 Welcome folks. We are House Corrections and Institutions Committee and we are continuing our conversation in looking at racial equity and social justice within our Department of Corrections world. There are two pieces of legislation working their way through the House S119 and S1124 and they are in both the House Judiciary Committee and the House Government Operations Committee. We are hoping to put in some language at least indicating our intent or our direction in terms of what we would like DOC to start looking at a plan of to start implementing racial equity within the culture of the Department of Corrections. And it's beyond not just those within the incarcerated setting but also our field offices as well. And we know that it is a real shift in the way we do business currently and it's going to take a long time and long conversations from many many sectors. So we're just looking at trying to put some language together to submit to one of those pieces of legislation and we hope come January we can do a much deeper dive into this issue within the Department of Corrections. So as we start the conversation today I want to welcome Executive Director Zuzana Davis. She is the Executive Director of the Governor's Task Force on racial equity and we will also be having some other folks coming in to our Zoom room as we continue this morning. We will be here until about 10 30 and then we're going to meet again Tuesday morning at 8 30 and I would welcome all the folks who have testified and will be testifying up to date to pencil that time in for Tuesday because we will start working with our drafts, our legal counsel to draft language and how we proceed and hopefully the plan is to finish the work on the language to the end of next week. We're meeting Thursday and Friday as well and submit that to our respective colleagues in those committees. So that's the plan. Any questions from the committee members? Okay so I'm going to turn it over to Zuzana. I have trouble with your first name I'm working on it but I want to welcome you and anything that you can offer to help us in what we should look at in any direction we should be going in. We are open to any avenue and how we can proceed here in working within our Department of Corrections. So I'll turn it over to you and if you could just identify yourself for the record and help us. Gracias. For the records of Zuzana Davis Racial Equity Director State of Vermont. My comments today will be extremely brief because I don't imagine that I have information or a perspective that you haven't already heard. Jails are a weird thing. We're a society, we're a country that claims to need them but universally hates them but doesn't want to get rid of them because they provide jobs but also people die in them and we've just decided through some social contract that that's something we're willing to live with. So it's a really bizarre animal but I have a few reflections that again you've heard before but that are really worth considering very carefully here. One is around workforce and the other is around the incarcerated population itself. On the topic of workforce I have concerns particularly around discrimination, harassment generally among staff. I've been contacted directly by DOC staff about being harassed and what feels like being hazed due to immutable factors like ethnicity and race. Correction officer is one of the professions that has the highest percentage in state of Vermont employment or employees of color. I'm saying that again because I said it in a confusing way. Out of all the different professions that you could have or rather all the different jobs that you could have as a state of Vermont employee the job title one of the job titles that has the highest representation of people of color is CO. So out of all state of Vermont employees you will find a higher concentration of people of color in the CO role than in any other role. Or one of the highest concentrations. So it's a workforce population that is very it is much more likely to experience racial discrimination particularly because the environment in any carceral facility tends to mirror psychologically the environment of police forces that have this often militaristic us versus them we're under assault type of mentality. And so there's very much this idea that we come to work we are at war and I don't I don't mean to ascribe this thinking to everyone who works in DOC in Vermont. But to some extent there is very much a sense of fraternity among the workforce in corrections and so when members of that workforce do not appear to fit in based on factors like sex or race or other similar factors it becomes really difficult because there's a high level of trust that's required for colleagues in that industry to be able to work together. And what we've seen in the United States is that for some reason many Americans find it very difficult to work with Americans who look different than they do. So discrimination and harassment in the workforce and among the workforce is one of the things that I'm very worried about. The second is recruitment and retention of course. And that's really tricky I have a lot of mixed feelings about recruitment and retention when it comes to all phases of law enforcement because on the one hand you want to be able to make sure that we're recruiting from a large pool of qualified applicants who are diverse. And yet we also don't necessarily want to have an overwhelmingly or unnecessarily large population of people working in law enforcement and at different stages of law enforcement or correction or sentencing when we know that we could also put those staffing resources to upstream factors that would prevent people from having to be in the justice system in the first place. So it's a strange balance. Do we pay for more police? Do we pay for more COs? Or do we pay for more youth programs so that today's youth don't end up meeting police and COs? I once read a statistic that said that because of the amount of time that it takes to build a prison, the paperwork, the permitting, the public opposition, the hearings, because of all the time that it takes to get to build a prison and have it be fully operational and open for business so to speak, if we started building a prison today it would not be ready until today's eight-year-olds are of age to be entering it. In other words if we start building a prison today we're betting against our eight-year-olds today. We are betting that they're not going to make it and that when we're there to catch them it will be in a cell. And so in thinking about how we invest, whether we invest and when we invest in the carceral system and in other aspects of law enforcement and sentencing these are some of the considerations that we have to make and part of that relates to recruitment and retention. Do we want to see more people guarding offenders after crimes have been committed and sentences have been issued or do we instead want to see that investment go to the upstream factors that could prevent this downstream result? And that's a philosophical question that I as a mere mortal am not qualified to answer but I pose it to you. So that's those are sort of my main reflections around workforce and again I'm being brief because I know that you've heard most of what I'm going to say before. The second thing that I want to turn to is the carceral pop the incarcerated population itself and this is really where we see a lot more of the racial disparity that we're trying to address. State of Vermont has now gone is going through its second round of justice reinvestment. I sit on the working group. I know Rep Emmons you do as well and a number of you have been involved in the process too. So in the first round I believe we about how the incarcerated population in the state and yet and if I may I just want to very very briefly show you an image I'm going to share my screen oh I am not committed to well I will. The field can do this if you can can we figure out how to do this Phil? I'm going to send a file in the chat if that's all right and I apologize because I should have been more on point. Oh that's fine thank you we've put this together pretty quickly so we appreciate. Susanna you should be able to share your screen now I believe. Thank you. It's very just a few seconds I just want to show you this image. What we're looking at is a bar graph that shows incarceration rates. It compares the United States and the state of Vermont with other countries and the reason that I like this graph is because it illustrates to us and this is taken from 2018 data. This is the incarceration rate per 100,000 people. The reason that I like this graph is because it demonstrates two things. Number one Vermont has come a long way particularly vis-a-vis the U.S. incarcerated incarceration rates and yet Vermont still remains an outlier among many other advanced countries when it comes to incarceration in other words I am so appreciative of the work that this state has done to reduce its prison population and yet let us not get a false sense of accomplishment or a false sense of security because it's clear that we still have a long way to go so what does this really look like? We were grateful to receive a briefing from the commissioner of correction and his data team this past spring where we learned that in Vermont the population, the incarcerated population remains 85% white, 9% black. People of color generally are overrepresented in the incarcerated population of the state and that is particularly true for black Americans and it is particularly true for black out-of-state residents as well. Now in our state we tend to be fed this narrative about why there are so many out-of-state people being stopped and detained and arrested and incarcerated in the state and so much of it revolves around drugs. We are told that well people of color come up from Massachusetts and New York with their out-of-state license plates on our highways and they're trafficking and bringing opioids in the state and but that's not what the data tell us. The data tell us that more often than not motorists of color who are found to have contraband drugs more often than not those drugs are found to be in legal quantities and when motorists are stopped and found to have drugs like opioids, heroin, 100% of them are white but that does not jibe with the prevailing narrative that it's brown people with out-of-state tags basically people, a description that I fit that we are bringing drugs into the state and that for that reason we deserve to be stopped at disproportionate rates on the roads, searched, detained, arrested and sentenced. So as we think about the population let's keep in mind that it's not just a disparity by race but also by place of residence and then one thing that I really appreciated from yesterday's hearing when Heather Simon testified was a particular, is something that she said and I don't think that I could have put it any better she said corrections has the ability to determine the quality of a person's sentence. This is big because I'm sure you've noted politely remaining quiet until I stopped talking but I'm sure you've already noted that a lot of what I'm saying I'm concerned about is outside of DOC's control. DOC is not on the road stopping cars. DOC is not checking license plates or driver licenses and determining who is in the facilities and so so much of the concern around incarceration really has to do with the upstream factors that lead people to DOC and that makes it difficult because I think that the Department of Correction recognizes, readily recognizes that there's a lot of positive change that coding should happen in the justice system and yet due to the separation of authorities between agencies and branches of government there is little that they can really do about that. That's not me being an apologist for DOC. After all we know that people like Mr. Johnson should not have had the experiences that