 Good morning, everyone. Thanks for tuning in. We've got several things to discuss today, including our usual vaccine update from Secretary Smith and health update from Dr. Levine. As well, I'm going to briefly highlight our proposal for the nearly $1 billion we'll be receiving from the American Rescue Package and talk about the launch of a very exciting summer program initiative for our kids. We're thrilled to be joined virtually by Senator Sanders, who's been a great partner and advocate on this issue, and it's a priority we both share. So first, as you know, last month, Congress passed President Biden's signed the American Rescue Package. As part of this proposal, Vermont will receive over $1 billion to help invest in our state and build a foundation for long-term recovery and prosperity. We're very fortunate to have a powerful congressional delegation representing us. Senator Leahy, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, and Senator Sanders, who chairs the Budget Committee, and Congressman Welch, who is well respected on both sides of the aisle. Their work has given Vermont a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make strategic, transformative, and tangible investments on priorities we share to build a more prosperous and equitable future for our state. Earlier this week, I outlined my plan for how I'd like to spend this billion dollars. First, access to affordable, high-speed broadband is an economic necessity in the 21st century. This is something we've all known for years, but it's become even more apparent during the pandemic, as many Vermonters worked remotely and more kids had to work and learn online. I'm proposing we invest more than $250 million to expand rural broadband so that all corners of the state are connected. Second, I'm recommending spending another almost $250 million for the largest housing investment in our state's history. Access to safe and affordable housing is another area of need that we've struggled with, and has been a regular topic in Montpelier and communities across the state. Because of the pandemic, nearly 2,000 Vermonters experiencing homelessness have been living in hotels and motels over the last year. My plan would significantly increase our shelter capacity and construct permanent housing for those in need. It also builds more than 5,000 housing units to help middle-income families who've been priced out of the market. Third, we know climate change is a major threat to our planet and to our economy. My plan invests $200 million by far the largest climate investment in our state's history to help reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and enhance resiliency. We also know that many communities struggle with aging or non-existing water, sewer and stormwater infrastructure and can't afford it on their own. My proposal provides $170 million to make these critical investments, improving quality of life, attracting economic opportunities, while also reducing pollution, and adding to what we already spend to clean up our lakes, streams and waterways. Lastly, I'm proposing $143 million for economic development, helping those struggling small businesses who've been hit hard by the pandemic rebuild and recover, and giving communities the tools they need to build a solid foundation so they can succeed long into the future. Now, I'm happy my vision and these priorities are shared by many in the legislature, but I also know they'll have some of their own ideas as well. I look forward to working with them in order to take advantage of this once in a lifetime opportunity to make monumental and transformative investments which will build a stronger future. And again, I want to thank Senator Sanders and the rest of our congressional delegation for their work laying the groundwork for this incredible opportunity. Next, the reason Senator Sanders has joined us today is to discuss a priority we both share, which is to give all Vermont kids safe, enriching, impactful, and fun summer opportunities. My team, the Agency of Education, Senator Sanders office, and other partners have been working with Vermont after school to expand accessibility and options for Vermont families this summer. Here's why this is so important. As you've heard us talk about before, this has been a tough year for our kids. Less in-person learning, the loss of connection with friends and classmates, the lack of nutritious meals, physical education, sports, drama, music, clubs, and other social events. So at the end of the pandemic and site, we want to do whatever we can to give our kids a great summer to replace some of what they've lost. Today, we're announcing our plan to expand programming so more families have access to these summer options and grant funding to help make this a reality. Deputy Secretary Boucher will go into further detail about how this will work and where Vermonters can find options. This summer, as we begin to transition to more normalcy, this will not only be a great opportunity for our youth, but a great opportunity for our communities to be creative as well. Working together, we can have a huge impact and help our kids in so many ways. With that, I'll now turn it over to Senator Sanders, who's been a passionate advocate for this and for Vermont kids. I thank you, Senator Sanders, for being with us. Well Governor, thank you very much for the opportunity to say a few words. Thank you for your leadership during this terrible, terrible year. Let me thank the legislature. Let me thank our state employees, our teachers, and all Vermonters who have come together in what has been the most difficult year in our lifetimes. As the governor indicated, last month at five o'clock in the morning after a 16-hour debate, the American Rescue Plan was passed by one vote. That legislation, in my view, is one of the most significant pieces of legislation to help working families pass in a very, very long time. As all of you know, it includes $1,400 per person direct payment. That's $5,600 for a family of four. It extends unemployment benefits with a $300 supplement through September. It does something very, very important also in expanding Governor the Child Tax Credit. As I think we all know, childhood poverty in America is much too high. We think that expanding the Child Tax Credit will lower childhood poverty in America by up to 50 percent. And obviously, we put billions of dollars into vaccines and the need to get vaccines in the arms of the American people. Last Sunday, in the United States, 4 million people were vaccinated on one day. We've got a long way to go, but we are making progress. We're able to expand community health centers in that bill, so very important for Vermont. As the governor indicated, what we also did is addressed a long-standing problem, but one that has been terribly exacerbated by the pandemic. This has been a very difficult year for everybody. It has been especially difficult for the young people. Kids have not had regular schooling. Some have not been to school at all or just part-time. They have not been able to be with their friends. Kids who are going to college are worrying about how they're going to get the credits that they need. Kids who are looking forward to getting jobs are worried about that as well. And on top of that, we have had a long-standing problem in this country in terms of after-school activities. In my view, and I speak for myself, we're about 100 years behind. All over America, in the state of Vermont, mom goes to work, dad goes to work, school ends at 2.33 o'clock. What happens to the kids? And I think there is a growing understanding that we have got to strengthen our after-school program as well. With all of those factors in mind, the especially difficult year that we have had and the chronic problems we've had with summer programming, inadequate funding, after-school program, of what we were able to do in this American Rescue Plan is significantly increased funding for summer programs, after-school programs, and enrichment programs for kids in general. And by significant increase, I'm talking about a tripling of funding over the next three years. That means the state of Vermont will see above and beyond normal funding some $71 million dollars for summer programs, after-school, and enrichment programs. And that is on top of the normal funding that comes into the state. And God knows I think that money is needed. And I look forward to working with the government and the legislation to make sure that we spend it in the most imaginative, creative, and cost-effective way possible. Now, what do we want to accomplish? I think the governor already made some of the key points. Number one, this money is going mostly to school districts around the state. So my appeal to school districts is we have got to make these programs affordable or free. My own preference will be actually making them free. Every family in the state of Vermont, regardless of their income, should know that come this summer, they're going to be really great programs available for their kids. And no matter what the income of that family is, those kids are going to be able to get into that program. That is enormously important. Second of all, and Governor touched on this as well, clearly there's going to have to be a strong academic component to the summer programs. Kids have lost schoolwork. Summer programs are going to have to help them make that up. We want some intellectual enrichment programs for several decades now. I think beginning on the governor's spelling. We've had the Governor's Institute, which has really been very, very successful summer programs where kids have been able to get education above and beyond, whether it's engineering, whether it's social studies, math, whatever it may be. And I hope that this funding will be able to expand that program and make it more affordable for our kids. I have talked to a number of young people. There is in this state a great interest in the arts and theater and music. And I hope we can inject that into the summer programming as well. And for those kids who may have developed some special problems during this difficult year of isolation, I hope we will be able to reach out to our mental health staff around the state to get their help as well. But in addition to academics, obviously we want a strong recreational program. I suspect many of the school districts will be working with their parks and rec departments that will need a strong recreational component. Also, I think that for many of the older kids, there will probably be an employment component as well. There are families that have lost income who may need to make that up over the summer. Kids want to put aside a few bucks for college or whatever. And also there is the opportunity to do apprentice-like programs with the private sector, maybe jobs created through the state and doing some important work where the kids can learn as they do it. So my appeal to school districts around the state is this has been an unprecedented year and we have got to respond in an unprecedented way. We have the resources. Let us