 All right, I see that we are now live on YouTube. Good afternoon, everybody. This is the Vermont State Senate Committee on Institutions. Today is May 7th, 2021. My name is Joe Benning, and I am the chair of the Senate Institutions Committee. We also have on with us today Senator Mazza from Grant. Yes, Grandiol, thank you. Senator Ingalls from Essex Orleans. Senator McCormick from Windsor, Senator Parrott from Franklin County. The conversations topic for the week has been what was originally sparked by the Freeman French Freeman report and our return to the state house. I wanna say a couple of things preliminarily to try to speed the conversation along because I've recognized that many people have been under the impression we are forced into making a choice between option A and option B as appears in that document. In fact, that document is not cast in stone by any stretch. If you read the very first paragraph, you will notice that it is couched in terms of COVID-19. COVID-19 is evaporating as we speak as a rationale for how we approach our reentry into the building. Zoom is always available in case COVID-19 rears its ugly head, but we are starting to change the narrative and recognize that COVID-19 will not be the driving force in the conversation, either today or when we return. The point behind that is I didn't want anybody to spend a lot of time exasperated like we had some folks earlier this week saying this is absolutely unacceptable and banging the gavel and all that stuff. The nutshell is we are opening the tip of the tip of the iceberg to talk with stakeholders about what they see as preferences for when we return to the state house. The Freeman French Freeman report does however spark conversation and that is wanted. We have an understanding that you folks are all stakeholders and part of the process, which is why we've sent out invitations to you to weigh in on whatever your thoughts are. It literally will become a round table conversation. That's okay, but I do recognize several of you have hard stops and need to get out of here as quickly as possible this afternoon. The other thing about all of this, I don't know how many of you have actually testified in committee lately, but we are on YouTube. We have an absolute unknown as to what our audience looks like on YouTube. For that reason, I try to keep all of this conversation at the 50,000 foot level, literally asking you as you identify yourselves to give a very brief biography on who you are and how you fit into the government process that is important for those people who are watching us for the first time and may not have ever had an opportunity to know what goes on in these kinds of meetings. With that, I am going to turn immediately to Karen Horner who's the first on my list and I do understand has a hard stop. Karen, again, if you are speaking and I hear you use a term that we are familiar with, but I don't suspect the audience may be, I may interrupt you and ask you to clarify as we go and for the rest of you witnesses, the same thing will apply. So Karen, welcome to Senate institutions and I'll leave the floor to you. Thank you very much, Senator. And thank you for inviting us in and thank you also for saying we're part of the process, not part of the problem. My name is Karen Horner. I represent the Vermont League of Cities and Towns and for the benefit of those who may be watching, I've been doing this work for more than 30 years in the state house and obviously over the last two years virtually on Zoom. So I did have just a few comments and I will be fairly brief. In some ways, live streaming has made the state house far more accessible than it's ever been before. And we hear this from our members, we remind them constantly that you can watch committee action and state house action on YouTube that you can ask to be invited in and the committees will do that. And right now you can do it on five minutes notice, which is really a huge improvement over having to drive potentially for hours to get to the state house to testify on a particular topic. I did write an op-ed last spring regarding the increased transparency that the Zoom has provided to us. It's a two-edged, a double-edged sword though because you really never have any idea of what's going on in the background. So if you're a habitual occupant of the state house, we spend a lot of time in hallway conversations or in the cafeteria talking to people and that just doesn't happen now. You have no idea what's going on behind the curtain. And so in that respect, it's a little bit less transparent than it has been in the past. We do think that remote meeting capacity and live streaming has to be continued for every committee going forward. And we realized that there are physical constraints with respect to that, but the public has really gotten used to it. And I think you would hear from a lot of people if that was suddenly not available going forward. We do certainly agree that you have crowded committee rooms. They were Petri dishes before the pandemic ever started and we're not gonna be able to go back to that. I think that before the committee thinks about actually building additional space, you might consider a glut of commercial space in Montpelier right now because people and businesses are rethinking how they're going to return after the pandemic. So there is space available in Montpelier and in surrounding towns that would be available for your use. We also urge you to implement electronic voting system for the House and Senate. And I don't believe that this was in the report, but Vermont is only one of 12 states that rely on manual voting systems according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. Manual voting systems consume inordinate amounts of time, particularly in the House over the course of a session. And an electronic voting system would allow every vote to be recorded. And with today's technology, that could be implemented without marring the historic integrity of the building, which I know is a huge issue for particularly David Sheetz, the curator of the state house. And let's see, and in the electronic voting system would also save time for everybody, particularly at this end of the session when there's so much happening all at once and people are very interested in keeping track. I imagine yourselves as well as the public and the lobbying community. And then lastly, we would urge you to consider the security needs of the state house. We've been lucky in Vermont so far, but luck is really not equal to security. And so we would just urge you to look at that as part of the overview when you're considering what to do going forward. And that's really it, Senator. Thank you for the opportunity. Karen, this is a roundtable discussion. I want to immediately respond to a couple of comments. First, you were concerned that you're not behind the curtain. And now for public edification, neither are we, which is one of the frustrating parts of this conversation. So we all have been meeting just like you're seeing us right now. And all of our substantive conversations have literally been taking place in this environment. Those easy ways of drifting out into the hall and having a conversation to try iron out details, very frustrating. We don't have that ability. We're as frustrated as you are about that particular subject. The security in the state house is actually being looked into by another committee. Probably we'll be spending some time over the summer to discuss that, but it is not likely to be subject of this committee's conversation, at least in the immediate future, as much as do we return and under what circumstances the security issues are kind of a complicated silo all by themselves. You had indicated that we are, we had a Petri dish problem prior to COVID. We all completely agree. Just for your knowledge, yesterday the chairs of institutions in the house and the Senate gave marching orders to BGS to start with an HVAC analysis of every room in the building. If you've noticed in the Freeman French Freeman report, which again is based on a COVID-19 discussion, nobody has ever actually done that analysis of each room so that if we arrived at the ability to say room capacity eight, let's assume for just this discussion that you are now eight plus one trying to get in the door. What is it that you would prefer to have happen at that moment? So for us, I think it would be important to have a remote option if you can't get in the door. And we understand that that's going to have to be an issue. I think that after the pandemic, a lot of people aren't going to want to get in the door if it's beyond whatever the appropriate capacity is. Right, okay. And by the way, for everybody's sake, my head is going up and down as I'm listening to you. I'm not trying to multitask. I'm actually trying to take extensive notes in these conversations. Committee, any questions for Karen at this point? If not, I'm going to turn immediately to Chris Dillia and Karen, thank you very much for coming to join us. Chris, welcome. Thank you, Senator. Good afternoon, Senator, committee members for the record, Chris Dillia, President of the Vermont Bankers Association. It's great to see you. I very rarely, if ever, get in your committee. So we really appreciate the opportunity. I know Senator Mazza is disappointed. You're yourself lucky. Yeah, that's what I thought, Senator. I should have said this before you continue. I should have said to everybody, this committee does love humor, so be prepared to be picked on like we pick on each other. That's just part of the Friday afternoon experience. I would expect nothing less knowing some of you. I represent the banking industry here in Vermont. We're a typical trade association. So while we perform a number of different functions working with the legislature here and the administration in Vermont, as well as with our congressional delegation is very important. I've been with the association for 18 years, so full-time in the state house for that period of time. But my days in the state house go back to 1992 when I started to really work in the building. I ran the Memorial Economic Development Corporation in Morrisville. And because I was so close when economic development issues came up, I often got the call, hey, can you come down to the state house? So that's really when I started to cut my teeth on the public process in the building. I think the legislature, but in particular your staff and especially IT did a tremendous job last year in pivoting very quickly to Zoom and YouTube. I can't imagine how we would have gotten through any type of legislative session without their switching so quickly to the technology that was available to us. And you've continued with that through 2021. I agree with Ms. Horn that I think it has added considerably to access for the public to view what's going on, not only in committee rooms, but on the floor proceedings. And I think that's, as I've said, a couple of people over the last couple of days, the Vermont version of C-SPAN has been very informative and appreciative. That said, I think we all know and perhaps would agree that the activity of creating good public policy really needs to be done in person. You need to be sitting with your colleagues, with the legislators in the room, in