 Hey, this is Tim Ash, president of the Vermont Senate. It's Monday, March 30th here for my daily update. Provide hopefully some useful information about what's been happening in Vermont today as it relates to the COVID-19 crisis. Also, some of the questions I've been fielding from people in recent days. Be able to offer a little bit of information, hopefully that will be helpful there. As I hesitate to start on a somber note, but just in terms of the number of individual Vermonters who have now tested positive, the number is 256, and 12 people have passed away who were infected. And so while we continue to respect the individuality of each people so that they're not just reduced to numbers, it's also worth noting that there are more people who likely are positive for COVID-19, just haven't been tested. And I'll talk a little bit about the state's newer updated protocol for testing in a moment. But we still appear to be at the beginning of a curve that is going to go up. And all of the efforts that we're making throughout state government are to try to keep the fewest people infected possible to keep the most people alive and healthy. I'm gonna share a bit of breaking news for a second. As you may have heard, I along with the speaker and others had encouraged our judiciary, continue to encourage our judiciary to issue an order which would protect those who may face eviction proceedings for non-payment of rent or inability to pay rent, while also taking into account that many property owners who may not receive tenant rent, whether it's residential or commercial, also are in a bind here and have asked them to come in with a uniform policy throughout the state about how the courts will handle that, hopefully holding everything at bay for the time being. And while they have not yet taken up that charge, Judge Helen Torr today issued a ruling or guidance for the Chittenden court system. So this would just be for Chittenden County for the moment, which describes, using her words, unprecedented times. I don't think that will surprise people to hear that. And said that all scheduled foreclosure sales will be postponed for 90 days and that all eviction proceedings will effectively be put on hold for 90 days. There are some circumstances where someone could seek court approval to move forward if it wasn't likely to end in someone being homeless and presumably if there was an instance that was jeopardizing other people's safety and wellbeing, that might be an instance where the court would hear the case. But for Chittenden County, they've effectively said no foreclosure sales or evictions for the next 90 days. That came from Judge Helen Torr and I think that that was a good decision. And if the rest of the courts don't uniformly create this as the policy, we will continue to think about how the legislature can step in and make this a policy across the state. One of the questions I see coming in now is whether this is for commercial properties as well. I did not see anything when I read the, it's a very brief order from Judge Torr. I did not see any reference to residential nor to commercial, so I think it would be all inclusive. But that will require a little follow up which I'm happy to do. So that's the breaking news there on the Chittenden side. And we will speak with the chief judge who oversees all of the county courts to see if this is something that should immediately be implemented across the state. One of the terms we often use in Montpelier which probably doesn't, people don't use it very frequently outside the legislature is access to justice. And we wanna make sure that if you're facing a particular experience with the court system that you don't get one deal if you're in Bennington and a different deal if you're in Chittenden or Caledonia or somewhere else. Vermonters should have the same access to justice or to the court system regardless of where they live. So we'll wanna make sure that this policy will benefit people throughout the state, not just in the one court that is operated right now by Judge Torr. I also, to answer a number of questions which have been flooding in, this relates to the new federal benefit that will extend the equivalent of unemployment insurance benefits to people who are self-employed and independent contractors. I have received many, many, many dozens of questions about how this is gonna work. And I will confess that the short answer is that the law was signed by President Trump on Friday and that the guidance to states like Vermont and all the other ones have not yet been issued about how this is going to be administered on the ground. So for those who have been reaching out to the Department of Labor and wondering whether you could immediately sign up for this new federal benefit, if you received an answer from the Department of Labor which said we're not yet sure how to make this, how to do this, I ask you, and it's the hardest thing to ask in these difficult times, but it is not the fault of the Vermont Department of Labor. They're waiting for the federal government to say how we're gonna get these benefits out to people. So for anyone who's checked in today or over the weekend with the Department of Labor and not been able to enroll, it is because they still don't have the specific rules from the federal government. Our contact at the Department of Labor who runs their policy believes that by Wednesday they should have better information about when people can start enrolling and getting their benefits. We will also be looking into whether people will be able to get benefits retroactive to Friday when the bill became a federal law. So I know it's not very satisfying to hear that the federal government's bureaucratic delays are keeping you from benefits which would help you pay your bills, especially at the end of a month, but this is something that is in some sense beyond the control of Vermont state government. We are waiting for the federal government to provide these resources. So if you talk to someone at the Department of Labor, understand that they're not the ones telling you you can't get the benefits yet. They are just waiting for the green light from the federal government. So would encourage people to stay tuned to that. I'm gonna start by talking a little bit about the governor's newest order relating to stay at home. And hopefully it will provide