be creative. Let's work together to come up with programs that become a model for this country. And after we do that this summer, let's develop the reform after-school programs, which are so terribly important as well. We have the funds to do that now. So Governor, thank you very much for the opportunity to join you this morning. I look forward to working with you. Thank you very much, Senator Sanders. And this is just a prime example. It doesn't matter your politics. There's always a way to come together. There's a common thread that we use this all together. And in this regard, we're on the same page. And I can't thank Senator Sanders enough for creating this opportunity for us for this summer. With that, I'm going to introduce Heather Boucher, our Deputy Secretary of Education, to go over more details of this tremendous opportunity. Thank you, Governor. Good morning. I'm pleased to announce the formal launch today of a new initiative designed to ensure that all Vermont students have accessible opportunities for enrichment and fun, as you've heard about already this morning, while also, of course, staying safe in the coming months. As Governor Scott noted, we believe this summer is a critical time for us to come together, continue to move forward after our collective experiences with COVID-19, and above all, celebrate and enjoy all that our beautiful state has to offer. And it was a pleasure to see Senator Sanders echo the sentiments as well. What will this look like for families and students? First, as you've already heard, we want every child and every adolescent to have access to something fun and engaging this summer, whether that is a full-time parks and recreation or camp experience, a summer internship or pre-apprenticeship for our older youth, combined school and community summer programming, immersion in a favorite or new activity through local library offerings, or simply taking advantage of the beautiful natural opportunities our gorgeous state offers. We want all children and youth to participate in something great this summer, no matter their age, their family background, or financial resources, their primary language, geographic location, ability status, or specific interests. To accomplish this vision, Vermont AOE is partnering with Vermont After School and personnel from the state departments of health, mental health, voc rehab, and fish and wildlife, in addition to educators and practitioners in the field, to substantially expand offerings for children and youth this summer. First, we'll be using state set-aside dollars, and you heard a little bit about those from Senator Sanders, to launch a new grant program to expand both the number of available slots and the length of summer programming. All types of nonprofit organizations, community partnerships and programs, and school community collaborative endeavors, will be able to apply for funds to provide programming for more students for more hours in the days or days in the week than previously available. We're especially interested in applications that build in more affordability and accessibility for students and families. You also heard that echoed by the two previous speakers this morning. We're also strongly encouraging and supporting new partnerships in regions of the state that have had difficulty offering summer programming before now. And we'll have more details available in the days ahead about specific application procedures, eligibility criteria, allowable expenses, and technical assistance and supports certainly to accomplish this expansion. Second, we are excited to offer a new website, Summer Matters, pulling together all aspects of this summer initiative in one place. If you go to the next. There are specific parts of this website that are tailored for youth and students. Again, as mentioned, they'll be able to look for summer jobs that are available. We know that staffing of a summer expansion is critical and so we're hopeful that through partnerships with youth looking for summer employment, we can find the sweet spot there. And then if you go to the next slide, another important feature is a state map that is really critical for families and also youth to be able to see, no matter their region, what opportunities are available. And families and youth will be able to actually click in on one of these dots and find, which we can't do right now because this is a screenshot, which and they'll be able to get a real nice summary of all the different features for each of those particular sites. Things like meal availability, the weeks and duration and hours of the experience, any accommodations for participants, and then as I said, available jobs for youth and much more. And as you can see, we are striving toward full state coverage. However, there are still a couple of areas with relatively few opportunities on the map and we'll be actively communicating with potential partners, organizations and entities in these areas to provide assistance for standing up summer programming. Third, we're also offering a variety of professional learning opportunities for existing and new programs this summer focused on safe and healthy operations, best practice activities, and ensuring that summer enrichment opportunities accommodate students from all backgrounds, including students with disabilities. We've developed a checklist to assist summer programs in moving towards safe, inclusive operations in the coming months. To close, I strongly encourage our local school districts and community organizations to collaborate in designing and offering innovative and rich experiences for our students this summer. We know that everyone is tired and certainly needs a rest after navigating this year, but this summer also presents a critical, critical opportunity for us to further assist students and their families in healing and well-being. And I know that we all share a commitment to ensuring that our students are as well as they can be. The requirements and purpose of federal ESSER dollars indicate that our summer matters activities should be a core part of each district's recovery planning and implementation strategies. We urge districts and schools to use their local ESSER recovery funds to design engaging opportunities, incorporating both education and fun activities in the broader community or region. I'll also reiterate that more information is forthcoming on how to access grant funds and attend professional learning opportunities. AOE will continue to work with districts on school-based programs as part of our broader recovery planning efforts, and families should continue to reference this new website, which we'll provide the link to, for up-to-date information about options available in their specific region. I'll now turn the podium over to Secretary Smith for his update. Thank you, Deputy Secretary, and good morning, everyone. Today I'll provide an update on our progress with the vaccination program and tell you about a new federal resource to assist Vermonters that may have lost a family member due to COVID-19. As I mentioned at the last press conference, we opened up registration for Vermonters age 40 and older as of Monday. As of this morning, 28,100 Vermonters in this age group have made appointments turning to BIPOC Vermonters and their household members. 5,353 individuals have made appointments to date on the state's registration site. We are moving in the right direction, but as I said on Tuesday, we need more BIPOC community members to sign up. You can make an appointment at one of our health partner clinics through the state website at healthvermont.gov-slash-my-vaccine. If you aren't able to sign up online, you can call 855-722-7878. Press 1 if you need interpreter services. Overall, in terms of our overall progress, as of this morning, 244,400 people have been vaccinated in Vermont against COVID-19. 88,200 have received their first dose of vaccine. 156,200 have received their first and last doses. I also want to share another Essex County update. Upper Connecticut Valley Hospital in Colbrook, New Hampshire will begin vaccinating Vermonters on Mondays beginning April 19th. We are very appreciative of this new partnership. We can make appointments, you can make appointments, and again this is going to sound familiar because I'm going to say it multiple times throughout my remarks through the state website at healthvermont.gov-slash-my-vaccine. If you are unable to sign up online, you can call 855-722-7878. Moving on to homebound individuals, 3,671 have received their first dose of vaccine. Those that are homebound and qualify for a vaccine can call. It's a different number, so just I want to point that out that this is a different number to call. If you're a homebound individual to get a vaccine, 833-722-0860, Monday through Friday from 830-430 for an appointment. And a quick pharmacy update. A few more pharmacies have joined the federal pharmacy program. SHAWS will begin vaccinating Vermonters today, and Rite Aid and Price Chopper will begin vaccinating on Monday, April 12th. As a reminder, for those aged 30 and older, registration for your age group will open on Monday, April 12th at 8.15 a.m. I'll wrap this up by letting you know that beginning April 12th, as part of the federal COVID-19 emergency relief package, financial assistance will be available for families who have lost a loved one due to COVID-19. Under the funeral assistance program, those who have paid funeral expenses for loved ones whose death was attributed to COVID-19, they can qualify for up to $9,000 in reimbursement, and those who have lost more than one family member can qualify up to $35,000 in reimbursement. For more information about eligibility requirements and to complete an application, please call the Federal Emergency Management Agency hotline at 844-684-6333. Online registration is not available. We are very sorry for your loss. At this time, I'll turn it over to Dr. Levine for a health update, but I just want to remind 30 and older Monday you can register. Thank you very much. Good morning. As you may have noticed with our data, we are still seeing fluctuating, sometimes higher case numbers in Vermont on some days reaching into the 200s. Yesterday was 145. Our positivity rate is at 2.0%. We are fortunately down to 23 hospitalizations as of today, seven patients in the ICU. There was one additional death, a sad reminder to us all that the virus is still here, raising our total to 231. I've talked about the various factors we believe are driving this increase. For some, a willingness to take more risks. In other cases, gathering more. Pandemic fatigue. Feeling like the pandemic is over, even though we're not quite there yet. And of course, I've mentioned the variants of concern, which do make the virus more transmissible from person to person. The variants we found in Vermont include B117, B1429, and as I mentioned on Tuesday, the P1 variant. We are finding B117 much more frequently now in both samples selected because they were having a higher probability of showing B117, as well as in randomly selected specimens. This