 Hopefully we're now going to hear more about we need to invest in things we value. Yes, you're live again. Okay, so continued. Now that we've turned the page together. It's important to invest in the things that we value and so, you know, again, I think that thinking of my role thinking of the advisory panel. It's important to adequately resource our work so that we can work statewide on racial equity. And this is not the only way to invest in racial equity for statewide work, right, because I and any staff that may be provided to me and the advisory panel, we're going to be able to identify we want to continue identifying ways that we can be better on racial equity around racial equity. But the actual work needs to happen afterwards is going to happen in the respective and relevant commissions. What's the word departments and agencies. So as an example, I and a data person and maybe members of the panel might do an in depth analysis about, let's say housing discrimination, or bad example because we have the human rights commission for that but you know let's say discrimination in some other sector or about a racial equity failure in some part of government related to commerce. Then at that point, it's up to us to make sure that we're staffing the commerce agency well enough that they can address that issue. So the last point that I that I'm making here is that I urge the committee to keep in mind that investing in racial equity. One is a moral imperative to is necessary for the survival of our state and three is something that isn't just going to happen through the racial equity director or any associated panels. It's also going to have to happen in all of the relevant sectors where inequity shows itself. So I'm trying to think of how to how to do that here and so I'm thinking that your budget is basically you. Yeah. So, if we in one of the bills that we had we put an additional $50,000 into your office. And I'm thinking that's a little bit, but I believe we need to put more. And if, if we put something like if we said, we need to put an additional 150,000 into that budget but not specify what it's for you, you could then use it for if you needed additional staff funds or if you needed to to contract with a data analyst to help you. You wouldn't have to necessarily use it for for personnel to hire a person but you could use it for if you needed to to work with somebody on the outside or I don't know. I mean that's what I'm thinking here I don't know where where you committee members on on this and then one of the things that I would suggest is that it's, although it's not going to happen this year all those investments in other agencies is that you. When you identify those places, which is what you're doing that you can make recommendations for increase in other agencies and departments budgets to do this work. Correct. So, where are we. May I ask a clarifying question, the 50,000 we got into the budget was for the first quarter budget. So, it, I believe wasn't that correct. We got all we passed was the first quarter budget. Yeah, and I believe you, we got $50,000 in that didn't we for. I think so. Yeah, so it's that's just for the first quarter just think what Susana could do with the $200,000 that implies if it was fully funded. Well, if I may I'd like to make one additional point, really an observation of what I've noticed that I think that around state government there's an expectation or an assumption that something that's related directly to racial equity is assumed to the panel's budget. Just as one example, the state has a membership in the state is a dues paying member of a national alliance related to racial equity. The fees for that membership are pulled from the panel's budget. Of course it's something that's going to benefit the whole state. Unfortunately, during the earlier months of coven 19 when we were struggling to get translations of weekly updated orders out. We just very emergency sort of last minute basis, the panel authorized the expenditure of funds to have those updated orders continue to be translated by the community groups that were doing it. Definitely, our friends at the agency of human services were able to step in and say you know what we can actually afford to do that we'll take it on, which was wonderful. But of course, before we knew that the understanding was we're just going to pull from the the week budget. So I say that to say that there are some circumstances where it's very clear where funding should lie for certain racial equity related things. And in other circumstances, everyone kind of shrugs and the presumption is that it comes out of the re budget. And I asked you to keep that in mind as you consider how we're allocating these funds. The other thing is that the racial equity panels budget is actually a percentage of the human resources budget. So as the human resources budget fluctuates so too will our budget and that's 3.1% I believe of the human resources budget. So it's not a fixed amount it's relative to another department. So, let me just get this straight. Oh, Chris first. Go ahead you have something you're thinking through so. Well, the, we have the budget. And what is there a separate budget for the panel and then a separate budget for your. Yeah, they're all all it's just one one budget. My position and associated benefits and employee costs are line items in the racial equity advisory panels budget. And what is the total racial equity panel budget. That is currently. Oh my goodness, I apologize I would have to get updated numbers unless you happen to have that. I'm sorry I don't have it right in front of me and I don't remember I'm sorry. I think it's about 180,000, which I think included a one time allocation for the year during the when act nine was passed. The budget was stated as being 3.1% of the DHR budget, plus a one time allocation of $75,000, which, of course, drops off after that. After after that, after the one time allocation disappears, then the vast majority of the budget will be to pay for me to be an employee of the state. I had gotten that was tied to the human resources budget. Yeah. They did it the way they do. Buildings and general services and it and stuff they build. Yeah, it's an internal service fund so every agency pays a portion of it since the work is considered statewide service to all the other agencies. Right, right, of course. Chris, did you have a one thing to share and one question for Miss Davis and that is on the share side, and I'm glad that we're making a start but as is often the case in our state I think we we dramatically underfund things and just ask people to. I remember our first conversation when Miss Davis we were talking about sort of her portfolio of work and I said, is it possible for you know one person to do this and she had some very polite positive answer but I think underneath it. And it's like, it was a vast amount of work to be assigned to one person and I just hope that we will as quickly as we can and responsible way, step up and, and make this a more fully fledged effort and so that's the question in the question is it. What's up. We're just getting started down this road really in Vermont and, but what is a more mature version this model looks like as you were alluding to before. Here you are off in one place but all the real work in the end has to happen throughout government. So in a mature system. Are there people who are your colleagues that are at the agency level distributed around the state. How does it, what does it look like five years from now in if we were to implement this well. Good question. Senator if I'm understanding your question correctly. Then I will politely decline to answer it only because I think that this kind of planning and this kind of foresight and prediction really deserves more than just me at the spur of the moment. I'm not thinking about it but but I suppose because I don't want to completely cop out I would say that adequately staffing and funding this role would be key. It would be nice to have additional funds there available for the occasional, either grant to a racial equity themed project or entity or to be able to use. The panel's discretion in how to advance racial equity work around the state. But I really, and I think racial equity advocates around the state or would want to kick me for continuing to say this I really do think that the bulk of our investment in equity has to happen in the sectors where equity presents itself most acutely. I