 Wednesday, the 29th. And what we're looking at first committee and thank you, all of you other people for coming. This is a, and just know that I can't, I have an iPad so I can only see nine people at a time. And how though the squares get populated is way beyond my comprehension. So I have no idea who is there. I mean, I know who's with us, but I can't see you. So normally what we've been doing is if you want to speak, just raise your hand. But if you raise your hand and I don't seem to be aware that you wanted to speak. Just say, ask, say who you are. And because I can't see everybody. And so it's, I don't understand how this works at all on there is Senator Bray. You are with us. Thank you. All right, so let's get started. What I, what we were going to do today is have just a very brief discussion about the need to digitize our land records. We've had some conversations the other day about how difficult it was for transaction to happen right now, whether it's real estate transactions or refinancing or any other kinds of transactions. I would ask everybody to put yourself on mute until you're, until you want to speak because it's really hard. It picks up and don't have it on speakerphone. Oh no, this is, now that was when we were using phones. Sorry about that. Okay. So we had this conversation about how difficult it is right now to do, to look at these land records. And one of the things we heard from, I think it was Joy who said, or maybe it was, I don't remember who it was, but there were at that point in time, there were 1,100 private transactions per homes and condos and mobile homes. And this was only ones that were in the multiple lists, the MLS that were under contract, but couldn't go anywhere because they couldn't, they couldn't do the title searches. So, and that doesn't include any business contracts or apartment houses or anything else. So, or reappraisals or reappraisals. This is, no reappraisals. You wouldn't need to search the land, the title records for reappraisal. I don't think this is the, the reappraisal unless I'm wrong. Yeah. So reappraisal, if you're, if you're doing a refinance of your home, which many people are during the COVID crisis, they need, they need to access land records for titles. Yes. If they're doing a refinance or a sale or something, they need to access the land records, but if they're just doing a reappraisal from the, an appeal for their tax records, they don't need to write that for that kind of reappraisal. Yeah. Yeah. What we did was talked about this committee and I'd like to. That you have done work before on digitizing and. There is a report. There are a couple of reports. And what we're trying to do is, and I would, so I'd like to just hear from kind of everybody. About where we think we are and how we should do this. And what we're trying to do is, you know, I'm not going to say where I think the committee is first. We don't feel that we could do this legislatively. We could put something in the statutes that re-energizes this committee and tells you to go forth and do it. But at this point, we think it would be faster and. Easier to do it by just. Having you here. And telling you to do it instead of having it. So what I think our. Our marching orders, if you can call it that, I don't know that we have any right to give you marching orders, but we're going to anyway. Is going to be figure out how to, how to digitize these, how to set standards so that all digitizing is done in the same way. So we're going to be looking at how to set it up in the right order. So it's a, it's just a very simple way to do it. One towns who have already done it to make sure that. They, they can be incorporated into the standardized system somehow. And figure out a common repository. As backup for these records. And how to. Enforce the standards then if that's via. committee unless you have other other Brian I think it's also important madam chair for the group to figure out the costs involved yeah and how we're going to pay for it I had two calls this morning from clerks who said we just finished doing the paper stuff and putting them in these expensive binders and now you're telling us we're gonna have to do something digitally that's gonna cost a lot more money who's gonna pay for yes and I think that is something that the this group should be looking at and whether there's any COVID money that could come to municipalities for that I don't know but hopefully there's enough smart minds in this group to be able to to do it and just oh yes there's Tonya but you are backlit and I can't it looks like you're in a witness protection program yeah yeah it's the lighting in my office I actually have windows on most sides so I've tried everything I'm not really getting my computer sorry if I'm being agnito so it's okay I just I was wondering who that person was in the witness protection program and then I saw your name so so committee unless there are other comments or directions that you'd like to do what I'd like to do is just start and go through the wisdom list of witnesses and have them weigh in and how we what they think is the right way to go forward so I'm gonna over here other members yeah yes just one just one other thing to cost which we single standard cost how much who pays and I think time frame it would be great to get a notice of what the time frame is yes I think that what we want to do is not tell you to do another study but tell you to and we talked about this before and Andy in any case said he'd be happy to be locked into this virtual room until you can come up with not just a way to do it but the implementation plan because that's we we have no idea if this might be hitting us again in November December or April May so we need something in place so that we don't have to be having this conversation again so Anthony do you have any no only to say that we're asking these folks to take on this task and you had said that we're asking them to do this as opposed to legislation but it is possible that the group after coming up with its strategies may have to come back and ask us to offer up some legislation so it's not as if we're going to abandon you to the process if you run into things where you think we need to change the statutes in order to make it happen or happen faster or allocate the money to make it happen you will come back to us with ideas for statutory changes as well yes yes well said Chris do you have any comments no I mean I I'm just looking at my list from last meeting on this and you've gone over everything and then Anthony added the last thing there so we're okay we're looking to help but we know we're not to do more than try to facilitate and we we could have just we suppose just asked you to do it but we thought it might somehow having a Senate committee invite you to come might seem more compelling to some people than just asking you to go away and do it so that's why we're doing this and we're going to hear from people and then we're going to as Anthony said but out until we're needed again so with that what I would like to do I guess it's just I'll just start and go in line of what my participant list said and have you weigh in and see what where we are and if you have any suggestions and not necessarily today talking about how it could be done but about the process and how you regard what we're asking you to do so with and I'm going to put myself on mute until I call on the next person and if committee members have any questions please just raise your hand or shout out okay so first on my list is Chuck Starrow good afternoon committee Chuck Starrow lean on public affairs on here Connecticut attorneys title insurance corporation in my contact at the company Andy Michael is also in this meeting so truth be told I think what I would do Andy sorry to catch you flat-footed maybe but turn it over to you at this stage okay Andy thank you that was very concise great testimony we love it thank you to the committee Andy Michael from my attorneys title and catech thanks to the committee for taking this up and I appreciate your your guidance and the gentle nudge I think it is important for the the folks on this panel or committee whatever we're creating to understand our our goal I think we're all ready to go my vision I guess and others can weigh in I I understand the task to be to get in a room and come up with a single system with some kind of rules and regulations and come up with the cost and I agree we if we come up with this platform we will come back and likely need some legislation to among other things create a commission or some kind of regulatory body on a going forward basis that can implement the platform in the design the cost will probably be a challenge my vision is that we create a platform and we start on day one and we move forward and the second tier question maybe how do we get 200 years of existing records into this system that may be a different challenge but I don't think I hope it won't stop us from designing a new platform that at least going forward in five 10 or 15 years we don't find ourselves exactly where we are now I'm gonna guess or hope that within the first meeting or maybe to this ad hoc committee will be on one page in terms of how we see it being implemented and designed and if we're not yeah I don't know if we're gonna be able to come out of our unlocked room but we may have to report back that with some of