is entirely consistent with the CDC's proclamation that the strain is indeed becoming the dominant strain across the country. It also confirms the wastewater data validity that we've had. Regarding the P1 specimen, this was actually found in a New Hampshire resident who was being tested in Vermont. But as with all the variants, we should assume this means it may be circulating in our state, as the virus, of course, knows no borders. With variants in the picture, Vermonters should know that high case counts and outbreaks are likely to continue in the very near future, primarily affecting people who are not fully vaccinated. That means our younger populations who are not eligible for vaccination yet. And I have to still emphasize the incredible success of our vaccine program to date with very, I won't call it rare, but uncommon cases in the over 65 age set and even less common adverse outcomes in terms of hospitalizations or deaths. This will continue as we get lower and lower in age band across the population. But we still face these same challenges, so I again need to say this pandemic is not yet over. We can't let the virus spread faster than we can get Vermonters vaccinated. Mass unfaces, six foot spaces, uncrowded places is more important than ever right now. Certainly stay outside when you can, keep your social social circles small, have the COVID talk to set any boundaries before you have any get together, and get vaccinated as soon as you are eligible. This includes people who have had COVID-19. We don't want to have you rely only on the immunity from having had COVID, because we don't know precisely how long it lasts, although probably six or more months. Getting vaccinated will boost that immunity and give people better protection that much of the scientific community believes is longer lasting. We've now laid out Vermont's path to reopening, but it will only work if Vermonters are truly committed to helping us get there. And speaking of that pathway forward, I want to note that the state's new travel guidance begins today. The CDC continues to recommend delaying travel until you are fully vaccinated, especially now when there are still high levels of virus. But if you do travel, make sure you understand Vermont's new policy. If you are a visitor to Vermont, you will need to get tested three days before you come here. If the test is negative, you may come visit the state armed with your documentation of your negative result. If you happen to be a Vermonter who has left for a week's vacation and is coming back to the state, you need to get tested in Vermont within the three days of your return, counting the return day as day zero. Counting the return day as day zero. A quarantine period is no longer required for travel, but I want to emphasize that you should still be following all of the basic public health guidance. That means if you have any symptoms, stay home and stay away from other people until you receive a negative test result. Even if the test you got within the three-day travel window was negative, if you start to not feel well, stay home and get another test. And of course, if and when you are out of state, abide by our universal guidance to stay safe and protected. As the governor said on Tuesday, we believe the testing strategy will be easy to follow with so much testing available to Vermonters, so we expect we'll see more compliance and catch cases a little earlier. This new travel guidance is now available on our website at healthvermont.gov slash COVID-19. On this same note, I'd like to remind students and families who may have school vacation coming up to review the new travel guidance and avoid large gatherings whatever your activities may be during your break. Following the same basic prevention guidance is critical to a safe return to school afterward. Help protect your family, your school and your community at this time while virus spread is still ongoing. Let me end with two public health topics quickly. The first of these is something we've discussed frequently and quite accurately based on yesterday's CDC announcement and it regards surfaces and the virus. The three take-home messages are, one, the risk of contracting the virus from surfaces is quite low, possibly as low as one in 10,000. Two, transmission of the virus is almost always by breathing. It is airborne. Masking is way more important than disinfecting surfaces. And three, when you do clean and disinfect, soap and water are probably all you need. Finally, and important to me, I want to acknowledge that this has been National Public Health Week. Probably not something that's on everybody's radar screen at this point in time and that you don't all celebrate in the same way we in the public health world do. But I hope in this unprecedented pandemic, you'll join me in recognizing the incredibly hard work of our public health staff. Even throughout the past year of this emergency response, we've tried to keep a focus on one of our main public health goals for all people to have a fair and just opportunity to live a long and healthy life. We've much work to do on this front. Public health never sleeps, but when it comes to COVID work, we would like to take the opportunity to thank a number of our partners and grassroots organizations who have played a key role in equitable outreach efforts. Some of these include the Association of Africans Living in Vermont, the US Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, the UVM LEND program, NAACP for Wyndham County and Rutland Area chapters, the Racial Justice Alliance, the Vermont Professionals of Color Network, the Black Perspective, the Cities of Burlington and Winooski, Bridges to Health, Open Door Clinic, Little Rivers Health Care, Vermont Developmental Disabilities Council, the Clemens Family Farm, the Abundant Community Liaisons from the Vermont Public Schools, and I'm sure there are many more. So to all of the volunteers, interpreters, cultural brokers, community members who have poured their hearts into this work, we extend our utmost gratitude for all you have done and continue to do to support Vermont communities. Governor. Thank you, Dr. Levine. We'll now open it up to questions. All right. Just to know for folks that some of your families got pulled away, so we will not be available for the questioning and solicitation. We'll open up in room with Kristina, somebody's here. All right. Good morning, Governor. I wanted to ask you a little bit more about the summer programming. So there's a lot of opportunities here, a lot that's being offered and a lot that's already in place. But how can you ensure that families will actually sign up and get involved in these programs, especially those that may not feel like it fits for them and their family? Yeah, we're very excited about the program, obviously. And that's part of our challenge and as well, maybe some of you could help us out. We want to make sure that we touch every child in Vermont and every family and provide for different opportunities that fit them. And so I think there's a lot to do between now and then. But I think it can be accomplished and again, it's a great opportunity and to give back to some of what they may have lost. But I may ask Secretary Boucher to comment further. Thank you, Governor. Yes, that's an excellent question. It's a core part of our strategy is to actually get sort of a campaign out there so that families know a lot more about these opportunities. I think it's important to point out three important facts. So some are safe. So these are going to be safe opportunities for students and children and adolescents. Summer is important. This is a really important time for families to really think about getting new opportunities, enrichment for their kids. And then finally, it's accessible. And so we really mean it when we say we're trying to reach all corners of the state and you have our commitment that we're trying to do that as hard as we can. And it's also affordable. So accessibility and affordability are really critical for us. Thanks. And also a quick note and Secretary Boucher touched on this before, but this isn't just a top down approach, right? This is a grassroots approach. So many of the communities need to get creative for the schools and other programs that exist right now. We want you to expand. We want you to enhance. We want to provide a longer duration at a price and an affordable price because we have the money in the ESSER funds to provide for that. So I think, again, there's a lot of opportunity if you think creatively about this. I have one quick follow up. And is this program very COVID specific and temporary? Or can this be also a permanent solution moving forward in the next few years to the education that may have been lost over the past year? Interesting. This is good for three or four years. So the same as what we're envisioning for the recovery plan that I laid out this week over a three or four year period. This is the same, but this money will continue as well. This fits in very nicely with the my administration's approach. You may remember it was right before COVID hit. I presented our budget and the state of the state and our budget back in January of 20. And we talked about after school programming. This was something that was initiative of my administration that we wanted to provide for this because we think that this is something that's missing. And we identified like three sources of funding to make this happen. Those sources of funding still exist. The legislature didn't take us up on that opportunity, obviously COVID hit, but they're still there. So we want to make sure that we learn from what we're doing over the next three or four years and possibly make this much more permanent in the future. Governor on that programming is the funding going to be allowed to be used with programs that are sponsored by faith based groups or or anything like that? Or are those kind of excluded? You know, interesting. You asked that. I asked the same question yesterday and and I'm not sure that I had the answer, but Secretary Boucher probably does. Thank you, Governor. Yes, we actually requested assistance directly from U.S. Department of Education to find out whether we could actually award these particular dollars to private that is non non-profit organizations. And the answer was yes. So we are happy to say that this will be a very wide call for applications. And we again will have much more information on eligibility, but this isn't really meant to close down options or it's really meant to expand. Thanks. If I may, Governor, I wanted to address the initial the question before you. So just so everyone knows in the third bucket, so ARPA funding, there are actually required set-asides so so required funding that has to be required to actually fund after school summer programming and expansion of the kinds of things that we're talking about today at both the local level and at the state level. So this will be a continued effort, as the governor said, for the next three to four years for certain. We're required to. Thanks. Since