 Good morning. This is the Senate Agricultural Committee. It's Friday morning, January 13th, and I hope everybody had a good trip in this morning, kind of nasty out there, but I see everyone's here, so that's great. And this morning, first on our schedule, which you should all have, is where we have some folks from Vermont. The food situation and the committee is very interested in promoting our sustainability here in Vermont of supplying food for our own citizens. And so it's, I know you folks do a lot of distribution of foods, so it's great to have you with us. So we'll hear from Kerry and then John, the director will be in, I don't know, he's coming just later. Yeah, so he'll be coming along. And so to get started, we'll introduce ourselves and put a name with the face. Yep, I'm Brian Collamore, a senator from Rutland. I'm Bobby Stout from Orleans County, do four towns in Caledonia County. So you can see we go the whole length of the state and we're very interested in helping our citizens have adequate supply of good, wholesome, fresh food. So Kerry, welcome, and we'll probably have questions for you. We're kind of a loose committee. Mr. Chair, can I ask, you know, we just kind of blend in and get our questions answered. So welcome and the floor is yours. Great, thank you so much. And I'm really grateful for you inviting us to be here today. And for the record, my name is Kerry Steyler, and I'm the government and public affairs officer for the Vermont Food Bank. And I am coming here from Linden, almost in your district. So I put together just a really brief slideshow that's an overview of the food bank. One of the things that we realized, even though we're a relatively old organization that's been doing work in Vermont for a long time when we travel the whole state, is that we do a lot of different things. And it helps to sort of set a baseline so everybody has a similar perspective on what it is that we're doing. So I'll start with that. Please feel free to interrupt me. If you have questions, I'm also a very informal presenter. And so, you know, raise your hand or just nudge in. That should work for me in this room. Linden, you'll have to post a disabled participant's share and you'll have to give me the ability to share my screen. And some of what you'll see in this presentation is in the handouts that you have as well. So. Recording in progress. I think I got the wrong button. There you go. All I see is the date, Friday, January 13th. So you folks, do you distribute each week statewide? Yeah. So I'll just start without the slideshow because I think that's where we're at. It's great. So the food banks mission is much more broad than simply distributing food, but that is a lot of what we do. So our mission is to gather and share quality food and nurture partnerships so that no one in Vermont will go hungry, really with that goal of addressing hunger in all 14 counties in as many communities as we can reach. And we're primarily a food distribution organization, like you asked, but we do do some other work to help address food security in other ways. And I'll just touch on those. But really, the thing that is most relevant to this committee is that distribution, the food procurement and distribution. And we do that mostly through a network of about 320 networking community partner organizations. Those are your traditional food shelves and food pantries, community meal sites, use our food to prepare their meals, senior centers, afterschool programs. And we have a lot of partnerships with schools and hospitals. And those involve more direct distribution. So you do go to the hospitals and schools, all the institutions? Not all of them know. I think we're partnering currently with 11 hospitals and I believe 36 schools. But that one, I'm not 100% certain I can find that information for you. In schools, we do a few different programs, but the major programs are produce distribution programs that are veggie Van Gogh or a produce drop and go event through school systems. And then we operate a backpack program that provides food to children over the weekend who rely on on school meals for their food and don't have enough access to food at home. And I'm just going to lay a little groundwork. Are we online? That's okay. I'll just keep rolling without it. So I'm just going to like a little groundwork for hunger in the state of Vermont that is what we do is primarily to address hunger and food insecurity across the state. And in the House committee, I got some questions about the difference between hunger and food insecurity. Food insecurity is really the data term that helps us measure how many people in Vermont have not had access to the types of food they want and need, the amount of food they want and need, have skipped meals, have made choices that are not as nutritious quality food that they would like to eat. So it's kind of a very broad data term. Hunger is really that individual personal experience of not having enough food or being hungry. And I think that's something that all of us can identify with and is happening broadly across the state. So right now we're in a little bit of a dramatic moment. I would call it in the past 12 months, two in five people, which is roughly 40% of people in Vermont surveyed, identified that they had experienced food insecurity. So had not had enough food or the types of food that they preferred or needed to eat for their diet. And prior to the pandemic, that rate was about 9.6%. So we've seen this sort of ebb and flow over the course of the past two and a half, three