appreciate that we did during the coronavirus. The first round of relief funding is we had a set aside from the commerce grants we had a set aside for minority on businesses. That was key because we often have these big programs and say well they're available to everybody so it's not like we're excluding you, but it's usually not enough just to do that. We're just to put a big trough out and expect everybody to have open access to it. And so being able to not just provide money around to the state agencies for that work. Jen, not just provide the money and say hey we hope we use it for equity, but saying we're giving you this money, and we intend that you use it for equity is really important. Well, thanks. Chris, deeper broader practice looks like around the state over time, you know so that it's not just a specialized office operating but that it becomes part and parcel of how every department and agency lives. Damien are you with us. Do you know what the current budget is. I see Damien but he may not be listening in on our committee he may be doing juggling 88 things. Okay. Could I just up to Chris's question to Susanna which is, you know, okay so you can you don't want to chat at the moment about a mature system and what it would look like. What state has the best model in your opinion at the moment that we could at least look to. I don't even know that there's a clean answer to that because every state's needs are so different. We have some states that are very diverse and so, you know, putting work towards racial equity is a lot easier. We have a lot of states that have far larger budgets than ours does and so a lot of people don't even it could be a drop in the bucket for them what to us seems like a big lift. Another thing that I noticed about Vermont is that in other parts of the country we can often use poverty as a proxy for race and so oftentimes doing anti poverty work is also doing racial equity work. But in a state like Vermont it's tricky because while Vermonters of color have higher poverty rates, the wrong number of people living in poverty or near poverty is higher for white residents and so I'm not necessarily sure that we have enough comparable jurisdictions to say what's best but I will say that the states that are explicit in their desire to adequately fund equity measures. The ones who have carved out positions that are dedicated to this work and the ones that best or most utilize community input and allowing the public to shape their futures. Those tend to be better models than the ones that are more dictatorial, the ones that underfund and the ones that blend equity in and bury it deep in some obscure agency as opposed to making it prominent invisible and part of leadership conversations. So, what if we took this year's budget, I mean the current the budget that you're currently operating with, looked at that $75,000 one time, which I assume was meant to do the interviewing and all that kind of stuff to gear up and actually hire them, which we took that and we added, we've already added $50,000, we added another $150,000 to that, and then told the Appropriations Committee that if they don't want to have that as a line item budget as such that what they should do is take that total amount and figure out the percentage of the percentage that they would be assigning to the agencies and departments so that they come up with a, because that's what they did before they came up with what was needed. I mean the amount that was budgeted and then assigned the percentage. So what if we did it that way but added to the $200,000 for the full year. I think that's the way to do it. Huh. Alison. We also just need to make sure the 50, I'm pretty sure the 50,000 went through in the in the first quarter budget. Well, we'll say 200 for the entire budget, which would, if it went through then that's already there but, and I know it's a hard sell. Well, I don't know that it's going to be a hard sell I know that it's going to be hard to find the money but I think you're right this is work that has to we, we just need to be focusing on it and doing it and and not making it look like we're just nibbling at the end edges and penny pinching. That's my recommendation anyway, anybody else. Madam Chair may I speak a moment. Yes, please Andrea. One of the things that the panel has been exploring when we're talking about the outreach and education and data analysis is that we have been talking about conducting town halls around the state of Vermont. Pre COVID that was going to be in person at various venues around the state. And now we are looking at how to do that the way we are here with zoom or whatever electronic platform we would use. So when you're also talking about the budgetary items and the money that you're allotting. If you could please also can keep into can take into consideration that we are looking at. Will we hire someone to conduct a survey for the folks in Vermont. Will we and then what will it, what will need to be done in order to reach the audiences that we need to be reaching who may not have internet access. They may not be computer savvy. We're looking at language barriers. We are looking at rural Vermont and as Susanna pointed out is that we're look, there's, there's folks of color and then you have the Abenaki that we sit here we can pass as white Indians. And that is also a higher poverty level, more often than not rural, what will be access how will the panel get to the folks we need to in order to get this data, and to be able to move forward with racial equity for all in the state of Vermont. And that's as you're talking about this budgetary. This, this, this topic, please keep that in mind as well. Thank you. Yeah, Brian. Thank you madam chair, I'm just wondering, was there any increase listed in the governor's recommended budget. Not to my knowledge. I could be wrong about that but I'm not aware of a proposed increase. I would assume the way it would have been done as an increase is increase the percentage but I don't. I don't think that governor has recommended an increase, but so Andrea to your comment I, my thought here was not to even to keep that in mind but to not be specific about how to just have it there if it, if it, you needed to contract with somebody who does public relations or outreach or something if you need to contract with somebody to crunch some numbers or collect some data or at the panel's discretion, or do some training or, I mean I don't know. I don't know what it would be that you need, but I would like it to me remain flexible enough that you would be able to spend it where you need it to have the biggest impact on the work that you're doing. We're all doing. Yes, thank you. And I wasn't expecting that it would be like to devide up quite that way I wanted you all to be aware of that is one of the things that the panel has been talking about. Yep, and I think we, if we were to, if we were to make this recommendation, we would use that as justification for some of this information about why we were making that. So, thank you. So I think that Brian to answer your question I think that if we make this recommendation it's going to be not in line with what the governor has recommended it would be in addition to that. I've just sent Stephanie and Barrett an email to confirm that the 50,000 went through in the first quarter budget. Okay. So we'd be talking about, if we were to think of expanding that to the entire three quote four quarters it would be an additional 150 plus the current budget. Yes. Could I add one more thing that is pretty much that pretty much completely unrelated to this. Sure. You know, another thing when we talk about investing in racial equity and paying people fairly. Another big thing is paying people who aren't necessarily staff on this work for their time when we ask them to participate in things like this I'm thinking about a number of the committees that the state government has created over the last couple of decades. Most of them are powered by community members volunteers, people who are either subject matter experts or have lived experience but who aren't connected with the state it's not part of their day jobs. And just seeing the work that they put in the hours that they put in and I understand that many of them are entitled to the sort of basic per diems. I would ask that you also consider as a matter of government operations that as we engage members of the public, or other consultants in doing work, especially work that