the announcement that you made of the opening, we've received a couple of a couple of notes from students at Northern Vermont University saying that they're kind of disappointed with the university because they are still insisting on a virtual graduation when they have shown your program to them and said, hey, I think we can do this now. Any advice for them? Yeah. Well, again, you know, we're coming to a point where we see a path to normalcy by the 4th of July. That could even be accelerated depending on, you know, the supply of vaccine and the numbers and the hospitalizations, deaths and so forth, all the indicators that we're contemplating. But I would ask, you know, these some of the institutions, the educational institutions to reflect on what you can do. And I know that maybe a month ago it didn't look possible, but I think it is possible at this point in time. So I'm not going to get in the way of telling them what to do, but I am asking them to be flexible, reflect on the information we have today and where we think we're going to be and see if they can provide for that more normal graduation that is so important in the lives of our kids and our students. Good morning. Could you give us an update on K-12 school reopenings? You said April's the month. Is that going to happen? I would refer to Secretary Boucher on that. Thank you, Governor. I believe the question, so schools are open already. So I just want to clarify that they have been for several months. I think what you might be referring to is more in-person instruction. So yes, we're very excited that it's now safe to have a minimum of three feet distance between students, and we think that that should certainly spur activity at the local level to get more students into in-person instruction. That's, you know, that's really why we wanted to really get the word out on this. You know, we all know, including our local leadership, education leadership, that what's what's best for students is in person. And so I think we're all committed to really getting as many students as we can, you know, back to a sense of normalcy. Even if it is just for the last few months of this year, it's still really important. So I think we're on a good trajectory for that. Well, when you say good trajectory, how do you have pockets of resistance? What percentage of schools do you expect we'll offer full in-person classroom instruction by the end of this month? So I think, as folks probably know, we do a monthly survey that actually collects the information on what the learning disposition is at our school and district level. So how many students are remote? How many are fully in-person? That data hasn't, we're not quite there yet. I think we'll have a great answer for that in probably a week or two when we have that new survey data. Okay, thanks. Again, Stuart, just what we'd asked the districts, obviously these are local decisions they'll have to make. And but we've met a lot of challenges thus far, providing for vaccinations of teachers and staff. That was something we saw an incredible interest in, as well as a high uptake. And I don't know what the percentage was, but I was surprised at the number. Yeah, over 80% uptake of the taking advantage of the vaccinations. So that's great news for us. But I again would ask them the same, the districts and school boards. We heard from Ed up in Newport on Tuesday, and there seems to be a little resistance up in the northeast part of our state. But but I'd ask them to reflect on what's safe, listen to the health experts, Dr. Levine, Dr. Calso, and see if there's a way to bring kids back into school. Because even if it's just for a short period of time, and when I say that another month or two, it will make all the difference in the world to kids. And then we can offer the other opportunity for summer school programs and so forth. And then we can get all that exercise and then start out in September back to normal. Thanks, Governor. Thanks, Rebecca. Can you hear me? Okay. We can hear you just fine, Lisa. Okay, great. Thanks. So will school see releasing this information to students and families about all the summer programming opportunities in their areas? Or is the website really the place to go for here? I think it's going to be all the above, but Secretary Boucher can answer that. Yeah, sure. That's a great question. Thank you. So as you saw, the first strand of our push is this website, which is available to all. As I said, it's targeted primarily for students and students and families at the moment. But yes, the reason we have such a close partnership on this across different state agencies, but also with some practitioners in the education field. We've got some principles. We're certainly we'll work in partnership with the Vermont Principles Association, Vermont Superintendent's Association, and our own regular connections to make sure that our pre-K-12 education system is fully aware of this initiative. I think that's why you've heard today some direct messaging to them about, you know, possible use of their funds and the real need to do this. And I would say I think many of them are eager to do this work. They're directly reaching out to me. Many of them are already doing this work, I should say. And so we actually want them to be we want we want others who are perhaps still planning to think about these partnerships. Just as an example, one of the neat ways we're seeing this start to happen is that school sort of academic type activities are happening in the morning. These are the plans for the summer with arrangements being made so that students will then go on to parks and rec, other kinds of day camp or other kinds of association or organizational activities for kind of the fun part. Not that education isn't fun. We think it's fun too. But I do think there's a lot of receptivity to this. I do think that many of our local education leaders are they understand the importance of this and they're eager to actually learn more. And where's we stand at the agency prepared to certainly get the word out directly to them. Thanks. Okay, thank you. And Deputy Secretary, do you expecting next year to see more students having to repeat a grade? Yeah, that's the start of next year. Any idea, yeah? Yeah, that's a that's also a great question. It's certainly something that is on our mind. So at the agency, we're very interested in assisting our local education agencies that is our school districts with being as flexible, as kind to our students as possible, who are, you know, who have navigated this pandemic. I would say earlier in this probably late fall, winter, we were hearing a lot more angst, if you will, from the field about what students had actually missed and whether they would be able to catch back up. I think the focus of our recovery efforts given that it's on well being plus engagement plus academics is really critical. You'll hear sort of nationally that people are less focused on what's called learning loss and more on unfinished learning, which actually then allows the leadership at the local level to really figure out what is most critical for students to actually know, you know, it might not make sense to have the same, it probably doesn't make sense to have the same exact number of requirements, for instance, that you that are needed for graduation that you had prior to COVID. So we stand ready to assist local entities in terms of figuring out what is the best approach. We certainly are not getting a sense from the local level that that districts principles are interested in, you know, failing a bunch of students. That's certainly not something that any of us are, you know, okay with. So I think more to come, but it is definitely something that we're concerned about. We're working with our education partners to actually figure out what we can do about that. And we'll certainly report back on you back to you more on that. Okay. Thank you, Rebecca. Good morning, Governor. I'm wondering now that most school employees have been vaccinated or I mean, at least the ones that want to. I'm wondering what the plan is to get performing arts back to normal in Vermont schools. Secretary Boucher. Thank you, Governor. We did release some data or some data, some guidance. I think in the past few months, I'm looking at Commissioner Levine that will that allows music to be happening. So that is really important to highlight again that students are able to participate in many more music activities. You know, a lot of the classroom art activities will be able to follow this current guidance that came out this week. So that should actually allow some more flexibility in how students can access arts in the classroom. Then I would also say with the advent of our beautiful weather, it's really important for our districts and schools to be thinking about opportunities outside. And that doesn't just include physical education. It certainly can include all types of experiences that could be linked to arts. So I think again, it's a great question. I think following the opening up based on our current guidance in terms of vaccination and in terms of minimum distance that we're actually going to be able to open up much more opportunities in the arts broadly defined for students. Yes. And as the Governor just reminded me, that will certainly be a focus of our summer activities. So I didn't mention that directly, but that would certainly be something that we'd be excited, particularly in terms of affordability and accessibility to support arts adventures and experiences for many more students. Okay, thank you. Governor, I'm under the understanding that there's a bill making its way through the legislature to regulate contractors in the state. I'm told that this bill and the associated registration costs that would go along with it would affect everybody, including nonprofits like Habitat for Humanity, which is essentially going to tax the not-for-profit entity like that. Do you support this bill? Yeah, Greg, you know, I'm aware of the bill going through. I don't know if it's even made it through the House, but I know that it's being contemplated, and I just don't know where the bill is. In the past, I have not been an advocate for this, and I understand the reasons why many think it's essential, but I am a little concerned about what this does to some of the smaller contractors throughout the state. So we'll take a look at whatever ends up passing. We will, obviously, be engaged in trying to provide as much information as possible and trying to engage for monitors to find out how they feel about it. But I think some of the issues revolving around the pandemic, particularly this year, is the lack of opportunity for everyday citizens to engage with the legislature when bills like this are being contemplated. And so contemplated. So I'm looking forward to a much more normal legislative session next year where the state house is open and that people can come in and testify and understand what's happening in the legislative process. And this isn't a criticism of the legislature at all. They're dealing with remote