 And so we're going to start with Jim. It was in and out. There you are. Jim, can you walk us through the section of the draft language of what the recommendations the house sent to us? Sure. Would you prefer to start with the bill language or the letter you received? Does the bill language reflect the letter? It does. Then let's do the bill language. Okay. So let me pull this up. If I could show the screen. There it is. Right over there. Okay, committee, I have to make you go away. So holler if you want to speak. Okay, can you see this? Yep. That's a bit too big. Let me get this. Okay, this is only a 35 page bill. So for the record, Jim Daimler, let's console, we're going through draft 3.12. I'm sure it's 1, 2, but 3.12 of this draft committee bill. I'll take you to the changes. I'll start with the ELL pieces. So I'll come back to the beginning to go through the rest. So the first recommendation that came from. San education was to add a weight for ELL students. So in the waiting section, which is coming up. You'll see that. There's language now. The first step is for the secretary to identify students who are ELL. And then the second step is to apply the weight. And the page is not moving as you're speaking. Oh, I had that problem before. Let me stop sharing and refresh. I'm not sure what's going on. Okay. And I am going to try and print this out so I can. So it's backups. Do you see it moving now? Yes. Yes. Yeah. Okay, I'm sorry. So we are on. Page 10 of the bill. And we're adding a weight for ELL students. And the languages here says the secretary shall next supply a weight for ELL peoples. Each ELL people included in long-term membership shall receive additional weight being amount of 2.49. That's the weight part. Okay. And then there's a grant part too. So coming up to. Here it is. Okay. So you have a new sections being added in section seven 2016. 4013. First it defines ELL students who are English language large for whom English is not their primary language. And then it defines ELL services. Means instructional and support personnel and services that are required under the Equal Education Affairs Act. For ELL students and their families, which shall include licensed teachers, paraprofessionals, translators and cultural liaisons, high quality instructional materials such as books and digital resources, family support and education with assistance from cultural liaisons to speak the students native language and community outreach education and engagement. And then section B is what's required to be offered. This is each school district shall provide ELL services as just defined budget sufficient resources to a combination of state and federal categorical aid and local education spending to provide ELL services. And then section B refers on ELL services annually to the agency of education through the financial reporting system is required by the agency and report on educational outcomes of ELL students as required by the agency. And then section is run the agency support and quality assurance. So says the agency of education shall provide guidance and program support to all school districts with ELL students as required under federal law, including professional development for instructors and support personnel. Information on best practices and without language and development standards and prescribed collect and analyze financial student outcome data from school districts to ensure that districts are provide high quality ELL services and expanding sufficient resources to provide these services. And then D goes into categorical aid so it says in addition to the ELL weight under section 410 which we just went through the school district that has as determined annually on October 1 of the year. 1 to 5 ELL students enrolled shall receive state aid of 25,000 for that school year, or 6 to 25 ELL students enrolled shall receive state aid of $50,000 for that school year. And then ESD appropriation section says annually these are simply so include as appropriation for statewide education spending and appropriations provide aid to school districts for ELL services under this section. And then next is the payment section so I'm before number one of each year the church or shall withdraw from the education fund based on one of the commissioner of finance and management and so forth to each school district a amount owed under this section. So that incorporates the recommendation of education. Okay, committee questions. Yeah, okay, maybe you can take. Let's hear the question then we'll decide we can take it down. Yeah, I'm just, I think I know the answer but and so now it's an embarrassing question because it's a significant change but when we're describing the weights, Jim, their first apply grade level weights. Next apply weights for people from economically disadvantaged. Is there any impact maybe this is a Brad James question but is there any impact of the order of those determinations. I don't believe so I think the grade weights might need to go first for everything else that it could be in any order. When I was drafting I didn't have in mind that the order made it made, I did not have in mind that the order made a difference. That's kind of what I was hoping. Okay, thanks. We can double check that with Brad. I'm sure. Yes. Do you know, Senator Hardy. Yeah. So, it used to matter because some of the weights were multiplicative and some of them were additive grade and the poverty weights were multiplicative so they did the multiplication first, and then added on top of that. So, now that they're all additive. It doesn't matter as much, but I think that traditionally the grade weights have been applied first because those used to be multiplicative. And those are the ones that more or less every single district has because most almost every district has middle and high school there are some just elementary districts but. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Maybe. Committee, that was the big, the big square box we've been waiting for is that what the committee would like that okay. That's hoping we could just stick it in. Yeah, the. Sure days draft, there was, or the last draft we were looking at, I think I'm trying to find it here, where we talk about the need to have sort of an ongoing look at the weights. Yeah, that's the advisory board will get to that. Okay, good. Thank you. I'm waiting for all my last of my 35 pages to print out so I can start marking it up. Oh, that's your printer I thought it was a train going by. Almost done. I hope. Okay, Jim, maybe we can go back. I have to put paper in again. To one, and we can start just walking through and see where we're in agreement. Perfect timing I now have my copy. So I can mark it up. No, I don't. I have five more pages to go I'm out of paper give me a minute. Okay. Let's start walking through and if I'm lucky. I won't have anything to mark on the first page. Okay, we're on page one. Page one this time the statement of. Bill. Yes, I'm sorry, Julia had her hand up so I just wanted to give. I don't know if you want to see people. I can see people because I moved you all. Let me see if I can. I don't see Julia. I don't see Julia. Julia. Most people out. Well, I don't see Julia. But Julia, if you've got your hand up. You have a. Thank you, Adam chair. Julia Rick, I would join fiscal office for the record. I just