requires the kind of emotional and actual labor that racial equity tends to provide that we keep always, we always consider mechanisms for how we can compensate them fairly not just for like gas mileage which at this point, no one's doing. But but for the expertise that they that they provide. If I had my way, we would leave that leave a chunk of money in there to be used in the best way possible and clearly you'd have to justify how it was being spent. And if the auditor or the administration or this committee or the appropriations committee next year said, whoa, did you see how they spent that money. They can't spend it that way. Then there's a reckoning but but otherwise you, my thought is that you would spend it. I'm sure that was the best. So where are we committee in this do we want to take a little more time to think about this or yeah and let's find out what we got back from what we hear from Stephanie, and I think today we we might just be hearing and let us think about it and then make a decision in the next next week about actually want to lobby for in terms of our spend our gov up spend. Okay. Right. Nope. Just very briefly, I was thinking about I used to be an EMT and we weren't paid, but every once in a while we got some sort of bonus. I don't know. I forget how it was a crew. So it was a very modest amount of money. It was very actually meaningful to people to have that volunteer work somehow recognize compensated and by honestly most people took that money and they would go buy better equipment to do the job. So it wasn't about the money in and of itself it was sort of a recognition and respect thing. I agree. And you know I think that we're at a point in time in 2020 when we can consider compensation to look a little bit different than just the currency. Right. For some people who have children maybe they would rather be paid in a certain healthcare hours at their local, you know, facility or some other, some other mechanism that that maybe could be in kind and I know we're, you know, this is a bit tangential but just keeping in mind that sometimes we operate under systems or guidelines that are better suited for the times when they were created, and that we can be created now and people where they are. So thank you all for your consideration. I apologize I'm going to have to run in a few minutes so if there are any additional questions, I'm happy to answer them. I have none. And thank you and thank you Andrea and I think Allison is right what we'll do is we'll kind of hear all the budget things that we have to hear and then next week we'll come up with some proposals and some decisions. If you want to know when we're going to do that. If you want to join us then. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And Damien had come in to, I think, answer a question that we had. Well, my question was how much was in the budget but you've already. I've asked Stephanie but I mean, we're trying to tell us that actually something. I mean, if you're listening, here he is. Yeah, I am I'm sorry I had to move I just put my daughter down for a nap. How lovely I want to nap. I know I was really hoping the microphone was muted while I was reading stories or was. I was just going to let you know that Stephanie is not available today so you probably won't get an answer till Monday. So I just want to make sure you knew that weren't expecting a quick answer. I don't have an answer to your question. That's fine. Thank you. Yeah, it's amazing. I mean you don't have an answer. You always have answers. Well he didn't know what the question was so it was a little bit hard for an answer. I think we'll move on to bore. Hey Susanna and Andrea and you're welcome to stay with us but I know you have other things to do so. Thank you so much. Thank you. Bye. Bye. So bore. Talk to us about the Human Rights Commission budget. Okay, so thank you all for having me here today and I just want to thank you for. Thank you sincerely for giving me this opportunity to weigh in on the budget as we are being asked to cut our budget by 3% and some of our carry forward has also been or is going to be reverted back to the general funds pool. As you all know, we are existing in unprecedented times. We have a country that is in crisis. At the same time we're dealing with this pandemic. We're also dealing with social unrest. These are dynamics that are creating really complicated and difficult situations as we try to balance many competing demands and needs with limited time and resources. We are a very small state entity, six people with a very large mandate to enforce all of the anti discrimination statutes in the state of Vermont, and to protect all people that fall under those anti discrimination statutes. That includes race, color, national origin, gender identity, sexual orientation, victims of domestic and sexual violence, and more. Depending on which anti discrimination statute we're looking at. And as you all know, every legislative session as you serve on all these other other committees. That more is added to our plate, or at least more is anticipated on a regular basis to be added to our plate. So recently victims of domestic and sexual violence was added as a protected category, almost every legislative session there is a bill to add bullying to the Human Rights Commission jurisdiction. And the only reason in the past we have said no to that is the lack of resources. But there's a real need in the state of Vermont to have someone other than the schools oversee bullying in our school. And there are many, many students and parents who are in need of an entity to oversee bullying. And we're happy to do that work, except that we really don't have the resources, the people to do it. There has been bills to add criminal conviction as a protected category. Homelessness is being considered as a protected category. So we're just adding more and more people to our plate. We are often the first or one of the first entities considered for task forces and working groups and legislative committees and activities. And the majority of this 3% cut is going to come out of our carry forward because we can't really absorb it in our regular budget because our budget is entirely salaries and benefits and a little bit towards the building and keeping the lights on. So whenever there's a budget cut, it has to come out of our carry forward or their means cuts to jobs. Luckily, we have a carry forward. And the reason why we have a carry forward for the first time in probably 30 years. The Human Rights Commission was enacted was because last year the legislature gave us a new position after a lot of fight and hard work and convincing and persuasion and support from all of you. We got a new position at the Human Rights Commission, and we made the decision to hire for that position halfway through the fiscal year to save us some money. So we have vacancy savings that created really this carry forward. So now we're looking at cutting that carry forward that we just received. The budget cycle is short-sighted. It looks at what you have right now and what the needs are right now. And what we can absorb today may have a detrimental impact on the work that we can do in the next five years. I know that getting money added to your budget is a much harder feat than having it taken away. Having said all of that, I think that your job is probably very hard because we are operating at a budget deficit. I understand that there are many needs. Many Vermonters are in need of services and support. And I know that there are many great programs that are facing potential cuts as well. So on the one hand I want to say I respect any decision that you make. On the other hand, I also think that it would be disingenuous to suggest that we are okay with these budget cuts because we are not. And this is probably not the time to be cutting the Human Rights Commission. And I don't think if there ever was, this is probably the worst time, if there ever was a time to be cutting it. And so that's pretty much what I have to say. I am happy to answer any questions about the work that we do. I do want to say, and I hate to even just say this because it always sounds like I'm complaining, but the work of the executive director is so varied. I wear so many hats. As you know, I'm here, so I'm doing policy, but I also give training as you have seen. So I do education and training, and there's such need for education and training. And there are so many entities in the state of Vermont