legislating, just like the rest of us are doing in our everyday, whether it's remote learning or remote legislating, it's not ideal. And they know that. And so, again, I hope this is an area that maybe could wait so that everyone has their opportunity to make their voices known and their feelings known. Thank you, Governor and staff. Have a great weekend. Thanks. Hi. I was wondering if you had some more specifics beyond. We know that the age range of where we're seeing the infections right now is 18 to 29 range. But I'm wondering if you have more specifics on any industries or occupations that are where you're seeing higher rates of infection? I'll let Dr. Levine weigh in. But I take a look at this on a daily basis. And I'm struck by how broad it is. And I think that goes back to, you know, I don't believe this is being spread within some of the businesses that I'm seeing or the entities I'm seeing. I think it's just about the community spread from outside those entities and they're bringing it into those those particular sectors. But maybe Dr. Levine has a different perspective. I don't have a different perspective at all, Governor. We are certainly aware that when something occurs in a business or a work site, it's often a reflection of what happened in the community that impacted that one individual who then shows up at work feeling fine but not realizing their infections until after they develop their symptoms. So it becomes a case that we want to check out the work site, obviously, and make sure that nothing has spread. But it usually turns out that people are doing the right things to protect themselves. And it's a case that's isolated and doesn't involve any broader implications to the work site itself, or if it's a public facing business to the public who might be frequenting that business. We aren't really seeing any specific trend in any specific sector of business, if you will. And nothing that's so dramatic that we would immediately say, gee, there's an entire workforce that's at higher risk than another workforce in the state because that's not really what the data is showing us. I also want to provide some encouraging news looking at the state as a whole. Cases are subtly starting to diminish over time. And we, for the first time that I've been looking at the data, pretty much every county is aligned with each other. And they're all going in a slight downward direction. There aren't any counties as of today that look markedly different than the rest of the state in terms of their numbers of cases going upward. Yes, there are counties that have more than the average for the state in terms of cases, and counties that have less than the average, but they're all trending in the same direction. Does that help you? It does. I mean, I just, you know, it seems Vermont, I mean, we are experiencing some of the highest case trends we've had throughout the entire pandemic, and we're seeing it so concentrated in an age demographic. And it just, it feels to me like, you know, I'm just trying to find some more information beyond just broadly an age group. It seems sort of sudden and a little surprising to a lot of folks to see that number ticking up and not have anything to go on other than it's just an age group and they haven't been vaccinated. So I just wasn't sure what trends you were seeing. And if you were going to focus at their vaccination messaging or any other sort of mitigation messaging towards certain areas of a population. Yeah, no, I think you've hit hit hit the nail on the head there. It's really the bottom line is there are less people in an older demographic to become infected because they become vaccinated. And the younger demographic is a more socializing demographic who may be in more circumstances that would enable them to be more susceptible to getting the virus transmitted than the older. I hate to oversimplify it, but that that's really what it comes down to. Okay, thanks a lot. Thank you. Thanks, Rebecca. Governor, I was wondering if there was some way that reader is inquired if there's some public education outreach to kids and teenagers who are afraid to go to school, afraid to go out in public, afraid to immerse themselves in society, you know, as we try to come out of this thing. One reader wrote that she thought someone in a powerful and prominent position needed to reassure children that school is safe, that they're safe in the world, the danger of COVID has always been to sort of older and more vulnerable, not the kids and young adults yet. She believes there is a subset of children that are still afraid of this disease due to misinformation, misconstrued statistics, lack of reassuring messages from those out there in public health sector. So, I mean, is there something that you or, I don't know, Champ or somebody that can really well to kids and tell these people that might be afraid of needles in society and what's going on? Yeah, no, I think it's a good point. You know, we spent the last 14 months making sure people understand the dangers associated with this disease and how it could affect our way, it did affect our way of life, our economy, our health and especially in the older populations. So now that we're seeing light at the end of the tunnel, it's time to emerge from that. We need to be cautious over the next two or three months, but there is going to be a time when we can get back to normal. And that's part of what we're talking about today with these summer school programs. We want kids to get back to normal, to doing something fun, something interesting. And I think this is a great way of messaging that it's okay to get out and be with your friends and get out into more of a social atmosphere. So hopefully we can do that. But I'm going to ask Secretary Boucher to also give her thoughts. Thank you, Governor. Yeah, it's a great question. Seeing some of this picked up in the national media as well, some kind of new terminology for it. It's really critical. I think that's why we are trying to actually get the word out certainly that everything that we're doing is safe. Nothing has changed about the way we at the state make decisions about what opens, what new regulations are in place, including the latest regulation from the agency's that has come out and also our summer programming, as the governor said. So I just want families and even students to hear directly from me as your Deputy Secretary of Education that we would not be actually moving in this way if we did not think that it was safe to do so. And I think that's really important. The other thing I would say is that who students and even families really look to for assurance is their family members, but also their teachers and their school leaders. So we can certainly, we're happy to actually message this from a state level, but I also really know that who matters most to students are trusted adults and mentors, coaches and confidants at the local level in their lives. So I just want to urge and put a plug out for those folks who are actually coming in contact with our students on a daily basis to help reassure them. We think that the way we've actually structured our recovery plan, this will actually naturally occur because we are focusing on students' well-being. Part of that is looking at well-being when we actually turn to opening things up a bit more. So it's a great question. As I said, you know, we're trying to actually message that that it's safe and really urge folks at the local level to assist with that messaging. Great. Thank you. Governor, my other question. Back on February 1, gunmen opened fire in the middle of the University Mall, which was pretty crowded. Target escaped, but one innocent party was wounded. Gunmen fled to Florida, got arrested after a nationwide search. The shooting appears to be gang related and involved the stolen gun. And now State Attorney Sarah George's office has asked that this 18-year-old gunman to have his case sent to juvenile court so he can be treated as a youthful offender under a new state law. They didn't wait for the defense lawyer to request it, but and obviously by having it at this juvenile court that would wipe the shooting off his record when he turns 22, if convicted. I know you've had differences with State Attorney George when she dropped those two homicides and sent their homicide cases all in one day and STJ Donovan to review those cases. Just wondering if you might ask STJ Donovan to step into this case and or what your thought is on an 18-year-old gunman shooting with the University Mall going to do it out for. Yeah, obviously a very serious crime and thankfully no one was hurt and but that could have taken a different course. I'm going to leave that to the those in that area at this point in time to see if they can work it out. I know the legislature has weighed in in the recent years about their vision of having more of our youth youthful offenders treated as such and up to a certain age I think was 22 actually or somewhere in that area. So this is a this is a product of legislation and I know there were parameters around that and and I'm sure this will be a topic of debate in the legislature as well. That's not a concern that that case or might you have a concern down the road? I think I'm more concerned about where this takes us in the future. Self you know some responsibility self responsibility and and I understand the brain isn't totally developed at 18 sometimes it takes a number of years further especially for for young young men and sometimes it takes decades actually but I think we have to again think about what message this sense there are repercussions to every action and some are serious and and I think that there has to be some penalty to that some repercussions that we have to be subjected to in order to change behavior at the same time understanding that people can change and this may not be who they are at that point in time in their adult life but it could have an effect on them to make them become something more hardened. So you know there's a balance admittedly and again I think the legislature will reflect on that and see what we can do to make sure that people are held accountable but at the same time giving them the opportunity to change their ways and to change their course so they become better human beings. There's a big difference between throwing up your bottle through a window of age 18 or 17 or 19. Yeah that's the that's the balance. Yeah that's the universal. Yeah that's the balancing point and that's something I think there was a provision in the legislation that talked about serious crimes and I think this fits into a serious crime but but again I'll let the legislature debate that. Thank you very much have a great week. Yes Governor your counterpart in New Hampshire yesterday announced starting April 19th anyone 16 and older can set up for a vaccine appointment for guard lists of residency. Given demand for the vaccine appears to be higher here than there and New Hampshire appears to have the capacity would you encourage reminders to get the vaccine in New Hampshire if they can? Yeah