the divergent issues we're so far apart that either we do need legislative help or each group would go its own separate way and come up with its different designs and present them to the legislature to choose one but I do remain optimistic that everybody sees the problem knows the problem is committed to resolving the problem that we can create one single jurisdiction that anybody can access the land records and they'll be in a uniform and concise recording system committee any questions for Andy up to this point or should we just keep going yeah this is Chris Bray I have a question for Andy and that is you were mentioning 200 years worth of records which I hadn't really thought about how far back they go for towns that have already gone ahead and started to digitize have are any of them have any of them done all of their records all extant records or you know just going forward will digitize but pass is gonna see paper yeah excellent question and Tonya may be on a better position to answer I believe some municipalities have gone all the way back I don't know how many but even if they haven't gone back to the 1700s they go back a very significant time period which for 97% of title searchers they're generally looking for about 40 or 50 years of records and yes the other ones are important but again to me that's phase 2 or phase 3 unless they already exist and I will naively say maybe it's as simple as pushing a button to get it from their existing digital platform to this new platform but that's a question for a technology person certainly not me okay so I think we'll move to Bobby is next on our list hi I've I've served on a few commissions and study groups in the past and the question that's always been first in my mind is for the clerks that are not already digitizing need to figure out why they're not I know in some towns it's gonna be a question of cost but for some towns it's hesitancy on the part of the select board to allow it and in some towns it's a question of resources and time and technology but for the towns that have already done it I don't see the need to build a new platform there really only a couple that are being used already in the state I don't see why we need to build something new when we already have a couple of pretty good systems I think we could simply build a website to direct people to the right portal there are already portals out there but we need to figure out why the clerks who are not digitizing what's holding them back I think especially now with with the situation we're in I think most clerks want to do it all the clerks here in this virtual room right now have already done it but I think I think we could encourage more clerks if we could figure out why it's not being done and if it's financing that's holding them back let's figure out a way to provide it if it's technical expertise that's holding them back let's figure out how to provide that and if it's their select board that's not allowing them to let's convince them but I don't think we need to start over from scratch when so many of us do have so many years worth of records and we've already chosen the system that works best for our size town I don't think there's gonna be a one-size-fits-all system that works for everyone but I think I think most clerks want to do this they're just haven't been able to so far and I know go ahead so perhaps this speaks to the need to have not only the clerks here but to have maybe a couple representatives from VLCT that represent the that also represent the select boards and get them involved hi Karen oh sorry I just wanted to mention that I am on the call thank you okay Karen I will put I'll add you to the list here thank you sorry to interrupt so I think that and I don't know a lot about technology but it seems to me that it is a little bit like I know when we were talking about other things it's a little bit like and Chris Delia will understand this like I can use my ATM card so that there's there's kind of a spine there's a backbone there and even though I want to withdraw money from Bravo bro savings and loan I can go to People's United Bank to their ATM machine and somehow that spine gets us all connected and maybe that's the maybe that's the platform but that's something for you all to figure out how that will will actually work so any questions or sorry Bobby yeah go ahead I think I think the biggest question that maybe the legislature will have to answer is how to pay for this yes we we change the we had the fee bill last year to say we have now have a restoration fund or computerization fund in every town but it's gonna take some time to build up the funds in towns that weren't weren't saving for this and you are right we what we I don't think we heard from any clerks when we were doing that I don't think we heard from any clerks that they didn't want to do it but they many of them the select board hadn't set up the restoration funds do some of them have their records digitized now and want to put them make them accessible on the internet and their select boards won't allow it yeah somebody there needs to be some clarity about whose decision it is the select board the purse string yep Allison did you have a question yeah just on this subject of cost it strikes me that we have a you know the towns have paid for it to date we do we I have two questions one is it strikes me that it's a shared probably a shared responsibility for who pays for it that it's town and state but that it I'm just curious how much our new fees have have brought in or is it too early to tell do we have a notion of what that fund maybe Tanya knows what that fund has in it at the moment or somebody well it's a the fund is at each town oh the fun okay so Bobby do you have a notion of how much that's raised additionally for you in Marshfield off the top of my head no because I put more in than then was specified my town's been very supportive we've had a restoration fund for years right put far more in than required in a town my size maybe three thousand dollars yeah and and do you have a notion do you have a can you give us a sense of what the call total cost was for you to digitize your records two hundred and twenty five dollars a month ongoing and the cost of a scanner a couple scanners maybe a new computer and when did you start it so we get a sense of that two twenty five a month June 1st 2010 with our software we are able to go back and put older records in so we're back to 2002 but when did you actually start digitizing June 1st 2010 oh 2010 so I don't want to get us to get too into the weeds here of what this committee will be dealing with but mainly hearing from people about the process of the committee and stuff because we're we're not the ones that are going to figure this out you all are so Brian did you have a question I think I'll pass madam chair I had a question but Bobby sort of answered it what I'm getting is it's unlike the law enforcement reporting system where we have two systems Spellman and one of the other is and they're not compatible but this is not the same situation for one year when when the commission one of the commissions years ago had this exact same discussion um we were told that by one of the committee members that his high school student could build a that would link to the land record system I have and the land record record system that South Burlington has so you could have a website you could say I want to search records in Killington click on Killington and it would bring you to the portal that you need or click on Berry City and it would bring you to the portal that you need okay already yeah as I said I thought you answered that already thank you all right if there aren't any more questions for Bobby thank you and thank you so I'm going to move to Carol she's next on my list here I Carol Dawes Berry City clerk and chair of the Vermont Municipal Clerk and Treasurer's Association Legislative Committee um I don't have anything to add to what Bobby said I think she covered it um the only thing that I would say that would be another thing that the group would look into is electronic recordings I know that's another thing that um there is interest in moving in that direction and there is potential for legislation that would need to be passed to get us in there to get us there um so that's another item that would be on our agenda great any questions for Carol we and we will come back to once we get through everybody we'll come back if there are kind of general questions that anybody might um want to raise so Chris Delia I have you next on my list thank you madam chair for the record Chris Delia president for Montbankers Association I'm going to take a slightly different approach because I think everybody who you have uh involved in this discussion has much more day-to-day expertise and some have the historical context so here's my approach I would like to spend I would like the group to distribute the previous studies that have been conducted just so I have some context as to what all was discussed way back when I'd also like to see if there are any national models that have been used in other locations uh uniform law commission models that might be appropriate uh to support bobby's comments look at the existing systems that are already in place from that I think it's an opportunity to figure out what direction to go in whether it's uh grandfathering those