 Last year my office began receiving calls from Vermonters who were leaving the state's transitional housing program at area motels These callers wanted help receiving security deposits They were entitled to through the program and had been withheld They felt like they had no option but to take what was offered if anything by the motel owner and They had nowhere else to turn. I am so pleased to Announced today that my office has reached a settlement agreement with certain motels owned and operated by Anil Sokdev to return more than $300,000 to the former occupants of his motels signifying security deposit monies that were That they were entitled to through the transitional housing program In addition The state will receive will require verification of monies for needed repairs maintenance and improvements that will benefit current occupants My office's consumer assistance program and I'm going to stop here and Introduce Chris Curtis the director of the consumer assistance program. You may know him he's been at our office a long time and So the office's consumer assistance program helped some Vermonters get their deposit monies back And that was happening through our usual mediation service However, in the course of receiving those calls, we were able to identify Two key trends with regards to the motels involved in this settlement Number one was that a number of people had been given a written notice Saying that they may have caused some damage with varying degree of specificity about what the damage was In addition the notice is required a signature and a waiver of pursuing any Remainder of the deposit in some cases people felt compelled to take the money in order to have some amount as they left the program These notices were unfair and deceptive under Vermont law under the settlement all former occupants Who receive these notices will receive their full security deposit amount back In its three thousand three hundred dollars And if they already received some of that money, it would be a remainder not to exceed three thousand three hundred dollars Other people so this is category two other people leaving the program received partial amounts of their deposits And while notices were provided by rule to the Department of Children and Families There was no photographic evidence or meaningful Chronologies of all of the damages of all of the units before and after the current occupant And that meant it was almost impossible to determine whether damage was caused by a current occupant someone who came before or some combination and Whether or not there may have been some damage My office did receive complaints and our concerns were that while there may be signs of damage Identifying the who the what and the when especially after occupants had left the premises and after the passage of time Would be challenging to the extent that poor or unsophisticated record-keeping may also have had an adverse effect on some people That is also unfair in the absence of complaints for all of these circumstances But knowing that harms were likely all qualified former occupants will be entitled to an additional five hundred dollars Up to a limit of three thousand three hundred total if they already received a payment at exit under the settlement agreement In brief, this is about bad notice and poor record-keeping All the money is accounted for we want to reassure Vermonters that all of the money that the taxpayers Went to this program have been accounted for Money's not paid out directly to former occupants have been or will be put to needed reasonable repairs Maintenance and improvements with verification provided to the state by July of this year These monies will make reasonable repairs to help improve living conditions for Vermonters who are using the program In total the Department of Children and Families issued one point four million dollars in security deposits This agreement accounts for that money with some additional to ensure a sufficient pool for payments and repairs and maintenance The amount set aside for repairs and maintenance is subject to verification If those monies are not put toward that purpose it will result in a penalty paid to the state of Vermont. I Will note that the motel's owner. Mr. Soktov has been cooperative throughout the process and I believe he appreciates the gravity with which We view the situation Motel owners throughout the state have no doubt benefited from state funding for this essential program and they do provide Vermonters shelter who otherwise may not have shelter and and That is an important function and we are grateful our fellow Vermonters are our friends our neighbors who require temporary shelter must also be treated fairly and reasonable by proprietors of these motels I Am pleased to have achieved a reasonable outcome that more than doubles the amounts already paid out to qualified former Occupants that ensures monies we put toward repairs and that accounts for taxpayer dollars devoted to this important Program I want to close by saying that shelter is a basic human right and Vermont needs more and better affordable housing We are so pleased to have been able to return these security deposits to the former occupants of these motels I Threw a lot of numbers at you. So those are the you know That's the overview, but I'm also happy to just tick through some of the key figures So to orient it reorient you so the number of all former occupants that includes folks who already got a security deposit And who were not eligible to get a security deposit because they didn't stay long enough Is that yes? So if you didn't stay four months, you weren't eligible to get a security deposit So that number was 429 Who stayed in these motels so we kind of teased out who all these people are did they stay the four months? Were they entitled did they get money already the amount of restitution is? $310,000 so that is the amount of money the security deposits that are getting returned that would not have gotten returned if we hadn't gotten involved and The amount already issued is approximately $300,000 The amount recouped and retained for repairs These are needed repairs Damage you know had been done. They were reasonable repairs. It's 372 thousand dollars roughly and The amount to be documented for repairs and maintenance is $523,000 and The total deposits was 1.4 million dollars. I mentioned that And the total accounted for it in the settlement is a little more than that $1.5 million so we want to reassure that we went through