keep keep in mind the supplies that we're receiving are all by per capita and opening up the registration process doesn't mean they're going to get it. So he I mean New Hampshire opened it up to a broad broad spectrum and including those who are not residents increases the size but that doesn't mean they're going to receive their vaccinations and anytime soon. It could be you know a month or two down the road. I just don't know how far out they're booking but I would have to imagine it's not days it's at least weeks if not months. So we feel we can get to you as quick as possible. We have a good system in place and but for those who are residing along the borders and maybe it's easier to get a vaccination in another state they should feel free to to sign up but but I think we can take care of our monitors and hopefully as I said before we want to open up as well after the 19th we're opening up to 16 and over for for those here in our state and then for the for for monitors and then week or week and a half later we wanted to open up to a much broader spectrum for those who are not residents of the state and and we're going to stay here for the summer and so we're going to open it up as well but it's not not on the same timeline. And so if a resident chooses to go to New Hampshire to get vaccinated would that skew Vermont's vaccination numbers? How would you be able to track that? Yeah I'm not anticipating there's going to be that high a number to go because again I think I believe we'll be able to get to them just as quick here in the state as they would out of state because I think they're booking further out but I also believe the CDC will be keeping track and yeah we'll we'll have that data so again at that point in time by the end of the month we'll have it open up to to anyone actually and so but we'll get that data back. Okay thank you. Hi there this is for the governor I wanted to ask after the announcement yesterday that Amtrak will be resuming service then with the rail advisory council's recent plan putting re-establishing a line to Montreal as a priority what is the administration's plan in terms of going forward with extending that line? Yeah we've been working on that I think ever since I got involved in politics which is over 20 years now trying to re-establish the rail line in service to Montreal some of that involves pre-clearance we've been working on that obviously from a federal standpoint with the Canadian government we're making some inroads we still have again people working on that it's been multiple people over the last couple of decades but we're getting closer all the time and and obviously the pandemic slowed those efforts up but but I look forward to a point in time when you can get pre-clearance in Montreal be able to get on to Amtrak and come back into the states without having to stop at the at the border same with some air as well in Toronto and so I think I think we'll get there but I just don't know when that's going to be I can't even tell you when the border itself is going to be open back up but but this pre-clearance opportunity is something that we've been working on for a long time and that'll make a lot more sense especially with all the infrastructure improvements that are being contemplated for rail with the infrastructure package that President Biden is considering. And I also wanted to ask about a portion of the American Rescue Plan funding proposal you have in the specifically the ARPA funded projects for economic growth there's mention of certain projects in downtown village centers being exempt from Act 250 I'm wondering is this purely for to expedite these projects or is there DC is some sort of opportunity to see you know how taking away those types of restrictions might aid downtown development going forward. Yeah this was twofold one is this was part of our proposal to the legislature initially in terms of having the exemption for those downtowns to do their own so-called Act 250 they have have the expertise and and would be able to allow for economic growth in their downtowns we think this is essential but having received all this money going forward and having you know three or four years to put it into place we thought this was an opportunity to try and expedite the process so that we could use this money as quick as possible and put these projects into play sooner rather than later and and some of it would and I know that some have been looked at this as exemptions this is an exemptions in some respects it's just expediting putting more people in place to consider some of the applications but in the downtowns and villages giving them the opportunity those on the ground those having the expertise in some of these communities to determine the Act 250 portion of that I may ask so it's really oh yeah maybe I'll ask Secretary Curley if there's anything I missed on that or or Secretary Moore this is this is Lindsay I don't have anything to add I'm not sure about Secretary Moore so I don't need their governor I think you covered it well okay thank you thanks Cameron hi we're hearing from some her monsters who are having issues finding available appointments and some people had to book their vaccines into May I know you said here people might have to wait a couple of weeks to get their appointment waiting a month seems longer than expected for people who are running into these kinds of issues what should they be doing um I'll ask Secretary Smith to weigh in on that as well but sometimes what we're seeing is some feel that they can only get an appointment some place close to them and that's fine and they make the appointment they may want to consider looking around and see if there's other sites available where they can get in sooner we've seen that to be the case but if they do they should cancel when they make their another appointment they should cancel that one and look at the pharmacies as well there's other opportunities throughout the state that we don't have complete control over so look across the board once you've made your appointment you have something in place you may want to explore a little bit secretary Smith yeah cat what we've noticed too is as the age groups come down people are doing what the governor said they're exploring around the state they're using the pharmacy programs in a much more a greater way than we've seen before so I would urge them to do that the other thing too when allotments are more than what we expect we open up more uh slots uh earlier so I would encourage them to come back and look at that on an occasional basis to see if the slots are open and sometimes when we see slots fill up in an area we'll add more slots to that area uh despite what the allocation is we just want to accommodate that so I would urge them to go back to the website we on average have been seeing a lot of people uh get earlier appointments and uh than what you're describing I would just ask them to continue to look at the website and look at all their options there all their options are um uh out there right now and as we said as I just said uh the younger um age groups are being much more mobile in to the point where they'll travel to Essex County so just so you know one of the people who wrote to us said that you have to cancel your state appointment the initial one you have before you can even look for another one has is that something that you're going to fix there's two ways to do that one you can look um you do have to cancel one appointment to make another appointment but I would urge that person to call okay so maybe I have a helpful question here how do the vaccine appointments actually get open up so are they all once on Monday with the sign-ups or do they reliably get added in as the week goes along we we put out what we know at that point all the sign-ups that we can and we make sure that there's enough slots for that age group uh on that Monday and as we get more allocations or if we see places fill up we'll add more slots so where are you booking out to right now as far as appointments go yeah I I don't have that information cap but I'll I'll get it to you thank you it's one way to speed it up I am here Rebecca um I was on the call as you were governor with legislative leaders in industry uh people on Wednesday about the broadband build out and a couple of things uh struck me uh one was there's concern about whether the CUDs could actually had to wear with all to to build it out and um in the industry folks were wondering if they might get left behind now that the the residents of Vermont might not care about the those kind of details they just want the broadband under as as far as you can see under the the proposal will this plan get broadband to the last mile I think with the the plan that we're putting forth I think we will get to the last mile we'll get to most of Vermont now again this is a an incredible amount of money we're proposing about a quarter of a billion dollars to do so I'd said early on that I thought it was going to take hundreds of millions of dollars and here we have it so if we take advantage of this I think we can we can accomplish this now it's going to mean what you know the details do matter and when I say that it depends on the speed and the download capacity the 25 3 versus the 100 if the higher the speed if it's got if we go in that route I don't know if we'll get to the last mile but the proposal we put forth would I believe would get broadband to the vast majority of Vermonters and but again details matter well it or the seat you're not concerned about the the CUDs being over their skis and and being a big part of this I think there's going to be a balance in the end I believe there'll be a balance between the CUDs and and other organizations for profit organizations so there'll be some competition as well so competition always breeds opportunity and I think that will happen in this case as well all right great as far as what Secretary Smith was talking about making the vaccine appointments I guess Kat hasn't gone through it she's probably too young but yeah going through the the pharmacy program and actually bouncing back and forth making appointments has worked for my family so that and getting actually closer and more recent appointments so thank you for all that yeah and I I do think that that's believing some capacity as well so someone who finds an appointment sooner with the pharmacies and then closes out their appointment in the state program then that becomes available so you have to search it to find it thank you good afternoon I believe this question is probably for Secretary Curley can you verify for a reader that as of today traveled by plane does not require quarantine only proof of a negative test within three days yeah I can go ahead Secretary Curley I think the answer is I can confirm that um traveled by air um does not require anything different than our our new travel policy which requires somebody traveling in state to have a negative test within three days of arriving here great that's all for me thank you very much yeah question for Governor Scott