existing systems or coming up with something else but regardless uh then regardless of what you come up with identify the challenges and obstacles to going in that direction and then coming up with a plan to overcome those obstacles and implement so obstacles being funding obstacles being select board reluctance obstacles being perhaps fee issues for town clerks whatever those obstacles may be put them on the table given the direction that we want to go in and come up with solutions for every one of those look at the opportunities uh paying for it I don't think we can wait till digitization funds are well capitalized at the town level we've got to come up with something else that is going to get this off the ground because as bobby has demonstrated with their diligent efforts not a lot of revenue in a cap in a digitization fund that's going to uh perhaps accomplish the task that we're looking for so I say that we're just wanting to get a little bit more context so I don't repeat the previous uh I guess uh discussions if you will and not get anywhere I don't want to get so bogged down with that but it would be helpful for context and then pick a direction and let's go and overcome all of those obstacles that people are going to put in our way sounds good um all right I'm going to move right to ton to donna donna there you are you need to unmute yourself you can do it you're you're you're muted there we go oh there you are now I am I don't like zoom I used to go to the meetings um I agree with most of what bobby said of almost all of what bobby said um I just to give some perspective I was on the land records commission back in the summer of 2005 2006 which lasted for a couple of years and we went through all of these discussions you're having now um and it came to be um the realization by the clerks there was a separation to give some context separation of what the clerks and thought they could have versus what the state when everything else wanted the states this clerks wanted to maintain our records at our level and as bobby stated one of the it people from the state said his his high school student could build that portal so you could still have towns which have their records at their location they process them as always they digitize them they put in the system and then what would happen is that someone would come into vermont land records they would click on south burlington and they wouldn't even know they left the site they would all of a sudden south burlington records would show up uh it was that easy that that um done unfortunately that it person was replaced on our commission and we have someone else who came in and um so it kind of got hung up at that and the commission kind of just died because we couldn't seem to move forward um so those are my biggest things um but one thing i do want to put out there um i know senator clerks and um said about all the number of back sales that aren't taking place um i know majority of the clerks in the state went against the governor's executive order and they were there in the office behind the scenes they were taking phone calls they were emailing documents out to people we weren't the only cog in all of this um and the listeners were also cogs in this the bank is the everybody was so i want to make sure you pull this back from that this is a clerk issue and this isn't a clerk issue because many went above and beyond i know myself we're still letting people in silently um so they could do their their work at our risk yeah so um that's all i want to say yes we understand that clerks were very very creative here and um that that there were a lot of steps along the way that presented problems so we're not the only i mean if you're really truly looking by having records online they also have to look at the assessors as well it's not just the clerks issue this is assessors zoning planning all of that has to be out there it's a bigger issue than just the land records oh it is but we have to start someplace correct we need yeah okay jim where are you oh there you are i'm here um i really don't have anything to add wait did i did i hear somebody oh i guess not okay sorry sorry okay go ahead jim all right um i don't have anything to add to what people have already discussed um i don't know exactly how this group will proceed but i do think that it's really important to identify our goals upfront because i think there are a lot of people here who have different perspectives on getting to a different place so i think getting a unified set of goals upfront is really important and i don't think there's really any interference with getting this done other than money and i think people are going to be surprised at the cost of how much how much it's going to cost particularly if you're going to do historical because starting today and going forward is great that means 40 years from now somebody can do a title search if we think there's going to be a resurgence of this problem in december and we will not have finished the process of even beginning digitization by december so realistically we're talking a couple of years here to get this system up and running but um i think funding is going to be the big issue and we're really going to have to help a lot of the smaller towns i mean i i unfairly certainly pick on tin mith and baltimore when i'm doing seminars because i know those are two very small towns if they have a couple hundred dollars in their newly created fund i'd be surprised and i think you're talking thousands to tens of thousands of dollars to get towns up and running and back at least somewhere between 50 and 80 years of records and if you take tens of thousands of dollars by 150 towns 175 towns that's an impressive amount of money and with that i'll wait you know what other people have to say may ask a question chair yes please uh jim it's good to see you i'd like to go to your first comment um other than the fact i represent baltimore the only town in vermont that has no paved roads um i i would just like to ask you about when you talk about unifying the goal uh for i think it would what do you view the goal being what do you view the goal being okay the highest the highest level goal is that someone anywhere who needs access to vermont land records should have a single place to go and access those records that means you need to address both public access as in a portal to get there you need the records digitized and those are two separate processes that that because you digitize your records doesn't mean they're automatically online i i think bobby mentioned and i'm a big fan of this we've got two companies that have been digitizing vermont land records for a long time and they all have portals and they know how to do it and they know how vermont records work they've created their index process they've created all the mechanisms to make this work we really should be seriously looking at not starting over but using those two systems and helping the towns that can't afford or can't convince their select board to do it to build on those systems because they work and yes i know some practitioners say well it's really expensive to use one of the other systems it is it's expensive to maintain an online portal with digital access to these systems you can't you can't do this for free that this is going to need money to get started and it's going to need money every year to keep that process going did i answer your question i'm never sure if i answer the question no that's exactly what i wanted you to say which that's a great those are great goals i applaud them and i i think you're right and i to go back to andy's comment i think we're going to have to face it you know phase 50 years but and then next phase you know and you guys will figure that out but it's clearly and it's i'm amazed that one town bobby's town has spent over two million dollars doing this already or two hundred and seventy two hundred and seventy thousand already that's a lot of money ellison i i believe that bobby has a correction there i don't think that that's what she said no two hundred and fifty dollars a month it started at two hundred started at two hundred dollars a month when i started yeah two twenty five a month times ten years that's a lot so that's thirty maybe thirty thousand dollars two twenty five anyway doesn't matter you guys will figure it out what i what i also want to make clear is the money that we're getting in the because of the fee bill the four dollars a page that's allocated that's enough for my system that's enough for anybody not with my volume of records to get that system i'm going to show my ignorance finally by asking bobby what the monthly fee is for is that to maintain the records that is that is the licensing fee for the software that i use oh my goodness i didn't realize that and okay i'm okay are we okay with that yeah yeah sure so i'm going to move to joy oops i have a question madam chair oh i'm sorry we're mistering that um or bobby actually since but the when you're talking about um a couple major pieces of software that do this grand x and y i don't know what they are um does do they also host all your records or are they local and all you're paying is this the fee to to run that software in your shop but all the records are actually served off of your own spot or they in in the cloud in a repository so i'm going to let bobby answer that one i