 Welcome. This is the education committee and the Vermont House of Representatives. And we are looking at a current, uh, amendment to the budget bill. And this is related to, uh, testing for PCBs. And I'm delighted to welcome Commissioner Peter Walk from the Department of Environmental Conservation, uh, to help us understand what's happening here, where this idea came from, and what the impacts would be. So welcome, Commissioner, Commissioner Walk. Thank you, Madam Chair. For the record, Peter Walk, Commissioner of the Department of Environmental Conservation, I'm joined by the A&R General Counsel, Matt Chapman, and the Director, or the Program Manager for the Sites Management Section in the DEC, Trish Capolino. Appreciate the opportunity to be here today, subject specifically as PCB testing in schools, um, as, uh, as you are all well aware, there has been significant, uh, concern around the discovery of PCBs in, in Burlington High School, indoor air quality in Burlington High School. From that, we understood going into the session that there would be significant interest in, uh, in PCB testing, uh, in, in schools in some form. And so we set aside as part of the Governor's recommend $5 million for indoor air quality testing, um, as part of, of the budget. The intent there was to leave the specifics fairly general, understanding that there was likely to be a conversation similar to the one you've had around lead in the last couple of years. Um, the, I will apologize that the language in the budget was a little unclear. Um, it said to $5 million or ended up being $4 million to complete, uh, lead, or PCB testing. The intent there was to originally leave it as a voluntary program and let the conversation unfold in the legislature during the session. As part of that work, Senator Campion, your counterpart in the House, or excuse me, the Senate, um, real, uh, asked Michael Grady to put together a draft, uh, sort of for a mandatory program and what that might look like. Um, Matt, as part of that effort, um, assisted Mr. Grady in developing that language. Uh, unfortunately, because I think the lack of clarity in the budget language that, that, um, that specific, those specifics never, uh, made it into committee in the Senate. And, and up until news articles of, of last week, people were assuming that we were going to implement a mandatory testing program. Uh, at least, uh, legislators in the, in the Senate were assuming that that was the case. Um, and were surprised to read our comments in the, in the, in Digger and, and, uh, seven days. Um, so that led to a quick, uh, retrieving of that previous language and trying to figure out if it was possible to move that language forward, um, this late in the session as part of the budget. Ultimately, what you've, what you see in front of you is the, um, is, is a very simplified version of that that leaves out many of the details that we will need to resolve, uh, prior to the program really launching in earnest. The basic structure of what you have in front of you is, is a setting a deadline for testing to be complete by 2024. Um, but with the first year of the program being voluntary. Um, and then additional details to be worked out during the 2022 session. Um, we, that, that simplification makes, uh, some sense given the time period we're in, trying to close out the budget, trying to wrap up the session, all of those things, except for the fact that it, it, it leaves unclear a couple of things that, that I want to highlight for you and offer as an opportunity to, uh, to, to, to request an amendment if, if at all possible. Here, the, the basics of the structure as you, as read the language is that DEC will conduct this testing program. Um, and this comes out of what budget? So it comes out of the environmental contingency fund, uh, which is our, um, which is the fund that we use to address, uh, emerging sites, site cleanup needs where there's no responsible party and we conduct emergency actions from. Um, we have already included in the budget, and I think it's, it's not clear whether it's still in this language or not, frankly. Um, might need to go back and, uh, yes, it is. Um, the, uh, the, so the challenge that we face is that we don't, uh, regulate or provide oversight for the cleanup of, of indoor air quality issues, uh, release releases into indoor air. And so part of what we had included in, in the language that we developed in February was language that clarified that the release of, of PCBs into indoor air from building materials constituted a, a release. And I read a release in terms of sort of a, a spill that, you know, sort of those sorts of things that we typically clean up. Um, so that leaves us in a bit of an awkward point because we can't, we, we can do the testing, we can help facilitate the testing. We will, uh, develop a contract, contract or a series of contracts with the third party consultants to help us do that work that will require a lot of site specific design around testing protocols to understand where to test. Um, and then it will involve a lot of follow up if, if, uh, if issues are found. We can do that. What happens after that is, is much more up in the air, um, because we don't have the authority to compel a school district to clean up, um, their, the, the, the contamination, if it's discovered, if it's an indoor air quality issue. Um, and while I don't imagine that any of the schools that we'll test during the sort of voluntary phase as laid out here, uh, will not want to act, right? They're going to move, if they want to move forward, they're going to want to move forward. But, um, we want to, you know, we always like to have belt and spenders from a regulatory perspective so that we have the ability to, and if, and if there is, if there are issues, uh, that is being a school district or other party can't resolve them, we have some tools to bear to do it ourselves if necessary, and we don't have that currently. Um, and then more generally, I think that the idea that the testing we are doing, we are doing the testing and the obligation falls to us to do the testing rather than to the schools to work with us to do the testing, right? It's sort of an interesting, an odd, odd set of, uh, responsibilities and authority. So that's, those are our sort of primary challenges with the language and its simplified form. Can we live with them until the 2022 session? Probably. Does it, it feels like we're, we're getting a little bad over our skis at this point, though, um, with a fairly complicated issue. Um, this is not led, led what are, what are quality testing for lead, this, that these are significant, you know, sort of, uh, sampling design, trying to understand where in the school we should be testing, uh, and then trying to identify sources, um, and, uh, the, the levels and building materials and other things. And