 We're looking at 297, and as you heard on the floor, Senator Lyons sent it to us. Do you want to set it up here? Sure. Sent it to us pending. So we will have it officially tomorrow, but what I'd like to do is make sure we get it done today so that we can just vote on it tomorrow. So what I'm going to do is we did a walkthrough just built before, and the health and welfare has made some changes. They've essentially turned it into a study committee. And what I'd like to do is start, I think, with Senator Racine. Well, yeah, I'd like to hear. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. All right. So welcome. Thank you. Did you ever serve on this committee? No, I did not. No? Okay, well, you are. Right now, but I served with you down the hall. Now the welfare, yes. Yes, thank you. So thank you. I'll try to be very quick, because I know you're pressed for time. Madam Chair and members of the committee, for the record, Doug Racine, former of this, that, but more relevantly, the former Secretary of the Agency of Human Services. I have concerns about the bill as introduced, and I want to address that bill to help your consideration of the amendment that's been proposed by Health and Welfare Committee. Just to be clear, the way I look at this bill is it's creating a new agency for healthcare, which is really built around Medicaid funding. And I see it as an opportunity to have a discussion about how best to administer the Agency of Human Services, but I think the bill as introduced goes in the wrong direction. It leaves, it pretty much separates the current agency into a Medicaid agency and a general fund agency. And I think the best work that the agency can do to serve the Vermonters that's charged with serving is to actually blend those funds and to coordinate the various programs funded by Medicaid, together with those that are primarily funded by a general fund. I understand the purpose of the bill and I understand that healthcare has gotten a lot more complicated in recent years. And administratively, it is more complex than it used to be, and healthcare is certainly more complex than it used to be, and the state has taken a much larger role than it has. But I also want to say that healthcare has gotten more complex and complicated in other ways as well. I think we've come to understand in recent years issues such as trauma and the effect of trauma in those earliest years on children can affect healthcare outcomes as adults. I think we've come to understand what I've been called the social determinants of health. In other words, somebody's housing, somebody's childcare has an impact on the health of children and the health of families. So in many ways, just as Medicaid has become more complex, so has healthcare. For those of you who are here for 124, we're not there yet. We're doing 297 first, and you're welcome to stay. I don't mean that you shouldn't stay, but I'm just letting you know that we're not at 124 yet. We're doing 297, Senator Racine is telling us his experiences and his recommendations on this bill. So I'm sorry about that. You seem to have the door down there. I'm familiar with the problem, I've been here a few years. Trying to say as effective programs, effective in terms of the outcomes for the individuals being served by whatever department of the Agency of Human Services, the effectiveness depends on breaking down silos. And to bring the programs together where it's appropriate and build programming around individuals, children and families. Some of the best efforts in recent years from the legislature and from the Agency itself have involved more integration of services. This bill, I think, would make those sorts of, that sort of integration much more difficult if not impossible. If I could point to two quick examples. One is Huygenspoke. Huygenspoke brought Medicaid money together with other funds in the Agency to provide better outcomes for those who are addicted. I think it's been very successful. It was a national model. The owners have gone across the country and spoken about it. It required different departments in the Agency to work together. The funding was complicated, but it becomes an accounting problem more than it is a program problem. The other one is initiative that came out as legislature in the last several years. And that's trauma and understanding the effects of trauma. The response of the legislature was to create a new position, a coordinator, in the Secretary's office to coordinate across the Agency and also outside the Agency. The way the bill, the underlying bill, envisions things, you'd have the, I don't know where the coordinator of trauma would live, which secretary that person would report to, but try to understand that the bill separates corrections and DCF out from the other current AHS departments. The victims of trauma are most often found in corrections, particularly the women who are incarcerated, and in DCF, families that are really struggling. So you'd have the victims of trauma over here in one Agency and you'd end up with the services that they needed over in another Agency. I think the coordination is best served by having one Secretary, a Secretary's office that can coordinate those sorts of programs. There are others that have required, that have been important to the legislature, have been important to governors, that have required more cooperation and integration, reducing recidivism. Somebody coming out of prison needs mental health services, substance abuse services, housing, job training, and all of that. Those are services offered elsewhere in the Agency of Human Services, not just the Department of Corrections. Department of Corrections doesn't have much to do with reducing recidivism in the end. It's being done outside and after the fact. Home visiting, home visiting is best coordinated between the Department for Children and Families, which has the social workers and the Department of Health, which has the public health nurses. They often end up visiting the same families. That's been better coordinated over the years because the Secretary's office has made sure that those programs work together. And finally, results-based accountability, which has been discussed over and over and over again over the years here in the legislature, really- And supported. And supported. And those answers. Absolutely. And it's absolutely the right thing to do. You probably know True Rest League, who's been running around here talking about this for years. That was one of my better hires. I stole her from Governor Shumlin's office and she came in to do RBA. But the issue with RBA is that you're looking at population outcome. Whether somebody is in better shape, that has better outcomes than they would have otherwise. The whole theory of RBA and accountability is that different departments and different stakeholders in the community partners work together for a better outcome. That requires greater integration. So we finally serve an ancillary issue and not to muddy the waters here too much. But the Accountable Care Organization, One Care, has become one over time. And I think the vision is that they will have Medicaid monies. The contracts for mental health, disability services would be running through One Care. Now, we can debate that. I have my opinions, but that isn't the place for it. But the point is you're going to see a lot of disruption on the Agency of Human Services around Medicaid as a result of One Care. You can say, you can argue whether it's a good thing or a bad thing, but that's definitely the trend that we're heading in right now. The SASH program, which some of you may be familiar with, was one of those programs, which is now partly a One Care program. Services for elderly will be split in this bill. Long-term care will be in one place and independent living will be in another. Same clients. So instead of breaking down silos and integrating services, the bill actually creates two separate silos. So in terms of the amendment that was sent over by Health and Welfare, I think what it says is go slow. Be careful. Any sort of reorganization is highly disruptive. The first thing I was asked by people in the Agency when I arrived as Secretary is, please do not reorganize this Agency again. It's really, it's very disruptive. And I discovered that rearranging the boxes is not the solution to the problems there. It's reorganizing the way it's managed and the culture of the Agency and really encouraging the kind of integration which has proven successful. If you go with the amended version, that's recommended by Health and Welfare, I hope you'll flesh out the process. It's right now, it just says the Commissioner of Secretaries and other stakeholders. I think it would be helpful to be very clear that stakeholders need to be involved and maybe even identify some of those who should be involved because the impacts of this on various constituencies. I think of elderly services, for example, splitting those apart would be very significant for that affected population. So I would encourage if it's gonna be a process and a study that it include people in the community and be a very open public transparent process and it doesn't become just people in the Agency talking to themselves. We have to answer questions, but in the interest of time, I'll shut up. It's so one way that we've appreciated the full integration of all these departments and the de-siloing is in, and I don't know under whose watch it was put in, but the go-to people, the agency created go-to people that have been very helpful for legislators who oversee, who are just the go-to people for everything in the Agency of Human Services because so many of our constituents needs touch on three or four departments and to go to each one of them was really a pain and it took us to be able to go to one person like Lynn Boyle who could integrate and pull together the meeting that meant all of those corrections and DCF and, you know, that is for me as a legislator, both in the House and the Senate, has been one of the most helpful things we've done for our constituent service ability and being able to be impactful in helping pull the cog out of the wheel. That to me is a good example of what you're talking about. When was that actually, was that under your watch? No, it started much earlier than that. I think it may have gone back to Governor Dean's time. Oh, really? Because I remember it early on in my time. I might be mistaken on that, but it was, it had been large at one point. There was one in every regional office. There are 12 regional offices. When I arrived, there were seven as a result of budget cuts that had occurred. Yes, that was a problem. That was a tough time, but they worked for the Secretary. They're technically on the org chart as part of the Secretary's office. And for me, they were my eyes and ears. I would meet with them on a regular basis, and they're the ones who would coordinate the services. And one of the models we were looking at when I left the agency was to give them more authority, and that's been an ongoing issue about them. But their authority has been very helpful. They are able to accomplish an awful lot to coordinate around the complex cases. Lynn was terrific. I really loved having her around. But I'll tell you one quick story, I have a poll of that. When I visited one of the offices as Secretary, I had a, somebody who was working in Economic Services, part of DCF, explained to me that she had one family that had eight different case managers. They didn't meet together as a team. Sometimes they'd talk to each other. Sometimes they wouldn't. Some of them were case managers representing different departments of AHS. Sometimes they included people in our community partners, mental health agencies, disability services, housing and all of that, but they weren't coordinated. So people were being told one thing by one case manager and a contradictory thing by another case manager. And this Economic Services worker said, we have doomed that family to fail. And if we really want to be successful with families, we need to build programs not for bureaucratic convenience and not with an organizational chart in the boxes, but build those services around families. And one thing I learned as Secretary by talking to colleagues around the country is that's what's most effective. That's what really works. You are able to do the prevention. You're able to do the two-generational approach to work with the whole family. You're able to include all the people who are involved with that family in regular meetings with the clients to build a plan to make, and somebody takes a leave, but to be more effective. One of the things that I learned before I even took the job, I went and spoke with Tom Davis, who was Secretary, the second secretary of the agency, Dean Davis's son. And he said, think of the agency as the Agency of Human Development, rather the Agency of Human Services, because what you're trying to do, and what we're trying to do as a state and a government, is to help people develop their full potential, whatever that may be, to get them the help they need to be more successful in life and to live more