don't know how the systems actually work i only know how the portals work anyone know it looks like we've lost bobby we've lost bobby carol do you know yeah um with the system that we have in barry city um and just to give you a frame of reference our system costs uh about 13 thousand dollars a year so a little over a thousand dollars a month um they the the fee covers um actually in our case it covers all the hardware they have provided us with um computers scanners printers so it covers the hardware it covers the hosting for the scanned documents indexing the online access and they also archive our documents on by way of microfilm so great and just one more because this is really about the whole central repository question when when when when someone calls up your records are they actually speaking to a computer in your office to get that data or are they speaking to the company that you use to get that data they're speaking to the company thank you sorry my i'm sorry my what if i quit so the problem with electronics jumping out and then love you all right so are we ready to go to joy okay hi thank you madam chair for the record my name is joy limose i'm an attorney in wilson i serve as general counsel for vermont federal credit union equity counsel for northfield savings bank and as a result i work with andy michael pretty much on a daily basis all day much to his chagrin sometimes christalie has said everything brilliantly quite frankly and and i i would echo his comments on i i think finding some sort of a uniform goal and i won't reiterate everything that he was saying but i would like to very much be part of this group okay great any questions for joy yes okay okay yes i just i'd like to applaud her historic clock behind her head it is spectacular you like those hands off the clock we're just like manufacturing times thank you all right nancy where are you there you are thank you madam chair um i am going to actually pass my time because the chair of our government affairs oh nancy lynch for the record the government affairs director for the vermont association of realtors but i'm going to pass my time to the chair of our government affairs committee peter tucker um i was originally on the uh the committees that met last year but i think peter may be taking it for it so if that's all right with you madam chair that's fine thank you peter you are next anyway so okay peter tuckered vermont association realtors uh chairman of government affairs committee um so thank you you know for inviting me to this uh this group um you know as i've listened to other folks you know it what occurs to me is that you know 101 towns are digitized right now that that there's some pretty good programs in place as as jim nap mentioned there's two companies that are doing you know the lion's share of this work um it also occurs to me that that really doing a survey of all towns you know so that we begin to understand you know what are the you know what are the true impediments um to digitizing land records um and you know i think that that's got to be a place for this this group to start um as far as as funding and financing of this you know it it does seem like it's going to be there's going to be a cost involved in it and it can and ongoing costs just to go forward and then this additional cost to go backwards uh at least 40 years would be the uh the final objective i would think um do title searches online completely um and when you talk about the the cost of doing this you know one of the things that that occurs to me is towns that have put in a substantial amount of money already to get their fun to get their records digitized um and making sure that whenever we come up with this fair to them you know they they've made the investment um and and still allows for towns that that don't have the resources potentially small towns things of that nature um to also be treated fairly it's it's going to be a real challenge um you know on the funding end to to make sure that the balance is correct but uh we really talked it to all the towns and we certainly have people in this group that are talking to all the towns um that you know we can kind of break it down into different groups of you know who's doing what um look at platforms that are working uh you know i said you know my thought was to go outside of the state to look you know what's the state that's doing this the best and uh look at what their platform looks like but if we have some companies here that are doing it effectively right now um you know perhaps we find a uh a preferred vendor and if we could go to that person and say look you know we'll we'll contract for the you know all the towns in the state of vermont um there should be some kind of cost savings or negotiations um to to create a you know a budget that we can live with thank you thank you so i think i'm gonna go to Lucretia are you still with us there you are yep i'm here so so i've agreed with everything that bobby carol everything that's been said um i think that one of the other things that i've mentioned it before is the uh you know coming up with the standard standardization of how we record certain documents and how we index things but a lot of the questions have been coming up we have started collecting data from towns we have um the first year of data from last year um that and so this coming year we'll be collecting the data with the first year of the increase in fees we are also obtaining the data of the towns that are digitizing what their plans are for digitizing and we're hoping to see a progression so that three years from now when we have to present our report to the legislature to let you know where we're at that information will be there um you know i don't think it's it's it's not going to be a quick process but i think it's a very doable process and and you know it depends on the condition of how these towns have been indexing those that are not digitized yet if they have some type of a computer index i know some towns at least are maintaining that those are much easier um to convert to a digitized system and and quicker but i think that's uh it's i i feel that the COVID this this situation that we're in has certainly shined a light on the fact that we do need to move in this direction you're right we're learning a lot about things that we should have done before and need to move forward with um i have john adams thank you lacretia hi i'm john adams with the director at the center for geographic information um and i'm just here interested keeping tabs on how this evolves learning about you know the challenges municipalities are facing seeing if there's any insight that we can can add as issues come up uh we manage the statewide parcel property program digital parcel program so anything we can do to make our systems more interoperable the future of digital land records we'd like to well you are now part of this committee great okay um terry here uh who who's trying to speak um somebody madam chair it's chris bray i have a question from your adams okay um so john i'm just trying to understand the relationship between land records at the municipal level and your parcel maps um are you just getting a feed from the town or are you have you constructed these this data set from scratch so um the construction of the the initial data set which was completed uh late last year was a three-year project um that involved contractors across the state in many um existing leveraging the existing work that a lot of municipalities had done uh so we essentially created a standard and tried to have everything fed into uh a single statewide layer and now we're in the process of keeping it up to date and to do that um we do it a number of different ways some municipalities do keep their own parcel data up to date and they feed it to us and then we integrated into the statewide layer um some of the contractors that they work with will uh deliver us the digital data and then some municipalities you know are not going to be able to maintain this over time um so our approach to that thus far and it's it's so very new is to um take digital surveys so so now uh any survey that's for a subdivision of land reliant adjustment that's recorded in the land records we receive a digital copy from the surveyors from that we can um draw the line work and then every year when the grand lists are submitted we can we can try to join the so it's um uh we take the best available information we could get from municipalities and go from there and is it I don't know enough about these records are the records that you have for municipalities that have not digitized their own records are they potentially a data set that could sort of jump start the municipalities own data set or they enough different that they're you know they're similar but they're always going to be two different sets well uh it certainly helps them with their parcel data but I think the end records are totally separate um you know the um the line work that we get the surveys are just a fraction of what is recorded as as land records in the right municipalities thank you um okay I have terry I have you are you here for this yeah can you hear me yes I am and I'm so sorry to be late I went from your other um senate committee senator white um to a conference call that went longer than expected but it looks like if Andy Michael and Jim Jim nap have already spoken