a little bit more insight into how we're making sure that as days progress, we continue to have as much sheltering in place, staying at home and distancing as possible. As a reminder, based on the federal guidance that we're getting, we expect that it will be mid to late April when we start to peak in terms of the total number of cases that our healthcare system is taking. So each day that passes, many people may start to be fatigued of being at home, the kids are inside, and when the weather gets warm, it's going to be more and more attempting for people to break the new system that we've developed. And I think that the governor's newest order is in part an attempt to make sure that we reduce the potential spread of the infection as much as possible. So to cut to the chase, the governor had already issued a stay at home order. And as I've mentioned in previous updates, had a variety of economic activities that had to stop unless they could be done completely remotely. Others that can stay open, don't have to stay open, but including grocery stores, pharmacies, and things that are critical to our ability to manage this crisis. One of the concerns has been, how will it be enforced if at all? If one store decides they're gonna stay open, what's the consequence to them? So the governor had a number of law enforcement officials over the weekend traveling around the state and basically checking in on establishments to see who was complying or who was not complying with the shutdown order for some industries, and found that there were a number of lodging facilities, hotels, motels, inns who were still operating, even though none of the people who were staying there were healthcare workers or people displaced because they needed to be isolated and things like that. I'm not saying that this was the preponderance or the majority of establishments, but there were certainly some. So the governor's order more explicitly said that unless the actual beds in a lodging facility are being used to serve the needs of people who were helping fight the COVID-19 virus or who are placed in that site to be properly isolated, that all lodging facilities are to be closed. That includes inns, hotels, motels, and Airbnb and other platforms like it. So we know that there have been people who have been coming up to Vermont to quote unquote get away from the city and get away from what are now called hot spots as one of the terms of this crisis. But if someone is, let's say someone is from New York City or Boston and thinks that it's safer and healthier to be up here, they are not allowed to come up here to stay at a rental lodging site. So it's a very explicit expression of intent. And for all the people who have Airbnb's, which there are now thousands of them around the state, the only way that you would lawfully be operating would be if the unit was being occupied by someone who was in the handful of eligible uses. They are a worker serving at the time of this crisis or they are someone who has been ordered to be in some kind of secluded or isolated environment because they may have been infected or to avoid infection if a family member is infected, say, but they're a nurse and need to be able to continue to work. So that's part one of what I wanna describe about this new order from the governor. The second one is that anyone who travels to Vermont from outside Vermont's borders is to home quarantine for 14 days. So this is not just people who might be coming up to be in a second home if they live in Southern New England, for instance, but also people returning to Vermont from winter second homes, perhaps in Florida or states in warmer down in the South. So home quarantine means not that there's gonna be police officers roaming the streets, making sure people are in their homes, but you are required by the order of the governor if you are coming back to Vermont from any other place to home quarantine for 14 days. The one exception for when these people can leave their homes is for basic essential services like getting food or going to the drug store. The second thing is the governor is explicitly asking that people from what are called hotspots in New York City and Boston, a few other places are considered hotspots, not come. It is the opposite of a welcome mat being put down. It's basically saying you are from a hotspot, meaning you are likely to be carrying the infection in the virus, do not make problems worse for us by bringing it here. So there is going to be almost like the way the Agency of Transportation puts up roving alerts about wearing seatbelts and things. They will have signs saying that if you are coming up from a hotspot, do not come, turn around. It will not be police. That has been discussed and we believe that there cannot be a constitutional prohibition of people entering the state. People, for instance, have a right to come to their second homes if they have them, but they're being asked not to come. Now I'm gonna turn briefly to the issue of testing and testing protocols. And I know that many in the public have been as frustrated as we are in the legislature. And frankly with the governor's team are frustrated as well that not everyone who is symptomatic of COVID-19 is being tested. There, I will not go into the long litany of reasons why the country is so unprepared for this kind of testing, but we'll say that the limitations of testing capacity has been a real challenge for the Department of Health. And so as constituents have said, why aren't more people being tested? It is obviously difficult to say because they don't have the kits, they don't have the chemicals that are necessary for the testing, but that has been the answer, unfortunately. Up till now, the testing has largely been focused on people whose symptoms are more than mild. And that is obviously a subset of all the people who may actually have COVID-19. That has been operating under the principle that many people who have COVID-19, if their symptoms don't really develop, are best to stay home, handle their symptoms and get to the other side of the virus alone without needing hospitalization. In effect, what the Department of Health's position has been in light of the scarcity of resources and materials that it's not, you're not really prioritized for being tested if you're someone who is not in a high-risk demographic and whose symptoms