who cannot afford to pay for that. The Human Rights Commission, we see our job as providing those services for free. We ask for a donation, or if they can, and if they can't because of policy or budget line items, we give those training. We do trainings on implicit bias. We do trainings on microaggressions and bystander intervention, as you all know. And we do trainings on sexual harassment in the workplace. We do trainings on fair housing. We do trainings on bullying and harassment and hazing. And anytime the legislature says, hey, Bore, can you do a training for us on how to do an investigation, how to do this, how to do that? We always say yes, because we see that as part of our job and our duty. And to be proactive as much as we are reacting to discrimination in the state of Vermont. So it's a lot of work. I would also say that I might be the only or one of few executive directors who also is a litigator. I have to litigate all the cases that the Human Rights Commission sees. Rich is a lot to ask. And if we make decisions as a team about whether or not we should pursue litigation, and we don't pursue litigation, even when it's meritorious because of the lack of resources. There are cases that we have determined reach the standard of discrimination, but we say we cannot join that lawsuit or bring that lawsuit because of the lack of resources. We have to be very picky about the cases that we bring. I think in many ways that's unfair to the people that we serve. If we are a state entity and we've done a neutral and objective investigation and found that discrimination has occurred. I think we have to see that through litigation and not abandon people at the agency level and say you're on your own now because we don't have the time or energy to do that or your case is not as important. Sometimes that's the decision that we're making. We're going, what is the potential for this case to set precedence in the state of Vermont? And that's the reason why we take it. If a case is important to the individuals, but may not necessarily be important in terms of setting precedence for a larger group of people, that's a basis for why we don't pursue litigation. And so we could honestly, we could use a legal director to take over the litigation so I can do all the other piece of work that I do like supervision and management and budgeting and everything else and policy and so forth and education and training as well. We could use an administrator to do all of our administrative work and appointing authority type work to handle our budget to do all of the running the numbers and stuff and so that we could be responsive to the people who reach out to us and need those direct services and benefits. I almost feel like we're always in this, in this situation where everybody has needs. These are ours. All I can do is present them and respect whatever decision you make. Alice Allison. So, for I have a couple of questions for you. When you say, and I agree with you that if ever there was a time not to cut the Human Rights Commission it would be now. Is that because you're seeing during the pandemic. And during this very divisive time in America, more discrimination in against our protected classes. I mean this. Chinese restaurant that I know I've closed because of the incredible. They talk about about being Chinese in the coronavirus. I mean really stuff like that are you seeing more discrimination. And so that's question one and then question to on the litigation. Well, first of all, John Campbell is also a litigator who's an executive director. Do you not are you not able to partner with the AG's office litigating cases. Well, no, because we. The attorney to redo state government employment and the Attorney General's office represents the state. And so sometimes our lawsuits are against state departments and agency. The Department of Corrections were in litigation right now against the Department of Corrections, because a woman who needed hearing devices was not given them for like a two year period. Right. And so the Attorney General's office has a conflict of interest. And so they can't do our case. Okay, so back that idea but go if you'd go back to the needs, the heightened needs during the pandemic. Yeah, one, I think that being that this pandemic is of just March, we don't have the numbers yet in terms of the complaints that are coming up. But we have the cases and the story, people are just not necessarily filing a complaint of discrimination. And that's not unusual. That's because when people are fighting to maintain their homes and their jobs and staying healthy. The last thing they're thinking about is filing a complaint of discrimination. Usually what happens is you have the forces that be that causes these things to occur. And then you see the complaints of discrimination coming in about a year or two years later, when people have sort of settled down, and the statute of limitations has not run yet. So then now they're like, my house is situated. I have a new job. I feel like that person did the discriminative against me during COVID, because of this or because of that. We do have some COVID related cases right now at the Human Rights Commission. We are hearing stories of xenophobia and racism against Asian Americans in ways that we had never heard before in Vermont, because we're hearing this virus we refer to as the Chinese virus. And we've heard stories of bullying in schools. But part of that is that we need to do more outreach and education towards schools and our teachers and so forth to be of service. But how much of that can we do is obviously limited by our time and our resources. But yes, we are hearing a significant amount of disability related COVID cases. I don't want to identify too many, but they're, they're across the gamut. They're in employment. They are in public accommodations, like schools, as schools are reopening, we're hearing stories about that about teachers and parents and students, and also in housing too. We know that because of the moratorium, we know that because people have lost jobs, the housing is a very scary state right now. And people are people might be in a situation where they haven't been kicked out yet. But as soon as that moratorium is lifted, we might see a whole lot of evictions and foreclosures. And we need to sort of do a lot of work on the front end to sort of be of service to people who might be facing those evictions and foreclosures as well. If you, if, if you took this 3% cut, would it impact your ability to have this other position? I mean, does it cut into your, because that was a kind of a savings because you didn't. I think we, there's a name for it we use in this, in the state and it's a something savings and Steve Howard is there and he would know what vacancy savings that's what we got. So, if you, if you took that 3% cut does that mean that you would not be able to fully fund the new position that we approved, or would it cut would, would it actually mean a decrease in your core budget. You mean the position that you approved last year. Yeah. We are fine. So, the cut is the cut to the vacancy savings only. The cut will not be our budget. Your budget would remain what it was, plus with including that new position. Yes, because we hired that position last year in the middle of the year, save six months of that person's salary and benefit to put us in a position where we could use some of that money for the outrage and the education. Because we asked for the smallest amount of money for that job. And so yeah, what we're doing is we're dipping into our hope was to keep that money to do the education and outreach and to do to provide the services that we had hoped to provide for the first time. So yes, we're dipping into that. And so, does the 3% represent that whole vacancy savings or is there some leftover from that. There is, there is money left over. There is money left over. Yeah. Our budget is, oh, go ahead. Well what I'm thinking here is that it is not a good time to cut the Human Rights Commission. On the other hand, this isn't really a cut. What it is, is you have less leftover from your vacancy savings to spend, but it doesn't cut into your core budget or that new position, including that new position. That's correct. Okay. Does anybody else have any questions or I just needed to get that straight in my mind. Brian. Yeah, no, and I appreciate that madam chair because I was wondering about it as well. So your ask of us for is to not go through