they are having so DOC certainly has a lot to work on and yet the bulk of the reform that we want to see in the jails begins before the jails. I know that the racial disparities and the criminal and juvenile justice system and advisory panel has put together a set of recommendations in its report last January and has recently let's say reissued that report because those recommendations remain relevant and include things like establishing a public complaint process with the HRC funding the 211 service better so that it can be available beyond business hours, improving training, supporting efforts for first responder training including 911 operators so that we can have more behavioral health screenings, expanding and supporting the use of community policing, expanding and improving current law enforcement data collection practices, committing to staffing and providing adequate data resources, creating centralized statewide staffing to assist with data collection. These are all really, really important recommendations and I continue to urge people to read that report particularly because what we're talking about a lot of the time has to do with what that committee describes as high impact, high discretion points and unfortunately this is a river that flows it changes direction but for the most part flows in one direction where we're looking at the upstream factors that end up determining who are our incarcerated people and what are the conditions of them being there in the first place. The last thing I will say and I know that this is a touchy subject I must preface this comment by saying that I haven't really had a lengthy conversation with others in the administration about this yet I know those conversations are ongoing and are being given a lot of thought and intentionality but I have to say that I am very curious about the practice of housing incarcerated people outside of Vermont. We are seeing the fruit of that practice born out in the disparate rates of COVID-19 infection among our incarcerated population who are outside of our state borders and I think that with all of the work that we're doing to reduce our prison population in the state we can stand to reassess whether we need to be moving people out and that's what I got for you today. Thank you I think this is very helpful it summarizes some of the feelings we've all had and testimony that we've had over the years and recently and I guess I'll just open it up for questions or comments from the committee though before we go there I do have one of the questions that was rattling around in my brain was in talking about the incarcerated population have you had any feedback at all beyond the incarcerated population the population that's being supervised from our field offices with our P&P officers out in the community have you had any communications in that world at all because I think we always look at people who are physically incarcerated but there's another sector of DOC population in fact the bulk of their population that's under the custody of the commissioner are serving our out in the community being supervised by our field offices. Yeah absolutely and largely those conversations have been had through the work of justice reinvestment where we talk about the community supervision the proposed changes to the furlough system and ensuring that we're not bringing people back on technical violations that end up having a cascading negative impact especially the minor technical violations that are not posing enough of a threat of harm to the public to warrant continued involvement or revocation of furlough or other community supervision statuses and I agree with the recommendations that were put forward through that working group's work because again you know we're not we're not trying to trick people and and say you know I'm thinking of those board games used to play as a child where you land on the wrong tile and you have to go all the way back to the beginning right that's not what we're what we're here to do we're here to transition people back to the community and so understanding that the goal is to reduce recidivism and have them be returned to communities is really key to how we end up treating people who are under community supervision so I guess the the short answer is that the bulk of those conversations have been had through the work of of the justice reinvestment working group and the following so if you've been seeing I know we're all part of that working group but in your work and have you seen a disproportionate share of revocations of in those technical violations of folks for people of color when they're out in the community supervision is there any data with that at all I believe that the data do exist and I have items on my screen that I'm referring to I just don't want us to overlook that big piece of corrections because of the eight or nine thousand people who are under the jurisdiction of DOC only about fifteen sixteen hundred of them are physically incarcerated the rest are in the community so there's all that community pressure and I just absolutely want to lose that that part of the picture absolutely and rightly so I am I believe the data exists I do not have it right now and you know call me a pessimist but if I had to guess I would say yes we are revoking furlough and other community provision status is disproportionately for people of color under DOC supervision I'm willing to bet all the loose change in the bottom of my bag that that is the case and then my last question what for the task force the governor's task force that you're the director of what is the charge that the governor gave you that the administration gave you for the task force the charge that speaks most directly actually all the charges in general the first one is to evaluate systems of support for people of color in Vermont particularly as it relates to COVID-19 disparities the second one is to look at existing state laws surrounding free speech hate speech and displays of things such as flags and other incendiary symbols and recommend any changes to state law that need to be brought about the third charge is to develop recommendations and possibly recommend some sort of a training structure regarding how to encourage more Vermonters of color to run for and serve in public office at the local state and federal levels including boards and commissions so of those three charges the one that speaks most directly to this topic is actually the one that is the most vague which is uh is evaluate systems of support for people of color in Vermont now we have intentionally that that first charge the report was originally due August 15th the governor was kind enough to give us an extension to September one we did submit the report to him on September one and we're looking forward in the coming week to doing some public engagement around that and you will be disappointed to know that that report does not talk about policing and incarceration because we felt that that topic was so broad and needed real intentional and thoughtful consideration that it deserved to be a standalone issue that was addressed not just as part of a big hurried report so the task force hopes to take up the issue of criminal justice on its own as a sort of dedicated focus area so for us as a committee that really we we oversee the policy of corrections can you we're trying to formulate some language how we go forward here it's not going to be a deep dive in terms of the culture within DOC and racial equity social justice but we want to put out those statements do you have any thoughts on what language we should include how it should be phrased what I mean we keep going around with we should look at the workforce we should look at recruiting we should look at training um and we don't want to get into real specifics you shall be doing this but more maybe language that says DOC and and advocates need to come together and figure out a plan on how we move forward and present a plan to us is that we're just trying to grapple with what's the best language we can do and I'm just wondering if yes some help there can help us a little yes absolutely um putting language in there that makes it clear that community involvement has to be part of the process is absolutely key we've heard this phrase before nothing about us without us and it's incredibly important that people who are going to have who are going to be directly impacted by this work and people who have lived experience be part of shaping their own futures you know people in racial justice advocacy space are often asked by policymakers what do you need what do your communities need and we say well we need ABC and then they say yeah I don't know how about DEF instead and it's like you could do DEF but then you're not giving us what we need so you can't call yourself addressing the problem you did something to it but you didn't necessarily do something about it so making sure that the needs of the community and the needs of the people with lived experience are being heard and incorporated is super important I think a lot of us were disappointed to see after the murder of George Floyd on camera by the government that a lot of us wanted to spring into action and a number of measures um were put in place that felt rushed because people wanted to act in particular white people wanted to act and and I think a lot of us appreciated the sense the renewed or the new sense of urgency and yet it left a lot to be desired and it felt short pieces precisely because of that sense of urgency and so I think it's very hurtful for and dangerous for communities who have been clamoring for something for decades and not getting anywhere with it and then suddenly there's a catalyzing event and then it seems like it's something that's pushed through in 72 hours there has to be a middle ground and so putting in language that makes it very clear that community involvement is key is is highly advisable also in terms of intent language I think being explicit about saying we are putting an equity lens on this work we are not just looking at operational impact and fiscal impact we want to modernize and make this process more efficient but we also want to do what is just and at times those two ends are not the same I just want clarity here which two wins in terms of the financial and then versus what is really the equity language and what is just is that correct okay sometimes what is fiscally or operationally advantageous is not the same as what is just right and so acknowledging that and acknowledging that the goal is justice and the goal is equity is very key great this is very helpful we have a question here sir thank you good morning Susanna it's really wonderful to have you come in to our committee and really ground us with that with your 10 000 foot view on on this and to kind of unsettle some of our thinking or add to it a little bit so um one of the questions I had for you is um I think representative our uh representative Emmons asked um about the task force but I want to make sure that I'm really clear like your position as the executive director of racial equity for the state of Vermont is a permanent year-round position and and correct I mean and then so my question technically it's not permanent it does expire in 2024 but that's that's for the legislature to work out okay okay so my question that I have is you know I know that this for my clarity that the the task force was that was uh created in June of 2020 to look at these three topics that the governor asked you to focus on um beyond this September first report is that task force going to continue its work and the the what's behind my question is I'm thinking about as we're asking our folks in corrections I think we're looking at and they're looking for um partners in the work or ways to engage the community and um on this work and I see it as we have two phases like it's already September we're coming back uh in January we have a