 Our two end reports are available on our website for easy access and here I'd like to go into a little bit more specifics to justify our request to not be covered under the Act. The Sustainable Jobs Fund program was created by an Act of the Vermont Legislature and signed into law effective April 20, 1995. VEDA in that bill was tasked with incorporating a non-profit corporation for the purpose of administering the Sustainable Jobs Fund program. IRS non-profit incorporation status was received in March 1996 under the organization name of the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund, Inc. Thus, the VSJF has been a separate legal entity with its own IRS legal status as of March 1996 and has operated as such since that time. As an independent 501C3 organization, we are managed by 11 member board directors. Eight of these directors are independently selected, while two are members of the administration and one is appointed by the governor who may or may not be a member of the administration. Currently, three out of the 11 board members are members of the administration. All board members attend quarterly board meetings, receive a written and or report from our audit firm, JMM and associates each fall. They participate in strategic planning work with the staff and approve the organization's annual budget and perform the legal, the standard legal and fiduciary responsibilities required under IRS rules for non-profit organizations. In fiscal 19, only 27% of the VSJF's budget was provided by state sources in the form of grants and contracts, whereas 73% comes from federal and philanthropic funding sources fees for service, income, corporate sponsorships and events. Any state funding support is requested or applied for and is not guaranteed year over year. So thus we are not a line item as a standalone within the state budget. Grant agreements and or contracts are put in place between the VSJF and the granting or contracting agency which outlines the work plan as it was proposed by the Sustainable Jobs Fund, not as dictated by the state entity. Interim and final grant reports and contract reports are required by state agencies providing the grant support and or contracts to the VSJF and thus these documents are already publicly available if requests are made to the appropriate agency. VSJF makes its audited financial statement and IRS form 990 publicly available upon request and via the website GuideStar. Interim reports for the VSJF can be found on our website in two different locations. So up until fiscal 15, the VSJF did provide a set of our audited financial statements to the auditor of accounts in the office of budget and management for the purposes of inclusion in the state's CAFR. And that was a historical thing that was set up way back at the beginning of the founding of the Sustainable Jobs Fund and at that time we were considered to be a component unit of the state for this predates me so I don't really understand how that determination was made but back then I think because Vita had been originally assigned to set the jobs fund up as an independent nonprofit that for what and also because at that time the board prior to prior to July 1, 2011 all board members were in fact appointed by the governor but and I'll get to that in a minute but basically as of July 1, 2011 statute was changed so that our board is now designated as two administration officials plus one seat by the governor and eight independent board members. So as of 2011 at fiscal, fiscal 12 that governance structure changed very dramatically. So in that year of 2015 the executive director myself became aware of significantly outdated language that had been included in CAFR including erroneously listing our address as 58 states reach states which have not been the case since 2002. So we then contacted John Becker at the department of budget and management and he updated him on VSJF statute change in 2011. He then decided to undergo a review of the VSJF statute vis-a-vis the state and issued a finding that as of fiscal 16, VSJF is no longer considered a component unit of the state of Vermont. As of fiscal 16, VSJF no longer supplies its financial audit to state for inclusion in the CAFR. Had Mr. Becker known of the jobs fund statute change in 2011 we believe this determination would have been made shortly thereafter and I have attached in the my written testimony a copy of the letter from Mr. Becker and his justification for why he determined what he determined. So as a small staff of 10 without any standard administrative support it would fall on me the executive director to manage all public information requests. We just don't have the capacity to manage additional requests outside of what we already make available. Doing so would represent a significant burden that we do not believe is justified given the amount of information and reporting already provided by us as an independent organization both to the state and to with those couple of documents that I mentioned that we all already make available. S305 also tries to subject any subsidiary of the Sustainable Jobs Fund to the Public Records Act. So state for the record VSJF does not own a subsidiary entity. The Sustainable Jobs Fund has a minority equity investment in the flexible capital fund L3C the Flex Fund which is a separate for-profit company and we have a 21.67 percent ownership stake in that company. As a for-profit company it's own with its own governance board of managers 38 accredited investors and 16 for-profit portfolio companies the Flex Fund would be exempt from Act 1 VSA squiggle 317C9 which applies to confidential business information. Additionally the Flex Fund is certified as a community development financing institution by the U.S. Treasury which requires for certification purposes that there is no state control over the flexible capital funds decision-making. All decisions about the Flex Fund are made exclusively by the Flex Fund's board of managers so sort of further justification that that entity meaning this the flexible capital fund L3C should not should also not be subject to a public records act because they are a for-profit company and anything that might get requested of them would be exempted from the Act. The VSJF has a contractual agreement with the Flex Fund to provide fund management services for a fee-for-service arrangement. VSJF is an organization VSJF as an organization and all its board members and staff have signed confidentiality agreements that prevent it from disclosing financial information about the flexible capital fund or information about the funds investors or portfolio companies again because of trade secrets and traditional business exemptions. If the VSJF were subject to the Public Records Act any flexible capital fund financial audits in its possession would be protected from public disclosure by one VSA squiggle 317C9 which applies to confidential business information which gives its ownership to an opportunity to obtain business advantage over competitors. The Vermont Supreme Court has applied this exemption to private financial information Springfield Terminal Railway Company versus Agency of Transportation at all. The VSJF the flexible capital funds financial audits and management letters are confidential business information belonging to the Flex Fund and it's not something that the stable jobs fund would be able to disclose if requested that's that's what we contend and there's a list of some of the other exemptions that we believe would apply to the flexible capital fund so as I mentioned did provide the letter from John Becker from 2017 along with his justification why he does not think the stable jobs fund is the opponent unit of the state which is just one piece of our reasoning for why we would thus not be considered a public agency and thus should not fall into the state's public records act. Therein lies my testimony. Thank you. Any questions? Randy? Oh, Randy. I'm thinking of Randy Brogher because he put Brian newer. I was on the bill. You were on the bill also. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So I know, I like when you refer to the squiggles. Here I never know. Exception. I know. Exception. Oh, is that what that is? I believe tigers in the section. I'm so glad it's all these long term serving. I don't know. I think it should be called a squiggle. It's what it means. I guess I would just like to ask Tucker what is the definition of a state entity? Well, if we look at the, I think that we need to look at what the bill proposes because it expands. It expands it dramatically. So, yeah. The bill mentions a stable jobs fund, but it's meant to go much further than that. Well, yeah. It specifically calls that out, but it also considerably expands what a public agency is here. I mean, it would be. A public agency, not a public entity. It would be, in my opinion, Tucker, would you join us? Thank you all. Yes, thank you. Would you join us? Because the way I read this, it would be anybody who has a contract to do a state function, which could be pipe industries paving the road because they, they perform a state function through keeping the highways. So it would be anybody who has any contract with the state who we cover. Am I wrong in reading it that way? Good afternoon. Tucker Anderson with the Office of Legislative Counsel. That would be an incorrect reading of the bill. Okay. So the definition of public agency and the way that it is extended here, it would apply to any person that first, let's deal with the relationship to the state, that is through a contract that would be one venue, through a directive and statute or rule, that would be another way. Performing a governmental function, that is one way you would get captured, administering public funds or implementing a state or local program. So performing, administering. If you're doing any one of those things, performing the governmental function, administering public funds, implementing a state or local program here. The relationship, again, is that you are doing this pursuant to a directive and statute, administrative rule, then we deal with the local set, ordinance, or contract with the state or its political subdivisions. You heard some testimony, what it seems like months ago, but I think was just only a few weeks ago, about the governmental function test that has been applied in two superior court decisions in Vermont. Vermont Information Technology Leaders was one of the nonprofits that that test was applied to. The other was the Corrections Corporation of America. That test has been used and applied in a morality of states to identify when a nonprofit entity is acting as a governmental, performing governmental function. The test that is applied is typically a balancing test, and there are four factors that those courts look at. They weigh them, but ultimately what they are trying to identify is, is this entity performing a governmental function on behalf of the state or political subdivision, right? And should they be subject to same transparency laws? And the policy decision that is typically made there is, should the state or its political subdivisions be capable of avoiding those transparency laws by delegating its authority to a non-governmental entity? Some states, and one that I know for certain and in particular, Connecticut, have taken this test and put them into either their Freedom of Information laws or their public breakfast acts. That is kind of the walkthrough, the definition, how it might apply. As far as particular objections to the application in the bill of the Public Records Act specific entities, there is an argument that even without that subdivision in section three of the bill, it would add the sub-sections that apply the Public Records Act to the Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund that the fund would still be covered by the definition of public agency as presented in the bill. Right, right. You don't need the follow-up. I just have a, you said non-profit. I don't see that anywhere in here. It doesn't say non-profit. It says any person and a person is a corporation. So if the town of Putney hires Joe Blow to pay, to do some road work on East Putney Falls Road, they are now subject to, Joe Blow's company is now subject to public records. If they need one of those three. Well, yes, they're doing, they're doing on the governmental function or they're administering public funds. Well, they're not administering public funds, but they are doing a governmental function, which is to take care of the roads. That is a governmental function. It's one of the few that municipalities have, or, and they're doing it by contract. So I don't, I don't see who this doesn't cover. In, I mean, the expansion, it's huge. I don't think we cover the arts council, the BSL. Who does it not cover? That is a great question. The press. No, they are doing a governmental function because, because I've got, isn't the press informing people about what's happening? And it does add a governmental function is to inform people what's going on. And so, oh, yes. Okay, we'll extend it to, they're right. And the bill has introduced governmental function is not defined. There is ambiguity there. There's the potential that it could be tied to another phrase that has less ambiguity, which would be the business of the public agency, right? That is a phrase that we deal with quite a bit in the Public Records Act, and we're dealing with the definition of public records, records that are produced in the course of agency business. So if all these other people aren't part of an agency, but are doing it under a contract, they're, they're contracting with the town of Putney, which is a political sum division. And they're doing business for that public agency. And they are doing a governmental function, which is maintaining the roads. One of the very few that select boards are allowed to do because we like to tell them what else they can do. I just have to get that little ad in there. That's called a product placement. 2291 subdivision four. So, so they would be covered. I will, for the second time in the context of public records refrain from answering hypotheticals. I, I realize that. But the, it definitely is a broad expansion of this bill. And I, I, I'm just curious where the verb is in 2a. Well, in the actual current statutory definition of public agency means an agency board department, commission, committee, branch, instrumentality, or authority of the state or anything. It doesn't have a verb. That does what? Those are all direct objects. I know, but it doesn't direct it doing what that is, makes it a public agency. They don't have to be doing any of them. These are just who they are. They don't have to be doing government functions. But they don't pay doing government functions. I don't think it needs to say, well, that's perfect. I don't think it needs to say doing government function because it says it is an agency board, department, commission, or authority of the state or any agency. So it's already okay. It's doing government functions. One would assume. And an instrumentality. Just remind me, give us an example of an UVM. UVM is a fantastic example. The emergency service districts all throughout the state. State colleges are an instrumentality. I'm