with the 3% cut. And just sort of leave things the way they would have been had the governor not requested. Is it am I understanding that correctly. I'm actually not making any ask. I wanted to share with you the concerns. And I wanted to be honest that I respect the governor's decision as well as yours. I made a big ask last year, and you did give that to me. And so I did not want to come in here and say, don't you dare cut me because I wanted to be honest about that. Having said that, this 3% cut is a lot to us, nothing to the larger budget. Can you tell my Human Rights Commission doesn't have that much money to begin with. You're not making much of a dent, taking money from us to help anybody else having, but, but I guess. Everything that you have said is true. I purposefully did choose not to make any request. I'm not happy about the 3% but at the same time I respect that it's it's we're in a tough time. I think we need to really make it clear, though, that it is not a 3% cut, like we think of a 3% cut to a budget. It's not. If your budget is $100,000 and or $100 I'm really simple here your budget is $100 and this savings. Vacancy savings was 10. It, it's the 3% is 3% of the 10, not 3% of the 100. So it isn't really a 3% budget cut. It's 3% of a particular amount and can you, can you just tell me what that 3% amounted to 3% of that savings. $19,000. Okay, and I think that $16,000 of that is coming from that carry forward. So what happens is they say we're cutting your budget by 3%. And you find it in your budget. But if you can't find it in your budget, which we normally wouldn't, you look to, did you have any budget savings from last year. And that's what we are looking to. But I don't want to suggest, or leave anybody with the impression that that wasn't money that was already slated to be used in other ways. Right. That's why we save that's why we hire six months later to save that money. When we are taking that money away, we are saying the work that you intended to do with that money, you cannot do that with that money. Right. And yes. Okay, I think I understand that now wasn't quite as complicated as the Vermont emergency management but any other questions by committee members. All right, so what what you heard us say with the racial equity advisory panel is that what we'll do is kind of take everything into consideration and then we'll have a committee discussion about it and make some recommendations and we'll make sure you get an invite to when we do that. I have to say I was disappointed to hear that they are not absorbing any cuts and I know that that job is really hard as is ours. We have a large mandate with lots of protected categories, and my understanding with everybody was getting cut by 3% did not come from government entities are getting cut and not others. And that to me seems not necessarily fair or fully considerate of the work of the Human Rights Commission. I think it's a little bit different actually because the way as they're funded as an internal services function. So if so they get, they get 3.1% of other budgets. So if the if other budgets are $100 this year they get 3% of that if budget cut, they get 3% of the remaining. So they are in fact being cut because they'll get a percentage of a lower amount. Does that make sense. I would just say I'm not privy to all the testimonies. I am curious if every department and entity is facing the same. But you all are and so that's something that I would be mindful of if not everybody is being asked to be cut to be just cognizant and thoughtful about why the HRC should be absorbing that cut, as opposed to the Department of Human Resources or the Department of Finance or any other department. So that's, that's the last thing I would say. I hear you, I hear you, particularly given how much you do for how little right already. Yeah, and I can't I can't justify that and I don't know if everybody's being asked to do a cut of the other committees are looking at their people in their jurisdiction. And we'll see what happens. I can't answer that question I don't know but I do know that the reap will get. If, if everybody is cut. So they have a smaller amount to be starting with, they'll get a percentage of that smaller amount so they in fact will get less. In the end also because that's the way they're funded that's the way it is funded also. And buildings and general services as an internal services fund so. Any other questions. Thanks for. Thank you all very much. Bye bye more thank you. So, Gail, did we hear from Carrie Brown. I can. What. We did not Senator. Okay. I can text her when was she expected. We just invited her I mean we didn't have any time. Oh, necessarily but so let's then. Oh and now we've lost Steve Howard. Oh no there he is. There he is. Maybe we could put the women's commission back on the schedule for next week. Yeah. We can do that. So Steve, would you like to talk to us about. I think that your butt your input into the budget is a little bit different than departments and agencies. And I think that if you can talk to us a little bit about the impact of those cuts on the workforce. So I think that the one of the things that's come up is the issue of reopening the negotiations, which does impact the budget. So if you can just talk to us about that. Thank you Madam Chair for the record Steve Howard from the VSEA. I think if I, if I may, I will start Madam Chair with the second issue first. The, and I hope that you have the language that we are proposing for the FY 21 budget. So basically, we are so let me begin if you recall at the end of the June session when you adopted the Q one budget, you would, you made the decision to fund the year one of the pay act. And said explicitly that the legislature would consider whether what, what amount to fund your two at a later date. And that's pretty explicit in the budget. The administration has interpreted that as meaning that you did not fully fund the pay act and therefore we have to open the contract in year two and renegotiate year two. So that is a different interpretation than what the state employees have our interpretation is, I think consistent with the testimony in the appropriations committees with the advice that was provided by, by the legislative council is that the state made a determination about what, how much to fund or whether to fully fund year two, and that we are, we have no obligation under the state employees relations, state employees Labor Relations Act to meet and renegotiate until they make that decision. So the language before you would not withstand the state employees Labor Relations Act, and I believe the judicial, the general or the judiciary Labor Relations Act and I think also the state's attorneys, and basically would say that there's that it was not the legislature's intention to force a reopening of the contract that when they said they'll consider it a later date they'll consider it at a later date. So if you make that decision, that may have, that may have the effect of requiring us to renegotiate or it may not, depending on what the legislature decides for the FY 22 budget, which would be the normal course of things anyway. As you know Madame chair you pass the pay act you fund the year one in the same year and you fund, you have to fight to fund year two in the second year. That would be the normal course of things. So our, the state employees would ask that the appropriations process that the FY 21 budget for the last three quarters that that budget include this language, so that the administration and the VSEA can be clear about what the legislature's intent was. Does anybody have any questions about that. Yeah, we can't wait Anthony. I just want I mean I don't really question it's going to be really clear. They're implying that we said that we would decide later how much of the pay act to pay right now there it's the administration is saying that we may theoretically choose to make it small lesser lesser amounts, but as opposed to saying, we're just putting off the decision as to when to fund it and how to fund it. That makes sense. And they're, they're taking what I would describe as a liberal interpretation of will we will make the decision on year two later and saying well see they didn't fully fund the pay act therefore we have to negotiate. You don't think that's true we think what the legislature said is what the legislature said which is we'll take that decision up later. And so we would our position the VSEA position