 Welcome and good afternoon. You are with the House government operations and judiciary committees, and we are reconvening to to hear testimony on a couple of Senate bills that will shortly be passing over to us. Our intention is to continue hearing from the folks who were not able to testify yesterday. And so the first person that I have on my list is Kaya Morris. So, Kaya, I would welcome you to to join us and share your thoughts on s 219 and 119. Thank you very much. I'm really glad to have an opportunity to meet with you all today and I apologize I can't offer my video but I'm sort of recovering from a back injury and you all don't need to see all that. Thank you for having me. My name is Kaya Morris and I am the movement politics director for rights and democracy Vermont. Thank you for the invitation to provide comments to these statues rights and democracy stands with the national movement for black lives and their demands for defunding the police. We cannot look to a single point in history in which police violence and the use of policing by the majority culture to uphold white supremacy are not present. Rights and democracy joins leaders of colors throughout the state seeking citizens oversight of law enforcement to create pathways for accountability and access to real justice. Rights and democracy will continue to make it clear that black lives matter, but this work is not just about the legacy of the violent depression of black for monitors. In this moment, the legislature has an opportunity to act with wisdom and through the use of best practices, which include direct engagement and design of policies with impacted communities. You are hearing from representatives of organizations, constituencies, racial, ethnic and social groups who repeat warnings, frustrations and fears around the passage and implementation of policies that may increase harms to our communities again and again. In this moment, we do not wish to admonish anyone for their desire to create solutions. That does not mean that we will withhold criticism about the policies under consideration. S1-19 attempts to impact the harmful use of force by law enforcement, but is influenced by the self interests of law enforcement. This bill does not address the larger impacts of use of force and the misconduct that creates an environment in which an officer might use that force that could turn deadly. S1-19 hides from the work of creating accountability by removing the word necessary. This is not a novice area, as the well informed critiques against the California law on this very point remain salient. Qualified immunity is one of the most harmful legal precedences concerning police interactions with the communities they are charged with serving. This bill does not seek to modify or create greater protections for the public against the oppressively blanket use of qualified immunity in this work. Creating the smallest of standards like the inclusion of the word necessary is one of the only tools available for justice available to victims of wrongful use of force. S2-19 adds definitions to the statutes that imply an additional opportunity to find criminality in the conduct of law enforcement duties, but does not actually provide a means for actual findings to occur. It is significant to note that we could not find data on the frequency of charges being levied against law enforcement under current statutes that were not dismissed because of the rather arbitrary application of the laws in each case. It is too common to hear from attorneys that there is no justice for the public when placed on the opposite side of the courtroom from an officer of the law. The public loses almost every single time. When an individual is on the receiving end of the tactics we're discussing today, they're not consulted on what's considered quote reasonable, unquote, quote necessary, unquote, or quote, unquote proportional. What happens in these moments is that the legacy of police brutality has built a reasonable fear of disproportional responses from law enforcement, unnecessary harassment and unreasonable outcomes for members of the public in these exchanges. An individual will not respond to the interaction perfectly for the pleasure and approval of that person wearing the badge. They are not given the same latitudes for their natural responses in those moments. Their humanity, their very lives are not given the same care as those who are given a license to kill with no accountability at all. It is seen clearly that the most mundane encounters prompted by law enforcement definitions of reasonable suspicion lead to harmful and deadly use of force. It is truly disheartening to hear language which presents a set of standard guidelines regarding the view of the use of force that is overwhelmingly failed to protect the public being held up as good, right, and somehow sufficient. On its face, these guidelines sound comprehensive, and they purport a pathway for potential justice. However, the courts, again, and again, rule in favor of law enforcement and endorses practices and the ultimate killing of people with these legal decisions. Legal precedent does not move in favor of the public as again, the standards are designed to protect law enforcement under the guise of equal application of the law. So while choke codes may have been deemed illegal, should someone bring a claim around this, the other components of both of these statutes and the internal policies of the departments give the deliberately false determination that no actual legal act occurred. There is a difference here. Do not lose that nuance in these deliberations. While this moment in time creates a natural urgency to act, the specific actions should not be finalized without deep community input and design. This means that those most impacted need to lead the design process, not just provide testimony, but as peers and subject matter experts of their experiences. To create the dramatic and lasting change we need, you must do things differently, and this may require slowing down to create something distinctly new. Look at the length of time it took to get the panel on race and the criminal and juvenile justice system to get to the point of strength of where they are today. Look at the length of time it took for the ethnic and social equity standards working group to become fully activated. And look at the incredible amount of talent and wisdom that comes from those community members who are engaged in that work and are deeply invested in the success within those groups. These are non-traditional folks who would not normally be asked to the table, but in this moment we put out the call and they said I am ready. We do need those people today. Vermont needs that level of expertise to unpack the system of deadly oppression. Those most impacted who we are talking about today, they do not trust law enforcement and our criminal justice system to protect them. That trust has not and cannot be casually earned through the passage of policies. These policies under review are overly complicated by design, more often than not created at the behest of police unions and not the people that they actually serve. If the policies that are being discussed today do not ultimately heal and strengthen those most impacted, then they are the wrong policies. Again, to bring about healing, we must do these things differently. It may be necessary to create a citizen's oversight board, much like what Director Boreang testified to yesterday, to help design this process and create a system of accountability throughout the state. It is the vision of rights and democracy that our most impacted communities do not have to live their everyday lives in fear because of the overuse of policing and the disposability of their lives through these nefariously designed policies. I'm available to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you. Thank you so much, Kaia. Hal Colston has a question. Thank you, Madam Chair. And thank you, Kaia, for sharing your, your truths and your wisdom. My question is, what would you envision for a process to have this effort designed by the community. Any thoughts about that? So, I don't want to dismiss the work of the criminal and juvenile justice panel, but recognizing that that is super heavy, super, super heavy majority almost of law enforcement and folks within the criminal justice system. It does not have enough people on there. And I don't know that they're the right group for this particular work. What we're talking about, and I think you had mentioned it yesterday was around thinking about a reconciliation process that's necessary, right? So it's going to that entity, it might be coming from this citizens oversight board that perhaps they designed that process. So there needs to be, this is the reality and this is what we're seeing, right? So we often think we need to pull in those constitutional experts to come and get to the specificity of this work. But the people who are living through this, while they may not have the legal lease as part of their ability to articulate what's happening in their experiences, they know distinctly what those moments feel like. They know distinctly how they play out within their everyday lives. And that perspective needs to be there and central to those conversations. So I would want to see something that is really looking to provide the space for community members to build that, and if there is a necessity to have that legal expertise there, which there likely will be, that it's in an advisory capacity. But that the people are the ones that are holding that power to make that decision. Providing guidance much, I mean, one of the things I think we forget is that this is a citizens legislature. And so there are folks on this committee who don't have legal backgrounds, like that's not the world you come from. But that does not mean that you're not able to make decisions, provide input, and engage in this work in a way that if you're given some of that guidelines, some of that technical support that you can create really strong decisions. So I don't see that not being able to happen in the private sector as well. So I would want to see something on that level. And I think that would be really necessary in order to build trust in any sort of a process that move forward. And so for those who feel like something needs to happen right now. That's how you can build the assurances that you're doing the due diligence. We understand it needs to happen right now but we got to check the system up from the bottom up and it can't happen in an immediacy. It needs to happen with your work. And if it happens in an immediacy, those impacted folks who are in this work are just going to be further harmed, trying to do that work. That's what I'm saying. Mm hmm. I do. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And thank you, Kyra for taking the time. And I hope you and your family are well and I would add that I miss seeing Jamal around the State House running around. Kyra, I've been trying to look at examples of citizen review boards and looked at the one they're doing in Newark, New Jersey. And I wonder if you're familiar with that one or if there are other examples that you can hold up for us. Here's the thing so we can take best practices from different places and I think that the group can decide what that's going to look like right. I think that's what really needs to happen I think that that's part of the problem is we're being prescriptive and then asking people to adjust and make all changes and adjustments to it. I think the people are going to know what they need. And I think we need to ask them that they know what they need they may, they may need a little bit of guidance on getting to what that specificity is but I think that that would be helpful whatever those citizen review boards are in my ideal world and I'm not speaking on behalf of rights and democracy or the larger BIPOC communities that are trying to wrestle with these questions right now. My ideal world would be seeing one regionally on regional levels that would then offer an opportunity for a statewide group to act as quasi judicial entities kind of like our restorative justice panels. So that if that justice is not there there's a place for an appeal and a place for a secondary review. That means that both those groups need to be able to have the ability to have subpoena power. And that's something that law enforcement fights tooth and nail. And there's a reason pay attention to this when they say that they don't like something pay attention. Or if they do like something pay attention there's a compromise that's being made that never works out for the benefit of the people. So I'm not trying to build complete distrust but we need to understand that they are a lobbying entity in this moment and you need to look at them with some discretion right like that is, as you would with anyone else who's coming to advocate you can look at me with discretion I'm fine I don't care about that. So in saying that I think that that would be a really key component is that it has to be built it does not while they may need to have folks on there that have legal expertise. It doesn't have to be the majority of the folks that really does not we have not seen that that has had to be the case within our restorative justice panels who do create decisions that have legal ramifications. So we have examples of how that can happen. So I would say that that would be the real key for me. If that helps. Thank you. Thank you. Martin Malone. Thank you, Kaia. It's always nice to hear from you wish we could be seeing you as well but I want to thank you on the judiciary committee. So, I have a couple questions I like to frame them by kind of timelines. One would be kind of the more immediate. The second would be between now and when we come back in August, and the third would be for the beginning of the next. Well, well for the beginning of next biennium, although work could be done obviously between now and then. What can fit into those different categories. And I guess I would I would start with the furthest one out in something that one of the questions I was going to be asking for yesterday and I think get a chance to ask her today. I had to do with some of the comments that she had made. And really where we're focusing now and where we might want to focus and that is, you know, our focus has been on this policy and maybe a little less on training. I think that the focus needs to increase for accountability and oversight or consequences and the concept of either the Human Rights Commission as recommended by the panel or some other entity being that oversight and I think that's going to be something we can't really reasonably I think get done between now and in August I think that's a get set up for the beginning of next biennium. And you can, I'm going to lay this out and you can comment on this and whether you agree or not but So that that seems to be a little bit further out whether on the accountability and the use of force component I have been asking questions of folks and trying to understand what we can do about qualified immunity and that does have to do with the accountability issue. But again, I'm not sure if we're going to have time to really get that put together between now and in August and and the big and the reason I'm saying about time is because I think what we need to focus on and I don't think the Senate had an opportunity to focus on is the process which is what I've really been hearing from you and from others that we need to hear from the right people to get this done right and and maybe maybe you know from what I'm hearing from you as far as really getting a group of stakeholders together to even figure out this use of force. Is that something that we would be able to accomplish between now and and August so let me throw that out to you and then I'll go to that short term of what we can reasonably get done right now at least from my viewpoint. Sure, sure. I know it's always challenging and wanting to meet the push pull of both the urgency of responding which I think you're doing right now. You are responding to the urgency by having these hearings and trying to deliberate around this right now. So the solution that you come forth with has to be the one that will bring the most healing for the people that are impacted and that will take a much longer deliberative process. So, in my mind if I was to think about what are you going to be able to accomplish. I think folks might be ready. What I'm hearing for example and a casual conversation that I had there's a community member down in Bennington, who was born and raised African American woman she's a nurse has a master's degree in criminal justice and found out about the racial equity task force panel and three pieces I apologize that came from the executive order. Most recently and that one that one new community member seat and this woman was like I want to apply for it and at that point it had almost been decided and had the applications hadn't been extended to apply and this was somebody who had never stepped into this work but was like right now. I feel I need to get in. The reason why I bring that forth is that again this person who works too many dang jobs has kids like all these other things is like I'm willing to step into this work if I'm given the opportunity. And what I feel like we saw with some of these other groups as well as that if you put out that call, you're going to meet people who you haven't met before who are ready, and people are feeling that urgency right now. Do know that I'm going to require that folks get compensated so it would be great if the state would do that. If they are not able to make a public private partnership happen and the same people who came up with the money to pay for Curtis read the work down in Bennington can come up with some money to pay these folks to do this work on behalf of the state. So I believe that it can be done. If people are brought in meaningfully they can't just do it as extractive labor though because it's where we're worn out. We're kind of exhausted right now, but people want to do this work if they feel like they'll be cared for through this process. So that's what I would say it could happen between here in August to initiate that process and again, perhaps it's the citizens review oversight board is they're developing that whole strategy, perhaps it's a smaller advisory group that does are same size but a different separate one perhaps it's a subgroup of the racial justice group. So I don't know where that lives it feels the best, but it is necessary so that in itself if you do that right. That is a solution that you can come forth with between here in August that will. I believe help to show in good faith where the state is able to really move this and recognizing that something really dramatically different needs to take place. So I'm understanding from you with that that that's actually getting the group together, get the charge for the group, but we're not expecting to have work product as far as what the use of forest policies be. Okay, you can't, you can't. We've had hundreds of years of like little stacking building blocks on a complete system of oppression. Ain't nobody gonna have the actual answer within three months, even in the room of legal experts. They're not going to come out with the right solution in a few months, and I wouldn't expect you to and I and that wouldn't be right. It wouldn't be right in this moment. I mean the problem with this is that it's got to be more than just a study group and such because we got pushed back from yesterday, regarding the recommendations from the panel. These are our depth of recommendations that we haven't acted on those that reports are done and there's no result but I understand this will be different but let me go to the immediate component and looking at s2 19. If you have any input or comment on section 123 and possibly section for. I heard you already comment kind of about. Well, it seems to me that there are components there that are ready for prime time. They may not go as far as we want. You know there's there's certain ways that, for instance, the law the data collection. I don't want it to go further than just roadside stops, but it doesn't, it's not, it doesn't hurt anything I guess it's not going backwards at all. And but I would like to know that's my opinion what does that matter what I want to understand is from you what what you think in 2019, especially is ready for prime time understanding that some of them are just incremental improvements that we still need to keep on working on. That is really, really hard. I appreciate your question and these are really, really difficult things to answer as far as what is ready and what is not ready. So, I'm going to go back and I'm not trying to just keep dodging this because that's not what I'm trying to do and saying that there isn't an answer. But the challenges and especially okay let me look at 119 the effective data is October one right. So, what will change with in the way that things are currently processed through the court systems in a due case that if somebody brought any of these claims coming October 1 that it would actually deliver justice. That's the question that I feel like we need to ask is if these changes is a these amendments that we're making to these statutes. Is it going to comprehensively is it going to substantially change the public's experience with trying to bring charges in these in this way and find justice if it does not then it's not ready. Because if it's just giving us more language that we're going to get caught up in then that that's that's my biggest concern, quite honestly. What about I don't feel like I have that answer that I guess I guess I'm looking more on on to 19. For instance, the, the incentives for law enforcement agencies to actually provide the data that under law they're already supposed to provide that section one and two in S2 19 section three is is expanding the data that's collected roadside. And that's the one in particular I think the 119 is the one that certainly time and I'm just wondering what your position is on to 19 on those two I think that they're really great start. I'm still wondering though I mean again there's just too much subjectivity and data collection. If you're