 Thank you for having me, Madam Chair, members of the committee. Just for the record, my name is Boyang, and I am the executive director and legal counsel for the Roman Human Rights Commission. And first, I'd like to introduce you to Amanda Garces, who was just in here. She is our newest director of policy, education, and outreach. And so she will be doing the lion's share. Amanda, I'll just introduce you. No, that's OK. She will actually be doing the lion's share of a lot of policy work over here. And of course, I'll still be around as well. We'll be working on that together. So yeah, I just wanted to share that, this good news. And many of you may remember that Amanda's position was supported by the legislature last year. And so that was a really big push, and I really appreciate everybody who voted to make that happen. Thank you. So thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony today. I thought that, first, I should probably talk a little bit about the difference between the Human Rights Commission and the Attorney General's Office's Civil Rights Unit so that you know what we have jurisdiction over. So our agency has jurisdiction over claims of discrimination in three primary areas, housing, state government employment, and places of public accommodations. And so housing can be anything like someone was denied housing because of a protected status, or neighbor-on-neighbor harassment because of a protected status, et cetera. Places of public accommodations is a huge area, and that could include prisons, roads. That also includes hospitals, schools, and basically any business that provides goods and services to the general public, and then state government employment. So for any state employee who believes that they have a claim in discrimination, they would be filing a complaint at the Human Rights Commission. So Julio Thompson heads the Civil Rights Unit of the Attorney General's Office, and I'm sure you all are familiar with him. And they do all private employment, as well as in a municipality employment cases. In addition to that, they have jurisdiction over the hate crimes, which is the statute that is being proposed here today. And so I am a big believer that any time someone has jurisdiction over a statute, that they are probably the go-to entity in agency. And I think Julio would do the same whenever Bill comes up, that impacts our statute as well. And so that's the first thing I'd like to say. The second thing I'd like to offer here is that H-496 was a bill that showed up in a letter of a concern last year from various constituents, many of whom are from protected categories, or represent members of protected categories. And they had raised a concern about 496, partly because of process and wanting to have input in that bill and how it comes about. And partly because I think they said that the language was just fundamentally flawed. It was not a part of those conversations or a signatory to that letter. So I can't say entirely what the intent or motivation or all the concerns are. So I don't want to represent what those are. I would just say that this is probably a bill that should be more reflective of the people and also as if you move forward to be mindful of the people that need to be heard on this bill. So that's probably really important. The other thing is, too, that I'm not entirely sure that changing the word hate to the word bias really has a practical impact, whether there will truly be applied in a different way. I believe that the sponsor of this bill definitely had good intent and wanted there to be more of an open door. But I'm not sure that in practice that there is a significant difference between the term bias motivated versus hate motivated. And again, I would refer you to the Attorney General's office's testimony on that bill. So because they, again, have jurisdiction over and they'll know what would be included if we change it to bias, I'm not sure that I do know. So I want to be respectful of that. Having said that for what it's worth, so we neither support nor really not support the bill. I just, those were the concerns that the Human Rights Commission had. And also that if we're spending time and energy on a bill that may not necessarily translate to real practical changes for the people that are most vulnerable in Vermont, there are many bills right now that have been introduced that I think are those bills that do change people's lives. As 83 is one of those bills, that's a bill that seeks to prohibit employers from punishing people who have filed complaints of discrimination. And one of the ways in which they punish those folks during a settlement agreement, they will include a clause or insist on a clause that prevents that employee from ever reapplying for work again. And that's very problematic at the state of Vermont because we employ about 7,000 or 8,000 people. And also state government is supposed to be one of the most inclusive places to work. So if you prohibit, let's say an African American person who has filed a complaint of discrimination from reapplying for work at the state, you're closing the door to a lot of places. And many times we've heard directly from people who have said, I just wanna leave the state of Vermont. And so that is a really important bill. Another really important bill also is H556, which is the Gender Neutral Bathroom Amendment Bill. We've had some trouble insuring compliance. And for the majority of respondents that we have reached out to and have found to have violated the law or have heard or inviolation of the Gender Neutral Bathroom Law, we've had good compliance with those folks. But there are a few people who have ignored community members as well as the HRC's request to have them come into compliance. And so H556 actually does a little bit more to maybe assess the fine and also appropriates a little bit of money to the Human Rights Commission to do a public ad campaign to get everybody on board about the bill. There's also several other bills out there that are really good too. And I just wanted to highlight those two. Having said that, there are many states across the country that are doing some really interesting bias stuff. Oregon is one of those. I think they recently revised their bias crime law to provide more clear guidance about data collection. They had a bill that was seeking to penalize people who made unnecessary 911 calls on people who are from protected categories. Primarily white people calling on African-Americans for sitting in a cafe or sitting on a lounge at the college or barbecuing in a park. Those are the kinds of incidents that kind of triggered these types of bills. And I think something like that would be really interesting and could capture a lot of that bias stuff. Having some standardization around bias incident reporting would be potentially helpful, but that's something that the AG's Office and the Human Rights Commission are committed to doing regardless whether there's a bill or not, but something that we can continue to have a conversation with all of you about as well. Yes, please. My question has to do with the difference between hate motivated and bias motivated. You had mentioned that it wouldn't really create any practical changes. I was