it's, so it's a significantly more involved activity than, um, than the, the lead testing was. And further, the, like the opportunities to cure the, the, the fixes are not simply replacing an old fixture with a new one. It, uh, will be significantly more involved than that. So, um, my question, my question to you is that we have been working on a, a bill, uh, last year and again this year related to assessing our school buildings. And I'm struggling to find out why we are hearing about this in the last week of the session. And were, were you in touch with the agency of education regarding this? This would have been a really well developed conversation in our committee had we heard about it in January or even February. We have been in regular conversation with the agency of education. I think we were all under the assumption that the Senate was taking the lead here and then did that didn't come to pass. Don't forget about us. We dig in in our committee and I'm, I'm really disappointed that we didn't have an opportunity to take a look at this. So it's something may start in the Senate. It's always a good idea to have the house is going to act as well. So, um, I think what we have have here is, uh, finding about this at the last week is giving us a very, very little opportunity. And I respect that. I apologize for that representative web. We were, we were fully comfortable moving forward with a voluntary program this summer, um, and getting testing started and then coming back to this conversation. Um, next session, it's going to take us multiple years to do the testing anyways. Um, so we didn't, it wasn't an intentional slight. We, uh, we assumed that we assumed wrongly that people were willing to move forward with a voluntary program in this year and, and then, and then revisit it. It's obviously been an incredibly busy and hectic year in the education world. And I'm not, we're, you know, trying to make sure that we're, we're not adding to, to, to the, the, the number of issues you, you need to work to resolve, but, um, certainly understand the challenge of timing and apologize for our role in contributing to that. Yeah, we take, we take no slight. We don't, we don't just let it at all. It's just unfortunate because especially when we figure what happened with lead, that was originally going to be, you know, just a quick assessment at 15 and all of a sudden it became a much more complex issue that took a year to resolve in a complex committee of conference. So there's certainly was background that, um, you know, that the simple idea of just doing lead testing turned into a full blown, uh, event in the, in the house and the Senate. So, um, but I, I do recognize that this has been a year like no other. I would agree with you. I'll add to that, um, that the, the, the wall we're in this and game pieces now and I, you know, those are the things that we would want to, to potentially resolve in the, in the near term, the bigger, bigger challenges associated with this are the sort of what happens next and that shouldn't keep us from testing. That should have us go in with eyes wide open on what's potentially coming down the pike. There's nothing, there's nothing in law right now that says that you have to fix, that someone has to, is responsible for fixing that other than the community members, um, up in arms and not every community has a Macy's at least. Well, so there are, there are a couple of caveats to the, my correct answer. One is that there is, depending on the levels, there would be regulation under, under the toxic substances control act of the federal level, um, and, uh, varying degrees of authority from the Department of Health that could come into play in extreme instances. But, um, for the most part, at least our authority as an EC, which typically manages sort of cleanups of remediation actions, if it is a release from building materials, it is not considered a release, and therefore not regulated by us. So that's not a TOSCA? It, it, our jurisdiction is separate and apart from TOSCA. Okay. Representative Harrison, I'm sorry. Representative Harrison, please. Thank you. Uh, my question is a little bit outside the domain of our committee, but it bothers me that, uh, these environmental concerns are, uh, concentrating on schools as opposed to all, uh, public buildings, especially the ones owned by the state of Vermont. I certainly, Representative Harrison, I respect your, uh, your perspective and I don't think you are wrong. The buildings that were built are substantially renovated prior to 1980 or sort of after 1950, prior to 1980 are, are likely to have, uh, PCB related building materials in, in them, those, um, that does not, that's not limited certainly to buildings. It has come up in the, you know, sort of public interest because of the discovery of PCBs in relative to high school, but it's certainly not limited to the folks. I'm assuming you were working fairly directly with Burlington High School? We have been, uh, Trish Copilino, who's on the phone has been working regularly with them. It is to go back to the point about what it takes to, to respond to one of these situations. It is, it's not a, okay, we found this, this fixture is, you know, above standards for lead. We want to replace it and then retest. It's a, you know, full blown investigation and, and Burlington is, is living that right now. Um, and obviously with, you know, the temporary relocation to the Macy's that now is up in the air because of the decision to sort of not renovate the building, which was a decision made by the school district, not, you know, not by us or not necessarily under our authority. So, um, that is, uh, that we, we like to think that that's an extreme example, but we don't know what we're going to find. And we, we haven't yet done the work to determine which schools would, um, would need to test, right? It's not every school. Um, it, those that were built, uh, before 1980 or after 1980, excuse me, were, will, will not, uh, have BCB related materials that are not likely to and, and therefore we, we would not, um, that would be sort of the cutoff for testing. And as you, you may know our H426 that is, uh, in the Senate now does have an inventory and an assessment. So that would be a great conversation, at least for the inventory stage. Before we move to the assessment stage, great question. We're also looking at that in terms of the, the radon testing to prepare schools to be ready to do the radon testing by getting, you know, four maps, for example, um, representative Austin. Yes. Um, thank you. I'm just wondering if you could possibly talk about what would be the worst case scenario and what is the percent or the chances of that happening? I, in terms of what we might find. Yeah. In terms of that, that remediation or, you know, again, what's the worst that, you know, probably won't