 good morning everyone. We are now one week away from the start of the school year for students. I know many teachers and others are already back in their classrooms and that they've been working with their principals and superintendents for weeks in preparation. Working within the state's guidance, which outlines requirements and provides protocols in the Department of Health and the Agency of Education with a lot of input from pediatricians and infectious disease experts, schools have spent the summer being creative, transitioning classrooms and other shared spaces, creating outdoor classes while rethinking and adapting curriculum for what we know will be a challenging and unique school year. While we know most schools are taking a hybrid approach with three or more days of remote learning to start, this initial transition back to at least some in-person learning has taken creativity, flexibility and commitment from many, many involved with our schools. I sincerely want to thank them for this work. I know it hasn't been easy and Secretary French is going to highlight some examples shortly. As I've said before, a successful return to school is up to all of us. We've got to all pay attention. We've set health and safety protocols to help keep COVID out of schools and to limit the spread if and probably more like when it appears. Public health officials have given the green light for in-person learning because of the low prevalence of disease in Vermont. Now it's up to all of us to keep it that way. So while some may see our continued success as a sign we can let up, I urge Vermonters to stay vigilant. That means physically distancing, massing up in public, washing your hands a lot, staying home when sick and quarantining when you've been exposed to someone with COVID or travel to a red or yellow county. These steps are critical to keeping our schools safe and helping to continue to move forward with our economic restart so we don't have to take a step back as other states have had to do. Vermont continues to be a leader in our ability to suppress this virus. We have the lowest positivity rate and the lowest number of cases per capita in the country. This is thanks to the work of Vermonters and your commitment to keeping each other safe. But let me tell you how quickly that can change if we let our guard down. Eight weeks ago Hawaii had the lowest number of COVID-19 cases in the country with under 1,000 while Vermont had about 1,200. That was then. Throughout July and August Hawaii is averaged more than 120 new cases every single day. And as of this morning they have 8,447 cases more than five times what we have. This is a reminder of why we're doing what we're doing to suppress this virus. As we get our kids back to school with as much in-person instruction as possible because we know it's best for our kids, this work is so important and must continue. My team is also pushing forward on our unique approach to set up child care hubs for remote learning days. And Secretary Smith will share an update on that initiative in a few minutes. Whether it's K-12 schools, child care, higher ed, retail, manufacturing, or health care throughout this crisis we've seen there are simply no easy answers because none of this is ideal. And there is no roadmap for this once in a century crisis. But Vermonters ingenuity, nimbleness, and a long history of neighbors helping neighbors has gotten us to this point and we'll see us through the months ahead. Now I'll turn it over to Secretary Smith for his update. Thank you very much Governor. Two weeks ago we announced an initiative to stand up regional child care hubs as a key component of our initiative to provide expanded school age care on remote learning days. This is an effort to expand on our existing capability to build on our current successful programs as well as foster new ones to ensure that we can support our children and working families as best we can during this time. As we all know all too well these are challenging times that require creative thinking, flexibility, and action. To be clear we're working with our community partners to essentially create and implement an entirely new additional child care system that works under new circumstances and we are doing that all within a matter of weeks. As has been the case throughout the pandemic response, Vermont is taking an innovative approach to addressing complex problems as quickly and as collaboratively as possible based on the unique challenges and perspectives we have. We have made significant progress today on building out this school age capacity. Vermont after school has done a remarkable job taking up this challenge as the lead community partner and we are grateful to them for collaborating with us on this endeavor. The hard work and expertise they have brought to the table is incredibly valuable. We have also appreciated the local entities coming forward over the last week in offering their resources, their skills, their experience running after school programs, summer camps, and other youth programming. This is a huge asset and will help Vermont set up the system while responding to the needs of working families. We also appreciate the wide variety of private businesses and other types of organizations that while not having sponsored child care programs before have really come together thinking creatively about what their employees and their communities need and are willing to contribute to innovative solutions. In developing the HUD program, careful thought is being given to establishing a system that helps with the immediate child care needs for school age children on remote learning days without harming the existence of the network we have in place right now for early childhood after school and youth serving organizations in this state. Wherever we can, we will continue to build upon the investments the state has made in Vermont's child care system throughout this COVID pandemic. The end goal is to have child care systems in Vermont for infant and toddlers as well as school age children that are stronger and more accessible. Just to provide an update since last Friday, over 160 submissions have been put forward to either become a hub, provide space, or enrichment activities. On Friday, last Friday, we highlighted areas of the state where we are concerned, where we do not have enough capacity to meet the need. We are happy to report that the community response has been overwhelmingly positive and additional conversations with our partners at Vermont after school have either already happened or are scheduled to take place in the coming days in those areas. We are now up to 12 potential hub sites that have been identified. The hubs can be seen here on the map represented by black dots. The map developed by Vermont after school has the reopening schedule of every school serving children in grades K through 6. The shading indicates that reopening plans for that area. You will note that green means school is in person five days a week, yellow is hybrid of in-person and remote learning, and the orange areas are remote learning. Gray areas indicate districts which the approach varies by school. The hubs are in eight counties so far than the 12 potential hubs that I just mentioned. Addison 3, Chittenden 3, Franklin 1, LaMoyle 1, Rutland 1, Washington 1, Wyndham 1, and Windsor 1. Combine these hub sites, these hub sites combined could provide approximately 2,300 childcare slots or the capacity to serve 4,600 children. We can serve approximately over 4,000 children because the sites identified so far are all in schools that have split schedules for attendance. Also, I just want to make you aware, there are an additional 20 sites currently finishing data gathering conversations with Vermont after school that will be then elevated to the DCF CDD for final vetting. Those are represented in the blue dots on this map. Just to give you some idea of some of the activity that's happening out there, Essex Junction Rec creations and Park is a hub site. They will serve eight schools. They anticipate having 700 childcare slots available and have already filled those slots. We highlight this both to show that there is great need that this provider has filled and also to acknowledge that there is likely additional capacity needed to support all Vermonters who need this care. We continue to work to identify additional partners that could also support a program in that region. Mount Abraham Union School District expanding learning program in Addison County will be serving five schools. They have an estimated 240 slots with openings ready to take additional children. They have just located the site for their Wednesday program when all schools are closed and will have capacity for 100 children on that day. So the first 12 hub sites are working through their final stages with DCF this week and additional 20 sites have applications actively in progress with the expectation that they will move forward by Friday. Approximately 40 more potential sites are under review. As for whether we will meet the goal of meeting the 7,000 slots, Vermont afterschool along with DCF has done a great job so far in a remarkable short amount of time. As I mentioned before, we're working together diligently and quickly to build as much capacity as possible in the time remaining. But I want to be realistic here and I've said this a couple of times at this press conference since we've talked about this program. It may be that some sites come online after September 8th but right now we're focused on building out the system as much as we can and working diligently to do that. It's important to keep in mind that we are dealing with a fluid situation. There are some schools that may move more quickly to in-person days and there is always the possibility that we will need to decrease in person learning over the school year if an outbreak occurs and the incidence of infection increases. The hubs are responsible for connecting children to their education. The educational services will be delivered by the school system. Hub sites must have access to Wi-Fi and will support children connecting to their classes. This is in addition to providing children a safe enriching environment to spend their day on remote learning days. Conversations with the agency of education around access to food have happened this week and a clear communication tool is being developed to share with hub sites so they know who to contact with questions. I just wanted to give you an update. There's been a lot going on with these hub sites and as you can see throughout this map a lot more will be coming forthcoming in the next few days. With that and give an update on education and the progress there, I'll turn it over to Secretary Dan French. Thank you Secretary Smith. Good morning. I thought I would begin my update by addressing some of the data questions that have come up in the last few weeks. We are working with our partners at the Health Department to design the data reporting for if and when we have COVID-19 cases in schools. We are seeking to design an approach that strikes a balance between student and staff privacy with the needs of parents in a larger community to understand the public health trends. I thought I would share our initial work on organizing these data. Student health information is part of a student's educational record so it is protected by FERPA or the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. Staff data are protected by HIPAA. To address these privacy concerns, we are thinking of reporting the total positive number of cases in a school with the number of student and staff cases combined. This means we would not report student cases separately from staff cases and would not report student cases by grade level or class. Even with this level of protection, we have the issue of very small schools in Vermont so our initial thinking is we would not report data on schools that have a combined student staff population of fewer than 25 people. 