wanted to follow up to Senator Pearson's question as well as Senator Hardy's response and just also add in that. I just wanted to make sure that you have a good understanding of the draft that I have in front of me. There's also the. The sparsity and school. Small school weights. So while it doesn't necessarily matter. Mathematically, as Senator Hardy mentioned, when the weights are applied, that's sort of an if then situation. So first you look to see if the, if the school is sparsely. So that's where we put the weight. And then the small school weight applied. If that makes sense. Yes. So let's. We're on page one here. Let's go down. What do we, this is under age six. So we added to support school food programs. So there are still six, 16 positions in this draft, but they've been rearranged a bit. They've been rearranged. They've been rearranged in the section, but now you have one person to support. School food programs and the development of the universal income declaration form. You have three people. To provide financial. Financial and day support to the agency. And the education fund advisory committee. And you have, as before. To. Staff to support EL. Okay. So. I'm going to focus on the change. Is that we are. The whole bill. So I think we really need to kind of walk. Through the bill and just, you know, we can do the 2000 foot. Kind of view. Just to make sure that everybody is comfortable with what's in there. So, okay. Do you want me to review findings in detail? Or do you want to just have those. All right. This is redoing it. So we'll just let it go. And just committee read through the findings, see if there's anything there. Righam state. All right. This kind of background, of course, how we got here. So it's talking about our constitutional requirement to provide. Sustainable equality of education opportunity of Vermont. And. Text, but the importance of this and changing economy. And then. See talks about students come to school with different learning needs that to be addressed. And then going to the history of some of the background acts. So once you make three. And then going into the report that came out of that from Tammy Colby saying that their weights were outdated. And then in the last session that created the task force. And their report. So that's probably the findings. The goals are here. There are five goals. The big goal is to fulfill Vermont's constitutional mandate to ensure that all students receive substantial equality of educational opportunity throughout the state. And that specifically is designed to increase educational equity on real this, but improve educational outcomes. Approve transparency. And enhance educational and financial accountability. And prove oversight of the K through 12 system. So those are the five goals broadly. Then we go into. Changes in the determination of weighted membership. So first, we're making some changes to the definition of long term membership. So just to remind the committee of the way you come up with, with equalized peoples. If you start with your average daily membership, which is just an enrollment count for the current year. And you average that with a prior year enrollment count. And then you apply the equalization ratio and you come up with equalized peoples. So this is the. Second step. So after ADM, then you do lunch from membership. And it's. Create an exception. Usually it's just the two year average of ADM, but there's a small wrinkle that Brad uses. To do the two year average of small school grants, small school weights. He uses the past two years as opposed to the current year in the past year. So there's a slight. Language change there to account for that. Methodology. And then section four changes. What is the poverty ratio? Which is just the two year average of ADM, but there's a small wrinkle that Brad uses to do the two year average of small school grants. So that's the poverty ratio. Which is no longer relevant. It changes that to a definition of people from an economically deprived background on one line nine. And that is a people who. Is eligible for free or reduced product lunch. Under that federal laws. Okay. So that's there. And then we have the universal income declaration form. And this states the intention. Of the general assembly. That the determination of whether a student is from. And economic not. Economically sorry to pry background. Be changed from. eligibility for free or reduced price school meals. To a measurement determined by. The general assembly. Not lower than a hundred and eighty-five percent of current year. Federal poverty level. Importantly with the collective from a universal income declaration form. Missions that the form is used by other states. It reduces stigma. And the agency scheme that can be in working group. On before October one. And then we have. 222. Including some stakeholders. To develop in your form. To be ready for the 2324 school year. Okay, so. This. When you first started reading. But other states, I thought this was a standardized form, but this is a form. That. The agency of education. Will put together specifically for Vermont. And it will be sent to schools and schools will send it home. With children or mail it. Or it's up to them. I don't think I know the details yet. How it will be distributed. But before any of that happens. The general assembly has to set. On the top of section five. The general assembly. The general assembly. Is basically. The general assembly, eligibility, meals. Measurement determined by the general assembly. So. We will have to do that next year based. On what. And how will that get submitted to the general assembly. Should we say the. So this was just language that is establishing intent, I believe. So the measurement that is used in the form would be the same as the measurement that's used for free and reduced lunch, which is 185% of the federal poverty level. But if it's confusing, we can certainly take that out. We have meals to a measurement determined by the general assembly. Yeah, and I think that the intent there is that it could be a different we could set it at 200% of the poverty level, for example, but this would be saying it couldn't be lower than 185%. Probably would be good to set a number. I just don't want us getting back and having the school sent out all these forms and waiting for bill to make it through the entire legislative process, you know, saying 185 or 200. So if we just say in this bill, it shall be, then the general assembly will have voted, and when the schools start moving they'll know what they're moving with. Does that do we want to stick with the 185 to start with or up at committee. Yes. I guess this section caught my eye in similar but slightly different reason. I think the Senate AG had a lot of testimony when we were working on universal meals about the need for this form and AOE and and hunger free Vermont, it was broadly agreed this is the right way to go. So what I see here is is a direction to get people who can figure out the details together and do that and an expression of intention and one of the questions is that that I suppose it's implied is they would figure out if it's 185 or 187 or 200 or 100% of poverty, but I guess I would hope that we would make it more explicit that we will shift once that work is done we will shift and and Jim that's not expressed here