happen. And again, the percent would be helpful, but you know, what are the possibilities out there? Sure. Uh, we don't, uh, fully know, I mean, but the, you know, sort of the worst case scenario is Burlington, where the facility is mothballed, right? And not able to be used. It will still need to be cleaned up at some point. And if it's going to return to productive use, um, there are, you know, sort of overall, if we, we did a pilot study in 2013 and looked at four schools around the state. Thankfully in those four schools, we, we did not see issues that, that ultimately needed to be addressed. And so we have some hope that there, that not all schools are going to potentially have, have concerns. But I mean, we can be talking into the tens of millions of dollars in remediation costs statewide easily. Probably multiple dozen. Thank you. Without, without systems that have an empty Macy's building. Correct. Right. And then you're talking about what do you do with them in the interim? I think we all can agree that we would like not to go back to remote learning. Um, and so yes, there are, there are some real, real logistics challenges with what happens at the back end of this representative Williams. Yes. Thank you. Probably everyone else has the answer to this question, but I would like to know where PCBs come from. So PCBs were a common additive to various products through the late 1970s. They were manufactured exclusively by Monsanto and included in things like caulking and window glazing, light ballasts, anything that was needed to sort of maintain flexibility, like the caulking or a, or a, or a mastic, like the glue for tiles and things like that. Anything that you did to drive, but also have some flexibility PCBs was a common additive. Thank you. Thank you. So to undertake this testing with it, so are you, what are the logistics moving forward right now for you? So we, the first thing that I would want to do is to do a survey of, of school districts to find out which schools and their systems would qualify for the need to test. We would need to bring a contractor or multiple contractor contractors into the fold to be able to do the, the, the design work to do the, the sampling. And then, you know, we would, we would need to conduct that sampling in a, in a way that we could, we could get results in and sort of have a timeline through the end of the, of the sampling period to get that all done. This is not something where we can send everybody a few bottles and, and have them send it to the, the VDH lab and, and get our results back in, in a summer and be done. Right. It's, that's not what's going to be able to happen here. It's going to be much slower. So if I'm a principal in a school, what would I be expecting to happen in my school just to get concrete? So, so may, you know, so essentially we would work with our consultants to design a sampling program to understand sort of where around the, the buildings, the building should be samples to get a sort of representative mix around the, around the building. And, and then the sampling would occur and the results would come back. And then we'd take next steps from there. If, if PCBs were just, if PCBs were discovered in the indoor air, then we would start to look at the building materials and big scrape samples and other things to try to understand where things were coming from that would be analyzed. And we would work to see where, how things would be addressed while, you know, if it was isolated to a room or two, and we could mitigate that impact and move people out of that room, then those rooms, then we could essentially could do, could think of that as an immediate mitigation member. There's going to be a lot of sort of iterative steps along the way to understand. And how much, how much, what is the timing on that? So what is that, what is that, what is that for lack of a better word disruption in the school? Are these things that need to be tested while, you know, students are there or can be tested in the off seasons during vacations? People wondering on the school sampling things? I did my best to, to keep Trish off of screen because she's at the car dealership getting her car fixed, but I'm going to have Trish walk through a little bit of that if, if you don't mind coming on screen, Trish. Or you can stay off screen and just talk to us if you want Trish. Thank you. Okay, I'll do that. So, so we actually did discuss whether or not you could do the sampling while the kids are in school and they can. I mean, the biggest issue that we have when doing indoor air sampling is trying to make sure that nobody is bringing what we're sampling into the building, but that shouldn't be an issue with PCBs. So the air sampling can happen while the kids are there and for us that actually makes it more realistic as to what exposures might be instead of doing it in the summertime or on school break when the air handling system might not be at the same levels that it would be when the kids are there. The air sampling that we're doing is 24 hour air sampling test and it's got a pump that you attach a filter to and we sample the filter media not us directly the lab. And we had talked about trying to do about at least 10% of the different rooms that are in the school and so it would range from maybe a cafeteria to a school room to a library to a locker room depending on what's there and what different types of products might exist in the school. But there shouldn't be any major disruption to kids being there as long as, you know, we can make sure that they don't really mess with the system while it's running. Well, we've already heard about the canisters for Radon that certainly look like they great opportunity to be messed with by students. So it would be okay. Representative Brown. Oh, thank you. I'm not sure if someone already said this, but do we have a rough sense of the percentage of Vermont schools that would be eligible based on building age, et cetera? Do we have any kind of ballpark around that? We do have rough, rough estimates. It's, you know, sort of there are there are 450 somewhat schools in Vermont somewhere around there. We anticipate roughly a third of them would likely qualify to need to be testing. Um, oh, excuse me, that's that I'm sorry, I meant two thirds roughly around 300 schools. And so then that would that's that's where our, you know, and each each school will likely take on average about 15 to $20,000 to test. Um, they're these are not inexpensive tests and they're and that's why so that 300 times 15 is is roughly how we got to the $4.5 million number. So it's just and that's just through just as a reminder, that's just through testing, right? That's doesn't get us into the what we do with it when we find it phase. Right. Thank you. So with two thirds of the schools and let's say all of them volunteered this