years, where that number has gone up and down. But a lot of programs were available to folks to access additional food or additional financial resources, whether it was the child tax credit or rental assistance or a whole host of other programs that the federal and state government were able to help people through really the height of that crisis. As we move into this recovery phase, a lot of the folks who were impacted by food insecurity are folks on the lower income spectrum. And so it takes them a longer time to recover. We know that because the last time we had a real bump in food insecurity was during the Great Recession in 2008. And so there we went from a sort of nine-ish percent food insecurity rate in 2007 up to about 14%. And it took about 10 years for Vermont to recover from that crisis for food insecurity rates to go back down to that 9%. This is a much more dramatic increase than we're seeing. And we fully expect this will take years for Vermont to recover from as far as making sure that folks who could get it. Even with all that we've done and the feds have done, we instituted the universal school meals program. That hasn't slowed or lowered these numbers much. Well, you know, I think what that did was keep the numbers where they're at. Right? It did actually impact folks. So it held it. It held it. And now as we sort of move into a new phase of normal where people are sort of, you know, the assumption is we've recovered. But I think a lot of people have done that. Right. Yeah, that's what I was going to say. We've entered this real economic crisis. So sort of an on-the-ground look at your work. So you're veggie going to go in my community, right? What are the other areas where you might be in a community? Because I've heard incredible things about veggie ban go. I've heard people will go and just, it's really interesting to me because it can be such a stigma, you know? But people, I'm finding that might be breaking down a little bit. You know, it's just interesting because I am hearing the veggie ban. I keep hearing from different folks that they're going to the ban. They're going there. They're picking stuff up. They're sharing it with their friends, you know? So they're getting a bunch of things and then passing it along to people. Yeah. Which is great. And so I'm just wondering where else would you be in a community in terms of a food bank? Yeah. So Senator, I can't get you to name something really important. I don't want to miss that signal piece. So make sure I come back to that. But logistically speaking, our network partners are the community hubs for food access, whether that's meal sites, senior centers, food pantries. Like the meals on meals, do you connect with it all? We do often connect with meals on meals programs and they utilize the food that we distribute to repair the meals that they're making. So it helps with the efficiency of the cost for food preparation and programs like that. But you know, like a small food pantry in a town that's open one or two days a week. That they're often getting most of their food from us. And, you know, Senator Renner, you work or you volunteer in Jericho. So if you have anything to add, we're just very grateful. Yeah, please don't hesitate to hop in because, you know, food pantries like the one in Jericho order from our system and our truck brings it to their site and delivers that food. We also offer grants to our network partners and that's a really important piece of it, particularly for Vermont agriculture. One of the grant programs that we've been able to really take advantage of or offer for networks so they can take advantage of is our Vermatres feeding, Vermatres grant program. And that food program is essentially, the goal of that is to purchase Vermont farm products from Vermont farms at market rates and distribute those to people who need to access the shareable food system. So whether it's through Veggie Van Gogh, through our network partners, through some of these produce drop and go programs, you know, we're really trying to make sure that there are multiple distribution points. But as an organization, we can't do all that work on the ground alone, nor do we want to. Those community partners really know the folks in their community and can make sure that they're doing the right outreach to get people in the door, that they're offering the types of food that people need and want, that their hours work for the people who live and work in that community. And so it really, I'm here as an organization, but what we really represent is this broad network of folks across the state who are working really hard to get that food into communities. Could you tell us, how does the farmer, do they bring the food to your warehouse? How does that... So there's really two ways that work. Yeah, there's two ways that work. So we as an organization operate three warehouses, one in Rattleboro, one in Rutland and one in Berry. And those are big warehouses with like loading docked truck bays and large facilities where we're using fork trucks. So the farmers that we work with to buy and bulk for those facilities are large farms who can deliver pallet-sized loads. We were with a farm in Williamstown who brings us pallets of potatoes, and those go into our warehouses and then get distributed out either via the vegan goes or we do produce pickup events regularly with our network partners where we'll show up in a parking lot and they all come to the truck and bring the produce that they want back to their site. And so, you know, or we're delivering