wondering if you feel that would apply to the police or the attorneys or both of them or if you could just expand a bit more on that. Sure, well, we both perhaps because we certainly know that the police have a lot of discretion when they're being called to respond to an incident, but also the prosecutors have a lot of discretion when they're deciding whether to charge an incident that comes from the police. And so it certainly could apply to both. I'm not sure that the... I don't know if I can speak on behalf of the police, but I think as an attorney, I'm not sure that a crime that is motivated by bias is that much different from a crime that is motivated by hate. I just don't know if it has a legal impact in the courtroom too, yeah. It might change the way the police look at crimes, but I can't speak on behalf of the police. I'm not sure, yeah, to be honest. A couple questions. What is with respect to age 496? And if you have any input, there's really two components to the bill. I'm looking at section nine, which creates a civil penalty and the cause of action for violation of constitutional rights. And I don't know if you had a chance to look at that if you ever need input on that. I did. I think that's definitely seemingly a very good idea. I just think I would seek more clarification and again the entity that has jurisdiction over that is the AG's office and how they would apply that. When what that comes to mind or what that brings to mind is obviously the incidents with the hate that happened with Kaia Morris, Representative, former Representative Kaia Morris and that how if we had had that, that could have been something that the Bennington police or the prosecutors down there could have used to find the racist individual that who was harassing her in violation of. But I also think that there were already plenty of laws in place too that also could have been used too. So, but yeah. So a couple of others. One point I just wanted for clarification and then I had another question as well is that, yeah, this was shelved last year because of that letter, because of the pushback and I was hoping that over the off session some people would get together and kind of understand what we should go with this. And that didn't really happen. So what we're trying to do is certainly, all right, we're bringing this back and we're trying to reach out to make sure anybody wants to comment on this bill and it's gonna, I mean, it's gonna change. That's the way bills are. I just want to make very clear that we're trying to have this, an off session is not always the best time to get input on a bill in the coordinated on the right kind of fashion. So that's what we're trying to offer if anybody wants to comment on this bill. The other thing is, do you have any, are there any bills within the judiciary committee? I don't know if you've had a chance to look through those and if you could end points, point whatever that you think would help because the other bill you mentioned are great bills but we have little influence on it. We do have a data gathering bill which I think we've had some good input would be helpful. Yeah, I wish I could say, I don't know. No, you don't have to look, I'm just saying maybe get back to us if there are particular bills there. I will definitely be mindful. We follow bills by their subject matter and then we'll follow it through the committee but certainly I'll take a look at that and we'd be happy to respond to you about that. I think that we have to be mindful in committee to invite people who are the voices of the people who are impacted by it. So oftentimes, and I'm happy to be here, I enjoy being here and I certainly think we see a lot of those people and I hope that we do a fair job of representing those voices but I also think to what you were saying is that we should also be reaching out to those folks to show up in committee to testify. One, because many of them are working full-time jobs and they're not available from eight to 4.30 when we're usually here doing our picking testimony and so I would encourage you to invite those folks in here to testify as well, yeah. And if you are seeking, well one, there's a list of names on the letter but if you're seeking actually other people then I certainly would be happy to see if I could provide some of those names as well, yes. Do you think this is, well I'm sort of weighing what I heard you say which is, and maybe if the bill is amended, you can address some of your concerns about what it really does, like if it does enough to merit spending a lot of time on it. But I'm just wondering, so I'm wondering if there'd be any value in having a public hearing on this bill or and maybe if there's other kind of related bills in our committee just to get outside of that, let's say to five, kind of, we know that we tend to operate in here but I feel like maybe that's a little at odds with what I'm hearing you say about the tension of like, your position of like, I'm not sure this is the bill you should be spending time on and what I heard a little bit in your testimony. Because I want to make sure I got that right. Yes, that definitely is what I said, yes. I think that our focus at the Human Rights Commission is to bring about real change that has practical impact, right? And not just legalese or changing verbiage if it doesn't translate to something that really impacts people's lives. I think more importantly, I have a question for the people, for all of you and for the sponsors of this bill is what was the goal in changing the verbiage from hate to bias and what are we including that was previously excluded? Because that's where I didn't get but that's because I don't have jurisdictional writ so I don't see those cases but my understanding from talking to Julio Thompson is that it doesn't capture those cases. And so if I hear that we were trying to change the verbiage from hate to bias so that we can include incidents like this then I think I could go well then here's an amendment to the bill or here's a better bill that captures those cases whereas this one, a court might interpret it all sorts of way but I think I don't quite know and we didn't really spend the time you're right outside of the legislative session on what was the thought and thinking behind this bill and what were we trying to capture that the hate bias bill, I mean the hate crime bill right now doesn't capture. So I don't know that might be something that you can answer. Yeah, I will, I know that. So ideas for bills come from all over the place as we know and the idea for that component of this bill came from James Water of Kai's husband and at the beginning of the last session I was talking to a lot about what can we do in this situation and he had seen these changes in another state and the bill and it sounds good to me and so I got a request for the bill and we both recognized James and I that it wasn't significantly changing the substance but it was changing kind of how one might look at it as far as that bias can be different than hate. But the more important, I think since then we've both thought James and I and whether this is worth it. The more important component in that is getting rid of maliciously as a plow fire that has to be maliciously