to make sure the taxpayers all these monies are accounted for And the 310 is the restitution, but I just wanted to describe all the other all the other money So that the folks in the press would have that and I'm happy to answer any questions Yep, so the process will be A couple things one DCF has records so we'll be able to get names, but we've also The the person we're settling with the motel owner is contracted with someone We know a claims administrator who will have a website and the name of the website is in the folder I gave to Amelia so I can't tell you but Chris probably remembers What is it? And they're gonna set that up it'll take a little bit of time to set that up And once it's open and the former occupants can submit a claim it will be open for 60 days After that the money will go to the treasurer's office, you know, they're like unclaimed properties division So it will go there and that's how they would have to the where they would have to go to get their their security deposit back Or more The state Yeah, yeah, that's one way of putting it It's like not a part of the settlement because they weren't they weren't eligible for this But we wanted to just acknowledge that to get the full accounting of the full amount of money that went so that you guys would have that big picture That was the total 1.4 right and those yes exactly well some of them have been retained for the Reason yeah, the reasonable repairs that were needed Yep, and we all do lay all this out in the in the press release, which is why Was supposed to have it here, but I actually gave it away. It also lists all of the motels. They're really statewide You know Rutland very I think there was Montpelier so there there's five or six of them. So yeah But obviously it's practice We don't As a policy, we don't acknowledge whether you're Investigating anyone, but I will say this has definitely been our focus these past few months I Don't know that we've had that kind of testimonial We did direct and your fine Publication I think noted that folks should call the consumer assistance program if they had concerns or questions And so we and I think we're getting calls before that but we we have you know people called cap And that's where our information came from initially So this was a consumer protection act claim you don't have to prove malice You don't even have to prove intent under the consumer protection act this was a settlement and we were grateful that the The motel owner Settled now and we didn't have to go to court. That's always favorable to everybody So we're really glad that things turned out the way they did here The money that he's supposed to pay like I just how do you ensure that he's actually well We we filed what we in under the consumer protection acts called an assurance of discontinuance And it gets filed in court as in the terms of a consent decree We call it an AOD and it gets filed in the court as a consent decree and that was filed yesterday It requires the money to be paid the mechanics of how that will happen if money is not helped by the state It will be transferred to the claims administrator so that the administrator can make payments directly to Vermonters And that will be happening on or before February 23rd Legislators right now I mean in terms of that kind of policy stuff We would defer you to DCF for those questions and we have been in as can imagine like close communication with them throughout the process But I would defer those questions to them or just the lawyers for this one No, those were paid on their behalf by the Department of Children and Families They would go back to those individuals they're paid on their behalf so it's their money to you know to use if they if their Unit was not damaged or you know, there was some other reason to for the motel owner to keep the the security deposit Yes, the needed repairs No that well the settlement money we're focused on is the restitution that's going direct to the former occupants This was an amount that when we look at the total that it was reasonable for the motel owner to keep Because the security deposit was made on their behalf by the state Yeah, I just want to clarify so Money is retained by the motel owner operator for damages or repairs In their possession having given notice to the department what the state is requiring as part of the settlement is that we get proof That those repairs are in fact made So that's a crucial second component is not just that the monies were retained for you know itemized Alleged damages, but that then there's some evidence to the state that the monies were actually put to that purpose Well as a result of this settlement with this particular motel owner Yes, because we negotiate another settlement for that but other questions about the motel program I'd have to refer you to the Department of Children and Families Well he has five motels this this owner of the five motels. Yeah, yep Well, we know that there's four hundred and twenty nine Who were subject to the transitional housing program so they're recall that there is a second program There's a general assistance program that can offer temporary shelter for individuals So it's the emergency housing program which is part of that general assistance program So there are multiple ways that the state is attempting to ensure that nobody is out in the freezing cold without shelter This is that one group for whom it was specially designed to have security deposits on a very temporary basis to assist them in transitioning out of the program so That's what the security deposits were for and One part of the settlement is an injunctive term that does require that if the owner or operator of these five motels comes into possession of future security deposits under any program they'll give adequate and accurate notice to the occupants themselves in all cases And if they don't or if they fail to Provide an adequate notice They forfeit the right to withhold any portion of the deposit which is have to get paid out And if it's deemed willful it would be paid out double And we'll have a we'll link a copy of that AOD. I mentioned will be in our press release so you can prove the terms yourself Thank you There I would say there's great variability in the records that were furnished at the department any other questions If you think of something or if you look at the press release, of course, just let Lauren know we're happy to Either get you the answer or do our best to answer ourselves All right. Thanks for coming