short window of time it's almost like the we want to set things up for good you know we want to have some action steps and um I think I said yesterday in our committee with um Heather you know it's like I don't think we have time this fall to do a big deep community engaged process um and I don't know if DOC has the people or the capacity to do that I could be wrong about that but so my question is like is there a is there a something that would a way that would make sense for you I know you are a one person office right now um that might change we hope maybe at least I'll say that to add some more capacity but if if would it would it make sense for you to have the for DOC to work with you in any way on this topic outside of the justice reinvestment work or is it folded in um we're acutely aware of DOC's capacity I'm aware of a lot of the work that you're doing and I'm imagining your capacity is um uh maximum right now so that's what I'm interested in hearing from you is like do you want to be involved in this work or you think or could you identify other partners who could help us advance this work excellent questions I'll start with the first one which is the status of the racial equity task force so we did issue that first report September one the other two regarding hate speech free speech and public office those are due December 15th and the executive order specifies that the racial equity task force will exist at least until May 31st of next year or as extended by the governor at this stage we don't know whether it will be extended by the governor we know that um I I hope I can speak for the whole task force when I say that what matters more to us is not that we exist in perpetuity to keep talking about what needs to get done but that the recommendations come out and be implemented so in some sense there's no need for the group to remain in existence once we've satisfied the existing charges unless the group identifies areas that we need to continue looking at beyond the um prescribed timeframe that said we do have a number of other groups in the state that do racial equity type work and the most pertinent one to us of course is the art app and so what I would say is that that is a group that should be thought of as the first group to be approached on these issues because they are the most topically relevant and are um its members are actually people who are in this industry and who really understand it intimately and do it as their day jobs apart from that the advisory panel that was created alongside my role that's the racial equity advisory panel it's a five member panel um it has appointees from the house the senate the judiciary the human rights commission and the governor and there is a sitting judge on that panel and there is a data researcher who has immense experience and understanding of criminal justice data in vermont so it's another it's another working group that you may consider engaging on this topic to the other question of whether I would like to be involved in this work yes um I will grow another hand if I have to just to juggle this extra piece because it is so so so critically important and I may not do a great job at it but I'll do a job at it with with the support of those other partners that we've talked about thank you so much thank you so much for your willingness to be part of it and for your guidance on this this is as you can see you know this is a really important opportunity that we have before us as our chair has said you know and and we're going to fumble through it I think I don't think we're going to do it perfectly on the first pass so we really do need to tap and be aware of you know the expertise in our state so thank you so much for this and for your work and if I may I would just like to respond to I'd just like to respond to one more comment that you made if I may um you said that you it wasn't certain whether we would have enough time to do a big community outreach this fall because of legislative deadlines and bill drafting and introducing etc and I would just like to say that if we consider our process our legislative process as the given and community involvement as the variable around what you know that that has to fit within the confines of our process then we're not centering the needs of the community we're centering our predetermined and changeable process but if we treat community involvement as the given and as the anchor then we are called on to modify our process so that we cannot move it forward unless and until we have that community engagement piece so I would urge us to to really consider that and to lead to lead with community and when I say that I don't just mean hold a couple of listening sessions and say okay we collected advice and we're going to do what we want to do anyway but but really really saying how can we create a work product that looks as close as possible to what our constituency and the public say they need. We have a couple more questions butch and then Carl. Thanks Alice and Susanna welcome to our committee. I guess mostly a little bit of a background that I remember from our committee here is that you pointed out a lot of thoughts that you have in your in your work and I don't think this committee will disagree with anything that you said because we've been we're we are the policy committee for corrections we we I think we take pretty deep dives into corrections and coincidentally we also are the policy and money committee for the institutions committee so when you talk about building prisons it's not foreign to us. We understand that process pretty well I think your target dates are about right on and so that's great we we also don't like out-of-state prisoners we would we've been working diligently to get those folks back home keep running into a roadblock here and there but we're we're conscious of that and cognizant of that and they're always looking to do that process better and try to make sure that those folks if they're incarcerated and if they need to be incarcerated are serving their sentences within the boundaries of the state so that's that's something near and dear to me and to the committee and I look for your help on that because not only is it a bad public policy to have these folks serving out of state it's uh it's also a bad financial decision how that happened so it's a kind of a two-pronged process for me uh and you know you know we should know we as a legislature haven't had and you talk about working on the front end of people coming into the uh affirmative corrections and into the justice system we as the legislature missed the mark maybe two or three years ago with a report that we asked uh corrections to generate talking about disparities in the in the population of our of our incarcerated population and corrections weren't diligently on that report and the final piece of the report that I took away from that was we asked the wrong people to do the report we asked the people on the back end and not the front end so I think what am I hoping that the legislature today is looking more at the front end and I appreciate you making that statement because I think that's the important piece here but once they come into into corrections uh I'm you you talked about hazing and harassment people of color in the in the corrections system uh first time for anybody say that but I'm not surprised to hear that so thank you for talking about that and I'm sure you and Heather Simon's had conversations about that and thank you for having conversations with her she was very upbeat and enthusiastic about your work with her as as they move forward and I for want to appreciate that uh recruitment and retention anything you can say to help us with that that would be that would be a big thing how do we how do we attract uh not only people of color but people that want to do this this important job uh how do how do we do that and how do we improve the process so looking for suggestions there this this may all come about maybe in the next legislative session because we talk about and you just talked about you know what can we do between now and january uh not we well one thing we can do is make sure we keep talking about this and try to figure it out thank you uh the I guess the the biggest thing that I'd like to leave with and maybe have a comment on is is we need as a policy committee we need suggestions from from your group and and from the uh the working group on s 338 and in jr2 um which came out of our committee by the way so we're pretty familiar with that uh and we need suggestions because we don't the 11 of us on the committee don't have the answers I think it's our job to listen to the the people in the community and and others to try to figure out the best path to go and if we're going down a long path please tell us we often don't know because we have a lot of things on her plate and that's not an excuse it's an explanation but so anyway I guess that's my my my soapbox and thank you and I was expand I would expand a little bit butch on what you were saying about we don't know because we have a lot on our plate personally I'm not speaking for the committee but personally it's like I don't know because I haven't experienced it and and you know I haven't experienced the situations that people of color have experienced we think we've experienced it but we haven't and we talk about that uh and uh and I and I agree we just don't know you've been here a little while you see Donna and you understand the culture a little bit of what's going on around here whether it's right or wrong and you've seen it so so we need we need to be trained and we can see what happens and we have been seeing it on our tv screens over the summer and it's appalling and and it jars you and it's makes you want to do something to make it right we experience it but we may experience it as a very different level than the community of color experiences it and it's we come at it from our experience which may be very very and is very very different and I don't want to discount anyone's feelings I'm just speaking personally we want to do we want to go forward in a healthy manner that's very inclusive and we need help to do that so we have another question Carl morning Suzanna and thank you for joining us this morning um I I know you're know you're busy and um we really or I really appreciate your spending the time with us to to work through through our our work and and figure out where to where to go next you said something that you know yesterday when Heather was with us I asked her some questions about grievance procedures and we spoke a little bit about that but mostly on the on the incarcerated side of things not on the workforce side and we know we've heard from DOC that the problems with retention are are due to too much overtime or forced overtime or they're due to supervisory issues but you know you really opened my eyes up this morning I did I did not know that corrections officers make up the largest proportion of people of color who work for the state um and I am really disappointed to hear that although like butch not surprised really disappointed to hear that there's discrimination and harassment among that um in that workforce around ethnicity and race and um I'm wondering if you have any information either anecdotal or otherwise about what what's happened in those situations have have people brought grievances have they just said you know what I don't want to work here and left or or something else that I'm not you know that that maybe you know about that I don't I'm I'm just really struck by by that because we we we can't afford to lose good people and especially for something um for something like that that that's really it's disheartening to hear um and so I'm I'm just wondering if you've got any more information for us about that what I can say is that this is not um it's not rare it's not rare at all a lot of people don't come forward one because of retaliation