monitored. I mean, if it's hate, why do you have to show that it's or if it's bias, why do you have to show that it's malicious hate or bias? It seems redundant and just an extra thing that has to be shown. But that's how that particular component, so it wasn't necessarily this deep long thought process. It's like James and I thought well this is something worth throwing out there to hear about. So I think that also brings up the conversation that we had earlier about who are we targeting in terms of how they're seeing this. And so coming from a legal perspective, I don't think a judge would see the terminology differently but it might be that a police officer might respond to incidents differently if the word bias showed up then hey, but again then we need to hear from officers about what does that look like and how would that translate when they're on the streets and they're responding to an incident and if we think that the police are not considering all crimes that might be bias motivated because of the word hate, then I think that's a matter of training policy changes and also doing more with our police officers about capturing that. And so I think there's room there certainly for improvement I don't know really, I don't have the expertise on whether the police would be seeing things differently based on that. I think we have a hard enough time having the police even capture hate and I don't think that's a matter of because of the verbiage in the law. I think that sometimes hate is one I think, well, I'll just be transparent. Sometimes I think that maybe they don't take hate that seriously or we seem to be less nervous about people who are spewing hate but we somehow when the hate is based on race or gender identity or protected status but we're less, but we're more scared if the hate is based on someone's status. So for example, a person of color calls the police and says, I'm really afraid of this white person who has been posting all of these really negative things about me and then I've seen their cars a few time and I'm really scared about that. The police might take that less seriously than a white person that says, there's a really strange African American in my neighborhood and I don't know if he belongs here or not and the police go, oh, okay, I'll come over there and check that out. That is not about verbiage. That is about something different and there's a lot of possibilities here on how to address that. The Faraday Partial Policing Bill is one of those but there's possibilities here to address that but see, I don't think that that's because they went to the statute and said this is not a hate incident. Many times they just, they have a lot of discretion. So yeah, so if we're trying to target who is viewing it, yeah, just going back to will the police really view it differently and if they do, then maybe it is worthwhile, certainly. And perhaps we should look in the state now where I had to look, I know it somewhere, where there are other states that go with the bias-motivated. Yeah, to see if that's made a difference. Yes, yes, and to do that research and yeah, yes, absolutely. So one question that I have, which is not exactly related to the bill but it's been, I'm curious about it. The way that we have the duties and obligations split up between your commission and the AG's office, is that how it's done in all states? Like it seems so random, who has what and why and I'm just curious at that. Every state is different. Every state is different. Some do house discrimination within the state like an AG's office and some of them are housed in a separate entity too. When they gave jurisdiction to the Attorney General's office's civil rights unit to have jurisdiction over employment, they realized that the state has to also represent the state and so they needed another entity to deal with it when there was a conflict of interest and then it just made sense to for the Human Rights Commission to do that. But could we have had a statue that says all employment discrimination cases are handled by the HRC? Sure, the conflict only exists because we gave it to the AG's office. Right, because it seems like okay. Because they have to represent the state. And so even in looking at things and gathering stuff, it seems like we've been more complicated because you and Julio have to continue to sort of talk through what are you seeing and how does this, so I just wonder if there's anything different about that. I appreciate you trying to steer us in the direction of bills that could make a difference and don't know if part of your authority or ability is to have like a legislative priority list. Absolutely, sure. Of what you're hoping to see. Absolutely, yes. And I would also refer you all to the annual report the Human Rights Commission submitted this year that made some recommendations to the legislature about bills that we do see as being helpful. And so I know that this bill was introduced with the best of intent. And I really appreciate that. And I'm grateful to be here to have an opportunity to even testify about it. And none of the concerns that I've shared today are even concerns that I would suggest we kill the bill. I think it was more of let's just be mindful and proceed slowly on this. And also if we're taking up committee time and energy, then there are also probably a lot of other important bills that do, I know for sure at this point, do have an impact on it. I think that's super helpful. The last question I have for you is, is it appropriate for us to ever have a joint hearing with HRC because maybe that would end up being more inclusive? I'm very, so there's the, what legislation we put forward and how we include the right stakeholders so that we're not sort of being part of the problem. Yeah, absolutely. Yes, the HRC is definitely open to working with the legislature in any way that you see that would be helpful. I've had other legislators approached me about, I have to take testimony about this issue. I happened to be the chair who was a male and this is an issue that impacts women. And I really want to be cognizant of that. And I go, that's wonderful because I'm more than happy to help about that. Yeah, so I think that's wonderful. And I'm sure there are many opportunities. Don't hesitate to reach out to me. You certainly know that I won't hesitate to reach out to you if I think anything's important that I want everyone to be mindful of. And like I said, our annual report does suggest some recommendations that I think would be helpful to our remands most vulnerable. Those were the ones agreed upon by the commission at our last meeting. Any other questions or thoughts? Thank you. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Sorry, just to help out. Oh, that's okay. I knew you knew. Yeah. Our colleague, Mark, uses it and like, Susanna. Susanna is in the camp. She just sent me an email saying she had things come up if you can't be here. Okay. Do you know if Mark will be here? Mark told me to or after. To or after? Yeah. Okay. All right. Break done. Yeah. All right, so let's take a break and come back to Mark. All right, great. So we can move up in the schedule. Yeah. All right. Hello, Mark. Hi, Mark. This is Maxine. Let's see, can we? Uh, barely. You could put it. Hello? Hello? Hello? Mark, can you hear me? Can I try to call you back? I mean, I just, I can't hear anything that happened right now. I'm just going to try to call back into this number. Okay. Okay. Thank you. You really can't hear that, but you know. Yeah, I know. I don't know. Sam, if it's helpful. Well, we can hear it here, which is great. I hate that when that happens, you know. You're on the call and you're using Bluetooth or something and you're just talking away and all of a sudden you go. Hello? Hi, Mark. Is this better? Is this better? It is kind of choppy, though. Okay. Well, let's try it. Hi, this is Maxine Gregg. Welcome. We're here to continue our testimony on age 496. And go ahead. Thank you. And good afternoon, Madam Chair and House Judiciary Committee for the records, Mark Hughes, coordinator for the Racial Justice Alliance. I'm sorry, I couldn't be with you this afternoon. I was woke up pretty sick this morning. This is kind of the first time I've been sick for a while, so I don't really know how to handle this, but I think I'm making it. Well, we appreciate you calling in. Thank you. So if I cough a little bit or something like that, I will try to hold it down. We are having an incredibly difficult time with the premise of age 496. And therefore, I'm unable to support it. Unfortunately, I'm limited to what is probably the most terrifying change to unpack something that took years to manufacture and had the direct adverse impact on public safety of the entire state. With broad strokes, I'm making a train to get into good policy to complaint former representative Mark Hughes to steer around that table with you. Surrounding stalking and harassment by self-proclaimed life offenders and allegations by the police, by the Barrington Police Department, who, by the way, still have two civil rights complaints filed against them. You can refer to a video link that I've provided to you that provides complete analysis of the handling of the case from an outside national journalist. You should find that in your email. I mean, that's kind of each of you checked. The AG's, he initiated an investigation in certain ways, the Unprofessional Conduct Statute that is a Title 20, 2401 and 2404. This clearly indicates that it was the Vermont Criminal Justice Training Council's responsibility to review any allegations of misconduct perpetrated by the Barrington Police Chief. Then, instead of prosecuting Title 13, Section 1023, 1027, 1061, as well as 1455, the attorney general claims that, quote, freedom of speech on behalf of the defendant was his job to defend. So what happened after that was that the AG, supplanting the specifically assigned responsibilities of the racial disparities in the criminal and juvenile justice advisory panel implemented a bias against the reporting protocol, with absolutely no input from the impact of communities across the state. Founding on the narrative that the situation in Barrington was a result of law enforcement lacking the upper attitude for a crime, the protocol, it gave way to the emergence of the use of, quote, bias as the third option in the absence of the decision to prosecute a criminal on a civil fraction, exacerbating the problem in a number of ways, including ignoring the history of racial disparities in the justice system, relying on the hope that the state attorney will make the appropriate decision in routing a complaint from a community member that is that decision, whether to rally to the AG, the HRC, the ACLU, the Civil Rights Commission to elect oversight, it fails to take it to account potential misconduct by police. It also supplants the responsibility of the racial disparities advisory panel to implement a public complaint process, as I indicated previously, and it removes control of the access to the data associated with the process. I think we're starting to control, we're starting to understand how important access to data is within the justice system. The attorney general himself, he introduced F-132, an act relating to hate crime and bias incidents, which seems to give the attorney general broader investigation powers in several matters and establishes a working group of law enforcement folks who quote, define bias incidents to establish death practices from crimes and establish a reporting system in developed training. The following day, Julio Thompson introduced in this committee the proposed policy before us was built on the weaponization of the term bias by seeking a rename, Title 1314-55, from a hate-motivating crime to a bias-motivating crime. Essentially, it defied civil penalties with the language from the precise criminal law that was not prosecuted in Burlington, Title 13, 1061. Now, it's worth noting here that F-132 was recommitted to send a judiciary somewhere around the third reading last year. When I offer to you a bill provided by myself on behalf of the racial justice alliance on March 25, 2019, which is also one of the attachments that I sent in the email to the entire committee. It was sent to representative of China, Comer, and Senators Ingram, Lyon, Houston, to Lincoln, as well as the entire House of Government Operations and Judiciary and State of Government Operations and State of Judiciary and Government Operations. I did ask that it be introduced as testimony. Now, the only point in this middle is this thing. And I quote from this March 23rd memo last year sent to the aforementioned, the decision that the law exists to address simple insults, disturbing the peace, stalking, and hate crimes. Civil results are released as also available. The laws must simply be equally prosecuted. The amendment to F-132 that was adopted on March 19, in 2019, we lose Section 1, Title 13, 1466, in its entirety, the removal of the pre-existing language in Subsection A, withdrawing the Attorney General's ability to impose a civil penalty or to jump in relief. A-496, in House Judiciary, is proposing the use of language from Title 13, 1062, to create civil penalty and changing our law-stated hate crime statutes, Title 13, 1455, to a five-motivated crime bill. None of this is helpful in the pope. I'd like to also mention a memo from the group of impacted union members. They include Sifan Gillop, the President of the William County AACP, Talitha Paul Moore, the President of the West Brooklyn AACP, Sha'an Moyer, the founder of I Am Vermont, too, Reway Wayne, of the LGBTQIA alliance of Vermont, and the freedom of Black Lives Matter Vermont. What's the foreword, founder of Vermont is for justice. Vermont is for justice in the Holocaust. Chief Rich Hoshu, I'm sorry about that name, Hoshu, Commissioner of Vermont Commission on Native American Affairs, Amanda Garza, founder of Vermont Coalition for Ethnic and Social Equity Studies, and now outreach and policy coordinator for the Vermont Human Rights Commission, Curtis Reed, Director of Vermont Partnership for Fairness and Diversity, Don Stevens, Chief Noel Hayden Band, and Kusa Abinaki Nation, Sheila Linton, the Roots Social Justice Center, and Marita Canado, migrant justice. Notable from this memo, which you should also have as a third attachment, is this paragraph, and I quote, furthermore, while the creators of H496 express good intent, we feel that