 Good morning, everyone. Thanks very much for being here for today's update. We saw parts of Vermont was significant rain and winds yesterday, but overall we made out better than expected. Although it appears Robin and Addison counties were affected the most with high winds, which led to more power outages compared to earlier this week. The utility crews are working hard that made a lot of progress since last night. Yesterday, the state unfortunately confirmed its first fatality related to flooding. I want to express my sincere condolences to the Deval family, Stevens friends and my hometown of Barry for this heartbreaking loss. While we continue to have an eye on the immediate response, we know communities and families are really need our help. So we'll be actively moving on our recovery work as a result. On an individual level over the next 48 hours. It's incredibly important to get flooded homes, businesses and public buildings as dry as possible to prevent other outcomes like mold. And we're working on resources to help with that. Dr Levine is here with us today to talk about health and safety when dealing with floodwaters and responding to the damage it causes. And when it comes to recovery, the federal government continues to be incredibly helpful. On Monday, I'll be I'll be welcoming the U. S. Secretary of Transportation, the Buddha judge to Vermont and will survey impacted infrastructure and talk about how we rebuild and recover. And as you know, last night, I submitted to President Biden a request for a federal major disaster declaration. And I'm happy to say about 20 minutes ago, the president approved that request. So I'm very grateful for the speed of FEMA and the White House. It will open up significant federal resources for communities, individuals, businesses and the state. We'll have more detailed information on that with a press release on the approval right after the press conference. In anticipation of these funds, we're working to develop a concrete list of resources to help impacted Vermonters and making sure it's as easy as possible for Vermonters to access those. In a few minutes, Secretary Tebbets will also discuss damage sustained to our farms and resources available to them. Lastly, I've been inspired by the thousands of Vermonters, businesses and organizations who have reached out wanting to help. As we transition to recovery, we know we'll need all the help we can get. You can sign up to volunteer at vermont.gov slash volunteer or with local community organizations. There's a ton of work to do. An impact of Vermonters will need all the help we can provide. I know Vermonters will continue to step up and meet the moment. I'll now turn it over to Commissioner Morrison to give a situational update and report on the recovery work that will soon begin. Thank you, Governor. Good morning. Good morning, my fellow Vermonters. We are relieved that last night's storms did not bring the full fury that we anticipated. There are areas that were hit quite hard, but we did not receive any calls for evacuation or rescue. Today, we will keep teams staged throughout the state ready to respond to emergencies. You will also see air assets out today looking for vehicles in waterways or other places that they don't belong. To date, we have performed 202 rescue missions. We've assisted with approximately 100 evacuations and have conducted dozens of vehicle checks to ensure that no one is trapped inside. As of this morning, as the governor mentioned, there is just the one known fatality associated with this event. Last night, our power outages spiked to around 14,000 but are down to approximately 3,500 and currently the highest number of those outages is in Rutland County. It looks like we will have a day or two of decent weather in most parts of the state. It's going to be easy to think that we're out of the woods, yet several of our communities are still reeling from last night's events. And candidly, the high winds, the rainfall, thunderstorms, complicated and already devastating situation locally in many communities. So please remember our neighbors right now, particularly along the 22 a corridor towns like Bridgeport, Shoram, Cornwall and Middlebury were hit hard last night. And let's remember that we're all in this together. We're beginning the work of understanding the federal disaster declaration just signed by President Biden this morning. As the governor mentioned, this will open up a variety of streams of funding to assist Vermont individuals, businesses and municipalities as well as the state. And we're going to have more details on that very soon. It is important to note that we did not wait for this declaration to summon federal disaster assistance. There have been numerous FEMA resources on the ground here in Vermont since very early this week. Specifically, there are two incident management assistance teams, one here in Berlin and one temporarily staged in South Burlington. There are two disaster survivor assistance teams, each with 35 people at a staging area awaiting deployment. One urban search and rescue incident support team at the Vermont National Guard Armory in White River Junction, plus two USAR type three task forces that have been hard at work with our state and local teams for days. There are also two disaster emergency communication teams deployed to the EOC in Berlin and one in White River Junction. As of eight o'clock this morning, there are 198 FEMA personnel deployed to Vermont. 