I wanted to get your thoughts on the latest effort by the legislature on sports betting I'm still working out the details in committee but the basis of it allowing six online sports books to operate in the state you know last year there was a bill to bring mobile only sports betting to brahman but it didn't get much traction this is something you've spoken to in previous budget addresses and I've kind of had an evolving opinion on so I'm just serious obviously there's a lot going on with the pandemic to worry about so maybe this isn't uh top of your mind but what are your thoughts on uh you know if this gets passed what that could do for brahman as we're looking for any opportunity to get the economy going again well again this was one of our initiatives early on so I'm happy that they're taking this up because I believe for monitors are doing it now we're just not receiving any benefit from it so I think moving forward on this makes makes sense from my perspective and just happy the legislature is taking it up and then a question for Dr. Levine there was a new study that suggested around one-third of COVID-19 survivors were diagnosed with a neurological or mental health condition within six months of their diagnosis anxiety and mood disorders were the most common but it did say that conditions like stroke and dementia were more common among those who had severe COVID-19 than those who didn't have it I was just curious to get your thoughts on this I mean some of these may have been things that we already knew when we had a lot of conversations about the mental health impact of COVID but just seeing some numbers in an attempt to try to study this a little further what are your thoughts on that? Yeah that's an important study to talk about but I want to emphasize it's a study but the fact is some neurological complications of COVID we have been known knowing about for quite some time now including stroke not that I want to say that that's excessively increased but but there is a relative risk increase for that the study itself was much more concerned with the psychological than the neurological and needless to say anxiety and depression were quite prevalent months down the road from that infection I think some of that you know certainly I think anyone who's had COVID would probably say that's really believable but even for those of us who haven't had COVID but have been living through a pandemic for 14 months we would probably say that's quite believable as well it doesn't mean that these are going to be enduring aspects of someone's health that's never going to go away the study doesn't tell us what the pre-COVID status of individuals were in terms of how they dealt with stresses in life anyways anxiety and depression disorders unfortunately are very prevalent in our society and as a former doctor who saw a lot of primary care as well you know literally a third of visits could be attributed to some form of psychological distress or symptoms that were probably not as physical as they were psychological so we have to be careful as we hear about data like this but I do want to say that I have no question that an illness like COVID could leave some enduring psychological impact on someone and that's quite believable what I don't know is how long that should be expected to last and if that would be something that like other aspects of people's lives they over time begin to deal with more constructively and put that in the back and the rear view mirror so to speak thank you thanks Rebecca two quick questions first one governor I read this morning in New York Times report about 73,000 open registrations for vaccinations not having been taken at this point in Mississippi and similar data for many other southern states and surveys showing that clearly a large percentage of those populations do not intend to get a vaccination has there been any discussions in your weekly calls with the White House about governors asking to have some of that shipped to your state and other states are being more proactive and for the population is more willing to wanting to get vaccinated no nothing that that I can recall obviously this is a challenge for many states around the country thankfully we don't have that challenge at least I don't believe we do at this point in time the demand far exceeds our supply at this point but that's why you know when you see other states as I said you know we've said over the last month or so when you see other states opening up quicker they open up I think Alaska was one of the early ones open up to 60 and over almost immediately but it doesn't mean that they're going to get to more people it means that they have more supply than demand so they need to open that up to a broader population and we haven't had to do that I mean there's a lot of demand here I hope it continues but but I haven't I haven't heard any discussion about shipping to other states but I did to the the White House is from their perspective they are watching that and they had warned states that if I'm not aware that they've done it but if they're not using their supply that they would send it to areas of need so it's on their minds as well okay thank you the other question is with this with the this opportunity with broadband I'm sure there's a long way to go before you're going to know so many details but one question was how much thought has gone into the process that once all of these rural areas have broadband depending on what the rules are for the providers of the internet they a lot of them have a nasty habit of creeping up prices based on being the singular provider in that area and having a great potential to outstrip the economic ability of those rural areas to pay for it is that being addressed in this plan you know it's it's being addressed in a lot of the conversations I know our secretary or commissioner Tierney has talked about the digital equity and you know the affordability I know Tom Heslin and others senator Brock have brought this up as well so it's on the minds of many we're going to continue to do whatever we can to make sure that we provide for an affordable subscription of some sort and that's why I'm you know I like the CUDs I think that they their mission is more to to provide for broadband and it's a non-profit so that would tell me if they can do it efficiently that the the prices may be down a bit but we'll see and this is a conversation we're having collectively okay thank you have a good weekend my question is for secretary Smith you're ordered to not waste any doses and we know Vermonters have been signing up at pharmacies to be called at the end of the day for any leftover doses and they've been getting them we also know people have been waiting outside clinics at the end of the day hoping to get a dose after the clinic administered after the clinic administered last dose so my question is do you have a problem with Vermont using that approach and are you keeping track of how many shots are left over at the end of the day we're keeping track and Dr. Levine can notice the numbers on this but we're keeping track on what you would call wasted doses those doses that are not used at the end of the day and I will tell you that the percentage is very very small you've got to remember we're over we're approaching I we're over 300 000 doses that we've administered I think we're approaching 400 000 doses that we've administered and out of that the what was called the wasted doses is is pretty small we do have a protocol that is put in place for not only our own vaccination sites national guard vaccination sites but also pharmacies in terms of the protocol that you use in terms of those at the end of the day those dosages and that protocol is a you try to find somebody that is within 1a for example or is is scheduled for another time slot that would be qualified under that time period but at the end of the day and I've said this multiple times at the end of the day if you can't find anybody get it into somebody's arm and that has been the procedure since day one so yeah and by and again in by the 19th it's not going to matter you're going to have you can you can do it you know we're opening it up to everybody and by the 19th it's not going to matter so there is protocols but I have said this multiple times at the end of the day if there's a leftover shot get it into somebody's arm do you have a count of how many Vermonters receive shots that way just by getting the leftover the doses that weren't used that day yeah I don't the only count we have is how many are wasted and again I'll let Dr. Levine talk about the wasted dosages but it's very very small compared to the you know nearly 400 000 doses that we've we've administered and the wastage rate at this point in time is 0.2 percent which comes out to in the 700 range of doses and just really quick follow-up what what is the thing about the supply versus the demand of vaccine right now in terms of people waiting people signing up for these less leftover doses clearly we're still in an inadequate supply for the demand situation we do expect that will transition though coming later perhaps later this month perhaps in May where dosage allocation hopefully will be on top of that but not until now right now it's we appreciate those who have signed up actually because we don't want those doses wasted and every person who gets a dose on a given day is another person who adds to our vaccination rate and gets us closer to the finish line that we want to get to thank you I think as well that johnson and johnson and once we receive an increased supply of johnson and johnson a more steady supply this is going to impact our appointments as well because the others Pfizer Moderna two dose regiments two appointments where johnson johnson is just one so this should should alleviate some of the the demand in some respects my questions I think for Secretary Smith or perhaps Dr. Levine I'm wondering if there is a system in place for ongoing vaccination clinics at nursing homes there was one home I spoke with recently that after the first round of federally run clinics was over 90 percent of residents who had received the vaccine but now due to patient turnover and limited ongoing access is down around 70 percent yeah secretary Smith thanks Derek that's that's a great question we have instituted a program to make sure that we keep up with the vaccinations on nursing homes and in particular what would be what's interesting for us is the use of johnson and johnson in that particular instance not only discharging from hospitals into long-term care facilities but also providing them with vaccine in there so we're using some of the the system that we built up through home health our is homebound and and EMS and trying to use that system in order to keep up and make sure that we don't fall behind in long-term care that system is in place now okay and so you're you're understanding that that system is working there's no need to change that yeah I think we we have to we have to always make sure that we're enhancing that system but that system from what