more fuzzy on the state colleges than I am in UVM. VSAC is an instrumentality. VSAC is a potentially complicated example of an entity that is formed by statute that may fall under the definition here of public agency and to be. I'm not entirely certain whether they fall under the definition in two ways. Once upon a time, the Office of Legislative Council was asked, I believe by this committee, to start identifying every time in statute that an entity, non-governmental entity, we'll say a person was established in statute to perform government functions. And the list is, I'll say, a minimum of 16 entities. VSAC may be one of them. The Humanities Council is created in statute. The state librarian was given authority to incorporate non-profits to perform certain functions. VSAC was created in statute. I don't recall that one, but it's entirely possible. Okay, does anybody else have a question? I don't usually. I wouldn't normally contradict Tucker. I'm not contradicting him. But when I read it, it does seem really broad to me. So I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm just saying, if we have a person who reads this, it seems like because, well, we have the same job stuff that opens up all cameras. Yeah. I understand you don't agree, but I just think it feels that way to me. If I gave that feeling or said that I don't agree that it's broad, I apologize and retract. I didn't say that. He just wouldn't tell me who wasn't covered. I think it sounds to me like everybody's covered. Yeah, it sounds like it took me that way too. If you do a government function or administer public funds, or implement a state or local program. If it would be helpful to the committee, I can come back with the statute in Connecticut. That deals with the governmental function test and then incorporates it into their records act. And I can bring an example from North Carolina, where all records relating to the administration of public funds are brought under their records act. What does the administration of public funds mean? The actual management and custodianship of funds. So the reason I'm hesitant to jump into your hypothetical is because I'm not sure if Joe's plowing service was granted in that contract, the ability to actually manage and designate where the funds are going. If they are just being given the money to perform the actual function, I'm not sure that it would fall under administering those funds. But it does fall under a government function, and therefore it's not ands. I'll provide a more concrete example of something that would certainly fall under this definition. If a Vermont municipality takes their sidewalk maintenance fund for a fiscal year and gives those funds to an entity and says implement a program to clean all the streets, and then that entity starts giving the money out to clean the sidewalks and streets, that would certainly fall under this. Because it would be dispersing state funds. Right. It would be performing that governmental function of administering the funds, determining where that money goes, executing those contracts. It would be an act of custodianship that would fall more in line with those tests for governmental function. Rain in the state budget. Well, nobody will contract with the state. Exactly. That's the way to go. Rain in the budget big time that we're going to pass this. That one's going to want to take state money. Yeah, any other comments or? I am not supportive of expanding this at the moment, but I'm not a big fan of this language. Anthony? The way, I mean the way it's written, the way I perceive it to be written. To a qualifier. It seems like it does seem very broad and would affect a lot of different things. And I think if we were going to go down this road, it would take a lot more discussion than we're going to have over the next couple of weeks. I mean, I don't support going in this direction the way it's laid out. Rodney? Rodney? I'm still on my pill, so I'll save life with support. And you don't. You feel not supportive. I am not supportive of this. It's drafted. I actually am not not supportive. I oppose it. Yeah, well, that's what I was trying to say, but I was trying to de-gen ourselves. Not for being against ourselves. But it just seems so broad to me that any, I mean, I originally thought that there was language in here that said if it's an agency, if it's an entity that is created by the state and is controlled by the state, which I think vital is, is they were created by the state. Well, they, okay, I guess they weren't created by the state. I was on health and welfare when they were created and worked with Kevin Mullen around the creation of vital and giving them the authority to do it. Now, we might have had in the bill in the legislation that there was to be this entity, and then somebody came and said, we're that, we'll fulfill that entity. But it was a function that was created by the state. I think the fact that we're sort of these examples are popping up and each example raises kind of questions is an indication that this would need a lot more discussion. I mean, I don't think the, I'm not necessarily totally opposed to like what it's trying to do. It's just that I think it's doing a lot more than it's pretending to do, or I actually feel it is. And again, I really don't know. And we have to hear from, I mean, I think at this point in the session, your point earlier, is a good one because we have to hear and understand more fully the impact of anybody taking state money, what impact that would have. If we give money to the guy who's going to fix East Putney Brook Road, which actually I live on East Putney Brook Road. Anyway, I don't know whether it means that person would be chemical, would be subject to this law only while they're doing that job. And let's say it's a six month contract, they would, they'd be over the subject of public records just for that six month contract, or does it be, it's not going because they did it once and they might do it again. Just a lot of questions. I'm not saying if they answer what I'm saying, that's one more sort of question that I'm floating around. Thank you for not making me answer that question. I'm sure you would have a good answer. Which is 251 Club, you might even drive that number. That's true. Chris, you were near for the discussion, but it was called Flying Crowd Ranch, by the way. Oh. I don't know if it's still there. We discussed it based on what our last discussion, my position hasn't changed. I wouldn't support the bill as it's currently. Okay. When you only elaborate more reasons for, for why not, in this current formulation, the idea of access and transparency is always attractive. What do you do to the operations of the entities that you bring in to that kind of requirement? Yeah, I actually thought it only referred, when I was thinking about it, to organize things that were actually created by the state and controlled by the state. That's. So, I'm just for clarification. If we don't take it up, and it goes back on the wall, are we, are we finished with public records? Well, we can, if there, we can do one or two things, we can do that. Or we could do a strike all and put anything in here that we felt was appropriate for because it is the, it is the only bill that we have that refers to public records. So we could do either, either one. And so what I think we should find out then is if there are other things that should go into other suggestions about public records, the one that we had sent, we heard from Chris Herrick and the dispensaries. And they are actually putting that someplace else in a bill that deals specifically with