132 personnel are already on the ground and 66 more are en route. Now more than ever, it is important that municipalities clearly communicate with state officials. We cannot assist you at the local level if you do not communicate your needs to the Emergency Operations Center. Whatever it is, food, water, transportation, infrastructure or supplies, please make your needs known so we can start problem solving with you. Because there are two to three dozen communities that we have not heard from despite our outreach, today we are sending National Guard troops to those communities to establish contact and ensure that every town and city in Vermont knows how to reach the state Emergency Operations Center. And I'd also like to remind homeowners and business owners to report your damages to not to 211. 211 is the place to call so we can accurately track the magnitude of damages both to individual homes and property and businesses. I'll finish up with just a quick word about the status of state run shelters. As of eight o'clock this morning, there were 35 people seeking shelter in Barry, four in Rutland, 23 in Johnson, six in Ludlow and zero in Hartford. With that, I will turn things over to Dr. Levine. Thanks, Mr. Morrison. Good morning. I'd like to start today by thanking everyone in this response for working so quickly and so hard to keep for monitors safe and to all of our monitors, your willingness to help and take care of one another continues to inspire me and never ceases to inspire me during difficult times. We've had our share of consecutive once in a century events and you give new meaning to the word resilience. As the governor noted, the Department of Health did report our first and only to date death as sure tragedy and we join the governor and extending our condolences to family and community. Now I know that experiencing property loss of your own or your or of your neighbor or your community or just the stress and uncertainty surrounding crises like these can take a toll on our mental health. Please recognize that's completely okay. And reach out for help if you or someone you know is struggling. In addition to all of our local resources, there is now a national disaster stress hotline that you can call or text for support 1-800-985-5990. Now, unfortunately, we know that climate change will continue to make severe weather a threat to our world. So it's important to understand how it impacts our health and what we can do in the short and long term to mitigate these impacts. As we all work toward recovering from this disaster, returning to homes and reopening businesses. It's my task today to share some guidance for staying as safe and healthy as possible. Let's start with drinking water. If you're not if you're on a municipal water system, follow their guidance on boil water or do not drink orders. But if you have a private well or sprayed and are in a flooded area, you should assume your water is contaminated. Don't drink or use your water for cooking, baby formula, washing food or brushing teeth until you can have it tested. The health department is offering free test kits for anyone impacted by the flooding. These kits check for bacteria, nitrates, other chemicals or contaminants. Please call our public health laboratory at 802-338-4724 or check our website, which also has this number for more information that can be tailored to your particular situation. Boiling your water for one minute kills bacteria and other organisms. But don't use or boil water that's untested if it's cloudy, full of sediments or smells like fuel or chemicals. Next talked about water in the swimming and water safety capacity. Even once the skies have cleared, people and pets should stay out of any body of water after heavy rain or flooding event. This has always been true even in non-disaster circumstances. High water and strong undercurrents can linger and carry debris several days after a storm, making swimming or boating in these areas dangerous for anyone. Bodies of water may also be contaminated by microorganisms, fuel and wastewater runoff. Swimming in contaminated areas can result in rashes, sore throats, diarrhea or more serious problems from bacterial infection. So it's best to find another summer activity or place to cool off until waters are calm and cool again, especially in light of the fact that we have repeated rain events throughout this time period. Next returning to your home. Wait until local officials say it's safe and standing water has gone down. Watch for any downed power lines, gas leaks or damaged fuel tanks. If you smell natural gas, which smells like rotten eggs or hear hissing, leave immediately and call your local utility. If electrical circuits and electrical equipment have gotten wet or are in or near water, turn off the power. If accessing the main power switch requires entering standing water, you should consult with an electrician and never use a generator inside your home, basement or garage or less than 20 feet from any window, door or vent. And if you're entering such an area and you have cuts or sustained any injuries with nails or the like, please remember to check your tetanus status and obtain a tetanus shot if that is due. Finally, cleaning your home, which I've seen a lot of efforts being conducted as we speak. First of all, we're not recommending anybody test for mold. If your home has been flooded and closed up for several days, you should assume your home has mold. So obviously you'll need to dry it out, opening doors and windows. You can use fans and dehumidifiers when electricity is safe. Children with breathing problems and people with weakened immune systems should not help clean up after a flood. Those who are helping should wear protective clothing. Time to get out again the N95 masks and gloves. You can clean moldy items and surfaces that do not absorb water using soap and water. But other materials like fabrics and cushions will probably need to be thrown away. You can find more information by visiting our website at healthvermont.gov slash flood. Now, knowing that Secretary Tebbitts is up next, I'll leave the brunt of food safety for him, but I will leave you with this strong recommendation. Don't eat or drink anything that has touched floodwater. Throw away contaminated food along with any foods that have not been refrigerated properly. When in doubt, throw it out. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Levine. And good morning for monitors. So here we are. We know the story. We've seen the images. We've witnessed the heartbreaking pictures of water tearing through our cities and our towns and villages, uprooting our roads and our bridges, flooding our farms and destroying our crops. This tragic event follows closely on the heels of a hard freeze many of our farmers experienced in May. It's too early to fully describe or even estimate the damages, but it's clear the losses will be catastrophic and our farmers, small businesses and agriculture producers will need help. We expect the excessive flooding and silt will destroy a large share of our produce and livestock feed. In our hilly state, some of our most fertile farmland lies in the river valleys and countless fields of corn, hay, vegetables, fruit and pasture were swamped and buried. Vermont's growing season is short and a historic flood in the heart of our limited window to grow food and crops is particularly devastating. Many crops cannot be replanted and losses will not be effectively recovered or mitigated prior to our early fall harvest. Farming is challenging and rewarding, but heavy losses of agriculture products or feed will put many at risk. There is a ripple effect. The disruption to our farms may disrupt our regional food system and our food security. The widespread flooding we suffered throughout Vermont this week is among the worst of the last century and it arrived in the heart of our growing season. So what's next? Farmers are already cleaning up, calculating their losses and preparing for the fall and the winter. The work will not stop. We want our farmers, producers and nurseries to document their losses. There will be a time we will need that information to present to our federal partners, including FEMA and the United States Department of Agriculture. Farmers should contact their insurance agent. We encourage our farmers to visit our webpage for any of our or any of our social media channels. We have put together a packet of resources that may help farmers navigate the many issues that they're facing. Again, that information can be found on the agency of agriculture's homepage. What can the public do? This is the time to support farmers. Maybe it's checking on your neighbors to see if they need a hand with a chore or an errand. Maybe it's attending a farmer's market or buying meat, cheese or produce from a farm stand. Maybe it's hopping on the computer and buying a product so it's delivered in the mail. Or maybe you can donate to a fund that's focused on farmers. There are many farmers are rugged, hardworking, creative, darn tough governor, curious and kind. They love their land, but they are hurting like the thousands of remoders who have lost their homes or businesses. Farmers feed us and they will continue to feed us. Let's do our part to support them as we navigate this historic event with them. One of our strong partners has been the Agency of Transportation who's helped restore many of our roots to support our farmers. I'm going to turn it over to Secretary Flynn for an update. Thank you, Secretary Tevitz. AOT has had its first response related injury while driving a 10-wheel dump truck yesterday. A sinkhole opened up and the truck stopped dead in its tracks. I'm pleased to report that after the driver was evaluated at a local hospital, they returned to work anxious to get back to the job at hand. More updates. As a result of the damage on Interstate 89 that occurred Monday requiring us to close the interstate northbound, there you will see some paving out there today and there will be a temporary restriction to one lane northbound while the damaged pavement is repaired. The VTR, which is the Western Rail Corridor, should open later today, allowing the Amtrak Ethan Allen into Burlington tonight with southbound passenger service restoring tomorrow morning. Currently across the state, AOT is working with 47 private contractors on our state road projects. That's an increase of 15 private contractors since we spoke yesterday. There remain 19 state roads fully closed. Nine roads are partially closed, and I would like to take a moment to share with you an enormous amount of effort over the last 48 hours of the following list of roads that have been reopened across the state of Vermont. Route two in Marshfield between Plainfield Village and Naz Myth Brook Road. It is a gravel surface, so motorists must be prudent with their speed. Route two in Marshfield just east of the Village Center. It too is gravel but passable. Route two in Duxbury between Vermont 100 and Vermont 100B. Route two in Waterbury near Fars Field. Route two in Middlesex near Lower Barnett Hill Road. Vermont 14 in Callis at Perkin Brook Road is open but gravel. US 302 in Berry Town from old Route 302 to