asking for somebody to also indicate whether there's use of force who's determining whether or not they will as they're putting that in that information into the system. So, because again, it's been already so subjective. Just in the same ways that they weren't really reporting race, because they're saying we don't know a person's race and we don't know how to quite qualify that I'm worried that they will not know how to qualify whether or not there was use of force and what that level was in the reporting but it could be ready to go it's just I'm not sure. I'm sorry I feel like I hear someone's TV in the background. Yeah, I'm not sure, not mine. I see no TV, you're good. Does that all. Yeah, I think there's some other great people on this call to that may also. Anybody else who is going to be test find it they could address that that would be very helpful, or I'll ask it again, you know me. Thank you very much. Thank you. Any other questions from either committees. So I don't see anybody diving for their little blue hand. Kaya I would welcome you to stick around with us. And totally understand if you can't. We are going to be continuing testimony on this again tomorrow morning at nine and noon. So I would welcome you to to stay for as long as you can. Thank you so much, Sharon greatly appreciate the opportunity to participate. Thank you all for being a part of this conversation. All right, so I think I'd like next to invite Mike O'Neill to introduce himself and and to share thoughts on either of the two bills. And so take it away Mike. Nice to know everyone. Again, my name is Mike O'Neill. I'm the executive director of the Vermont Troopers Association, and I am a retired trooper I've been in law enforcement for about 30 years. I appreciate the opportunity to testify on the legislation you're considering the troopers Association supports most of these issues. Many of them the Vermont State Police, I think I've been doing for a long time. And I think that's the three that any policy that provides clear guidance for our officers when interacting with citizens will improve the outcomes and I think that is everyone's goal is to have a positive outcome. So that there is trust within our communities. We support the 10 points that have been put forward by Commissioner Shirley. I want to make sure that our members again, you know, find ways to work with the communities to build trust. It's hard to sit and listen to some of the testimony that I've heard over the last two days, but we agree that it's necessary. You know, we want to do a good job of policing. It's a good opportunity right now to point out that law enforcement officers take pride in the job they do, and they want to do it well. Unfortunately, enforcement is inherently or inherently creates conflict. And at times that is going to play out badly in some of these situations. And nobody wants to walk away from a traffic stop with a traffic ticket. You know, it's not a positive interaction for them. The same of any criminal investigation walking away with a citation or an arrest is not an easy situation for the person on the other end of that and we understand that we have policies and we do training that are intended to help our officers find ways to deal with those situations so that we don't have use of force come out of those situations. But it is also a reality that most situations do not result in the use of force. But it's a small fraction of what we do that does result in force being used in a much smaller percentage of that a fraction of that that results in the use of lethal force. But no matter what any force is a bad outcome and we agree with that we want to find ways to continue to avoid that and improve on what we do. So we are not opposed to most or all of the discussion that's taking place here. We have some concerns about the language and Commissioner Shirley testified yesterday and I thought he did a very good job of explaining the points of concern that he had, and we agree with everything that he touched on. So I won't get deep into all of the same concerns. I'll touch briefly on some of the things, but we are in agreement with Commissioner Shirley. I think we think it is very important to create a mandatory uniform statewide use of deadly force policy. Everybody in Vermont should be working off the same policy there is no question about that. How to best accomplish that is a good question, should it be in statute, or should there be mandated policies that departments have to adopt and work with. That's a good answer to that question and it sounds from the discussion that I've heard over the last two days there were a lot of opinions on both sides. The best answer you will come to I hope, and there'll be a lot more testimony you here to get there. Section C5 creates prohibited restraints and puts them into the policy of statute wherever this ends up. We agree that these restraints should never be used to restrain an individual or to control a situation. Our policy already prevents those from being used. What we have with this is there, we believe there should be language that creates a carve out for a hold or a restraint being used when lethal force is justified in a situation where someone is defending their own life, or the life of another individual or the situation could play out. I don't think anything should be taken away in the possibilities to end that and a prohibited restraint may be the only option at that time. I think Commissioner Sherling addressed that well and I heard testimony in the Senate from Chief Fakos who shared the story of the situation he was involved in early in his career, where a restraint like that was necessary. So we do agree with S1 19 that is the only concern we have with it that there be something addressing the lethal force or the possibility of using one of those restraints in a lethal force situation. In 2019, we agree with most of this as well. The mandate for law enforcement agencies to collect the race data and the forced compliance through withholding state funding or grants. We agree with, you know, there is no doubt that race data needs to be collected. So we do agree with C police do well at this Commissioner Sherling is trying to improve on how we do this. So we fully support that the council sections that add prohibited restraints and failing to intervene to the unprofessional conduct sections. Again, we read that this is the proper place for it. And yesterday about this section and the council's ability to take action on a first offense. And the answer was that if a department doesn't take action on a first offense, the council can't. I disagree with that. And I think it's already addressed in these sections. It's in section 2408 of the unprofessional conduct standards that addresses a valid investigation. If a department does not conduct a valid investigation, the council then can step in even in a first offense and do an investigation in issue sanctions. I believe it is there. There was a lot of work that was put into that on the Senate side when that statute was developed. And that was one of the things that was contemplated at the time. Section 5b creates a felony for using an improper restraint. I agree with Commissioner Sherling that this is already addressed in the aggravated assault and homicide statutes that are currently in place. And there clearly is no place for these restraints when not using lethal force, which is most situations lethal force is not again very common. Body cameras, we also support we've had video cameras in state police cruisers for about 20 years. It's good policy to have accurate documentation of the interactions we have. Body cameras will enhance that. So we support the use of body cameras. And it sounds like they are already in the works, you know, the purchases are being made and they are coming. I'm open to questions. I don't have anything further to it. Thank you. Jim Harrison has a question. I have to lower my hand first. Thank you madam chair. Thank you for joining us today. Can I go back quickly to 219 and some of the comments you made on it. Yes. So in section 5b. I think it's B. It, it sounded like you're suggesting as Commissioner Sherling I believe suggested that that was not necessary. That is correct. I believe that that conduct would already fall under existing statutes of aggravated assault and homicide. So I guess my question to you is there any harm in including it. I mean are we are we doing something different here. I'm not an attorney and I'm not going to try to analyze how the laws are applied. But my number one concern would be is it doesn't have a carve out for the least use of lethal force, whether or not if that were taken care of it causes any harm. I can't answer that. But maybe something we want to flag whether it's just duplicative or if it's as additional meaning then. Yes, I would agree. Okay, thank you. Martin along. I have a very narrow question actually if I can find it on us to 19. To 19 the effectuating the stop this is for the racial of the different data for roadside stops the outcome of the stop including whether physical force was employed or threatened in effectuating the stop. If we changed that language to employed or threatened during the stop. Would that make a difference for that seems to be clear. I'm just wondering if you comment on that because effects way in the stop may be well known, what that means for law enforcement but, but when I looked at it it just seemed like when you are getting the car to pull over as opposed to the whole duration of the stop. I'm just and I think commissioner Shirley and agree that we could put this into real language and this proposal that I'm throwing out there is just saying during the stop or is that not sufficient. I agree as well. I think the intent is to ensure that everything during the stop is captured. And I think plain language in any case is much better it should be clearly understood what the intent is so I would agree. Thanks. Tom bird it has a question. Yes, I do. Thank you. I mean lower my hand here. I was going to say good morning Michael but I guess it's afternoon now but in a couple, couple questions that I probably would have saved for for Michael but I don't see him. He's with us today but I'm looking at the law enforcement modernization, you know the 10 point plan that Michael went over yesterday and I don't know if you know the answer but I guess. Where did it come from and I can't believe that Michael sat down by himself and wrote this whole thing. There was probably, you know a few other people involved and I'm just wondering who may have been on lack of a better word, a board that may have put this together. I believe it began with several points that have come up in national discussions that were looked at the commissioner then I believe spent considerable amount of time quickly working with the command staff and coming up with these points. They then went out and get input from the troopers association, the chiefs of police association the sheriffs. And the Vermont police association I believe they involved all of the law enforcement groups in Vermont in coming up with the 10 points that were developed. Right. I guess. I