it on a weekly basis on our large delivery trucks to those locations with the rest of their order. The other way that we do that work is that we offer grants to our partners where they can get up to $2,500 per grant, you know, they're using the grants. Then they use that money to purchase directly from farms in their community. So we're building that relationship between our local network partners, our food shelves, our food pantries, and local farms. And people love that because they go into their food shelf or food pantry and they see, you know, what Dan grew down the road and they know his farm name and they know his, you know, lettuce and his produce and they're all of our network is doing that in different ways. Some of them are purchasing CSA shares that come in on a weekly basis and people can come and shop with CSA shares. Some of them purchase CSA shares on behalf of families and the families go and pick that up from the farm. Sometimes they're ordering, there was a farm in Barton that the Northeast Kingdom Community Action contracted with and bought beef from. And so they would get that beef sort of on a semi-regular basis because they only had so much freezer space in their facility for people to come and pick up the beef. And so they had this agreement with this farm that every X number of weeks they would come and pick up beef from them. So it really, those grants really put the flexibility in the hands of our network partners and our farmers to figure out how to work together to make sure the people who can afford that food are able to act. Are those federal grants? They are not. No, they are private grants through the Vermont Food Bank. Okay. Yep, yep. And we try to make the application process and eat as easy and smooth as possible so that it isn't a burden on our network to get those funds to do that Do you have any idea how much or how many pounds of Vermont products you I don't but I can tell you the dollar amount that we that we were able to inject into the Vermont economy was 2.4 million dollars last year and that is farms. That is not any sort of economic multiplier that is direct dollars that the Vermont Food Bank spent on Vermont for our purchases. So that's good. Yeah, but we probably eat millions of dollars. So there's room there to grow. There is and I will say you know over the course of the year. You're pun intended. Pun intended. This is a place for it. I would say over the past few years we have had to do much more food purchasing than our system you know sort of was traditionally built for. Food banks are built to receive donated food and redistribute that food. The need over the past several years has been growing at such a rate that we have been purchasing much more food. And this is where I may point to the handout that I sent you or I handed you the second page. Oh, YouTube can see this second page. You know there are a few different federal programs listed on here. The top program in that middle bar on the second page is called TFAP and that's the emergency food access program. And that's a federal food program that the state of Vermont administers in the Vermont Food Bank works together with the agency of education. And that is a huge source of food for us in our network. It provides what's essentially USDA commodity food that goes out into our network and can either be used at those meal sites to prepare food or can be you know there for folks to pick up. And it is no longer like the old-fashioned commodity cheese and like a wave brick that used to happen you know a few years back. The USDA has started repackaging that food it looks like shelf brands. It is sort of like an off name you know like this is still cheaper or still cheap. There's lots of other things. There's lots of other food. And it really varies depending on what the USDA contracts with these huge farms around the country for us. And so that is one source that has been really readily available during the pandemic and the past year the amount of food available to us through that program has declined by 40%. We expect that decline to continue. There may be some ebbs and flows in available food based on what the USDA chooses to do and kind of funded Congress gives to the USDA for that program. Yeah because they I mean they report to us all we're buying all this trying to you know keep the market somewhat tight and then you do read about the millions of pounds of butter that they have stored. It's a little bit of an opaque system I will agree with you. So the food shelves in my area but a lot asked for from private donations is stuff like toilet paper and those. And what's never been really clear to me I've been clear there's lots of help from different all sorts of different places for the basic food items and the food types. Is there any avenues for those things like toilet paper in basic I'm trying to wonder why those are the things they they tell us bring those. There are a couple of reasons for that. One of them is that we do carry some non food items but not many. So that is broadly a need. The other reason is that SNAP benefits so what we call three squares Vermont here doesn't cover those items and so people are having to use their own money to purchase those and if they don't need to use their money to purchase those they can buy more. Right so that I just bring up the toilet paper. I can't. There are necessities that people require to live their lives that you know that they need to get and sometimes that is hard. We have started to try to sort of offer some more good items but it's