 Thank you very much for being here today, really appreciate it. My name is Dan Barlow. I am the Public Policy Manager with Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility. And I'm here today with the CEOs and founders of some of Vermont's most iconic companies because there is a looming threat to our economy. As a state, we have not taken the necessary steps to address this crisis. And failure means the end of Vermont as a green state. Climate change has been called the greatest crisis of our times. It has also been called the greatest wealth-generating opportunity of a generation. Moving off of imported fossil fuels, investing in clean energy, efficiency, and electric vehicle infrastructure will jump-start the Vermont economy and restore our standing as a dynamic, innovative green state. The business leaders with me here today together employ thousands of Vermonters, generate hundreds of millions of dollars in annual revenue, and have facilities and stores across the state. They are worried about our failure to fight climate change and optimistic about the future of the state if we do rise to the challenge. And I would urge the legislature and the governor to listen to what they have to say. My name is Jen Kimick. I am the co-owner of the Alchemist. There we go. We know that a healthy economy relies on a healthy environment. And Vermont's economy is in trouble. In 2011, my business was devastated by the effects of tropical storm Irene. Today, nearly eight years later, climate change is still the biggest threat to our business. The three main ingredients in the beer we make, hops, malt, and clean water are all threatened by severe climate change. The hops we get from the Pacific Northwest and the malt we get from our family farm in the U.K. are both susceptible to flooding and drought. And we've seen firsthand what heavy rains do to our quality of water here in Vermont. Whether we are talking about craft beer, maple products, farming, skiing, or snowmobiling, the long-term sustainability of our businesses and our economy are at risk. My name is Bram Klepner. I'm CEO of Danforth Pewter. And Vermont has recognized the suffering that global warming is already imposing on Vermonters and recognized the threat that global warming poses to our safety, to our health, to our security, and to our prosperity. We have also recognized that we have already done a great deal of damage to our planet and we have already inflicted a great deal of suffering on the people of the future. However, the order of magnitude of that suffering has not yet been determined. And if we take action now, we can reduce the suffering that the world's children will endure over the course of their lifetimes and over the course of their children's lifetimes and their children's children's lifetimes. The more immediate the action and the more massive the action, the more we reduce the future suffering and the future damage to the planet. Vermont has also recognized that while Vermont acting alone cannot make a meaningful difference to the global environment, we are not acting alone. There are individuals and families and churches and neighborhoods and communities and municipalities and companies and states and countries around the world who are taking action today. Recognizing all this, Vermont has set meaningful goals to reduce our impact on the global environment. But as you can see, we are falling the orange line being our goals, the black line being our carbon emissions. We are falling far short and we are going in the wrong direction. The Boston Globe called the gap between what we had hoped for and what we are achieving an embarrassment. And we have an opportunity to move from being embarrassed by our lack of results to being proud of the results that we're delivering. Good afternoon. My name is Matthew McCarthy and I have the privilege of being the CEO of Ben & Jerry's. And from our proud and humble roots here in Vermont, we're now a global business. And I think there's a powerful message in there to be an agricultural-based business that touches millions of folks around the world. And so many of the crops that we depend on, from the feed in our dairy to the vanilla in our ice cream and our chocolate, is being threatened very directly today based on what's happening over their climate. And secondly, I'd say that our brand, Ben & Jerry's, is inseparable from the state of Vermont. So everywhere I go, everywhere my team goes, people look to our brand as a part of Vermont. Representing the people, the land, and the brand of Vermont. And so in order for Vermont to stay strong and a leader in environmental space, it's not just for Vermont. It's for all of our businesses that extend well beyond. And quite frankly, the health of our Ben & Jerry's business depends not only on the health of the agriculture that we depend on to make our ice cream, but it depends very directly on how people around the world see our brand. And we need to take action now so that Vermont continues to be seen as a leader and not a lagger, particularly around climate change. And we can do it. I would just really urge and call on the legislators here today to take some action, meaningful steps in place that we can measure and feel proud about our progress to combat climate change and put Vermont very much at the front and leading edge of doing the right thing for Vermont and for the climate. Good afternoon. I'm Joey Bergstein. I'm the CEO of Seven Generation. We are a proud Vermont-based company. We've been in Vermont for over 30 years now. And at the core of our business has been about making this world a healthier, more sustainable, more equitable place for the next seven generations. Climate is a real issue that we deal with in our business day in and day out. As a company, we have put in place an internal tax on the carbon that we emit, and we use that to be able to invest back against infrastructure to lower our carbon