25 is the number we arrived at after reviewing the size of our small schools and applying our best professional judgment relative to privacy restrictions in our current data practices. This means we will probably not be reporting data for about 15 of our schools. We believe a consistent approach to using these data at the state level will help schools with communicating with their families and their communities and can replace the need for districts to do this on their own. I think school level data will also be useful for highlighting our common purpose as Romaners in supporting our students. By working together, we can ensure the safety of our students and school staff. When we look at our data relative to other states, it is clear we've been very successful, but we must continue to be vigilant to ensure our success in the future. Until we have a vaccine, we will likely have COVID-19 cases in our communities, which means we expect COVID-19 cases in our schools. We can minimize the likelihood of the disease entering our schools, however, if every Romaner does his or her part in following the guidance from the Health Department. Our goal is not just to reopen our schools, but to keep them open and to provide learning opportunities equal to, if not better than, those provided before the emergency started. This will require everyone to work together. To monitor our progress on learning opportunities, we will be gathering data on school reopening plans and how they change over time. Commissioner Petschak gave a preview of these data last week by sharing a map of initial school reopening plans from around the state. When we announced our approach to hybrid learning back in July, I indicated we would be collecting monthly data pertaining to the patterns of student opportunity that were emerging as part of districts having flexibility in designing their own plans. The data we used in the demo last week were gathered manually by analyzing these initial reopening plans. We are using this initial information in the map to design a more automated process for gathering and visualizing these data. We intend to launch this new data collection in late September or after we make the shift to step three, which we expect to make around the same timeframe if conditions remain positive. The purpose of this data collection would be to monitor patterns of student educational opportunity. We think it is important to be able to understand how these patterns change over time, including how many students are involved in in-person instruction, remote learning, hybrid learning, and what the student grade levels are. As we approach the start of the new school year, I would like to thank all the administrators, teachers, and their school staff for their hard work in making the necessary preparations. When I talk with educators around the state, I consistently hear from them that this is some of the hardest work they've ever done. To highlight some of this work, I would like to share some of the preparations of the River Valley Technical Center in Springfield. River Valley Technical Center is its own school district, which is a fairly unique structure for a tech center in Vermont. River Valley Technical Center is hosted on the site of Springfield High School. Also located on the site is the Vermont Virtual Learning Cooperative, which has done phenomenal work during the pandemic in rolling out a statewide online learning platform. In addition to serving the students at Springfield High School, River Valley also serves students from a larger region, including students from Green Mountain Union High School and Chester, Bells Falls High School, and Fall Mountains High School at Langdon, New Hampshire. The reopening plans for the tech center, therefore, had to be coordinated with all of these districts, including a district from another state. The center began for its reopening by forming a committee that included teachers from its various programs, the lead negotiator of its teacher's union, and its cooperative education coordinator. This core committee was augmented as necessary when it had to address specific issues such as special education and student support services. The center's planning team considered the state's health guidance as a blueprint, walked through each of its elements, and applied them to the unique circumstances of the center. The center's plan addresses many specific logistical considerations such as how students and where and how they will be dropped off and enter the center, since students are coming from many different sending high schools, and the center itself operates separate morning and afternoon programs. Due to the hands-on nature of many of its programs, the center decided to implement a schedule of in-person learning for four days a week. For one day a week, all students will be engaged in remote learning, and for the first semester, some of its programs will be completely online, including its information technology and business and financial services programs. This complex schedule had to be coordinated with every sending high school. To do this, the center's leadership team held monthly meetings with all the principals throughout the summer to coordinate the schedules and transportation routes. Their success in collaborating demonstrates how valued these technical center programs are to both students and their communities. As one high school principal remarked, my kids won't come to school if C.T. is not open. The support for the center is also evidenced by the degree to which parent groups self-organized on social media to provide transportation and carpooling options for students. It has been observed that perhaps one of the more lasting impacts of this emergency on Vermont's educational system will be a stronger conceptualization of how to use remote learning technologies. Being co-located with Vermont Virtual has certainly given River Valley some advantages in that regard, but it's interesting to note how this emergency has expanded the center's use of online learning in new innovative ways. This innovation was stimulated by a strong commitment on the part of the faculty that they needed to take advantage of every opportunity to work in person with their students. As one instructor said, the first day will be like, hi, good to see you again. Now pick up your tool bags and let's get to work. To maximize the time for in-person instruction, the center purchased new digital cameras that operate in three dimensions and are emotion sensitive. Instructors are using these cameras to record introductory equipment and procedure demonstrations. These video demonstrations are then uploaded to their online teaching platforms, so students can access them 24-7. I think the staff of River Valley Technical Center would agree that planning for the reopening of school this year has been some of the hardest work they've ever done, but it's clear that their planning has paid off. Their reopening plan demonstrates a confidence in working together and problem solving that is representative of a high-functioning organization. Like so many of our educators, they leverage their expertise and use their best professional judgment to do what is best for their students and their communities. It is clear to me in reading their plan that not only are they ready to reopen their school, but they are also well prepared as a team to navigate the new challenges that this semester will inevitably bring. I would like to thank all Vermont educators and school staff who, like the staff of River Valley Technical Center, have worked so hard this summer to make preparations for reopening our schools. I think this work has been incredibly challenging because in many ways we have asked our schools to do things they were never designed to do, whether it's shifting immediately to teaching all students online, providing child care, using school buses to deliver meals, or holding high school graduations in cars. It is also challenging because as educators we cherish our routines and traditions, and to a certain extent some of those routines and traditions have been disrupted. As we prepare to reopen our schools however, we have the opportunity to create new routines and to re-establish a continuity of learning in the lives of our students so they can pursue their plans through education. Although this pandemic has been disruptive of our traditional school routines, we cannot let it be disrupted to the aspirations of our students. So thank you again for all the school personnel who have worked so hard this last six months in support of our students. I expect the reopening of our schools next week will go very well. Thank you to your dedicated service to our schools and our communities. I'll now turn it over to Dr. Levine. Thank you, Secretary French. Last week Vermont had eight new cases per 100,000 population. The national number was 88 per 100,000. We remained lowest in that as well as in percent positivity rate. There are so many things going on on the national scene and on the medical scene with regard to COVID. I suspect people in the public are having difficulty just keeping up with the onslaught. Being the cleanup hitter this morning and looking at the time, I'm going to restrict my remarks to what's going on here in Vermont right now, but I'll anticipate there'll be plenty of questions in the Q&A with the media. So let me talk about the Rutland County-Killington outbreak. As we announced in a news release yesterday, the Health Department is investigating an outbreak of COVID-19 cases associated with people who attended a private party at the Summit Lodge in Killington on August 19th. At the outset, I want to first thank the management at the Lodge who've been eminently cooperative for following the state's guidance to protect their guests and employees and for their assistance and support of our efforts to contain this outbreak. To date, we have identified 14 cases among people who are at the party and among their close contacts, which means the virus has spread to people who were not at the party. I understand this news potentially could be yet another worry for people in the community, but as I've said before, the efforts to contain outbreaks, whether we're talking whether we're talking measles, Ebola, COVID-19, this is what we do. We have systems in place to address public health situations, even ones that take a long time like pandemics. And like we do for all outbreaks, clusters and situations of cases in Vermont, our experts here at the Health Department are working nearly around the clock on this. Keys to our success are the actions that Vermonters take every day to keep yourselves and others safe. You know the drill. Masking up and keeping a six-foot distance from others, washing hands often and well, staying home when you're ill. There are serious reasons why we say this over and over. These seemingly routine actions have an important cumulative effect. They are a significant reason why Vermont is doing so much better than many other states and countries. So by taking these actions every single day, you reduce the chance you're exposed to the virus and you help protect others, especially people who are at risk of serious complications or worse. The Health Department's investigation began last week as part of our standard outreach to give guidance for isolation or quarantine to people who've tested positive. Our expert contact tracing team has been working to reach the more than 40 people who are at the party. Contact tracing is key to our ability to contain outbreaks, and I'll speak a little more about that in a few minutes. We appreciate the cooperation of those who've responded to our contact tracing team thus far, and we urge anyone who's contacted to please also respond to calls from the department. If you attended the August 19th event, but have not been in touch with the Health Department, please call 802-863-7240 to make sure you have the information you need to protect yourself and others. Because it's possible to spread the virus without developing symptoms, people who attended the event should also take steps to limit any possible exposure to others. If you attended the party or if you are a close contact of someone who attended, monitor yourself for symptoms of COVID-19. If you have even mild symptoms, contact your health care provider to be tested. Speaking of testing, pop-up testing will be held in Rutland City tomorrow from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at our local health office in the Asa-Bloomer building. Registration is required. To register, go to healthvermont.gov slash COVID-19 slash testing. We are also arranging additional testing opportunities the remainder of the week in the area. I want to return to the topic of contact tracing for a moment. After a half year of experiencing this pandemic, contact tracing is a term everyone should be very familiar with. The concept may seem quite simple, reaching out to a confirmed case of COVID-19 and then their confirmed contacts. So they know what to do, how to prevent further spread of the virus and have the information they need to recover and stay healthy. But contact tracing is not just a notification system. It is work that takes care, empathy, patience, knowledge and expertise. Both medical and in helping people handle news they generally don't want to hear. If you test positive for COVID-19, contact traces will ask you questions about your symptoms and activities. They use your answers to determine when you were infectious and then who your close contacts were during that time. Anyone you were within six feet of for at least 15 minutes. Contact traces then reach out to these close contacts who may be at a higher risk of getting COVID-19 themselves. They give health guidance, answer questions and provide support to people who may be stressed out or overwhelmed. Not an easy job, but I'm proud to say we're doing it well. Here in Vermont, 92% of cases are interviewed within 24 hours. This is a very high percentage, probably one of the highest in the nation. It does stand in stark contrast to news we've heard of other states and cities that have struggled to reach the people they need to, which means virus can and does continue to spread in their