or embarrassment or shame or because they've internalized that this is what their life is like and is going to be like and why struggle um so yeah this is definitely something that needs to be addressed and it's going to have to be addressed whether or not we have cooperation from people who are experiencing it I mean obviously you want to protect people and you want to make sure that no one's being um harmed or railroaded through the process um but but it's clear that intimidation is very real and that if we do not act on vulnerable people's behalf then they will continue to be vulnerable and I've just sent you in the chat an image that shows that distribution of job titles and SOV that we talked about just for you all to review at your leisure um I think that we need to find a mechanism through which people feel comfortable coming forward and that may be different than the existing mechanism um this is something that we experience in a lot of workplaces people say well there's a reporting structure why didn't they come forward or why didn't they report it well the person they're supposed to report it to is the guy who's doing it or well they've seen this happen before and every single time the the agency takes the side of management or they think of it as a risk reduction from a risk reduction perspective like how do we avoid a lawsuit as opposed to saying how do we find a just end to the situation and do right by the complaint so there there may need to be a parallel structure or a rethinking of the existing structure to make sure that people feel comfortable enough engaging in this process and then I think you'd be shocked to find a lot of people come forward and it very much is a cascade right when one person comes forward then suddenly a cajillion people do who've just been holding on to it and hadn't felt brave enough to say anything until that one person does I don't know if I've even addressed your question I just talked around it but well I didn't I didn't necessarily know that you'd have an answer for me but I appreciate your your comments man I was asking you sort of something that you probably have anecdotal information about but I really appreciate your bringing this up because I think it's you know of all all the problems and the commissioner talks about the issues around culture this has got to be part of that discussion too because the problems that it causes and the within the structure of the workforce are very real if what you're telling us is true and I have no reason to doubt that at all so thank you and I'd like to say thank you and just one other thing about the impact on the workplace I think a lot of times we don't really recognize how much discrimination in the workplace hurts the organization a lot of reports and I'm blanking on the numbers but I think 80 of people who have either experienced or witnessed bias and discrimination in the workforce 80 of them say they give less effort at their jobs as a result I think 11 uh I think there's an 11 drop in productivity and a 17 drop in focus and attention and skilled work and again we're talking about a workforce that needs to be sharp and needs to be on point and needs to have its crack together and so when we have people who are being harassed in the workplace and it's already a workplace with heightened security concerns one error or one oversight could could really end very poorly so it's particularly important in workplaces like that that the team be a team and if the what you're talking about is going on there there's not much team there thank you so another committee member has a question but I want to intervene here in a minute just for clarity because mine I was diverted a little bit in this conversation with some other things so when we're talking about the harassment the workforce I just we were just talking about staff to staff correct so I'm looking back on the notes and saying that the state employment of employment within the state of Vermont of state employees the highest concentration of people of color who are employed by the state are COPs are you have you had any reports of incarcerated inmates harassing staff or people of color I have not heard those reports directly I am sure that it happens but I have no I do not yet have data to show that so I think that's another piece that we also need to be very aware that is the situation I would think so we've got a couple more questions Kurt and then butch um when when I think of workforce I also think of the VSEA and the union that represents them and there would seem to me if there are complaints and things like this going on in the workforce the VSEA should be aware of them and should be working on them as well I know I don't know whether they accept that role or not but it seems to me a a valid thing for an association of the state employees to be working on do you know anything about any contact with them or any word through them about these sorts of issues I don't I haven't heard okay we have reached out to VSEA to come in and testify there's been some conflicts with Steve Howard's schedule um he was to we were hoping to have him in this morning but then he was double triple booked and um I have indicated to Phil that we would have some time first thing Tuesday morning to hear from him and hopefully that will work out because Adam chair he has he has confirmed just a couple of minutes ago for Tuesday first thing okay great okay butch thanks uh Alex uh so Zana thank you for sending us that that report uh but I'm wondering uh and maybe a question Phil too can we get that downloaded to our yes did that thank you very much that's one of the things I was doing it's going to be posted on our webpage I was trying to do the same thing I was trying to download it was having trouble downloading because I know when we go off we lose the chat so I don't you mean the you mean the chart that I sent over with the minority report that you just sent in your chat Phil has already done actually okay great Phil has done it to put it on our webpage right Phil yes I downloaded it to the desktop and we'll put it up on our webpage a little later oh thank you very much the the beauty of zoom I guess I don't know that's why I was distracted questions yeah and just for um just to dot the i's and cross the t's that comes from the state of Vermont workforce report from fiscal 2019 I've just put the link in the chat as well I would I would point out on this charts that uh co1 and co2 are listed separately so if you were to combine those categories is where you see bigger jumps okay that's good and maybe we could put this link to uh Phil to our webpage because butch is right when we sign off a zoom we lose the the chat anything else versus Zuzana Zuzana I'm sorry I struggle I want to call you Zuzana Zuzana um anything else before we go over to Anthony Marks um Anthony was scheduled at 9 30 and I had said to Phil to let Anthony in earlier so that he could at least get a flavor of our conversation and discussion so anything else for Zuzana you're welcome to stay on um where you know we are scheduled until 10 30 what I'm hoping to do after uh Anthony's testimony to maybe start grappling with the committee in terms of what we need to do for language we have Becky Wasserman with us who's a draftsperson that at least can get a flavor of what direction we're going in so that we can have some language before us on Tuesday morning and I would and I know you heard this Zuzana and Anthony has not but I would encourage as many people to be available if you can on Tuesday morning at 8 30 to zoom in with us while we start walking through our proposed language because we're going to need everyone's feedback for that so connect with Phil Phil's our tea person okay thank you I do have to jump off um because I have another meeting with Secretary Young um but I look forward to trying to pop in on Tuesday that'll overlap uh it'll overlap with our cabinet meeting but as soon as we're done there I'll come on over that's great that's good thank you Zuzana real quick before you leave before you leave before you leave I want to thank you so much um and this is just honestly like unfortunately obviously all these people around here when I'm thanking you period but I do want to let you know that like when we when we the black community talk about black excellence um I think you represent that that statement in every aspect of it and so again like thank you live up to that thank you so much thank you that's that's big thank you very much for saying that absolutely great thank you everyone thank you we'll see you Tuesday so Anthony we're gonna we're gonna shift over to you and I hope you've gotten sort of a flavor of what we're kind of thinking um as I stated at the very beginning of our meeting there's as you well know there's two legislative bills senate bills that are working through the house s119 s124 um they're dealing with law enforcement and training and a big piece of the criminal justice system is corrections and a lot of people don't think about corrections they're thinking of law enforcement in the courts but corrections is the one that houses the folks that come from that feeder system of course um and I felt it was appropriate and our role as house corrections and institutions committee that oversees the policy of corrections to have a place at the table and to put in some language in one of those bills to really start looking at racial equity and social justice within our corrections so that's what we're looking at it's not going to be anything um a deep dive because we just don't have the time but it will it will set the table for us to really do that deep dive come january so any thoughts any um direction you can give us would be really appreciative so i'll turn it over to you anthony if you could introduce yourself for the record and then we'll go from there absolutely well my name is anthony my quest i've actually been doing a lot of work around the state um obviously vermont doing different types of i'm a huge i'm huge into videography cinematography storytelling and i've been really documenting the um the protests that we've seen all over the state as you guys know this is a huge like this is this is such a different time this is history being made every single day in the state and it's not necessarily um the the right side of history all the time but it is definitely allowing us to see that ugly that ugly invisible face that vermont pretends to to not have or exist here and um throughout that work what i've noticed is how many people literally just don't know and how many people use that excuse as well we we had no idea vermont um had racial racial issues we had no no no idea that vermont possessed this sort of um racism in whatever the case may be but for me it's like even if you didn't know that does not that does not mean you shouldn't have been doing the work forever ago and i think a lot of these conversations that we're having um day in and day out week in and week out as far as the black community is concerned is it's it's educational more or less than it is furthering the conversation like we're literally a lot of people are unlearning their their their views of what race looks like or racism looks like in the state and a little bit a little bit of that is scary because a lot of those people that are having to to undo those thoughts that they they grew up with um honestly look like you individuals on this call right now and so we're really we're really like i've been in a position where i'm really pushing that narrative of like do the work don't just assume that you know just because you're in a position to understand obviously this call um you guys being who you are it to me it's a little it's a little scary because when i hear we're looking to um we're looking to put language into a narrative to me it's almost like you're looking to pick little pieces here and there to fit whatever narrative you guys are trying