is, there's no negotiation that's required until the legislature makes a decision on year two. And depending on what that decision is, you know there could be a there could be a need to to renegotiate if you don't fully fund your two. Or if you decide to fully fund your two. There's no need to negotiate at all. So, we just want to take that off the table. And, and return to what would be the normal status quo of the process that would typically occur when you pass the pay if you pass the pay act. And we wouldn't normally. And we normally fund, they were going to fully fund the pay act, and then year one gets in year one budget, but your two budget doesn't get into your two budget anyway. This isn't a decision that needs to be made this week so that we can. Go into your two budget. Now anyway, the only thing, well the decision on whether or not to put this language and doesn't need now, because there's the administration is saying we have to renegotiate now. And that as you said, as you just referenced madam chair. That's not true. It's never true. The decision about the pay act only authorizes the funding, the appropriations process actually appropriates it, and the year two is never actually appropriated until year two. So FY 22 would, you know, when we come back in January. And that's when we would have the debate about whether to fully funded or not. And there should be no need to sit down to reopen an agreement that you put nearly a half a year of blood, sweat and tears into, in order to come to between now and then. So, if we, if we went in that direction of reopening, one could assume that we would be able to do that justify doing that every single year, and have one year contracts because we normally don't appropriate the money for year two. And then we fight about that then. But so every time there's a two year contract if we didn't put it, we can't put it into your two budget because we haven't done that yet, we would be sending this precedent, we would be saying every at the end of every first year we could. I mean, anyway, there's no, there's really no provision for a one year contract but what Celera says is that the parties would, if it's not fully funded by the legislature that the parties would meet to negotiate to the amount that the legislature did appropriate. And in this case you've said you haven't made the decision about what how much to appropriate near to. So we don't know what we would negotiate to. So it's a rather liberal interpretation of the legislative legislative branches intent. And we just want to, I think, we want to preserve the legislature's prerogative to make their own decision about what they want to do on year two. Brian, did you have a question. I guess I'm just confused, but I'm sure Steve will unconfuse me. I thought more. When we and we voted on this. At the last part of June, right. Yes. Yeah. So I thought for some reason that both parties. The administration and Union had agreed that we would fully fund the first year, but that the second year was still in question. Is that not true. No, this was not something that the VSEA agreed to. This was this was something that was decided for the VSEA. And, and while we were quite happy to have at least year one funded, we would have preferred to have both years funded. And we would have preferred to have the pay act passed as normal, as it normally would have have been. But given, we were, we were sort of given this information. While the legislative hearing on the house side had already begun. So we didn't really have much time to react. So it was not something that we negotiated or worked out. We would have preferred that we would have passed the pay act and that it would have been fully funded for year one. And, you know, we wouldn't, of course, anticipate funding for year two. The reason I'm confused, I guess, has to do also with the provision that legislative pay was, I'm trying to recall how this went. The house, it seems to me voted in essence to give themselves a raise. The Senate said no, we took it out. There was some provision, I thought, again, in that second year to reconsider that, but I could be not remembering everything exactly right. I remember that was part of the discussion. It's a little bit different. So I was just, so in year one, there's no legislative raise. Right. And the reason for that is because the current statute, I'm doing Betsy and my best interpretation of Betsy and in year one. The statute ties your increase to our COLA, what we negotiate, and there is no COLA in year one. It was just a flat 1400. So you wouldn't get anything in year one. And I understand the change. This is not something that we negotiate, although we would be happy to represent legislators if we could figure out a way to organize you. Rotem about that. The way that provision works is it simply changes. It allows the legislature to be paid the same as the constitutional officers, which means that you would get the COLA plus the average in steps, which is what everybody else gets. It was an exempt employee or a constitutional officer. Right. Can I, can I just throw something in here and what, what happened is that, first of all, we can't give a raise to ourselves so that we, the race would be for a new legislate new legislators. And then when it got tied in the language somehow to constitutional officers, it made it sound everybody started talking about how we were going to get the big bucks like those big people up there like the governor and the, the secretary of the people that we were going to be getting that kind of salaries. And that isn't true at all. It's everybody else in the state, every single employee gets that combination of COLA and step. So everybody gets that right. So, but it made it sound really terrible and we could not even convince our colleagues that we weren't going to somehow start getting $90,000 salaries. I mean, it just, anyway, so that was put in by the house and, and in the inability to sit down and talk to people face to face. I think that there was never any understanding of what that actually meant. And most people don't deal with the pay act or with salaries at all. So they had no idea what, what that was all about. But my understanding is that to go back to the, unless somebody else has a question or comment on that, that cold that legislative pay thing. Betsy and was joined us magically appeared, I think, were you wanting to clarify anything Betsy and it is listening in Steve did a great impression. Quite smile enough. Does anybody else have any comment or question about that. Well, may I just clarify. So Steve what you're asking us to do is to in to make sure that the language X that what you'd like us to do is accept year to the the design for year to the agreed upon design for year to and put that in the budget, not necessarily the money but the, that the agreement that that's the plan for year to basically the language just says not with Stan Selra that basically says that there's no need for the parties to meet to negotiate until May of 2021. Right. If the legislature decides, you know, just as Selra would dictate if the legislature decides not to fully funded in May of 2021 when you adjourn, we understand we would be obligated to go back to the table. But until then, we want to clarify with this language that there's no obligation to go back. It's kind of what I think Betsy and said in her testimony here I go again would be a wait and see provision. So see what the legislature does and then figure out how to how Selra applies. Well it doesn't even make any sense to me to even think about reopening because if the, I like to use $100 today so if the entire pay act is $100 and the and in year to we only fund $90 of that then you have to go back and renegotiate because you have to figure out where that other $10 is going to come from. But but to renegotiate now there's no amount to negotiate to it isn't $100 it isn't $90 it could be $70 or it could be $110 but there's nothing. So there's no, you have nothing to renegotiate to where if you wait until the legislature decides to either fully fund or not fully fund, then you have an amount that you are obligated to negotiate to get to that amount because that's what we've appropriated. That's correct. Okay. Anthony I see you're unmuting yourself. I'm not saying I want to do this but suppose we did nothing Steve that this is does the governor have the power to force it to renegotiate. You're saying we should put in language that says