communities. While I want to give a lot of credit to our team for their time expertise and truly impressive commitment, I must give equal credit to the people of Vermont who understand the importance of answering the phone when we call, talking to us honestly and doing everything they can to stop the virus in its tracks. This is public health. As a physician, I want everyone listening or reading my remarks to truly know there's no shame in being exposed or contracting the virus. If you made a choice to not wear a mask one day or attended a party where people were not taking precautions, then all I can ask is that you learn from that and make different choices the next time around. And don't let that keep you from working with us to contain the spread of the virus. We've run into a very few people who are uncooperative. I understand we all have different reasons for the choices we make. I may disagree, but I don't judge them. If you are contacted by a member of my team, I ask that you check your feelings at the door. When it comes to protecting the public health of Vermonters, we all have a responsibility to do our part, even if it's as simple as picking up the phone when we call. Vermont is about knowing we can count on each other when it matters the most. Nine years ago, we were Vermont strong when we worked together, neighbor helping neighbor, to recover from tropical storm Irene. And despite the sense that COVID-19 is the new normal, it really is not. It's a long-term but finite public health emergency, one that we can end all the sooner if we work together again, each of us doing our part, even when it's inconvenient. So I ask all Vermonters to keep up the good work and thank you for doing so. And if you learn of a possible exposure or a case at your place of business, contact the health department and encourage any customer who tests positive to get in touch with us as well. All this will help ensure we can do the essential and proven work to containing this virus. I'll turn it back to the governor. Thank you, Dr. Levine. Well said and I appreciate all your efforts. With that, we'll open up for questions. Thank you, Secretary French. So I'm wondering with school a week out why we weren't working on setting up these earlier in the summer, especially since we knew that remote learning would be on the table. Calvin, we set them up as soon as we saw the trend of what it was going to look like. As you remember, we weren't certain how the various hybrid or in-person or remote learning was going to be. But as soon as we saw the trend, we came out a couple of weeks ago because we saw how this was coming together and put this plan on the table. This is an unusual, this is a unique, innovative way of looking at things as we've been with child care throughout the whole pandemic. And one of the things that I'm most proud of with the governor's support is what we've done with child care and making sure that child care has been available throughout the pandemic, as well as opening up in a successful way back in June. We provided for essential workers and opened it up to everyone back in June and kept the infrastructure in place by paying to keep the infrastructure in place. This is just another innovation about what we're doing and moving forward. And once we knew what was happening with the school year, I mean, if the school year was normal, we wouldn't be doing this. And once the school year goes back to normal, we won't be doing this. But given what we saw, this is how we reacted and I think reacted as quickly as we could. Yeah, to Secretary Smith's point, it's a very dynamic situation. Looking back on it, we still had districts, I think in the second week of August that hadn't finalized the reopening plans. And many who came out early with the reopening plans were revising them somewhere around the first week of August. From my perspective, you know, this is how we've addressed many of our problems as they've emerged to the emergency. We collaborate very closely together. Our small piece of that was I heard from superintendents pretty consistently or started to hear somewhere around the first of August that they were having issues with staffing due to child care for teachers. So that piece of information I shared with the Agency of Human Services and that led to us putting together this package to serve all Vermonters as well. But it's an iterative process focused on problem solving and getting it done to support the emergency response. And Secretary, as you mentioned that there may not be all of the hubs up and running to try to get aid. I'm wondering if you have a sense of maybe how many we'll have by the time school starts and maybe where some of the deficiencies in the state? I don't have that, Calvin, where it's going to be. We're obviously trying to get as many up and running as by September 8th. Remember what we're doing here. We're putting a whole new child care system in place in a couple of weeks. And that is something I don't think we've ever done as a state. So the challenges are there. We're meeting some of the challenges. I can't give you a number right now because I don't have that number. But we are working to get as many up as possible by September 8th. And by the way, we're not going to stop there. I mean, once September 8th rolls by, we'll continue out. But as I said the other day, this is a Herculean task that we've undertaken. And the fact is we'll have these up and running. The interest is there. It's just whether we'll have all of them up and running by September 8th. I'm wondering if the state has any sense of where we might need additional staffing. And if this is an issue, and how do people handle that? Your questions about school staffing? Yeah, I think that's going to be our biggest challenge as we move forward. As I said last week, what we're trying to do is get the staffing into place. Remember, we have staffing for after-school programs and those that we can draw on. What we have to guard against is making sure we don't poach from the existing system in order to staff what is a temporary system that we're putting up. So I think staffing is definitely one of the main challenges of this initiative. But I really feel along with our community partners, we're looking at how to effectively staff these without draining the resources from the existing system. We'll have to see how this goes as we move forward. I think if you're saying what the number one challenge is, it's going to be staffing. But I'm optimistic that we will find the staffing. And I'm optimistic that it will be sufficient enough to have quite a few of these hubs up and running. Just to add, as well, as for those who are listening, who are unemployed, we have 40,000 people unemployed and from off right now, either on PUA or traditional unemployment. If you have an interest in early childhood care and learning, reach out to us because we could use the help right now. So I think that's an important factor. As well, I want to remind everyone for those who are wondering why we didn't anticipate this and work towards this back in the beginning of the summer. We're less than six months into this pandemic from a emergency order standpoint. That was March 13. So less than six months. That was three months ago when we started planning for the reopening of schools. And I don't think any of us could anticipate what was going to happen today. But we're doing the best we can. We'd hope for more in-person instruction. But again, we have to deal with reality. And we're doing just that and putting into place a system that I believe will be beneficial for the months to come. So I do believe there are both Vermonters and out-of-state people who attended the party. Concerning only in the regard that they may have left and traveled back to their state, but that's why health departments are connected with one another. And so we can provide that information to the other state. We also try to connect with anybody no matter what their address is because they may still be in Vermont and they still have public health at mind. So their attention to their care is still paramount. On this breakout, are the contact tracers out within just the community or are they going out of state as well? Unfortunately, a lot of their work can be done by telephone. So you never know always that a cell phone is in state or out of state. But at the same time, we know the names that we want to address. And because the venue was so good at keeping the records that we asked them to, and then more recently we've gotten information from the hosts of the party, we have phone numbers that we can rely on no matter where the person is located. So they did their job at the restaurant advice for others who are welcoming people in as well? Yes, no, restaurants are required to, you know, keep a list of those who eat at their venue or tend to function like that. And the Summit Watch did exactly what they understood the guidelines to be. And on the education side, we're now a week or so into the return of colleges. Have we had any sort of update on testing, test results, where we're at with that? Are we seeing a problem yet? So let me start with the way you phrased the part of your question. Are we seeing a problem yet? Because I'm not putting a spin on things, but if we saw zero cases, I would say we have a problem because we have students coming from all over the place, mostly nationally and not internationally, but still places that may have higher prevalence of virus than here. So we are seeing students who have tested positive. Some of them are testing positive before arrival, so they're being held up in terms of coming to Vermont. Others are testing positive on the day zero that they arrive or on day seven. Last number I had from last week was 19 across all campuses. I suspect that's grown a little bit, but I don't have an updated number for you at this point. I can tell you that these are people who are generally surprised at their result. They're not coming in sick and coughing and what have you, with rare exception. So they're asymptomatic people, isolation, contact tracing, quarantining is being done on the campus, just as it's being done in communities like Killington as a matter of routine, what we do. So most of the schools have start dates that either just happened or are happening in the very near future, and there's nothing we see that's interrupting their plans. Just one last question for the governor. The cities and towns has brought out their recommendations as far as changes in policing here in Vermont. Have you seen any of those recommendations or have any comment on that? I have not seen their recommendations at this point in time. We did ourselves. We issued, I signed an executive order and has not been made public yet, but we'll be putting out a press release in terms of policing and some of the things that we believe will be helpful to Vermont. So that will be coming soon. Look forward to looking at what VLCT has offered as well as what the legislature might be contemplating. Hopefully there's a common theme that we're all trying to work together in terms of trying to protect Vermonters, but at the same time just change the way we do things in light of everything that's happening throughout our country. So you're not ruling out state legislation? No, I mean, we're always willing to listen. We want to be better. We want to, again, provide for the safety of Vermonters. I mean, public safety from my perspective is the highest concern of any government and we just need to find ways to do that and work together in order to accommodate that. So yeah, look forward to hearing that. I also wanted to compliment the Lodge in Killington as well for being forthright, being helpful, doing what they were supposed to do, providing for the names of those who participated and I think it does highlight for those who are tiring of writing down those establishments that are tiring of writing down all the names and keeping track. This is exactly why we need that to happen because it can not only help protect the families of those who have been part of the experience in one of these establishments, but also helping other states when they go back home. We want to protect them as well. So it's just a good idea and it's proved itself to be essential. All right, moving to the phones, we'll start with April Burlington Free Press. I have two questions, one real quick one for Secretary French. And my questions are, first off, you mentioned the data recording for COVID cases in schools and then also the data for the reopening plan. Will that information be housed on the Agency of Education website for all to see? That's a great question. I think our inclination right now is the health information relative to COVID cases would reside on the Department of Health's website. And the educational reopening would be housed on the Agency of Education website. It's more of an educational issue, but that could change. We're still we're still designing the data collections. Sounds good. And my second question, as schools reopen and step to students will be eating in the classroom, has