to um accomplish or push and and that as a black man is a very um to me that's very undermining that's undermining the realization that there are real things happening in this world especially in this my bad there are real things happening in this world and the state of vermont is not exempt is not exempt from those real things this stuff has been happening for a very very very long time and actually excuse me certain uh books there um there's something that you had distinctively said that like stuck with me a little bit and you talked about how you understand the number of incarceration um for out-of-staters is extremely high in the state of vermont and you said you guys are working on um pretty much you're working on something that would allow that number to decrease um and i think my my biggest overall question at that time was are we talking about the the black end of like the black community like are we talking about um african-americans or or brown people indigenous people are we talking about that community or are we talking about just in general like the incarceration numbers so community the whole thing yeah we have right now what we're folks when we say we are incarcerating folks out of state we have a contract with a private entity and we've had contracts for 25 years yeah of housing vermont offenders out of state because we don't have bed space in our facilities yes right now we have about 217 folks yeah who are sentenced here in vermont having incarcerated sentenced here in vermont but due to the lack of space within our current facilities say miss Mississippi right right they're being housed right now in Mississippi we've been wanting to bring all of our offenders who have been housed in out-of-state beds because we don't have the capacity here in vermont yeah bring them all back yeah okay okay that's what representative shaw was referring to okay okay cool cool and thank you thank you that's not clear everything out for me as far as that's concerned so thank you um but yeah i mean like honestly like this is guys this is stuff that clearly i could talk about all day but what i really want to stress the importance of and i think um as you were saying earlier your white a lot of these experiences that like are being talked about are something that you i mean you just don't know because you've never personally experienced what it's like to even be a black man or a black woman in a predominantly white space and what i would beg you guys to get a better understanding of and i think it's very i think it could i think it's very simple if we're looking at it from a micro perspective we got to understand there is a specific type of person running for two correction officer jobs there is a specific type of person and every now and then somebody who has values morals integrity signs up for a job like that every now and then that happens but nine times out of ten there is a specific type of person individual that is running to these jobs and within two to three weeks they have the power of putting somebody in the hole for two weeks at a time like literally taking them from a space that's already uncomfortable and taking them completely out of that space and then locking them in a cage that has no light that has no wreck time that has no like you can't you can't call your support system at all throughout the day unless it's from one to one thirty or seven to seven thirty and then all of a sudden what happens is now they learn their lessons so what we do is we take these individuals that we locked up in these like specific holes and then we put them right back into whatever community they have built throughout um throughout their time being in jail and to me it's like it's like it's like it's like it's like it's like it's time being in jail and to me what that automatically does to the human mind what that does to like your psyche in general is I mean there's words that I really want to use on this call right now that I'm not using but understand like what that ultimately does is excuse my language but it fucks you up like it really messes with you in a way that is so hard to truly explain to you guys as individuals but like without being on a zoom go I feel like this is a conversation for in person um it's really tough it's just hard to take something that is so familiar because you're forced to get used to that take them out of that familiarity and then two weeks later try to integrate them back into that system that same community and expect them to have a good day expect them to to be able to look at individuals that again sign up for these jobs because of power because of that that that physical I want to control you mind frame that mindset and then you put these individuals that are struggling just to get by day to day with these individuals and I mean so so many so many so many scenarios and situations are overreactions you know I mean like these people that like are in control of these individuals they overreact on these guys like like that's their job and from from me for instance it's just I don't I don't see power in that I don't see how that is doing your job and when we talk about like race that is huge when it comes to like one like I'm not sure who it was um but someone on this call had said it was the first time they had ever heard they had or either the first time they had heard or it was one of the first times they had heard individuals mistreating inmates or vice versa and to me it's just like are you serious like you're in this but like you don't realize that's a thing and ultimately what that tells me is we we not just you but we as individuals are not doing the work to ensure the safety and to ensure the and to ensure a better understanding a deeper understanding of what's actually going on behind closed doors um I mean miss davish I mean she she touched based on if she literally stated and I quote the work is literally the work can't be done if we can like consistently turn and the work definitely can't be done if the people that are doing the harm are the ones in control of changing it and I think ultimately when we when we view when we look at that from a concrete perspective we really to take a step back and be like first and foremost who are we employing like who are we who are we saying like yeah you're fit for this job and if those individuals are a specific type of person um I think we need to look at that specific type of person and then decide from there like how can we do a better job of how can do a better job because again when you employ anybody and everybody to me there's this there's this level of like power hungry driven individuals that you are driving into these positions and it's not it's not when we talk about racial justice like we're actually pushing away from that statement more or less than pushing towards and I mean like I said this is stuff that I could talk about all the and get way deeper into it but uh that's that's just where I'm at right now it's it's tough it's tough for me like this is a tough call like this is a very tough call because like you guys are looking for language to put in whatever legulate legislation that you're going to put in um but to me ultimately it like this we're talking about life right like we're talking about life and when I hear words are supposed to change something it's it's it's very it's it's it's uncomfortable because like to me words have been words for over 400 years but we still have this system called imprisonment and that imprisonment like that that system within itself is doing exactly what it was intended to do 400 years ago and and that to me is like the most scariest aspect of this whole thing it only it incarcerates the marginalized individuals it incarcerates the the oppressed it doesn't give the benefit of the doubt it's it's very much so if you're here it's because you're this not because you're that or because you could be this or that um I really want you guys to dig deep when it comes to when I get like this might not be on your plate but I really want you guys to dig deep when it comes to individuals that are being incarcerated that are asked to program in jail like DOC could could could mess up their entire programming like that just by throwing them in the hole for two days because they skipped because now they miss a class so there's so much more going on that is so much deeper and again I know you guys said we're not diving into the deep dish right now but like I don't know how to not dive into that as a black man because I know this is happening to a lot of my brothers out there I know this is happening to a lot of my sisters out there when we talk about individuals that are um black that are employed by the uh by DOC I want you guys to really understand that number is very very low like that's not even like that's that number almost doesn't even exist in the sense of like who's really being employed by DOC so ultimately it's like I think we need to start looking at the opposite side of things because you do not choose to be incarcerated however you choose to work for DOC and like there's a huge there's a huge difference and there's a huge balance that like I think people ultimately um really need to separate because I don't think like they're two of the same things about so Anthony I want to thank you um for sharing all of this and one thing I do want to say is I know that doing this work on Zoom uh in an electronic format is very difficult for all of us um if we were sitting in a committee room together hearing testimony I know that there would be a different environment feel and I just want to say to you that um I hope you feel safe in sharing sharing sharing your testimony with us I think if you were in a if we were all in a committee room together hearing this you would feel that definitely definitely very very difficult when we're on a platform of Zoom and we're all away from each other um I also want to just clarify the ish the question about the discrimination and harassment I think the question was and and the first thing we first time we had really heard any uh acknowledgement and it was the first time it was really verbalized to us uh in a public setting that there have been um issues of discriminate discrimination and harassment between staff members between the staffing of correctional officers and and within the department of that's the first time we as legislators in this committee have heard anyone to really say those words and acknowledge that and that that was the question from in the statement from our committee members as well as asking the question because we have not heard any of this and this is why we're doing the work we're doing about uh staff or CEOs that are people of color and they're supervising uh white individuals what's the harassment from the inmates to those staff members so that's that's what we were working around that's it wasn't that we were shocked to hear it what we were to hear and was the actual acknowledgement that there is harassment discrimination between the staff members and and and and thank you for the words to that before yeah yeah no no definitely and thank you for explaining that like I said like obviously jumping into it like I probably didn't like hear the this the angle that you guys were taking um so I appreciate you explaining that I think ultimately to me that still doesn't um again like the fact that you're surprised like as a black man right so I'm coming at this from total different level of thought process right so as a black man I'm thinking of myself like I'm not surprised at all because again it goes back to the type of individual that wants a job like this in the first place and like I said when I say people slip through the cracks I'm saying like I know there are good people in DOC like I have I have a lot of good friends that are in DOC um whether it's counseling or whether they are actual guards like I have a lot of friends that um I know put that hat