would ask what were any of the groups that are on our, or types of groups of people that are on our witness list today were they involved in it at all. I don't know. I believe it came from law enforcement. I don't know if the fear and impartial committee was consulted as well. I hope so we have a lot of members that are testifying on that committee that have testified as well in the last two days but I don't know the answer to that but I hope they were. Yeah, I am on representative. If you'd like some further clarification. Thank you. Did you hear my, my whole question. I did sir. I'm and for the record, Mike Sherling I'm with you until noon. And we did consult 1249. Excuse me I'm different day I'm with you until one let's let's go with that. Mike O'Neill is correct. In the rundown law enforcement partners we did also engage a variety of community partners as a representative sample of the community but important to note that we still have a robust engagement process ahead of us with a much more broad cross section of the community and the FIP team is working on some suggestions on what that engagement strategy will look like but we did seek input from a variety of different folks from the RDAP panel to FIP and others in the in the draft 10 point plan. Okay, great, great. That's a, I'm glad to hear that, but so I guess jumping to, you know, restraints and deadly use of force and I'm pretty sure I know the answer but I'm going to assume that there's continuing training and updates on that type of thing on somewhat regular basis whether it's at the barracks or at the Academy. Yes, there is. Okay. Michael when you were testifying I was going to ask you if you had ever been in a situation but you alluded to Tony, his testimony and the Senate, being in a situation as far as a restraint goes. And I hope he repeats it today I see that he's on with us today so that's all I have right now. Thank you. Thank you. All right, any questions from any other committee members for Mike O'Neill. All right. Thank you Mike, please, please stick around in case we need to loop back to you. Thank you for your time. James Lyle with the ACLU is with us and I would like you to share your thoughts on the various components of 119 and 219. Madam chair if I may. Commissioner Sherling was saying he can only be here till one and we're nine minutes away and he's on the witness list I didn't know if he was going to testify anymore. I just thought if he was that we might be able to squeeze him in. We did hear from the commissioner yesterday and we are we can certainly schedule him for a future. Follow up testimony if he's got more perspective that he would like to share with us but I do have a pretty robust list of people who've been with us both days and have not yet testified so. Thank you. Thank you. Take it away. Hi, everybody thank you madam chair committee members. I am James Lyle I'm the executive director, at the ACLU of Vermont. on. It's nice to see some familiar faces, even if via this infernal zoom contraption, which I'm sure you are all very sick of by now. But it's good to see you all and to be with you. Thank you for inviting me and the ACLU to testify. I want to commend the committee and the legislature for taking this on. And I'm well aware of how much is on your plates and what difficult circumstances we are working in. So I think the impulse to respond in this moment is a very good one, and I appreciate the work and appreciate the opportunity to weigh in on it. What I'd like to do is I have three general points I'd like to make. I wanted to start just by reading only the introduction to the testimony I submitted for anybody who didn't get a chance to see that or read it yet. And then I'd like to cover just our three overarching points and take any questions that you have. So to start with the testimony that we submitted, again, thank you for inviting us to testify. We are in a historic moment, and we do appreciate this legislature's work to respond rapidly. These bills contain police reform measures that we, the ACLU, have supported in some cases for years and often with staunch opposition from law enforcement. But while we recognize the committee is operating on a very tight time frame, we urge you to make some critically important changes discussed, which I'm going to discuss today. Most importantly, we encourage you to see this as the beginning of a broader movement to reimagine policing in the state and in this country and to expand on these efforts when the legislature reconvenes. And we offer some initial recommendations for what that work might look like. We have our own 10-point plan. Lastly, I want to emphasize and reemphasize what Kaia Morris and others have said, that in order for this work to be effective, more of it must be led, directed, and articulated, not by law enforcement but by other experts, particularly impacted communities and individuals whose voices are often not given the same privileged position in so many of our institutions. Our courts, our media, and our legislature, and that is a large part of why we are where we are today. The police murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, another in a long line of police killings of black men and women across the country, and the mass brutality exhibited by law enforcement in response to nationwide protests have laid bare the urgent need to meaningfully curtail police power and combat systemic racism and white supremacy in this country, including here in Vermont. And when it comes to the national crisis in policing, Vermont is not an outlier or an exception. And reforms long overdue must not be derailed by any suggestion that Vermont somehow stands apart from these national events. In this context, the notion that Vermont is exceptional is false, just as it is offensive, particularly to brown and black community members who are disproportionately targeted by police today. As you know, in Vermont, black motorists are stopped and searched at disproportionate rates. Our prisons have some of the worst racial disparities in the country. Images and videos of police brutality appear regularly, and the number of police killings is steadily increasing year after year. We are not exceptional. This week, the ACLU reached a settlement in its racial profiling lawsuit against the town of Bennington, whose police department has been described by the International Association of Chiefs of Police as exhibiting a warrior mentality badly out of step with best practices. In the IACP survey of local residents, 40% of respondents said they did not trust Bennington police, while 20% 1 in 5 reported experiencing discrimination. These are some of the examples of the limits of traditional police reform efforts and the urgent need for Vermont's legislature to sharply reduce the immense power of police and finally make law enforcement meaningfully accountable to our communities. So for these reasons, we would again underscore the point that the bill is under consideration today. Though they may represent important progress, they will not be enough. And I think that sentiment has been put forward by many legislators and many folks who have testified. Even with the changes we're urging below, this legislation is still not gonna be enough. Far more remains to be done to respond to this moment and reimagine policing in the state. And we genuinely look forward to supporting you in that work. So the three points that I just wanted to touch on specific to these two bills are as follows. As to S219, the main concern that we have is that police body cameras that are not accompanied by robust policies governing transparency and accountability do not function as a meaningful accountability tool, that which is the purpose of having police body cameras. S219 as it stands doesn't really have any policies governing the use of police body cameras. And that is a problem. NACLU doesn't support the use of police body cameras unless they are accompanied by robust protections submitted with our testimony is the ACLU model body camera policy. I've seen submitted the LEAB, the law enforcement advisory board model policy on body cameras. And as to that, I would just say that that is not a model body camera policy. The LEAB policy is completely inadequate. And is actually an example of the process point that others have been pointing out that law enforcement cannot be the ones to generate these policies. We cannot leave it to the police to police themselves. Our experience with the LEAB policy, not unlike the discussion we just had about the DPS 10 point plan, it was similar. These are things that are drafted by law enforcement and then presented to stakeholders like the ACLU and community members. And then when we provide our feedback and input, it is ignored. And that is exactly what happened with the LEAB policy and that is why it is such an adequate policy. So I would caution anybody from using that as a starting point. I would direct you to the ACLU model policy. The ACLU has deep expertise and experience in this issue locally and nationally. We've been working on it for a very long time. But the bottom line is Vermont, if it's going to require the use of body cameras and needs to regulate them, and that regulation needs to be done by a wide range of stakeholders and the legislature has to be responsible for it. It's not something that could be delegated to law enforcement if you wanna have a meaningful and effective policy. That's our primary concern with us to 2019. And there are- Madam Chair, just can I ask it's a real quick clarification question. Could you tell, can you remind us what LAED stands for and where that policy came from? Sorry, this is the Law Enforcement Advisory Board, the LEAB. And I believe that that model policy is up on the Law Enforcement Advisory Body website. Its model policy was submitted, I believe, yesterday with some of the testimony. We submitted today, along with the ACLU model, the ACLU's model policy, we submitted our response to the LEAB that we sent them raising our concerns back in 2016 with the policy that they were developing and those concerns were ignored. And so again, the LEAB policy in our view is completely inadequate. And partly as a result of the process that was followed there. So I think it's a cautionary tale for looking to law enforcement to set the agenda and come up with its 10 point plans without consulting and involving community members in advance or even better, starting with the community and other experts when we're talking about regulating law enforcement. So again, that is our main concern with S219. We feel there are a number of very positive provisions regarding use of force in S219. But unless or until the body camera policies are addressed, we don't take a position on that bill. As to S119, I would say we support this legislation with very strong reservations. And I would second Kaia Morris's testimony and concerns with S219. And really I would second all of her testimony. This is a start, but this is not an adequate policy to ensure that force is used only when absolutely necessary, which I think is the goal that most people have and would like to see. In addition, we would just raise the issue