there been any discussion at the state level for best practices to protect students with severe food allergy who could have increased exposure to allergens by having food in the classroom? Yeah, that hasn't come up to my knowledge, but it is a good example of something that might emerge locally. But I would say our schools are very skilled at managing that issue. That's that's an issue that's been in our schools for a number of years. So if it emerges as a statewide concern, we'll certainly address it. But I would expect the locals are addressing that right now. Okay, thank you. Steve. Hi, can you hear me? We can. I've got a quick one for the governor and then one for the doctor if I may. Governor, I'm up here at the end of the long trail and I've shuttled hikers for like 15 years. But I still get calls about parking and stuff like that for the long trail terminus. Is it like incompetent upon me to ask these people about quarantining or anything like that? I mean, I didn't even think of it when I started getting calls at the beginning of the summer. I'm just trying to understand the question. So when people come to to travel the long trail, they start there and you're you're near that location. Is that what you're saying? Yeah, they either drop the car off here and get a shuttle down to the bottom of the state or to where they had left off or whatever. But they usually leave their cars here in the village. Yeah, I would I would recommend that you, you know, have the casual conversation with them. Ask them where they're from. Did they quarantine? Make sure they're wearing their their masks and keeping their distance from others. And if you're in contact with them, make sure you have your mask on as well. I think just taking those simple steps means the world a difference. But but I think making them aware of our policies here in Vermont is helpful. Okay, great. I'll bear that in mind. And I've got one for Dr. Levine, if I may. Okay, Dr. Levine, let's see. In a nation of about 350 million people, we lose about almost 300,000 people fatalities a month just to attrition. And I was looking at this, the numbers that came out from the CDC on August 30th, that said that only 6% of the fatalities from COVID were COVID only, and that the 94% had other comorbidities or underlying health conditions. And so that means that only 9683 had died from COVID only. And they they go through the top underlying medical conditions of influenza and pneumonia, respiratory failure, hypertension, diabetes, vascular problems, dementia, you know, and and whatnot. Is there, I mean, for for some people who are skeptics, is there a chance that that this may have been not now, but in the beginning, not in the beginning, but but now that it might have been, you know, been been overblown in some way? And aren't we just postponing deaths, not really preventing them? Thanks for the question. I kind of anticipated someone would ask this today. So my answer is not directed at you. You framed the question really well. But I've already received a number of communications regarding this data. And I'm very concerned about how, if I may term it armchair epidemiologist and armchair physicians are reporting their take on this. Because you actually do need to understand medicine and epidemiology to understand what the CDC came out with. So true, if we examine all the death certificates of everybody who's died of COVID in this country, 6% will say COVID was the only thing that killed the person. They were a healthy person otherwise. The other 94% have a variety of diagnoses on their death certificate. And you named a number of the diseases that are there, you know, respiratory failure, hypertension, heart disease, all kinds of things, diabetes, kidney disease, the list goes on. Many of those do impact the most vulnerable in our society. Which is why we are always trying to have everybody take all the usual precautions to protect the most vulnerable. Many of those affect people who have compromised immune systems. And make them very susceptible to disease. But it's, I have to make it clear that many of these people would not have died this year if COVID was not here. They've had this burden of disease that they've lived with for sometimes months, sometimes years, sometimes decades. COVID tipped them over. It was overwhelming. And their system couldn't handle it. It didn't mean they died of something else. They died of COVID in the setting of having all these other underlying diseases. And I hate to tell you, but lots of Americans have a lot of these underlying diseases. So the answer is no, it wasn't all 15 and 20 year olds who have no problems and suddenly died of COVID. It was people who have other burdens, but they could be young, they could be old. But nonetheless, they died because COVID was here on the planet. Just like many of them die during a flu season of the flu, where they're kind of in a fragile balance, but they can go on for years in that balance. But if they happen to get the flu, it can be overwhelming to them. And their death certificate shows they died of the flu in the setting of these other kinds of diseases. And so that's how death certificates are filled out. The communications that are coming across the airwaves and to my email and whatever are saying, this was a hoax. There was no pandemic. Why have we put all these restrictions in place and kept our society from moving along and doing what it wants to do every day? This data should not give you that impression at all. These are people who have died that wouldn't have died otherwise if there were no COVID on the planet. And I can't say that anymore strongly. And we have 58 of them in our state. And because I feel so strongly, we should take just a few moments of silence in the memory of all of these people who died because COVID happens to be a pandemic on this planet right now. Sure. And thank you. There was a New York time study, too, of positive tests from three states, New York, Nevada, and Massachusetts. And these tests said that they showed such small traces of the virus as to render them meaningless. Have you seen that study? And could you comment on it? Yeah. I believe that there was a epidemiologist at Harvard who is trying to make the case that there is a portion of the population that we're testing who have COVID, we say, but the amount of COVID that's present probably isn't representing anything that could be infectious to anybody else or what have. This is very early. And lots of people, even colleagues at the same institution, the Harvard School of Public Health, were kind of taken aback by that. So I'd like you to kind of put it on pause for the moment and we'll see what evolves out of that because you're right. There was that report. And I don't want to misrepresent the way it framed things because I haven't read the whole thing myself. But it shouldn't change dramatically our thinking. I do believe it was trying to make the case for altering the way we approach testing in the population at large. And that is such a big deal, if that were to come to be, that we should actually research that further and be a little more knowledgeable about exactly what they were trying to say. So stay tuned on that one, if you will. And we're on track to lose probably to opiates. Where it looks like the numbers, we're on track to lose twice as many people in Vermont to opiates as to COVID. Has the Department of Health come out with anything new for the opiate problem? So there's a lot of ongoing programs that are going on right now. I hope your prophecy is untrue that it would be double. That would seem a little on the higher end of the range. But let's suffice it to say that the number of opioid unintentional overdose deaths this year is higher than it was the same time a year ago. And that's concerning. That's true around the country. It's related to the pandemic. It's related to a lot of what goes on in terms of being at home and being more isolated, not having people witnessing injections, not having people aware of the fact that somebody's injecting something that could be lethal and being there to rescue them, if you will. Heightened anxiety and depression related to the pandemic, etc. So astutely, the federal government through SAMHSA has actually released more money, some of which has come to the Vermont Department of Health, to actually help us continue some of the preceding programming, make sure that all the treatment options remain open and available not constrained in any way by the pandemic. New rules that allowed for prescriptions to be done remotely, like telemedicine, as opposed to have an in-person appearance to get one's prescription for medication-assisted treatment. And there's numerous other initiatives that we've undertaken because our Alcohol and Drug Abuse Programming Division is very aware of this data. They publish it, and we've been actually targeting it to be responsive in a way we can. Well, great. Thank you. Thank you all very much. Hello, Governor. First, I want to thank your people who do your media lineup scheduling doing a great job, and I really appreciate it. So the question for Secretary French, I guess, his agency and the superintendents and legislature are looking at plans to use last year's enrollment figures for districts that had a lower enrollment, in large part due to homeschooling. And so two questions about that. The first one is, Secretary French, can you give me the most recent number in both the total and percentage of homeschool applications to agencies of education? Yeah, we're currently expecting that number to be over 4,000. The applications are still over, have sort of a bit of a log jam. So in the end, I expect the increase to be about a hundred percent increase over last year. Okay, so that's the next. So given that if I understand what I heard in the house education hearing this week, there'll be less, there'll be the same amount of funding for districts with lower enrollment due to homeschooling or whatever, but districts that have an increase enrollment will still be able to use that average daily sentence funding. So in a sense, there will probably be fewer students but more money and therefore a tax increase. So what I'm asking is, is it possible that some of this added revenue could go to help parents who are homeschooling for the first time, either, you know, I have concern for their children's welfare or whatever. You're doing this for the first time and are maybe struggling with training curriculum and IT. You know, I can see that education has been pretty nimble in meeting educational needs, but I'm like, again, could this be one of them? That's a larger policy question. What's being talked about now is freezing what we call average daily membership. Certainly, as you're right, part of the issue is to introduce some stability into the budget deliberations of our boards this fall, because we expected to be a very challenging budgeting process with so many variables. So we thought this would be one variable that we could at least isolate and take off their plates. But, you know, to what extent the larger policy question around funding homeschooling, that's really not what's going on with ADM. ADM isn't really about sending dollars to schools or dollars to kids. It's about the tax rate, which then gives districts the ability to make those investments. So that would be a whole separate conversation. And I'm not sure the legislature is in a position to take that up right now with the funding issues are really the priority. So how about an agency initiative to help out homeschoolers give them a sort of unique circumstances? Yeah, we wouldn't necessarily have the ability at our own authority to do that would require the legislature to enact a policy change of that record. Okay. Thank you. Hi, thank you for taking my question. So we received an email from a concerned mother who said she wants to pick up her child from a soccer practice. And she said her child could barely breathe. He was forced to wear a mask because of the COVID policies while running around exerting himself. Actually her similar comments from my own children. I have an eight year old in summer camp and he kind of reiterated such as well. What evidence does the health department have that playing sports and math doesn't cause harm? Dr. Levine, I'll have him answer that. But I would also like to offer that these are unusual times. I think there's a lot of evidence in terms of masking and providing for the spread of this disease and transmission of this disease through the droplets. And that's why we've taken some of the measures we've taken here in Vermont. And I think sports is one of them. It's been difficult in terms of decisions because we want them to have that social type of interaction, but we want them to be safe. We want to keep others safe as well. So difficult times, challenging times, but we just need to persevere and work through these. And I think that there has to be some recognition that maybe there needs to be more breaks during games. That you want to make sure that you're giving time to the kids to rest and catch their breath