I'm sure they have covered anything much better than what I would cover I just wanted to say on behalf of you and your committee for being willing to take this whole issue forward um it's something that a lot has been done on in the past and I think we're very much pleased to go next and we really really appreciate your leadership thank you um thanks terry uh we've seen a lot of each other this morning uh Karen are you still with us are you there Karen corn yes yes I'm okay okay thank you yeah would you like the way um thank you so I think that um we are happy to work um on this group and you've gotten all kinds of great suggestions from everybody it sounds like the one thing I would um mention which is an opportunity I think is that this the whole issue having been thrown into relief by the COVID crisis makes us think that there might be an opportunity to use some of the CARES Act funding to actually help digitize the records and alongside of that is there's a lot of discussion in the legislature right now about using some of the CARES Act funding for um high-speed internet everywhere so I I do think that those two issues are related and and we should try to make the case for some of that CARES Act funding to finance this effort I think you're I think you're right and I think that um the probably one of the things that could um I mean we have some sense of what it costs towns to maintain and so there might be some ability right away to for the group to figure out some some budget um constraints that we might be able to use for the COVID with COVID money so Allison so um as we think about the money you know Bobby only mentioned the cost of the licensing per month which she didn't mention her time and so I would remind everybody that it's a ton of time uh on the clerk's part two so we want to make sure we build that into the cost I mean yeah well I think that we're going to have to build lots of stuff into the cost of it but we have to be in terms of COVID funding um I'm not sure that they will care much about the clerk's time but might care about the um the licensing fees but yeah well I don't I mean not care I mean that be so that we can be um eligible right whatever Chris um I don't want to uh complicate things but I had since our last meeting on this I looked on the ncsl website to see if there was already you know background useful background information on electronic land records and stuff like that and I found an awful lot on electronic records much less on land records and it just raised the question for me and this is where I don't know is should this be part of a bigger conversation because more and more records will be electronic or is it you know do we want to steer away from thinking about it more comprehensively and just say we're only going to talk about um land records and the reason I just bring that up is it there might be choices you would make if you contemplated having electronic data of seven different types one of which will be land records as opposed to just a land records only specific system that's all I think that you're probably right that it is a larger and that they all integrate but I think if we try to take on too much we'll get so bogged down in it that we will never get anywhere this is a very discrete and they do they do enter interrelate but I this is something that um we need to we need to deal with right away and if we if we look at all electronic filings all electronic records I my belief is that we will get um it'll be like uh the difference between um uh easing the world hunger and having a food shelf I mean we need to start anyway Allison so I go back to Carol Dawes comment which is it is an opportunity and I would leave it to them if if I would leave it to this incredible group of people and and I if Carol and the rest of them feel that it it's appropriate and easy relatively easy to have that integrated conversation of electronic filings as well that we should have at it because I think Chris is right and Carol's right we have an opportunity and if it's cheaper and smarter to to integrate those from the beginning together that might make total sense but I think this committee that we're um delegating through this work should should should look and see if that makes any sense as they go forward we just need to be I think very careful that we don't overwhelm them because there are a ton of types of electronic records that have nothing to do necessarily with towns and electronic filings there's wills deeds I mean all of these um advanced directives there are tons of things that are electronically filed and I if they if there are some very discrete issues that they think connect nicely with this then I would say go ahead and do it but I don't want them to think about the world of electronic filing because that is humongous all right well so I hesitated to ask the question but I thought just to offer it I don't want the perfect to become the enemy of a good solution here right on the way in worth worth putting the question on the table that's yes it is I mean we have electronic health care records there are there's a bazillion electronic filings out there and I think we can't overwhelm them so with that I'm going to jump to Tanya I think is there anybody else on the here I've been trying to keep a list of who is here for this and I think everybody has weighed in um I'll jump to Tanya and then I'm going to um Chris uh Chris Campany hasn't weighed in and um I I didn't see him here and John Quinn hasn't weighed in oh I they were not on here oh okay I don't know I don't know that I don't know who's here I'm just reading from our general you can if you look Alison if you look up at the top there's a thing that said says participant list and it tells everybody who's here oh but that requires getting very close so um Tanya can we jump to you and then um I'm going to try and wrap this up and spring some surprises okay thank you madam chair for the record this is Tanya Marshall I'm state archivist and chief records officer for the state I'm also director of the Vermont state archives and records administration and secretary of state's office um for those who know me I'm I'm kind of retro record centric so I you know what I have to say for land records is what I say to the judiciary for court records and and I'll cross the board um just just for perspective I do want to um you know support whatever the committee's gonna take on as a charge for this particular committee when I look at things I just do want to point out that you know our current statutes um for land records and I always start with the legal record keeping requirements are paper based and we have paper based recording um and there's processes by which you know records can be made accessible digitally through scanning um but in order to make them actually continue to be viable there's a lot of requirements around standards for that so when we work with agencies and departments and different um public agencies across the state um I just want everyone on the call to kind of recognize that our current laws require paper based records and paper based recording and so you know for the work that's being done within the counts and digitizing there's always a liability or risk that occurs when the laws don't match what's actually being done in practice um so I just want to have that kind of laid out for that um the other part is that um to get to Senator Brace question is that everything that's being digitized is electronic so there so we're talking about electronic records um there's also a component for digital preservation um and that is something that you know statewide the Vermont State Archives and Records Administration has a digital preservation system we're the only ones in the state um that currently have that um one of the charges that I have as state archivist is to always look for opportunities for enterprise systems so in other words like we're providing digital preservation support or on target to do that for different state entities including the judiciary which means that those records will be preserved in our system but we don't own them they're owned by the judiciary so I just want to point out that there is a component for electronic records if we expect to access them 10 20 30 40 50 years from now that those records have to be in a digital preservation system um and that system can be attached to an actual recording system um so those are those just I just want to lay that part out um you know with the land records um I think Don and Kimville and I go way back as Bobby does well um for the municipal land records commission and so forth um you know I I think it's what the committee decides or what the legislature decides to do but I do want to point out that there's a road map um when I hear digitizing records it makes me really nervous because the roadmap that we see in other jurisdictions for recorders are really going on to electronic recording and the benefit that we have that other states did not have or that we did not have when the municipal land records commission which which I chaired and then Donna did um were you know there's industry standards and best practices across the board for real estate or real property documents um there you know there were a lot of early adopters in the late 1990s and early 2000s who have really just coalesced nation nationalized so there's a lot of industry