the hallways, in the cafeteria and other locations because yes, it's important to know what's going on in the committee rooms, but just as we have an example, I've lost count of how many committee hearings I've been in this year when I say in watching on YouTube where a particular question has come up that if you were there in the room, you would be able to immediately address. But because we're not there, you're spending more time, I am and you are spending more time trying to make those connections to address that question or issue that came up. And a lot of that goes away when we can sit in the committee room after the hearing or in the hallways and again, address those types of topics. So from my perspective, what would I like to see? I skimmed the report last night. I'm only gonna concentrate on the short slash median term proposals that are being discussed because I remember long ago, some of those reports about what we needed to do to expand the state house. I think we need to get back to in-person. And I recognize that some people may not be comfortable with that. Some people may still have concerns about the virus. We all have concerns about contracting the flu every season and we all go get our flu shots. And I'm hoping that with booster shots, maybe it's something to akin with the pandemic and COVID. But I think we need to try and get back into the building in the broad context of legislature staff and the public. And again, I appreciate as Karen does being included in that public category, if you will. I would also agree with the report that says, let's expand for the time being where we need to be meeting, whether it's in 109 State Street, whether it's in 133 State Street, because those are all viable options. I think when you start to get beyond that central complex within Montpelier, it can become difficult for all of the parties involved. If all of a sudden you've got to shuttle yourself or committees to another location that requires driving or busing, the downtime in the scheduling may be a bit hectic when you're trying to coordinate that. Senator, you mentioned the HVAC system. I think whatever you need to do this summer and fall on HVAC, IT to outfit the committee rooms, other improvements to the building to increase the committee room sizes, let's move forward with that aggressively so that we can be prepared to open up in January of 2022. And again, utilizing those other spaces. I recognize and appreciate your comment, Senator Benning, about you being as frustrated as well. I have often thought about the newly elected representatives and senators coming into this process who have virtually no context to how it works under the Golden Dome, doesn't have the ability to really establish those personal relationships that we all rely on and work to accomplish over time. So I greatly appreciate you looking at this and I hope that we can move in the direction of getting back into one building, plural buildings within the capital complex come January. You asked the question of what if you were the eighth person or excuse me, the ninth person going into the room, I guess I'd like to know who seven and eight are and maybe I could work out a deal to kick them out of the room perhaps, but if you had that public option close by, then once the committee is done, you could always run over to the state house and visit with those members to perhaps address those issues that came up. The other thing as I was thinking about it is maybe there's some self-policing that has to go on. There's many days during the session that I'm in the state house but I don't have anything going on but I feel the need to be there because maybe something breaks or maybe have an opportunity for a conversation. But quite honestly, if there's days when I don't have hearings or topics on committee attendees, maybe self-policing, I just don't go and be respectful of others who need to be in the building and conduct their work on those days. So maybe that's another option. There's many ways to explore or many opportunities to explore but let's get back into the building and doing the work of the people and developing really good public policy. Chris, you brought up a subject and I'm gonna throw this out there. I am not saying I am wedded to it by any stretch. Vaccine passport for entry to the building. Your thought? No problem. For me, no problem. I have said to some folks, we're fully vaccinated in my family. We're just starting to go out and do some things. It feels a little weird. It takes a little getting used to. But for me, honestly, what's the point of getting the vaccine if I'm not going to get out there and start to try and live our lives again? And if you're gonna ask me to show at the door that I've got vaccinated, I don't care personally. I know others may feel that's an intrusion in their privacy. They have every right to feel that way but for me personally, not a problem. Okay. Dick McCormick, if you could just keep an eye on my screen because I got bounced out there while Chris was testifying, but I think I've got the gist of his conversation here written down. Any questions for Chris? And Dick McCormick, you're on mute. Could the need arise, Mr. Chairman? I'll be proud to take over in your stead. Oh, thank you. That pretentiousness was intended as a joke. That's another joke we've had lately that our tombstones are all going to say he's finally muted. Patty, calm line. Chris, thank you very much for coming. Patty, you're up, you're the other one with hard stop. Yes, thank you very much. It's so good to see all of you. And now that I see you all in one place, I wanna get a client in institution so I can see more of you at some point. For the most part, I represent a number of associations whose members are small businesses. Right now, much of my time is spent on the lodging, wedding, and events businesses and business owners who struggling since the governor's executive order, restricted gathering and travel restrictions, which resulted in a lot of limited business and in a lot of cases, just total shutdowns. And no Zoom is wearing thin on everyone. Decisions are being made sometimes unilaterally, we see, without a full picture of inputs from us on the outside. And I think even sometimes from committee members, they don't think that serves the public well. And so we are looking for when we can return to a semblance of normal. Your rooms are pretty full in good times. I remember seeing that Senate Ag room and thinking, even if I ever got elected to the Senate, I think I would give it up if I had to sit in that room. So... You're bringing up a sore subject, Patty, because my entire life wraps around that particular room getting moved somewhere. And I can go on for hours about it, but you're right. Yeah, it's bad. And you know, and they're always crowded and you all know how sick everyone gets that time of year. It's like a kindergarten. So we do join all the others that have asked for continued streaming. We think your IT people are the best. I'm involved in a lot of national phone calls and early on, no one was up to speed like Vermont was. So they deserve a lot of credit and we do appreciate the streaming. I would like to see that continue, but nothing's as effective as being in that room. So what we would ask for is equal access or in access. If you're saying one more person can be in there, my personal feeling is don't have anyone in there, which may mean that your meetings are closed, but the rest of the building is open access. Because as you know, we are very good at joining you as you walk down the hallway or you go into the cafeteria for your cookie. And so if we had that kind of access, I think that would be effective. Sitting in that room does give people an advantage and I don't know how you could do first come first serve in that situation. So that's what, to do that until everyone can return to pre-pandemic conditions where they're comfortable would be a suggestion to consider. One of the other considerations I saw in the study that I thought would be compelling was fewer house members. You all might wanna talk about that and see what kind of reaction you get from the other body. Yeah, back in 1836, they brought us into being. So it's the old joke about, we brought you into the world, we can take you out kind of a routine. I think that was a Bill Cosby line back when. Yeah, I wasn't gonna mention the name. I know. It's not politically correct these days. It was a good line though. Anyway, so thank you for having me. Thank you for all your work. And I know it's tiresome and we're all over it. So we appreciate you listening. You had brought up, if the rooms themselves must be closed, for instance, to committee members and staff, you would still want the open hallway access, as I'm sure as well, some remote access of some kind somewhere. Yes, definitely the streaming, we would ask to continue. So many of us could do that from our offices, but we need to catch somebody in a hallway or we see something that, we've watched something on Zoom that happened that we need to get over and catch somebody on their break. It would be very helpful. Okay, some of you have joined us after the initial conversations. I was trying to accommodate anybody that may have a hard stop this afternoon and needs to get out quickly. Is there anybody really pressed for time? Cause if not, I'm gonna go down my list. John, welcome to Senate institutions. This is where you jump in quick. Yeah, thank you. Thank you very much, Senator Benning. First, for inviting us in, I have been for those who don't know. And I feel funny talking here too with Senator Ingalls in the picture here who I feel like I've gotten to know and he's never seen me before in his life. So that's some of the imbalance that we're going through that the rest of you have seen me maybe too many times, but anyway, I've been a lot of these. John, hang on a minute. I think Dick Maas is ready winding up for a joke here. Wait, I want to see what it is. She just said we've seen her too many times. I just want to. Yes, he's, okay. Anyhow, I've been in the state house since 1981. I started when I was about 10. I was first there as a representative for two terms and I have been a lobbyist since 1987. I started with a firm that's no longer in existence. I know those people are no longer around. And then I went on my own. I have a sole proprietor lobbying business and I have had a number of clients over the years. And so I represent multiple clients as does Patty who spoke earlier. I have been watching, I think my eyeballs are falling out because I have been watching so much of your activity the last year on, usually on YouTube, because as you know, we don't go in to the hearings unless there's a particular reason, which to me brings up that interesting subject of if you're going to have, if you can only have, I think no matter how large your state house got the committee rooms, I've been in the Louisiana committee rooms, which are enormous and they can still get full. So no matter the size, you can always have a situation where you might have to close and say, for safety reasons even, this is all we can handle right now. I think that we've learned over the last year that there are probably ways to allow a certain number in committee rooms and then