the bill is fundamentally flawed in regards to its proposed vertige. For instance, the exchanging the worst hate to buy places people of color in other marginalized groups at risk as it unboats the door, letting those in power define and thus persecute the majority perception of what constitutes bias. It's not uncommon nor unprecedented practice for the most potent bureaucratic structure to utilize gray language to promote their own agenda at the expense of the disenfranchised, thus crafting a weapon with no owner to be used by us or against us. End of quote. In closing, I am prepared to take questions, and I've got a couple of ideas that I wanted to share with you just prior to that. The question really, because with all good intent, what we're trying to do is we're trying to protect vulnerable communities across Vermont. The challenge with the relationship of African-Americans in particular to the law enforcement community and the justice system itself are relationships is that racial disparities don't just exist in the justice system as a propane to our prosecution but also our defense. And what we see here is a very serious, limited situation that is just unraveling in front of us. And it's unfortunate because of the creative distraction turned out to be areas where we can be productive in protecting wider of those who are the most vulnerable. It's unfortunate because a justice system was less unchecked in Bennington. So when the representatives from Bennington and the senators from Bennington introduced these two bills at that time in light of the circumstances that were unraveling in Bennington, when the attorney general introduced this so-called by-attentive reporting protocol, there's certainly a fail-safe in the system that protects us. And we call that really an oversight in law enforcement. So it's not this and what. There are some things that the legislature can do to make us safe. This policy is not one of them. We're calling for the withdrawal of the bias related to the reporting protocol because it doesn't make us any safer. We didn't have anything to do with its construction. And you've heard it all in the impact that it has on us adversely. Just as we said, just as we asked last year, in the general meeting, 25th of March, we are yet calling for withdrawal of H-496. As I said, S-132 has been recommitted to judiciary committee and state. And that was, I believe it was right about the time it was given to go for a third reading. I think that the coordination of consultations impacted communities is very important. And I think that the legislature should play a part in, or at least effectively, overseen. We know that there was a mandate that was placed on the racial disparities in the criminal and juvenile justice advisory panel to interact with communities. So we really have to see that. We also strongly recommend the continued expansion of the Human Rights Commission. They are the apparatus that, because we protect everyone in this state that's not a right fit man, we need to rely upon them and equip them accordingly. None of this stuff is new. Just because what happened in the beginning happened, just because there was a narrative that was created that would cause this to potentially look any other direction doesn't mean that as a state for the last 243 years, we haven't been equipped to deal with the things that we're dealing with right now. We just need to make the system that exists work and when it doesn't, call it into accountability. Mandate the use of force data collection policy and training. Mandate use of force data collection policy and training. That would be H464 on government operations wall right now. I believe that's been taken up, and I do believe there will be further testimony in the upcoming Friday, calling for support. Expand upon justice system data collection. You have on your wall, and I think a week ago began, discussing H284, strongly urge the continuing collection across the remainder of the justice system. Conduct public hearings for civilian oversight of law enforcement. Article 5 and 6 of the Constitution says you work for us, and it also says that we hold law enforcement accountable to you. Rule 25, house rules, state-to-government operation at the top of the state authority. It is our opinion that it must be in deep collaboration with the judiciary if this occurs. We've been calling for public hearings for civilian oversight of law enforcement for the last three years. The conversation usually resonates in partial police and policy discussion. Conduct implementation hearings on Act 9 and Act 54. We know that we've just appointed a racial equity director who has only the support of an unpaid panel and has more work than five people to do for the next five years. We gave her everything except for a cake. It is imperative that now we begin to look towards funding that occurs and growing that capacity for serious about the development of systemic racism across the state and further with Act 54 implementation. Act 54 is not just the racial disparities in criminal and juvenile justice system and rising panel. If you recall, this policy was sourced from your meeting. There was also, in a term in general, a legalized commission task force which issues a stable report on the state of Vermont in terms of the racial disparities across all government systems, including housing, employment, health services act, economic development, and the criminal justice system. So it would be appropriate in now being over two years since that report has been out that we would revisit the product that's been made there, remove the attorney general, you know, Vermont criminal justice training council. This may seem a little curious. However, at all times when it seems that there needs to be a limited oversight to ensure that things are going down the proper track, the implementation of policy, the oversight of the law enforcement practices, the investigation of law enforcement agencies use of force across the state and whatnot, the attorney general is generally calling in as a quote unquote third party, he's interested in third party. And, you know, I've discovered testimonies from Rick Gauntley himself who pushed back on S132 because the attorney general is really only a quote, one vote on the Vermont criminal justice training council, and it would make him an quote, super vote, we'll name that construct. It's important that the attorney general, if he had called upon the oversea and asked if there's law enforcement, that he is not a part of the criminal justice training council, that he'd step up to the criminal justice training council. This would go on, and finally, remove Nancy Sheehan from the state police advisory commission chairmanship. She's been appointed and reappointed. And there are a few people that I've spoken to, they don't really, I mean, there are a few people that I've talked to about that they don't know that she's actually a part of the law firm here in her practice, the state law enforcement folks on a regular course. So I guess, sorry, I got distracted there, but I guess what we're looking at here is, there's no possible way that we can expect impartiality from a lawyer. Who has been law enforcement folks on a regular basis