and so forth. But all the while keeping each other safe. I just have a couple words to add to that. The scientific evidence about impairment in your physiology, if you will, from wearing a mask, very minimal evidence, unfortunately. So, though I can't tell you what strengthens your respiratory effort, I can also tell you that there is not enough out there to indicate that it can be harmful. But there's very little research unfortunately done because who's going to be doing research on this in the past before we had a pandemic? I don't think most people were wanting to wear masks when they engaged in any kind of physical activity. So, on this one, as the governor's kind of indicated, we know the benefits of masks and we know that in close contact sports, there's clearly going to be the opportunity for people to be breathing heavily in close proximity to one another. We also know that there's opportunity just in the act of yelling and screaming for people to transmit virus. Whether they happen to be the players on the field who will be doing that or definitely the people who will be doing it who are on the sidelines. So, having this uniform policy seems to be the right thing to do even though we don't have as much scientific data as you'd like us to have. So, it's fair to say for the moment we don't have clear data weighing the risk of these kids wearing the mask versus not wearing the mask in like a soccer game or a gym class? That's right. But we just don't have enough data that says there's harm in doing so. Well, thank you for your time. Hi, Governor. I'll just ask for a couple updates on my questions last week. First, do we have any numbers on the testing at the DMV this year versus previous years? I thought I answered that last week. I didn't think that we needed to go into that unless we thought it was really, really important. It's not that we don't have some of the data from previous years. We just haven't kept track of it this year. But I'm sure we can go through the exercise, but we're pretty busy in DMV trying to renew licenses and fund registrations and put this new in-person type of operation into place. So, I'd hate to take away from any of their work to provide the information unless it's really, really important. But I mean, it's not that it can't be done. It's all math, but it just takes time. Yeah, it's my understanding and I could be wrong, maybe you could clarify that there are at least some state employees right now that are still out on a straight-up lead unable to return to a work setting that I would think would probably want to maybe get their hands dirty. I'm not aware of any who are not doing anything at this point. Are all the state employees back to full-time workload? I wouldn't say that all state employees are back to full-time in the traditional sense, but we have never stopped working. I mean, we've done it remotely and we've just been doing it a different way. So again, I mean, if this is really information that's vital, we haven't seen a sharp increase or decrease in the numbers that I'm aware of. We've tried to put into place a system where we could get kids that testing so that they could get to where they wanted to be and on the roads, so to speak, to the next chapter of their life and experiencing driving on the roads. So I can't say that we've seen anything dramatic one way or another. And I'm not sure, you know, getting going through the exercise of providing information is going to make a difference one way or another unless I'm missing something. I'm just not aware of what good use this would provide, but again, we could do it. It's just going to take a little time. Okay. I guess moving on, was your staff able to find any information about the law enforcement issue in Ritz-Werd and the secondary effects of moving a large number of people into that community and what kind of victims might Ritz-Werd expect? Yeah. You know, I may refer to Commissioner Shirling this because I did ask they look into this. It wasn't quite to the magnitude that we thought. It was a very limited number of people and actually talking with some folks in Ritz-Werd, they were more concerned about the welfare of the kids, wanted to provide for something for them to do, and they were willing to work as a community to try and fulfill that. So that's, I believe, what we found. Secretary Smith or Commissioner Shirling? Secretary Smith. Thanks, Greg. I followed up on your questions from last week, including sort of the presumed behavior of motel guests, including complaints that juveniles were vandalizing the park in the area. And while we cannot disclose the specific of individual cases, it's worth noting that children in households receiving emergency housing in that community are largely under the age of three. I think we have two that are not under the age of three, and they are under the age of 10. And regarding concerns that these people are being housed in the community from other places, again, while we can't disclose the specific cases, all the households being served are from northwestern Vermont, and almost all are from the immediate surrounding communities, just so that everyone knows homelessness happens in most places and can happen in more places in Vermont than many people in towns wish to acknowledge. And the harsh reality is that Vermonters experience homeless and housing insecurity. There are neighbors and our friends and our community members. And the General Assistance Program, the General Assistance Motel Program has been there for 50 years to help these Vermonters. And we do that because people are attached to their communities and we like to house them to their communities. One of the other things that I heard regarding the prospect that the state of Vermont needs to provide more law enforcement, I'll let Commissioner Scherling talk about that, but people experiencing complex trauma and unforeseen and sometimes devastating crisis, they need connection and help, not more law enforcement. And we have been surrounding a lot of these places with extra services to provide that help. And if we look at the model of success around the state, there have been some really successful models, including Rutland, where we've worked with local law enforcement. And so I just want to, this is, the portrayal was that this was a huge amount of people causing problems and that kids vandalizing the parks in there. And what we found is it's probably a small group of people in this program, in that community, and the kids are from infant to under 10 years old. So that's what we found. And Commissioner Scherling, do you have anything to add on that? Just a bit, Secretary Smith. I think the Secretary covered the vast majority, including the importance of wrapping services around folks that are in any kind of crisis or need, rather than it being an enforcement issue. It is, as far as we know, a relatively small number of people, not as originally portrayed somewhere fewer than a dozen. And there's no indication that we're aware of that there has been a significant increase in law enforcement call volume as a result of any of the activity that's happening there. So what was said during the meeting on Thursday by the lieutenant was that they don't have the personnel to deal with it, partially because the community of Richford is so far outside of their core service area and partly because they're just under staff. So is Department of Public Safety unable to adequately staff law enforcement in Richford? No, I think the version that I heard, there appears to lack some context in the content of your question. I'm not sure what exactly that was in response to, but there is no indication that we have a resource deficit or an increasing call volume, for that matter. Okay. Well, I will have to go back to the recording because I certainly have downed differently from what I took down for notes at that meeting. I guess I'd say, Governor, unless you have anything to add. I'm all set. Thank you. Thank you very much. Wilson, the AP. Hi. I hope this is a quick question. Governor, I was interested about your comments when you first started about Hawaii, which for so long was the state along the bottom of the event. I guess it affected an infected state here throughout the COVID and now Hawaii is skyrocketing. And it seems like some of the other smaller states that had circumstances similar to Vermont are also seeing some pretty significant increases. Do you think that Vermont can keep these numbers down, or do you think this is something that just by chance at some point something will happen to make something explode, to be much bigger than say the Killington incident that the health department is now following? Yeah. History will be the judge of that. Wilson, we'll see what happens. I'm hopeful for Monters. That's why I keep talking almost every single week, every single press conference about the need for us to remain vigilant, to do all the things that we're doing now, and improve upon that. It's so vital. And when we hear of a case like in Killington and where we need the information so that we can do the proper contact tracing, it's it's incumbent upon each and every one of us to provide that information because that allows us to mitigate and suppress the virus. And that's what we've been trying to do over the last five to six months and improving upon. You know, we always have room for improvement. But I think what happened in Hawaii, for instance, I think they did open up their economy. Obviously, you know, like Vermont, they are reliant on hospitality and lodging restaurants and so forth. I believe they opened up some of those entities and didn't have sufficient contact tracing to follow up as a result and didn't take some of the measures that we've taken. So we're trying to learn from that. And again, watch other states and see what they do that could be better than what we do and take advantage of that. But but I'm, you know, the bottom line is can we can we keep this up? Sure, we can. But it's up to us to make sure that that happens individually. It's not just the government. It's individually taking all those steps that I keep talking about, making sure you wear your mask state physically separated from others. And and the large social gatherings staying home when sick, all those simple measures wash your hands a lot. That's the key. It's very simple. But but sometimes, you know, we get complacent because we see that we're doing well. That's my fear that everyone, you know, we believe our own magic and and then we don't believe there's a problem. And many people don't think there has been a problem from the beginning, as we heard from another question earlier. And for those who think this is some sort of hoax, you know, tell that to the 58 people and family members of family members of those who have passed away in Vermont, whether over 9000 in Massachusetts or over 33,000 in New York over the 185,000 across the United States, tell that to them. And then think about if we hadn't taken all the measures, all the steps we've taken here in Vermont, if we hadn't done everything shut down some of the the the restaurants and hospitality and businesses and so forth that that were really counter to everything I believe in. If we hadn't done that and hadn't taken these steps, my guess is we would be facing vast, much larger death rate, much larger case count throughout this state and throughout the whole United States. So we wouldn't be talking about 185,000 people. We'd be talking about hundreds of thousands more. And that's why it's important for us to persevere, see through this until a vaccine comes to be. Okay, perfect. Thank you very much. Hi, this question is likely for Mike Smith. I was looking for an update to your long term care guidance. Several families have reached out to us wanting to know what the statuses of health departments look into possible revisions to help families reconnect with their loved ones who are in long term care facilities. Where does it stand and when can families expect to hear an update about it? Thanks, Kat, for the question. I just want to make sure that people understand that we do allow visitation at long term care facilities, and I'll get probably to the question you're asking for, Kat. They have to go through several phases, and those phases are sort of in the guidance that we have issued. Phase zero means there's no visitation. Phase one is allowed when a facility has gone 14 days with no cases, and there is no substantial community spread, and that allows for outdoor visits up to two visitors as long as mass and distancing is maintained. We have phase two, which allows visitors can be outside and increase up to four. Non-essential health care and contractors are allowed as well as non-medical necessary medical visits. Some communal dining and group activities are also allowed, and then phase three, of course, is with the most sort of 42 days with no cases. Phase two, by the way, is 28 days with no cases, and no community spread has all the phase two, and as well indoor visits are allowed. The thing that we have been struggling about, and frankly, what I've