I can see that system is is starting to work and get up to speed to make sure that we continue both at the discharge level from the from the hospitals and at visiting the actual long-term care facility to to get long-term care facilities back to where they where they need to be which is as many people vaccinated as possible okay thank you yes thank you very much good afternoon governor earlier in this briefing you spoke about looking forward to students in schools getting back to normal in september I'm wondering if you could offer a prediction on what that normal might look like without vaccines for kids is it going to be masks just a thing contact tracing and and even potential shifts to remote learning as cases pop up yeah it will depend on a number of factors I know in some of our calls dr. Fauci has talked about there's been some trials on vaccines for a younger population he believes that there will be a vaccine available to some of those kids maybe a little bit older than elementary and by the fall and so we'll have to see but obviously there'll be if there aren't vaccines available there'll be some precautions in place but it's hard to say at this point in time dr. Levine or 12 to 16 is the next age group that they believe that will be available for vaccines and they're doing trials as we speak okay and in terms of the enrichment programming at the push that you're announcing today how do organizations propose and apply for funding for summer programs and potential after school activities next year and are youth sports leagues and associations like soccer hockey things like that eligible you know my feeling I probably should let secretary deputy secretary boucher answer but we want people to be creative about this we want to there to be opportunity for kids so if it revolves around sports or revolves around drama or music or whatever it is we we want to be have that all in the in the mix thanks governor yeah I just to add to that I would say what's really great about this initiative is the partnership with vermont after school agency of education and then some of our other state entities affiliated with fish and wildlife mental health and so we are actually in almost constant contact with our respective fields to get this workout or get this idea out and so we will definitely continue to do that level of outreach certainly the website that I talked about earlier in our press conference today is kind of the go-to initial place to take a look at excuse me most current up-to-date information but many of our entities have close connections with vermont after school and that's a really good resource vermont after school is going to be actually running the logistics of the grant program in partnership with us okay thank you go ahead Joe hello go ahead um unless a listener wrote to us and said he was surprised not upset when he was asked for a vaccine card when he went to a regular medical examination or appointment um and he is curious as to whether there are any other situations where he is likely to be asked to show his card Dr. Levine so this is an unfolding art and science you've probably heard from the Biden administration that they do not want to control any such thing or be responsible for the apparatus but I think they endorse the idea uh New York State has got its own thing that they've developed um there's a whole host of both legal and ethical issues associated with it but I would say that most of the tone out there is understanding and think that it's reasonable in terms of allowing people some of the degrees of freedom that they would like to have but it's a little premature to be able to comment fully on this in fact we're we're actually doing a little bit of a study on the area as we speak because um it's really it's more than Vermont it's greater society in general and um you know whether it be allowing you to travel whether it be allowing you to go to a specific event of whatever size it might be and whatever kind of location it might be um we have the issue of this is a sort of transition period where not everyone is getting vaccinated as quickly as they want but some are there'll be a future point in time which will be in a much more short term future where anyone who wanted vaccine could access it and get it so it's going to be a little bit of a more moving target as well so I'm going to be a little bit hedging on this just because of what I've laid out for you to think about in terms of the kinds of issues that arise okay so that's another question that I'll have to ask about sometime down the line yeah we we seem to do well with those don't we Jim see you too well thank you very much hi there um just to follow up on that question I wondered um and I think this might be for Secretary Curley um if there are businesses in Vermont that have um I guess asked for guidance um on how to check whether people have been vaccinated or not um I know that some national news media has reported on um national companies who have wanted to have that ability to check um and I wondered if there was that same interest here so if you're quick about employers wanting to check with employees or wanting to check when they're serving people when there's uh I guess both but I think I was more asking about um when they're serving people okay yeah so businesses um have at this point it's their discretion if they want to have the proof of vaccination or proof that somebody has had COVID within the last 90 days and recovered that's really up to them at this point okay but um has there been any official guidance handed down from your office well we have um we have tried to make our guidance easier to follow simplify it and so we don't you know explicitly state that in our guidance but um certainly you know as a business you have the right to do that you know when you're serving people and I talked about we have a variety of people who have yet to receive vaccines and and particularly with events um gathering we have permitted uh event venues to add more vaccinated people to their town so in order to determine that they have not exceeded the um limits on the unvaccinated person they may in fact act for um proof of vaccination I mean yes proof of vaccination thank you and and to follow up on the um question of wasted um vaccines I wondered if somebody could provide a breakdown of where those vaccines were wasted yes we'll definitely have to get back to you with that but we'll we'll have the data it's also important to understand the word wastage is an umbrella term so some of wastage may be that they could not find someone to put the dose into at the end of the day but a lot of wastage may be technical things that happen in the management of vaccine storage vaccine administration etc so it's a it's a broad term that has many possible components to it um okay thank you very much bt digger we'll try this again hi thanks rebecca uh quick question on the restart guidance uh we heard from restaurant employees who feel like they're being asked to take on elevated risk with the guidelines relaxing on may one uh they are proposing that this stage should allow a short window before the final age band opens on April 19th just to prioritize them within the confines of that last group is this something that you're considering um bluntly no um from our perspective you know what we've done thus far is working um and I know I have a deep amount of empathy for them everyone and I'm happy to hear that people want to be vaccinated but it would take us more time to develop the system in order to accomplish that and then it would be to just let this happen uh on the by the 19th by the 19th everyone 16 and over uh will be able to sign up for their vaccination so um think about how do we contemplate who those specific people are in those areas and how do we make sure that they're uh jumping to the the front of the line and are associated with a business who's going to collect that data so it gets very complicated so again within the next week um you'll be able to sign up and uh and and then not to diss in future um we'll be back to uh somewhat normal and people will be able to have their their vaccinations if they so choose I think what we've heard is that uh you know there's there's nervousness that you know based on having been told that that 16 plus age group is going to be the largest group and there's going to be a lot of competition for those slots kind of in the first hours that they opened um and kind of acknowledging that the state has uh at certain times opened up to different occupations before based on just kind of a checkbox or information that you collect in the registration system just wondering why why this case would be different well again um if you maybe Mike you could tell me how that data would be collected uh when we did it for let's say teachers and staff in in education um we did it for a multitude of reasons but we had all their names that was something that was easily accessible uh they're registered so that wasn't that difficult um this would be much more difficult to administer and to collect the data and the names and then again to to figure out how are we going to actually allow that to happen and how would we get a code to everyone I mean it just it gets much more complicated than you might imagine so we feel the approach we're taking uh although we would like to like to speed it up we'd like to have more supply uh has been necessary and we'll just have to see this through thank you hi can you hear me we can or we did okay we don't we can now yes oh okay yeah it's funny I was told that I was muted and then I was immediately unmuted um I uh I have a question about um requiring college students to get the vaccine an increasing number of colleges even just within the past week or a few weeks have um announced their requirements um for students for the fall uh on the other hand some governors in Texas and folks in Florida specifically have come out against that requirement um have you contemplated your position on this um especially for you know public colleges in Vermont yeah we uh this is a conversation we're going to have to have we haven't had it yet but I would again under the under the emergency order uh of the the federal acceptance of the of these vaccines you can't require anyone to have it so but I'm assuming that that they will become it won't be an emergency under emergency authorization eventually and that they will be accepted so this is a conversation we have to have we haven't had it yet but we will okay are there any kind of immediate thoughts that you have explanation um I we haven't had this conversation with our team of experts um and I haven't been asked specifically from any of the universities and colleges in Vermont that I know of but I'm maybe Dr. Levine has had those conversations he is shaking his head no he hasn't been asked either so we will um we will be contemplating this and uh and giving our advice to these colleges and universities in Vermont as well as businesses okay thank you that's it thank you very much and we'll see you again on Tuesday