the Roundabout. US 302 in East Berry Road between Waterman Street and Messier Drive in the vicinity of the VFW. The Waterbury Park and Ride off Lincoln Street has reopened. Vermont 64 in Williamstown between Vermont 14 and I-89 has reopened. Vermont 12 in Brookfield near Bakers Pond no longer is being monitored and is open. Vermont 12 in Berlin near Rowell Hill Road also is no longer being monitored and is reopened. Vermont 12 in Hardwick at Bridge 66 is open to one lane. Vermont 12 in Roxbury, Warren Mountain Road to Granville Town Line has been reopened. And then Vermont 103 in Chester, Vermont 100 in Wordsborough to Jamaica, Vermont 107 Stock Bridge to Bethel, Vermont 100 in London Dairy, Vermont 100 in Weston, Vermont 10 in Chester, Vermont 5 in Westminster, Vermont 66 Route 66 in Randolph, Vermont 4 in Woodstock, Vermont 110 in Tunbridge, Vermont 106 in Reading, Vermont 14 in Randolph, Gassets excuse me, Vermont 14 in Randolph, Vermont 103 Gassets to Proctorville. There is alternating one way traffic, but it is open. Ludlow South to Weston on Vermont 100 is open to emergency vehicles and limited local traffic. Plymouth, Vermont 100 a has multiple slow zones but open. Vermont 15 in Cambridge at the wrong way bridge is now reopened. The intersection of Vermont 108 at Vermont 15, Jeff reopened. Intersection of Vermont 108 and 109 has reopened. Vermont two at the Richmond exit 11 is reopened. Vermont five Coventry to North Newport. Vermont five Barton to Orleans. Vermont five Depot Street in St. John'sbury. Vermont 105 near Hillekers Store. Vermont 58 Orleans to Brownington. Vermont 16 Barton to Hardwick. Vermont 122 in Lindenville. Vermont 15 and Hardwick is open with traffic light control. And Vermont 232 is open to traffic and emergency one lane. Now I remind you this is all occurred in the last 48 hours. Much of it has been because Mother Nature has cooperated with receding water. But each and every one of these sites that I've just read have required that we visit them to assure that they're safe to open to the public. Our crews have been extremely busy as has everybody. I would like to say also reinforcing what Commissioner Morrison mentioned about communities contacting the SCOC working with the SCOC and emergency management. AOT has been able to contact 228 towns. There are still 24 we have not been able to contact. Currently AOT is assisting 15 towns. There was one new closure last night as a result of the rain. Vermont 346 and panel. Actually that's a result of trees and utilities across the road. Vermont 155 and Mount Holly is a result of the rainstorm last night. A deep culvert washout has failed. There has also been a large bank slide and erosion on Vermont 100 in Washington. Currently our geotech team is out there today planning on what the fix for that will be. 40 bridges were inspected yesterday across the state local and state owned bridges. Today 121 bridges have been inspected. Six rail bridges were inspected yesterday. Four of them were on the line through Barry and Montpelier referred to as the little wacker. There still are some rail bridges that are difficult to get to and inspections still need to be conducted. Some updates on some roads. Bridge 116 and bridge water on Vermont 100 in the area the governor and I visited on Saturday, which was a result of the Friday storm. We'll have a temporary bridge installed tonight, but it will not be open to the public until we finish the work of the approaches to the bridge. But the big effort was to get the bridge brought in from Brattleboro and get it put in place. One town highway bridge structure in Jamaica on route 30 has been closed due to being compromised. We are currently in conversations with the town of Jamaica on plans for the way forward regarding that structure. Rail 306 miles of rail remain closed. 103 miles of rail have reopened in the last 24 hours. I would like to just say to most reminders don't see the work that's going on on railroads because they're often off in the middle of nowhere. But the effort that's been put into re establishing the rail lines amongst our partner our partners with Vermont rail systems and contractors working on those lines, among other things are enabling Amtrak to get back into Burlington tonight. The Green Mountain Railroad in East Wallingford does have a large slope failure and frankly it's getting worse. There's a lot of work left to do on that line between Rutland and Bellas Falls. The Connecticut River line which runs the eastern side of the state up to Newport is now fully open. And as I mentioned the little wacker between Waterbury I'm excuse me Barry and Montpelier a moment ago there is some very severe damage on that line and planning continues for the way forward there. The 10 state owned airports are operational. There are no impacts and the two AOT owned dams have no issues at this time. Thank you. Thank you all. We'll turn it over up to questions. We'll be working on that. I think that was for their maybe their quarterly filings but I'm not sure that the quarterlies were in June I believe so this is probably in September so we have a little bit of time to figure that out but we'll we'll obviously react accordingly and do everything we can to reduce the burden on impacted Vermonters. You know along those lines I had some store owners and Montpelier asked me yesterday if the state was considering delaying their collection of sales tax by the end of the month so that was money they could use to help recovery. Is that something? Yeah it's all in the mix I mean we we don't know what