year. How long will it take? How long would it take to do 300 schools? It's the challenge isn't necessarily in the testing. I think we could get through the testing relatively easily. It's that no school community is going to want to have us stop the process with them to continue to test when they've discovered in their schools. And so we have to have a sort of continuous cycle of testing to response phase. And that's where the challenge comes in just from a logistics and and and capacity issues. So you say you get you get a first order response and then you do do more testing after that. As you can see, we are we are brand new to the subject. Yes. Yep. And we so we really want to get to where the source of the the issue is and to understand what the what building materials are in there and sort of how much of a challenge it might be to remove them that we can then get into sort of what the remedial options are. And that is a lot of back and forth. As you can imagine, there will be a lot of community interest in this. And so that we participate in public meetings with the school district to help them understand what the the the issues are that all of that is a lot of of just of good technical assistance and and administrative support through that process. So what do you have for requests now? Right now we have we and the Department of Health have each asked for a five year limited service position to assist with that. That was with the idea that would that was on the order of the sort of the five years that we had originally talked about this whole process taking the Senate would like to shorten that to three. And I think we're going to need more resources to be able to do that effectively. But I can't give you that given the the 12 hours I've had to think about three years. I can't tell you what that resource need will be right now. Representative Harrison. Thank you. Two questions. One, correct me if I'm wrong, that Vermont standard for parts for Billion is considerably less than the federal standard. So my question is how did we get there? And the second question is, I know PCBs have been on the car citizen list for a long time. What else is waiting out there to the rare it's had? So thank you, Representative Harrison. That's a good question. So yes, the Vermont guidance value, it's not a bright line standard is is considerably lower than the EPA's that is in part because it's not a bright line value. It's where we treat, you know, sort of the action level where we trigger looking at to see what mitigation options there are to reduce exposures and get below those levels. The happy to have the Department of Health come in that how they arrived at those values as we rely on them to set those. And we understood that there is no safe level as it was with lead. There was no safe level that that was just an action level. I think what Matt. So I think there are probably two things that are important to note. One is that the the PCB levels in that have been established federally were established in the early 90s. So there's been a lot of information on the human health effects associated with PCBs that hasn't been sort of captured by the federal government that the VDH has been looking at. And like Peter said, I mean, I think this is a screening value as opposed to a standard. And the significance of that is that when it's at or above the screening value, VDH is basically conducting what we're calling sort of an informal risk assessment, you know, where is it at? How many kids are there? How long are they there? What's the exposure? Because you're sort of looking at a lot of different factors to determine what is and what isn't safe. And that number is sort of what starts the process but doesn't sort of end the process. One moment here. So yours, your you had put forth to test voluntarily for one year while we work on the logistics and funding. Was that what you had recommended? So we had actually the the the idea of having enough one time surplus to be able to dedicate to to priorities came up relatively late in the process. So we wanted to make sure the placeholder was in there to be able to do the testing if that was what you wanted to do. It seems that everybody is interested in doing the testing, the conversation that we haven't that we anticipated happening and and didn't happen was the sort of what is the full program look like. I think that I don't think you have anybody that would disagree with the fact that we are going to need to be testing for this. That's absolutely very clear. It really comes down to what's the process? Yeah, and certainly that's that's why why why we included the money. We we agree. Certainly we want to be thinking about we we've seen enough of these things over the years to know that you know without a plan a full plan for what what comes next. It tends to they tend to linger and cause pretty significant issues. So uh representative Austin. Thank you. I want to thank you so much for joining us at this last minute. Representative Austin. Yep, thank you. I'm just wondering if there's any possibility current federal funds. I was reading through the tax rules for municipalities. Is there any are you seeing any federal funding that could apply to the testing impossible remediation and even the infrastructure funding that may be coming down? I will probably not for the testing. I don't have a good enough sense frankly about the money that's going to municipalities as to whether those would potentially these would potentially the remediation could potentially be eligible expenses. Um, but don't have a good handle on that in this space. I'll just that's okay. Thank you so much. So I have a question coming from him out here. What does the bill do that DC is not already ready doing with the money being allocated for testing? So I think what the language that the Senate was primarily interested in doing is ensuring that there was a deadline for when testing would be completed by and that it was to be a mandatory testing program. That was the primary primary change here to make that abundantly clear. And did you talk about a five year or not? Did that happen? So we originally the language well sorry the ring the language that that Michael Grady and Matt worked on that that is then provided a center campion was originally a five year process. That when was that? When is that? February. That was in February. Okay. Um, that that understanding that that was the start of the conversation. So it wasn't you know sort of so that language was discussed last week in the Senate in Senate education. They didn't they felt like five years was too long and wanted to move quicker. Yeah, was there any discussion on what would happen if we had um if we had toxic levels in a number of schools was there anything discussed at that point in response? There was obviously concern but