that while it is important to have a statewide deadly force policy, there is no reason we couldn't extend the same policy to non-deadly force, which can also be obviously extremely damaging and serious. And I think that's a point that others have made as well that we would like to lift up. We have a few other more, I guess, general concerns with things like data collection. We would encourage that sooner or later, data collection be expanded to go beyond only traffic stops, which is obviously not the only way that law enforcement interacts with people, sometimes in a biased way. We should be collecting data on all directions if we wanna get at these persistent racial disparities, if we wanna have true system-wide accountability. So my final point, and this goes beyond, I think these two bills, and maybe goes to some of the questions that were asked by Representative Colston and LaLonde. As I said, our view is whatever happens with this legislation, it's not gonna be enough, and it's gonna be really critical that when the legislature reconvenes, this work continues and is expanded. We believe there is a lot more that can be done that must be done, not just to tinker around the edges, looking at training, looking at some of the same incremental policy changes that we've seen year after year after year for decades. It's not getting it done. And this is really a moment of reckoning where we have to reimagine policing. And we're seeing this happen across the state and across the country. And again, Vermont is not exceptional or an outlier and should not be exempted from that discussion. It's a difficult conversation, but we need to have it. So going to Representative LaLonde's question, whether it's this week, whether it's in August or whether it's after that, we've provided 10 recommendations for things that legislature should consider. I feel that many of those things could be done on a shorter timeframe. When the legislature returns in August, the budget will obviously be on the agenda. And that is a time to look at the budget, including the police budget and ask the question, are we allocating resources in a way that best supports our communities? Maybe we are, maybe we aren't, but that question needs to be asked and that analysis needs to be done. Many people have no problem discussing cuts to our schools or our services. There's absolutely no reason that police budget should be out of bounds or off limits in that discussion. There's zero reason for that. And that is a discussion that, again, is happening at the local level across the state and around the country. And it is long overdue. So that could happen in August. The issue of qualified immunity, the Colorado legislature just passed a bill ending qualified immunity. We could look to Colorado and put forward similar legislation here in Vermont to end the impunity that law enforcement enjoys when rights are violated. The legal protections afforded to law enforcement and the immense power that they wield without accountability needs to be addressed and it has not been addressed yet. Another issue that could come up sooner than later is the issue of police in schools. Again, something that is a discussion that's happening on the local level, including in Burlington. We don't have a good sense of what's happening with police in Vermont schools at a minimum. At a minimum, we should be able to start to get a handle on that and to obtain data and information and do some analysis. But we and many others, including Vermont legal aid are calling for police to be removed from schools and for those resources to invest in schools in other more productive ways. In part because we have seen extensive data showing the disparate impact of having school resource offices in schools, particularly in children of color, students of color, students with disabilities and low income students. So those are things that can be done in the short term. And then there are other things that we're touched on that probably are a longer conversation, models of community oversight. I believe we should be moving towards that. But that is probably a longer term project. I would say though, whatever models of community oversight are pursued at local or state levels, one of the ways to represent Colson has how do we involve the community? One of the ways goes to how these hearings are running who's coming in and who's setting the agenda. I think some of the frustration from a number of groups that you're hearing is that in response to this historic moment, law enforcement has come in, it's presented as 10 point plan, it's attempted to set the agenda, which they always do when their power is in question or might be constrained. And it is now is a time for state leaders to really question that and really look at that and truly look to community members and other experts to set the agenda because there's a wide range of expertise in the state. Law enforcement cannot continue to be relied on to police itself or this is not going to change. So I'll stop with that and if folks have any questions, by all means, I just again want to thank you for the opportunity to testify and for having this discussion, for continuing this discussion when you return. And we absolutely want to support your efforts in whatever way we can. Thank you so much for joining us today and for folks who are not following the chat box, your documents are up on the GovOps committee page. So folks can take a look at the documents that you referenced. And I think it's probably worthwhile just jumping in for a moment to say that we hear loud and clear that we need to slow down and take the time to get the input from a wide range of committee members. And so in addition to that, I will just say that there's nothing about what we've heard so far in testimony that would lead us to believe that this is a one and done or that even if we were to pass all three of the bills that the Senate has put on the table that our work here would be done, there's much deeper work that needs to be done. And so I do appreciate you reiterating that and I just want to make sure that members watching on the live stream understand that we are hearing that loud and clear. So I have a couple of folks with questions. So we'll go with John Gannon first. Thank you and thank you for testifying today. I wanted to first touch on your comments with respect to the body cam and I guess I'd agree with you that S219 currently doesn't really have a policy for body cam usage, which I find problematic. But the question I really wanted to ask you is who should set a body cam policy? Because we want to make sure that there's community involvement in that process and that we get input from as many people as we can. Do you have any thoughts about that? Yeah, thank you for the question. I would say that the legislature should be responsible for it and should be responsible for inviting a wide range of community inputs. Frankly, our experience with the LEAB process and the outcome there gives us pause to say the least about essentially deferring the task or delegating the task to a law enforcement entity, even if other stakeholders are involved, their voices are not often or always incorporated. We, as I say, have extensive experience and would be happy to bring in our national colleagues who work on this issue every day around the country, as well as my colleagues here in Vermont, our senior staff attorneys have done extensive work around police body cameras. It is really complicated and complex policy, which makes it hard to pass in a week. But I think that the other main point that I made and would just underscore is that this is an important policy, the legislature should not delegate it exclusively to law enforcement or to let law enforcement lead it because they generally tend, frankly, tend to oppose transparency measures. They tend to oppose policies that restrict their ability to use the footage or release the footage in ways that are beneficial to them and that really undermine the intent behind these policies, which is accountability. Accountability isn't even listed as one of the objectives on the LEAB policy. There are a number of other objectives that are listed, but accountability is not one of them. And I think that's telling. And I think it's important that the legislature not let that happen again. Well, thank you. And I totally understand the complexity of this issue. We took up body cams, I think, in the last biennium in house government operations. And I remember the discussion or the testimony during our review of that. It is a very complex thing. And it's difficult for me to at least see us tackling it in five days or four days. That is very challenging. But I appreciate that ACLU has so much expertise in this area because, I mean, getting experts involved I think is important in developing and designing a policy. So I'm glad that you're willing to participate in that process. Thank you. Thank you. And just as a following, I did say in the testimony that we submitted, if there was a mechanism to get to a policy sooner than later and these cameras are deployed in the field, even if that doesn't happen this week, that would obviously be better than no policy at all. And we do have a model policy that might be a starting point for that effort. Thank you very much. Barbara Richardson has a question. Thank you. I hope I have the new thing working out today. Hi, Jeff. Good to see you. So thank you for coming in to testify. And you were here yesterday as well. Is that right or no? I was not able to be, I was on childcare duty yesterday. I apologize, I wasn't able to. No, Grace. So I have a couple of questions. One question is you, in one point you said that you support a lot of what's in S219, but I totally get the point about the body cameras not having a policy. So is your recommendation to us who passed the bill with modifications and same thing with S119 or do something different and discreet from the 10-point list that you have? That's a great question. Thank you for that. I would say as it is currently written, we don't take a position on S219 because of the issue of a body camera mandate without governing or regulations. But we absolutely support many of the other provisions around requiring data collection, putting some teeth in data collection and some of the use of force provisions. Ideally, as I say, recognizing how unlikely it is that a complex body camera policy could be devised on the very tight timeframe that you all are working on. Ideally, I would suggest that a change that allows for a policy to be promulgated and not, again, led by truly diverse stakeholders and not law enforcement. Before those body cameras are deployed, that I think would be our recommendation. So currently I think they're supposed to be deployed by August 1st. That is a very tight timeline. If that were to be pushed back and there were to be a process for policies to govern those body cameras to be in place before they're used, that would be our recommendation. But we don't take a position on the legislation as it currently stands. As S219, I think I said, we support this legislation with very strong reservations, hopefully as a starting point. Back