 Thank you. Welcome everybody. This is the General Housing and Military Affairs. It is Tuesday afternoon and this is live feed of our committee meeting. Today we're going to be discussing H880, which is a bill that was, had passed out of our committee back before the break. In fact, it was on the floor on Friday the 13th. It was on the calendar for Friday the 13th in March. And due to those circumstances, we were not able to get to it. And so we have Ellen Zajowski here to talk about just to remind us what the bill does. And then there's an amendment to the bill that is offered in my name. It could be a committee bill or a committee amendment that basically takes, makes this a mandate that's not entirely unfunded. And Ellen can explain that in her explanation. So Ellen, please let us remind us about H880, please. Sure. So, H880 had two parts primarily. First, it requires the Commissioner of Forest Parks and Recreation to add Abenaki place names to signs in state parks. If there is a name for that site provided by the Native, the Commission on Native American Affairs. Would you like me to put the bill on the screen or? Yes, please. Yep. All right, so this is, that's not the right one. It's here. Okay, so here, that's not it either. Here it is. Okay, so this is what you passed out of your committee back the first week of March. So first, we're amending the, we're in the chapter related to the Department of Forest Parks and Rec. So we're adding this new section. And it directs the Commissioner to consult with the Commission on Native American Affairs to determine if there is an Abenaki name for a site. And if so, the name shall be displayed along with the English name on signs. Subdivision B requires that all existing signs in state parks that have, that require adding the Abenaki name be updated by July 1 2025. So you may recall there was some discussion that the Commissioner did say that they have a pretty regular schedule for updating their signs normally anyways they replace them. And update them within the state parks. But this adding this date of July 1 2025 required that all of the signs would be updated by that date. And then subdivision C required that the Commissioner adopt rules to establish a procedure for selecting a spelling of the place name. If there are multiple spellings provided by the Commission on Native American Affairs. That was, you received testimony on that that some of the dialects have different spelling and so the Commissioner has to adopt rules about what to do in that situation. The second part of the bill directs the, the Commission on Native Native American Affairs to provide a list of places and landmarks that have Abenaki names. So that the Commissioner can then add those names to the signs. And so it directs them to have that list prepared by January 15 2021 so about six months, seven months from now. And also include if there are any sites outside of state parks that may have Abenaki names that can in the future also have their signs changed. So, so that is the bill. And the amendment. Does the amendment clearly delete the reference to the 2025 date. Yes, the amendment gets rid of subdivision be which is lines 15 and 16. So it just simply has the section that requires the Commission to the Commissioner to update the signs and adopt rules for selecting a name if there are multiple spellings. Okay, so the so that what you what you started with is what we passed. Yeah, and so I just clicked over to, yeah. Yep, so I just clicked over so it doesn't provide for a specific date by which the signs need to be changed, which implies that they just get changed in the normal course of sign replacement, which there's no necessarily any schedule but again we took me back then that said that they are usually replaced every 10 years or so there's no they have a lifespan signs that usually have a lifespan between up to 10 years, basically representative Hango. This is probably a question for Ron but I clicked on the link to the amendment on our webpage and it brings me to a page not found. So I'm not seeing the amendment posted. So, I initially sent the wrong amendment. And so Ron did have to update it so it may be the page needs to be refreshed. Oh, I've got it now. Yep, it's so it's on there now. Thank you. And this, the fact that there's a date for the science now we also took testimony that showed that there are lists that have been started and that have been I believe have been shared of place names. Tom you're on mute mute. We can't hear you. I could hear him. I can. I'm not muted according to my world here. Okay, so Chip. I don't know. Did you lose it? Chip, can you hear me? Oh, and can you take this screen down now? I can't hear anyone. Okay, thank you. All right, Chip, can you hear now? You can hear anything chip. Hold on a second. I think the rest of us can hear Tom, but Chip, you may need to push a button to unmute your computer. I'm going to type that in the chat. Maybe. Yeah. Can you read? Hang on. I just typed that in the chat, but I don't know if. I text him, but I don't think the text go through up to standard. What about now? Chip, you may have to sign back. I wonder if you might be able to send Chip an email and a text saying that it's on his end. He does not text. I can send him an email, which he might see. I can also call him. Right. Maybe that's a good call. All right. So I will have to dig up his phone numbers or give me just a moment. Maybe he should sign back in. Right. So we'll frustrate him by talking and looking like we're talking and he'll wonder what's going on. And we'll see how that plays out. I was going to ask a question. Mariana, good to see you. Sorry. We didn't, you came in. The, the thing I was going to ask was kind of based on the conversation that we heard this morning about the older Vermonters caucus about pushing dates out. This requires the date that names be that names be submitted to the, to the department by the middle of January. And I'm just curious to know or what we think about whether we should push those dates out. We're kind of in a place where I know the finding those dates or finding those names may not be a problem. I think there's a list that's already been started. But, but that being said, I mean, so it could be done by January 15 is that, and you know, I'm just throwing it out there almost as a technical change. Why we have an amendment out here. Is that something we should consider or are we satisfied with the January 15 date? Thank you, chair. You know, I'm not sure we're going to be back in full order in the fall. So I think that the January thing seems