been struggling about from a personal perspective, knowing what we went through and sort of the anxiety that we went through on long-term care facilities when this hit, is what Essex, New York is struggling with right now as the virus is going through a long-term care facility there and trying to guard against any of that happening. We're still looking at the procedures for what you brought up in at a press conference a few weeks ago, which is the personal contact, the touching of individuals at long-term care facilities, and as you know, and as I said a couple of weeks ago, you know, this pandemic has really upset all aspects of our lives, and in those conditions it's almost harder to see your loved ones and not be able to give them a hug or a handshake or interact with them that the ways that you usually do, and we understand that. And as I said, as you reached out and as other reached out, it's had a profound impact on us. At the same time, also has had a profound impact is when we've seen the results of what can happen if this virus enters these facilities. So just to give you an update, the health department and myself are still looking into possible ways to make small changes to these regulations, and I want to emphasize they probably will be small changes to these regulations to feel like what we're used to with small amounts of contact while keeping our facilities safe and healthy. So I still stay tuned. This is a very, very delicate decision that we will be making in the future. So I believe some states have policies that allow a designated family member to visit their loved one in a long-term care facility at least once a week, once they've been tested for COVID-19 and they agree to limit their movements. Could Vermont do a strategy like that? I'm being very specific because I think families that we've heard from are getting pretty nervous as they head into fall and they notice the weather is going to be less amenable to outdoor visits and they do not see a way forward for indoor visitation heading towards the colder months. We've not hearing a timeline from the state about when they might know how they can see their loved ones is frightening for them. There is a path to indoor visitation. It's through the phases that I just outlined and that's up to the institution. We have provided the path to get to indoor visitation. The issue is whether the facility which has the right to make stricter regulations than we have proposed, there is a path to indoor visitation. I think the question that you asked us which is a heartbreaking discussion and at the same time one that we're just struggling with to find the right balance is the touching aspect of loved ones and we're still struggling with that but Kat I want people to know we have a path to indoor visitation through the various phases. Last question on this we heard from a family who said you know my loved one isn't dying from COVID but their mental state is deteriorating rapidly because they're not getting the same kind of family contact and stimulation that they were prior to the pandemic. I guess what's the message for families who say we're never going to get this time back with our loved ones and we're sitting here waiting for the ability to connect again with them in the way that we used to you know. I can understand that you said it's difficult as we look at the balance of the health versus desire to reunite families what they're used to but I think some families aren't particularly you know feeling good about the idea of how long this taking to come up with. Just remember Kat they can visit their loved ones and I would urge them to do so but at the same time we got to remember it's just not those their loved ones that we're looking out for these congregate settings in some cases house hundreds of people that haven't made the same decision in that these people are saying you know just let me do it you know and the consequences will deal with as a family those consequences just don't stay to one family they can go they can go to multiple families throughout this. I do want to emphasize I understand profoundly what people are feeling out there but you also got to understand that we have to protect people in these long-term care facilities when one case gets into these long-term care facilities as we're seeing right now in Essex New York and as we have seen here where the majority of our deaths have happened in our long-term care facilities when one case gets in there sometimes it just doesn't affect one case it affects the whole facility and that's what that's what we're struggling with right now. Thank you. All right folks I just have to ask you to not go through maybe if you have several questions it's something reaching till Friday because it's 1240 and we still have 11 in the queue. Mike Donahue the Islander. Secretary French Ramon has often mentioned the inconsistencies coming out of the state at several levels in COVID-19. Today appears to be another classic example on one hand Dr. Levine says there's no shame with COVID-19 he doesn't judge people. I doubt the moderates have judged anybody negatively but the education agency is now taking a longer mentality when it comes to withholding COVID information in the schools itself and you probably know that your secrecy plans aren't going to fly too well with parents and most likely teachers wanting to know about COVID within the schools. Shouldn't parents be allowed to know what's happening with their children in their schools and actually the employees know about their own work sites and who exactly were the transparency experts the education agency used during your discussion about trying to keep the public actually informed. Before I turn it over to Secretary French I did want to mention very sorry to hear about your sister this past week Mike. Thank you very much appreciate that Governor. Yeah thanks Mike to a certain extent I agree you know the public does in parents specifically do have an interest in that information which is why we're trying to strike that balance as I mentioned I think our initial modeling looks at all but 3% of Vermont schools falling into having reportable data so we think that's airing on the side of being very transparent. I think in terms of our internal process our head data person Dr. Wendy Geller and our general counsel Emily Simmons have been my two primary folks I've been relying on to start once again design process where we consider what are the sort of requirements from a FERPA standpoint and from a HIPAA standpoint and then we've begun conversations with Department of Health which I gave an update on today so it's a collaboration between the two agencies on how to strike the appropriate balance in this information. Well we've heard earlier that HIPAA does not apply it's been blown out of the water Dr. Levine and others have nically used that statistics are not covered we've asked to where in the HIPAA regulations nobody's been able to point that out so that's been dispelled and I don't know if your staff didn't realize that but but again who were the transparency experts that you've got from outside that the education I mean the education agency is not always most forthcoming and I'm not saying your administration long before you got there they just have not been known as being the most transparent agency in the state so what outside experts did you get to balance the public's right to know about what's going on in their community as Dr. Levine said it's not being judgmental for monitors aren't judgmental when people catch the flu we don't hold it against them why would you think people are holding it against people for having cold it I don't understand I think that's what for monitors are baffled with and the inconsistency well you know to your first question we haven't consulted any outside experts I think we have sufficient expertise internally we do have sort of a unique interplay with this information inside of education as I mentioned we have a standard called FERPA the Family Education Rights Privacy Act which in school information even though it might be HIPAA information in the outside world inside of schools FERPA is a much higher standard so we have to rely on our internal experts to factor in that criteria but I think I would just say give us a chance what I was trying to do today was to say this is our initial thinking on it to stimulate a conversation we know we're going to have to address this issue and we're trying to be transparent as whole pointed today of providing that initial thinking on it so we look forward to continuing the conversation with Vermonters about this very important issue so that 25 did I understand you correctly it's a random number apparently that is that the number you're going with 25 in the schools yes we looked at you know the reporting criteria the health department uses and we started to model out you know the size of some of our schools and we thought 25 was a good cut point on that so that again that was just throwing a number and hitting the dartboard nothing in particular about it not quite as I said in my yeah to your point about it it's not a dartboard as I in my earlier comments spoke about our professional judgment and expertise which is considerable in that regard but we our modeling is based on an assumption of total population of employees and students does not include volunteers and parents that might enter the building it's just strictly employees and students so it's not really 25 then if there are people volunteering in the classroom does it include the school administration does it include the custodians all the staff and everybody like that yeah we're thinking of school employees and students to do a composite figure for cases because we think the public has an interest in the cases in a school regardless of whether they're students or staff so volunteers going into five from won't be counted well then my initial thinking is no because they're not considered employees okay thank you very much you're welcome jolly local 22 hi can you hear me we can all right I have a question for Secretary Smith could you explain what makes these educational hubs new and different the the child care hubs yeah yeah secretary new because we've never had them before and different is because we're setting up a program that not only looks from K-5 excuse me from zero to five but also K-6 in days that we traditionally don't have to set up programs for that because they're in school during those times so it is new and different in that regard we are setting up a system that we've never set up before and setting up for school age children during school times that normally we wouldn't be doing thank you so much I do have one question for secretary french um do um schools have emergency plans in place if they suddenly needed to go remote given that schools across the nation have been um increases uh in covid cases yeah it's a great question it's not so much they have emergency plans they have plans uh our whole assumption was that districts would have some flexibility among in person remote or hybrid learning so essentially from the very beginning we've baked into that sort of flexibility into our design so we think that sets schools up well to have to navigate these challenges that will no doubt emerge all right thank you tim from our business magazine hi governor I have a question about this bigot but I did one of the fyi to Dr. Levine I've been writing the the bus here in Burlington the last couple of days and they've been very crowded and there was only one person not wearing a mask so so that was pretty encouraging as far as uh turning the spigot more on the on the general economy you mentioned that the schools and the colleges themselves are kind of a spigot turn as far as the general economy is concerned are you waiting to see how the the schools and the colleges how the how the health data plays out and is there a timeline where you'd make another economic turn yeah we you know to be perfectly blunt perfectly honest highest priority right now is to open up the schools k through 12 in particular and trying to make sure that we're not doing anything detrimental that would affect that so we we are watching and as soon as we possibly can get through this this first reopening hopefully successfully then we will look at focusing on the economy to try and open up certain hospitality in particular to get back to some sort of normalcy but so there isn't uh you know three weeks after the opening of schools the fall looks good that you know they feel as we've done since the very beginning really watching the data the science what we're seeing on the ground you know the number of cases and some of what uh commissioner p check the the four guidelines that we we use the model and open up the the traveling network we're using here as well so we'll just have to play it by ear and and hope that we are moving in a forward positive direction so that we can again reopen the economy which is so essential especially as we head into the winter months and i'm very concerned as i've said previously about next year's budget we