footprint over time so that we can have a much more sustainable business and a much lower impact on the world around us. But companies can't do that alone. We need policy change and legislation to be able to take action now. You can't live a healthy life on a sick planet, and we're only seeing us going backwards on this front. It's very clear that Vermont wants to hit its goals that have been set to 2030 and 2050. Action is imperative today. We're beyond the place where we can rely on hope. In fact, if anything, hope that will get changed actually gets in the way of making the progress that we need. What we really need is for policy action today to make that change on climate. Thank you. Hello. My name is Ted Castle, and I'm the founder and CEO of Rhino Foods. We're in Burlington, Vermont. We employ 220 people. So I'm really here to encourage the legislators to think that carbon pricing will provide the money that they can invest in clean energy. And what interests me, because we have a lot of employees that are living more paycheck to paycheck, is these incentives will actually help for monitors that need it the most to move away from fossil fuels. And I'll get off the script a little bit to say, when I was on the United Way board for 13 years, and we started to see the epidemic of heroin and opiate addiction. And we started to really get this in front of people's faces. In 2014, Governor Shumlin devoted his entire address to this issue. And I think since then we've seen some real progress. So I encourage legislators to think of this this way with climate change. It's actually a lot more complicated, a lot more different, a lot different. It's a different challenge, and in some ways much more difficult. So the longer you wait, the longer you're going to be in this situation. As you see, since 2014 till 2018, we're finally starting to make some difference in the state on opiate and heroin. And if you don't start sooner than later, the climate you won't be able to catch up. So thank you very much. I'm Mark Kern, founder of Black River Produce. For 40 years, a major part of my job was to monitor and purchase our fuel usage, which was substantial with two warehouses and a fleet of 50 trucks. We had a 10,000 gallon fuel tank. We would buy fuel by the tanker load. Sometimes I would lock in for six months. But I definitely was aware of the price of fuel and how it fluctuated. I noticed how, you know, when fuel prices were high, people were smart about their usage. When fuel prices were low, they weren't so smart about their usage. In the 90s, fuel prices were generally pretty low. It was the Clinton administration. Gas was selling dollar-gallon retail. And I used to think this is a perfect time to enact a fuel tax. There wasn't talk about climate change back then, but people were talking about pollution, peak oil, and a looming deficit. And I have to think that a substantial fuel tax at that time would have gone a long way to resolve some of those problems. Six years ago, we retrofitted our warehouse to switch from oil to pellets manufactured at Vermont Renewable Pellet Company in West Windsor, Vermont, less than 10 miles from my warehouse. That worked great for two years. And after that, fuel prices came back down. It was actually cheaper for me to heat with imported oil than the pellets 10 miles away. That plan is now shuttered. You know, so I'm not an economist, but I have to think, you know, looking back 20 years, it would have been smart to install that fuel tax. Let's not 20 years from now look back and think we didn't have the political will to install a carbon tax right now. I want to thank all our business owners and CEOs who spoke today. I'm also really glad to have some supportive legislators with us today as well as Lieutenant Governor David Zuckerman. And now I'd like to introduce Representative Sarah Koblin-Hanzes to briefly talk about some of the things that the legislature is doing this year on climate. Thank you, Dan, and a big thank you to all the CEOs who are here with us today. The leadership that your companies are providing in terms of showing the way forward on climate action that looks at people, the planet and profits is highly valuable for us. And it's an important part of the dialogue as we continue to look at different climate solutions. I'm Sarah Koblin-Hanzes. I am one of the vice chairs of the Climate Solutions Caucus. Ms. Sullivan here is the chair on the House side for the Climate Solutions Caucus and Representative Molly Burke is a member of the Climate Solutions Caucus. We are a group that is 80 members and growing. And we are struggling every day to put forward climate solutions that can help Vermont or save money, help protect our environment, and strengthen our economy. And we are doing that every day, every week we meet. We are taking in some of the great ideas and examples brought to us from some of our business leaders. And we will continue to push for, call for, scream for, cry for, cheer for bold climate action, including investing in weatherization. Vermonters can heat their homes more efficiently, investing in EV incentives to help more Vermonters get away from their gas guzzling vehicles and onto more efficient electric vehicles. But there's so much more that we need to do. And so I thank you for being part of this event today and for also keeping after us day after day, week after week to call for more bold climate action. Happy to take any questions the reporters have. Is there a proposed carbon tax bill this session? There will be. Yeah, I think we expect three bills right now on carbon pricing specifically. In addition, I know other committees are looking at various other climate action proposals including incentives for electric vehicle infrastructure and increasing funding for low-income weatherization. Anything else? Okay, thank you very much. And if I could ask the CEOs maybe to hang out for a few minutes and we can do some photos.