that I see and baked into that would be us deciding the working group figure out 185 but am I right that there's not an actual replacement it's an expression of intent and setting up the scheme to replace it but not automatic. Well, the end here talks about a shell, giving the working group for implementation for the 2324 school year. That's more directive. Well, then what if we what if we in section four say, you know, until if we phase that out, once this form is available that that that would make sense to me doesn't answer the chairs question about 185 but, but it at least makes it in concert with those two sections. The form can go out. We just can't calculate the data in the form. Until we set the rate. Right. So, and but I would feel more comfortable if rather than just say well there's all these interested people out there and they're working on setting the rate. There's some committee in the legislature, and it would probably be the committee on education in discussion with all interested parties would recommend a number or so because this just would say who's who is responsible for coming back to the general assembly and saying this is what the rate should be. If, if I may, that I think that for logistical and mathematical purposes, frankly, we need to start with 185%. Because that's how the weights have been calculated right now if we change it to even 187% or 190% or 200%. We would have to recalculate the weights and that would set that set everything back again. So my recommendation is as I think what Senator Pearson was saying about tying section five and using that income form back to section, section for the 4001 paragraph eight Jim, and that that section that part of the line 17 through eight through 19 where it says to use the school lunch saying once the income form is developed, we would be using that instead of the school lunch. So that would tie that no bow. And then the second thing would be, instead of having this language that says as determined by the General Assembly, just get rid of that. Free and reduce meals measurement, not lower than 185% of the current year federal poverty level, which would would stay keep the weights consistent. Then if we wanted to consider in the future, changing that we could add that to one of the things that is recommended when the rates, when the weights are recalibrated or recalculated. So that it could be part of that process. But what it says is not lower than does that mean some schools might calculated it. What I'm trying to see is, who are we assigning the responsibility to set that rate. We would just set it here and saying not lower than 185% but not lower than doesn't set it. It gives a range. Right. Okay, you're fair. And we would just say that that the income form. I guess we just say 185% at this point and then give the put in the calculate recalculation of the weights the ability to change it in the future if it's necessary. Yes. Okay, that works. Yeah, I agree on a level playing field so in here we're just going to say, take out as determined by the general assembly, and just say it's 185% the general assembly can always change it. And that that may all the weights. Yeah, everything is equal in that. Okay. Okay, so it's just eligible for free and reduce meals. Yeah, we've got to reword that it's real free reduce meals. We do the universal income declaration is that how we're calculating free and reduce meals. Yes. And that's one of the nice things about this form is it could be used for both purposes. Okay, but I think we need to make that clear that we're going to start out with the present calculations. That's those universal, and we're not going to get all of them so we say a majority of the free and reduce lunch. I mean, I think to me that the form, the mandate here is not that every single person bring it back but presumably the working group would also be engaged in how to get a successful return rate. So we got a working group. Well it's a we plus interested whoever's right. Yes, it's a working group, including school staff and hunger and nutrition experts. Okay. Yeah, okay. Jim, do we give you enough to clean that up. Yep. Okay. All right. We're going to keep moving. Okay. So we are now in section six. And this is the big part here where we're changing the weights. So this is the amendment to 4010. Submission wave membership. It's a step by step process it's kind of like a recipe. So the first step is I'm before the first of December during each school year. The secretary shall determine the average daily membership. And again that's just a student enrollment count. So this is the school district for the current year. These two nations are this separately. Resident pupils and pre-K resident pupils and K through grade five. Resident pupils and grade six through eight. And resident pupils in grade nine through 12. And then again, by the same, same timing. The secretary will identify. Resident pupils from economically deprived backgrounds. And then. Next. Same day, the secretary will identify EL students. Okay. When he's determining 4018. That's using that either free reduced lunch or the universal income declaration. Right. Correct. Yeah. However, that will be. Yeah. Yeah. And then four is. Listing out school districts that have low population densities. I'm measured by the number of persons per square mile. And. And that's broken up by districts that have fewer than 36 persons per square mile. And this was to have 306 to 54. And this was to have 55 to 100. And that day will be based in the most recent U.S. Census data as provided by the format sensor for geographic information. And then. The secretary. By the same date needs to. This school districts that have one more school is to have. Small school enrollment. So. I was to your moment of fewer than 100 enrolled pupils. Or hundreds of 250 enrolled pupils. And that's by school and not by district. And then this has a little bit of a funky definition rather than using long-term enrollment to two year. ADM average. This is a. Two year average of the previous two years. And this is how Brad does it. So it's a little bit of an exception to the count here, but with the same purpose. So that was the. The second step, the third step. So the second step here is to determine like to membership, which is simply taking the, the average current enrollment. And these categories are averaging with the previous year. So that will be happening and be. And then the third thing is to add the weights. So this says the secretary shall determine the weighted long-term membership. So that is a negative point. So one, the six are shall first apply the grade level weights. So that is a negative point four, five, four for pre-K. And then the positive point three six for great six to eight. And positive point three nine for great nine to 12. And then the negative point three is the five backgrounds at 1. 3. And then next to the wait for ELL. People's, which is a weight of 2. 4 and 9. And then the wait for. Low population, density school districts. It's 0.1 5. Where the number of persons per square mile is 35 or fewer. Where it's 35, 36 or more, but fewer than 56. And 0.7 where it's. 56 or more, but fewer than 101. And lastly, the secretary applies to wait for small schools. So it's conditional. So if the number of persons per square mile. In a school district is 55 or fewer. And the school district has. Average enrollment, a few of the 100 pupils. Then we see an additional way amount of 0. 