very different process. That's helpful thank you. Another question you know we're we're having a tremendous time with our waste system you know filling up and you have to keep building more and people are upset about the landfills and what we've heard and you know it's just stores nothing but stores will take out product that you know maybe the dates run out on and you know Walmart is a very community oriented type group and do they ever donate outdated or you know stuff foods things to the food bank that really are still good but they're they're getting near their time limit? Walmart specifically is when I'm not sure about we have existing partnerships. Oh great John is a really good one answer question. We do have existing partnerships. Yeah he can set up there with you. Bring a chair. We have existing partnerships with a number of retailers who we do receive food from donated food that is closed dated or you know or slightly outdated but still good to eat. Is Walmart one of our partners who we get food donations from? I'm not sure. Yes so there's full record John sales. Yes John we'll run around the room Irene go ahead. Irene run her sitting in north center. Brian Callamore from Rutland. Brian. Brian can't be in Bennington County. I'll reach west and then we'll probably start from Moreland so welcome. Thank you thank you I apologize for not having been able to be here at nine. You know that's fine now. We have we do do have a relationship with Walmart and do store pickups at Walmart's that's the relationships with large chains like Walmart, Hannaford, Shaw's are managed through our relationship with Feeding America which is our national organization. So we have we have relationships all those stores and we actually have relationships with just about every grocery store in Vermont where we do store pickups. Oftentimes it's the local food shelf that will you know we train them and give them the equipment so they can follow the food safety regulations and then they do recording stops there. Okay so you must handle I mean if we can get that food up and get it out to people that isn't going to the landfills and so that's good. Yeah I can confidently say we are the largest food rescue organization in the state keeping food out of landfills. Yeah that's good. Yeah that's right. Do you do anything I'm just thinking of this single parent not a lot of time to prepare things. Do you do any kind of you know prepared stuff or even instead of just a bag of carrots that's kind of already ready to go anything like that. I know it's hard but I'm just thinking of the single mom and the single dad you know coming home from work and yeah. So the food bank itself doesn't yeah we don't do prepared things. We don't process you know there was we don't process we've we've worked on projects around that we do get some food that that is ready to eat our meals you know usually you know it's the you know like frozen meals or frozen meals or the meal kits where you you know you just add some ground beef and turns into a meal we do get those and those are available at food shelves you know and you know there was for the last couple of years Vermont everyone eats which was working with restaurants you know kind of a different model which was very popular yeah and so we've also had partnerships to explore light processing and preparing meals for a number of years five or six years we were working with the Center for the Ag economy in Hartwick to figure out how to do that light processing so instead of you know a five pound bag of carrots they're you know small carrots or they're they're coined and blanched and frozen so you just eat them up and eat them the the challenge is that it's just really expensive yeah and the the issue is actually labor labor you can't use volunteer labor because it's it's specific machinery and you have to be trained on it and to have people who are you know it just was too complex yeah okay we also did projects with them to create prepared meals we did a macaroni cheese pilot which was a little you know a tin of cooked macaroni cheese and just heat it up again it was very popular but getting the ingredients and manufacturing process at a price point that made sense just you know one way that we have had success doing that yeah I just want to add the food bank in Maine the shepherd food bank there's also one food bank in Maine actually has purchased the processing plant and they're doing a project with broccoli they grow a lot of broccoli in Maine where they're they're cutting the florets and blanching them and then working with Wyman's the blueberry company and using their facility out of season to freeze it and it's going to be a product that will be available in hanaford um and if you purchase it it's it's going to the the proceeds for the sales informant will come to the food bank but that they'll also have that available at the sale you know at their cost to us so we can purchase that from them and hopefully they're hoping to expand other products um but they're starting broccoli that's true but that's going to be on limited basis it's an off-season type operation that will work when the blueberries are right and that the when the broccoli is coming right is when that they're not using the freezing capacity of the blueberry plant so they're hoping to add some other other crops maybe do some some processing too and they're very open in fact I've reached out through networks to Vermont growers because they're interested in getting more product in and they're interested in this being a regional