productive lives and happier lives. He said services are means to an end, just like Medicaid is a means to an end. But keep in mind the end that you're trying to achieve, which is better outcomes for Vermonters. I tend to agree about the silos, but I think that we will always have some silos. I mean, for example, housing and transportation are two of the major issues around human services, and they are, they're not in here. So the goal is, we'll always have silos, but the goal is to stop silo thinking. Right. That is the culture. So we need to stop the silo thinking as opposed to we'll always have silos. You're always gonna have separate departments and separate programs, and that's part of an organizational chart. Right, it is. The challenge is to make sure they're working well together. Right. And my problem with the underlying bill is it takes half the agency or party agency and moves it to one, two, a new agency and leaves the other in half, the other separate, and the only way they come together is the governor. And I think that's asking a lot for the governor to be able to work out those issues. But I'm glad you mentioned housing because when I arrived in that agency, housing for the clients of the agency was scattered. Mental health folks need transitional housing. People coming out of corrections need transitional housing. DCF folks were reached out. Part of it is to get people housing, usually working with community partners. One of the first things I saw when I walked in was I heard was a dispute in a community in Vermont. Department of Corrections was looking for transitional housing for some of their folks and mental health was looking for transitional housing for people in the mental health system. In that one community, they're actually bidding against each other. They're bidding up the price with one landlord for a limited supply of apartments. What we did then was we brought in a housing coordinator in the secretary's office who coordinate all of those housing programs across the agency so they worked better together and also then worked with Housing and Community Affairs or wherever they are called to coordinate with them. But there was one point within the agency of Human Services, one person who made sure that we were speaking as an agency and not five or six different departments that each had an interest. But no, by your point, your point is still well taken. Any other questions or is there anything? No, thank you. Thank you very much, I appreciate the time and the interest. So, Mr. Secretary Smith, would you like to join us? Sure. I guess I should have, does one always remain a secretary? I know one always remains a governor or a senator, but does one always remain a secretary? No. Should I have called you Mr. Secretary? No. Okay. So I wasn't offended, though. He's always a lieutenant governor. I know one always is a governor or a senator. I don't know, okay. Okay, thank you. How about a rep? I was a rep once, do you call me the Honorable? No, I like the whole thing. I think mine works. That's where I like it. For the record, Madam Chair, Mike Smith, Secretary of the Human Services. By the way, I'm glad to hear about the Field Services Division that you speak of that coordinates. That was one of my proudest sort of things, the breaking together. We brought together 12 of the Field Services Division people, Steve Dale, if you remember back then, was the head of that. That happened 15 years ago when I was the secretary the first time of the agency. Well, they're terrific. I think sadly they funk a number. But they're working hard. They're fabulous. So thank you for the opportunity to testify before your committee on S297. And that is an act relating to the agency of healthcare administration. And I'm trying to keep up with the various versions as you are. That's coming on. I've been sort of preoccupied the last few days on something else. Yeah, you've seen that. I have. I read it before. I just read it before I came in. So I apologize if I don't know all the details of the particular bill. But I understand that the bill before you now is a working group focused on making recommendations to reorganize the agency of human services. So it's a working group to come up with recommendations for a reorganization. I said this in the Senate Committee of Health and Welfare. I was not opposed to the original bill that was introduced. And because I believe that this is a topic that deserves X to be explored. And this may sound different than what I've said in the past because I've been different. I've changed my opinion in the past. I have been opposed to this bill. I've actually, when I was briefly in the media, I actually came out opposing this type of bill. But I really believe this, that if we can find ways to deliver services in a more efficient and effective way for Vermonters, then we should look at it. We shouldn't try not to look at this. And if this is a vehicle to look at that, I'm all in on looking at it. And so as I'm trying to take, I can't believe I'm saying this. I'm trying to be peacemaker between two versions of the bill here. So the things that I would urge you to look at is in trying to reach the original version and the version that came out of the Senate Health and Welfare is let's put a date specific when we're gonna make a decision on this. I said this in the Senate Health and Welfare. Reorg's, I've seen Reorg's go very well. I've seen Reorg's go very badly. And one of the things that you wanna do is make sure you plan it out. So if we're planning for a Reorg and if we're doing recommendations, let's do it in an orderly fashion. And trying to reach a compromise between two versions that I'm seeing here is that if you don't put a date certain, nobody takes it serious. That you say, okay, we're going to do a Reorg of this organization, date certain, based upon recommendations that we will receive from whatever mechanism that you want to approve as a legislature. But I really feel that if we're gonna take this seriously, and I think we should take it seriously, then let's put a date certain that we're gonna implement any recommendations that are gonna come out of this working group as we're talking about it. There are some complications with a Reorg that I think just need time if we're gonna do a Reorg in terms of separating two agencies. And again, I don't wanna say, I actually think it's a good idea to explore this. And there have been things that have changed in the 15 years that I've been in this position previously. First is healthcare. I mean, it used to be 25, 30% of my time. It's 50% of my time now, as opposed to 20, 30% of my time back then. Last few days, it's been 100% of my time. But the issue of the growing complexity of healthcare is something that we need to look at as we're moving forward. The other thing that I think we have to be cognizant about is this is gonna be complicated as we look at it. So cost allocation for Medicaid and how we do it and what we do and if we do it is going to be really complicated in trying to figure out where Medicaid and how it gets split among the various agencies. I guess my bottom line is my goal is to spend the time to really look at this, trying to bring both bills together. The first bill saying do this, the second bill saying study this, trying to bring both bills together in trying to reach a compromise. Put a date certain, study this, put a good implementation plan together once you study it and put a date certain that we will have a decision on implementing those recommendations as we move forward. Again, this new legislation is quite a bit different than the first legislation. I'm not opposed to either one. I would prefer that if we're going to make a decision to move in this decision, let's make an affirmative time that we do it in. Yes. So Mike, this bill doesn't, I think that's anticipating a conclusion to have a date certain for implementation. I think if we're going into this open to really study whether or not it should even happen. I mean, so to me for us at this point, before the start working group gets together to anticipate an implementation date is premature. I see, I mean, Senator, I'll do this. Yeah, I do disagree and I'll tell you why. If you decide not to do anything, the implementation doesn't mean anything, but if you decide to do something, the implementation timeline I think is important to really make people believe that this is serious and where you're going and how you're doing it. So the signal more than almost everything. And it's an important signal, I believe. So I actually liked the first bill better clearly because I'm one of the co-sponsors of it, I think. Did you, can I, we're gonna take about a two and a half minute just break here. Mary, just trot your people in. Let me just point out else. Lines nine and 10 imply that there will be this is about two and a half minutes because we're running out of time. We're doing it in 30 seconds. We just want to thank you very much for your work in getting our bill out of your committee and then voted on the Senate floor and then finally over to the House. You guys are setting the bar really high for the House and we really appreciate that because this legislation is very timely and very important and I have a few buttons here that I'm gonna leave that. For those of you who don't know what this is, this is under 202 years and 15th anniversary. Yeah, that's correct. And then the House's bill is setting up a commission so that it can get started and hopefully get some federal funds and it can go. We should have had cost to go forward. That was presented. You're absolutely, when the National is married, a suggestion that we come in guard to help illustrate what's going on here, the drum up support and so people understand how important this is. So we really do appreciate the time and we won't take any more of it. We want to come in and personally thank all of you for your work on this. Thank you so much. Thank you. And we thank you. Sorry for being too long. No, that'll see you again, I bet. You will definitely be seeing us again. Thank you. Thank you all. Thank you. No problem, okay. Oh yeah, Ethan Al. Yeah, say hi to Easton for a second. I'll take credit for it, they, you know. So, so I clearly prefer the first bill. I think we've passed this out of the Senate before and I think that health care has become so complicated that it really needs to have this split. But- And to be for the record, I did testify in favor of the first bill. So we can always do another strike-off. I mean, we have the bill now. Well, I would not vote for that bill. I'm just saying we could if we wanted to. That is our- Whatever you- We have the bill now. We have the bill now. But, so what you're saying is that if we were to go with the Senate welfare version, health welfare version, that we should put on here some timeline for, because all it says is that they come back in 2021 with a report and recommendations. But it's a little bit like you get a new superintendent at school and he has a new philosophy of education and says we're gonna do this and all the teachers just sit around and say, well, forget about that because there'll be a new superintendent or another board of education in five years and then we'll have another new initiative. So let's just forget about it and not do anything. Madam Chair, I'm in a very unfamiliar territory for me. I'm trying to be peacemaker. That's not usually my role. And I'm just trying to bring the two versions together on this and trying to make some certainty that this will be taken seriously and looked at adequately. So, committee members were, okay. Thank you. Are there any more questions for- Nope. No. Check again. Thank you very much. If you do want to just say a few words. Okay. Oh, these are from the keynote. Yeah, well, we'll do it afterwards. We're, what do you call it, it's the button. Yeah, I'm looking at it. So, are we gonna do with this today? No, no, we're dealing with it. But I hear you say we're gonna try to finish it. Make a decision. I would like us to get to the point where tomorrow we can actually vote on it. Okay. Yeah. Good afternoon. For the record, Steve Howard, I'm the executive director of the VSEA. Madam Chair, I think I would, the two things that come to mind between the two versions of the bill, I think the VSEA would urge that you go slow on this issue, that you take your time to consider the issue. One of the things that I do think the Lieutenant Governor said that I think is really important is in the list of interested parties, we would prefer to be listed specifically among the list of interested parties. Almost all of the problems in state government or as a result of management, not listening to the frontline employees, not bringing the frontline employees in to talk about what really happens on the frontline and whether ideas that are thought of in either the state house, the governor's office or the secretary commissioner's office make any sense at all. So I would urge that the language and the study if you choose to go with the study, include frontline state employees in the ABCP services who can, I think, apply what's happening