0.2 1. And that's only for the students in the small school. And if they have 100. Or more, but fewer than 251 pupils, then they get additional 0.7 for each pupil in this small school. And then six, this says that the school districts with long-term membership shall equal long-term membership. As the average of two years. Plus the accumulation of the weights. Assembly secretary, so the whole thing accumulates under, under subdivision six. Then we've taken out a text, which is the old text about how it's going to work. So those are struck out. The whole time list. Which is a 3.5% decline is still here. And though later in the bill, it is suspended for the transitional period. And. It's the same. And then we have a language about updating updates to the weighing factors. And it says it's the intention. Of the joint assembly to consider whether and how to update the weighing factors under subsection C of this section. Should I say. Not less than that these are mistakes, not less than every five years. And if they are updated, the implementation date for the update weights be delayed by a year. In order to provide school districts with time to prepare their budgets. So that's the case to the weighing factors made through recalibration, recalculation, adding or eliminating the combination of these actions. Then we're amending the very same section we just amended, but a future date. So this isn't committed until. 2028. What it's doing is after the transition period. We're amending a three year average of the equalized people count. Rather than just the current year. So it's smoothing out the count going forward. And then we have this provision about perspective and conditionally appeals. And this is if I'm before July 1, 2027, so five years out. These are some ways that revised the weighing factors to put changes in cost factors from, from which weights are derived after receiving a recommendation of the education from the browser and committee committee to do, to do so. Then you're repealing the weights all together. And then you're repealing the, the, the section 6A, which is the, the one that talks about using a three year equalized people average. So this is, this is designed to force the legislature to take some action within five years, either update them or, or repeal this provision here. Can we talk about that mentor. Yes. So maybe I'd ask Senator Hardy. I'm all for motivating the legislature. To get it's self into gear, but, but this does seem. Seems fairly intense. Can you just, I mean, we, we set it up for, talk to me about, about the, the, the logic if you could. Sure. And I, Jim and I talked about this quite a bit to try to figure out how to create a mechanism that sort of forces the legislature to take action because we can't bind a future legislature. But one of the reasons that we sort of got into this situation where the weights were really out of date is cause we didn't do anything with them for a long time, except for one weight to be fair to Brad James. We did change the grade level weight a few times at his recommendation, but the other ones we didn't. And so this would, the, the, the report authors recommended that the weights be recalculated or recalibrated every five years. And so this would force the first recalibration cause they were done. In 20. Essentially we're putting them into place now. So this would be in five years. So it would force them to either recalculate them or recalibrate them or get rid of this sunset. I'm saying, oh, we don't need to do it. And it would. Forced the legislature to listen to the advice of this new education fund advisory commission, which is supposed to recommend the recalibration or recalculation of the weights. So that's why it's in there. I mean, obviously you can always repeal over appeal. And just ignore it. And that's the other. Possibility. We couldn't figure out another way to sort of force the action of the legislature. There's the intense language. But that doesn't quite do it. So. What about the phase in. Any concern that that, I mean, I guess. This does seem a little extreme to me because they can just, you know, if they want to ignore it, it's, it's pretty easy. There are baked in interests who will. Make it harder to ignore. Because we're setting up the evaluation. So I, to me, this is not. You know, in some ways it's no big deal one way or another, but it's not. Lock tight as we would think, but the five year thing, I guess would, had you considered starting this in 10 years, starting to have a fine, you know, because we've got a phase in, then we're quickly getting a reevaluation when, and it's actually just two years, right? Yeah. Well, one of the problems is that the weights originally, you know, were calculated based on data from 2010 to 20. 2018, I think. And so they already actually are out of date. And we recalculated them last fall. But that's a sort of more minor process. Then a whole recalibration. And so we're already, we're already, we're already, we're already, we're already, we're already, we're already recalibration. And so we're already kind of in the place where we should be fully redoing them. And so, you know, I think it's sort of, if we wait even longer, it's going to, they're going to get older and older is sort of my feeling. I, I, and we will have, there is new data, things have changed already since the, the, the weights were created to begin with. And so. If we don't have a mechanism to recalibrate, calibrate them, it's, they're going to get out of their art. They already will be out of date. All right. Thank you. A similar thing. I believe with used to be the tax property tax rate. The yield. I'm looking at Sandra McDonald, but I believe if the legislature fails to set. A yield. And I wait, when it was the tax rate, if we didn't set the tax rate, it reverted to the original dollar 10. Am I correct in that, Senator McDonald? You were correct about that. I couldn't answer the same question. With the yields. But if we don't act, it goes back to what the original. Yield was and we've never, we've never gotten to a state tax rate of a dollar 10. So it automatically up the taxes. If we failed to act. Yeah. And I think there's some. You may be very well. I'll be correct. I cannot vouch for it. That's my. That's on me, not on you. No, she's, there is a provision related to the yield that I think, if we don't change the yield every year, it goes back to the 2010 yield, I believe, or something like that. Yeah. So it's a similar provision about the yield that, that's a really dramatic thing that happens if we don't act. So there's precedent for this, even though it seems extreme. It's making us take a painful decision, which may or may not negatively impact some of our constituents. Right. And there, the reason that, that. We left in the three year rolling average for the equalized pupil count. Right now we don't have a three year rolling average. We left in the three year rolling average. So when there is recalculations or recalibrations, they automatically phase in without having to go back to zero and, and refaze them in. Because the, the, the three year average sort of. Levels out the phase in of new weights. This is a five year rolling because the change is so