we're not going to renegotiate. What if we did nothing, do they have the power to force you to renegotiate seen as it seems like it would be a hard thing for them to do. Not saying we shouldn't insert the language I'm just wondering. There's arguably an obligation for the Union to meet with the administration but we are under no obligation to renegotiate the terms of the contract. I think it's just clarifying and by putting it in there it's making it very clear what the way the way negotiations work. And by not putting it in there I think it still leads to that misunderstanding and that misinterpretation what I see as a misinterpretation by the administration. It also means that we have to have an argument between the VSA and the administration that we don't necessarily need to have. No, not in the end they negotiated in good faith for a two year contract. They had a hard negotiation. It was a hard one. And for them now to go back and undermine that is to me just bizarre. I mean I don't, I don't get it. I really think it's unfair and that, you know, they negotiated you negotiated you came to an agreement and we're sticking by that agreement. Well, I think Anthony that it isn't that there would be hard conversations between VSA and the administration because they're not under any obligation to renegotiate because we haven't done anything yet to not fund. I think the optics of it are that there is a huge disagreement and that the VSE a won't come to the table and that they're not willing to. In this time of drastic changes that they're not willing to give and I think that's that's the problem here is not. I agree. I agree. But it's, it's funny, Jeanette that that's the optic and not vice versa, that everybody had worked really hard on this agreement come into agreement, and that we're honoring that agreement why isn't that the optic that people aren't honoring the agreement. Because, because of the way it works anyway in year two, we could say look, our revenues, our revenues are so far down that we need to renegotiate we need to cut the pay act by so much and you need to renegotiate. So, we can't say that it's not going to happen. And I'm just talking about the, the optics. I think the optics are down the administration side, because they're saying they want to do it now. Right. Anyway, other committee members on the way in at all. So, Steve, did you have more to talk to us about the budget itself or. Yeah, so just a couple of other issues I wanted just to bring to your attention so if folks have been following along with the governor's press conferences. I think that he holds regularly you may have at one point heard from Secretary Sherling, Christopher Sherling that the state has plenty of PPE. And then we have nothing to worry about and that may be true for the medical facilities in the state. But we are currently, there is no PPE available for state employees that for your own employees. And there's a massive effort to try to get these materials. So I just want to make the committee aware particularly it's a particular issue in the agency in the Department of Corrections, where we have in the summer this has been a very difficult summer because we have correctional officers who are wearing garbage bags that have been modified into sort of PPE and sprayed down with disinfectant. They are they're extremely hot they're extremely uncomfortable they're dangerous in the sense that they don't fit very well and they cause the safety glasses that the correctional officers are wearing to fog up. And so you can't see what you're doing. And that's not good when you're in a correctional facility. And I don't know if people realize this but there are what a lot of what correctional officers do is checks on on inmates and they have to sometimes do those every 15 minutes and there's often involves running up and down stairs. So I think I wanted to raise this issue. I know, having talked to the commissioner of corrections about it. They're having a really hard time getting materials I think they're on the verge of running out of gloves. And then it's the market, what people are doing out there is charging an arm and a leg for these materials for these supplies but I did want to bring it to your attention because it does seem to be widespread in the Department of Corrections and throughout state government. I think people are under the impression that Vermont's doing well. And we have a stockpile for another surge coming in the fall. And if that is true, it is not then something that either our members have seen in the work sites across the state, or there are managed the commissioners that we've spoken to about it, have been able to affect. And so I just wanted to bring that issue to your attention because it's a serious issue, particularly if as the weather gets colder. We see another surge of COVID. The only other thing in terms of the budget that I did want to also raise concerns about which also reflects it throughout state government but we've talked about this before on in the Department of Corrections and that is the severe staffing shortage and the massive amounts of overtime. That is continues to be a pervasive problem. We are somewhat supportive of some of the ideas that Commissioner Baker has about hiring standards and improving hiring standards, but we are concerned that we can't hire people now at a lower standard. And we are really concerned that that vacancy rate cannot grow, and the amount of overtime and the cost to the budget is astronomical I think the number is close to $8 million, which is fairly sizable and you think about the number of co is that we could hire for $8 million. That is just an issue that I think is is pervasive in a problem. And then just lastly, I did want to, this is, this is an issue that we talk about annually in your committee. And that's the issue of privatization and we have some privatization proposals that are on the table that we are rigorously opposed to. And then we've been pointing particularly around the privatization of of Woodside and youth services and how we deal with with youth who need those that level of service that Woodside does provide. We've been trying to point out and I think it's just timely. If you look at the quote what's happening with the private contracts that we have. So core civic, you know, 176 inmates who have coven because we had no control over their, their system for fighting coven. You compare that to what happened with state employees and their cooperation with management. It's night and day mental health system we all know what happened with the mental health system. And the several examples of privatization that I wanted to raise because I think, particularly around the course of a contract, you can see the effect of giving up state control when you turn over state services to a private vendor. Anthony, did you get my chat. It's hard to read chat, actually. I'm going to see if I can it's so far away. No, I just sent it to Anthony. Oh, can you do that. Oh, that's cool. Somebody wants to know if we can join join a joint meeting. Oh, Sarah couple of hands. So I think Senator whites, somehow having some technical difficulties is what it's come down to. She's gonna be silent she's gonna be in a silence mode for a little while. One question I had just back up to what you were saying about the PPE is you're not asking for any kind of money to necessarily take care of this at this point are you. Well, I don't I, I guess I am in some ways, I think it may be something the committee might may want to look into it and I don't know the answer because I understand the struggle in terms of trying to find, particularly the robes that that correctional officers and folks in the Department of Health would need. But I do think it's because it's such a it is such a health and safety concern. It's something the committee should be up to speed on and aware of both from the perspective of our members but also I out you know we've been working trying to encourage the commissioners. Commissioner Baker I think would be a good person to talk to. To solve this problem. And so it just because it's such a it's a significant health and safety risk across state government that it seemed like it would be an issue that the government operations committee may want to look into and potentially recommend additional funding for in the budget. We need to go beyond garbage bags go beyond garbage bags to the actual actual real PPE. You raised this before with us I mean you