dispensaries. They're going to put in there about allowing the working, they've been working, I think with Laura Pelosi, about the language about how, when complaints are filed and substantiated, that they would be subject to public records requests. But that, they felt that more appropriate to go in that other bill. So. And that was the only other issue that I could recall. Well, we had a discussion about several other issues, any more questions whether we want to make statutory changes or whether we want to do a letter recommending best practices to the Secretary of Administration. I thought that was, we talked about that. I thought we said that we weren't going to, we weren't going to define best practices. Because I don't, and the other discussion that we had is how one of the challenges that I think all our departments and agencies face is not only each one that has different needs and different unique aspects to them. And, but it would be wonderful if, in my ideal world, the Tanya, the archivist would work with each department and agency to design the best and simplest way to collect public records and then use them. And she's on that, but I think that needs more encouragement because not everybody's done it. And the other piece is we really have to put our money where our mouth is. If we support public access to public records, we have to then finance it in the budget because one of the reluctances, one of the challenges we face is balancing the time it takes our public servants to research and find stuff in particularly very high-paid ones to find this material and make it available. And we are not currently, probably I would guess, in most departments and agencies budgeting for that. And that is a, how do we push departments and agencies to actually budget for it? And just like we budget for elections, that's what we consider the cost of doing business in the state. If this is the cost of doing business, we have to own it financially. And then we have to, so how do we encourage state government to own it and budget it and actually adopt best practices in each department and agency? And that's, I think, our question still that we have. Right? I thought that was, and the question is how do we do that? Do we do that with a bill or do we do that with a letter or do we not do anything and just talk about it and encourage it on the sidelines? I'm not sure. I mean, you're right. You're raising the right question. I'm not sure you have the answers. I would favorite a letter. I don't think we need to do it statutorily. Asking Tonya to work with departments to come up with a plan. Yeah. And I'd love to see it. I mean, I think we need to see action on that, particularly given the court's decision. And I think that would inform any further work that we would do on it. But I think, anyway, I think those two pieces really need work, best practice for collection and distribution and budgeting for it. And then people will feel and they'll own it more as this is, we need to do this and we have the money to do it. So on the budgeting, you're talking about for records, implement the best practice of records, not necessarily access, freedom of information. Both not implementing best practices for storing and maintaining records, but also the time it takes a lawyer or a very high-paid exempt person to go and find it. So we talked about this a week ago or so. It was like the idea of if we knew how much it cost, we might decide to write that check, making records free. And it was part of how would you ever answer the question if you didn't know how much it cost. And then I thought that you had met with the secret administration and it was going to be such a burdensome research request that there was, I gave up on doing that. I just talked to her and I don't know. I think that, here's my feeling about that, is that if an agency feels that we shouldn't have to put it in their budget, if an agency feels that it's going to cost them $100,000 from their past experience and it costs them approximately $100,000 to comply with public records requests, then they should put that in their budget. That's something that they should do. They should put, if the agency says, we already covered that in our budget, we are okay. We don't need to, it seems to me that that's a responsibility of the agencies themselves is to put that in their budget. They're not asking for appropriations, suggests, and they're providing service already. They've just taken it out as a cost of doing business already. And many of them do and some of them I think that's the question. Is there not already in statute, I seem to recall a couple years ago, that there's supposed to be a contact person or someone in each agency that acts as a liaison for people requesting public records? Yes. So I don't know what else you could do. And we have this little audit. We can encourage them to keep doing this audit and getting more people to level three. Yes, given most of them. Level one. I'm assuming that level one is the worst. So one of the things that she said was that agency of human services has been the best, one of the best in complying. And the reason for that is they have assigned somebody that actually works with her as a records something, something or other. She had a name for it, whatever she is. And that they actually have that person. And if you look at them, there are a couple, there are twos and threes here. There's nobody in the agency of human services. Agency of human services, yeah. That is a one. So clearly what we need to do is make sure that those other agencies have a similar, assign a similar person to. Of course, Madam Chair, the question for me is how do we get them? How do we encourage them to get there? To freeze. Do we have a competition? I mean, how do we get them to freeze? We could have the legislative records marathon. I mean, how do we get them? We could put something in statute that they, everybody buys such and such a date. Everybody has to have a records management. They can't just have the point person that they have to actually have this, this person. Or we can do it by letters. Sure. For the record, Tris Winters, Deputy Secretary of State. And I appreciate the committee's focus on records management. And again, it's a big part of the puzzle here. It's a key to making us more responsive as state agencies to records or requests that we know where things are. It's easy to find them. I did just want to add that there is a requirement in statute already for reporting into a public records system. The agency of administration is in charge of that. So they're collecting information. They revamped it about a year ago. So they've got some better data now. I did speak to Secretary Young about this yesterday. And she says they'll have some better data to report on. They don't necessarily segregate out what kinds of costs. You know, they have how much is charged for records requests. But they're not separating out, you know, that's, is that time of the copier? Is that cost of the paper? Is that a high level research, you know, exempt person, as you were talking about, who's having to redact some of this information? But I don't know that you can get your hands or arms around this or head around this. Do you know exactly what those costs are? So that's one piece of the puzzle. We have varying success with agencies, as Tanya has said. So I really want to, they realize that records management is a benefit for them. It's going to make their lives easier. And cost less. And so the investment is worth it. But it's almost never the top priority unless you have a position dedicated to it. So there is a records