in the real world to the philosophy of reorganizations. So you're not saying this list is the VSEA, but this list, not individual by name or anything, but I would assume each department has an employee, I don't know what your word would be, but some significant employee who can speak to the other employees in that department. I think it's always safest to have the VSEA have some representation on there so that it's not somebody who's chosen by the management as their preferred employee, but it'd be somebody who can objectively, yeah. Executive director or whatever. Well, it doesn't have to be the executive director, it could be the president or his president of VSEA or his or her designee. That I think is very helpful. Our members, we haven't had an opportunity in this latest version of the bill to fully engage our members on how they feel about this. We did, originally when the Senate did pass the bill a year or two last session, I think it was, our members were not enthusiastic about it. To be honest with you, I don't remember why, but that we will reach out to our members and the agency and talk with them about what concerns they may have. I do think that you're, if you do choose to do the study, you will find that the input of frontline employees will benefit any final decisions that are made. Yeah, I want to say this again, it's not really a question, I just want to get clear. Whether you're talking about adding, it says the Secretary of Human Services, Commissioner of each department, number three would be the VSEA or whether we're talking about individual employees for each department chosen by the VSEA to represent something like that. You can say something like that. Generally it says how many members of the committee or work group you want to have a member or two members chosen by the President of the VSEA. You know, that's usually how it's. I'm going to call the taller, I should be on the side. One, two, three, seven, four, five. It depends on whether you consider like the healthcare board at the department and long-term care and Dale is split up here or so. It'd be seven or eight. Six are former Secretary of Human Services. Six what? Departments. Oh, okay. I didn't even see you come in. I apologize. I don't know that we even, do we need Jen to go through this? This looks pretty simple. It's pretty simple. This is the study, this is what? This is the work, yeah. This is the, okay, thank you. Sorry about that. So I'm going to be here and then go to finance and then I'll check back in to see if there are changes we want for. Okay. One question for her. Yes. So to me, a working group is open and this as my colleague to my left pointed out, it's got a predetermination sort of baked into the creation lines between nine and 10 on the first page. And it says there's created a working group to develop proposals for reorganizing the agency of human services. That's assuming it needs to be or will be reorganized. So I know my chair is probably enthusiastic with that wording, but for those of us who are hopeful that people go in with an open mind and that may not be the conclusion, it does seem that we are determining a conclusion before we unleash this group to actually study and work on it. Well, you could ask her to say whether created working group to develop the proposals to explore proposals or to study proposals. I would feel better about that just because otherwise, you know, just do it. I mean, it's like, otherwise we could just do what our chair is wanting to do, which is do the bail, just do it. So otherwise there's no really no purpose in a working group. So I would, I think Anthony's language is good, something along those lines. We don't have to make a decision on how to make a decision. I would agree with like Senator Clarkson saying, I mean, I don't know why it is, or asking a question, but it's presuming that reorganization is going to be the result. And so it's an odd way to ask the question. It's not really asking the question. It's like we've made a decision. Now we're going to ask for advice on how to implement it. That's the case. And I understand where Secretary Smith is coming from. Build in the implementation date, schedule and all that stuff, because you could see where it's going to land, but my own take on this is I'm not sure it's a good idea. So I would like to learn from the working group and see whether they came back with that recommendation. I guess that's where I am too. I have a feeling that that was a deliberate on the part of the other committee. Leaning in. Yeah, right. And that's okay too? Sure. Well, if we go in this direction, I don't think we even need legislation. I think we just write a letter to the administration and say, trying to get this out. No, I think this would include, I think that our asking would also include things the administration might not include and we can be thinking over who else, the VSEA is an obvious one to include. So I think if we're really wanting to explore and have a more transparent process, this is a better way to do it, to have a working group doing it, because it'll be more transparent and help people can participate. If it just as an executive branch exercise, it won't have any of the public participation or transparency that I think we probably would like to shed some light on or at least be available. Also, if it was in the administration project, then going back to what you said about there's a preconceived outcome, I'm not sure where the administration's preconceived outcome would be personally, but I think you run the risk of having group people come together who have a preconceived outcome. I'm rather curious if you do it this way, you don't have to have a preconceived outcome. Right, exactly. Okay, because I'm not numbered here. Well, it's only slightly. No, only slightly. And with love and affection. I would just do it or not do it, but. Well, I actually, I think this has value. Okay, so we need to then between now and tomorrow if we want to make any changes on here, we have to vote this out tomorrow if we're gonna do this. Because we have two major bills that we have to finish before Friday. So if we wanna make changes on here, we should get that language to Jen as soon as possible. Okay, so since I have no interest in making any of those changes, I'm not gonna submit anything to Jen. So if other committee members have suggestions, please get them to Jen talk. I think we just did. Okay, but you wanted to have a whole bunch of other people on this. I think just, I think the proposals we've had so far would include the BSEA, not just the heads of each department and the other one. And I wouldn't use the word explore instead of develop, which I think Anthony proposed. Okay, so Jennifer Garvey legislative council. So the version that I was ready to find with going with explore two, I have written there's working created a working group to evaluate the organizational structure of the agency of human services and recommend any appropriate modifications. Sounds perfect. That's even better. As far as BSEA, it sounded like there were a couple of different ways that that could work. One being, you know, the president of the BSEA or doesn't need the other being one or more BSEA or one or more AHS employee selected by the BSEA and take on which. I would put three BSEA employees in there appointed by the president. Would have been a president of the BSEA or appointed by the BSEA and membership, I don't know if there's a president. Is that what you are? No, no. Executive director. That's what I thought. Yes. But there is a president? There is a president. Aims. So that's, that would be the language that I would do. So that gives, that would make it a committee of 11 people approximately. And then it has other interested stakeholders which we want to not. No, I think that's important too if there are other interested stakeholders. And that is so vague. But I think that you need to say they need to collaborate with other interested stakeholders because you can't have the membership of the group say other interested stakeholders because who's going to appoint the other interested stakeholders. So they need to work with other interested stakeholders. So we will cut it off at that membership and then say the working group shall, the working group in consultation with interested stakeholders. Yeah. Okay. That sounds like the normal way to have a advisory outside of a committee. Thank you madam chair. And we'll see if JB Jane, I will do an amendment on the floor. Uh-oh. Uh-oh. Wow. Thank you. Thank you and his forearm. Senator Haluzzi is available for drafting. I know. Maybe I'll do the amendment in costumes. And would you propose to, so this would, as it came over to you, change the title to an act relating to reorganizing the agency of human services, would you like it to be less presumptive in the title as well? Yes. An act relating to the organization, the organizational structure of the units. Okay. Thank you. Yeah. This is what happens when we have a floor. At least we did not be amended. No, we're not taking it up again. It's because of all the help. So we're not taking it up again, right? We shouldn't have been amended on the incident. We shouldn't have been taken up. I know she's waiting. I'll have her, I'll have her, I'll have her. Okay. Sometimes being chair doesn't mean anything. Okay. Okay. Let us go quickly to 124. And I'm going to make some changes here on the schedule. Because Shaila, there you are. She's right. You need to leave to talk to that little guy. So I'm going to ask you to come. So I haven't had extra copies of this. There was some confusion and anybody would like a hard copy? Oh, that's my barge, and here's the barge. Oh, there's Shaila, all around the second page. So we're going to just take you out of order. So feel free to comment on any part of this that you would like to make. I really appreciate it. Shaila, let me send it from the health department for the record. Thank you so much. And thank you to the people I just skipped to mine. So I'm going to start on the draft page 24. I'm going to focus primarily on the EMS sections. Yep. So we're going to go on draft 1.2. I'm asking complicated questions already, Senator. Yes. Okay, draft 1.2 and what page? 24. So I'm here also instead of Dan Batesy, who's the person who actually knows what he's talking about, but he has responded to COVID-19. So I have spoken with him and I'm going to provide the feedback that we have. And if you ask me difficult questions, I will get answers, but I probably won't know them at this moment in time. So appreciate the committee considering the changes in terms of licensing around changing the number of years of a license and also changing it to the health department that will really simplify sort of a basic red tape. So we are supportive of that. We're also supportive of removing the credentialing. So that is there on page 25. And I'll just tell you a tiny bit about that. The one thing to note is that we're fine with removing that. There are other entities, federal entities that do require annual credentialing that we can't change. So while we are happy to change our requirements, that on the ground it might still look kind of similar because there are federal rights around that. Actually, they find that. They said they knew they had other ones. Yeah, and that's fine. So yeah, I just wanted to put that out there. So the next big piece is the certificate of need at the Green Mountain Care Board. And the health department did not support this at this point. And the reason for that is... Can I just, I spoke with Susan Varkin this morning. Barrett, I mean, not Varkin. Second Barrett, anything that... And we thought that the point of this was hopefully to get at those for-profit ambulance services who might come in and just do the hospital to hospital and so what we thought made more sense, I talked to her and she, we thought that maybe it would make more sense to say that you can't, like we do with the VNAs, you can't cherry pick that an ambulance service that's set up cannot cherry pick. And they have to, if they're gonna provide ambulance services, they have to provide general ambulance services and take Medicare, Medicaid, private insurers, so that they can't just do that. And we do that with the VNAs. And so we would have to look at some similar language. But then... That would replace the certificate of need. Well, that would replace the certificate of need because that could get pretty complicated and it doesn't really get at what we wanted it to get at. Great, I have no idea where we'll stand on that, but I will get back to you, but that's definitely what that would, if we got rid of that CON, that would make us feel a lot more comfortable. And I can ask about the cherry picking issue. I know that was not the primary concern with the CON process. Right, right, that was why we put that in here. And so Susan suggested that we do that and so Susan suggested that that might be a better way of going. So we'll try and get that language around, I think we have it around the VNAs. So are there other? Why are, I mean, I'm not clear why you'd be against the CON. Sure, so there's a couple of reasons. One, the health department already reviews these applications and so does the district. So we do have an opportunity to modify or deny a license already. And then, and second to that, it is, as this committee knows all too well, a rapidly changing environment right now in terms of EMS services and annual services. And services need to combine, needing to do this, that and the other thing and that creating any more barriers or roadblocks or inflexibility in that system at this moment is not necessarily what we want. Again, it's not about the specific topic that the committee was trying to get at, it sounds like it was just about a process issue. Yeah. Maybe another way to get to that. Yeah, I think that the no-charity thing is a better way of getting at it. Surya Gurdind is very complicated. Green Mountain Care Board would have to go through it and do it. They have the ability to charge back. First of all, there's a huge application fee and then there's a charge back to the ambulance services. And then if Shaila says you need to have two ambulance services combined, is that considered a new one? So they have to go through a CON. It's much too complicated. Just doesn't work as we found out too late. But thank you. And then we're fine with having the resources in the HRAP, that's... Sorry, where are you now? Page 30. 