we're going to do but but we are certainly aware of the impacts on businesses and we want to do anything we can to alleviate that so that's that's part of one of our discussions. Unemployment violence number one I mean at what point do people qualify for unemployment like if they can't get to work if their car is you know unmusical and have you seen any uptick in filing? I'm not aware of the uptick at this point in time but it's anticipated there are a number of people who can't get to work who where their businesses are closed so we fully anticipate and we're preparing for that the arrival of many who will be filing for claims so we're working on that as we speak. Is there anything the state can do to prevent employers from firing people if they can't get to work? I believe there is I I I would have a hard time believing that anyone would do that especially with you know the workforce challenges we face we we need every single employee we have I can't I can't imagine any employer doing that but but obviously we will react accordingly. For those employees who are working I've been working with downtown businesses across the state who now is a postage recovery cleanup effort is there being a recourse for the next few weeks unemployment or is there a female money that covers salaries? How does that work? Yeah I'm not aware of that thankfully we have a couple of FEMA representatives here I don't know if you are prepared to answer anything like that but please come up and identify yourself. Good morning I'm Sam Harvey I work with FEMA on the individual assistance side. Yes there is the approval for disaster unemployment assistance which is grant from FEMA to the state to help with anybody who because of the disaster lost wages or lost employment they would apply through the Vermont Department of Labor and go through that process. So that's a separate fund that's set up for them? Correct. So when will individuals be able to apply for individual assistance? What will that look like and how much can people see financially? Sure so for those that were impacted that had uninsured disaster losses they can apply for FEMA assistance as early as today now that the declaration has been approved. We'll continue to roll out those programs but they can call 1-800-621-FEMA 1-800-621-3362 go to disasterassistance.gov or interact with one of our disaster survivor assistance operators in the field to apply. That will start the process going each individual will have a different time frame and path forward based on their situation and what they're able to provide and each individual based again on their scenario will have availability to the different funds for home repair for temporary housing and for a loss to person property. Is there a deadline to apply for a certain window? Yes right now there's going to be a 30-day deadline. That clock will start taking today since the declaration just came down. The administrator first of all was here earlier in the week she said to Ramon is don't wait to fix things get them down now take pictures worry about FEMA reimbursement later is that still the operating message? Yes that is still accurate I would not encourage anybody to delay any repairs necessary repairs. When our FEMA inspectors go out to look at the property they are trained to identify what has been repaired anything that may have been impacted by the storm. I know that FEMA is able to provide I think it's a $700 emergency check so can you explain to us a little bit more about how you get that help with the data? Sure I believe what you're referring to is critical needs assistance that's part of the assistance that would potentially be available as a survivor applies so the same process applies and then based on the information that they provide their unique situation they could potentially be eligible for that assistance. It's intended to be used for any critical needs so that could be for for lost to food lost to they had to pay for a hotel room out of pocket you know any of those things that are required in the interim just to get them through. Will the people need to provide their receipts to prove what they use it for and try to check on that? It's always advisable to save receipts and to have those available depending on exactly what they're reported as losses there may be requests for verification of it but it'll depend on each survivor's situation. And for the $700 check and then the other assistance that people can be qualified for is that taxable? It is not it is a grant. Calvin asked about the the dollar amounts that people can get. My understanding is about $41,000 for a damage to a home and 41,000 other needs that they might have in my track. That's correct there are three distinct categories housing repair for homeowners that have to make repair to dry wall to carpet and such. Rental assistance for those that have to be displaced from their home and personal property for their clothing and home furnishings each one of those has a cap of 41,000 dollars although I would encourage that it's it's dependent upon unique situation so I would not look at that as a target for what any individual could necessarily expect. We've got some folks on the phone so I'm going to go there and then we'll come back to the room we'll start with Bob Odette from our reformer and you Bob let's try Keith Harrell. Has anyone checked on or is monitoring the health welfare of our unhoused operation? They are being treated just like everyone else at this point Keith. If they are unhoused and need assistance they should also call 211 and