officer designated for every agency, the point person who's responsible for complying with responding to records requests. I met for the Secretary of State's office. Every agency has one. But those are different than the people who are managing the records day to day, making sure you have a policy on what you do with that piece of paper or email when it comes across to your desk. So I'm trying to think, are there ways that you could help us be a little bit more pushing into those agencies and doing their records management better? It's already in statute. A lot of this is already in statute. It's just a matter of changing the culture. The resources are necessary. Some of these agencies just don't have a person dedicated to it, don't have the time. That's a big piece. Some of it is resource allocation. So would it be helpful then for us to do a letter in encouraging the work that's already begun and encouraging more of it and, in fact, identifying what they're, if they were doing it at a three, what would actually cost those departments so that we can actually get state government to budget for it? I think you referred to what Tanya has said has worked really well at AHS is we have a position we embedded in the agency. That position just focuses. It's your position. You put it in, they were, eventually the agency absorbs the position until we get another position. And then we're done with AHS. I think we're working on it with another agency now, which one slips to my mind. But that's been a good model so far. What if we gave you three more positions this year? That would be ideal. I mean, then you can implant them into the agencies. You train them up in records management within the agency. They take care of a lot of the procedures, the issues that are with records management. The agency then takes on the position. So then you get through the agencies faster. I mean, if you have more positions, if you have the positions, it's another half a million dollars. That's what happened I want to say four or five years ago when the secretary of administration was Justin Johnson. We were kind of begging for these positions to do more to do more records management. And we got the three positions at that time from the pool. They needed a determination that we really do need to focus on records management. It's investment. It's going to save us money in the long run. It saves you the legal liability. It saves you the right people chasing down records that they can find. So I do know that I spoke with Rebecca Kelly yesterday and I do know that they are working on this thing. So maybe we can convince them to take three more positions out of the pool and give them to you. Because the other the issue that people have been promoting is an ombudsman. But for my part, I would rather have those positions embedded into the agencies and then and see if that makes it any difference than have one person as an ombudsman because it won't be one person as an ombudsman. Then they'll have to be staffed people around it and then they'll have to have a desk and then a full moon. You know, you know how that works. That was your Minnesota. I didn't mean to do that. That's scary. So where are we? We're looking like a letter. I mean or a communication memo or something. I think that to the secretary of the agency of the administration encouraging a rollout of embedding further people that clearly when you embed these people that they it shows progress in public records management. But also I think the second piece of that is taking on board what budget impact it has for us to incorporate public records really as a part of doing the state's business. And what does that mean financially to the state? We could get you a page or two on how the program has rolled out in the AHS and why would they get successful and how we would impose it in other agencies. Well, what they allocate to it would be very interesting. And then what I would ask is for input from the people out there in the world who actually make these requests and want them a lot from the media, I would suggest is in your ideal world, which are the three, if we got these three positions, which are the three agencies that would actually benefit the most from having them first because they're going to have to make some decisions. Or not say. But where is the best place to put them in terms of who currently is the most reluctant or calcitant? Whatever. Are lots of options on this list. Yeah, but there are some that may be much harder to get public records from. I mean, we heard it the thing the other night is that many agencies, there are some agencies, their answer is an automatic no. That's the first response. It's like people applying for disability with social security, no. They all get a no right away. And then social security depends on them. But about 40% of them when they hear no, they don't appeal. Then on the second round, they again deny a whole set of people. So in the end, if you had 100 people applying, you might have four people that end up actually getting it, even though the other 96 probably were all involved. Yes. That's the way social security works. It's an automatic no the first time, except in very egregious. I mean, probably if you lost both arms and both legs, they might say yes, but probably not. Are we presuming, if we go down this road, that we're making an assumption or do we have to reconfirm the fact that what the court, the recent court decision said, you know, about free inspection. I always learn about that too. I think the court decision stand is there. I mean, I mean, I, it is there. I just don't know whether we, I, I still feel it. I feel a need in the sense to like make sure that we've confirmed it at the lips of the body, so that the administration will continue to take it seriously. I know some people think it's unnecessary. I'm not going to argue unnecessarily, but I just, I have this thing that makes me wonder whether people backslide whether the court decision is there or not. Well, they interpreted the language the way it is. So the way the language is right now is what the court says. It's, that's the way it is. I don't know that, I mean, we can't make it clear because they've already said this. We've interpreted your language. Yeah, but on the other hand, the Attorney General seems to be interpreting it differently than the administration. That's not missing something. I don't know that, he's resisting it. I don't know that he's misinterpreting it. I think he's just, he's interpreting it different. It seems to me like he is. Like the court said this and the Attorney General said it means this and the administration said it means this. I think we all know what we think it means, but it seems to me like the Attorney General has a different perspective on what it means. Oh, I thought that he just said he disagreed with it. No, no, I really need to interpret it. So the question is around what inspection means. Is that what he's misinterpreting? I don't want to speak for the Attorney General's office. I think that when they talk about cost of complying, they are including research review redaction. When other agencies are saying, no, it's time, and the Secretary of State's interpretation has always been, it's time spent actually making the copy. You know, so it's a different interpretation. Right. And there's a whole lot of time before you get to make the copy. The copy's like the tail end of the process. And I think the other piece that the Attorney General is talking about is when you take out your camera and take a picture. That's the difference between, even if you're sitting here inspecting, it's