in January when H808, which has now become S219, was first proposed, law enforcement was strongly opposed. DPS, the Attorney General, opposed it. They wanted to take time to study it and see what happened in California to see if the sky was going to fall. The sky is not going to fall. S219 is a step forward, but it is still a policy that I think was intended to limit deadly force to when it is truly necessary. Because we don't want police killing people unless it is absolutely necessary. I think that's a proposition that most people can get behind. But there are a number of other provisions, a lot of reasonable authors reasonably believing that water down, I think the original intent of the bill and it was watered down in California to address the concerns of law enforcement to get the bill through. So we support it. It's important to have a statewide use of force, non-deadly use of force policy, but it can absolutely be improved. It can be strengthened and can also be expanded to include the use of non-deadly force. If that doesn't happen this week, maybe in August or the next time the legislature reconvenes. So I have one other question which I'll hopefully not take a ton of your time with, but what about anything in terms of there's a lot to figure out and there are a lot of people I get that we don't wanna just hurry and make a law up. And yet this is not the first time the committees have looked at these issues or we know from other states what's been happening. There's a lot of evidence. And wondering, and I think I asked this yesterday about putting certain moratoriums in place now even while things get figured out because it seems like a strong message needs to go out that we don't support use of lethal force or use of force that or certain situations that can lead up to that. And I think about some of the Burlington cases that started out sort of mild and there was publication, et cetera. So I'm just wondering if there's anything with a moratorium that would make sense to you so that people know that we're curious and we're not just being the legislature again and gonna study it. And in the meantime, as you said, we're insulting the people that every day get screwed by us not having these policies. I mean, I think potentially it might depend on what specific policy would be appropriate for a moratorium. I think it's a really difficult question because I absolutely hear the concerns that you've all heard about the tension between wanting to respond and recognize that there's a moment to respond to and that people are fed up. But the very limited timeframe to do that and the need to consult with a broader constituencies, those things are intention. And I don't think that's an easy thing to resolve. Again, we take the position that there are some things that are in this legislation that represent positive steps forward. As 219 we think is a positive step forward but if it could be whether it's in the intense section or in subsequent provisions to make clear that there's more work to be done on use of force and that could include specifics or not to show that the commitment to, that this is not, as Madam Chair said, this is not a one and done or a closed book. That would be helpful to the extent that the body camera policy issue can get a little bit more time which people are calling for in general, but I think that's at least one aspect of this that really needs more time. Even if it's a process that is set up to work that out before they go into effect. I do think there are ways to act and to make progress while also making very clear that much more work remains to be done, will be done and potentially setting up avenues or signaling the intent to pursue that work either in August, hopefully in August and subsequently. Thank you. Paulson has a question. Thank you Madam Chair. And thank you Mr. Lyle for your testimony today. The Pledge of Allegiance has a phrase at the very end, justice for all which at this moment is very aspirational but I really appreciate the work of the ACLU to make it reality. So as you are a national organization, what other states have done this work well and what has been their process? It's a great question. Thank you, Representative Colston. I'll be honest, the ACLU has been working on racial justice and police accountability issues since it's founding 100 years ago. In Vermont for over five decades, we've been deeply, police accountability has been one of our, year after year, we have filed lawsuits to end racial profiling. As I said, we settled the lawsuit this week. We, in decades ago, we settled lawsuits to end the practice of roadside strip searches by law enforcement. We've litigated use of force cases. This is something that we have, as with police body cameras, deep experience and expertise in nationwide. And at the same time, we and our colleagues are, as with all of you, we are overwhelmed already by the crisis, the multiple crises that we are facing in the state. And now the crisis in policing has just been thrust front and center, long overdue, but here we are. And so there's a lot of frantic work to rise to this occasion that we and community partners are engaged in every day. And I think we will continue to have more detailed recommendations and ideas for how to do this work well in the weeks and months ahead. I would say, from what I've seen from my colleagues around the country, a couple of examples that jump out. I mentioned the Colorado legislature passed police reform legislation that included an end to qualified immunity. It may have included police body camera provisions as well. I would have to check on that, but the Colorado legislature, that bill received some press coverage and that would be one example. And then the DC city council is also considering a number of changes, including looking at police budgets, which as I said, other cities in town of Los Angeles is considering a major reduction in police funding and a diversion of those resources directly to impacted communities. So Colorado DC and other cities and states around the country, I believe a number have taken action to remove police SROs from their schools. So we're starting to see examples of legislation at the state level action at the municipal and city level. And I think we're going to see more. I think all of us are working on this right now at the same time. And so day by day, we learn more and we have more examples to look to and to draw from. And that's really one of the advantages of being a part of a national organization like the ACLU is we have this vast laboratory and vast expertise that we can draw on. And I think what we will have today versus next week versus by August, I think we'll have a lot of other really good examples to do and hopefully, you know, our goal is always that Vermont be an example that others look to as a laboratory so that we can be a model to other states as well. Thank you. Thank you for your work. Thank you. I have a couple other committee members who would like to ask questions. So I've got Bob Hooper and then Jim Harrison. And if that's all the committee members who have questions then we'd like to switch next to Lori Emerson. Thank you, Madam Chair. James, thank you for your testimony. I'm not being a person who is afraid to beat a dead horse. Go back to 219 yesterday. We talked about it a little bit. There's a list of five items that should be included in the data that is being collected. And I saw a gap between the reason for the stop and the type of search that was listed. And I thought maybe listing the probable cause was an important thing because that's generally a point of escalation for a traffic stop. And it seems important to me. We broached that with the commissioner. The commissioner said that it would be hard to quantify for the computer to basically continue to report. I know he has great expertise in that area, but would you agree it seems to me that actually the number of items that constitute probable cause for a search are kind of limited in number. What are your thoughts on that? I mean, I think it's a good point. I'm looking at it now. I think, I mean, the reason for the stop, I think is one of those pieces of data. Yes. No, it sounds like this would include the reason for the stop, but not the reason for the search. And that's my point exactly. And so I would question why it is that they could, they could capture the reason for the stop, speeding or what have you, but not the reason for the search. You know, a weapon was visible or whatever. So I'm not, I'm not clear on why that wouldn't be possible. I think it's a valid question, a valid point. Thank you. Jim Harrison. Thank you. James, I don't, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but it sounded like in general you were okay with S219 and with the exception of maybe a policy either timeline or something implemented in regards to body cams. Is that fair? Basically, I do think there are areas for improvement in the language. And I think Representative Hooper just named one. I mean, we mentioned in our testimony that ideally data collection is not limited to traffic. That goes beyond, you know, the reason for probably searching a vehicle stop, ideally we're also collecting other police interactions, whether it's on the street or in a home or elsewhere. So, you know, we think that could be improved. We think the use of force provisions are important and a good first step to limiting police use of force. We'd still like to see more. We'd like to see, for example, a ban on no knock raids, which have, we've seen have kind of deadly consequences and disproportionately impact low income communities, communities of color. We'd like to see more to remove police from interactions with law enforcement and more to limit police discretion to engage in kind of low level policing, low level offenses that can escalate. So we'd like to see more and, you know, definitely want to continue this conversation. But as far as putting the brakes on things or raising major red flags, it's our primary concern. Yeah, and I don't mean to debate, you know, whether you want to, we should do more reforms and that's why there's several bills and they could all be beginning. But earlier, the Troopers Association, and yesterday the commissioner suggested that in section five, subsection paragraph B, creating a felony was not necessary. It was already covered in existing law. And I didn't know if you had any thoughts or comments on that. I personally don't see the problem with some redundancy there. And I don't know of many examples of law enforcement being prosecuted or held accountable under existing law. I think those examples are few and far between, as Kaia Morris pointed out. So there's no conflict if it strengthens police accountability measures that we have, recognizing that they are still, you know, because of qualified immunity, because of extreme amounts of discretion, because of inadequate oversight mechanisms, that does not seem like a major problem or hurdle. Okay, and lastly, back on the body cam policy, I think Representative Colson was sort of like the same line of questioning. Do you have any recommended policies that you've seen in other states