30 and 31. Yep, okay. We're good with that. HRAP? Health Resource Allocation. That calls out for Cabra Ace. HRAP. Oh, HRAP has been around for... No, I know, but I haven't heard it since RAP. Okay, the next one is on page 34. This is about levels of training. So in a previous draft, you guys had option A and option B. You had three levels of training and two levels of training. So at the Health Department, this will require us to create new systems. Right now, we are recommending that if you want to make levels, which we understand that there is some benefit to doing that, that you only go with two, not with three. Doing any of this creating levels is just for awareness going to cause some issues with training staff availability. So we're already short on people. This could potentially cause additional barriers, particularly for those areas that are already having a hard time finding trainers and getting trainers. So our worry is we don't want to make it too complicated. We don't want to make it too onerous. Also, this will take staff time and energy at the department in order to implement, which we are willing to do, but are recommending that we try to start on the simpler end of it. That's interesting. I think we heard that by having the instructor one and the instructor two, that it would create more opportunities and you'd have more potential instructors. So that was not what Dan. Well, that's what the field told us. Pretty sure the field told us that. I can go back and triple check. Yeah. Because you can have people who didn't do the didactic, but did the skills. Exactly. The academic versus the answer. So, okay, anyway, just, okay. I will don't, I will, sorry, I'm out of my depth here. So I will go ask. Okay. Next up is, oh, that was credentialing. Okay, we're gonna talk about that. All right. So next up is the funding bill. This is from the Ridhill draft of page seven. Sorry. 35. The funding bill, this is from the original draft of 742. 742 has changed pretty dramatically in the house. We did work with the house health care committee on their current draft. We are more comfortable with their current draft than we are with this language and would ask the committee, please take a look at that. What that draft does, it is less funding and it is basically a little bit more flexible in terms of how we could use it, but essentially their main concern, I think is your main concern, which is how do we get funding for training to the areas that have not applied for it and are not receiving it? And what is that going to look like? And it's probably going to need to be fairly radically different. That said, we don't want to upset the Albuquart where it's working well in places like Shending County. And so trying to be able to do both those things and we feel that the house health care bill as currently believe it, oh no, it's in appropriations. As in appropriations, it does do that. So we ask that you take a look at that language. And is there, did they put in language or do we need to put in language that the whole application process and getting the money out needs to be streamlined and they did put that in? Yes, and I think the big, one of the things that I want to make sure is communicated is that as the state, we have to follow certain rules when we grant out funding that you all have held to put in place. So regardless of the type of grant, there are things that we have to do. And for some of these smaller agencies, they're just, they just can't or not doing them. And so we're going to have to look at doing it entirely differently, like having the state go out and do them or have some other method because the program has, I just want to reassure you, tried so hard to make it as easy as they possibly can to get the funding. And it's still not easy enough, but we cannot go further without breaking the law. So we need to just change the concept from you apply for money to something else. Well, that's the way they do it at ACCU with the community development funds is there's a community development worker that works with communities to help them with their grant applications. Yeah, that's a cool program. I mean, I do know what you're talking about. Yeah, but it wouldn't be, yeah. It can quite work like that, but we do have some new ideas of how we would have. Good, okay. All right. We need some language on that. Well, we'll get it. We're good. I think that Nolan might even have it for us. Page 38. This is about the fifth level of the Vermont first responder level. So we're opposed to this, not because we don't want more access. We definitely do. So this is not a federal level. So we would, a national level. So we would have to develop our own curriculum and our own testing for this level. These individuals can not be recognized in other places if they want somewhere else to work. This would have serious impact on our staff and our budget in terms of being able to implement it. And it's not clear that this will actually solve the issue of access to us. So we would ask that for now, you not include that level. Maybe this could be something that either the curriculum, you know, is looked at when they look at the curriculum and the advisory council, the curriculum advisory council, sorry, I forgot the name wrong, or some other place, but that right now we're opposed to this and that this would probably need to come back with some sort of fiscal implication. Wow, this is a pretty major part of their proposal. So that would be hard for us. And then we can, I can try to get you fiscal. No for that. Work with us. Is it the number of levels or the levels themselves? So the fact that it's not a national level. So all the other levels are national and we use the national registry. When we rely on curriculum that have been developed. So we would have to come up with all of that ourselves. We have had a position that's been open for a very long time, a trainer position and we have been desperately trying to recruit for that. We do think we're going to fill it soon. But just, what was that? Perception, page 38. 38. But you know, that type of problem, this type of thing would really compound sort of the issue that we're already facing. There might be a way of doing this. We have to find a way to do it. What is, can you tell me the problem that you're trying to solve with this? There are too few first responders out there. Real first responders. People who can go out and stop the bleeding or put on a, just do that very, very first response. And... Stabilizing the seat. Yeah, and we don't think that it's very complicated to setting up a curriculum for them and certifying them. And I would think that between the EMS people and the, and Pat Malone, that it could probably be done pretty quickly. And we heard very clearly from me, from the field, from everybody who testified that that was absolutely a need. And there was... Is there another state that does it? I don't know. There are, there were, in the fire service, there were fire first responders who were at a different level, from what I understand, but at some point. Well, they had them. I don't remember. I don't know if there are these days to do it, but... We can find out. But we can do it anyway. Yeah, but also the key thing here is that they want to create a lower bar to recruit more people and get them in on the ground level. That was a big piece of it too, was getting people in who could do fewer tasks but more people in so that then they could grow their skills. That, I remember, was a big piece of getting people without setting the bar too high. I mean, sort of like, well, unfortunately, we're done with firefighting. We've set such a high bar for entry-level firefighters that they wanted to lower the bar, get more people in who could do less stuff but then grow their skills in. And that's what I recall too, that that was a key piece of this. All right, I will go back and ask Dan for more details on that, but he was very clear with me that that is not, like that's not something that his shop can do right now. But it doesn't need to be him. I think that there are plenty of people out there that can work with the department to do it. He doesn't have to take that on. What we heard from the EMS people and from Pat Malone was that this isn't very complicated and it can be done. So they could probably come up with a curriculum by tomorrow afternoon if they weren't dealing with coronavirus right now. But I mean they, I don't think this is a- So as the licensing agency, if you are making it a licensing level, it will absolutely have to be something that we do in order to- Well yes, but they can, oftentimes we hire consultants or we ask for consultants or we work with other people to help us create whatever it is. It's clearly would have to become out of the Department of Health but it doesn't have to be- So then I would need funding to pay a consultant. No, I'm not saying you should pay consultants. What I'm saying is that the EMS people and Pat Malone talked very clearly about it and they had very definite ideas of how to do this. And probably a two hour meeting with them could create this is my feeling. I don't think that it's something that the department thinks that has to think that it should be doing alone. That it should come from the field and from Pat Malone. I mean, those are your resources. Yeah, so I can go again, I'm not going to go back and ask him again. I can tell you that it's never happened before that somebody had to deliver the whole package of things to us for free that we haven't had to modify or do anything with in order to license a new group of individuals. So that scenario while I understand what you're saying is not normally how any of that would work. But let me ask him again for more details on specifically what it would take and what that would look like for us. Yeah, because I think that according to everything we heard that our emergency management system is not under normal circumstances. They are in crisis in an emergency and we need to solve this. And so we need to think outside of the way. Well, and so I think that for me is helpful to hear what the problem is that we're trying to solve. The problem is the big recruitment tool to be able to bring people in at a lower level of expertise with a few key critical skills and then grow them up through their abilities and through the licensure level. If they want to go, they might want to stay there forever. We need more people just at basic training. I think that's sort of my understanding. All right, next one is the testing. Removing the testing requirement. So sorry, I'm on page 39. Oh, the C little I. C little I, you got it. So we're also opposed to this. We are not opposed to the concept. So we would like to be able to move to this way of doing things. We agree that it would be good to move to a portfolio based assessment. Most of our programs are not necessarily there yet. And so if you take away this option, it could dramatically impact the trainings that are available and that we are able to to have out there. Again, this is something that the department would like to move toward, but we are not ready for it. And if our hands are forced right now, it could have serious implications for the availability of training in the field. We would be happy to have something in there of a report out on any sort of development towards or timeline four or any of those types of things that we can come back and tell you next year, but we ask that you not mandate it. So what if we left it in there and put an effective date of like a year out? I don't know that that will be, we don't know that that will be enough time. Is this another thing where they need to work with Pat Malone more completely to feel comfortable with? It's not a thing that we can just change. So like it is