there was more interest in ensuring we were getting going with the testing and providing information to parents and teachers and school administrators first and foremost. Um, we obviously think that information is important and powerful but we also want to make sure that we're giving or aligning that information with tools to address it. Okay. So the first year is voluntary and how many do you have schools that are requesting testing now? We've had a few schools reach out through consultants that they've reached out to to to think about testing. We have been wanting to ensure that we didn't run afoul of where this conversation might end up in terms of starting somebody down a path that might be somewhat different than was ultimately required. And so we've been working on putting together what our protocols would be and getting ready for that. We have nobody has tested beyond the four that were tested in 2013 in Burlington High School at this point to our knowledge. And just to clarify again your conversation with the Agency of Education happened early as well that was happening by February as well while we were in the middle of a school facilities assessment planning bill. Yes. I guess my frustration is obvious. Any other questions? It's very difficult for us to influence things at this point. Other than I understand I'm waiting. I'm trying to get the language that they're working on right now. I don't have that yet. But I guess my understanding is it's voluntary but then by August 2024 it's everybody that fits that school age category and that there's supposed to be another discussion, whatever that means in January. I actually have the language in front of me if you'd like me to share it. I would very much like to see it. Perhaps if you could Jesse, if you could share. Screen share. I think I have the ability to screen. Or if you send it to Jesse she can also, well your co-host now so you can give it a try or send it to Jesse would be great. And this is the latest language as of yesterday? Yes. So I've got lots of screens up and I hope I just shared the right one. I should say proposed amendment with some highlighter. You lucked out. Okay, good. Can you make it bigger? I can make it bigger, yes. How's that? Okay, good. So the top portion is mostly what we included in the governor's recommend. It is the highlighted portion that was added to establish both long-term mandatory program and be clear that there was no testing required in the first year. Who would be available? Who should be included in this additional guidance? Who would you recommend including in developing additional guidance? So we, you know, I think that it's been an ongoing conversation between the Agency of Education Health and us about in the sort of what the protocols should be. We obviously there are lots of other interested groups in the school communities that would have a significant interest in the how this rolls out and what resources are available in phases two and three right through the investigation and the remediation portion thereof. And so obviously we would want to consult with the NEA and the school board association and the principal association and the superintendent association and other deliverers. So right now that would assume that this would happen, that this plan would get set up in the 22 legislative session, get determined by the end of the session, which would take two years to test. Two years to do the testing. And we are all, we all have our eyes on the federal infrastructure bill that at this moment in time recommends 100 billion for school infrastructure, some of which includes things like broadband. That remains an unknown. At this point. Okay. Any recommendations going forward? Given this is where we are. Would it be appropriate to ask for a report back from AOE Department of Health, DEC and perhaps the group that we affectionately call the V's? We. Let's, Jesse, please do invite the secretary in. We certainly are happy to report back it is in our interest. Bring this conversation to you actively. And so there's certainly, this isn't one where we would not be advocating for something. Come next session, we would want to work through the specifics that are laid out in the final sentence there. I would certainly see that this is something that our committee would be happy to start. But you do not believe that you need legislative action to get that conversation going. I do not believe we do. Okay. Any other questions at this point? All right. Well, thank you. Thank you for joining us. Let's start talking in January, not in May in 2022 and appreciate you joining us today. Thank you. Thank you. Secretary French. Good morning. We were just talking about the PCB language that's coming forward and we're surprised to have this come forward. Where we're hearing about it the last week of the session when we had age 426 in the committee starting in January and just wondering where that conversation fell off the wagon. Yeah, I think I draw a parallel observation to rate on as well. Some of these issues emerging very rapidly towards the end of the session. Would have been happy to include those conversations during that development of that bill. So I think my frustration is obvious that it's coming up now when this would have been a great part of the conversation. And I think it's always been an assumption in 426 that we are going to be looking at those items. But we have invited you and not for me to vent my frustration, but to get a response to the concerns coming forward from our CTE centers and their concerns about funding and declining enrollment, some of which is long more long standing and some of which is COVID related and looking to see if you see any options to help make them call to get through this year. It's coming year. Yeah, well, good morning. It's good to see you all. Dan French, Secretary of Education. Hope you're all doing well. Yeah, this is an issue several centers have brought it forward. It's not necessarily a situation that pertains to all centers, but I guess the conclusion there I would draw is it's we don't know. And they're very likely could be an impact financially to them as a result of the pandemic. And that should be a clue. I think that federal dollars can be brought to bear at some point to address that issue. So we're pretty comfortable setting things like Essar, both state level or local funding could be utilized if there are concerns, as well as gear funding, which is the governor's emergency education relief. So we don't, you know, we don't know the true nature of the issue. It might be a subset of centers that experience the issue. And, you know, we'll have multiple sort of targeted opportunities to address the issue. And I say that targeted basis is very well could be school districts might be able to use their LEA Essar funds, for example, to