effort so we don't necessarily have to do it um we can join in with folks in Maine so there is some ability through Salvation Farm to do some um and I know there's some connections but can you describe a little sure um yeah Teresa Snow who runs Salvation Farms she actually starred in Salvation Farms and then became part of the food bank and it was part of the food bank for about five years um and then she went back out by herself because it's a little bit different mission a bit different vision um one when Salvation Farms had their their light processing facility in in Winooski yeah we were their number one client right so we purchased most of what um they produced again it was it was economics even though Salvation Farms was running as a job training program getting folks coming in doing the light processing and packing um it just wasn't sustainable over the long run so the so what was in Winooski has and and Salvation Farms is looking it is still looking for other opportunities you know I know they've worked with corrections in the past um and just looking for ways to to take that agricultural surplus get it light processed so that it can come through our network more easily I wasn't aware that the Winooski piece it yeah it's been a couple of years since they they closed down that facility so John I don't think would remember but I have taken a tour of the Rutland facility yes um and when Terry was mentioning where the other two warehouses are so Barry Brattleboro and Rutland what about Chittenden County I was kind of surprised that there isn't something where 65 percent of the people live in Vermont I smile because we've been trying for at least 10 years to find a place um to have a physical okay it's just really really difficult to find the appropriate facility in the right place um we've we've been partnering actually there's a long term project that we've been working on with feeding Chittenden and the intervail and the intervail we've done some planning around it the intervail would really like to build a processing facility right there on their site and there's land available it's a brown field so that's an issue but but we've we've we've actually done a phase one assessment we're talking to the city of Burlington we're talking to Senator Sanders office about you know trying to start finding some money for that but it would be a project that would combine you know the food bank feeding Chittenden and and the intervail but it's just been really really challenging the state of Vermont likes to buy high and sell wall let us know when you're ready well I mean I'm wondering if there are any buildings that the state owns up there in Chittenden County that you know they sell it to you at your price I'm sure and and you know that could be utilized in the other outfit is you know IBM used to be there but now it's well they you know I've heard that they have vacant buildings at their place and and you would think that an outfit like those folks could use tax credits or something to where they could basically donate the the facility to you folks but then get the tax credits on the on the donation and I don't if you've worked you have work we have and we are we have those conversations we actually were just they allowed us to park one of our vehicles because we have a bunch of people in Chittenden County yeah yeah actually we have several we have several people who were kind of out of the intervail space already but we were we were parking one of our company vehicles at Global Foundries and I'm sure you have but if you work for GVIC because they do have the mapping of the whole region what there is available so yeah it's just our our needs are pretty specific yeah you're on institutions yeah you could work for state no they'll give away to somebody before we go too far I actually can we say back to Senator Cambian you had asked me about stigma and I have not covered that and I want to make sure we we cover that before we find a building so we can see more um but you had said how bad he didn't go is people love it because it's a little stigma and and I I think one of the things that that pandemic did was that it made those drive-through food distribution events really common and really normalize them they were not only in the news they were you know locations all over the state people were encouraged to go and pick up the food they need you know if and want if they if they need it and really weren't a lot of questions to answer and that's how we've continued to operate our veggie vangos they need to ask what questions were asked you said not many yeah how many people are in your household okay okay how many households and how many households are you picking up for and that's it that's it not how much money do you think what's your last name give us your security number food shelf does that do they um there are certain other words okay some food shelves do um how people sign a self affidavit to receive certain foods and it's that the USDA foods are quiet it's that the requirements yeah some local food shelves also um well restricted to residents of certain towns so their town and surrounding towns so they'll ask for some sort of identification and they keep you on file or you can only visit a certain number of times a week or a month so those veggie vango events people drive through they open their trunk volunteers load who have you know packed these boxes and bags load them into the trunk you know for the three households they're picking up for they give them three households worth of food and they say