about getting all of the different training programs to a place where they can actually do the portfolio based testing and provide all of that. And again, it would impact those regions that already struggle to do trainings more than it would impact the areas like where Pat teaches into Maine County where it won't be as big of an issue at all. Maybe not even any issue. So it's again, it's an issue of equity and who is ready to do this and who is not and how we can ensure that until everybody is ready to do it, we have another option. So you're using a term that isn't inherent of portfolio based testing. This can we have cycle motor still testing is that the same thing? Well, that's demonstration of those skills. Yeah. Is it okay? Sorry. Yeah. That's kind of a portfolio. It is demonstrating the skills. It's the same thing. Okay, well, let's think about that because maybe we could put an effective date on it. Cause we did hear from small rural areas also that this was good, not just. Right, but they have to pass it. I mean. Right. So like if they don't pass it and we close them, that's not good. No. Of course they have to pass it but they currently have to pass the tests that are there. Right? And the idea is that this is better and more rigorous. No. I don't know about the rigorous, that hurt. I don't think that it was more rigorous at all. But. That they just. I think that it was the thought was that they would be able to show, to demonstrate their skills as opposed to just. Taking a test. Right. And if you leave it as the option which is that you could do either one, right? With the idea that we are trying to move the whole system towards the portfolio and I can call it whatever it is. You have the portfolio based method. Right? Well it's like performance based. And what we're looking at is demonstrating skills as opposed to taking an exam. Absolutely. So to me that's demonstrate demonstrable skills. What I'm saying is our goal is to do that. But if you do it all at once immediately right now it will not be good. What we want to do is move. How long do we need to be able to do that? I don't have a timeline for you right now but I think that asking for a timeline, asking for a report, putting an effective date of a couple years out. Doing something that pushes the issue we're totally supportive of the concept. But right now that would not be a good outcome to have that happen immediately July 1. No. Okay, so but we could leave it there and put an effective date for. If you support the concept we want to help you get to that concept. And the question is, is there money that you need to make this happen by ex-date? Well there's money needed for everything so. Right. I think so I mean it is again it's not just like a programmer but that would come back then to workforce issue within the health department which is if we're doing all of these different things. So you want another level of training with another license level. We don't collect licensing fees so that's just our staff figuring that out and doing that. Those are all things that would impact timeline for all of these different pieces. So you mentioned an option as a way to do it. Whether if, and you keep saying Chittenden County kind of like is the model of where we might all. It's a place where there's more resources. So if there's a place that already could do it could they do it? My understanding is that yes. Okay. So at least it's far like on the road. So you could put in there that for the time at this point it would be an option to do that. And by a date certain it could be everybody would have the ability to do that. And those people who have the option and can do it first could probably help those people who are. I don't know it's just an idea. Yeah. Yeah. That's a great idea. Okay. Did you get that? Suncent review is fine, great. EMS council, education council is fine. I'm on page 43. We talked about that already. Yep. There's a report similar. Hold on, I'm getting to it. 46. Bottom of 46. So we would ask that instead of having this be a report where we have to either monitor or track these things that this be a request that this have a special look from that education council. Here's the reason that we do not currently track or require or regulate somehow the continuing education. And so that would be a whole new system. We get what you're getting at and we wanna support that but maybe having that come through that education council and sort of have that be a conversation there would be a more productive use of resources. Germany got you, actual language. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, that would be helpful. Yeah. I'll do that. I mean, we'll get at the same thing. It'll just be coming. It's gonna come from different places. And it might look a little bit different. But I agree with the concept. Okay. I think that's it. Just make sure that's it. Really, the level of training, the two tiers, two, three tiers and... I'm gonna get back to you on the tiers. The tiers of the educators, I think, I just wanna make sure that I have that correct and explain it in more detail. The CON, it sounds like you've got that and I'm gonna make sure that the concept that you just gave me is good with him. The first responder level, I'm going to pose the problem that you are trying to solve and try to come back with a way to make that more doable. And then removing the testing, you're gonna keep that in there, but change it so that we have a different effective date and or the option piece, which I like the language that you just came up with. And I'm going to get you language on the CE report. Thank you for bearing with me. No, thank you. Thank you for coming here. I hope we got you out of here in time. You did. I really appreciate that as well. Do you know how those little kids are? No. I thought you were upstairs playing all day. I know, wasn't it cute in the so hard mode? They were all sitting there with little sandwiches. Yes. So I walked in and it was just wrapping up the credentialing, so I didn't hear the credentialing. Fine. Oh, yes, sorry, we're fine, thank you. Okay, so committee, I am not sure how best to do this. Should we just stay on the EMS and finish that up? I mean, that makes sense. I feel bad for those people who, like Barbara and Ingrid and who are sitting here, but they love us so much that, actually not at my age, that's fine. Yeah. And Rick got here to pass a long message in the end of the week. Okay, all right, so we will get with you. His was very lovely, thank you. So do you want to do that? Is just continue with the EMS as long as we're doing that. All right, so I think that mainly all starts on, and did you hear, were you in here when we talked about the CON? Yes. Oh, yes, you were, because it's so complicated. Jen, so you want to structure it similar to what it required for. Which, it can't be cherry-cooking, and it's, we do that with the VNAs. If the VNA, if you want to set up a visiting nurse, you have to take everybody, you can't say we'll only take private pay people, or whatever, that I know when Bayata first set up, they thought maybe they were just going to take private pay people, but they can't do that, they have to take, so similar kind of. That the word, T-18, or? I couldn't look for that, too. I don't know that, but it sounds vaguely familiar to me. Okay, I'll ask Jen also. Yeah, I'm sure Jen could. Jen. All right, so does anybody else want to weigh in on the EMS issues? Yes, Nolan, you have to, why don't you present us with that first, so that if anybody wants to weigh in, they would have something to respond to, because they. For the record, Nolan Langwell, the Joint Fiscal Office, the thing I wanted to fly was page 36, and maybe I can work with Betsy on this, but you, starting on page 35, you break down how 50%, 25%, 25%, but then in section B, you say, department rules shall include a requirement that recipients offer their training costs at no or low cost to recipients who attend the services. That just doesn't make sense to me in terms of how, and the problem before you're saying, here's how the money should be spent, and then down here you're saying, and or this, and so it seems to conflict, because right now, my understanding is that the trainees, and maybe this nice C and T here can confirm that about, but the trainees cover a lot of the costs themselves. Right, that's what we want to spend far. But you're saying, the money should go to this, and then down here you're not matching things up, we don't know, so section B would have a completely different cost. So you're creating this rigid 25, 25, 50% goes on this, but then over here you're having a whole new thing that costs this. Do you want it or the other? Does that make sense to me? Okay. I thought that the point of putting that money up there was to cover the cost of the training. So what you're doing is you're putting yourself on the hook to cover costs that cost more than what you're appropriating in the bill. Oh, I see, there. And you're saying this costs at no or low cost, you're saying shall do it. But there's not enough in the fund to do it. So I looked, when I was looking, and you're not specific about are you doing EMTs, are you doing advanced EMTs, is that paramedics? You know, when I looked at this prior, I mean, it was the costs for, when there was a previous language that would cover all costs for everybody, we're looking like 1.1 million dollars for all the different pieces. So you're not clear on that, are you trying to do at low or no costs or just EMTs, the advanced EMTs, the paramedics? Like it's not clear. And so if it's still been ended like that, it could be a lot of money. So what I'm recommending is that you're more specific and or you maybe, and we don't know that the money that you're appropriating would cover those costs. So there seems to be like a conflict there. I also might recommend that, and this probably goes more to maybe the house version, that you don't codify the 25, 25, 50%, because that's tied to a specific appropriation and a specific bill. Maybe you want to have the health department or the EMS advisory committee have more flexibility in where they think the money should go. And I would, so I wouldn't codify it. So you would just have a certain amount that's appropriated for EMS training and online grants, whatever, can I just go to friends here? And I think the house health care committee did a good job kind of balancing the flexibility while saying like, and you have to get it to these communities. So maybe we should just borrow their money. I mean, again, I'm obviously, I like their language on the department, but I think you should take a look at that language because I think it was, it did a good job. So that just says there's an amount, it's flexible in how it gets used. So that will be decided by the... Yeah, I would recommend, don't be so prescriptive. Or if you want, if you're just concerned that the health department isn't gonna do what the EMS providers want, maybe you could have MSAC have some more say in that, I don't know. I think they are referenced. Yeah, so I just, my recommendation. And then is it, they're always specifies that all that money is gonna come from the insurance companies? No. I know that. I was just sitting back, just doing, he's sitting there. I just told him, I just... I just was wondering if he's paying attention. I already whispered in his ear that he was off the hook temporarily. He just see his blood pressure going out of the space, went from white to red from the past. No, elsewhere, so that's okay. Okay, no, and then I understand the way they did it is that at this point, they won't specify that that's where it's coming from and we have time to figure out where a long-term funding source will come from. So those are my suggestions, the 25 to don't be superscripted there and don't be, and I would be cautioning you on the no to low cost, especially when no appropriation matches that. So just take these two sections out, plump in the house language. I'm not saying do that, I'm saying... Well, I'm sorry, pick out which two sections, two in the grade, or two in the grade, or A and B. You can see the starting on line 19. Page 35. On page 35 and going down to page all the way through 36. Because these are remnants of the other originally House 742. If you want, I could talk a little bit about the 742 house bill to give you some sense in it. Other things they have in it? Just... The language around this issue, around the funding? Maybe I will talk about it. No, I'm here, what else are they doing? No, no, I just, I will get, they will come to us over here. That's true, yes. No, I just have a question. Yeah. It's like, are they doing a full response, EMS response to the EMS crisis bill also? No. Okay. This is just a trade still. Good, that is really gonna say, they are doing that, but this is... I'd argue this is very important for a foundation to be able to respond to future crisis. All right. But doesn't do anything to address the current crisis. So that was the piece that said, that was the prescriptive language that kind of, I wanted to flag a little bit. Okay. So that's the things I