address that issue. We might be interested in using the gear funds. We haven't settled yet. The governor hasn't settled on a direction for there's a 1.9 approximate component of a sort of a discretionary pot of money and gear to previously under gear 1, the governor was very interested in assisting CT centers precisely because they weren't often included in the Essar funding or the CRF funding. So it's going to be an evolving situation. I'm not convinced that sort of across the board hold harmless or a freeze, if you will, is sort of the appropriate response, because I think that's a fairly blunt instrument, so to speak, which it might necessitate a more targeted approach. So I mean, I'm parsing through some of this analysis in the last week or so. I'm not convinced there's an across the board issue, but I think we need to be open to being responsive if if an issue doesn't merge. And I think it's probably something I would conclude that we go back and take a look at in the fall and again and when the legislature comes back in January to see if there's something we can do if there's a need. Meanwhile, we'll be working on the gear to piece with the governor. I'm not sure how that would be brought directly to bear and addressing the specific issue, but those funds are available. I think we did hear that it's not that there are some centers are actually going to be okay while others aren't. And as their schools are working on contracts, there's I think there is the concern about losing faculty during during this and waiting till the fall seems like that could be a little tough. Yeah, I just I don't think we have solid information to address the issue right now. But you are you are looking at options whether it's is there a gear three? No, that's a good question. There's a yeah, there's just a gear one and gear two. There was never a sort of interim appropriation for gear. Okay. And that's about 1.9 in gear two for the years. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, gear two structured pretty significantly different than gear one in that the if you remember under SR one, there was the equitable shares provision, which was the piece around independent schools. So they didn't continue that approach through SR two and SR three instead, they included an independent school or non non public school strategy inside of what became gear two. So Vermont received about six, six million dollars under gear to about four million of that is reserved to what's called the ENAS program emergency aid for non public schools. And there's about two million or 1.9 million in the what would be I call the traditional gear governor's discretionary piece. Okay. Other questions? We did have a very good report from Jay Ramsey from from your department, and it definitely looked like there was a difference in how someone doing it. Yeah, I think that's fair. And I, you know, would just say the fall we just I don't think we have enough information suggests there's a broad pattern here, but it is something that could likely be a situation that we'd have to address. And I think, you know, part of the other solution is to take a look at that CT funding formula as it is. And that's something we were anxious to bring forward, you know, we've couple of the centers that contract with Bill Talbot. And we have some modeling there. So it might be something to look into essentially abandon sort of the FTE component of their funding. And that would certainly would be helpful in addressing this kind of issue. But that's that's a bigger conversation. Yeah, certainly that gets the the the sort of fighting over student counts between between the LEAs and the CTEs, I think might represent Boston. Yes. Just to clarify process, we use Secretary French or the department be communicating with the CTEs about what we just discussed about waiting till the fall? Well, yeah, we're I would say firstly, we're in close communication with them. And you had Jay come in and Ruth, they're they they're direct communication with the centers. We will be attentive to their needs. If this emerges as an issue that is a recovery issue relative to use of federal dollars, I think we'll we'll have some options available, including gear to and including working with the LEAs. As you know, we can't compel how the LEAs use their money. But there might be some options there for us to explore how to how to deal with that issue. Or you know, we're going to come back to you once we understand what the patterns are, we'll come back to you in January with some recommended changes to statutory language. Okay, okay, great. Just want to make sure that between now and January, they're they're aware of, you know, that it's on people's minds. So I'm sure they are. I just, you know, just wanted to make sure for my own peace of mind. Thank you. Yeah, I mean, in terms of, you know, several of them had brought this issue forward very early in the session, but it wasn't necessarily on my radar, that the that the problem, shall we say, was becoming sort of consistent or broad enough that it warranted a more general response from us. So unfortunately, it's just sort of getting on my radar in the last couple of weeks, is an emerging issue. So I'm certainly keenly interested in assisting them. I'm just not quite sure the scope of the problem and what what the solution appropriate solution would be at this point. Thank you. Representative Williams. Yes, thank you. I guess I had basically the same question that Representative Austin had. What do I tell my local tech centers? And what I'm hearing is that they are in a communication with you folks. And I'm kind of like behind the scene and knowing that something is happening with that. So that's encouraging. And I appreciate that. Thank you. Yeah, I mean, it's I think it's, you know, it's like so much of what we see in the emergency needs emerge. And we have to respond. The timing of this isn't the best if there was an opportunity to do something statutorily. Ideally, the need would have presented itself earlier and we would have been able to formulate an appropriate response. But this is, I think becoming more clear that there might be an issue for some centers, which also indicates it's challenging to write a statutory response if it's some centers, not others. But I feel, you know, I'm sensitive to the issue. I definitely want to support them. I also feel pretty good about we have some options in terms of tools that we might be able to deploy in the interim. So we'll do our best to be responsive to their needs. Thank you. And those options might be a little bit more targeted rather than doing a home home. Right. And I think in particular, if in a near term, we could look at using the gear to if we had to do something in that regard. And that would might be enough to hold us over to get us to January for next year. Great. And