drastic. Hopefully changes in the future won't be as drastic and the three year rolling will be sufficient. If the population changes, it, it could be. Sure. Yeah. And then you could change it again in the future, but. Okay. So we're on section six B. Am I right, Jim? Yep. And that sets dates. Okay. What are we repealing? You're appealing. The whole waiting system. Oh, that's the section where we repeal it. All right. Okay. There were into section seven. Yep. Which we've gone through. That's the EOL provision that we went through earlier. Do you want to touch on that again? Or should we. I think we can remember that long. Okay. Okay. Now we're into a different topic, which is the merger support. So this is rid of the small school grants. And keeps in though. The merger support grants for different districts that either voluntarily or were involuntarily merged. And that language is down here. So if you're voluntarily formed, you get your merger support grant. If you are involuntarily formed, you get a merger support grant. And they go away. Really only if the small school closes. So, but they don't get the grant. If they get the weight. So it's either the grant or the weight. Not both. Okay. So they get the grant or the weight. Correct. All right. And then we have just. I'm sorry. And I'm not objecting to that, but. I thought we were described. It had been described that. Everyone gets the grant that you get. That the smaller, the school is a smaller population get the grant and the weight. Am I, am I just misremembering that? Or have we changed. Yeah, absolutely. They're confusing the ELL stuff with the merger support. So this is about districts that have merged under act 46. So. They can't get the ELL or sorry. Now I'm doing it. They can't get the merger support grant and the small schools weight. If they qualify for the small schools weight, they don't get the grant. And they get the grant only if they merged. I had eggs for lunch. And I still have some on my face. Thank you. All right. So section nine is merely conforming change to get rid of the references for school support. Section 10 is again, a conforming conforming change to get responsible support. Section 11 is transition. So first is a is around the, the three fiscal years, the first three fiscal years of implementation, the equalize people to be a five year average. And then. And the fourth year. It'll be a three. Four year average. And then in the last year will be a three year average. And then that will continue thereafter as well. After your average. So this is, we saw that laid out in a grant the other and a draft graph the other day. Okay. And this is our transition plan. Okay. Have. And this is where we thought it might. Cost money. So. Is Julia still with us? I can't see people. Julia, are you still here? Don't hear her. So we'll have to get a fiscal note on this. Okay. Okay. Just to see if it is. Are you talking about the, the world, the phase in of the. Yeah. This transition plan is where we thought we. Might. Actually, because the idea is the more we give the less they raise in taxes. But. Depending on how we transitioned it. We just would need a fiscal note as to what kind of impact that could have on the. Grand list for the. Ed fund. Right. It wouldn't happen until the. Following fiscal year. So none of this would. Just a fiscal note. Just to be sure. Okay. Unless there's other questions. Okay. So section 12 deals with transition. As well. So this is suspending the excess spending penalty. For this. The transitional years, the five years. And also suspending the whole. Homeless provision. 3.5% homeless. For that same five year. Period. Okay. Okay. So. Any additional fiscal notes on any of this. Madam chair, I think this is excited about the. Excess spending threshold is the other body. So I'll ask joint fiscal to take a look at it. Hi, madam chair. I'm sorry. I briefly had a, had a phone call. I had to attend to. With regards to a fiscal note, but I'm not sure if it's a fiscal note. I'm not sure if it's a fiscal note at this point. Because the bill is, is still being ironed out, but we are following it closely and I'm, I'm, I'm working on some analysis and happy to provide analysis. That would be good. We're looking at section 11 and 12, which is the transition. Rolling average and the. I don't know. I'm not sure if we're going to be able to do the, the excess spending, but any thoughts you can give us. So predictions on that would be helpful. Yeah. Yeah. I'm happy to look into that. I guess the. The challenge, the challenge that. That we're having at the moment in terms of the modeling is just all of these moving pieces and. All of the. All of the details and all of the considerations. And the, the data that we're working with, but to the extent that we can prepare a fiscal note, I'm of course more than happy to do so. And also happy to come in and talk to the committee. About what some of these transition costs may look like, although there are a number of assumptions that we're working with. So it's. Yeah, I think we understand we've got a hundred moving parts. And it's going to come down to what the people at the local level vote eventually. But just any red flags that you see something that. Could have, you know, major impacts on the Ed fund. That kind of thing. Yeah, definitely. I'm happy to do that. And we'll get back to you as soon as I can. Okay. That's good. But it has to be. By the end of. You got two weeks. Yeah. Yeah. My crossover. Yeah. And the other body. So anything that. We miss. It will also go from here to a prop. So. They're obviously. They will look at it. Interested in fiscal. Yeah. Oh, this will go to a probes. Yeah, there's positions in here. There's, there's. Uh, AAP. Today, manager. If we could, it would be good. All right. Let's keep going. Maybe we can do that. I haven't gotten new red flags on my paper yet. Okay. I'm sorry, sir. Yeah. Okay. is a requirement for the Vermont Center for Geographic Information to assist AOE in determining the number of persons per square mile. And then we come to evaluation and reporting. So I'll read through the suspect here. So it says on before December 15, 2029, the state auditor shall submit to the house to various committees including you. A performance audit conducted under generally accepted government auditing standards that identifies the successes and failures of the implementation of this act including weather and the extent to which each of the acts five goals under section two of this act have been met. If a goal has not been met, the reason is why the recommendation is to achieve that goal and the physical impact of the act including the cost of implementation. And then it says on before December 15, 2024, the auditor AOE and the new committee shall jointly agree to the statement of work for the audit including how to measure whether the acts five goals have been met and submit the statement of work to you. So you have a chance to review it. And then it goes on to say that the audit should be carried out by the state auditor or a contracted designee, but has to be someone who would be independent. And then it says that we'll cover the period beginning on July 1, 2024 and ending on June 30, 2028. So that's the entire five year implementation period. And therefore after that's over, they have a year and a half to do their