representative Klackie. Thank you um Mari you know in the stripped down bill that we're currently looking at it doesn't designate your agency it doesn't designate the other agencies we're talking about either and it and when you talk about well this is in the plan but that's your plan and we would have to if we if it's as written the um the agency department of housing community development would have this money and then they would perhaps designate your agency to do this but they could determine a different plan than when you're talking about so are you comfortable that your agency is not named in this bill that as we move forward? You know I I'd like for agency to be named in this bill so um so that uh the program as I just testified to you happens um and at the same time I don't the only thing is it's really a question for the lawyers of which I'm always clear I'm not one I don't want to lose that flexibility and ability for the state to be able to shift resources as needed so yes I would like for it to say DHCD will work with VHFA to run this program what I don't want um to happen is for then um again what if there's not five million dollars of assistance which I think there will be but what if there's not I don't want there to be even a dollar that doesn't get spent where it's needed on housing because I think the needs are so great so that would be my only caveat but yes um naming our agency and at the same time I want to say I do have trust and faith Josh and I have been on the phone what at least three times a week Josh um talking continually about this the state is a wonderful partner to VHFA and so I do believe that whatever gets stood up will be okay uh Josh serves on my board and I serve on his community development advisory group and other things so um this is why Vermont I can already tell is going to be able to um spend these dollars in an efficient strong way that helps Vermonters because of the partnerships that we have between all the players okay now in in the proposal from a Vermont legal aid they put a time of September 1st that the agency gets to recalibrate if necessary to give us time does that seem appropriate to you as we try to set all this up and get it out in the field and then still have this flexibility that we need to reallocate instead of the last two weeks of the year yes um I like that I I didn't know about the December 20th date before I was listening to you and that seems awfully late um to me for what I'm talking about um and so September 1st I think we could all make an argument for why the first of every month could work so um that works for me I'm I'm working on the design of the program in June hoping to launch as early in July as you all let me and um so that would mean two months of work and so you'll get two months worth of answers um I don't want to I mean you know that it takes a while to stand up a new program just spreading the word takes a month and then getting all the paperwork from the servicers uh this is new so yes checking in by the first makes sense but if it's I have to spend all the money by the first September 1st then no the program will not be done by them but I know you know that so I'm not worried in that way that that's not what I that's not how I read that right right yeah okay thank you um and I want to be mindful of the time um we've been on zoom for a little while this morning this afternoon and um we're going to be back in a little bit so I just wanted to um thank everybody who's here right now so the homework for tonight for for the committee um what we did not get to is specifically looking at the information this should be posted now so um so the homework for tonight is basically um to take a look at what Josh had proposed for the language that he shared with us uh in terms of how how language can be shaped to virtually name uh an organization uh I would also like us to keep in mind um um the the financial breakdowns that we have proposed versus what we've heard today um and and to read the uh V the VLA proposal which is actually titled ACCD Representative Hango pointed that out it's it's titled the ACCD memo um about it it was provided by uh by Vermont Legal Aid so on on the rental portions of this so the decisions we have to make tomorrow morning in finishing this conversation is um are going to center around how prescriptive we want the language do we want to drop in language that talks you know as as as deep as what has been proposed or do we want to leave it at um simply that the uh department if that is if that's the direction we're going in in terms of giving the money to up front that the department then negotiates with those other organizations in order to provide those services in there in this way um anything that we're passing again just like S333 is session law so it is not permanent statute it's only dealing with this particular crisis so any program we stand up um and and I'm sorry I will take that back because if we do pass a bill that has the language for the rental registry that will affect statute that is the one element that would that would continue on but all of these programs to get money out to people and to help them through the crisis um our our session law uh I'm going to ask David to kind of I'll talk to David a little bit later this afternoon and I'm going to ask him to put together kind of a a big bill that has a lot of this stuff that we're talking about and then when we review it tomorrow we can say yes that's good no we don't need that yes we need that rather try to get him to try to add it in at the last minute I'm going to ask him to try to create a bigger bill um that addresses quite a bit of what we talked about today um if that's sufficient Matt you represent Byron yeah thank you um I actually had kind of an involved question around the maybe involved question for uh Commissioner Hanford about the VHIP program if we're tight on time I have no problem emailing him and trying to get answers yeah if you could do that and just CC me and or you know whatever you want to do um or unless it's specific to something that you can relate to us later um yeah sure sure yeah that would be that would be great but um I'm about to chew my arm off I haven't it's it's been a long morning um so I think that's it does everybody there's everybody have their homework um and we will um meet again tomorrow morning at 8 30 um is the schedule of time for us so um we'll see you over coffee and toast um what's that dog ate my homework yeah well I there's so much to go in that direction with homework