we made made it through because of the great year we had last year it would have been even better had we not had the the covid the pandemic hit us here in the first or the last quarter of this past fiscal fiscal year but that helped us get through last year and provided us enough surplus to get us through this next fiscal year the one after fiscal year 22 it's going to be very challenging because we're not going to have the surpluses because there won't be and we need to focus on the the revenue generators the employers to put people back to work to restart this economy more fully again those 40 000 people who are out of work right now we need to get them back into employment all right great thanks go hey i'm davis hi this is a question can you hear me we can this is a question to dr. levine i'd like to return to the first question one of the first questions he got in this press conference which is the the question uh what what i think is seem to me broader now i may i may be wrong and and uh and he knows it better than i do but here's here's my question um the uh looking at the testing per se had two or three elements in it one of them was whether um whether as the original questioner said the the uh the the pcr test is picking up people with very low levels of very low levels of the disease um and the question then was two fold one was whether it was whether it's worth uh refining your reporting okay to distinguish between people who have a clear dangerous load of the virus and those people who don't a second question a second question was should we modify the pcr test in order to uh run fewer cycles and and which would you still using the pcr test would pick up much fewer many fewer positives i think also that the question that the the question is much broader than one individual or our but i think it's at least half a dozen states that are considering moving and the last part of the question and it gets back to the manchester situation one of the things if somebody decides that you really in some states may do this uh which are having a huge testing problem if they switch to an antigen test uh then that's a very different proposition and one of the things that i have not heard about anywhere else in the country but we have definitely seen here is a is uh the manchester case where uh the antigen test uh which is not supposed to have any very few if any false positive it's got a huge number of false positives but i would just ask dr levine i'm going to stop in a minute but it's just it's what i'd like to ask dr levine to look at is when you call when you call the clinic the clinic in manchester what they tell you is that dr levine in a press conference down there or about there said that all of those cases that they found to be positive were in fact positive i think that's a huge problem i wonder if you've been addressed that thank you must anyone forget the first question um what ham is referring to is called cycles thresholds ct values the lower the value the more infectious someone is it has to do with how many cycles the pcr cycle needs to go through to detect the virus so the lower number of cycles that has to go through that presumably means there's more virus in that person that could infect someone if it has to go through many many many many many more cycles uh that might mean there's hardly any viral material to detect but it is detecting it because it's such a powerful test and maybe that person isn't so infectious so these are all wonderful thoughts you know they haven't been rigorously tested in terms of changing policies but they're they're all important considerations and as we learn more and more about the virus like we do all the time states will need to start considering or reconsidering how they go about things i'm a little concerned because there's also an issue of where is a person in their natural history with the virus so if the person is early on presumably they may have a higher infectious load and burden than a person who's later on and if they didn't have a lot of symptoms from the start it might be hard to tell from just talking to the person their understanding of how infectious they might be because they never really felt that bad in the first place so it's it's a very challenging set of questions you ask him about the cycle threshold and adjusting what states do so that you would do the same test the pcr test across the board but you would have a cutoff point so that your machine your instrument wouldn't actually go through more cycles than you preset it for so that would take a lot of the people who may not have as much ability to infect others out of the picture because they would be listed as a negative test because they hadn't yet reached that point in the cycle where they'd be positive i think that needs a lot more thought and a lot more testing rigor to be honest right now i'd rather feel a little more comforted by trying to pick up most people and even if i'm picking up some people who may not be so infectious i'm not too worried about that right now but i do understand that there are states that are very challenged by getting enough testing done for a variety of reasons and maybe looking for a way to maximize the yield get a bigger bang for their whatever because of the fact that they're doing it this newer way i haven't heard a lot of traction for this idea just yet so stay tuned with regard to manchester and the antigen test that they're that they do again i've said all along this test has a role to play and it needs to be utilized cognizant of what that role is there was a conflict or a discordance between the results on the antigen test and on the pcr test and even more importantly to me a discordance between the results of some of the tests and the epidemiology surrounding the work we did to determine if there was an outbreak or not the fda has done its analysis of how the machine performed if you will and the company kydel similarly has investigated how it was utilized and they determined that a positive test that by that machine was a positive test and we're not actually arguing with that at all what we're really doing is trying to get at more of why is there this discordance and that has not yet been resolved at this point in time hope i covered all three of your questions yeah on the money thank you sir all right uh it's about one o'clock and we have seven colors in the queue so folks please limit your questions uh and we can always follow up directly with Ethan and i or the health department afterwards john dillon vpr thank you uh dr levine getting back to the summit lodge situation from from what we know is anything done wrong there at that party were folks wearing masks where they you know not quarantined if they were from out of state and and if not if it was just a gathering and this happened is this just what the public should expect in a pandemic um without a vaccine so i would hope this is not what we should expect because obviously we have increased the size of mass gatherings and we feel that responsible people at mass gatherings can actually attend those we wouldn't want to put them at risk repeat that we don't feel the lodge itself did anything wrong they adhere to a lot of the guidance with regard to the list with regard to sanitizers hygiene etc i don't have enough detail and i don't think we'd ever understand without complete video of the entire several hours people were there how adherent anybody who was there was to all of the the rules and guidance that we've labored over talking about today as well as other days but the fact that we have a large number of contacts tells me that at least using the bare minimum rule of being in contact without a mask possibly for 15 minutes within six feet must have happened a fair amount there keep in mind it was a party people were dining outdoors walking around i'm sure with with food and not interested in trying to eat with a mask on so that's all i can tell you people have to be very extraordinarily careful were there people there who were supposed to be quarantining and not i don't think we're going to to know that unless they directly would say that to us there were plenty of remodels there so presumably they unless they had traveled wouldn't need to have quarantine okay thank you erin vt digger i should also like to note that all it dropped out of the queue is the one that looked like right after me so you can just get past his name this question is for the governor that's just where to set aside $100 million to help cover k-12 schools cover the cost of reopening during the pandemic but your budget didn't include any additional funding why didn't you include additional money in the budget well first of all a hundred million dollars is news to me had they covered or if they had set it aside that would have been in the first quarter budget so maybe somebody could point out to me where they stipulated that they were putting a hundred million dollars aside for education i could comment further but i don't have any knowledge that it was included anywhere unless you've got something different i mean i i just did you see it anywhere in the legislation anywhere uh they said there was a hundred million dollars set aside for the the next quarter or three quarters of the budget i uh i heard this from a reporter who you know is kind of translating it for me and i'm passing along so i might have to go back to him and uh you know get a better understanding where that's coming from i again in my conversations uh with leadership uh in you know with the last budget uh i'd never heard a mention of a hundred million dollars set aside for education okay did you consider setting aside money in your budget for a property opening well we have spent a tremendous amount of money for reopening we've we've utilized that in a number of different ways i don't have it all in front of me but certainly i can get that to you so it's not as though we didn't anticipate this in fact we did anticipate it but not to the level of what the apparently the legislature had envisioned again they wanted to put aside a hundred million dollars for this reopening we should have worked together to to provide for that but again there's there's still a time i'm not sure i might ask secretary french to comment on this further but i've heard a lot of talk in in the congressional arena about the opportunity for more money for restart of schools and so forth so we'll have to wait and see there there could be money coming from from congress we just don't know at this point but we won't know until weeks from now unfortunately so we'll see what happens secretary french can you comment on what we have spent now that's far yes i think your question pertains to what we call the crf of the coronavirus relief funds not necessarily the budget or the general fund certainly you know we went to the legislature with the proposal it was ultimately i think approved uh 50 million dollars was the total cost for reopening and that included about 6.5 million dollars for hvac or heating ventilation repairs some 12 million for food service programs and so forth so the question is has that been sufficient i think over the summer i think districts are managing cash flow pretty well the answer to the question like is it sufficient or not i usually draw a line between what are the reopening costs versus what are the longer term financial impact implications of the emergency so i think for the moment we're doing all right we are tomorrow i believe we're collecting information on the crf or coronavirus requests from schools so we'll have a better understanding of what might be their need from crf funds and i know that's a topic of great interest from the legislature the crf funds have a short time frame they have to basically be expended by this december i will point out districts also have access to what we call esser the elementary secondary education emergency relief fund that's about 30 million dollars statewide not all districts have really begun to start to draw those funds down but so once again my impression is there's adequate cash flow at the moment but i do expect there to be longer term financial implications of the emergency yeah just i do have those exact figures up so we have put forward 50 million in crf funds in vermont there's an additional 31 million in esser funds as you mentioned secretary french and an additional 4.5 million in g e r funds so we're looking at roughly 85 million dollars that has been put forward for reopening costs for schools on top of their standard budgets yeah and as a reminder any the funding that comes from the cares actor crf has to be utilized for covet 19 expenses not it can't be utilized for budgetary deficits and so forth so it's the guidelines are fairly rigid and we have to adhere to that and they have to be spent before 12 31 at this point in time we're hoping for more flexibility and that could be a game changer as i've said when we present our budget everything is predicated on this having to be spent before 12 31 if we're allowed more flexibility this could be a game changer for us in many different areas and we