all free, all free, all free. And then when you go like this, suddenly there's a charge for all the work that went into getting that in front of you. See, that you said more clearly what I was feeling like you're thinking. I think if that's the case, then I think, personally, I think we need to do something to make it clear. I do think it's, for the most part, not a problem for other agencies. It's the Attorney General's office. Right. And I just am reluctant to have us dive in and open this up because the existing law would interpret the way it is for most agencies. If the Attorney General's office is an outlier here and is looking at themselves as something different because they're a law firm for the state, then maybe that's where we should focus and see if we can figure that piece out when everyone else seems to be under the current law. So you think there's a role for us now, clarifying? I think there should be. I think, I mean, if every agency, most agencies, essentially every agency is doing it this way, the Attorney General is doing it in another way. I think it's incumbent upon us to make clear which way we think it should be. I mean, it doesn't seem right that we would sit side with the Attorney General is doing something that we all think is a noxious interpretation of the law. So I want to hold my question for you, Anthony, for just a second, but I think the Chair wants to read the Statute. What is the title to 360, did you say? I was saying 316 has not been amended recently enough to be in the pocket park, but it's one PSA chapter 3 sub chapter 5 or chapter 5 sub chapter 3, but it starts one PSA section 350. But, you know, as we think about it, it's not just the administration, it's also every police department, it's every, you know, it's municipal. I mean, it's on and beyond just state governments, it's municipal government, it's lunch council, it's JFO, it's police departments. Because if we all page, and a lot of people think that providing this information is the cost of doing business, you don't charge for it. And yet, it seems as if there are going to be more instances where the Attorney General's office charges people for it. Well, if there's a cost, I think part of their point is there is a cost to doing business. Sure. And who is paying, if the taxpayer is paying for it, then it needs to be allocated to a department or an agency so that they can pay for it. So they can come back next year, it's going to late this year, they can come back next year with a budget request. When they put in their budget, they would add a amount of dollars to help make sure they can deal with this cost of doing business around public records. Right, and I think that's one of the things we could be encouraging. And reminding every group that falls under the public records law, that this is the cost of doing business, they need the budget for it and they need to figure out how they're going to pay for it. In addition to having a great plan for how to manage the records. Well, sure, if it's a cost of doing business, that encourages them to be as efficient as possible, perhaps the best management of possible public records. Right. But if they think they're just going to send the bill to citizens, then they're just going to send it to citizens. Part of the reason they're doing that is it's costing them money that they do not budget for it, I think. Well, I don't know that they don't budget. They must be budgeting and some of the energy that they're providing the service for it. I don't think so. I think this is part of the chafing about this. Yeah. Have you found what you're looking for? Yeah, I did. And I remembered it very differently because it says, and it's very interesting the way, when we wrote this, I think we didn't think very clearly about it or carefully because it says that you may also charge and collect for the costs of staff time associated with complying with a request for a copy of the public record. The time directly involved in complying with the request exceeds 30 minutes. So when, but then down here it says the actual cost, which is only the cost of the paper and stuff. But so I have always been under the assumption that the cost included, the cost to produce the document, to get to the research and stuff. And for the life of me, I can't figure out why the Secretary of State's office, and then it says in here that they should do, establish a chart. And they have a chart and it says if you're charging for clerical time, it's this much per minute. If you're charging for managers time, it's this much. If you're charging for attorneys time, it's this much. Per minute. Who on earth would have their attorneys standing at the coffee machine making copies? So they must have, I mean, nobody in their right mind is going to do that. So why would you have, you'd have your clerical staff make the copies. The attorney goes and finds it and does the work and applies. Right. And then gives it to a clerical staff to copy, right? So why would we have the time for the attorneys time if we weren't supposed to be charging for that in the first place? That is the cost of complying with a request. Yes. And I think that is what means for you. So I think for the life of me, can't figure out why the Secretary of State would have made that chart. Well, how old is that? How old is that? Well, it was, it's from right here, but it doesn't make any difference. Because if it says here, it's only the cost of making the copy itself. Then why would the Secretary of State make that chart? One of the things that we are doing is pulling the APA files from when that rule was put in place. So we've got kind of the discussion of what we were intending there, the public comment that came in, how it might have been modified. I think that gives some clues as to what was intended there. I can see the way that you're reading it. And I think I understand why the Attorney General's office has interpreted that. Because I was here on this committee at the time. So what year was it? I think 1996 was when the rule went into place. Oh, which rule? The uniform fee schedule for the Secretary of State's office that includes those. But say it was redone ever since then. It might have actually happened before that. And I think it was redone in 2000. The cost, the cost is not in the copy. The cost is in the research, the review, the time. But the policy, the slippery slope is if you don't manage your records well. Right, right. You're going to be very faster if you manage your record. But if you aren't asking them to do it by date certain and budget for it, and be realistic about what this cost of doing business for the state is, it's going to continue to be interpreted individually. Well, it also says they can charge if the agency agrees to create a public record. And I'm not sure what that means to create a public record. Does that mean to look at the record and to redact? I think it would. Yeah. That would come into play when the requester is asking for a record that does not exist. But the agency may have information that could lead to the creation of that record. So let's say the Office of Legislative Council had a master's spreadsheet with information that might be responsive to the request. And the requester says, well, I want all the information from that spreadsheet and some associated information put into something new. And the agency says, okay, we will do that for you. But we're going to charge you for the time in the excess of 30 minutes, and materials used, and the IT person pulling that origin data from the database and creating this new record for you. And how is that different