maybe have a common room where the committee hearings are streamed to another room within the same capital complex if not right in the same building. I must say that in the many, many years, the decades I've been lobbying, I wander in and out of committee rooms a lot. And I know when I go into Senator Maz's room, he'll sort of look, what are you doing here? Why are you here? That's what his committee asks of him, too. Yeah, right. But for me, lobbying isn't about just the, every, the hip bones connected to the thigh bone, et cetera. What happens for my clients, like one of my clients is T-Mobile, so I've been following H360 forever, it feels like. And but what happens over in appropriations or what happens in another committee is all connected. So I'm kind of, I like to be in all the committees. So that far for me of being, I understand being maybe the 10th person or the ninth person who can't go in the room, but it does, it will somehow take away from that casual entry into a room. I watched the floor and sessions in the House and Senate. I wanna know what's going on in the entire building. And as my beloved state house is going to get bigger, and I see that into the future, I know there will be ways to accommodate for those things, but even if we're in a capital complex, whether that be an enlarged, with an addition on the state house again, or in buildings that are near there, there will still be the interpersonal relationship that we've all been missing this past year, not just in our work, but in our lives. And I really am happy Senator Benning to, first of all, I'm very happy to have anyone say the word lobbyist because I've been watching the Joint Legislative Management Committee. And I haven't heard the word lobbyist when they've talked about the state house, the FFF report, the Freeman French report. And we are a part of the process. And I believe that as long as you remain a, I think we're a part of the process in any state. And as long as we remain a citizens legislature where you have nowhere near enough staff, we serve a function in providing information, as you all know, but that's harder to do without the interpersonal relationship. So I would second what my colleagues have said ahead of me. I think that we have a huge task ahead of us. I remember the 1987 addition to the state house, as I'm sure Senator Masa does too. That's, it's changed, change is hard. And we're going to have change in this building that we've come to live. It's not just a building, it's a museum to me. It's a treasure building. And so I'm happy to see in some of the report that the, to me, the sacred rooms have not been changed, like the house chamber and the Senate chamber and the Cedar Creek room and the governor's office in the state house. I do think everything else, as you go down the corridors on the two floors, the second and third floor in the house and the first floor in the Senate, that there probably can be change, even the poor David Sheetz must be just shaking in some of those committee rooms. I love how he has taken care of our state house and I think it's a beautiful building. But we are in the time of movement. And I'm also pleased to hear you talk about, your committee talk about this in terms of not just COVID. Like so many things have come to the fore in the time of COVID, like I hear childcare from your rooms all the time of we now, COVID has exacerbated or brought to light problems that were already there in childcare. Well, COVID has brought to light problems that were already there in the state house. I have stood in the Senate finance room and for those who don't know me, I'm somewhat over five feet but not big number over five feet. I stood in the corner of that room with the winter coats that are hanging there, hanging around my head and three people deep in front of me and I can't see a committee member or do anything, that's not a safe environment. So I understand that it's time to look for something else but not lose the ability to have some interpersonal relationship with people and including just in the cafeteria space which I saw in some of the designs is also being changed too. And I won't go on, I could go on forever because I just love the state house so much and I've worked there so long that I want this change to work for all Vermonters. I would not necessarily say that our new way of doing business that has been inevitable and necessary in the time of COVID has brought more transparency the way I see the word transparency. It's brought more people and as Karen mentions with her members, a city clerk or somebody who's interested in your town issues can dial in, can watch it. You can watch it at midnight if you want, you can watch it at four o'clock in the morning you can watch what went on but for me transparency as a lobbyist is being in the building interacting with you not just watching you like a television show. So I understand the benefits of having been of what your technicians have done it's been truly amazing and what you have all adjusted to which I really respect and I just think everybody must be exhausted from it all of you but I am incredibly happy that you're holding this hearing and that we are looking forward to a better tomorrow. So thank you very much, it's good to be here. I will repeat what I said earlier this is the tip of the tip of the iceberg and it's highly likely that all of you will be back in again in some committee hours or possibly others to continue this conversation as we move forward because we are not the sole entity in charge of making the decisions. And as you all know, the legislative process has many moving parts. I'll also say, John, for your benefit when you come back next time if you haven't been in the state house recently you're gonna have to continue wearing your winter coat because all those hangers are gone from room nine. Okay, thank you. Thank you very much for coming. Committee, any questions for John before we turn to our next witness? I don't see anybody chomping at the bit. Bill Driscoll, you there someplace? I see your name. I am, I am. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Welcome. Thank you. I also don't get to talk in front of this committee very often but I appreciate the opportunity for record William Driscoll with associated industries of Vermont. I represent primarily the manufacturers manufacturing sector in the state. I think you've heard a lot of common themes or comments and you probably gonna hear a lot of them repeated as you go through the folks here today. So I'll try not to be too repetitive. I may focus on one key recommendation and it does focus on that central theme of being in the room and being able to be in the room whether it's literally or figuratively. And I think you've heard a lot of the advantages of that for the process in terms of being able to have real-time interaction whether it's committee members who have a question and they see someone in the room to be able to ask that or if something comes up and someone who may not be on the witness list is able to raise their hand and hopefully get involved in that sense. There's also another aspect that which I think is also important to keep in mind. And that is whether it's conscious or unconscious when the only folks who can interact in real-time or directly with the committee are people on the witness list then who is put on that witness list and who is not makes a big difference. And it's easier to, again, not necessarily consciously or deliberately but it's easier to not hear from some voices and some perspectives if they aren't able to be in the room and actually raise their hand and make that effort to be heard. And so I think that's an important thing to keep in mind as well. And I guess my primary recommendation is something that a bunch of us have recommended along the way here for this current session and the previous one. And that is especially given that the committee rooms are set up now for remote testimony and interaction online with the technology that's there now and certainly could be tweaked if necessary is to take advantage of the capabilities of Zoom to have that virtual committee room where certainly would like to have the opportunity for people to be there physically or in person but even particularly if you're considering scenarios where the number might be even more limited than it is now to have that virtual room in addition to what's going on. And that would really provide an opportunity particularly if it's something that people sign up for request ahead of time and then are there identified so that folks on the committee know who's in that room and can call on them if they want or people in that room can raise their hands virtually to engage just like they would if they were there physically. I think it'd be important to incorporate that in the sort of hybrid of live and streaming committee process that hopefully the legislature will continue going forward. Again, I think that's something that's certainly doable. It's capable of being moderated. Folks are always concerned about things getting out of hand online with public access, so to speak. And I think that I think it's a doable thing. I think it's something that ought to be considered. Just like if people are concerned about the wieldiness of it just like there are literally physical limitations as to how many people can get into the committee rooms previously, I think you could even start out with some sort of reasonable cap on the number of people who can enter the virtual room as well but some sort of some incorporation of that I think would be important as both practical matter and as an important part of the process of the community deliberation process there. Bill, one of the questions that keeps popping up what exactly is virtual going forward? This is obvious one way. The Senate chamber traditionally has a VPR live stream continuing. There has yet to be invented a universal television camera that can sit in the middle of a table and see everybody at the same time. So you might end up with a camera up in the corner of the room that's live streaming. Any thoughts on what your understanding is of an accessible and acceptable virtual appearance? Yeah, and I think, I have thought that particularly and I think the way it is now where you basically would have a camera where most committee rooms have a screen, I think that that camera's view of the room can pretty closely replicate or approximate what someone sitting in the witness chair would see. So that yes, unlike now where you actually have your Hollywood squares of people, it would be the room collectively, but I think it is reasonable and I think doable to have a camera that has a reasonable view of the room as a whole. And folks can engage in that way whether it's whoever is speaking to you would show up on that big screen or whether multiple people would be on the big screen. I think those are things that can be worked out with experience or practice in terms of what works best for that. But I think at its most fundamental level, I think it's doable. Okay. Committee, questions. I guess the parting question is, are you working with lobby still? That's not me. That's not you. That's great. Who's worked out for me as I see it. Yeah, the one with the sad look on them, that's for