artwork. This is the audit, so taking into account such metrics as the auditor, the agency and the committee jointly determine appropriate which shall include a number of things that the party went through earlier. So I won't repeat this all, but a number of metrics here are listed. And then we move on to a different topic which is the new committee. So should I pause here? Okay, committee, thoughts on this section? It's okay. I definitely have a question. But I'm glad to see Sarah Brock because my question's for him. So I'll let him go first. Okay. Okay, Senator Brock, you have joined us. I can't see you. Yeah, well, the issue in all of this is we're doing all kinds of stuff and we're spending all kinds of money and we're making all kinds of changes. And the real question is what we're doing working. And I am concerned about how long this is going to take. But realistically, the auditor can't audit something that hasn't been done. And so you have to have something done and you have to have an agreement as to between the parties as to what is done and what is it that ought to be measured. And I guess I'm satisfied in the arrangement that of the parties that are involved in this, particularly where it's done out in the open. And so any of us who have disagreements about the methodology will certainly have a chance to speak up. One of the things though that might be useful as we look at the various things that are going to be reported on in terms of, and they're listed here in the bill, it would be great if it were clear that those things would be available to the public within a reasonable period of time after being calculated on an ongoing basis. That way, those of us who are armchair auditors can be looking at what's happening as it's happening and raise red flags before 2031 or whenever it is that the final report will be done. And that's what I would recommend that we add something that these particular items will also be publicly released on an annual basis or as reasonable or as quickly as possible after their collection and completion. Okay, I'm looking at the list. I said to Hardy, did this come up? You know, I think most of these are reported. Yeah, so the things that are on this list, all of them are publicly reported right now and measured. They're, most of them are available on the agency of education's website, except for obviously the academic extracurricular and support services across school districts. That would be some data that would have to be collected I mean, that's available at an individual district level. I'm not sure that's collected on a statewide level at this point, but everything else is, I believe, and is available either from the agency of education. Some of them are the TOEFL exam, I believe it's a federal exam, but the agency of education has those scores. The Youth Risk Behavior Survey is on the Department of Health's website and is publicly available. So all of these things already are available. And that's one of the reasons I chose them is since they're not new measures. Could we add, or any other, this is being set up by a committee, right? An auditing. The specific metrics would be recommended by those three parties. Yeah, I'm trying, I've thought, or any other measure that that might be valuable. Yes, I think we could add that if it's not already in. Is that in there already, Jim, or? I couldn't hear the question. I'm sorry, there are a number of people speaking. Could we add, or any other measure the parties think would be relevant? Yes, that's here now. So on page 26, let me go back there. Okay, I'm on 27, all right. So 18 to 20, the Auditor General Counselor, such measures as the Auditor, AOE, and committee jointly determine appropriate, which shall include. Okay, well, how about include, but not limited to? That's always. I want to make sure that if they go through that and say, and start talking to school boards and say, well, I'm concerned about the kid and we've got more than a few that need so much help that we have succeeded. If we keep that kid in school, we have succeeded. Maybe that'll show up in standardized tests, but I just want to give some flexibility in there for these, I suppose they have it, but. Well, first of all, you're actually saying point where we draft for lease includes always means, it's not exclusive, you can always do more. Okay, it does mean, but not limited to. Yeah, yeah, it does. Yeah. Okay, that's good then. Well, the question that I raised Madam Chair was whether or not we should explicitly state that the metrics that are going to be used for this evaluation by the auditor over time as they are available on an annual basis shall be made available to the public. In other words, so that somebody who is following this can actually look and see what's happening in each of these areas. If the material is in fact being collected now, that shouldn't be a burden. Yeah, it is being collected. That's why the committee chose them. You go try to find it. So who would be, we charge with public. I would say that the agency of education would be the responsible party for ensuring that that gets done. Could we say that the education agency of education shall post? It's already posted on their website. They have a website with data. You can go and get all of this on the website. So I, I mean, we can certainly say it, but I think it's already there. I mean, I went and looked at all of this when I was coming up with this list to make sure that it was already collected because I didn't want to over burden the agency. I didn't want to... That's my point. If it's no burden, that shouldn't be a problem to say so. But if you don't say so, it's already on the website. It may not be there tomorrow or the year after or the year after that. So I think it's easy enough to say that the agency of education shall publish the standards on their website. Shall, yeah. Shall publish this list annually on their website. Is it published annually? I feel like the risk assessment one might be every other year. Yeah, the Youth Risk Behavior Survey is a Department of Health thing and it's every other year. And it also takes them, once they do the survey, it takes a year to get the data out there. So, you know, there's a lag because of getting data sorted through and cleaned and all that. I think just shall report it on their website, which would prevent them, or shall report updated versions on their website. Regularly reported. Yes, there you go. That's fine, that's fine. Okay. So we're through page 27. Well, sorry, I'm here, but... We're not through 27. We're real close. I got to check my agendas. Oh, we got to get enough time left to do cannabis. So keep moving. I wouldn't want to interrupt people from doing cannabis. No, I didn't think so. 2020, so I guess we're charging the auditor, has to do this, has to work with folks, the agency and the committee to do this. And then, but is that, then, is there somewhere where it then happens again? Or is this just a one-time thing? That is a really good question. It is a one-time thing. It is a one-time thing. We could make it at every five-year thing or something like that. I think that would, or recommend a regular audits after this. This is a pretty heavy lift. So maybe not this full thing every five years, but a smaller version. I wouldn't recommend making it a regular thing because this