standards and best practices there's a suite of unified or uniform laws um that are available um we've already adopted one of them the uniform electronic transaction act came out in 1999 the state of Vermont adopted that in 2004 um but there's also the uh uniform real property electronic recording act um and that doesn't actually make um any electronic recording happen but it does enable it to start um with certain conditions it does require a public body or a state agency to be a standards entity um and then there's also the revised uniform law on natural acts um the state of Vermont just enacted portions of that last year there's been a 2018 update so I hear a lot of the digitization and that makes me nervous because I really think at this stage if we're really trying to move ahead as a state we really have to talk about electronic recording and what does that do that allows the ability moving forward for electronic to electronic transactions it allows clerks to do what they're currently doing which is underneath that it gives them the capabilities by actually scanning a paper document that comes in and making accessible electronically and that's the big difference in our current law is there's a gap in there so it doesn't mean that's going to cause issues but when I look at marketability title and potential there there's just a legal gap that's enough there that we do see areas and outside of this that can cause some type of issue um so I think there's little baby steps but we don't have to reinvent the wheel but it's really whatever you know this group really wants to do but you know a state archivist I'm always looking I mean land records are archival they're permanent records we don't want to lose them it's really talking about what is the best approach moving forward with the the next recorded document that comes in and then retrospectively looking at everything that's been recorded and preserved because it's really the paper or microfilm that is the legal preserved copy for everything up into a certain date but if we're looking at the big picture you know and I look at my charge I want to make sure these records are preserved I want to make sure that they're you know preserving rights and that we have the right types of systems to support the clerks and what they need to do and so you know my charge does include you know enterprise systems to try to keep cost and low cost so whether it's something that we look at the digital preservation that we system that we use and try to have that layered on something I'm open to that but I'm just here to kind support whatever decisions made on moving forward but I'm always going to be looking out for the records and just making sure that we're putting ourselves in the best position to not lose the records and also not create liabilities for anyone thank you thank you so I I actually think that you're here for far more than that and I'm going to do something now I'm going to say that we will our committee will write a letter to all of you who are here today summarizing a lot of the issues that were brought up and where we think that you might be moving in what direction and encouraging you to do that we can't make you do it because there's no legislation to make you do it but we're hoping that you will so that if everybody can make sure that gail has your email we'll send it out to you and ask you also to have additional people that you think are necessary to to do this to work with them I think that we will not call this the land records digitizing committee but we'll call it the bringing our land records into the 21st century task force and because I quite honestly the difference between electronic records and digitizing kind of escapes me so I'll leave that up to you all and I would like don't faint here but I would like actually to ask tanya if you will convene this group and then you can choose a different chair if you want but we need to have somebody responsible for kind of uh moving this forward um thank you madam chair I would be happy to convene the group if that's what the committee would like second okay committee where are you with this if we do this okay I'm okay I'm okay I was sort of hoping to hear that tanya was saying and you kind of prompted her into saying I'm happy to participate with this group so everybody else it ended up so I didn't hear tanya say that so I did uh I was uh she did well she said for tanya's perspective land records wasn't on her agenda this year but right but many of us have taken on a lot of things that we never thought we were going to be doing this year and and I don't know that I think that there are many suggestions here and I I don't think that as has been pointed out by many of you we're not starting from scratch there are other studies that have been done task forces there are other states that have done it various some uniform law commissions that have been looking at these kinds of things so I think that um you can start off you're in a good position to to move forward and then to come to us we need um need changes in the statutes to move forward to implement what you're going to come up with so I I would um say that we can just send you away to your virtual room and um make have you um going going forward and and just I guess um it might be good if we had a check-in after a while to see where you are and and if there are things that you can think of right now that particularly as Karen pointed out that might be um where there might be accessible access to money from the COVID money Madam Chair Peter yeah it's Peter um yeah and my question was you know what's the time frame to apply for CARES Act funding do we have any idea I mean it depends on if it's there's so many different ones and my understanding is that one of the ones that's going to be coming up might have money for municipalities but I think that that's and I think that you can work probably with um I would ask around that that you maybe um Tucker is a good source there and probably somebody in joint fiscal I don't know if it would be Nolan he may mainly um deals with health issues but somebody in joint fiscal would have an idea of what the different application processes are and deadlines great thank you any other questions or anything before we jump to our next issue so thank you everybody this was really helpful and I will send out there are tons of um things in here that we would like to put in I think into your charge or whatever we're calling this and thank you so much for being willing to do this because I think that this and you're right this um will take some time but had we had we actually implemented something and been serious about it in 2000 uh I think the last study was 2006 this what I'm remembering we wouldn't be here right now so the as we've been told a lot of times the best time to start was 10 years ago but the second best time to start is today so all right thank you thank you and you're certainly welcome to stay around and keep joining us we're going to deal with um quasi municipal boards right now so feel free to stay with us how to clear a room oh really I have to see that your experience of that it just happened oh my god yes look at it goes boom boom boom yes they're all leaving there go there's committee members no no committee members can't leave all right so um and I just got one of these pesky invites a notification I I want to get rid of all of those anyway um is it is it for t time no it's from l n l w g whatever that is the golf courses aren't open yet also so if I press on that then it tells me that I have to go away and then I have to enter back into the meeting because anyway you don't want to hear all my woes so chair you know those annoying notifications they keep popping up yes at some moment when they pop up and you're not running a feeding if it's if your system is the same as mine I'm on a laptop not the uh pad but I think they're very similar at the very bottom of that list there'll be a little thing that looks like a gear you click on that thing and you can say hey thanks very much but stop showing me notifications but that's just for that one person right uh no you can there's it will list all the applications that are allowed to jump into that notifications window and you can just say I don't want anything thank you oh okay yeah I don't want anything I get we get all these from ncs l and webinars and notifications from bdcc and they also send emails so okay thank you chris okay okay where are we with uh Tucker and Karen where are we with um our quasi-judicial and did we get anybody here any um appraisers or um done fine and was here for a bit um madam chair breeze left okay and was he here from pdr well he's with the tax yeah he was listed as one of the uh witnesses for the two o'clock session okay he had some time constraints though so he wasn't able to stay oh dear how about jill remake nope she had tried to get in earlier and then I had communicated with her and she hasn't returned and I don't believe Lisa Wright will be joining us either well well do we know anything more than today that we can do today I mean are we any smarter today than we were yesterday without them I can only speak for myself and the answer is no yeah me too so Tucker and Karen I guess are going to have to tell us if we're smarter Tucker we have a draft from Tucker you were all plenty smart to begin with uh I don't