wanted to talk about. That's it? You know, the other thing I was whispering into Shayla's ear, we were talking before, but she was talking about that capacity for the levels and how... Hey, remind us what page that's on. That was page 38, section 10. Right. When she was talking about how you were saying that, that Malone, I think is the name, one of something, and VD, one compromise might be rather than shall, you require the health department to work with them to explore. No, to set it up. To set it up, explore, do something, but doesn't require them to do something right now, but rather brings everybody together to, so they can have a... Oh, and we'll put a date on there. Yeah, something like that, actually. A fixed date. And if I had the most important thing on this bill, is that there is gonna be a per diem cost of $1,500 for that section two, which was not even a set. You need something to be 600. No, I didn't. Oh, I still bought it. I never said it. Revisionist history. I'm kidding. I like per diems of $1,200. Okay, I get it. 15. So the statutory language on pages 35 and 36 in regard to how the funding is supposed to be split up, yeah, it's set up to relate to the page 45, second 28, that we're all in that operation, so you're just gonna take that out and remove all of the incident, which does not have to be so prescriptive. You could combine them, you can be used for competitive grants, online, just like combine those, like combine one, two, and three, sort of in a big way. That's what my, you know what I'm saying? One, two, and three, I mean, what do you think? Yeah, maybe combine them into like, should be used for the following. So that they don't use it for a new truck. Yeah, so you're saying it can be used for these things, but you're not being prescriptive of how much specifically gets used for each of those things. I mean, that's a reference. Suggestion. Thank you, yeah. Finally make suggestions, I don't know. Passcript, you should rise. No, well, I'll just have her, too. I'm not partisan. We're not particularly, I think these are issues, these are policies. I have very good representation of my district, including Senator Polina, so I'm not gonna run. That's right. He's happy. He's well served. Well served. Does that, did you, did that make sense to you? Yeah. Okay. I will discuss with Nolan. Okay. Now, given that we've made some changes here and some suggestions, does anybody wanna weigh in on the EMS portion of this? Let's get this finished up. Wanna talk to us? Yeah, I can, I can clarify on a few things. Okay. So my name is Adam Huston, I'm the Chief of Glover Ames once, and also the EMS District Chair for EMS District Two, which is Northeast Kingdom Orleans, Essex County, and the Northern Nests is coming. Worked tirelessly over the last two years on the legislative recommendations that we submitted back in January, and those were statewide, at Amelon Services, Small to Large, all coming up with agreements on what do we need, recruitment and retention is a huge one. Just going through this thing a little bit beforehand, and answering a few questions with the certificate of need, it's kind of redundant, because right now, if an Amelon Service wants to establish new establishment, they have to A, apply to the Department of Health, but also to the EMS District Board, and the EMS District Board makes recommendations. So if there's somebody coming in that's trying to encroach or set up next door, I like the cherry pick talk, but it's kind of already there to where the Board can make recommendation. The unfortunate part is, that's all it is is a recommendation. And then the Department of Health has the final say on it. So that's kind of already there, so the certificate of need, I think would be just a redundant on top of it that just adds more paperwork to the districts and the services. So you just support the Department's position on that? On getting rid of the certificate of need, yes. And I think that we could, if we put in the cherry picking language, then it holds the Department to that, so there isn't a discretion to, I mean, you can make a recommendation, but then it does tell them that they can't approve someone. All we can do is recommend that we're still gonna do what they're gonna do. Right, so we put in the statute no cherry picking services. Yep. I think a couple other concerns that is with the entry level provider, it really goes far beyond just creating a new level, because I think it can be done, and over the years we've had so many different levels called so many different things, but it's always kind of been four. It's been the entry level, the EMT, advanced EMT, or EMT Intermediate and then the paramedic. Being rural, having somebody that is able to drive, and this is how I'm looking at it, current law in order for me to build insurance, I have to have two licensed providers on the truck. And it spells out that one of which has to be at least an EMT or higher. So I can have currently an EMR is outlined in this as a second level. I can have an EMR driving, and I can have an EMT in charge of the patient in the back. Allowing this new certification level opens it up to that entry level. If I have somebody who maybe has a first aid, stop the bleed CPR, some other stuff that a group of your choosing sets up the recommendations for, they can assist on scene, they can first respond on scene, stop any life threatening injury, and then they can drive, and allows me to do what I need to do in the back of the truck. So I disagree with the department's stance on doing away with it. I think it can be done. In order to legally build insurance, I have to have two licensed people in the truck. So this would create that licensure. I totally understand that creating something new from the ground up is of an issue, and it truly is. But one of the objections I hear a lot of going through this is the lack of the state training coordinator now for going on a year and a half, two years. Oh, so that's the key position Shayla was referring to. State training, and it seems like every time they get close, something happens, and we don't have a state training coordinator. What's the barrier to somebody accepting that job? I don't know. I hear over some of the phone conversations that it's funding, but I don't know. I know the EMS office traditionally has high turnover, and I don't know if it's a funding issue competitive with other states. I can't answer for them. I don't know. Probably. So what's the title of the job again? It's the state of EMS training coordinator. And so, otherwise, 25 years of experience, is there any questions I can answer? That's great. Well, I think we all learned this year a lot about our EMS services, about the problems with funding and recruitment and retention, and also just the nature of them as not just transport, which is how they started, but really an extension of the doctors and the hospitals, and of the human side of it, of just making a cup of tea for somebody whose husband just had a heart attack or whatever he is. Absolutely. EMS has evolved so much, especially over the last few years. Yeah. I certainly know more than I ever did. Yeah. So, and I think our work on this also helps us inform the regional pilots that we're hoping to enact here in regional public, delivering of public safety services, because I think that also will help the challenges you guys are facing. Yeah, especially in the Northeast K&M, and I did see a language in here that there would be special attention paid to the Northeast K&M, so I'm kind of happy about that. And what town did you say you're based in? So, I'm out of Glover, but I'm the Chair Minister of EMS District too, which is Orleans and Northern Essays County. And in a year, we lost two ambulance services due to funding in that area, but a huge hole in the EMS response for the area. You have mutual aid like fire, I mean, so somebody's filling those gaps? Yep. Yeah, it's all full now, and we've started moving towards contracts with towns and whatnot, but that's unique to our area. But there's certainly extended response time to some areas. Okay. Well, there's extended response time in all areas of public safety. Yep. Absolutely. Any more questions? All right. Thank you so much. Thanks. I appreciate the time. Thanks. Thank you for listening so patiently. And I know that there are more, there are more EMS people who were interested in this, but they're all out there responding to something. Out there working hard. Oh, yeah. Yeah, I've heard that we can't go today, and then I'll be with her and Maddie tomorrow, and then we'll do it. All right, anybody else want to weigh in on the EMS, or are we pretty set with? Yeah, it sounds like we are. Will you get that language to Betsy? And then I would, on the tiers, well, you're not going to ask. No, I was just, you know, I was looking at 124 and not seeing the subcategories. Sorry. So on the tiers, I guess when you're back, I don't know why we can't have three tiers, but I mean, that's something we might. Of the instructors? Yeah, yeah. I think definitely. We might or might disagree with them. And then on the first responder thing, I was thinking maybe we should, the first of all, the tests. You suggested that, and you have that. And then on the first responder thing, if we could say that they will work with UVM, whatever that his title is. Hathelons. Well, yeah, whatever his title is. To develop. And the EMS Council to develop the certificate or whatever it's called, license, by January of 2021, that gives them six months to develop it. And I can't imagine that it would take them more than six months to come up with it. I think that's what I'm talking about. I mean, this is, it's a very, okay. Does that make sense? Yeah. So keep the requirement that there is that new license level. And that they, that they'll work with them to come up with it. And they need to come up with it by January of 2021. So that's an effect by that. I think all of us took on board to need for really creating a good industry level for recruitment. I mean, it ties in recruitment and training in that those five categories of licensing. Okay. I drank that Kool-Aid. All right. So I believe that we are done with the EMS part of our, of this bill. Yeah. We, if you can go really fast, cause we have a bunch of people here for other things. So, and I apologize to, this week is really crazy. And I was going to suggest to the pro temp that we not schedule any floor time for this week because, but apparently he didn't think that was a good idea. We also have Eleanor this week. Huh? We also have Eleanor this week. It's, it's, this week should just become any time. Well, certain weeks, for sure. It seems like adding anything next to it. I know. So, okay. So we are done with that portion of it. And we're only two hours behind there. So, Rick Gauthier had to leave. So we're going to just skip the academy training part for today. And so we have regional planning and dispatches, but, and so as far as this year, we'll do the dispatch part of it first. Okay. Are you ready? Yeah. Okay. Anybody can find it in their folders. Good luck. We've been kind of putting EMS on for dispatch. So we have folders about 12 inches high. Oh, okay. And it depends on very quickly where we push. Right, absolutely. Okay. So for the record, I'm Barbara Neal, executive director of the 911 board. And when I was here last on February 21st, the committee discussion, well, let me start with this. I noticed in the current draft that the section that, I think it was section 17 originally, that had a prohibition against the department of public safety taking 911 calls has been removed or revised to apply to dispatch. Okay. So I just wanted to acknowledge that I saw that. What is the start? Is it 21, page 21, I think? So this session is entirely starts on page 20, but the idea of director is correct, but the prohibition on taking 911 calls, thank you. Yeah. So I don't think we ever meant that. Yeah, it's remote. Okay, good. So that certainly aligns with the board's position on that and that very important partnership needs to continue. Okay. So during that discussion on the 21st of February, the discussion turned to the potential for the 911 board to assume responsibility for at least some aspects of regional dispatch planning, specifically as I understood it, having the board assume a grant administration role for funds of unknown origin, possibly the Vermont Universal Service Fund for distribution to public safety entities to convene these regional conversations to discuss regionally delivering public safety dispatch. And also the second piece of that was giving the board rulemaking authority to set the floor for what needs to exist to be a regional dispatch center and if needed, the power to move PSAP positions to those centers. I told the committee then that I would bring this topic to the board for their consideration and would return to the committee with the board's position. So the 911 board did hold a special meeting on this past Monday, March 9th, to discuss this and other issues and their feedback and input is as follows. Expanding the board's authority to include these responsibilities