we're there for them as well. Derek seven days. Yes thank you. Has the state been able to assess the scope of damage to mobile home parts around the state and how many of them damage will be to the state or federal level operations at the parks that are affected? Yeah we are aware of some mobile home parks and we are looking into those at this point in time and in fact there was one in we visited two days ago in Berry that was heavily impacted again from this storm. Is there anybody here might be able to speak to that? Yeah Commissioner Morrison had to leave we'll get back to you on that and give you a report on that tomorrow but I have been concerned about our mobile home parks because I was very I was involved I guess during Irene with many of the mobile home parks throughout the state in fact a lot of the deconstruction recycling and so forth was done by a team I put together so we are we are very aware of that situation. Two dozen or so towns that were mentioned that's not not having had contact with state officials yet are those towns or any of those towns in areas of the state that were known to be affected by the floods and when when you say the National Guard will be deployed to those places what's more about the flight? Yeah we'll have a liaison from the National Guard go into the communities just to make sure that we're we're talking to them face-to-face without an email without a phone call and so forth we don't we don't want to wait for that obviously something's being missed so we want to be sure that we have this contact so we know what the needs are of the communities because if we if they don't contact us we don't always know and so that's what we're trying to to alleviate. You know that okay Secretary Flynn. From the AOT perspective the majority of those towns that I mentioned were are in northwestern Vermont where there was much less impact from this event than the rest of the state so we would call that our district five and our district eight garages in the towns in that area probably just because they don't have a lot to tell us but we're not relying on that we're going to continue to try to make sure we have contact. Joseph Gresser, Rottenborough Chronicle. Up here in Orleans County there are many people who are concerned about the safety of the casserole landfill all the time. Was there any special attention given to things like potential run-off or other problems that might have resulted strictly from the heavy rainfall? First of all Joe I know you're from Barton so you know there's an inspection process at the landfills on a daily basis so anything any slides any any deviation from normal operating procedures are identified and repaired every single day so I would imagine that's still the case. Deputy Secretary Gendron just said that that is the case so we are not aware of anything but but they're they're inspected every single day. Thank you I have one other question. I was visiting an organization that had a lithium battery powered snowblower which they took out of a flooded basement and came back the next day to find in ashes is this something that they should be aware of? At this point in time I don't know as we can answer that and we'll certainly look into it and get back to you and maybe identify that as an issue but I'm not prepared to answer it right here from the podium. They give us an opportunity to look into it and then we'll we'll assess that. Thank you. Chad news 10 and if you could just speak up on the phone. The wind's coming today. Are there any particular areas? Question about that. Do you know how much yield has been dumped? I got it from the website that that is concerned. Any sense of how much has been done about it? Just a little background as many of you know you know countless have to be milled twice a day and then it's gone into a holding tank for storage and pick up could be depending on the size of the farm could be every day or could be every other day so there's not a lot of capacity to keep the mill cool on the farm it has to be transported to the creamery to be processed into you know cheese or butter yogurt etc so when we had a number of roads that washed out and collapsed that put a real strain on our transportation system and picking up the milk so it's not as bad as we thought it was going to be there's still pockets of it of course a gallon of milk that you have to throw away is a sad day for a farmer that's the that's the revenue stream for a farm and it's also a loss because that's turned into a valuable product for to feed us so there has been some great work done by transportation and identifying some areas that priority particularly route two there was a lot of the creamery and Cabot getting that milk there was very very important route two is open again so that milk is making its way to the creamery there we still have some pockets in the hills some of these back roads we have some incredible stories from farmers themselves fixing roads a town of Cabot a farmer up there got his tractor together and these are the stories you're going to see all across the state every month people just doing the work that needs to be done he got his track together he's been repairing roads along with the town crew in Cabot and that meant that his milk could be picked up and taken to the creamery but still some pockets out there but it's better than we thought it was going to be you mentioned the cost uh what are you looking at I know it's early but with a long-term impact on farm viability and the loss of these these two major events well it's uh it's too