a lobby. All right, I'll save my joke for him then. Unfortunately, Matt, you're not the next one on my list here. I've got Jesse Barnard. Welcome to Senate institutions. I think we've met before. Thank you. Yes, we have met. So I'm Jesse Barnard. I'm the executive director of the Vermont Medical Society. We represent physicians and physician assistants across the state from all corners of the state, different specialties. So we're a membership association. I have been, I think it's actually about nine sessions total with a prior stint and then back in my executive director role in the state house. And I have met several of you in other committees, but actually I don't know that I've testified in this committee before. So thank you for having me. Thank you for having this hearing this afternoon. I really appreciate being asked for feedback on this topic. And I also really appreciate the comment that Zoom is here to stay or some kind of streaming option. I think especially for our members who are busy healthcare clinicians to get to Montpelier is extremely challenging and it is really increased access for that sort of one-time expert witness appearance or public witness appearance to be able to participate virtually. I will say as a lobbyist who does monitor a lot of bills, it's also been an excellent way to monitor those bills that may not be sort of top-top on my priority list, but I just wanna check in, see what's happening. In fact, I went back and live streamed your hearing with the journalists last night at, I don't know, nine o'clock at night just so I could know what you talked about. So that's really helpful. I will say the main shortcoming I see is really when you get into the markup-type phase of a bill. It has been, I think I'm sure for you, but also for advocates, very challenging. I will say, you know this as well as I, but there are often times where even though we're lobbyists, we're also the content experts in a certain policy area or our members are for you. I think somebody else before me mentioned this was without having really a policy staff to work for you. We know you often turn to our members or other members of those on this call for really content information and that information about if we change this warning, what is the impact gonna be? What does this mean for you or the healthcare industry or whoever we're representing? And that type of conversation I have found extremely challenging this session that's ended up, you know, there'll be a phone call, texts going back and forth with a representative during a hearing while people are also trying to listen to witnesses and it's very unwieldy. And so that's the time where I've really found not being in the room has had its shortcomings. And in fact, I've heard in committee discussion, I feel like it's actually led to sort of a small C conservative approach to some of the bills that have been taking up this session where I've heard committee chairs or members saying, you know, we'd love to do more with this bill but we can't get all the stakeholders in the room this session. So we just, we can't, you know, until we can really have that opportunity, we can't take this farther right now, you know, maybe we'll do a study this session, maybe we'll create a task force, but we can't really solve this problem till we get all the interested parties together. And I think another year of only some people being in the building and not having the public or the advocates or the experts in the room to hash things out, I think feels like prolonging that process and possibly leading to not as strong or ambitious policy outcomes as might otherwise be accomplished. I would encourage, and maybe this has already happened, I don't know, but one thing, especially coming from the health perspective, we've done a lot of work with the Department of Health over this past 18 months and ACCD and all of their guidelines. And so I feel like this report takes a very structural solution to the problem, which you would expect consulting architects, but whether there should also be some conversations with the Department of Health with ACCD around these issues of what other mitigation measures can we put in place besides structural ones, whether that's vaccination, masking, don't come in when you're sick. I mean, I will admit there have been past sessions where I felt like I needed to be in the room. So I was there when I was coughing and sneezing. Hopefully we've learned, I've learned myself. If Zoom continues, you have a cold, you don't come in, whether you're a lawmaker or a lobbyist or the public, you can watch remotely that day. So I think there are some non-physical mitigation measures that could perhaps make the building safer. To respond to the piece about, well, what if you're the eighth person, these rooms are limited size, I echo what a couple others said. Before we get to the point of saying we're gonna stay in these small committee rooms and limit access, I would really encourage looking at other spaces around Montpelier. I think that's by far the first solution from my perspective. I think, not that I've been in a hybrid committee room, but trying to participate in hybrid sort of educational sessions where some people are in the room with the speaker and some people are at home listening remotely. I think that is very hard to moderate. I think it's very hard that the people participating remotely have the same access as those in the room. The people in the room, wiggling in their chair, waving their hand, just get your attention more than the little virtual hand in the corner of a Zoom window. So I think if you had six people in the room and six people zooming in remotely, they might be able to monitor it that way, but to really expect that they can participate, I think would be a challenge. If after a thorough analysis review, there really is no way to shift to bigger spaces, I think shifting as needed, as somebody I think will actually one of the journalists yesterday may have indicated, often there's a good sense of what's gonna be the hearing that day or asking for signups ahead of time. The day once the agenda is posted, contact the committee clerk if you want to be there. So we just have a sense how many people are interested so we could switch to bigger rooms. And then I would say maybe a last option would be sort of a signup list, as there is a signup list to be a witness, if you wanna sign up to be in the room for a markup, something like that, so it's a little more fair than just first come, first serve or the intern who can get there at six a.m. to camp out and put their binder on a seat to hold the seat, which we know happened in the old days too. Well, I just wanted to make one comment about the long-term proposal. I know that's not really the main topic on the agenda for today, but just one thing that caught my eye, I noticed that actually did to me very few, the only room was I think there was a large hearing room, but most of those rooms to me did not look like they were actually adding space for public or advocates, even I think they said the typical seven, sorry, the large committee room, their new larger committee room would have six public seats, which I don't think in fact, I think is smaller than some of the current committee rooms. So just really a plug that if we are thinking of some big redesign down the road, that that really include enough space for those members of the public or lobbyists and press who wanna be in the room and that we not make larger committee rooms that end up repeating some of the shortcomings of the rooms we have currently. So thank you again and happy to be part of the process and appreciate you reaching out to us. So there's a lot to unpack in what you've just presented and we could spend a lot of time talking about some things. I wanna say first with respect to the invitations that are sent out, Bill Driscoll brought this up earlier. We didn't realize until we attempted to do this, you are not a finite group of people, you lobbyists. In fact, I understand there's over 50 pages worth of names that declare themselves to be lobbyists. So trying to get something as simple as this put together is a massive undertaking and how do you exclude people in order to keep your timeframe within the limits of human capacity? I don't know how we cross that bridge. One of the other things that you should know at least from my perspective as a legislator when I'm sitting in the judiciary committee, for instance, we'll be discussing three or four bills that day. And during that conversation, I will have a file on each bill and a paper copy of that bill in front of me where I'm literally putting notes in the margins about who is testifying and what they're commenting on in that language. That's all been rendered almost impossible in this setting because at home, most of us don't have high speed, high capacity printers available to us to download a 42 page bill. And when we get to trying to accomplish that simple task, we're normally looking now like you are at a screen and it's very problematic to try to take notes off that screen and be able to go back later in time to further the conversation. So you're bringing up several points. I appreciate the fact that you've come to join us today and this is the kind of perspectives that we need to be thinking about moving forward. Committee, any questions for Jess? These guys were all anxious to get home on a Friday. I meant to say, Jess, one other thing, I appreciate the fact that you went on to watch us last night and for the rest of you, the guaranteed cure for insomnia is watching one of our committee meetings late at night. I've done it, it works really well. And the benefit of streaming is also that it doesn't have to be on real time speed. I'm sure you've all discovered that as well. So it can be time effective to go back after the fact. Is there a fast forward button? There is a, you can, it can be a time and a half. It can actually be double speed. That ended up being fun for some witnesses. Yeah. That might be interesting to watch. Yeah. I am moving down my list. Charles Martin, I have you next. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Welcome. Thank you to the committee for having me. Charles Martin from the Vermont Chamber of Commerce. I primarily come into the state house on economic development issues and the other issues that impact the composite interests of the chambers, 1200 business members. I'm in the state house just about every single day during regular session for what that's worth. So that's kind of where my viewpoint comes from. I'll reiterate that I think the legislature did an incredible job of temporarily pivoting to some pretty strange remote operations and strange circumstances generally kind of across the board. I think the public's been largely served by the legislature, but obviously there are some significant shortcomings associated with remote operations as well. Sort of our official stance I might say on resumption of normal operations is I don't believe, I know one of the recommendations that's just can was considered, but obviously by no means adopted or suggested that it would be adopted is the return of legislators without the return of the public. I think I would say that we either stay remote entirely or we all go back in some capacity. I think that excluding the public, the press and advocates from the state house and when legislators were able to access the state house and mass would create some significant issues in terms of just transparency and the efficacy of advocacy in general. I would reiterate the earlier comments. I think streaming has been a boon for transparency in a lot of ways for people who have issues accessing the state house and those issues could be anything from not enough time to access the state house to health issues, to just your general remoner at home who wants to check in on what happened but you just don't have a day in your week to hang out in the state house. I think the streaming has been incredible and I would echo the previous comments. Streaming on times two is even more incredible than streaming on times on regular speed. I have noticed and I know that this is not something that I'm going to necessarily be able to prove but it's been pretty intuitive that this has occurred that there have been policy and committee deliberations that have occurred kind of offline from time to time. I've jumped into a committee where it seems like the decision was arrived at and I wasn't able to witness the deliberation that led to that decision. I don't think that's anything deliberate or anything organized or anything like that from the committee, but people chat in the interim and those interim casual conversations can be meaningful. And previously in the past, and I understand even in the past committees are supposed to notice their proceedings but in the state house, I'll hang out and type a report in the House Commerce Committee, for instance, and if somebody's chatting about an issue, I'm at least in there able to hear what the conversation is and I have that kind of access to at least be cognizant of, these sort of not necessarily official committee proceeding but casual conversations between legislators that might be meaningful to advocates in the public. To the earlier questions about capacity, I might have a slightly different take on that than others. I think on just about a weekly or even daily basis, I was unable to physically enter rooms in the state house. I'm thinking in particular Senate finance, houseways and means, cloud tax comes up and you're waiting outside anyway and it's already a first come, first serve scenario. So I don't know that I would be or we would be largely radically opposed to a capacity limitation if we were forced to go into these little rooms but obviously the most acceptable alternative would be to use spaces that more people can fit in. So we don't have to exclude anyone and any individual. I think there's a level of self-policing. Someone else talked about that earlier that we can really do and we can encourage. I know I'll sit in committees, I'll testify or I'll listen to the testimony that I care about and then I'll continue to type my report in that committee after I'm done and the committee's moved on to a new issue. I'm assuming other people do things like that but if we're all hypercognizant of how that limits access and potentially exasperates health concerns, I think we might be able to do a degree of self-policing and kind of avoid that behavior and really get out of the committee room when our business there is concluded. And that's definitely something I would be willing to do. I will say because of the kind of diverse nature of the issues that the chamber covers, I do feel pretty strongly that I'm probably going to have to be in the state house just about every day unless I'm sick or have some other conflict and almost on a daily basis. I mean, I guess I would say to reiterate or to rephrase that I generally find it useful that I'm in the state house even on days where I'm not scheduled to testify because things come up and I'm able to action those things rapidly. Sometimes I'm asked to testify last minute on some whatever issue. So I do find my physical proximity to the state house on an almost daily basis speaking for me personally is useful to advocating for the members of the Vermont chamber. And yeah, I guess I would also just, I would really double down on the fact that we can forecast with some consistency the hot topic issues. If it's a new family leave program or some new not previously considered tax, we all understand that that's going to be a capacity issue in that committee room. And I think we can potentially even talk to chairs. I might recommend surveying chairs just to get kind of their input on what issues seem to fill up their committee rooms because I know there are some issues where I'm the only person in that room or maybe one other person because it's so obscure and it's such a tiny segment of the Vermont economy that cares about it. But then there are other issues where obviously the entire state is involved in the issue and those are going to be kind of the committee rooms that have those capacity issues. I don't know that I have a whole lot beyond that without repeating the previous witnesses but I'll leave it there for any questions. Well, first let me thank you for coming. I was just listening to you gazing around the screen realizing that Senate institutions is a committee room with 225 square feet. This group of people would be in excess of what I would normally think would be acceptable capacity for air quality and trying to keep it from becoming a Petri dish but I wouldn't necessarily have thought of this as a hot topic issue. And so there are certain issues that are obvious but there are many, many other discussions going on in committees where you just never know and then we have to worry about is there space available somewhere else to deal with it? And so one of our problems just so you all know is we have a limited revenue stream to take care of this whole situation. And even though we're receiving federal money right now the bottom line is some of the proposals that we've seen are hundreds of millions of dollars worth of expenditures. I should also say that when it comes to dealing with space elsewhere off the complex in Montpelier or surrounding communities we also have to deal with legislative staff and the legislators themselves who have access problems or work product problems that for instance in the case of a legislative council member who has to run back and forth from the drafting department and the editing department to get the language that we all on this screen are trying to get into a bill. It becomes very problematic if those entities are separate from each other. So this is not a small lift by any stretch and there's lots of moving parts to consider. You're giving us more moving parts to consider and that's why we appreciate you having you come down to see us today. Committee, sorry, go ahead. No, I was just thanking the committee for having me in. Any other questions, comments, committee? I'm moving down my list. Molly, how do you pronounce your last name? Mahar. Mahar, okay, great. Welcome to Senate institutions. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair and thank you to the committee for the opportunity to speak with you this afternoon. This is certainly an important issue for all of us. For the record, Molly Mahar, President of the Vermont Ski Areas Association for Nonprofit Trade Association representing 20 alpine and 29 cross-country ski areas across the state. And I've only been working in the state house for a few years, unlike many people that are speaking here today. And I certainly commend the legislature's quick pivot and your staff's incredible efforts and work to enable you to safely continue your work remotely. Throughout this pandemic, it's been difficult and while it has been very convenient to be able to catch up on hearings on YouTube after they occur, particularly when several things are happening at once, which happens quite often. There's really no substitute for being in the room when a committee is discussing an issue of real importance to our members. And as you know, and as several other people have mentioned, you know, it's not uncommon for a committee chair or a committee member knowing who's in the room to ask a questionable lobbyist to get more information outside of schedule testimony. And that just can't happen when we're watching on YouTube. An important part of our jobs, in addition to the obvious advocacy for our members, of course, is to bring in information to you, our legislators, about how particular policy decisions are affecting our members and in turn how that could influence the state's economy, jobs, demographics, et cetera. And that's really been difficult to do this year. Being able to be in the building is very important for many of the same reasons I've heard legislators mention just the ability to form relationships with you to catch you in the hall or over a cup of coffee to discuss an issue. And beyond that, just establish a connection with you as a person who is working to make Vermont a better place for all of us. That said, I strongly support better use of technology in the future to allow for online access to committee hearings. It's sort of a blessing and a curse. If you miss something, you can go back and watch it. However, you can also watch hours upon hours of Zoom testimony as well. But all in all, I have found that to be quite helpful. Also, the ability to testify remotely for our members directly if they have to travel, if they can't physically be at the state house due to their other responsibilities. I would welcome that. And certainly, and finally, crowded committee rooms are of course very challenging for everyone for a number of reasons and strongly support having access to expanded committee room space over limited access, recognizing that that may be a challenge in the near term. And it does seem like the two large hearing rooms, 10 and 11, could certainly be used more. But I understand your point, Mr. Chair, about sometimes you get surprised and it is disruptive to have to move, try to move a hearing once you've got the time allocated for it. However, I've been following Act 250 closely and that House Natural Resources Committee Room is regularly packed for that work. And it is even after they've moved to the Ethan Allen Room and it's a challenge to make sure you can get in there. And if you're really lucky, you can even get a seat for the three hours of testimony for the rest of the afternoon. So agree also with the points of security in the State House and better air handling. And I just to close, it is really important for a lobbyist to be able to be in the building with you all. Thank you for your time. Committee, questions. Molly, we do appreciate you coming. Thank you. Austin Davis, you're next on my list. Welcome to Senate institutions. Thank you, Mr. Chair. For the record, Austin Davis, Governor Affairs Manager with the Lake Champlain Chamber which represents about 1,000 members and upwards of 60,000 employees in the state, predominantly in the Northwest corner of the state. I think as the old saying goes, I think everything's been said, just not everyone's had a chance to say it yet. And I know that I'm standing between you folks and a lovely Vermont Friday, spring afternoon. So I'll try to keep this really brief because I think I haven't really heard much by