a little tight to me with getting the names and we also had that the preliminary list was was provided to the committee but then different tribes were saying that they were different ways to pronounce or to even write out some of these words and what the words were. So I think if we could be a little more flexible there as well to have it done maybe by June, January. Ron, was that the question you were asking? Yeah, hold on a second. We got a, I'm going to mute Ron and I'm going to mute Chip. Okay. Okay. Yes, that's what I was asking. I mean, again, I think I'm on the phone, I think, Ron. I think that the commission, you know, has the names ready to go but you're right. I mean, there's there is stuff in this law that in the statute or this bill that says they have to figure out whether the dialect based spelling. Right. So that's the question that, again, should we delay the, you know, and that's, that's where we are. Should we delay the actual reporting of these place names that may overlap with the English spelling. Representative Hango. Yeah, I'm going to concur with Representative Kalaki. I think everybody needs a little more time for everything right now. So I would be in favor of pushing it out a little bit. Does anyone have a proposed timeframe where we're talking about, you know, March, April, May, June of 20. I mean, I'm assuming that I'm assuming that if there are any signs that have to be dealt with next year. You know, construction on those signs would be in the spring anyway, but I also think that the commissioner was always very open about about this process too. And that's a deadline. I mean, they may have a list of names that they that they may be able to submit sooner than that. But this is the deadline we're talking about. So I'm open to a suggestion on any on any date that people think is reasonable. Well, by crossover of next session. Make sense. So, March 15. Yeah. I'm just asking a date. We're kind of just picking a date certain certain for something that, but it is this this March 15 that that adds two months to the process is that sufficient for people. Does three months seem more sufficient. Yes, yes. Yes to the March 15. Yes, March 15 for me, I think that the combination of that there, there are pre existing list that that can get picked up from and that they're even though there are some particular dielectric things that need to get worked out that that's not across the board for every place. And so I think that that March 15 is a good new day. Okay, so that what everybody was thumbing up for basically. So Ellen, if you could. In the amendment have that date changed. So, Mary, I just want to step back a little bit. You came in just a wee bit after we started. You're still the reporter of this bill. Correct. You're all ready to go on. You had a report ready to go back in March. So this the proposal on this amendment is to basically take out the. Um, Rather the deadline, the 2025 deadline that you would report on in 880 as it stands right now. And then add this and then changes date now if I keep if we keep this amendment as as an amendment presented by me. Then, you know, then I would present this after after representative Howard did. Her presentation on the bill. But if it's a committee, if we decide this is a committee amendment or that if representative Howard wants to make this amendment. Then you would just report it. Kind of the way we saw it today, which was the way that representative would present as she presented the bill, then she presented her amendment to the bill. But that's a call that Mary, whatever you're comfortable with, we don't know exactly when this might come up, but hopefully it's going to come up by the end of next week. Okay, I have, yeah, I have a question. It's stated that the science need to be updated. By July 1st 2025, are we taking that out? That's what the amendment that's the main push of the amendment would be to take out that language. Okay, because the reasoning that the way it was explained to me, you know, going back to March with that in I had a I had a. I assumed that this bill was going to go to appropriations after it left our committee because that's kind of an essential that's essentially saying that there's an appropriation. It has to be done by 2025. So that means that it has to be done over the next five years, which means that there has to be money in the budget and we weren't making that appropriation number one and number two. The way that it was explained to me is that by having a date without funding is an unfunded mandate. And so that this taking out that date makes it makes the science able to be replaced in the normal course of business the normal course of budgeting. Would I need a new report from joint fiscal. No, no. No. No, in fact, you may not have to even report on on that because of the. You'd be presenting the bill in a way that that you can acknowledge that this bill had this dead that has this deadline in it. And then say, but we'll be addressing that in the amendment. Okay. But you can certainly have that you can certainly have that information that was presented in that fiscal note that at your hand to make sure that you just remind people if you're asked what what it might cost. Right. Okay. Any thoughts committee this that should this be a should this be a committee bill that representative Howard goes ahead or do is it just, or should this be just something coming under my pen and I'll try to explain it as simply as I just tried to explain it this morning. Representative Hango. I think it should be your amendments since you got the direction to change that. Yeah, I can live with that. Okay. So Ellen. So we would have, we would have, I don't know if you want to just type it up while we we can we can stop the conversation now on this bill. If we want, and if you can just do do a change on the amendment. So that it includes the March 15th date as a deadline rather than January 15th. And, you know, let me know and I don't know what is that going to take you 10 minutes. If you're if you're not stacked up with stuff and then we can vote on that. Is that okay. Sure, can I have closer to 20 minutes. Of course. I've been in hearing since nine. So I need a tiny break and then I will do it. That's fine. And I just, it's there's such small changes, but I just want to make sure that we can vote on it today and let the, let leadership know that this bill is absolutely ready to go. And whatever it can fit into the queue. So, yeah, if you want to, if you want to just come back in and 20 minutes signed back in and 20 minutes or whatever. We'll be here.