is a one-time thing because it's dealing with a new program and it's dealing with the analysis of something that's brand new. This may not be the same standard and detail that you would use to audit an ongoing program. And so I'd be a little bit hesitant to just simply put it on an automatic repeat. But I think that we got plenty of time to deal with it. We don't have to deal with that today. Okay. We may want to change the weights. We've got years to do it. No, that's fine. And then the audit is to be conducted under the standards. I'm looking now for that language, whatever. You hear them all the time for it. Yeah, it's generally accepted. Generally accepted. Coming on to regarding standards, Gagas. And I guess I don't think this is a big deal, but I'd be curious what you think, Sarah Brock. Page 26, we make it clear who the auditor may not contract with to do it. Now, I understand, I think we're sort of saying you can't go to the very people that we've depended on to design this new system and have them evaluate it. I'm sure they would say it's doing great. No, they wouldn't. They have integrity, but that's the risk. But I'm not aware of... I guess it's almost not worth the question, but wouldn't the standards that the auditor applies to anything already preclude that? And I'm just kind of curious it jumped out to me. In theory, it would, yes. It would. Realistically, they are likely going to go to an auditing firm, a firm that is in the business of doing audits as opposed to the kinds of folks that we have in the design process of this program. This is an auditor's job, someone who knows what generally accepted government auditing standards are and produces a report accordingly under those standards. So the issue of independent may be superfluous, but we wanted to make it clear that this is something that is in fact independent. And that was the only message there. Okay. But does this preclude whoever's doing the audit from talking to the very people that helped design it? Cause that... No, no, not at all. Not at all. I'd expect that they would. Yeah, I would hope so too. Okay. Thank you, ma'am, Chair. Okay. Who's paying for the audit? That's so much fun. That's a good question. I mean, we could ask them to tell us how much it's gonna cost. Cause it doesn't happen for quite a few years. So it doesn't happen until 2028. So we certainly don't have to budget. Just what I'm knowing about audits, it won't be cheap. Cause this isn't just looking at the books. This is looking at student performance. This is looking at, did we switch all this money around and the kids aren't doing any better than they did 10 years ago? So it's... Well, until the three groups get together and define the scope of work and what the audit consists of, you can't estimate a cost now and take two, but by any means. I just want to make sure, yeah. And I'd be very hesitant to say the funds would come out of the Ed fund because by 2028, the Ed fund may be in a very different position. So, okay. All right. We can keep going. Okay. You want to be advisory committee? Yeah, we're in the advisory committee on page 28. So section A, creative advisory committee and membership has not changed. So commission of taxes or in section of education or designate and then five members of the public appointed by different parties or with different people. All with expertise in financing. I really think we have that many people in Vermont with expertise in Ed fund financing. I mean, what is expertise? And is Senator McDonald an expert in Ed fund financing or it sounds good, but are we thinking of an accountant? Are we thinking of a school board member? What was the task force? What kind of person was the task force thinking of? I think what we were hoping is people that have had more ongoing ability to engage in education finance conversations than your average legislator who is trying to do eight million bills at the same time or keep track of everything. So it could be a school board member. Certainly there are school board members who are very well versed in education finance. It could be former legislators who have worked on education finance. It could be professors or academics who do it. Accountants or people who have financial expertise. So I think it's a fair question about how many people have deep expertise in our particularly super complex system, but there certainly are people who have more expertise than the average legislator in sort of looking deeply at the education fund. I guess it's in the eyes of the beholder or in the eyes of the appointer, I suppose to define expertise as well. Yeah, okay. Well, when I was testifying as an expert witness, it was usually defined as someone from more than 50 miles away who has a dark suit. Well, this is Vermont. I guess we could find 15 people with dark suits. Okay, let's keep going. The membership. Madam Chair. Yes. Madam Chair. You might be an expert, but I don't know if you have a dark suit, Senator. If I hadn't learned, I probably wouldn't wear it. We have people, whether it's the School Boards Association or the Superintendent's Association, perhaps the most important recent development and expertise on this was the committee that was assembled and has worked in the last several weeks. They have brought more legislators into being knowledgeable about stuff, those of us that were around 20 years ago have been gradually forgetting. So I don't think we do a lot of good by creating simply a number of additional, another additional committee, but this last group has created a freshman class that's gonna go on to of knowledgeable people that's gonna be doing us good for the next several years, that for sure. Nothing precludes legislators being appointed. Thank you, Senator. So we will see who's here to be appointed. All right, are we going? We're down to powers and duties. We are. So the powers and duties are to make recommendations each year by January 15th to you regarding updating the weighing factors which may include recalibration, recalculation, adding or limiting weights or any combination of these actions as necessary, changes to or the addition of new or the elimination of existing categorical aid as necessary, the property dollar equivalent yield, the income dollar equivalent yield, non homestead property tax rate, excess spending threshold, and the amount of the stabilization reserve. So those are annual recommendations about two of them are as necessary. We showed the, right? And then, but then it says two, the committee shall recommend updated weights and categorical aid at least every five years which may include a recommendation not to make changes where appropriate. Okay, I guess my question is with the section above that because they can recommend whatever they want but the property debt value equivalent, the income dollar, those are all just arithmetical calculations depending on the budgets. So, and that's, you know, we have to set the yield rate but we can't set it wherever we want. It is set based on school spending, you know, reserves, and I'm not sure that having a committee have to come together once a year. To me, these are, this is housekeeping stuff. You know, it's just saying, this is what it is. And so that's what the equivalent yield is. This is what the schools are spending. I would rather, if we're looking at them as having expertise, maybe