may make sense on some levels. However, there are several important considerations and concerns. The board would need much more detail about what is actually expected of it in order to fully develop a position on this. The questions that came out of that conversation were what specifically is the board being asked to do? So I think they're looking for a little bit more of an understanding on the tasks that you're looking for and what kind of funding for this new program is expected. It was very clear in the discussion that additional staff would be needed, board staff. We are stretched thin right now with our current responsibilities for the statewide 911 system and are not able to take on additional responsibility first without a clear understanding of the expectations. So kind of going back to that first point and without sufficient funding for a new program to include sufficient staffing resources. It's unclear at this point what additional staffing might be involved. So once there's clarity on what's being asked we might be able to develop a better picture on that. The board is also concerned that the Vermont Universal Service Fund is or at least was being discussed as a funding source for the grant program and presumably for any additional staffing needs. I'm sure you're aware that the, and I think I mentioned this actually the last time I was here, that the Vermont Universal Service Fund is experiencing considerable pressures right now to support even its current programs. So that generated quite a bit of discussion at the board meeting as a concern as well. And then finally there was discussion about the whole issue of governance. So earlier this legislative session and last there has been discussion about a potential change in governance for the 911 board. If that were to happen that could have a significant impact on this discussion. And specifically the board asked me to convey that a move away from an independent board to one of presumably an advisory nature within the Department of Public Safety or some other agency may result in a conversation that looks considerably different from what we're having now, what we're having as an independent board. So they wanted me to convey that as well. So those, that's where we are. So I have a question. I was thinking about the grant awarding the grants and you really aren't set up to do that at all, I have no. But I was wondering since this is a regional, we're talking about regional grants that originally we were thinking of doing it through the regional planning commissions but it may not always be the planning commission. It may be a regional, whatever they're called, that the central Vermont one that public safety authority. Yeah, whatever they call themselves. But could the granting could be done through ACCD because they're used to, I mean, they do that all the time, right? They, so that might make more sense to put the, but if we're looking at maybe four pilots, is it ACCD? Yeah, they do because they do all the grants for the regional planning commissions and then. Right, they do. Right, so if we're talking about regional, looking at four regional, they already are familiar with regions and how they work and would have a, and they have the structure set up to award grants. Yeah. So I was thinking that that might make more sense than the E911 board to do that part of it. Yeah, so just to be clear, we do have currently a small, I would describe it as a small grant program that we've been operating for a few years for the schools and getting their telephone systems able to meet specific 911 requirements. What's different about that grant program is it's not enormous and it is on a topic that we know inside and out. I mean, and really there's nobody else that be able to make sure they met the requirements as well as we could on that one program. But that program has stretched us thin administratively. So we were able to build it up, but a continuation of that would be, of any kind of program like that would be difficult. Yeah, I think that when I started thinking about this, it made much more sense to do with their ACCD because they have the structure and all that set up. So we should talk to them. The other part was setting the standards. Right. Right. So I noticed in the draft it mentions and for, okay, so I'm on page 23, section one, setting the technical and operational standards for public safety answering points and for performing dispatch functions. The board did not discuss this specifically, but I think that more precision would be needed on what it is you want us to do here. I guess defining dispatch functions is a bit unclear. And I think the concern would remain because now we're going outside of our expertise, our existing expertise into the world of dispatch that there would be a need likely for additional resources. Right, because you do not normally do dispatch. Correct. And so the governance, the equipment, the training, all of that is separate. So it's a whole, I mean, we certainly interact and we have some familiarity with that, but it is not something that is part of our operation. And maybe you're the wrong person, the wrong group to do that also. If you, who would be familiar with doing, with setting standards for dispatch, not for 911 call day, but for dispatch? So there are regional centers that are already up and operating. There are individual call centers that are not regional, more local call centers who have in place practices, they have practices that they have had in place for a long time, which may or may not be effective and may or may not need any particular national standard. I guess my answer is there's a variety of governance structures out there and authorities for the dispatch function. So there's that at the Department of Public Safety, but there's also that in the regional centers, the Central Vermont Public Safety Authority, that type of organization. So it's all over. What if we had somebody like the Sheriff's Association, the Police Chief's Association and the Department of Public Safety work with whoever is out there to set the standards? Work with some unknown expert on. Well, but they all do dispatch. Those people all do dispatch. And so they would have some idea of what standards should be for dispatch, I would think. Right, I mean, that's an option. That's a possibility. I don't know what I would recommend on how best to corral that information and have it be discussed and implemented effectively. Well, I think they have to come up with some kind of a standard and then bring it back here for adoption, I guess, of the standards for. We could charge them to come back with a standard, to develop a standard. This is the floor, this is the thing. And I don't know if that's the right group or not. I think it would be helpful to get input from the members of those organizations on whether or not that is something they're capable of. Okay, well, because you're off the hook. So, thank you. Well, then she's down here, she's section 21. That's what you talked about. Oh, what? That's what it's related. That's an additional standard, dispatch thing. And I just saw a little hand wiggling there and probably some, over here, probably somebody, I would think this suggestion was going to be probably somebody from BSEA who does dispatch. Madam Chair, I was actually hoping, if I understand how the committee schedule has been backed up this afternoon, that you might hear a quick snippet of testimony from the BSEA on the general provisions of the bill. We had some language we would hope that the committee might consider. Oh, okay, on the, just the bill in general? On the dispatch section and specifically the prohibition of the state being involved in the business of dispatch. Yes, I'm happy to hear it. I know. Beth, just, okay, we will hear from you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Beth, are you here for the judiciary? Yeah, yeah, for us. Would you know we're not going to do it today? No. Okay. But we're a good committee. But I've been joining, then, the barbecues. Would you like a cup of tea? And how's the, what is the shape on there? Yeah, her hair is gorgeous, her hair. I know. That's what you came. Yeah, pretty much. Well, you have to see all the way around. I'm sorry. We were not supposed to. Yeah, it's bad. We're supposed to be saying things like that. I can't. You can't. I can't. I'm appreciative. All right, so anyway, we will hear. Yes. Okay. Thank you. I guess you're off the hook. All right, thank you. Nice to see you all. So, thank you for taking that out upon reflection. I think that that was maybe on my part in ill-advised direction. Okay. Thank you. Thanks. Your drives. I don't, I'm not going to be left. No, no, no. I just have. Okay, I'm just going to go get three from the CID. Unless you want gout medicine. Cough medicine, gout medicine. Gout. No, I don't. Not yet at that point. Steve, would you like to talk about this a little bit? I'm getting some IV programs. Do you have it? Anybody? No, I don't. Thank you. The special meeting that Executive Director Neal just referred to was convened at my request of the chair in order to persuade the 911 board to withdraw the rule they had pending before Elkar because of the magnitude of the changes that are required. The fact that, I'm somewhat shocked to hear that the director proceeds the board to not have the capacity to address dispatch. The both the chair and the vice chair have been running dispatch centers for decades. Well, the former chair was Chief Gary Taylor, St. Albans Regional Dispatch. The current chair and former vice chair is Roger Marku and has been running the regional dispatch for Lamar County for the longest of any regional dispatch in the state. The state police appoint a captain to the 911 board who has extensive, the prior appointee was Tom Hango and he was actually running the dispatch operations for the state police. He now works for BSEI, I believe. So he could continue to be a resource on that topic. I think what you're hearing is part of the capacity problems and the need for a form of the 911 board. So I wouldn't yet rule out the 911 board taking on this task. We don't, we want this done now. We don't want to have them reorganizing. I understand, but so there's another problem I see with the bill and that the planning money that's specified for public safety emergency management plans is distinct from the regional dispatch consolidation. When I testified last on this bill, there's clearly a need for some planning money. If you've got three years and a clock ticking to convene or complete the regional dispatch consolidation that is currently going on in Chittenden County and in central Vermont and the beginning to happen in William County and elsewhere, there needs to be a source of funds for planning money for those. And the administration of those grants are not in here. That grant program for regional dispatch consolidation, I don't read it as being the same thing as these emergency management plan grants. What, then they can be combined? Well, $50,000 is gonna get you both done statewide. It is possible. I do like- No, we're not talking about statewide. We're talking about- You're gonna do three pilots. Even $50,000 wouldn't get you three regional dispatch consolidation funds. Well, I thought we put in 100. Well, I read 50. Oh, you can use 50 right now. Okay. I think we based it on when they did the energy planning. I would look at what Chittenden County has paid thus far and what central Vermont has paid thus far and how far they've gotten. Because there's different elements of that. There's the governance, the staffing, there's the radio infrastructure plans that are all necessary to get in place. Oh, yeah, but this doesn't cover the, the planning grants don't cover any of, this is just planning. This isn't any- I'm not saying building infrastructure. I'm just saying mapping the wireless coverage in the dead zones in the public safety radios. I was having a conversation with the chief from Glover Ambrilance and he recognizes that the need to upgrade a multi-million dollar public safety radio system is overlapping with the emergence of cell phone coverage. As cell phone coverage becomes more ubiquitous, we may be able to avoid some of the million dollar costs for repeater systems. So that kind of planning does not come cheap and needs to be done if you're gonna effectively be ready to cease the dispatch services from the Department of Public Safety in three years. Well, I don't know how to address that. I think you need to catalyze, you need to catalyze that planning process, define it very clearly what you're hoping or intending that these regional consolidated dispatch districts form and plan. It's specifically all of those elements of planning. Staffing, membership, governance, funding, technology and radio. Those are the five that come to mind right off the bat. I may have missed a few. But again, I would encourage you to hear from Paco Armand on this. I know time is short, if you gotta get the bill out tomorrow. We gotta get it out by Friday or it doesn't happen. I think he'll make himself available. I spoke to him today and he was unaware