I'm pleased to hear that you are considering the gear funds. And we are aware that it could be part of the LEA they're sharing because they are supposed to be moving those funds to areas of partnership as well. Yeah. Any other questions? Secretary French, we're sort of coming to the end of this session here. And just looking at closure on the work that we're doing this year. And certainly we'll be looking at a discussion going forward next year. We have for 26, which is in the Senate, which I anticipate them concurring with with that amendment. We have 106, and which has the meals language attached. Did hear from Rosie Krueger, some of that. And just checking to see if there's anything that remains not as 13 is on the floor today. Just checking in with you on any of our remaining issues. Well, I appreciate the opportunity to reflect a little bit on where it's where we've been. And I, you know, I'm really grateful for your support this session. I know it's been very challenging. But we've always felt very supported by, you know, both policy committees and the recovery works are greatly appreciated. You know, I do tend to parse these kinds of things out through the recovery lens. So I'd say firstly that, you know, we're seeing a tremendous demand for summer programming. You know, if you remember our recovery plan has like three focus areas. One is social emotional learning. Second is academics and a third the reengagement and it really putting a priority on a reengagement piece as sort of a precondition before we can get into the other two. And that pointed to making a significant investment in summer as a strategy related to recovery. So we're really trying to put put as many front loader resources essentially into the summer. So I think that's that's going to serve us well going into the fall if we're successful through the summer and doing that. And I think, you know, we're been working with the JFO very collaboratively to resolve our issues around Essar. So I feel really comfortable and well supported in that regard. So thank you. I think we're going to be in a good place to organize our recovery response and use of Essar SDA funds and the state plan that's required and so forth. So I think I think we have our arms around all of that in terms of general planning level and, you know, do our best to be responsive to issues like the CT ones as they emerge. But I think the other legislative and issues I'm aware of where they all are at this point. So we're we've been standing by to help any of those last minute sort of questions that emerge and be happy to continue to provide that support. Thank you. I have received the afterschool report 27 pages, which I will admit I have yet to read on my night table. Representative Austin. Just can you also give us an update on vaccinations about if they're, you know, if you're going to be mandating them for people to come into the school, students, teachers, or if you don't know yet, because I'm sure we'll be hearing from our constituents about that. Right. Thank you. Yeah. Well, firstly, I'll say the vaccination program is going very well. You know, in the 12 year old and up, you know, we are leveraging schools as vaccination sites to do that. And there's broad support from the pediatrician community as well as, you know, the public health and private practice and so forth. They're all involved. Essentially, there's a greater educational role in this vaccination deployment than there were in the other age groups, because, you know, parents have questions and but it's it's going very, very well so far. We are spending some time in the next couple of weeks working on the fall as I've advertised at press conferences, you know, we're anticipating at some point a state of emergency ending. And we have to figure out how to transition from sort of the state of emergency guidance, if you will, that's essentially been functioning as regulation, and falling back on our existing regulation or, you know, directives from the CDC or the Department of Health that guide us and how we how we employ safety mitigation strategies for the fall. Vaccination is certainly part of that. My understanding is that our current vaccination requirements for students, meaning those that are required, you know, prior to enrollment in a public school, come from Health Department regulation. So in the Health Department regulations, they describe what vaccines are required. And to a large extent that those Health Department Vermont Health Department regulations feed directly from recommendations from the CDC. So there's a direct connection there. But that's that's the place where we look to to inform, you know, what vaccinations would be required of students. It's likely in the fall that there will be an extension, I think, of the EUA, the emergency use authorization of COVID vaccines to be expanded to other manufacturers other than Pfizer, but also extended down to younger age groups. So conceivably all school-age children would have vaccines available to them. It's not clear to me at this point to what extent this would ever become a compulsory activity. I think that's going to take longer time to sort out. So I don't see that being a live issue for the fall, actually. So I think, you know, the fall will likely be an understanding of what the broader health conditions are. And, you know, vaccinating everyone contributes to the overall health of those that are unvaccinated. So it is important to acknowledge that adults getting vaccinated has an impact on the safety of children who are unvaccinated. So I think the health conditions are likely to be very positive in the fall. There'll be a lot of vaccination activity going on, particularly if the EUA is extended down to students younger than 12 years old. And that that still will be more or less a voluntary kind of construct. But again, there'll hopefully be such a low prevalence of the virus due to the broader community adoption of vaccination that it's ultimately going to sort of contribute to a better operating environment for schools. At this point, I would expect that schools would be back to normal, essentially, full in person, if you will, five days a week and probably some health guidance emanating from the Department of Health or the CDC on sort of advisory like how you should operate your school safely. But nothing right now about staff teachers, a mandate or possible mandate or So teachers, I don't know. I mean, that gets somewhat into sort of a broader legal conversation that's emerging now around conditions of employment, you know, to what extent could an employer require an employee to be vaccinated? And that's that's part of a larger legal conversation first. So it's it's not necessarily specific to the school context. But then I think so once once we have some understanding of how that broader legal