than if they agree to provide the public record in a non-standard format? All of these changes came from the 2005 report, which originated in this committee, on the complications of electronic data and records for the Public Records Act. And the non-standard format language comes into play when you are, for example, keeping your data in an SLS file. The individual says, I want an PDF or I want you to print it out and give it to me. Sure, I'll give it to you in that non-standard format, but you're in vain. Okay, so where are we? Confused again. I thought we had to figure it out. I was all in favor of basically doing nothing, change anything, sending the letter, and to Ellen's situation, obviously, getting out of the board, take her off the 305. So that's where I am. But to end to this point, that's what I was going to ask you the question. How would you clarify then what's the phrase that we want, or the phrase that's put together that we want to make it clear? Well, I'm not sure. I mean, I would ask, talk for that question, but honestly, I mean, I think you take a line from the court decision and be clear about what it means to us. You know, the court said this, in plain English, it means this. Right, clarifying. The legislation says you can't charge for inspection. Right, therefore, it's the legislature's position that you cannot charge citizens' fees to develop the information, do the research, do the redaction, etc. You could, in fact, possibly charge them for making copies, if that's the case. But in other words, we would just say in English what we believe the court said. I'm not saying very well myself at the moment. Well, it's clarifying what copying means and what inspections. But they did not address the issue of whether you could charge staff time to redact and get this record. If it's going to be copied. They didn't address that. I mean, English is okay. I think that's okay. Yes, Christ. So, given that the Attorney General said one of the sixth-right executive officers in the state, what's the legal relationship between what we define and the operations of that office? They have any additional latitude that other offices don't have? I think we're too old. Because he's an executive officer of the state, directly in his own right. Is there any difference between how the rules apply to that office compared to any other agency office? Let's set aside the two parts of the discussion and answer them independently. First, on the public record side. No. No, right, several public agencies. On the records management side, and the teeth that come particularly from, well, I'm not sure if there are any of the archives and records administration, you have two independently elected executive officers. So, requiring one independently elected officer to comply with the demands of another would create some serious government operations and communications. I want to figure out what we could say something directly to the Attorney General. Yes. One of the things that was pointed out that the forum last night by the Attorney General's office is that they are in the position of being the attorney to the state. To the attorney, they do do consumer protection and that kind of stuff, but they are, their main responsibility is to be the attorney to the state. So, when you're dealing with the relationship between them and an agency, that's an attorney-client privilege relationship because they are the attorney for that. Damien, I know you're waiting very, but you don't have to, we'll call you when. I'll just come back when Gail calls me, yeah. That's what she just waited for. Okay, good. I just said we need you. So, they see themselves in a slightly different position than the rest of the executive branch and the administrative branch because they are the attorney for the state. Right. But I don't see why that would affect their requirement to not charge. No, no, no. I'm not saying that. I'm saying that many of the requests that they feel they consider to be directed by an attorney-client privilege, that's what I'm saying. It has nothing to do with the charging or anything, but they see themselves in that slightly different position than the secretary of state doesn't represent. You know, if it's really a cost of doing business, which I think it is because we've already paid for those represents tax payers, so we shouldn't have to pay for them again to look at them or to have them copied or prepared or anything else. I mean, I don't see why, to me, there should be no charge for preparation or copying. I think the idea that you get into this thing where like, we're not going to charge you for pairing, but if you have to copy it, then we're going to charge you for preparing it. That makes no sense at all. Copies are not that expensive these days. So I would suggest that maybe Tucker bring us the wood. Was it Connecticut and North Carolina? Connecticut and North Carolina? Oh, good. Well, information, and we can look at that next week and see what. Is that okay? Sure. Is there any other information the committee would like on some of the other issues that you see in front of it? Well, maybe we could have, not for me necessarily, but maybe we could have either Secretary Young or Rebecca Kelly come in and talk to us about what they're doing. Sure. The other thing is, I think it would be great to get some real definitions on some things, because if we're going to clarify things for people, it would be great to get some definitions on things like inspections, not what that means. To me, that's okay. Or, you know, and why the words review and research and all the other stuff that's entailed in copying are not or inspections are not, you know, where are those ever described as we talk about public records? Well, Chris. Yes, the Secretary of State's office would love to bring you some legislative history, and some history on the rule so that you can see the similar conversations that have been put in this line, which was changed before. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Okay. But I think where we are is from the side. Right, sure. We have this, I know, but I think that this and open meeting laws are, they're always in flux, and they're always a balancing act. And as technology changes and things happen, or they remember when this rule was made, copying was 25 cents a sheet or something. And so copying actually had a cost, where it now has, you know, your extra credits is like completely different. Well, I'm dying. I'm going to use rub-on letters. And then we have, then we have, and Galway's suggestion here about clarifying that taking a picture of it was, if you inspect the taking a picture does not constitute copying. So we look at that language also. Exactly. Okay. All right. Is that where we are? Yep, it seems like it. Okay, good. We are going, thank you Tucker. Aren't you glad you're the public vertical guy now? Yes, and the records officer. Oh, you are? He is, he has to do all the public records requests. I just don't like to follow records requests. But this is the question I'm talking to you that would be interesting for us actually to understand for our own legislative council is how much time you guys budget for it. Well, you can't. We don't. Yes, we're going to, no. We're going to take, it's like a seven minute break. It gets paid in chocolate. It's all done in an hour time. Oh, that's very cost effective. We're going to, we're going to take a seven minute break here because we have to. Yes, indeed. I have to be. Okay. All right. Well, now we are dealing with a new bill that we're just absolutely clear on. Which one? 307, the finding arbitration bill. So where