way of testimony that I don't want to agree with or that I wouldn't want to say myself. I think there's a couple of things though I will say, I really think as many of you know, like I'm possibly one of the youngest people on this testimony list and I probably have the least time in this State House. I think I've been there now about seven years. I think Senator Parent, you and I started about the same time in the State House, you were just a representative and my parents rep and it's just been such an experience in the last seven, eight years to just grow in that State House. And I think it gives me being that early in a career, kind of gives me a unique perspective. And that I think really our citizen legislature is incredibly unique. And I think having the State House be such an open public space, it's just an asset to the State of Vermont. And I know it sounds hokey, I just don't know any other way to put it. And I think it comes down to a great deal of just empathy that gets built for other people. The political divisiveness that you see in other places in the country, in the world, we're not exempt from them. However, I just think that having those cramped committee rooms, I think to some extent, having to share limited elbow room with the person next to you while on a committee room just does build that sense of like, this is a true person. They have the best intentions for Vermont as we're both kind of just suffering through this warm committee room together and all because we both have our perspective on what's best for the state we love and we're willing to just sweat in a late spring day in our suits, through our suits or nice dress clothing in order to get that perspective heard. I just think that it's honestly such a special thing and from when I was an intern in Shumlin's office, right on through, I've just been hooked because I just love being in that building where there have been so many amazing public servants and I know so many more will follow me and I would just be sad honestly to think about it changing too much and losing some of that unique character. I mean, I think about politics of the national scene and there's an older gentleman whose opinions I really I really take to heart and I remember him telling me at one point that he saw political divisiveness really start when members were able to start loosening their ability to be present and were able to jet off to home or fundraisers or whatever on a regular basis and committee meetings were less frequented and they didn't have to sit around and start forming those relationships and that meant that there wasn't a great deal of empathy. There wasn't that I trust that you're doing this for the right reasons type of thing. So that's just something I think hasn't been highlighted to at this point in the conversation that I think I just wanna highlight. On the things that have been talked about the eight plus one I think that's a conversation point where I think from the Lake Champlain Chambers perspective I think it's an all or nothing. I think as Patty kind of put it well when you start having that first come first serve and you start making or you start making choices about who can be in the room and who can't be in the room you start to kind of degrade folks trust in the process a little bit because they start wondering why is it that person? Why not other people? And I think, you know Justin made great points about just kind of the inequity of treating some people being in the room and some people being out of the room they're two vastly different experiences. And I think just having some of us have had times where we've had witnesses call in, you know and I can think of one time that there was a snow storm and I called in as a witness. It's really just a different experience. You don't get the contextual, you know discussion that's happening in the room. I'd agree with a lot of the folks, you know that there's a lot of off air time that's really important. There's a lot of on the fly especially towards the end of the session when folks are doing SNAP committee meetings where it's important to be around and be there and be able to run into the committee room. You know, I can sympathize with the fact those things that these rooms get really crowded. I mean, I remember a July veto session in Tony Klein's house natural and energy I guess that was natural and energy at that point. You know, there's a veto session in July and the spewed out into the hallway of that tiny committee room and we were all just sweating, sweating through our clothing trying to just listen in on it. And, you know, I think we could do better obviously in using other spaces in the capital complex. And I think that's something that certainly should be explored. I just think that that needs to be the first priority. You know, I think on a philosophical level, you know, just legitimacy of the Vermont legislature kind of stems back to the social contract that we have in our constitution that, you know, the general assemblies doors shall stay open in case, you know, I can't remember the exact words, unless someone's behaving indecently or the welfare of the state requires them to stay shut. I just think that that is kind of a crucial part of the Vermont, you know, social contract, if you will. And I think because of that, you know, any conversation about coming back needs to be first about how do we bring the public back to the state house? And then once we figure out how to get the public back in the state house, the public can invite the legislature back to their house. It is the people's house. It needs to be first and foremost, how do we get the people into the house? And second, how do we get the legislators into the house with their constituents? And that's just kind of, you know, our perspective on it, my perspective on it. Like I said, I know I'm holding you folks up from the rest of your day and you've got many more people on the witness list. So thank you for your time and I'll take any questions. Committee, questions. I'll let you know first that the exact quote, which came from then representative, Kola Hudson was, Mr. Speaker, everything's been said that needs to be said, but not everybody has said it yet. I will also scratch my head and wonder if you were entering the state house to learn about government with Corey Perron as a representative. You have any idea how the citizens of Franklin County managed to elect them into the Senate because we're scratching our head about that still. Roll call. And the other thing you should know, the great descriptions that you've provided about sweating and getting that close feeling of camaraderie, our good Senator Ingalls here has never had that experience because he's brand new in the legislature and he doesn't know what it's like to be in a committee room with the temperature going through the roof, but hopefully he'll find out soon. Senator McCormick. All this, thank you, Mr. Chairman. All this talk about the crowds in the state house, you should have been in there when we were doing civil unions. Yeah, right. They were coming from around the country. I got used to it. When afterwards voted out and suddenly this place was quiet again, felt strange. And I know that it sounds hokey. That's the magic of the Vermont State House. It just feels incredible to be in the presence of all these people who have their own perspective on how best to serve the state. And there's just an incredible sense of history when you walk through those halls. There's an incredible sense of decorum that you feel like you have to have as you stand in the shadow of some of the great folks who push forward legislation such as that. And I just think that that can't be recreated. That can't be bottled up. That can't be done virtually. Empathy doesn't work virtually. I think we see that all the time. I mean, I think if you folks have children, nieces, nephews, grandchildren, you see that. It's technology doesn't do good things for human contact and empathy and things like that. And I just, I think that we've done a great job weathering this. I think you've all done a fantastic work. I worry about continuing down that path, what we lose if we don't go back to the way we used to do business. And I think first and foremost, like I said, needs to be about how do we get any one of the public who wants to join in and then how do we get the legislators in? Because that's the Vermont way. Appreciate you coming, Austin. I'm gonna go down my lists to my predecessor on the Vermont Human Rights Commission, Terry Corsons. Welcome to Senate institutions. And even though I'm younger than Austin, I have fewer years at the State House. But... Terry, you're breaking up on me. I don't know if you can switch off your video. Perhaps that'll clear the conversation. Does that help? Or am I still switching? Well, I can hear you better right now. Let's see how we go. Okay, I really will take to heart what you said and not repeat what others have already said so eloquently about the reasons for returning and the benefits of the online access to the proceedings. The only thing I guess I'll add that hasn't been already said before when you talked about the crowded committee rooms. I know some have dedicated seats for legislative council. So perhaps dedicated seats for whoever's scheduled to testify might help. And then again, if the room is too crowded, if we have the ability to listen in here and talk with people in the hallway, I think that will go a long way towards addressing any inadequacies. And I apologize. I can't tell if you can hear me if I'm still breaking up. Well, we can hear you. You're a little bit weak in the volume, but we can hear you. Okay, well, really honestly, as I said, I don't want to repeat what others have said so well. So on behalf of the Vermont Bar Association, and we see ourselves ideally as a resource to legislators, normally I'm asked to bring in lawyers who might be versed in a particular area that a bill pertains to, to speak in support of it and maybe to point out unintended consequences otherwise. So have a way we can best facilitate that. That's what I favor. And that does involve being there in person so that somebody can grab me to say, hey, we've got this coming up. Do you have any, can you speak to it or make arrangements? So, we're happy to abide by whatever protocols you all determine our best to achieve that. Okay. Committee, any thoughts, questions for Terry? Terry, is there a chair, member of the board or the bar? There's every year a different president who sits on the chairs. Okay, I didn't know if he was a good member or not. That's all. I don't know, they keep accepting my money every year for my dues payments. Oh, are you saying? No. Well, we are thrilled to have your chair as a member. Oh, we did. And honored. The committee wants to know where we file our complaints in the future. She says she's thrilled and honored to have me. They obviously have a very low bar for their standards here. Terry, I want to thank you very much. Sure. Go ahead. I was, you'll hope whatever is allowed that I can bake from time to time. Yeah. Committee, if you don't know, Terry is, Terry, bake some of the best cakes that we have ever had at our disposal at the state house. Sometimes you walk into the Cedar Creek room