raised this in May and June, and, and the, you raised both the overtime issue and the lack of PPE. And so this is not a new subject for us to be dealing with with you, but it seems to be only focused on in the Department of Corrections. It's been widespread throughout state government was at the march when this all really broke out it was a huge issue across all of state government and it may still be in places like the vets home and the state hospital. It's a it's a global problem I understand the supply is not there, but I think there is this popular view based on some of the briefings that the governor's the governor's offices has had that we have plenty of PPE and we're all set. And if that's true. It's, it's not making its way to the work worksites across the state particularly in the correctional facilities. And we have a number of people who also working in the field and we have people forget that you know our family service workers are still going into people's homes. Right. And, you know, government hasn't shut down completely. And so that the lack of PPE, I think is an issue and one thing that we will be talking to the administration about is, I mean there's going to have to be some investment, if, even when state offices reopen in modifying those buildings to meet this this CDC standards for for spacing and also for putting up barriers between the public and and our members. Any questions. Steve this is off point of this conversation but you brought it up. Is there any discussion of when people might come back to work in a more full way. I knew we're here not until at least January but I'm just wondering if you're hearing anything different. All we know is what the Secretary of administration put out December 31 that that that those who could work from home should. And so we do have thousands of state employees who have turned their dining rooms into state agencies in order to keep state government going. We are going to have a, maybe I should mention this to me we are beginning to get a significant number of calls into our field services office about childcare and the lack of childcare, and the kind of convoluted way in which we've decided to return kids to a single schedule with not a single schedule but different schedules, some hybrid some not hybrid. And that is creating a problem accessing childcare. And so I'm not quite sure how the administration is going to propose to deal with that but I think it's a looming problem on the horizon that is beginning to become so noticeable that we're, we're, we're starting to step up our advocacy on it. We're not necessarily read they're not necessarily ready to propose that there be childcare centers affiliated with state government right different agencies would have on site childcare. Right I mean they haven't done that yet, although they should. And I did, I did I did suggest that the one agency that might want to start with that is the is the Department of Corrections. It's really hard to find people to work for the Department of Corrections, and it's really hard to find diverse to make the workforce diverse. If you wanted to hire. If you want to diversify the workforce, it's childcare is essential. And it's hard enough to but was hard enough to find it before COVID. It's really becoming a challenge now and the fact that school schedules are going to be so different across the state I think is causing massive amounts of confusion. Well, at some point maybe we would want to have either commissioner Baker and or someone out of Baker you're talking about terms of go back to PPEs for a second. You know we talked about corrections being a major instance of where that would be necessary to take a look at that but there might be other state agencies as well. The Emergency Operations Center. Yeah. Any other questions for Steve. Okay. Thanks a lot Steve for joining us. Appreciate it. And I guess we're going to be talking about when we come back to some decisions about the budget stuff but obviously we'll bring you back and let you know what we decided about the language that you're talking about inserting into the budget bill. You sent us that language. Did you send us that language. Yes. Yeah. It's on our website now I just didn't see it. Yeah. There might have been an email from Vince actually there might have been an email from Vincent Lucy. Oh there was was is that where the language is. I think that's where the chat box and it was emailed to us. Right. You can chat. Click on the link and find it. Okay. I think I decided that I wanted Gail to send it out because I wasn't sure everybody would open Vince's email. Good strategy. There could be the legislative filters might have snagged it. Filter may have shut it down. That's right. Thank you everybody. Thanks a lot. Thanks to appreciate it. And committee members. Jeanette's not going to be able to join us. I don't know exactly what it is, but something to do with noise down her way. I don't know whether the hamsters are being too noisy or whatever it's taking to get her back online, but she's not going to be able to rejoin us again. So after this, we'll just sign off for today. But clearly we have to give some thought to the human rights commission budget issue and to the regional equity justice committee panels. And then we'll have a budget commission budget talk. And this thing about the BSCA language that they're proposing that we insert into the budget. So bring those things up next week. So. The way to talk Brian. In the chat box, we've been asked to attend. A meeting on Tuesday from 11 to one. With the house go box committee. I think you and I will have an issue. Unfortunately with that Anthony, because with agriculture, I'll have a Senate meeting at the same time. Yeah. I got the same with the topic is. No. It also includes Senate judiciary. I think it's social equity and racial equity issues. Is that right? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The subject. I don't know. Well, if it's judiciary also might be something along those lines. Yeah. Gail, would you be kind enough to email and Sarah couple of hands us and find out what the subject is. And. Let us know. And let us know. Maybe if Brian and I can't make it because we are taking up some stuff in agriculture. That's kind of important to us next week. Senate economic development is flat out. Yeah. Yeah. I guess we're in the grinding our way to the finish line on act to 50. Yeah. The editorial today was great that op-ed piece by and static. Before we sign off, I also want to just. It's about law enforcement. Pardon. Janette's just sent in a chat. It said it's about law enforcement at the meeting next week. Well. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Gail and Jeanette, if, if you're, if Jeanette's agreeable, I think that, that we'd love to ask for a change in the time. Because the Senate meetings are all meeting until. I'm going to wait. I'm going to wait in here for just a minute. This is a, this meeting. I don't know why we're being invited to this. I already told them that. We are an afternoon committee. So our morning committee people cannot come. So we're going to have a separate meeting. We're going to have a separate meeting. Which is the excessive use of force. And that I will, I am trying to get a separate meeting on one 24. The meeting on that meeting is more judiciary. It really isn't gov ops at all. Maxine grad sent me a note that said that it was more. A judiciary meeting. And then we'll try and have a separate one on one 24. And then we'll try and have a separate meeting. And then we'll try and have a separate one on one 24. And then we'll try and have a separate one on one 24. Do we have a meeting on Tuesday set for Tuesday? Yeah. It's Tuesday at one. And we're going to continue the. Budget discussion. Okay. We don't. EMS. And. Right. Is there. Is there a reason we shifted back from what one 30 to one. Yeah. So we could get out earlier. Okay. So. I have half an hour of, of time to actually get things accomplished. During your avocado toast. Okay. We'll just do it later in the afternoon. Okay. So I'm away next week. You're going to be joined by Mike Ferrant and maybe Peggy on Friday. I do not have an agenda for next week. Past Tuesday. So. I guess anything that comes up. I think I will try and put together, but if it's any later, I guess it will have to go to my front. Yeah. Okay. We'll get something back from the house on those three bills. Okay. Okay. Yeah. Beautiful. Have a good weekend, everybody.