in the course of her regular job during the day, and in the place of the chair of the preeminent, to lead an oversight law enforcement apparatus, to lead an oversight law enforcement apparatus in the state, this apparatus oversees me. One third of the law enforcement officers in the state who cover 90% of the land that's in the state, and she is an attorney in the laborer close to her job, have the same law enforcement officers. Not to mention the fact that she's also a partner in the law firm of TJ's uncle. So we started with this particular people legislation, I just wanted folks to print it. And we just think it's a bad idea with what this is, and with the representatives that are in print, and I'm asking you to share it down. I'll take your question. Thank you, thank you, Mark. Questions? So Mark, I'm gonna have to ask the direct question. This is Coach Christie. Speaking to other, we've asked and invited others to participate in discussing this bill anew. And not all of the witnesses have appeared as yet. But invitations have gone out to pretty much all of the folks that were on that original memo. And we're hearing different positions about the bill and its concept and what it may or may not do to strengthen options for disenfranchised folks. I think in all fairness, we need to hear from the rest of the folks involved in the original list. And before we let's say just conclude the proceeding, so to speak, and that's a fair approach at this point. At least that's my personal feeling. I'm not sure what the rest of the committee's feeling is at this time, but I just needed to share that. Thank you, Coach. If I might respond, I would say that yes, of course, I think it makes a lot of sense to get a lot of perception, to get a lot of perspectives rather. And I think that it's really important to understand that you should expect a lot of, different perspectives. The message that I read to you regarding the concerns about 464, where I quoted that was to affect the gray language. And I've listed maybe about 13 folks across the state and the reason why I didn't sign off on that letter, and this just goes to speak to the differences in how, because we're not, we're not, those are faculty, jury, those folks were people of color, but we're still not in my Olympic category. And just like you, the other people of legislation that you would consider, you really get different perspectives from different people. And I think part of the constructs that we've been kind of painted into is quite often folks with political and economic power as they often expect black and brown people to come in and have this, you know, unprecedented level of consensus on various issues. So we're no different than anyone else. So as you know, you're gonna get different responses from what I was, you know, to share with you as a result of just doing a little research that those 13 folks are on record in opposition to this bill. And I would invite you to call them back in and see if they changed their mind. Well, that's why this is a new round. You know, this isn't the old round of testimony and you're the third or fourth person that's testified in this, you know, round. And requests have gone out to the folks so well taken. I would also add to that and appreciate the opportunity to come back to this full circulation that really, that's not the point at all. What I believe here is that if you lead these deliberations and you're not able to draw a conclusion based upon what has been laid before you and what public records exist and there are more, I've been not saying if they wouldn't kind of provide you everything you would need to see in order to draw a conclusion that we have drawn, certainly we've given you some homework there, but at the end of the deliberations here, if this does not become an oversight deliberation, then I think we have more problems here than we thought. Because at the end of the day, our communities are less safe today as a result of what is called fire prevention. Black and brown people in this state are less safe today and white supremacists are more involved today as a result of it. So if there's going to be some serious work done to protect brown bodies, it's gotta start here. So I'm glad this was uncovered that it was brilliant that this was uncovered, but I think what you're doing is pulling out a thread right now. Salita? Hi Mark, it's Salita. I hope you feel better soon. And good afternoon, Gina. Hi. I just wanted to, I just wanna reflect back to you what I am hearing. I think, I mean, I appreciate all the priorities that you shared and look forward to continuing to work with you on those and talk to you about those. But with regards specifically to age four and me six, I wanna say what I think I'm hearing from you and from some of the previous concerns that were raised and just make sure I'm understanding. So it sounds like one of the concerns about this approach is that we have, that it may, there's a sense that it may dilute the use of existing laws and tools, such as like the hate crime enhancement or stalking laws or some of the other things that you cited and provide like, almost like an off ramp with less serious consequences. Am I understanding that concern accurately? That like there might be that by creating the kind of bias motivated crime and the civil penalty here that we might be giving prosecutors, law enforcement, the attorney general tools, incentive to like not pursue the use of some of those laws that we already have on the big, that might have stronger penalties. Is that part of what I'm hearing you say? There are a number of concerns because first of all, we can't really look at what I'm saying without looking at 132, without looking at that 132. Again, the attorney general introduced that 132 before the day before, the day before who you'll constantly came and introduced the H-196. So there are, these bills are now, you're talking about bias over in the house and the state is crying in it, okay? The state is over here, they're saying that they're putting together a group all law enforcement, by the way. But folks, they're gonna sit down and at the top of their agenda one of the first things they're gonna do here and I'm just letting you know that now page three is to find bias into them. So you're over here in the house talking about something that hasn't even been defined. Okay, so I think that there are a number of challenges here with this approach. And the generalization of the term bias is not the least of it, okay? And yes, I do believe, representative Cobra, that what you're saying is a part of the challenge that we're faced with here, which is why I took you to the genesis. I find it quite ominous that there was a representative from Bennington, two senators from Bennington, and a Vermont criminal justice attorney council executive director from Bennington that were all involved in this project, as far as where we are today. So that makes me a loner. Okay, so I don't, if I can't trust law enforcement on the criminal side that I'm being prosecuted, what makes you think I'm gonna trust them when they're supposed to be protecting me? Okay, so this is all quite obvious. You know, we've got four laws on the books down there that folks are stressing