early to tell but I know there's a lot of discussions going on you know some of these farmers went through this during Irene like a lot of our monitors went through this now they've gone through it again 12 years I think you know so there's a lot there's going to be a lot of discussions of what to do we're prepared at the agency to work with particularly I think one area that we got to work on is the produce section I think the produce farmers this came at the worst time for them much of their crop was coming in at this time that you know they we have a very short growing season there may be not enough time to replant maybe some cases that can they can replant and get another crop so there's a lot of discussions going on and a lot of farmers probably pretty discouraged right now but now we've got to evaluate the losses try to get them as much support as we can and have discussions with them to prepare for the late summer and fall and then to winter I have not received any that does not mean there have not been some but I think you know farmers are pretty careful about taking care of their animals and getting them to where they need to go now there may have been but I have not received any you know you know big reports of losses for livestock if um let's say a dairy farmer for instance if their fields are flooded and their cows can't graze or they can't make hay I mean what are they doing a couple of things we're encouraging farmers to do there's going to be some testing done on the soil so we're working closely with UVAM extension and Dr. Heather Darby is an expert and she's been visiting farmers looking at you know the what to do with the corn crop there's a little debate whether the corn can be saved or not unlike Irene it was too late in the season and may have lost there may be a chance that some corn can be salvaged and on the hay side I think we're going to have a hay issue I think we're going to have an issue with a lot of hay that's been destroyed that maybe cannot be salvaged so we're going to be testing both you know the the crops to see if they're okay and we're also going to be testing the soil between our lab and UVAM extension that's that's the plan we have not we have heard from USDA that if we're going to get direct payments to those that were impacted by the freeze Congress is going to have to allocate some money for that we believe the loss for our growers was about 10 million dollars during the May freeze so we have heard from USDA they do have existing programs that most of those are are loans and not direct payments but if we're going to get any direct payments to those that suffered loss during the May freeze Congress is going to have to appropriate a special money for them or the budget negotiations it could there's a number of vehicles there's some discussion in Washington there are a lot of a lot of disasters that have happened over the United States over the last year and sometimes they put together a special appropriation just for natural disasters related to agriculture we think that may be a vehicle but we're in close contact with our delegation the other thing is the region has been impacted so we've had you know Connecticut was reaching out last night Massachusetts was involved in this flood as well so it's just not a Vermont issue New York was impacted so that as a region we've had some serious farm issues both on the frost and on the flood which may benefit us as we seek federal aid we're we're looking into that we're under discussion maybe the overall female one that the president has given us may be enough but we're prepared to file one in case we need an additional one uh and get that to the governor for his signature to present it to the United States Department of Agriculture this is a super brief question but you mentioned that this was a regional event and a lot of crops have been damaged as the climate warms and severe weather events continue to happen are you concerned about long-term food security i think we're always concerned about that you know that sometimes we forget about when farmers sometimes they're criticized for whatever they some practice or what they do but in the end they're feeding us and you know i think brahman is in a good spot without these natural disasters we can produce a lot of great food for the region we can produce more but it's challenging you know the price point to the farmers always a challenge we've got a national system we probably should have a regional system but a lot of people are working on that you know vermont can produce a lot of great food for boston and new york and the northeast they just need to have that system that system supported but it's a very complicated everything from transportation to getting it to market and getting a return to the farmer that's that's fair if the feds are able to provide relief i'm wondering is there a difference in how non-food producers can receive relief i'm thinking that there is in particular a flower farmer that i've seen whose entire stock has been demolished yeah those that we we have concern for our nurseries our flower farmers we also should not forget about our loggers as well it's been a very very uh you know i'm working with forest parks and recreation as well because our loggers it's been so wet they have not been able to get into the woods to cut trees but now they've not been able to get that those logs out of the out of the woods and get them to the mills to be processed as well so that's a that's a pocket that as we discuss this overall recovery we're always we're always