and there's a huge cake for some reason. It's probably Terry who's behind it. But if you happen to get to know her really well, she knows how to cook one heck of a chocolate cake for, or bake a chocolate cake for your birthday. So Terry, thank you very much for coming along, Matt. I'm going to move to you and Paul Burns. I'm not purposely trying to keep you last. I was frankly hoping that Vince Illuzzi was going to be on the screen so I could purposely point out he was going to be last. But I haven't seen him yet. You're following Matt just so you know you're on deck. Matt, good afternoon, welcome. Well, thank you, Mr. Chair and committee for having me. You all know who I am, but for the folks on the call, my name is Matt Musgrave. I'm with the Associated General Contractors of Vermont where the trade association that represents the road and bridge builders, vertical commercial construction, as well as we have a contingency of home builders. And we employ somewhere in the tune of 15 to 18,000 Vermonters in any given year, depending on the economy. So first, just get straight to the point and let you know what our position is. We believe one of two things should happen. Either one is you should hold a hybrid session that would allow people that felt comfortable returning to the state house to do so. And for people that weren't comfortable returning to the state house could choose not to. The vaccine is a real thing. Some people are choosing not to take it, but we believe that's one of those steps that we've taken to get back to normal. And another witness had brought that up earlier. The second thing, if we don't return in person, is I would ask the legislature again, as we asked the legislature early this year to only focus on must pass bills, including the budget, including any kind of COVID considerations that we may have, but to stay away from policy that's not absolutely 100% necessary in that year, because as we've seen this year and other witnesses have testified, it's really hard to draft complex legislation that makes a positive difference for Vermont when you can't hear everybody out there. Of course, our first choice is returning to a hybrid setup. The reasons I have that desire is number one, we talk about engagement with politicians. I'm gonna change that script a little bit. I think the engagement with other advocates has been a huge loss for me this year. And I don't mean the advocates that I agree with, I mean the advocates that I don't agree with. I really missed the opportunity to sit in the lunchroom with someone that I'm on the other side of a position from and have a conversation about why they got to their position. What are the reasons they get there? Oftentimes they educate me because I don't know why they are where they are. And I'll name one specific policy when I was working with an association that represented property owners was working directly with CLF, Conservation Law Foundation on putting together the stormwater rules that are helping keep our waterways clean. I learned a lot of stuff from sitting with Rebecca Weber and the crew from CLF as well as the Lake Champlain Committee that I needed to learn, that I was able to bring back to my members and explain to them, well, we understand that you don't wanna have to get a permit for this, but the alternative to getting that permit is a dirty leg and the real estate that you're selling or own is going to lose value. So does it really hurt to get a permit? So I learned stuff by meeting with other people that don't necessarily agree with me. And my second reason for wanting this is when we don't have that opportunity to sit down and learn from each other, we're constantly in a position of dehumanizing each other over these calls because we're not looking at each other face to face. You know, whether it's advocates disparaging other advocates, I've seen advocates be very blunt where they wouldn't have been with committee members. I've seen the opposite end where committee members may have not acted appropriately in some situations and I'm not gonna name the person, but one committee member actually told a list of witnesses that they were wasting the individual's time. If that person had been expected to be in the building until five o'clock, as we normally would be, you wouldn't have made that comment. So I think that the humanizing factor of being in person is important. There is difference of opinion of whether we come back and that difference of opinion is based on someone's appetite for risk. Now you're talking to someone that works for a construction association and we specifically deal with risk every single day. We know from dealing with OSHA that it's likely that you'll die if you fall from six feet and hit your head. But we have people and we have systems that we've put together, their engineering systems or administrative systems and their personal protective equipment systems that we use to keep people safe out there. I think, you know, when I go back to the beginning of this and the AGC was approaching the Vermont restart committee, it was very clear that there were very different levels of appetite for risk. When we were talking to the health department, we did a very good job. They absolutely wanted no risk. And that no risk factor meant we all went home. And we've seen other complications from the separation over the years and that's led the health department to, over time, accept more risk. As more people are becoming vaccinated, they're willing to accept more risk. And as we get towards January of next year, we're gonna be in a much different situation, meaning I'm anticipating we'll have a whopping, I mean, right now we're over 60% of at least one shot. By the time we get to next January, the only people that won't have taken the shot are people that have chosen not to. And if their risk assessment is absolutely no state house, then they should be able to stay home and go on Zoom. But people that have gone out, taken the vaccine and feel like it's a calculated risk to come into the state house, maybe wear a mask, make sure we're washing our hands a little bit more. That should be the choice of the individual. I myself was the beneficiary of the Petri dish back in February of 2020. I don't even know if it was COVID because we weren't really talking about it, but I was out for a week sick. It happens. It's a risk that we take in the world when we go out there. I also had an idea. I'm not sure we're gonna get to it today, but I'm aware that H438, the capital construction bill, has not crossed the finish line yet. And for a long time, I've been listening to conversations about improving, expanding these rooms. And when I look at the capital complex map, we've had discussions just so everybody is clear where the construction association, we've discussed internally, acre and drive properties. That's a large piece of real estate that the state has with state buildings. And there's only a few people in each one of those buildings. My friends at BGS may not agree with me on this, but we have talked here about creating a larger capital complex over there, what it would take for us to do that. And this may be the catalyst to get us to make that decision point that it is time to modernize the way that we're doing business. So more people can get involved in these committee rooms. We can use the state house a little bit more less formally than we do now, but we've envisioned being able to put, you know, you could put a garage over there and prove parking in Montpelier and do all kinds of great stuff. And I think that's something that we can explore. Last but not least, I have a personal reason that I'd like to come back to the state house. And I think everyone on this committee knows who my boss is. I would like to come back to the state house for five months out of the year, please. To get away from Wabi. To get away from Wabi. You know, I keep offering people like you my condolences and I keep expecting to hear something snarky remark back from him and I never hear. And it's like, well, he must just hear that so often it just comes and goes. Wabi, does that like a virtual state house designed on a computer for all of us? We're doing great, Mati, you mentioned Wabi, you know, please, you know, you're really sounding great. Well, so with all joking aside, mostly you may not know my personal experience, how I landed up in front of you today. I spent most of my career styling real estate. It was a great career, I enjoyed it. It was, I made good money doing it. But I got involved working with our board of directors and I got on our government affairs committee and I began testifying in front of your committees around eight years ago. It wasn't long after I got involved with the board of directors that our government affairs director left and they looked at me and they said, Matt, you're the only one crazy enough that loves this process enough to wanna do this. And for the last five years, I've taken great pride putting on my suit every single day, marching into that state house, working with people like Mr. Burns and the rest of the folks that are on this committee to help better the state and the world that we live in. So if I want nothing more than to come back to the state house and work, I know that we can put together systems that'll keep us safe, whether it's the vaccine, administrative protections or personal protective equipment, we can do this and we'll do this together as a strong Vermont. Thank you. Matt, thanks for coming. Comments, questions, committee? Senator Ingalls. Matt, off the comment, I apologize, chair, but Matt, I hope that the government, the governor's requirement of callbacks got your 18 to 20,000 people a little bit more happier. I mean, actually the requirement that they do a job search. That, I believe will go a long way to helping people get back to work. And like I said, it's that risk assessment. And as people understand they're getting that vaccine, we are so successful as an organization of construction to not get people sick. It's by planning, being careful and making sure that you're following protocols and that's what's kept us safe. And we believe, you know, getting people back to work is the best way for at least mental health at this point in time to improve. Just let's not extend that job search requirement to legislators, okay? I'm fairly confident we will. Okay, thanks for coming, Matt. Senator McCormick may have a question though. Yes, thanks. I just want to thank you for your comment about the value of dealing with people you disagree with. It's such a fundamental underlying issue that it never gets mentioned because we're always more focused than that. We've never had a bill about that topic but you're absolutely right. And we're living in a time where people use the word argument as though it's the same thing as a quarrel. And I think an open-hearted, open-minded argument is the exact opposite of a quarrel. And we learn from people we disagree with. If nothing else, you can sharpen your argument and use their arguments as a rhinestone to sharpen your own. But I actually often find myself at least modifying a position because of someone I've disagreed with. And I do miss that from not being in the state house. That is happening less. So thank you for your comment there. At your way, Dick. She doesn't like to argue. She's controversy averse, but it's not that she's shy. She expects to get her way without a discussion. Just remember, she can watch this later on. Well, I won't read you the story, Senator McCormick, but if you're familiar with the works of Plato, there's a story in the Republic called The Allegory of the Cave. Oh yeah. The principle of the cave is that you have a bunch of people, us, watching a screen that's got flashing lights on it. And those flashing lights are the echo chambers that we live in. And the point of this cave is there is actually a doorway to the light over here where once we come out that doorway, we can look across and see and agree and disagree and go along with other people and realize that we do have common bonds that exist out there. So you just had a construction guy get philosophical and I'm gonna stop. Quoting Plato, I don't quote Plato anymore because I feel my grandfather's ghost, I majored in ancient Greek philosophy for a while and he was furious. Thank you. Yeah, you're right. All right, thanks. Paul, my apologies for leaving you to last. For some reason, rather Dick McCormick suggested I keep you last because you apparently opposes you all the time. Welcome to Senate institutions. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, members of the committee for the record, Paul Burns, I'm the executive director of V-PURG, the Vermont Public Interest Research Group. It's my pleasure to be with you today. And I know most of you pretty well, so I don't know that I've testified in your committee before, so appreciate the opportunity. V-PURG is the state's largest consumer and environmental advocacy organization. We work, among other things, on good government, government transparency and so forth. So these issues are near and dear to us and to the 40,000 or so members and supporters we have around the state. I don't recall a hearing with a witness list as varied as this, where I have found something to agree with from what every other witness has said. It really, there is a lot of common ground, I think among those who are testifying here today. And as you struggle to find the best path forward, I think we would all probably agree that there is no perfect path forward. You cannot please every single person and every single interest with a single decision that you will make about how best to proceed. But as you come back together, I do hope and trust that you will try to find ways to preserve the kind of transparency that many folks have become accustomed to in these difficult times. So that is important to me and to my organization that as you open up, as you return to work in the state house, that we find ways for you to be accompanied by members of the media, by members of the public and by those of us who are registered lobbyists as well. I think there is a role and a place for each of these folks in the process. And it is important, not just in the committee rooms, but in the building itself, as others have said. When you are looking for other space, I don't know whether you're gonna move quickly toward construction of other space nearby, although maybe that's not a bad idea to consider that as well. But certainly there is available space and others have commented on that and going back to Karen Horne at the beginning as well, which I thought made a lot of sense. Another point that she made that I will just simply express our support for was the idea of electronic voting, more important in the house than in the Senate in terms of a time saver, but something that would improve, enhance transparency and speed the process as well as you move forward. I again, I don't wanna repeat a lot of what others have said, but there was a question or some have suggested it's kind of an all or nothing with respect to hearing rooms and committee rooms. If you can't get everybody in, don't allow anybody in. That is not something that we would agree with. We understand that there are space limitations and those space limitations may be even more limited. And I think we will listen to the health professionals on what those appropriate limits ought to be, but allowing for some, even if you can't have everyone in, I still think makes sense. Let's do the best we can augment that process with the best possible virtual technology. And here I think I agree with Bill Driscoll and others who have talked about having at least one camera in that room and having some sort of real time capacity to monitor the committee's progress as we can have now, not Brady Bunch style, but in the best possible way. And so I would not say all or nothing, use the space as best we can, perhaps have more meetings in a different location if you are anticipating larger meetings. All of that makes a lot of sense to me. It was also suggested that you should limit though the issues that you take up. I know that was a suggestion made before the start of this legislative session as well. And I'm grateful that you all decided that you had the capacity to consider issues certainly including direct, those directly related to COVID, but also those that went beyond the exclusive link to COVID issues. And I think that was important. I think the state is making important progress on other areas. I'll mention just one that you all have voted on already. That was the legislation dealing with PFAS toxins in consumer products like rugs and carpeting and firefighting foam and food packaging. That legislation, well, not without some controversy and people on this testimony list today have taken different positions on it, but it has passed now unanimously in both the Senate and the House. There is a slight relation to COVID in that, but it is not primarily a COVID related piece of legislation. And yet doing it this year means that we will take action sooner that could help to protect public health a little bit sooner in this state. And in so doing create a model for other states to follow as well. And there are lots and lots of benefits that will come from that. So it's just one example of where I think you made the right decision in not limiting the issues that you take on to being those that work deal exclusively with COVID in those topics moving forward. So keep up the good work. Each committee has its area of focus and I appreciate that and I'm confident that you can continue to do that successfully as you move forward. I think with respect to the seats in the room, I just have one thought as others mentioned saving seats for legislative council. I think if there's another seat or two that I would think of reserving in a room or allowing in that room would be the media. Most importantly, it really is critical that the media have the, be the eyes and ears of the public in these processes. Witnesses who are lined up to testify. Obviously I can see the logic in that. You might also consider maybe more frequent breaks as you're meeting in person and rotating the room a little bit. Maybe that's, there's a fairness that will come from that. And others have said to, and I agree with this that I think we will all need to self-regulate more so that we don't, we could work more collaboratively, collaboratively, at least with those that we're working with on a particular piece of legislation so that you don't need somebody from DPR and CLF and BNRC, et cetera, in a room. And maybe one of us can handle that. And I think that there's going to be an interest in that naturally as we move forward and perhaps we would see a little bit less crowded atmosphere anyway. But those are my comments, Mr. Chairman. And again, I really appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today and appreciate your focus on this important issue. Thanks, Paul. Committee, any questions? Paul, I want to thank you for coming in to you and all the rest who are still on the screen. It is very important for all of you to walk away understanding that the legislature appreciates that you are all stakeholders in the process. We may not often exhibit that, but as we think through this process, it really becomes apparent that the moving parts of this building are not limited to the legislators themselves. The empathy that Austin was talking about is not just a component of the legislators themselves. It is the interpersonal interactions with people who are coming and going in the building. I know that there's often jokes about lobbyists, just as lobbyists have jokes about legislators. I remarked yesterday that as a lawyer, I have to go to continuing legal education courses and one of the funniest and hysterical course I ever went to was when legislative council gets together every year and they produce a really great production on legislation that was passed the previous year. And if you really want to hear jokes about legislators, that's a great place to go and visit when you listen to them talk about us. And I say that with friendly regard because those people are also part and parcel of the empathy that is required in the building. And having all of us talk about how we interact with each other is really an important part of the process of trying to figure out how to rebuild as we go forward. So I want to thank you all for taking time out of your day committee. Just so you know, I think this is our last gathering together for the year unless we have to come back, which I'm sure we will do because I know the house is working on a few twists and turns in the capital bill. We will have to get back together one more time but officially for committee testimony, I think this is it for us for the year. Say it ain't so Joe, say it ain't so Joe. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The new guy always gets the last word. But I do want to take the time to make sure everybody knows it's been an enjoyable experience this year. Denise, thank you very much for shepherding us through the process. And as these witnesses know, it's really difficult to get scheduling sometimes, especially in an environment where you're actually doing things in a strange way. I see Matt has sent us a chat that Wabi is sending us his love. I think that should go without comment. Nice, Matt, put it. Thanks, Matt. We appreciate that. Hopefully as we move forward to make decisions, Paul, you're 100% right. Not everybody is going to be 100% happy. In fact, I can almost guarantee you that everybody will be unhappy about something. Just these past three days, we have learned that when you make a decision that for instance, Jessica Bernard, you're talking about the health and safety of people. It is a culture shock and change to some people who are going to end up being in spaces they have no familiarity with whatsoever. And trying to juggle those two things is a real difficult process. And it is a conversation that is becoming more apparent only because you folks have all taken the time to be here today and educate us about that whole problem. So, Dick McCormick, you have your hand up. Yes, thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to say to Denise that you should understand that theoretically we are now taking you to the plaza for a drink. Oh, great. In theory. Yes, we have raised a glass to you, Denise. Thank you very much. Good day. All right. We're going to call it and you can take us out of you.