that I just read him some of what's in this draft. So I would encourage you to speak to him either privately or if you don't have time to invite him to the committee. Yeah, if he can come tomorrow. How do we reach him now with his even new email? He has email, he has his cell phone. No, I think there's been some communication gaps but he called me back, that's the phone that rang. I apologize while I was running out the door. But my point is that this, we don't yet know the boundaries. I think it would be inappropriate to cast this as a county-wide, county-wide dispatch boundaries might work in Lamoille County. It doesn't say county-wide, it says regional. Right, and I believe there was some mention of contiguous. Yes. Okay, that's good because we've got problems here with non-contiguous towns. Contracting out of the region and undermining the coalescence of a viable regional dispatch economy. But ACCD is a good choice. They do community development broadcast grants. They're involved in the communications union districts which have significant overlap. They're building fiber and regional dispatch needs fiber and can even become an anchor tenant on community-owned fiber districts. So I would encourage you to, you're only specifying three and would that be three in addition to the two that are already underway and is Wyndham County already underway or not? Well, if they want it, it would be three that could apply for funds. But are Chittenden County and Central Vermont? Chittenden County I think is far enough along. We don't need to fund them. They have not done their technology plan though. Well, I think they haven't had money up there. Yeah, I don't think we need to fund them. I think this is through, I would say this is three new regions that have not yet begun their regional, their planning for regional law enforcement or public safety or dispatch services. I would not, not as a personal interest but as a conceptual, I would not disqualify Central Vermont because they may actually prove to be the model because of the coordination with the community fiber district. They may be your best bet at setting the model and helping to establish those standards and protocols for uniform dispatch. Okay, well, we wouldn't have to exclude them. So, but finding that it's gonna take several years to form these districts and develop the uniform standards and you don't have a clear, if you've ruled out that I will one board as developing those, it's not clear to me at all who's gonna develop the rulemaking and the rulemaking has to be contingent upon a funding source. If you ask these regional dispatch participants to come to the table and we're gonna start telling you how you gotta run your shop but we're not giving you any money, it's gonna fail. Yeah, but that's, we can't, we can't do all of it. Okay, I'm sorry, but we can't do all of it now. We can't put in funding for set, to establish the, to fund the systems. We can't do that. I mean, I know we can't. So, and the planning is that we don't know what the regions will be. Rutland region may apply for, and they're saying, we don't even know who the region is. We don't know, we're going to start talking with Rutland Regional Development Corporation or the Planning Commission or somebody is gonna say, we wanna start talking to things. We might end up with 23 towns, we might end up with four but that's what a planning grant is for. We're not gonna define the, and there's so Rutland would apply to say, we wanna work with the towns in our area to come up with, to look at how do we provide regional law, public safety and dispatch. How do we do that? And it might be that there's, the regions are slightly separate for the different things but that's what the planning grant is for. You haven't defined the regions yet at all. I'm not suggesting that you could. Rutland may be a good model to work because they have yet to convene though. But we're not gonna decide who's the model. No, what I'm trying to do is plan to see that there's a logical and an efficient, cost efficient overlap between fiber optic planning of communications union districts and since Rutland has yet to convene a communications union district, that might be a good place where both could evolve together. Well, I don't, they could but I think that'll make, we'll have to give. But without that rulemaking going on, the rulemaking for how you're gonna create uniform dispatch standards, such that the two of these districts can fail over to each other or carry the load on a, on a. But isn't that what the planning is all about? That's what planning is all about. I know but I've been wrestling with it for many, many years. I know. And unless you specify what the product is that you're conditioning those funds on, you could end up with nothing. You could, you might, and you might, and you might, you might have a pilot that comes out of it and says, you know, we attempted this and the towns in our district said, we don't want anything to do with regional law enforcement or regional dispatch. What do they do when state police are no longer doing the free dispatch? That's, they're gonna have to figure that out if they come up, if they, if they're, a pilot is to see what might work and what might not work. But I think what you're saying is that the pilot, if the pilot's really gonna work, they have to be clear on what is gonna be available and not available in the future. So it's, yeah, it's one. It's not a theoretical exercise. It's a deadline looming. Yes, but we're not, we're not setting up the, we're doing the planning for an eventual pilot. We're not doing the pilots. Except with long public safety. I don't even think we're doing. Oh, I thought we were incurred. We're incurred, we're asking. Well, okay, this is, I may be wrong here in what I'm thinking. When you have, I'll use Windsor County as an example. Windsor County says, the Planning Commission says, you know, we really need to take a look at how we do our dispatch, our law enforcement coverage, all of that, because it's a mess and we're, so they're going to start taking a look at it. But they're not gonna set up the pilot. I mean, with $30,000, they're not gonna set anything up. They're going to work with the towns in their region and they're going to say, this is how we could do it. We're gonna do it. We're going to work, White River Junction is gonna get rid of its police force or White River Junction police force is gonna cover all of Windsor County. They come up with those kinds of ideas and that's what planning is all about. So it's planning. So that's inconsistent with your three-year timeframe of getting these up, stood up and running. Well, I don't think we can get these stood up and running. I want public safety out of it by three years and we may have to say, we can't do that for three more years. But... What I would encourage you to do is explore, even just conceptual language and have it polished on the outside but conceptual, explore the synergy between the other communications planning that's going on with the communications union districts and these initiatives so that you may actually be able to accomplish regional dispatch consolidation in three years, if you... But then you are limiting it to those areas where they actually are doing that regional communication. They could start now, if there's just funding source. That work is underway now. In some regions. In Central Vermont, in Chittenden County, it's already underway. It's already operational in Lamoille County. Northeast Kingdom has begun discussions around... We can't even get our towns to talk to each other around that. So that would leave us out completely for a plan for this pilot planning. If you had to do it in conjunction with that. No, because they're currently forming a fiber district down there. No, they're not. Okay. We'll talk to them. They talk about it and then they fight with each other and then they say, no, we don't like you and we don't like you and so. Well, I'm encouraging you to condition funding on a level of product such that you don't spend a lot of money on people deciding they don't like each other. Well, if we conditioned it on a product, we have to give them a lot more than $25,000. Yes. And then we would have one pilot. Or you raise the amount. Now with the art in regards to the funding source, Ms. Neal spoke to that, the Universal Service Fund. This is another analysis that is being discussed in other contexts in the finance, is expanding the Universal Service Fund from only telephone lines to broadband, which would more than double the annual revenue there and by inserting the word dispatch into the 901 Board's purview, that is eligible for using that Universal Service Fund without violating the federal prohibition on the Internet Tax Freedom Act. That's an important piece to keep the dispatch with the 911 because you can define that as one system funded out of the Universal Service Fund. So I think it might take a year or two to pass that change to a Universal Service Fund, telephone 2% tax no longer applies only to telephones, but to broadband connections as well. And that's your funding source for dispatch. Now I'm more confused than I was. I thought this was pretty simple to just have a couple pilots around. Well, it can be. Huh? It can be. I just, I don't think we can get into the two levels of pilots. You can have some more complicated. No, but what I'm hearing is that maybe there are two different types of pilots that we should be looking at. There's pilots that are already underway that you could get involved and actually write the dispatch standards. If, for instance, hypothetically, Lemoyle, Washington County Equivalent Approximate and Chittenden County could all cooperate on that rulemaking for dispatch with full engagement with other regions that are not yet to that point. And the first level would be starting to talk together as in Wyndham or Rutland, Bettyton County. And that's what the, that's what the planning grant is for, before we start talking to each other. But I don't think so actually. That could be on the dispatch piece. I mean, you could begin or launch that those pilots sooner. It sounds like there's enough infrastructure there to get some of those pilots, one or two of those pilots underway now, and that the public safety pilot needs more planning or absolutely right for us, for people to actually be able to apply for a pilot to be ready as a region to apply for a pilot. And it maybe, dispatch needs to be pulled out of here for that and worked on immediately in a pilot. It's sounding like maybe we could learn something from working on those pilot, but that pilot now and do the public safety piece. I mean, I know dispatch is the piece of it. It sounds like we could get a head start on that part. And I'm confused too, but that's what I'm hearing. I commend your grasp of it. And I also would point out as a Windsor County example, both Woodstock, which has the funding in its own 24-hour dispatch, and Hartford could serve as failovers to each other. And they do one. So we're talking, what we're thinking about is potentially having a funding of a couple grants for dispatch, regional dispatch, and then separate for public safety. Is that, so we're not gonna connect public safety and dispatch at all? Not yet. Okay. It sounds like we could get a head start on the dispatch piece. Well, what we're doing is funding Chittenden and Central Vermont then, in that case, right? I'm not sure that either of those, I know Central Vermont both just voted to put an additional 25, so they've got another 50,000. Okay, so they've got. And Chittenden County, I believe, is well- Okay, well, fine. So they don't need money to. Not right, not to continue their planning to the next day. But we could piggyback, maybe, onto their planning work and learn from it. And facilitate the rulemaking. And facilitate the rulemaking. For whatever. Okay, I'm gonna stop the conversation right now for a while and then maybe we can, I have to think on this for a while. I don't know what Anthony looks like he needs to think. And maybe Paco would help. It would be good to get Paco. If he can get here tomorrow. If he can't. I'll call him right now. Thank you. I didn't mean to confuse you. I just, I just want to make it a better bill. I want to make it a better bill. There's no information. So what I'm gonna do, committee, is, yeah. So I just had a quick question on this. So there's meetings going on with the, with the commissioner of public safety talking about dispatch and funding dispatch. But yet here it's showing July of 2023, that's gonna go away. You're right. So it is you're not talking to Ying on that? No, we're talking to each other. We just disagree. Okay. So the other thing that I would just caution with this is 2023 having infrastructure in place. If you're telling me and I'm one of the users of state place dispatch, that I have to formulate my own dispatch. Utilizing somebody by 2023, I would challenge that it would not legally be possible. Okay. In 2023 may not be the right term. Okay. We would have to push out at least five years just for FCC compliance. Okay. So we'll change that. Okay.