on put that put that gear on and they go to do real work um but I also know within that work is a certain level of power that comes with that and that power is what drives people into those positions so to hear that within the staff even all over the state um to hear that there is issues going on and I'm not just saying like racial discrimination I'm saying like sexual harassment it goes way deeper than it goes way deeper than like black and white right so like like to me there's no surprise because these same people were the same bullies in high school these same people were the same kids that were like stealing off kids lunch plates in junior high like these kids were like these people were the same people that like never connected with individuals unless it was them controlling the narrative and ultimately they are the ones running to these positions and obviously this isn't a guessing game like you guys aren't out here to like guess like I bet this is going on but like to not to be surprised that that's going on is like again like that baffles me as a black man a little bit because ultimately it's like as a black man in this country you have to you grow up having to be aware of everyone around you like every single circumstance that you ever put yourself in you have to be fully aware and conscious that that could be your last situation or circumstance and so I'm fully I fully understand where you're coming from and I get it obviously from your angle completely and again you said already as a white person how could you even like how could you even know what it's like being black if you know what I mean like vice versa um I wish I wish I was able to have and and I don't mean I don't say this as a as disrespect but I wish I was able to have that ignorant outlook or that that naive outlook on the situation because I wouldn't have this this frustration and anger that like lingers in my life throughout like any day at any given time like I wouldn't have this certain resentment towards conversations like this I wouldn't have this um I wouldn't have this this like emotional reaction to hearing individuals like yourselves saying you're surprised you know what I mean like that that word alone like a very like it's like a triggering word because it's just like what's surprising about that like like to me it's just like it's obvious and like I could tell and I know one thing that happens a lot when it comes to uh inmates being transferred to different locations like they're always asked have you been the victim of like um any sexual like uh anything sexual that like you may have not wanted sexual harassment or anything like that have you been the victim of this or that they're always asking those like inmates these questions but people that work for DOC they're not being asked those questions at all as a matter of fact I think it's one time during the application process and then after that like what so it's like to install so much trust in the the oppressor and to not install and to not see what's happening to the oppressed and again I'm talking more so people women I'm talking men of color I'm talking women of color like they're like there is I mean as far as I'm concerned women like to work for DOC that's a that's a tough job like as like as a woman and again I'm not talking about color this one I'm just talking purely like like a woman walking into that that that location every single day it is not that that cannot be easy so for me it's it's just not I'm not surprised that there are racial issues that there are that there are all these issues that are being brought up now or finally being brought up that people chose to not take a deeper look into um earlier in the game because I mean it's it happens all over the country and this is this is outside of prisons so I can only imagine what goes on behind these uh behind these walls so excuse me as we have some questions from the committee Sarah hi hi Anthony I just want to say thank you for joining us and I know it feels like a really white space um being oh it is it is yeah and um and uh and I have to say you know I like Alice said you know if we were in a committee meeting I think you would probably feel um the like you'd be able to pick up how I'm feeling right now and I think that your voice is is so important in this and I just wanted to acknowledge that um the committee um has been looking at this and actually we it was pretty disturbing at the top of the session in January we got a pretty deep dive into the rape in our facilities actually um it was it was uh it was pretty extensive and it was a pretty painful first three weeks for many of us so you're absolutely right about um you know that it this is about race it's about control and power what goes on inside of our facilities and also in our communities under community supervision yes um and we at some days it does feel like we are really nibbling at the edges um and I think one of the things I wanted to ask you is you know um while we've been involved in this process I've been trying to educate myself outside of this committee as well I mean I just to let you know a little bit about me since you're spilling your guts here um you know like I have I was a part of a multiracial family my like I have family members who experience some of the stuff we have queer people in our family so I think these issues are relevant and I know that there are other members of this committee who can who can relate to some of this and I think like one of the big questions that we're grappling with is like I think at the bottom of it is like our prison what are we doing with prisons in our country and in our state and album and we have people in them and how do we make them more humane um and one of the big questions is like I think that is about like how do we get different people working in them and how do we make it a better workplace because we do like we're really struggling we have these abilities and people are there and people are working there and people are incarcerated there and I hear what you said you're saying and I hear what Susanna is saying it's kind of like like this the um the kind of uh the philosophical question about like why do we have prisons and why do we incarcerate people and who are we what are we asking people to do who work in these spaces so our question that we're asking about this language is about like what is it that we can do that would attract a different kind of person to work like can we change we want to be changing the culture inside of our facilities for the people who are in our care and also the people who work there and what I'm hearing from you is and I'm hearing from Susanna too is like you need to engage with the community who is impacted most by these systems to affect these changes and I'm a person who wants to get some action I want to move to action and so I really am looking at you like how do you feel like there's a lot of at our state there's a lot going on with different task forces and different groups and you know giving um input do you have recommendations for us about how that should authentically happen like so that we can really authentically so I'm sorry for the long intro question to you and I just I just really I thank you for being with us today so no sir first and foremost thank you um and I can I can sense the emotion so like I really appreciate that um actually I'm gonna move over here so I can charge my ipad the same time um no amazing question for charging iPads and computers um no that's an amazing thank you honestly thank you I think so we can literally go into this all day like this is something that obviously is not um it's not necessarily the most easiest conversation to have but I think and it's not something that's just like black and white like right like I say this and then boom everything's better um however I do believe in the power of communication and I think that if you're hiring individuals in these power positions that like have never had any form of higher learning when it comes to communication and any form of actual learning when it comes to psychology the way the brain works the way humans work like empathy if you don't have passion I don't see how you can be in a position that is supposed to well ultimately when you release people make them better for society standards right like I think I think having real discussions with inmates and actually developing relationships to me is very is is very key to a successful um to a successful sentence and it sounds messed up like a what's a successful sentence right like um but ultimately it's like a few of my friends who are incarcerated a 90% of them tell me the nurses the people that like the psychology like I mean like just in general the therapists the people that they speak to I will keep them afloat in that in that place and so naturally to me that tells me that what they lack what what inmates lack the most of is interaction and what they lack the most of is um bond right like a close connection with somebody that like they can they can consistently count on from a day-to-day basis they lack that um it's one thing to get that from like a phone call but I don't know how you guys would feel about talking to your son daughter father mother and hearing you have one minute remaining right like when they hear that that in itself is like a triggering like even at the end of a good conversation it reminds you where you're at and so just little things that consistently like they hear and see throughout the day I feel like have to be that that are positive in their life and I understand individually um that changes from inmate to inmate for instance some inmates enjoy their peace and quiet like that's just who they are they need that but those are like those are individuals that that like writing that like creating books stories that love um again just like being in thought like from an emotional perspective and just kind of like sitting there and just doing their time in a um um in a quiet manner um so obviously there's so many different levels to what I'm saying right now but I think one of the biggest things um is communication and like having an understanding that if we're going to employ these individuals to be in these power positions they have to also be fully willing to connect and explore the the inmates life in general and not just stand there waiting for one of them to mess up so they could drag them out of the the unit and I think there's too much of that which is um which is ultimately this overall issue like what are we here for like what do like when I for instance as a basketball coach trainer you name it I'm the type of person that tells myself like from the moment I wake up like what is my goal here like I know that I'm going to be in a position to affect young people what is my goal here and I always tell myself I will never ever ever just assume because of somebody's age that they can't do something like I would rather overestimate them than underestimate them and then have them feeling that pressure and I feel like if we start looking at um positions of power in the sense of their coaches their life coaches as opposed to their guards just waiting for again somebody to mess up to drag them out um I think ultimately that in itself will create a more positive environment and respect will be will go a long way between the inmates and the uh and the uh the correctional officer and so um I don't know if that answers your question but obviously this is something that like we can clearly dive deeper into like way deeper into um but that's just like a quick opinion that I have like I truly believe communication is key and um bond and developing relationships is something that needs to happen in a uh in a space that is intense and not like sad right like is I mean is being an inmate enjoyable like right like is it ever like is it ever easy regardless of what you're there for like is it ever easy to be there