thanks and have a great day so that stigma keys you know if you're no one's telling anyone their name you don't necessarily have to approve your residency there's really it is much easier for people to feel comfortable the other piece that we've heard from people that even go is that they really love receiving local produce because they know it's helping farms right so it's that circular gift back where they know that you know even though they're they're in need of assistance someone is being helped in the process of it and that is sort of um something that that even folks who need for assistance really appreciate I'm sure that that Carrie has mentioned our our I don't see the hand out there the food banks three million dollar base funding request and really what what that that three million dollars will do is allow us to purchase as much local food as we possibly can last year the food bank purchased 2.4 million dollars in local food definitely not yeah and you know we're talking a lot about local farms and people receiving that and doing processing and having facilities that we can we can really maximize the use of the agricultural resources in Vermont and that's really that's the the purpose of that base funding request is to be able to do that in a consistent way our purchase food has increased pretty dramatically since COVID began and what about farmers I mean you know this time of year they can't be growing a whole lot so what about having that product year-round is there should we be looking at a way to enhance you know freezing and packaging uh to allow farmers to have food for you to distribute year-round is there is there a bad time of the year when you run low on certain things that people you know nourishing foods that people should have but we don't can't grow it so definitely you know the seasonality issue you know we're not getting locally grown you know but you know greens and things during this time of year we do year-round so we for when we purchase from local farms we forward contract right so so this time of year will actually probably already been done that we've signed contracts with farmers for next year a lot of those are year-round contracts because we're still getting storage crops so we're still getting you know the the hard five the squashes the onions potatoes carrots yeah beads you know we work with deep root co-op so we're getting those constantly you know the folks that the big big producers like maza and paul harlow you know they're all growing screens yeah they and on they're they're all growing storage crops and so we're getting those year-round we also can get the the seasonal crops from other places when they're not being grown in Vermont but you know like what main's doing if there were the capacity to economically likely process and freeze or somehow some you know can Vermont products then you know we're always on the market close to a few days ago they were showing the drought in california and you know there's cracks that wide in their fields because there is no water and the other so you know it's questionable how many more years we're going to be able to rely on on them growing our food and the other issue is you know Vermont we're trying to be as green as possible and cut as much carbon as we can and we're trucking that product from the west coast to the east coast and well I don't know if you end up having to pay the trucking but it's very expensive with fuel at five dollars or better a gallon and you know we're wasting or we're spending a lot of money I wouldn't say we're wasting it because we're getting their food but we're spending a lot of money to get that food shipped to to the east coast and and you know we have great growing ground here in Vermont especially along the the river bottom lands and in the you know quite a few members in the legislature would like to try to get us to growing as much of our produce and and right here at home processing it and having it available to our people so you know we get rid of the carbon we get rid of the worrying about whether they're going to get water from some place and and it's just crazy to truck product 35 hundred miles to feed our people we're very we do pay trucking transportation so we're very aware of that you know we also we have a national network so we're working with feeding America and and they help we have transportation subsidies we can we sort of broker food within 200 food banks across the country so you know there's you know extra oranges in Florida or you know cherries in Michigan you know we figure out how to get them here we also here in Vermont because of transportation costs and just relationships a lot of the non or most of the non Vermont produce that we distribute comes from western harvest in Quebec yes how they have worse winners than we do yeah they have a lot of greenhouse growing they're huge they distribute all up and down the east coast we buy a lot of seconds from them and they'll deliver us mixed loads mixed tractor trailer loads which is unusual for large producers so and you know it's the greenhouse gas footprint is much smaller I mean stuff come down from Quebec them from Florida or Texas or California no that's that's good yeah and where in Quebec does that where do they come from do they grow I think they have huge operations a hundred acres yeah or no thousands and thousands hundreds of acres I think of greenhouses alone yeah oh yeah you you know I live around the border but I haven't been going to Montreal lately at all but you go along in Ottawa 10 and you see huge