again trying to figure out why they want to prosecute, okay? And why is it that all of a sudden the lexicon of violence became preeminent and prevalent on the heels of that? Okay, but more specifically towards the particular pieces of legislation. Yeah, we've got some, as I said before, the special laws were addressed, stuff like the laws that were prosecuted, like assault, disturbing the peace, stalking, and even hate crimes, they are all on the books. The tools that the attorney general needs to do his job are there, he didn't use them. There's also civil and injunctive releasing, already available, the laws, they just have to be prosecuted. So again, when we start talking about, you know, this whole, down back over to 496 that he's over here for, you know, what is it buying us by calling hate crimes, hate crimes, bias-cruelty crimes? What is that doing to us? You know, the other thing is in the beginning of it, you know, back on page, I think the laws right in front of you, if you go back to page nine of 10, and you look at section two, course of conduct, there's two or more actual peer-to-peer, there's time to sort it and so forth, that language is verbatim about it, title 13, 1061, the very law he never prosecuted me with anything. A criminal law. So, Mark, Mark, this is Maxine, you know, I appreciate your frustration and your comments are helpful in terms of whether we, whether this is the right response, whether we need legislation or whether in fact perhaps something else and many of the things that you referred to certainly are the jurisdiction of government operations and I also appreciate what you said about the Senate. We do our work and the Senate does their work and often we're working on the same things or different things or things, you know, go back and forth. So your testimony has been very helpful to help us understand. I appreciate having the opportunity and I think the last point I was really making about section two back there, is that, you know, this language is the exact same language that comes out of criminal code that the attorney general failed to prosecute in title 13, 1061. This is the exact same language that he failed to prosecute. So what we're doing as representatives of color is yes, just as you said, we're changing hate crimes to bias-intimate reporting crimes and we're also de-escalating criminal charges to civil charges despite the fact that he was not prosecuted even when they were criminals. So this entire mess is incredibly problematic. I thank you for your time this afternoon. Thank you for being patient with me with the phone call and I wish you all a great weekend. Thank you, feel better, feel better, Mark, take care. Take care, Mark. Yeah, thank you. Thank you, coach. Thanks. Bye. Anyways, I guess my, I understand where he's coming from and I think it's pretty clear from his research and his perspective where we should go with this. Or not go. Or not go. Well, I think more about where we should go because the should-go part is hold people's feet to the fire that didn't get their feet held to the fire originally. And that's all he's done talking about. As far as the statutory changes or potential for statutory changes, what we're looking at is still in question. I think, and hearing from the rest of those voices on that list, they think is very important. And from Kyra herself as well, because she's offering testimony from that, from that. And one of the things that we see even from the HRC's perspective, when the board offered her testimony, she spoke about that conflict or between the two jurisdictions, one being the AG's office and the HRC. So, I mean, some of these are inherent problems. And I think until we hear all of the pieces, it's hard to make a decision about anything. It's like information. If we stop here, that's all we got. But if we hear from the other voices that were out on the memo, basically, now we will have an opportunity to balance that information. But that's that kind of our job. Without going to a hearing, hearing from this extravagant list of folks is just, you know, that's where the rubber hits the rubber. Was it bore on that, was bore on that memo? No. No, okay. I would have guessed no because she didn't, she wasn't nearly as strong against it. So, I would have been my guess. Although I did hear her say some of the same things we heard Mark say, which is, and I really wish I had asked her more of a follow-up question, which is actually, I mean, I heard her say pretty clearly, like, I think we do have a lot of tools in our existing law that just weren't used in a particular situation and haven't always been used appropriately, and I just, I don't know. But I could certainly follow up with her individually about that, but I wish I had asked that question more. And then I think it also, like I heard, I didn't share the same priorities, but I definitely heard. And I think if we do have more witnesses and it would be good to explicitly ask, even if some of the priorities I share aren't really the jurisdiction of our committee, like that point was really well taken to me of just how much time are you gonna spend on this or what the change, what change it really affords versus what more effective strategies might, and pieces of legislation might be, so it would be interesting to, as we hear from our witnesses, be really explicit about just kind of consistently asking that question. And it would be great to first look at that annual report and see what their wish that the platform was. Well, it is, when you look at the bills specifically, a lot of them aren't in our jurisdiction. Right. There are a number of bills that are. 496 was not on the list of bills we reviewed. There were... State of the bill. 10. There were about 16 bills that we reviewed at the last meeting. And it's important, 496 was on the list. And as she said, she didn't, we did not decide to speak against it as a commission because it was a commission vote. Let's see, 333 and much prohibiting discrimination based on an individual's criminal history. You know, that. We're good with 284, was he us, and that's here. And those were the only one to, and S-132. So those were the four judiciary bills. She said she's gonna look at these. But the thing is, you know, she can't really speak without the, she works for the commission. Sure, no. So I mean, that means that all of those bills are gonna have to come to an agenda. And, you know, she'll have to prepare her recommendations for the commission. It just feels awkward to be co-signer on a bill that people feel like they didn't have a voice in and that we're doing something to them rather than working with people to come up with. Well, this is part of the reason why the witness list is what it is. And it's the people that were on that list. Because initially, it was a finite, you know, group that started it. And it's, it's like herding cats sometimes. But the bottom line is each of those folks and Mark admitted to us as well, is you might hear differences. Sure, right. But it seems like one thing we're gonna hear in comment is there's worry about some of the ramifications that this bill and people felt excluded from the process. So it just seems like the process is as important as the product. Well, the