period and don't get me wrong I am not sitting here saying there are not some people that deserve to be locked up in the key thrown away like like that I'm not saying that at all um but I am saying if we're just talking strictly about how to make the environment a better place I think ultimately um relationship building communication and really evaluating like who you are when you go into that work like when you go to work who are you going to work as what side of the bed did you wake up on like stuff like that is extremely important to me and I think ultimately when you see what's going on in this country um especially with these uh these cops that feel like it's completely okay to just nail on somebody's neck for nine minutes straight um you have to question like what was he like as a kid like like where where does this hate stem from because at one point I bet he was that kid that like just wanted to play PlayStation with his brother and sister right like like I bet he was that kid that just wanted to go to the beach I bet he was that kid that wanted to stay up late and like watch that TV show that his mother said nope you got to brush your teeth and go to bed for it so it's like ultimately like I look deeper into scenarios before I just assume like this person's a horrible human like I want to know like how people wake up in the morning and what their mind frames at because ultimately that's going to dictate how they treat individuals that are already on edge because they woke up at six on a cot that's about that thick with one sheet and like a crappy pillow so I think like I mean like we could talk about this out there you know what I'm saying like I think like there's so much more growth to be had um just in the sense of like how you walk into your workplace in the morning and I think ultimately that is something that needs to have a deeper broader dive into for sure so we really appreciate that because being on zoom we walk into it every morning and that's to a different world um so do you have any other questions Sarah I just want to say thank you Anthony and you know um just to say you know if you can think about how we can create these thoughtful exchanges um it with DOC and with folks I think it's I think that's how we're going to get there and that's uncomfortable of a space as it is I think it's important to be in those spaces absolutely absolutely thank you so much definitely thank you thank you Sarah so I'm looking at the time we've only got about 20 more minutes and Becky has had to go to another meeting and I want to allow time for us as a committee to kind of start getting our thoughts together in terms of what we need to put together for language um so we have one more question and then we're going to shift gears to um where we are as a committee with what we want to propose to our colleagues so much thank you else um Anthony thanks coming in uh from your perspective that's how we learn absolutely but I did hear one reoccurring theme I think through your testimony that we need to do a better job of recruiting CEOs and therefore if we do a better job we'll have better retention rates and things will be not easier when you're incarcerated but at least some continuity or whatever your whatever word you want to pick here absolutely you can know and you may already know that DOC has just changed gears a little bit and now has an office of professional development that's for central hiring in in those times issues and they are working on uh so standards for the hiring of all employees within DOC but especially CEOs have you had a chance to have any conversations with anybody from DOC um either through uh Susanna or uh yourself just reaching out to DOC to talk about this a little bit they're they're looking for help also they're looking for ways to do a better job and recruitment so they can retain people um not not I've had a lot of conversations with individuals that work for DOC but what you're speaking of I haven't necessarily spoke on terms of that what I do what I do sense and again I think this could be because of the time and what's going on around the world in the country what I do sense is a lot of individuals that work for DOC from different capacity levels um I do see a lot of them stepping up and saying this is not okay and a lot of them are starting to like come forward but like um and obviously to protect those individuals I'm not going to tell you like where they work or anything like that but there are specific areas um in Vermont that a lot of what we're talking about right now happens is happening right now right like it's like literally happening right now because of the individuals that work there so I think I think um to kind of touch base on a little bit of what you're saying like those conversations are slowly approaching and I don't know when those conversations will be had but I know like I'm in a position where I'm ready to have that conversation and I'm ready to listen I think a lot of that um I think I think a lot of the uh the BIPOC the black community are are asking a lot of white people during this time to just shut up and listen but I think it's also very important for black people to also be willing to shut up and listen on the other end of things because if we're talking about trying to change the structure of power we also have to understand how power works in the first place and I think that can only be done um and learned through individuals that are in power which obviously are white people so we uh I'm ready to definitely have those conversations and I'm also ready to shut up and listen on terms of when those individuals from these specific um from these specific facilities and or uh places like I said of power um are ready to have those conversations so so uh current DOC leadership uh is is very enthusiastic about doing a better job of recruitment and not the time is right now to give get I think to give them your your input um so if you can reach out to the commissioner's office or the office of professional development that would be that would be great because I'm sure that the the gal in charge of professional development would be more than willing to listen to your story definitely absolutely I'm more than willing to help in any way so that being said let's move on committee to and Anton your stay on um we've got to at least have a framework of language that Becky can work on Becky's going to call me about 11 o'clock to go over which what we can do so I'm going to open it up to the committee members I know some folks are thinking of maybe just intent language some folks may be thinking about DOC and it's beyond DOC it's also reaching out to the advocate community as well to develop a plan in terms of racial equity um and then also a member has submitted a proposal about having the state auditor's office do a race equity audit um so Terry it's Friday indeed it is it's Friday time for you to talk yes it is and so I have some time necessary to think about what we need to do to go forward with this and I think back to when you madam chair and butch and I were on the committee and Mary Hooper was also on the committee and her mantra was what's the plan and so I think that's where we have to to start is ask DOC what's the plan and to address racial equity and social justice and in that plan to put particular things in it as far as staff training recruiting and retention and Heather brought up the the issue yesterday wouldn't we asked about it is to review the department directives which are badly in need and the sort of overwhelming job probably but but we would need to have that done and to develop a not an all inclusive list but a list of other things that we would like to see in the plan a timeline for each of the things that are being developed to the resources that are needed what costs that there might be how do we include the stakeholders and then a planned report back on that plan and how it's going to be developed sometime either through the oversight committee before the end of the calendar year or to the committee on corrections and institutions and probably Senate traditionary early in January about where we're at as far as developing something to go forward so that's my my party's thoughts that's very good cherry i think i think you may have summed it up for us i i think so and i'm you know it's great sometimes theory that you get all this down all at once to approve that listening sometimes is better than talking our committee members feeling about this Alice yes hearing it i just want to say i terry did sum it up quite nicely just as i said yesterday i think we need to have some pretty strong language not kind of just let it happen as that happens and i think terry laid out a very good plan and you know with the with feedback to come back or plan compact within the end of this year um and so that we're moving along it's not just being talked about and again as i said yesterday i think it's very important present and from all the commissioner there that a lot of this work is is done and and put into place or or i should say moving along and you know there will be additions and subtractions right along but i think we need to have a strong statement coming out of this committee and i think terry nailed it so terry i just want to make sure i've got what the is about the plan and what it should include that and the plan would be to address racial equity within department of corrections we'll be looking at hiring training review of their directives would be a timeline for each of those developments um the training of staff the cost who would be included as stakeholders and report back am i did i capture that okay you got it okay i'm just thinking in conversations with becky what maybe she could incorporate there um other thoughts from the members butch heather talked about this yesterday and you brought the the question up about how do current employees get trained we had a great discussion on that and i was thinking back on that a little bit and you mentioned something about just doing it a roll call and those type of things but i try to relate maybe a little bit to the to the police that they and and folks that have testified today have said you know well these guys are similar to police in the jobs they have and and what they do you know the police do continuing education all the time for existing employees they're they're in down here in pittsford current officers are here all the time doing continuing continuing education some some of the stuff that we we mandate and some of the stuff that's just necessary for them i'm wondering do they need a plan for continuing education of of current employees because i don't think that's happening now right i really like that that's why i brought up that yeah because that happened that was very clear when we were looking at the david character situation it was a long time ago it was back in 93 94 and and that really came to life that whenever there was any new directive change in doc or new policies or just something new that correctional officers needed to now do they only got that information at roll call and roll call was not required for officers to participate roll call occurred about 10 minutes prior to the shift coming on um and uh that's why i asked if that same practice is done for that so can i ask a question sure this is open for anyone to weigh in it's a committee discussion on language we've talked a little bit about directives um and uh what what did we hear yesterday that there are something like over a 500 plus 500 directives and i'm i'm guessing that some of those have to do with um this issue and i i'm wondering if we might also you know thinking about our our conversations about furlough statuses if uh maybe there's there's a number of different uh directives on um uh racial bias or um equity that can be distilled into one i'm that's just a that's just a thought in my mind i you know i'm knowing that there's 