that we don't have to reinvent that this would be a good basis? So in addition to the ACLU model legislation for body cameras, which we feel is the gold standard for body cameras, again, I believe body camera, some of those policies are incorporated in the recently adopted legislation in Colorado. And I can absolutely reach out to my colleagues there and get it. Okay, that'd be great. Thank you. Yes. Thank you. We would all appreciate that. Martin Malone. Just a follow-up question actually pretty close to what I thought Representative Harrison was about to get there, but didn't quite get there. The commissioner suggested a carve out for the prohibitive restraint for when it's used in a lethal force situation, if you could just comment on that suggestion. You know, again, recognizing that I don't know of any examples of law enforcement being prosecuted in a self-defense situation and I'm not convinced that that would happen with this provision here, that a law enforcement officer who was acting in self-defense to save their own life Yeah, I think that's right. I guess I'm actually wondering more to section four, the professional, the category B conduct, gross professional misconduct, placing a person in a prohibited restraint and whether there should be a carve out there. Cause there is essentially a carve out for the crime that you just mentioned, which is self-defense. Right. Similarly, I think it's unlikely that an officer would be disciplined for acting in an extreme situation to defend their own life through the use of a prohibited restraint. We just, again, we don't see a lot of examples of law enforcement being prosecuted period. So it doesn't rise to the top of our list of concerns with this legislation, but I suppose I see the point that they're raising. Thanks. Great. I wanna thank you so much for being with us today and please do stick around so you can hear some of the other perspectives we're about to hear from. So next I'd like to invite Lori Emerson to share her thoughts on the two bills that we're working on right now. Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate you inviting Nami Vermont to participate. My name is Lori Emerson. I'm the executive director at Nami Vermont and that's the independent Vermont chapter of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. And we're a statewide nonprofit 501c3 grassroots volunteer organization. And we're comprised of people who live with a mental health condition, family members and advocates. And Nami Vermont's comments are going to be focusing on mental health and interactions with law enforcement. And we agree that the systemic racism must be addressed to change the culture and make reparations and really looking to a continuous process led by the Black community and other leaders as well. Bills S219 and S119 are very important to Nami Vermont and our community of individuals and families living with a mental health condition. Law enforcement officers are one of the first responders to any mental health crisis. And we need to hold law enforcement to a higher standard and be accountable for their actions. It first needs to start with governance, policies and training, all leading to more accountability. So we also need to look at different alternative systems to help prevent crises from happening. So one of the key points was accountability and addressing misconduct. You know, I agree with a lot of the testimony that's been provided and establishing a civilian or community government oversight committee, whether it be in all communities or statewide, probably preferably with the responsibility to review all policies and misconduct incidents. Establishing a process to address officer misconduct and some of the thoughts around that and we did ask our membership about, you know, what their thoughts were many times, family members may be involved in a lot of mental health crises and interactions with law enforcement. So a lot of these perspectives are coming from our lived experience and that's really what our core competency is, our lived experience with mental health conditions. And creating a registry for officer misconduct can really track the misconduct that may be happening as well as, you know, we don't want one person to be leaving one department and then going to another department where there are still issues that they do need to address. And really having more accountability and sharing any kind of transfer information or recommendations with misconduct incidents could be as well helpful in creating that accountability. There were also some talk that we had with a previous meeting about decertification and is there a process for decertification where there's misconduct involved offenses with officers? Looking at body cameras for all law enforcement, having that accessibility to the public for the footage would be good as well as, you know, from what I'm hearing, there aren't clear policies on body cameras. So including policies that could also include that as well as, you know, having the cameras remain on during interactions and having a review and monitoring the footage by the Civilian Governance Committee, especially where force is used. Many family members don't want to call the police with a mental health crisis, just the presence of law enforcement can escalate a situation resulting in our loved ones being charged with a criminal offense or worse, use of deadly force. When all that was needed was to keep our loved ones safe due to pseudicide ideation and at their attempts that they might make. Having some clear policies with consistency and standardization of policies throughout the state with the ability to improve them and share best practices as needed and starting with a baseline of requirements. And this is where also this committee could help with a civilian oversight with the policies and really ensuring that these policies also have a crisis intervention policy when they address a crisis. And NAMI Vermont supports the collection of data to inform fact-based decision making to ensure accountability as addressed in S219. And we would also recommend tracking data as to the number of mental health calls are made to police as well as calls that they respond to with mental health. That way there we can assure that more preventive measures can be put in place with community mental health. And the other component we were looking at was training to really have more consistent required training that focuses on trauma-informed education for officers, de-escalation, decision-making, conflict resolution, using proper tactics and scenario role-playing such as with the team two training. And I think you did hear from Kristen Chandler about team two. So we need to continuously review and monitor and improve and improve all trainings involving that diverse representation of stakeholders to review trainings and such as the civilian governance committee. And also include trainings by individuals or professionals with lived experience such as mental health conditions, developmental disabilities, autism, Alzheimer's, brain injuries, just to name a few and not just have the Vermont Criminal Justice Training Council provide the trainings but have people in the community that are doing the work with lived experience provide trainings as well. And we really feel that all police need to be trained in crisis intervention and or to address a heightened state of emotional dysregulation for people. Another component we wanted to address was recruitment, staffing and partnerships. And law enforcement should have access to their own mental health support. And I know there hasn't been much mention of that. And it should be promoted internally such as anonymous support groups or mentors facilitated by other law enforcement personnel because they have been through traumatic situations and they need to help with their own mental wellness. And we really need to acknowledge that as well and provide them that support. We also need to build collaborative community partnerships and intensive training will help improve responses and resources for individuals and families that may have a mental health crisis and focus on prevention and alternative systems by embedding mental health mobile crisis social workers or peer support specialists within law enforcement and police departments and having that paid for with police funding because the mental health system of care is underfunded. And looking at other best practices that we already have right here in our state such as HCRS which social workers embedded within law enforcement, the Howard Center with the street outreach team and the community outreach program with the six towns in Chittenden County and finding alternative sources for funding these programs. And I do understand that you do have funding also set aside for having social workers at police barracks which is another great approach. So some of our comments on the policies as they are on page seven, line five, section 2407, Nami Ramon disagrees that a category B conduct where the council shall take no action that officers need to be held accountable no matter what for their actions and that there should be some action taken whether it be a corrective action plan or some other way of addressing any kind of misconduct. Because for instance, if you looked back at page six, line 17, it states that will fulfill your to comply with a state required policy or substantial deviation from professional conduct. So that's where I think we really need to address maybe the language in those two areas and align that better. Section seven, page nine. We would recommend adding public accessibility with the video recordings and to be monitored by the civilian governance committee. I don't see where there is any mention that it could be accessible and it could be in the provision when use of force is used. And then Nami also agrees that choke holds should be prohibited a prohibited restraint and to make this a criminal offense. Addressing S119 on section 2368, C2, page four. There's a statement that says that law enforcement will warn that deadly force may be used. This is not de-escalation tactics. So of course that would be the last resort. So I think that maybe some tweaking with the wording there because that would surely create an escalation with somebody who may be in a crisis. And there are also multiple instances of the wording with the word necessary, reasonable and that almost creates a qualified immunity clause for law enforcement. I think as family members, one of our greatest concerns, what is necessary to use deadly force? I would hope nothing unless someone has a gun pointed at them for self-defense. But that's really a lot of our concerns as family members that it's not so much a matter of if the police would ever be called with our loved one, but when and we would want law enforcement to respond compassionately, to have the right training and to approach it from a manner of de-escalation and calmness instead of escalating situations which usually happen and make a bad situation worse. So thank you so much for listening to our comments and I could take any questions you might have. Thank you so much, Lori. I appreciate