frustration is, Kaya's situation and the fact that all of these bills that were on the books were not addressed by the people who had the authority to do it. And that is what Mark just clearly shared, okay? And so you could see where there'd be a question about developing a new piece of legislation when the bills that were there weren't really used. Right. And there's more frustration probably about that than there is about anything else. But then also hearing that this bill might not, we could put our energy towards taking up a bigger difference. Well, but here's the rest of the discussion. If we don't hear the other people come to the table, then it puts us in a position where we don't hear that. I agree, it just feels wacky, that's all. Well, it is junky stuff. It's junky stuff for people who don't have to deal with it every day, you know? And when you're in the middle of it, and you're on the phone with these folks and you're in the meetings and on the panels and going to the things. And it's a whole different, you know, like, piece and that's not to short sell, you know, like the work of our committee. What I'm hoping to achieve through us listening to all of these voices is to hear. Because if we stop this bill, you know, right this minute, then we won't hear the other people's perspective, okay? Even if it's partially there, not there, there, whatever it might be. But I think in all fairness to those folks that were on that list, and that's where the witness list came from, basically, are the folks that were on that, you know, on that level. So if you're right, just assume that we're probably gonna hear the more of it. Did Kaya's like, did he have anything on that? Have you ever heard from her? Yeah. I mean, I'm happy to give this a real quick idea of what we're gonna hear from Kaya, because I talked to her on the phone with her. That there are real problems with this bill? That's great that we're hearing about those. That's, I still consider, you know, I understand the concept of process, but I think there's as much a misunderstanding of how bills are induced and what the bills are there for, I guess, to get a conversation going. This is the process. Right. I mean, in many cases, yeah, it's great if you have coordinated stakeholders who are coming together to come up with an idea that we've been run with. We do that. Everybody certainly do that. But in other situations, when there's not coordinated stable results there, you put something out, and this kind of focuses attention. And this has certainly never has been meant to be resolving anything. It's an incremental change as it provides some things. Any of that. Yeah, and we'll hear directly from, I'm assuming that that'll be part of the written testimony, explain what the issues are with this. But there are, and I agree with her that there are, she pointed out some very important issues that, for instance, the big one is that a situation where somebody is being victimized by harassment, well, that harasser can turn this around and use this and sue the victim because the victim is striking out against the exercise of my First Amendment rights to harass you. So I mean, this could actually be used as a tool by a harasser, and I don't know if that makes sense. But she also said that there's an idea that this could be a vehicle for, and it actually wouldn't change it radically, which is interesting. We're not necessarily wrapping away. Where this, it could resolve what Brenda's issue is as well, or one of the things that Brenda Churchill raised, that this could be something that only that the state's attorney or the attorney general can bring an action against somebody for a violation of somebody's constitutional rights. They already can kind of do this, but it could be a civil option instead of a misdemeanor option or a criminal option. Now the criminal option is hate crimes and there's other threatening and there's stalking and there's always none of other things. And there is even a civil option in the discrimination that we have, but this would spell it out a little bit better. And by doing that, this couldn't be a tool used by harasser unless the AG becomes somebody who harasses people. And you could put in here as a civil remedy referral to restorative justice. So I think that's worth pursuing, maybe in this as a vehicle. I don't know if it's timing if we let everybody else come out and steal their eggs against this one first and then come out with something that well here's an alternative that hopefully addresses some of these issues. That's part of the process. And I guess for us, there's still that question that it's like an open sore basically and that it isn't so much this bill as it's the incident. People have not, they've not healed from that whatsoever. It's as open to room as you can get. It hasn't snapped open. Sometimes things take to be so graphic, but it's still there and you could sense it in Mark's research and all of his research has gone towards what did they do that they could have done? Or what, in that, in some of what Kaya talked about like two is that, but you notice she came back around in some of her conversation about this could and even Brenda did. And I think hearing the just coulds or just as important is hearing that people didn't do what they were supposed to do with the old stuff. I would like if this is a tool that would be valid, however this is to that situation, if it's an additional tool, we can't necessarily control the discretion of what I force the state's attorneys and whether they use the tool, the way we control that is what we're trying to do. My view is shed light on what's happening in the transparency, hopefully through the political process since the state's attorneys are elected, that can be what we need, but this is potentially an additional tool, it's not a tool yet for what I'm hearing, but perhaps it can become one of the tools. This is the icky part. Sorry, it was the icky part. Yeah, please, do we have to do it for you? Not what I was expecting, that's for me, so. Anyway. More work, too. A lot more. If it were easier being done already. This is just part of the process. I mean, when you go and you sign on some of these bills, you think you're going somewhere where people want you to go and it's done, you get beat up a little bit and then you tweak it a little bit, right? I mean, that's part of this process that happens in this room. Yes? Yeah. Yeah, that's fine. Great. Anyway, thank you, everybody. Thank you. Yeah, so again, I won't be here next week, but I'll be checking in with you. Thank you, and that's how we'll be your chair. Yeah, and just so everybody knows, if you can be here for 9.30 on Tuesday morning, it's the Martin Luther King Day commemoration that Chief Justice Ryber comes in with a guest and this year is the Honorable Anna Blackburn Rigsby, Chief Judge of District of Columbia Court of Appeals, and she's coming in just to talk about, I believe, her take on Martin Luther King and what it's all about. So 9.30 on Tuesday day. Yeah, thank you for mentioning that. Yeah. So, in this room? Do you mean to Justice Peter Mothable? Was that kind of the Justice Ryber suggestion? I think we have some materials. Oh, yeah. All right, so thank you.