500 of them that's i mean how does that how do you deal with 500 directors if you're an employee right right on a mission we'll put curd on that he probably already is maybe not maybe not part of the language but um uh you know i i mean i i just wanted to bring that up i i like terry's approach i like you know i think that we've got we've had a we've had a really encouraging nine months here our discussions about these issues whether it's um what was happening and what we heard about at chitenden or um commissioner baker's acknowledgement of an over sexualized workplace um he knows that there are issues around um hiring and supervision and training um and so i i think just having what what terry what terry said i'm i'm i'm very comfortable with the other piece there about the directives i'm thinking of a conversation i had with commissioner baker um just this week and he alluded to this in testimony when he was here was it tuesday um that there was a situation of an inmate who was a person of color and were not having water in his cell and his mother had connected with doc and then the staff tried to enter the cell and um the inmate didn't let him come into the cell and what the commissioner stated was that well they did what was procedurally laid out in the directives they did what was protocol that was driven by directives and maybe what needs to happen and looking at those directives has come with a view of social equity and racial equity because maybe some of those directives they can say well we did protocol we did as it was laid out in that particular directive but it didn't come through the eyes of racial equity so that may be more the angle of really looking at the directives just the thought based on the conversation what he shared with me does that make sense to the committee and there's a lot of directives out there but it may come from a particular viewpoint um sarah whoops i don't care which one sarah go ahead sarah i'll be quick um i i agreed that i i all i have some slight fear about getting caught up in the minutia of the directives where i think the strength of this is like come back to us with the plan like and um and i think what i also heard people talking about is about like what are the core competencies that we want um the state's employees working corrections to have you know i think um that's if we can get that word in there somehow or competency yeah competencies like because i think what butch was saying is about like continuing education and it's about and i feel like that's part of uh our training and the training is like developing core competencies and and uh for doc to identify what those are those competencies are to address equity and racial bias um within the system current uh i just just wanted to say that i with regard to the directives i got the number 550 just by going to the website and they're numbered um there's gaps in the numbers but some of the numbers have a b's and c's so there's additional directors but they're all on the website and you can uh the doc website so you can the directors are all public information but i think i agree with what sarah's on that we don't want to get into the minutia the directives but i think it can be a statement you need to update these directors some of them have been there for 30 years that haven't been updated and that came to me from the commissioner as well but he was shocked that some of these directors are 30 years old and it was a different world back then in corrections and in the world and also 30 years ago the folks who were being incarcerated 30 years ago had a very very different than what's being incarcerated now i mean back then a lot of people were incarcerated just for duis there's a whole different population they had misdemeanors and now we're dealing more misdemeanors and now coming in through the door for the most part can you give can you give me again what uh what ter what you wrote down for us what terry's kind of proposing i just wanted to get a better clearer picture of it well this is what i'm hearing uh ask doc to come back to with a plan in terms of how to address racial equity and they would be looking at the hiring the training and the review of directives there would be a timeline for each of those that they want to i don't know would it be implement or that's something to look at it would be training of the staff the cost who to include as stakeholders and then to report back uh to either the oversight committee or to us i would almost say the report back should come to us not the oversight committee and have to have the date like january 15th or january something like that because the oversight committee is just gonna we don't know how many times we're going to be meeting can i um can i make one more suggestion yeah we've sort of uh you know in the in that language we've got um the training piece but you know butch made a point about continuing education and i do we want um do we want to really highlight the difference between a new trainee who's going through the academy versus um existing staff in there uh because i i think there's there's yeah there's a there's a um there's a big difference yes and the the uh the impact um well i'm kind of thinking about how to say this uh there's a there's a need for um in what commissioner baker has talked about changing the culture there's a real need for training amongst existing staff there and so i think it's really important to to really differentiate between those two yeah i've got that down so i'm looking at the time and i know that phil has to go and set up for house education committee because they're meeting shortly um any other thoughts so one of yep butch you're so we're going to ask and we don't have to answer this question today or tomorrow but we're going to ask doc to do a lot more work again so we i don't know how we do this whether we approach appropriations is too late for this year's this current budget i suppose but somehow we keep taking money away from doc and flowing it and demanding that they they do more and more more for the for the dollars that we have we need to think about what we're asking you we need to think and we should and we should ask but we also think about how are they going to do it do the report or do the work do do the work you know do the report and do the work well that goes into the cost and how are they going to do it yep well and i agree butch that's where i was kind of getting at yesterday when we were speaking with heather like you know is this i mean an organization that would do this would hire like some outside consultant to help them do this deep work because they don't have the expertise necessarily in house but also to cultivate the expertise in house in the process so um that might be a recommendation of their plan exactly you know like i don't know if we're going to get the appropriation and in these next couple of weeks but i think it's about it's gone i mean it's about seeding what can happen right um right i mean what are the resources that they need to do this work right it's submitting the plan which then tells you what they're going to have to do which could be hiring a consultant to do a deeper dive it could be more money for training it could who knows what uh you know the the continuing education piece is going to take legislation alice because if we don't legislate it it's not going to hear the same thing here what comes out of central office again yeah uh mar marcia i know it's going to cost money and stuff but i think this is going to be a good back in for the commissioner of what he's seen and what he's going to try to correct and he's going to need all the help he can get yeah and mary's saying the same thing make the language strong so i'm pushing us because i'm looking at the time and i know phil has to get ready for the other committee what i'd like to do here becky's going to call me about 11 o'clock today because she had to scoot to another meeting at 10 she's going to call me i'm going to relay this so we can she can start working on language i'm going to relay this conversation and what terry laid out and also include um the cost and how they're going to get to doing the plan and also uh make sure we're including continuing education and training so what i'm also going to ask all of you and i'm going to ask becky the same thing if you come up with something or want to be a little clearer about the path we're on to connect with becky over the next few days i know it's labor day weekend um but connect with becky and i'm going to ask becky the same thing that if she has questions about some of these specifics to reach out to some of the committee members or send out a whole email to the committee members and have us respond that's what i'm thinking does that make sense just so there's more i think also one thing i keep thinking about is to have like an intent language that sort of says um re-emphasize that the mission of corrections is really to rehabilitate and that doc has a role um in implementing the quality of a person's sentence i think those words are really important to have as our legislative intent so um any does that make sense to at least start our come start our language with those two pieces we get we might even say as a as a department in the agency of human services yeah drive that point home a little more that oh about the role of implementing the quality of that just doc is an agent it's a department in the oh yeah and kurt you had your hand up yeah i just want to make sure that we realize we've gone through a couple of cycles here i think we started out yesterday talking about a report and then we decided there was too much work for them to do a report and now we're back to having them do a report so i'm just i'm cautious i want to make sure that we're doing going on the right track and not just responding too quickly um so i i'd be interested and i want to watch this and see have another chance to talk about it well we're going to we're going to ideally i would like to ideally i'd like to hear from doc what they think the impact of whatever we're proposing would be on there on what they're trying to do is they think it's a good thing or a bad thing or like that well that would be part of their plan that they're going to come back with no i mean just the idea of what are we requesting a report no it's now we're requesting a plan we figure out it's what terry was saying yeah i don't know that i heard it wrong i thought we were getting a report about how to do a plan well i think we've transitioned from that i think at the beginning when we started talking about this was while we could have them do a report it was just to try to get the idea out there just to see where it went so what are we asking doc to do with this year now with this with this language we'll come back basically with a plan how they would like to address racial equity within their department so we are making we are asking them to do a bit of work quite a bit of work to come up with a plan yes yeah i mean it's so so i think we ought to get some input from doc as to whether they think they how what they think about it right so what we're going to do is next tuesday we're going to have some language presented to us phil's going to reach out to all the folks who have testified to this point to be part of our zoom meeting on tuesday as we start working through the language so that will be the point for doc to weigh in that'll be the point for advocates to weigh in okay that's because sometimes you're not going to get any further testimony until you actually put words on a paper for people to see what direction you're going in and then they can say wait a minute you're off base or yeah this makes sense but it's going to cost money for this or we need to expand it over here okay so sounds good so anything else before we sign off because i'm worried about phil needing the time to shift gears here sarah no okay anything else okay