are not particularly bad. So that list of groups that are now going to be prioritized, it now expands a little bit as a result of the Health Department's latest communication to include people who have symptoms in long-term care settings, healthcare workers, people with compromised immune systems, people who are on dialysis and also people who are in our correctional facilities. And at any given time, there are about 1,500 people. Usually there's about 1,750. Right now there's about 1,500 people in a Vermont correctional facility. And so they are also added to that prioritized list because prisons and jails are effectively considered like cruise ships when it comes to the potential spread of infections. And we know how the luxury cruise lines have fared when it came to the quick spread of the infection. The other bit of news that we heard a little bit earlier today in a legislative leadership call that I host with the speaker each day is that they're currently using these protocols according to the commissioner of health. There is no backlog in testing for those who have been put on the prioritized list of those who should get a test. So there is an important distinction there. It is not to say that everybody who wants a test is getting it. It's saying that all the people who are on the health departments prioritize the list for testing are getting it. And those are obviously not the same groups of people. There's some overlap, but it's not a complete overlap. There is good news in that the amount of testing is being expanded using some support from non-public actors, including the Mayo Clinic of all places and some private labs that are helping move this process further. There are, yesterday, actually, on Sunday at Landmark College in Putney, they opened a new testing site on the campus of Landmark College. I think they tested 10 people, if I understand it, yesterday. And we believe there will be two more sites opening up in the coming days, and the health department is still finalizing how that's gonna work and where they're gonna be, so I can't say too much about that at this time. And then, finally, one of the issues that many of my constituents have reached out to me about is the issue of the correctional facilities and just how worried we should be about the spread of COVID-19 in the correctional facilities. At present, there has been one positive test, and that person right now is being held in what's been referred to as a special isolation room. That room is one that basically is on its own air handling system, so it's not transmitting the air, exhalation of the inmate to other inmates, so it's all in a contained environment. They are looking to have an overflow site because in the correctional facilities themselves, they believe they only have 10 bed spaces, effectively, that are appropriate for people who need to be isolated, and they are looking at what is currently a St. Johnsbury work camp as a potential site to shift to if the worst case happens and we have a breakout in our correctional facility. So right now, the problem seems to be contained. They're taking precautions, testing people as they come in for work, but obviously it's a very vulnerable location and we're gonna have to stay on top of that. I'm gonna wrap, I think, for the night but say that yesterday my letter of appreciation, which I've been doing every day as my own personal commitment to recognize those people here in Vermont who are stepping up in this difficult time and are showing up at work, putting themselves at risk. Each day I've been sending a very short snail mail letter to people who I've never met, encouraging them on because they are going to need some resilience in the days ahead if we're gonna keep expecting them to show up and perform essential functions. So today my letter is going to be to the folks at Brock. Brock is the community action agency for Southwestern Vermont, for Bennington and Rutland counties. Among many other things right now, their prime objective is making sure that food is getting out to all the people who customarily use their food, distribution programs, and as we know, the demand on those programs has been doubling in some cases, tripling around the state as people are out of work and face more anxiety and with the schools closed and some of the meals programs may be being slow to unravel. So the folks at Brock are out there not getting famous doing this work and I feel very strongly that we all have to turn our attention to the people here in Vermont who are at the front lines of fighting this virus because it's too tempting, as I've said, to get your sort of emotional outlet on social media and seeing some of the amazing tributes that are going on around the world. But here in Vermont there are people who out of sight are doing amazing work and if they did not show up because they get sick, it puts us all in a bad place so that we owe them a huge amount of thanks and gratitude and I can say that one of the things I'm particularly hoping that we can accomplish in the days ahead and I've talked to members of the Senate about this is making sure that we properly reward those who are required to show up for work whether they're in custodial, they're in retail settings, they work in grocery stores, pharmacies, you name it, all of the positions that barely pay above the minimum wage and we're expecting so much of those individuals right now and I'm hoping that when this is over, in addition to having a new appreciation for how valuable they are that we will make sure to somehow reward them for having shown up every day through this terrible crisis, putting themselves at risk in order to serve all of us. So with that, I'm gonna sign off till tomorrow and let you know that there are Senate committees that are meeting all week along with House committees and they're talking about an amazing range of topics that we have to explore in order to respond to this crisis ranging from education, to childcare, to energy, to broadband. This crisis has laid bare a lot of gaps and problems, both things that we need to respond to immediately and things we need to respond to to prepare for the future because we're learning a lot about crisis mode as we work our way through this. So thanks so much for all of your conscientious behaviors to reduce the spread of this virus and I'll see you tomorrow.