have much to add that would make any of us more smart at the moment uh I sent you all an email today with some clarification on the statutory deadlines that we were discussing yesterday and I apologize and that's that's up on our web that's up on our website too yes and I apologize for talking about the deadlines that were in statute because I didn't realize that the deadlines that are in statute are automatically and mandatorily extended by a subsequent statute but for some reason when that was drafted they didn't go to amend any of the deadlines listed in statute they left them and had a separate statute that says all of those deadlines that we've listed get extended by 30 or 50 days yeah um so my sincerest apologies um I received more information uh from Abby Shepard who passed along some testimony that was submitted to the House Ways and Means Committee maybe last week or the week before uh and that describes decisions that were made by the Department of Taxes to automatically extend the filing of the preliminary grand lists to August 15th that is a progression of the municipality but from what I understand at least that initial step has been taken I'm not comfortable and I don't quite understand how that will impact all of the other hearing and appeal deadlines that you've been looking at because they are not directly addressed in that extension order that the department put together I will say that the last statute that I highlighted in the email when combined with the authority you granted to administrative agencies in Act 92 to extend deadlines that are applicable to municipalities and to grant municipalities some authority to extend deadlines that are applicable to licenses plans other issues there may be some wiggle room there for the department to exercise authority to extend these deadlines for all municipalities without receiving a request from the municipality so if you want me to walk through that I can but that last statute that I sent you authorizes the director of property valuation and review and any of those deadlines that we were looking at if the municipality requests the extension of that deadline um if you get out there because you take that somebody somebody is um having a conversation without being muted and I don't know if it's a private conversation but we don't we shouldn't be hearing it thank you and the statute there just to that we're all on the same page is 32 vsa 43 42 if you look at that the authority that it grants to the director taken to consideration some of the authority that was granted in Act 92 there may be an argument that the department has the ability to extend all of these deadlines for the municipalities at large which is something that appears they've already taken a step to do with this filing of the preliminary grand list uh extending it to August 15th that is all that I have I summarize it in the email I don't know how this necessarily impacts the policy choices that you've been presented with as to whether to suspend the in-person meeting requirements um or the um in-person inspection requirements but those at least you have a better map of the uh timeline than before so I do see that Doug Farnham has rejoined us um so Doug do you have anything to share with us what we were grappling with was um whether or not we could suspend and how that would impact the um in-person um reviews or appraisals but when there's a an appeal right um so for the record Doug Farnham deputy commissioner for taxes um for the committee um I've previously been the director of property valuation I was most recently the policy director um so the grand list processes and um everything are pretty close to my heart um and one thing that I actually worked with the legislature successfully on while I was pdr director was making the um the inspections from the state hearing officer so essentially after the bca level the appeals can go either Doug we're kind of losing your voice you just become muffled don't have your you don't have to have your mask on when you're in a virtual meeting is that coming through more clearly now yes oh sorry I think I had it too close to a speaker and the magnetics were interfering um so uh sorry a train of thought um after the bca the appeal from the town can either go to the superior court or the uh hearing officer and one thing I was able to do working with the legislature was to change that state hearing officer inspection to be discretionary so my personal opinion is that um in-person inspections are not necessary to do to resolve a property tax dispute I really think that you can document and you can uh you know either provide photographic evidence or video evidence to resolve these disputes so I do think that it is prudent um to remove the in-person requirement I actually do think long term um it is worth considering that it shouldn't just be uh it doesn't necessarily need to be an emergency measure but I would understand why you would only make it a temporary measure um moving something this quickly so I do have a question about one of the things because I thought that what we heard was that if if a town if a an appellant um refuses to allow the in-person inspection then it is as if they are um giving up the appeal and I I can't remember if it was Tucker or Karen that I think it was Tucker that talked about that and if that is currently in the statute how can we um get rid of the um the mandate the in-person inspection and yet let the um town continue with the appeal I guess those two things conflict in my mind right you are remembering that correctly that the the the BCA and the the section of law detailing the BCA's rice is a bit older it's a bit more um uh I don't want to be too aggressive but draconic is the only word that comes to mind so it tends to err on the side of the town as far as if you don't let us in it's over um the the property valuation hearing officer doesn't have that same language and we find ourselves able to resolve these disputes now we are acting more like a quasi-judicial impartial body in that case but I think that if um if a taxpayer doesn't provide any evidence to the BCA that um you know that improvements weren't made that the listers claiming were made then the town could easily choose to decide in you know against the against the property owner and then they would have that document of evidence going to superior court so I do think they would lose a hammer you're right that you would have to remove that ability for the town just to say you automatically lose the appeal but I do I don't think that will actually cause much harm to the towns to not have that um you know uh that option okay yeah um thanks Karen do you want to um comment on that well this this is Karen Horn with the League of Cities and Towns Doug makes it um sound orders of magnitude more simple than we were discussing yesterday no hazmat suits right no hazmat suits and that's a good thing so uh I think that um at least on the on a temporary basis that that during the emergency that that is a good solution so do we need any legislation or anything to to do that because the the it sounds like PVR already has the ability to to kind of wave that and um I I think that this is Karen Horn again I do think that um we might want to say something and and Tucker may be able to speak to this but it sounded to me like the house government operations committee was um quite concerned that there might not be clarity around that issue Tucker I lost you all for just a moment so I need someone to give me the issue that house gov ops is looking at so whether they're whether they're need that there needs to be the in um there whether there needs to be the physical inspection my understanding was that house gov ops was concerned that there um that there might need to be legislation to allow that not to happen right the concern is that uh if the statute continues to require an inspection a physical inspection and the town doesn't conduct it that they're essentially creating a procedural defect that the property owner can then appeal on so they're essentially by not inspecting the property and carrying through with the procedures and statute they would be handing the property owner the ability to appeal whatever the decision of that board is um and because of that defect they wouldn't really have a good basis to uh fight or defend the town on that issue so uh the option that was discussed in committee was temporarily suspending the inspection requirements um to avoid those procedural issues and to also avoid any possible contact between the board members and the property owner um the discussion has gotten much more intimate and complex in this committee but that was kind of the the basis of the issue so I are they I'm a little confused as to how legislation is happening right now are they starting are they going to introduce legislation that does this that just temporarily um uh does away with the need for physical or are we doing that or do you know how how this is all working they started the discussion and it was my impression that they were going to wait for this committee to take action on the issue before they did anything with it Brian it's just a suggestion we have a joint committee with the house government operations committee tomorrow to take up the issue of elections could we just add this to the agenda since we're already given virtual communication yeah good