recommending any change in the new or eliminating existing. Yeah, that is good. Categorical aid is not automatically set but the other ones, perhaps any changes they might recommend to do the way we calculate Senator McDonald's. Madam Chair, the system we have now has many parts that self-regulate and that's one of the things that is repeated over and over again as being why it's lasted so long. Right now, I am reminded that one of the things that does not self-regulate is that we have to the percentage of Vermonters who pay based on their household income on their local education taxes. And I have asked four or five times this year that we be told what the current percentage of Vermonters pay based on their household income. We've heard numbers like from the 60s to the high 70s. And I think Senator Hardy gave us a number last week which I think she refined and came back with yet a more precise number. But we still don't have that number because that's the sort of thing that's difficult to calculate if, and we haven't calculated it and acted upon it in over a decade or so. So if this committee is trying to solve that sort of a problem, maybe it's useful, but it would seem to me that we should be able to ask for that number on any given year and haven't given to us within days. And we've been in this session now for the last, well, for the last two years and we haven't gotten that number from anybody yet. Well, Senator. That's a long way of saying, Madam Chair, what's that number? Fine. I think Senator Hardy gave you the number that was given to the committee. If you would like a direct number, have you directly sent an email to Joint Fiscal and asked for that number? I've asked the committee repeatedly to ask for that number. Why don't you send an email over and ask for that number? But while we're doing this, you're right. I mean, the property equivalent, the income equivalent, that all gets set, but it gets set on a, you know, it's a calculation unless I'm mistaken. But the, a better thing might be, we have adjusted the income level upwards. We have adjusted the home value. We have not adjusted the home values upward. And this is all given the present taxing structure. But given the inflation in, so we might want to put those recommendations in there, the home value, the income level, the any adjustments to those things which do change over time. And we could even ask for a recommendation in updating. I don't know what we call the stupid circuit breaker, but it went from 35,000 to 47 where you get both state and local taxes capped. And it was put in place in the early 80s. Yes. And it's been adjusted a couple of months. So, Madam Chair, I'm gonna, I think Faith is listening and I'm gonna ask her to ask JFO for that number on behalf of the committee. And maybe she said that over this afternoon, but the point I was trying to make is if we, we as a finance committee need to take a look at that dollar figure which doesn't change automatically, periodically and change it when we think it ought to be changed. And creating a committee to do that seems kind of cumbersome. We are the ones that ought to be making those recommendations today after consulting with superintendent school boards or whatever. Okay, so this is asking them, I think it would be more helpful if we have a group of experts in ed finance that we're paying to come together. I don't know how often I'll let a probe steal with that rather than ask them to talk about things that are presently just calculated. There's no policy in there. It's calculated to recommend to us any changes in the appropriate income levels to, you know, to get the same equity as it, you know, people are making more income. And we raised it to 90,000, right? And we've raised the home value and we've put a slope down. So I think those are things that would be helpful to get a recommendation as to when they should be upgraded or downgraded. And if the market crashes and everything goes down the tubes, we might need to downgrade all of that. So Senator Hardy, we just massacred your massacre. No, no, it's totally fine. So the CD and E, those three things I think, those were, so I heard you loud and clear that and others about the December one letter. So we took that out. So this committee would no longer do that. It would stay the same as currently tax would do that. So I think those three things CD and E are sort of leftovers from when the vision was that this group would do that December one letter. So I agree that those make sense to take out. And I'd like your suggestion about having this group do sort of bigger picture stuff. And the other thing I would sort of add to the list is our previous conversation on the poverty percentage. That we, you know, the whole conversation we had earlier about 185%. Yes, okay. And then we wanted to change that at any point that they could make the recommendation, the income levels for the income tax portion. I think this is good. And if you have a list, I can work with Jim to put it in there when we do another. Okay, we'll get. I'm sure Julia can get us a list as to what the official terms are. And we can get those in. I hear the bells are ringing, which means our next set of witnesses on cannabis are showing up. And we have not, I'm only through 29 pages. What else have we got to go through here? I can take you through it quickly. Okay, let's go through this quickly. I'll be quiet and we'll, I think we've been through the heavy lift stuff, but. Yeah, I agree. So I did put in the appropriation for here and therefore had to put some number of meetings in per year up to. So I put eight, I'm not sure what the right number is, but some years might be. You can just skip over that because appropriations. Okay. Okay, good. They're going to deal with it. Six to 16 and change. It's a collaboration between AOE and JFO. MOU on the, the models and the information needs to update waiting factors, hosting the models on the websites and on the websites. Hosting the models, updating them as necessary and then recommending the recovery rates. So that is unchanged. Staffing is changed. So again, we have six positions, two for EOL, one for school food programs and to help develop and maintain the new Universal Hospital Income Decoration Forum and three for financial and data analysis for AOE and the committee. And then we've got only technical and conforming changes and these are very technical. So just taking out a few of the excess spending categories that are being used in numerous years. So one's about a merger of the school districts with 20 or fewer students. One is doing enrollment, which is not funded through school, different budgets anyway. Technical change here just equalize pupils, clarify what year it's for. Technical change on the school board. Again, just making the correct cross-reference and then the effective dates, which grown for a long time. We don't need to change those, huh? Yeah, yeah. Okay. That's it. This is one bill we have. All right, committee, are we comfortable with this? We can get a final draft and vote it out when we get back and get it over with a little leeway for probes. Does this work? So we'll let Jim get a clean draft and we'll be ready to vote that out when we get back, all right? You get back meeting Tuesday or meeting today? Tuesday, I think. That might be a little much to ask.