fields and and green you do see the green on the right for you that was all going into Montreal or over to Toronto or something but you folks get food and you know the the food that we purchase again you know the the appropriation the funding request the food we purchase through western harvest if we buy seconds um it's actually about half the cost of buying local locally grown from produce but we make a commitment as a new bank to buy as much locally grown food as we can because it's important to Vermont and it's important to the people that we're serving that they're getting food that's grown here in Vermont and creating that connection between the food grown here their health that you know it's more nutritious it's more nutrient dense and fresher yeah and where you know I look at it is the food bank by by distributing local food we're actually creating new customers for local farmers because the people that are coming to food distributions are going to a food sale they're still buying food and and when they have the opportunity to to know that local food is tastes better and looks better and lasts longer then they're willing to spend a little bit more in the grocery store to purchase that also and that their kids will like it I think that's one of the big things so um so besides the budget items now do you know if the governor included that in in his budget or is this something that we don't know I did you know in August have a conversation with uh Commissioner Gresham and his deputy that we presented all the information to them he told me he would talk to the governor about it and I followed up with Adam and and you know they don't tell they don't tell no as you know so so we're waiting for the governor's budget address also and for the budget to come out but we have made that request yeah well it's good to know that because you know if he only went partway two of us in here also sit on appropriations so you know ag gets used if I can convince him we get along pretty well one of the handouts that's in front of you is the detail request governor's office and it has um both information about why we need that funding but information about how we'll spend that funding and like John said you know primarily to purchase from yep and then the cost to distribute well we I think in the past we've used the food bank pretty well like my memory certainly right yes yes the last few years well and and you folks know do a good job getting their food out to our citizens and so I mean it's a good working relationship I think all the way around yeah I can't with especially the two appropriations members here I can't miss the opportunity to to say again that I know that there are going to be some ARCA funds that are appropriated and not spent and uh there is a deadline on that and the food bank is the ultimate in shelf ready projects we can get food money out the door helping Vermonters very quickly so keep that in mind do we need a processing place of our own here in some layers I know hardware's working our tribe during that you know that's that's a broader conversation and we are part of the farm to plate network we work very closely there's there's a whole other food resiliency plan being developed well with Ellen and some other folks she's coming in yeah and just so you know we are we are part of that process and very much dialed in those folks um this is all really quite general um if at some later point you could highlight what the three million dollars does specifically I can send you a budget yeah that would be helpful because people will ask they it it's on top of base funding but what does that mean yeah and and just to be clear the reason we're asking for base funding is very much related to that forward contracting that we're doing with farm you know if there's any matching or anything was on this any of that would be helpful yeah we do have a budget yep yeah we'll follow up with you with that information um Irene did you have anything else thank you so much do folks have anything else for us not specifically now but we are here if you have additional questions I think it's a complicated system for my terrible food and it's very related to feeding for monsters and other weights too so don't hesitate to ask if other things come up that we can help answer yeah constituent questions yeah we're not we're not you know I know you are a little bit yeah I'm a little shy oh yeah well thank you so I just from a budgetary standpoint and I think I know the answer for this question but I'm going to ask you a question the peanut gallery the three million you think is the most vital thing for people at risk for food um that you would be asking for for an increase in prices can you can you say a little steep I understand yeah there are other asks around food there are other asks around foods but if I was going to get at people with insecurity this it must be pretty top top of the list for you guys it is for us absolutely it's tough yeah because you you folks deal with the Hobson in yours strategically located other than Chattanooga and I think somebody said that's where I'll buy answer that's where I suppose all the people and that's where I'm from that's where all the money is too yeah that's true uh they but as as we move forward through uh you know this year if um there are things that you think we should know about um you know we also will not be shocked yeah that's good that's important yeah there will be changes coming for low-key people well um if there are no other questions uh thank you very much thank you