idea and then we can figure out how we start if Tucker if you could have something drafted uh and Doug I we it may be uh what we often refer to as well most people refer to it as belts and suspenders but I often get mixed up and call it boots and suspenders but um the so that um towns feel a little more at ease about eliminating the need for our physical inspection Madam Chair may I elaborate yes please um so I and and Karen picked up on it I probably talked uh too quickly and was trying to be too concise so what I was trying to say was that from the department's perspective and we're advisory in these contexts we don't we're not a regulator here so this is primarily just advisory um we wouldn't be concerned with a law change to remove that physical respect inspection requirement I do tend to agree with the house gov ox perspective that a law change would be prudent and if you didn't remove that I do think it would be a liability for the town so I was I was jumping too quickly I think um so I would recommend a legal change in this area okay but I think we'll make it a temporary legal change instead of a permanent one because if it's going to be permanent I think we need more conversation of course yeah okay so Tucker could you get something drafted so that we could look at tomorrow when we meet with them yes and I would just ask what the list of policy decisions that you would like to be presented in that is so the issues that were brought up um the first part of this discussion that you all discussed last week and yesterday was whether uh you should suspend the designation of physical meeting locations for these boards and for the listers yes okay so uh I will make sure that that is ready and the second is this temporary potential temporary suspension of the in-person inspection for for the bca for the bca uh both of those are in uh a draft uh for a discussion that the house and they were also in um I believe it was version two or version one point one of uh your municipal posting of notices bill right so what I'll do is I will put uh those two policy decisions into a new draft for you to discuss with house gov ops uh tomorrow Anthony I have a very basic confusion I think today is today Wednesday yes and our joint hearing is on Friday so you all can say tomorrow and I'm beginning to use just every day is Tuesday for me sorry Friday you're right so whether they saw a blend together it's hard to tell which one is going to be so today is Wednesday tomorrow is Thursday we're meeting with the joint house committee on Friday yes and the i committee is meeting Friday also Brian right uh I believe so I'm confused too so how does we the other the other um issue that we talked about was the DRBs um and right getting rid of the necessity for them to have a physical meeting location but do they have to do any uh do DRBs have to do any um physical inspections of uh projects um I know when you throw up a road you have to do that but um I don't know if the DRBs do I'm not certain um as far as the DRB designated physical location requirement that first section that you all discussed uh on Friday applies to any quasi judicial proceeding of a municipality and it was drafted broadly enough to make sure that it caught not just the grand list related appeals but also the DRB and because there are numerous quasi judicial panels that might be floating around in title 24 that we hadn't caught yet it was drafted as any quasi judicial proceeding tied to similar electronic procedures it's the open meeting law and finally there was a blanket clause added in there that stated that they could hold their meetings electronically so long as they complied with all the other requirements for the conduct of those proceedings and that clause was added in to make sure that the only um procedure that was being suspended was the designation of the physical meeting location and the ability to hold the proceeding electronically so if if there is a requirement for them to meet at the brownfield site to figure out what's happening there that doesn't go away it would not not under that first section and the suspension of the inspections was limited exclusively to the members of the bca that go to inspect on a grand list appeal any other questions may i just make one comment regarding your question about the development review board there are occasions when they do go out and inspect property or a or a proposal um i my suspicion is that most of those are outside you know not inside a building but um they do on occasion do physical inspections and i think that um as i guess i guess um i'm not prepared to eliminate that right now anybody else not even temporarily well i i think that the drb is they're um giving permits for uh and if if it's required for them to go out and look at a a site i yeah as far as yeah most of them are outside i i think that that's uh giving a permit i think it does require them to to know what they're doing and no one asked us to do that all right no one has asked us to do that right well oh i think we've been asked to look at all quasi judicial boards the for their meeting sites for their physical meeting site right not for and i don't i i feel very uncomfortable eliminating the need for a drb to go to a site and i agree i would agree okay chris well yeah sounds fine to me and then easy to add okay all right okay so i think we might be done but tucker you'll have this ready for us tomorrow aka friday is that right company uh and uh for tomorrow aka friday would you like this to be a standalone committee bill or should i prepare the draft to be added to other work that the committee is doing uh which is the other work we're doing i don't know i don't think we are doing any other work right now i think this everything else yeah everything else we did is already passed yeah and and anything else we're doing we're doing kind of by letter okay i didn't know if you had other projects with betsey or you know your other fantastic ledge council attorneys that i was not yet aware of no i i don't think we do do we committee no i just i have questions with that are with tucker that i sent before so i i just await his wisdom on other things okay yes does somebody just said senator i don't know who that was but or maybe not maybe with somebody in my house staying senator all right so can i ask a quick uh committee question just to make sure i know about the other tomorrow known as thursday not friday um are we are we scheduling a thursday meeting as well no we've had thursdays as well okay so we did we did have thursdays as well but this is um my um i took the initiative here because i have to go clean out our apartment yep okay and i needed a full day the rest of us will meet because that's what we do on thursday maybe maybe we'll meet at the Hanover co-op or maybe not okay anything else that we need to do and so on friday this is going to be a joint committee so let's all be there on time and randy brock has pointed out it's really hard for people in the public out there if we're 10 15 minutes late they don't know if we're not going to meet or if they're at the wrong place or whatever it's going to be a joint committee and i have no idea how it's going to work because that'll be uh 17 people and um that is two of my screens completely without Tucker or any witnesses so and we're going to hear from uh the secretary of state and will sending about the particularly the municipal elections issues i think that they're all set with the administration about those procedures i think there's some still lingering questions about the general election so we'll hear what what they have pour us up to that point right brian i promise one more minute and i mentioned this earlier in the senate agriculture meeting i watched the rules committee meeting this morning and there's a seven days article about the long delay of the all senate meeting earlier this week we went 20 minutes before we started and they wrote a piece about the fact that we were surreptitiously deciding policy issues before we went live and we have to really be careful if we're going to join a meeting 10 or 15 minutes ahead of when it's scheduled that we do not take up any policy we can talk about the weather and what we're wearing and all that kind of stuff but we should not get into any potential uh open meeting law uh situations i just i'll just mention that that's all yep you're you're absolutely right miss ma'am chair it seems i i haven't been watching the clock that closely it seems like we've been pretty well starting on time is that not right yes we yeah well we were about six minutes late today yeah okay it falls in line with what we do in the state house let's put it that way actually maybe even sooner than the status perhaps and it is hard because i know that um like anthony and brian just got out of egg and i i just got out of judiciary about 20 minutes before we met but um yeah so but we we do need to be careful about about that um any other anything else that we need to nope i think it is a pleasure to see you all and work with you as usual wait let me see if gail has anything she needs to gail you do not have anything um i will ask everybody who's attending friday's meeting to log in earlier and i apologize for the late login today um but uh we'll see you at ten of on friday afternoon great thank you thank you all right thanks bye thanks everybody have a good walk