conversation will play out, then schools will have to adapt to that. But that'll be a I think not necessarily a subject of state level direction, but more a function of local, if you will, HR collective bargaining and so forth. Yeah, we don't we have we have statutes related to vaccines for students that requirements other than for medical and religious exemptions. We don't have anything for staff to have ever had anything like that that I'm aware of. Yeah, and once again, I think the what we're finding the right the real regulatory teeth for students is in the Health Department regulations, you know, and that's in that way again, that's tied directly to CDC recommendations on what students should have before coming to school. But I think you're correct, Madam Chair, there's there's very limited if any guidance on what teacher or employees need to have as a function of working in the school environment. But you know, to what extent those things will be examined, it's uncertain at this point. But I think there's going to be a broader national and state level conversation around to what extent can employers require employees to be vaccinated. Once that settles off a little bit, you know, maybe there'll be some implications for the school environment. But again, I think, you know, it's what I'm understanding is that the broader context for health in our communities, and as you know, there's a symbiotic relationship between schools and their communities. If the broader context is one where the virus has been suppressed significantly, it's not probably going to warrant specific guidance for schools. You know, the guidance for the community will be the same as for the school, essentially. Right now, you know, we've operated in a very specific subsection of guidance, essentially, particularly in the last month or so, essentially, because students are unvaccinated and they're a large group of our clients, if you will, inside the organizations of schools that are unvaccinated. So we have to anticipate that as part of our regulatory construct. But theoretically, in the fall, that all sort of goes away because the virus has been suppressed significantly through the broader community vaccination. Having lived through the, I think, only represent a couple, and I were here when we removed the philosophical exemption from required vaccines in schools, I would say the chances that any kind of requirement for vaccination happening at the state level are extremely remote. Yeah. And I would probably say unnecessary as well, you know, because there'll be such a high rate. And I've since I've been secretary, you know, I've received those reports from Dr. Levine and help communicate them to schools, you know, on the vaccination rates of individual schools. And we've provided those on an annual basis, you know, how many, how many students in your community are not vaccinated and so forth, because the health department has those statistics. And we have very high levels of compliance, so which is good for things like measles and so forth. But there are places sometimes where you see the numbers drop off. And I can remember Dr. Levine calling me and saying, Hey, can we reach out to the school or that community to see what we can do to increase their participation in the required vacuum immunizations. So I would agree. I don't I don't see us requiring that in the fall. But again, the conditions might not warrant it because there'll be such broad adoption of the vaccine and low, low case counts of COVID-19. Thank you. Anything else from from anyone? Okay, we are aware with both the sort of end of session discussions on PCBs and radon. You have with 426 passing and the level one of inventory. I would hope that that it's too late to do anything right now, I think, but I would hope that that your group would be looking at looking at some of the inventory questions that would be really helpful in moving forward, such as for radon having those floor plans. We understood that that that can take a great deal of time for a contractor. But if as the inventory stage is coming together, that folks can begin to pull together workable floor plans might might speed up the process and cost for the radon testers. One thing that we heard, and there's probably more in terms of gathering the information on PCBs in terms of having that as part of the list of inventory questions, the agent school. Yeah, and, you know, I've testified on several occasions now on this issue. I think, you know, we we have to be attentive to using the funds strategically and also in accordance with ESSR. So I think this we have an opportunity before us to start addressing many of our facility needs. We have to stay focused on trying to maximize the use of the ESSR funds to do that. And as challenging it is try not to get, I don't say distracted into going down to some of these separate standoff programs. That's that's going to be a challenge. But I think the initial needs assessment slash inventory, hopefully will provide some good baseline information. And I think that needs to be done in a very timely way so that in itself will narrow the scope of that inventory. Because there I think it is likely that, you know, at some point we'll see some significant investment of federal dollars to help us address some of these issues. And it's going to be useful to have some updated information in our database, if you will, so we can begin that planning process. But you know, quality is specifically air quality is specifically addressed in ESSR. Well, it's it is because it relates to COVID-19, right? So that's that's ESSR's COVID-19. So you have to think about it that way. But yeah, air quality for sure. Okay. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. We are closing down pretty soon here. We have in terms of where we are going. We have 13, which we expect to pass today. We have 106, 426 and 115, all in the Senate, some of which we expect to pass some that we'll need to return. And then we have the discussions in the big bell related to PCP's OPEB and excess spending threshold or the areas and I am in receipt of the governor's letter. So with that, I guess we can head to the floor at 10 o'clock. I don't have anything reason for us to return yet. We'll keep you posted on that. We have do we have anything on and Mr. Secretary, please let you go. I'm just doing a little logistics. Okay. Thank you very much. Talk to you soon. Free to leave. Yeah. Thank you. We don't have another discussion happening on 106 yet. Do we in relation to we're going to need to have a conversation about 106 and the the Senate amendment, which will be coming passing today. So let's do it. What are we doing tomorrow? Tomorrow. Let's put that on our schedule tomorrow morning, Jesse, that we will be looking at H106. And with that, I think we're good for now. Anything from anybody?