would probably want to go back and reflect on where we're spending the money okay thank you very much matt nbc five thank you um this question is a follow-up i believe um from what john just asked and i believe it'd be directed best towards dr levine in regard to the killings in outbreak um you guys said there's been 14 cases among those who attended and then closed contact out of those who attended the event do you know many from how many people test the positive who are from out of state and from who live in vermont in those outer staters do you know if they came from counties uh those green counties without requiring a quarantine or if they came from either those yellow or red counties and did not quarantine properly yeah i think we'll let dr levine answer but uh but we're trying to get to the bottom of everything at this point and doing the contact tracing takes a little bit of time and trying to get all that information together uh has been challenging and i can't give you a full breakdown um although we publish the cases each night on our daily update so you'll be able to tell uh county of residents or if people are out of state from that daily update the um and and this isn't over by any means you know we anticipate there may be several more cases yet so uh we'll be able to categorize them the way you're asking uh but i don't have that off the top of my head right now the other point though that you're making is uh if they are out of state you know what kind of county are they from you know yellow green red um and that would also presuppose that perhaps they actually just came for the party and maybe should have quarantined and didn't versus they've actually been at a second home in vermont or vacationing in vermont or what have you uh so we we can't make clear judgments on all of that every time just knowing that they came from out of state as well but we have a like i say a large significant proportion that are from vermont so um i wouldn't want fingers to be pointed in any way at any particular part of the population here okay and then just quickly um i guess cooperation in regards to this incident from contract tracers um overall has it been positive i mean have you had any pushback from any of those people who attended from the contract tracers at all yeah so starting with the universe of all the outbreaks we've done i would say it has been extraordinarily positive experience here in vermont going to this specific outbreak there are a few noteworthy instances where it was not as positive as we've enjoyed elsewhere so uh that made this stand out in our mind a little bit more but i don't want to um cast a label or a spell over the majority of people that we've been in contact with uh who have uh been very cooperative and who often through their own social network actually had some idea about things anyways and were interested in talking with us further um so it's a it's a minority that hasn't been totally satisfactory but it is perfect thank you very much and it is improving thank you doctor we appreciate it the andrew caledonia record yeah yes good afternoon uh thanks everyone for hanging in there with us um questions for secretary smith um looking at the education hub map that you provided and showed earlier it appears there's um one in progress in st johnsburg can any of the details of that proposed site be shared out i'm presumably after the conference um about the facility the local partner i think details like that andrew let me uh let me check right after the conference on that and i'll get back to you how's that sounds good and well i while you're at the podium um the uf 12 proof sites right now that can accommodate 2,300 kids a day i think you mentioned um with hundreds of kids in in each of these hubs uh at any given point can you describe what the daily experience might be like for the kids um and is the state helping to find that uh the programs on the daily basis or is that the local partner that's coming up with with how it'll function the local partners in in conjunction with the state will decide how it functions i don't want you to um think for example i talked about the sx juncture recreation parks as a hub site and 700 uh child's uh care slots we're not going to have 700 kids in in one spot i just want people to be aware of that that's going to be in multiple locations at multiple times uh during multiple days so it will be spread out and we'll keep sort of the the smaller groups as we um as as we move forward it's i i just want people to realize that um you know different kids will be coming on different days uh because of the the way that the schools are handling their hybrid system as well as um you know there'll be different locations in here so i can get i can get sort of the after um dcf to give you a call give you a sort of rundown of how this will work right after this okay thank you can you guys hear me is that you lola or mara yes uh this is lola go ahead can can you hear me yes we can okay great um so i just wanted to go back to the child care hub um the 12th that has been approved um that are expected to uh serve about 2300 kids a day are those already you know we've talked about how staffing is expected to be a problem are those already fully staffed or are we at least confident that they will be i just want to clarify um everybody's using uh it's 2300 slots and that can accommodate uh 4600 children and the reason is the reason the slots and the children are different is just what i just described there'll be different days um in terms of when different children will be attended um in terms i forgot your question lola i'm sorry um that's fine and so it's accurate to say that it's 2300 kids a day right no it's 23 there's 2300 slots that can accommodate uh 4600 children all right because they'll be in school and alternating days that's right okay um the question was about staffing um you know you've knowledge that that's a major concern here are the hubs that are approved so that are serving offering those 2300 slots um are those fully staffed they i i don't know the precise answer to your question are they fully staffed are we looking for staffing right now in order to accommodate those the answer is yes um but let me lola let me get back to you on whether they're fully staffed i i i'm confident that they will be but your your question is are they fully staffed and i don't know the answer to that right now right and you've also mentioned you know being worried about poaching from the existing system um what are you trying to do or what are these hubs trying to do in order to make sure that that doesn't happen well there is several ways that we can make it try to make that happen first of all remember these are going to be temporary hub sites so if you've got a permanent job i would urge you not to go to it to a job that's going to be probably temporary in uh in in in the makeup of the job uh there we can look at contract language too to make sure that we aren't poaching we can also look on the other side as well um and see if there are ways that we can help with existing staff uh on on the current child care system and i don't know what that looks like i don't know if that's a possibility but i'm willing to open that discussion to see what can be done on that as you know we had about a 12 million dollar expenditure for um uh that was just approved by the legislature um maybe portions of that can be used to help out in regard to make sure there's no poor poaching okay and one more quick question what is the uh cost structure in terms of cost of families um that we're looking at in these hub sites you know but are some places offering this care for free are they all charging to some extent there are what are we doing to make yeah go ahead what we will pay for is the startup cost and some of the um getting supply costs getting the startup costs through the rent making sure there's different things there on the operational costs that's up to the provider and there will be a charge to the parents now we will be able to provide some assistance to parents depending on income and we have programs in place to provide that assistance uh depending on income i can get the sliding scale for you uh for income eligibility matter of fact we want to promote that so i will get that to you because we definitely want to promote that lola right right is there a concern i imagine this is the i think cc sap subsidy that is right uh right so anyone who's using um right so anyone who's eligible for that would also be eligible for um to use it for this program is there still a concern that i mean for a lot of folks um that still doesn't make child care affordable so we we could be looking at you know especially like middle-class families the lower middle-income families um who suddenly have to pay for child care um when they use to send their kids to public school for free yeah i mean look uh this initiative is not um you're absolutely right and they used to provide that their um uh you know going to school five days a week would be through your property it's not free by the way um you're paying it through your taxes but um would there be an extra cost yeah there will be an extra cost we're trying to minimize that extra cost as we're designing this system are there issues of inequity that you just mentioned uh this initiative frankly is not intended to solve the pre-existing challenges that the system is facing rather is just intended right now to provide additional capacity around the state based on the need we're seeing from the data and the conversations we're having with the communities and and that's what we're trying to do we're trying to minimize the inequity through the various payment programs that we have but nonetheless um this program probably won't solve all the inequities that were in the in the program before the pandemic hit fine that's all for me thanks you for daily express yeah good day this question uh is reflected on the uh the uh covid outbreak at the prison down in uh mississippi and believe it is where we have a couple hundred romances uh imprisoned and incarcerated are there going to be any type of plan to move them back to vermont um i think secretary smith can answer that but uh you know we're having internal discussions about what we do moving forward but at this point in time we wouldn't displace them from where they are actually they're getting through the whole period of time we're almost uh two cycles through so they're better off where they are than coming back here and possibly infecting others so at this point we're not bringing them back anytime soon but we're having the conversations about what we do in the future secretary smith thank you thank you for the question just to give everyone an update we have 219 total vermonters in the facility in um talahachi um county correctional facility in a mississippi uh total inmates that uh were positive during the outbreak down there within that facility was 185 that's about 84 percent of the vermont population a good news report uh the total positives that are in recovery that means they're almost ready to go back to the general population is 172 we have three pods down there we have positives we have negatives and we have in recovery and those three pods um will uh that one pod will disappear probably because people in recovery will move into the general population uh we had we had four total that refused to take the test down there and they're they're uh treated separately and and quarantined separately one inmate um i i think i mentioned a week or two ago that one inmate was uh was hospitalized uh with covid had that in may has been uh released there are two inmates in the room the infirmary uh this includes the inmate uh who was previously hospitalized there are no other inmates that have uh concerning symptoms uh we are doing a lot of things now to make sure that they get tested on a regular basis those that are negative get tested on a regular basis and three months from now testing all the vermonters that are down there if they're still down there you ask the question are we looking at bringing vermonters back i think it's going to be in this covid environment it's going to be a little bit challenging in order to do that but we're looking at it nonetheless to see if there's any possibility of bringing some or all of those um uh patients back last last press conference on friday they asked uh i was asked the question are we going to renew the contract uh with core civic down there if we renew it it will only be a one-year renewal and we'll look at alternatives in the meantime we're examining internally uh alternatives right now to see if we uh renew that contract i will say it's challenging to bring all 219 back we may be able to bring partial amounts of that population back uh over the course of the this year very good thank you very much thank you a new record for us two hours and 25 minutes thank you very much for tuning in and persevering um but we'll be back on uh friday for our modeling and uh determining the uh vast majority of people that can come to vermont um safely so thank you very much