your observations about the focus that we should hope law enforcement will have in order to de-escalate interactions with people who are experiencing a mental health crisis. Thank you. Just so that we're level setting here, I'm not seeing any members with their hands up at the moment. So I'm inclined to go kind of directly to James Pepper because we have a hard stop at two o'clock to be back on the floor for the first quarter budget deliberations. And so I'm gonna go to James next. And before we do that, I wanna say thank you to Lori and also invite all of you to come back and join us again tomorrow in case we have other questions or as we begin to look at possible amendments to one or both bills. So thank you, Lori. And James, take it away. Thank you. James Pepper, Department of State's attorneys and sheriffs. I really would like to thank the committees for taking these bills up. I'd really especially just like to take a moment to thank the witnesses and other advocates that work not just on this legislation but have been really working tirelessly, usually uncompensated behind the scenes over the last years on informing all of government about these issues. Through my work on that, I'm the representative to the racial disparities panel and we've spent almost two years now looking at dismantling systemic racism. And I think police use of force is a really good place to start. It's really where the rubber meets the road when you think about the collateral consequences and sometimes deadly consequences of the criminal justice system. And of course, public confidence in law enforcement is crucial and foundational to the community-based policing models and kind of a 21st century policing that we're all striving for. These bills serve the end of building public confidence in the system. I'm gonna start, if you don't mind with S219. And I'm gonna start with the later sections then go back to the data section. So I'm gonna start with section four. So section four and my comments will be brief on this. This is dealing with misconduct and it's really outside the scope of the state's attorney's jurisdiction. So we're neutral on this section, certainly support the principle that underlie this section though. With respect to section five, this is the new crime that's created, the law enforcement use of prohibited restraint. So our comments in the Senate are the exact same as they are here. Police are not trained to use these types of restraints. They can only be deployed when necessary for self-defense or defense of others. So the intentional use of a prohibited restraint is already a criminal act. And it is chargeable as an aggravated assault. It's chargeable as manslaughter, which is a 15 year felony. And depending on the intent could be first or second degree murder. So one thing that I would mention which is consistent with some of the other testimony you've heard today is that it's very important to think about how these criminal acts are investigated. In practice, there's an independent review done by the attorney general's office and the state's attorney in the county where the incident occurred. If charges are brought though, usually the state's attorney will have to conflict out of the case because of a working relationship with the police department. So usually the case is sent to a different state's attorney to prosecute. As long as I've been working with the state's attorneys, alternatives to this system have been discussed. There are a number of proposals that the state's attorneys have thought of. We're currently gonna be working with Michael Schirling and others through his kind of 10 point plan to think about alternatives to the current system. If there's any questions on this section, if not, I'll move on. I think go ahead. Sure. With respect to body cameras, we are fully supportive of section seven. I agree with the ACLU that having some sort of policy underlying that and also having an enforcement mechanism is important. I'm also the public records officer for the department of state's attorneys and sheriffs. And as body cameras become more ubiquitous, the request for that footage is also pretty ubiquitous. And it takes a lot of time to redact the confidential information, confidential health information, HIPAA protected information, the inside of victim tomes. There's a lot of just considerations to think about the intersection of creating public records and public access to body cameras, body camera footage, or fully supportive of section seven. I'm gonna talk about sections one through three right now, which is the data collection section. The state's attorneys, the RDAP, the justice reinvestment working group are all, you know, all of which I participated in are very strongly supportive and have recommendations very similar to this. They even go further than this that say, look at every high impact, high discretion system starting with the initial arrest or initial police contact all the way through to when the person is no longer in state custody and collect data in every single one of those points. It's really the kind of cornerstone to finding where implicit bias, explicit bias, pretextual racism creep into the criminal justice system. And we've been, the state's attorneys have been supporting this through those other groups, the racial disparities in the justice reinvestment working group. One note of caution is, you know, we heard, we had one meeting of the racial disparities advisory panel where Stephanie Seguino came and talked about the data that's being collected by law enforcement under this very section right now. And the big takeaway is that the quality and consistency of the data that's being collected is by law enforcement agencies is highly variable. By way of example, she showed us eight different ways that various law enforcement agencies are coding events involving Native Americans. Some use I for indigenous, some use NA for Native American, some use FA for first Americans and so forth. There's also a problem of duplicates that she identified with the data. Some departments code every stop as a single event. Some other departments code every action as a different event. So if a person is pulled over and given multiple tickets or given multiple tickets and then arrested, that could be four, five, six incidents and it's all the same stop. And that's not being, that's not consistent across the state. There's also differences in whether, you know, race is as observed by the police officer or whether it's self-reported by the individual. And there's variations between the police departments in that regard. And that's under the existing law that we have that. And this is really tying funding to complying without law. And my only point here is that it's very difficult to kind of look at end results and kind of trace them back if the law enforcement agencies have a different definition than the state's attorneys or a different definition than the courts or a different definition than the Department of Corrections with respect to these kind of fundamental indicators. I really appreciate the approach that's taken in the Justice Reinvestment Bill, which essentially says all of the stakeholders including members of the public including the RDAP Committee of the Racial Disparities Panel get together, figure out what data points should be collected. What are these high discretion, high impact points in the criminal justice process and come up with a consistent definition of how we wanna collect race data, gender data. How do we want self-reporting of the individual? Do we want police observed or do we want both? And have a real kind of consistency from that throughout the entire criminal justice system. I think that's certainly essential. One issue that I think is not addressed with this legislation is that the resources that are necessary to do that kind of collection are not really addressed. Here we have kind of a stick I would say, withholding grant funding for law enforcement agencies that don't do this well. And you think about the agencies that are kind of held up as the better ones across the state and certainly the state police come to mind. And they have one person who does all of their data compilation and she, her name is Betty Wheeler and she doesn't, that's not even her full-time job. She does that over time. And so you think about some of the more rural and smaller police departments and they're gonna continuously get penalized for not reporting in a timely fashion. Whereas, they just, I think that the resource question is fundamental to data collection. But it's not necessarily addressed in here but regardless of that, these are important principles and we certainly support sections one through three. With respect to S119, this really isn't a state's attorney bill. We state's attorneys had not been involved with the kind of evolution of H808. We certainly agree with the basic principles that are laid out in S119 and I'm gonna just summarize them in my own words that deadly force be necessary, the use of force be proportional to the harm pose and that there would be a duty to intervene. These are all important principles. In my experience, as someone who reads police affidavits for a living, the vast majority of our police officers are operating under these standards already, albeit informally. And so if there needs to be a push from the legislature to formalize that, I think that, and what I've heard from law enforcement is they're willing to accept that. So I think there are, of course, you heard from the chair of the racial disparities panel yesterday, just directing the committees here to take a second look at the racial disparities in the criminal juvenile justice system report that we submitted in December. I would just wanna echo that. I mean, when you look at things like incarceration rates, school suspensions, school expulsions, there's certainly a much more insidious problem that's, and subtle problem that's happening, not just in Vermont, but across the country. And there's some strategies laid out in that report to dealing with that kind of implicit bias that comes throughout the criminal justice system. So I would just once again echo Dr. Nasred and Longo's request that the committees take a close look at that report and some of the strategies that are laid out there. And with that, I'm happy to take any questions. Thank you so much. You did a really brilliant job of sticking to the timeframe since we do have a hard stop at two o'clock. I'm wondering if you will be able to join us tomorrow for members to ask you questions? Of course. Okay, so if we could have you at nine o'clock in the morning, that's when we'll be back together as committees. And then we do have another, at least one more witness that we need to hear from tomorrow morning before we start looking at the specific components of the bill. So thank you so much for sharing your observations really directly and quickly with us and also for making yourself available tomorrow. So committees, we do need to end here and get back to the floor because the government operations committee has a bill on the floor right now. So thank you Pepper and thank you committees. See you tomorrow.