committee we, I believe have a couple choices here. We can do nothing with the bill. We can extend arbitration to the judiciary employees as they are state employees. We can extend it to the state colleges and we can extend it to UBM. So there are really kind of four issues here that four, four questions. And I would posit that the first one is probably, in my opinion, the least desirable outcome, which is do nothing. So where are we with the other, let's take judiciary first. And do it that way. Okay. You just want to yes or no? Well, I just want to know where we are kind of so that we can, yeah. I support including judiciary by arbitration. I do too. I do three, four. Five. Okay. Okay. So that's two sections that are. Okay. State colleges. I support including the state colleges by arbitration. I do too. Three. I do not. I do not. No. UBM? I support UBM as well. I support UBM as well. Me too. I do not. Yeah, I think it's the same as state colleges for me. I would just remind, well, that there's been this discussion about whether they're perhaps whether they're state employees or not. And my understanding is that they are state employees for purposes of collecting part to make them go off. Is that true? I mean, I assume they're included under the state employees labor relations act. So that's, so for purposes of collective bargaining, they're treated the same as state employees with the exception that when there's an agreement reached where the labor board has to sell the dispute and impose the agreement at the end. That agreement is not subject to a legislative appropriation agreements for the judiciary and for state employees are. But state colleges and UBM are not. So they would just clarify, they would go through the same process, but not as they prove that the legislation is the same. Right. So they have the same process throughout with the exception of this option of binding arbitration or labor board right now. And if they go all the way to the labor board and the labor board imposes the terms of the agreement or basically chooses one last best offer or the other, that's binding on the parties. And there's no question of the legislature having an override like there is with state employees where theoretically you could get the labor board's decision and you could say that's too much money where I'd go and appropriate this much less and then the parties have to go back to the drawing table within those constraints. That last case, so it's just a pay act in the end will govern exactly what you're saying? Theoretically the pay act. There's not money there, whatever the terms were, there's not enough money to fund it. Right, so theoretically you need the pay act to fund it. The, my understanding is that there have been times in the past where the pay act has not matched up entirely but the funding's been pulled from somewhere else to fully fund the agreement. So this, I believe before my time here, but I think if the legislature affirmatively said we funds cannot be used to fund that agreement, the parties would be forced to go back to the bargaining table and to meet the constraints that the legislature imposed, but I don't think that that has ever happened to the best of my knowledge. And with the state college as an example, they would not have that that's the decision making process they would just have to move the money. Yes, so they would have to raise tuition and fees or pull money out of the endowment or you know just fit it into the budget somehow. You know, whatever means that they have, if the employees win and it's more than the state college would like to pay, they just have to find a way to pay it at that point. But that's true whether they would find arbitration or not, we wouldn't be changing that. You wouldn't be changing that. They have six units already in yield in terms of that. Right, so you're not changing that, what this bill would change is just that option because we're binding arbitrations that have labor board and that's a policy decision. It doesn't change and it won't affect this sort of a callable legislative veto option. It won't affect that. But for purposes of negotiating, UVM and state colleges are included in the Labor Relations Act. They're included under the State Employees Labor Relations Act. So I don't know what the history of that is. I would say it's not uncommon in other states to have a variety of public employees under the State Public Employees Labor Relations Act and Vermont were somewhat unique in that we have six different public and quasi-public Employee Labor Relations Act. Most other states will have one and then subchapters that govern specialized employees like public safety employees or teachers or something like that, but they'll have sort of one large act that they all fall under. It's a less state power kind of in our situation where there's multiples and we have at least in my opinion a particularly high number of acts. So we have municipal employees, teachers, state employees, judiciary employees, and then the two quasi-publics which are the early care providers and the home care providers. So if we're going to do this I think we have to take more testimony from because we have not had anybody in here to speak for the, for or against the state employee that except for Heather is really the only person that's about for the state colleges and UVM. I thought we heard from Jeff at the beginning. We did and that was last year. Oh no it wasn't. Why should we serve her this year? Okay but I think we have to, I think we have to hear we have not heard anything from UVM. No, we have not heard anything from UVM and they, they have, so they have far four unions, is that right Heather? They have, yeah so we represent the full part-time faculty, teamsters represent these services and nine magical workers represent service and maintenance of three, I think that's the three unions. Do they have an adjunct union as well? Yeah they're with us. I was going to say all the adjuncts and lecturers are under Heather's umbrella. Yeah I did reach out to the other two, I did reach out to the teamsters and to the nine electrical workers and they weren't supportive of being included and they're available to testify by phone if they can't be any person. Okay so and then the professors are of course supposedly protected by tenure but we know that tenure is tenuous. And I would say of the full-time unit 45% are not tenure track faculty so it's you know it's pretty close to half and half on campus for a ten-year university. Okay so I guess we'll have to take, because I do think that if we're going to, that we need to hear from, UVM has asked that we hear from them from not the labor unions but from the UVM person and it would be the person who does their negotiating. I don't remember her name. Do you know Chris? Who does the negotiation do? For UVM they have a particular person that represents them I think. I think that's what Wendy said. Yeah thanks a lot thank you. I don't remember, I never knew who that was. So or we can just vote it out and hear the way it is with a minority vote. But I think we owe it to them to at least hear what they have to say. Yeah it would be a majority vote, it would be a majority vote. I mean I mean. It would just not be unanimous. Yeah. Just to be clear. I think it would just because we've heard of one side on the UVM side. Yeah right yeah all right. So we'll sketch them out for next week. Okay. Thank you baby. Thanks for your time. Okay well I guess that does today. My god he looks like it. Don't do our legislative reception manager. You're doing dinner again? Just upstairs. Oh is that today? Yes.