partnering with our logging industry as well because they're they're a important part of our landscape and our rural economy good time for me one or two more i just had a question about housing uh governor as you know there's a pretty significant time of our housing that's temporarily at least knocked off line we've got people in shelters what do you see is the the medium to long-term vision about how this storm will affect what's already really time for housing yeah obviously we knew that there was a housing crisis we've known that for a number of years a number of people leaders legislative leaders have have characterized that as as a crisis and this just further burdens that and and so we're it's not lost on us we're going to be doing all we can during this situation to again further the replacement of housing and to build upon that so we'll continue to work on that and have you been in contact with lawmaker pro tem speaker about whether housing or anything else that there's questions that this storm might have arose that we might need to tackle in a legislative session or a section yeah i mean considering it's been four days we are taking care of the response right now but those recovery our teams in in accd are already working on that and we'll be in conversations with with the legislature to see if there's anything that we should do but but again we know this was an issue before the legislative session for the last five five years it's been an issue and and this further impacts that and so we will continue to do all we can to work on that and to alleviate that could you give us a quick update on what you expect now it's going to happen on sunday night and early monday morning and how the state is preparing for that possible yeah again we're asking vermoners to be vigilant to be prepared we don't know the extent of some of these storms is one on on sunday and another one on tuesday and then it appears that we're just going back into our pattern of almost every other day of of rain but we haven't heard about the intensity or the severity of these storms at this point in time but to be honest we had didn't know three days ago about this one that we experienced last night so again we will continue to to monitor we'll continue to listen to the experts and we'll continue to to communicate with all of you so that you can communicate with your listening listeners so that we could be prepared if and when there's another event but again at this point we're in pretty good shape the streams and rivers are receiving that's good news the reservoirs and dams we're seeing that level received so we have some storage capacity and that's the important part so what we experienced again with this weather event was three days of intense rain if we can get a few breaks here we'll be able to have that storage capacity we may have the flies flooding but we'll have the storage capacity so that we can so that wouldn't impact our downtowns quite as much as it did this time so the past couple days there's kind of been a keen watch on dams so now that we're in the level we'll be kind of going down is there any type of assessment or inspection process going forward in the next couple of weeks all of them we continue to monitor them and we'll continue to to see if there's any damage we were concerned about the Kweezy situation it appears we're okay there for at least now but we continue to monitor each and every one of them could we get Dr. Levine back up I thank you for being so generous with your time I really appreciate it I'm wondering if the department is at all gracing for an uptick in airborne illnesses specifically COVID with people in shelters in tight proximities fortunately you know respiratory infections are less common in the summer so most of the viruses are not major players and people are not congregated indoors most of the time COVID levels have not really been altered at the present time that's obviously very early and the experience but we're not seeing the kind of summertime surges we've seen in other summers during the pandemic which is a great thing but obviously we continue to do surveillance on all of these conditions COVID specifically people should also understand you know the health care system is up and running and it's had its challenges as a result of the floods but the reality is almost 100% of both inpatient and outpatient facilities are open our substance use disorder treatment system is open things are actually available for any vermonial need have there been any increase in people coming into hospitals or doctor's offices for what are intake illnesses like I guess a food poisoning if I can keep the back water yeah so I have not heard that as of yet obviously this is still very early in the experience we will know if that occurs but I've not heard that yet what about illnesses from coming into contact with flood water like hepatitis or hepatitis yeah those are the kinds of things I was cautioning people about in my comments again I think that's a little early in the response yet too to understand if that's been an issue for people but wearing all of the protective equipment we talked about and taking great care in those environments is really the key so staffing issues some of the hospitals were concerned about staffing issues mostly because of transportation issues not illness issues I've not heard that any have gone to a critical level and they're all been they're all making do with the staff that they have at this time not that I've been informed all right thank you all very much province here