 Good morning. We're back. This is the Vermont House Appropriations Committee. It is Thursday, January 19th, 2023. It is a little bit after 10, and we have two ourselves, the RAND report and those that put it together for us to hear. We heard in the joint committee yesterday and now they made themselves available to all the committees that wanted to hear from them. Directly so that we can ask some questions on that. So I would have if you have either up on your screen or the report and we'll hear and then we'll ask some questions. But first, we'll introduce ourselves because you didn't get to meet us formally. So I will start. I'm representative Diane Lanford. I live in Virginia and I represent Addison 3. Hi, good morning. Welcome. I'm Robin Shai, and I'm from Middlebury. I'm Pat Brennan. I'm from Colchester. I'm from Burlington. I'm from Bradford. I'm from Westfield. Lynn Dickinson. I represent St. Almond's Town. Trevor Squirrel. I'm representative Andre Dallin-Chericole. I'm from Newport. I'm Jim Harrison. I'm from the town of Chifton and a few others nearby. Rebecca Holcomb from Sharon-Strafford, Norwich and Stratford. And then we have Erin as our committee assistant. We have our JFO members, Maria, Nolan, and I'm sure others. So please introduce yourself for the record and your team, sir. Sure. My name is Christopher Doss. I'm a policy researcher at the Rand Corporation. I'm joined via Zoom by Liv Heroly, who's a senior economist at Rand, and Erin Strong, who's a senior economist at Rand. Lynn and Erin, did you want to say hi? Just for the record, Erin Strong. And for the record, Lynn Caroly and just a personal shout out to family in Thetford, Stratford, and Norwich. There's zero degrees of separation here. I dated somebody from Rutland at one point. When you're ready, sir, please. Uh, did you want me to, I'm not sure how this, did you want to answer questions or did you want me to do? Well, we heard your presentation yesterday. If you, you might want to spark our mind a little bit because we will, we jump all over the place in subjects and get us dialed back in. Sure. I'll give you the 30,000 foot overview of what we did. And so what we tried to do is, is answer two charges from Act 45. The first was to say, what would the cost of a high quality pre-dependent garden system that's available to everybody who wants to take advantage of it costs? And then part two said, given how much money that we have in the system, how much money that we have that's going to cost, what is the amount of funds that we need to make up with public funds? Where, what are some possibilities that could be used as sources of revenue for those funds? And then given that, what is going to be the effect on the overall Vermont economy? And so what I presented yesterday was, how we built that, that cost estimate of what a full ECE system would look like in Vermont. What we did was we looked at all the inputs to what the research points as a high quality early childhood education system. We cost it out those resources. We then looked at all the different revenue streams that are currently providing funds into the ECE system in Vermont. We subtracted that out. And then we created six scenarios where you subsidize people of various income. And we estimated how much money they would contribute to the system under those various subsidy schedules. And then we simply took our total costs, subtracted out the money that's already in the system, subtracted out the money that would anticipate people would contribute based on the different subsidy systems, and that left us the gap. And so we give you gaps that range from the least generous subsidy system that's around $190 million per year. And if the most generous subsidy systems we modeled would have gaps around $280 million per year in 2020 dollars. We then put those numbers and said, how can we, you know, how could you possibly find sources of revenue for those gaps? And so we modeled about six options, about six different taxes for you. Happy to go through any of those options that you would like. And we found in general that effects on on economic well-being would be about would be small. It would grow the Vermont economy between 60 and at the number between 60 and 100, maybe 80 million per year. And that you get increasing in sales and tax revenue from about 1.5 to 18 million per year. And then we estimate that about 600 to 2,800 people would enter the workforce due to the subsidies, depending on the situations that we modeled. Representative Harrison has a question, then Representative Shai. Of course. You have the four, sir. So looking through the report or the summary, there's a figure in there of 645 million, I think. And that was what was first flashed up on one of the news pages. And gosh, that is a really big number. Much number. And but then I'm reading it, it sounded like that's the total cost but we're already paying for some of that. Tell me out as to how you figure out what we're paying. Is this what parents might be paying, is that what parents paid and then you subtract that out? Or help me understand that big number and then how do you get down to the 200, 180 to 280 million dollars? Sure. Absolutely. And I'll share this slide, which I kind of summarizes one of those numbers for one of the scenarios because it's going to depend on the scenario, the subsidies, how generous of a subsidy schedule you want to impart. But so this top number here is that 645 million. So that's the total cost of a high quality ECE system. And we anticipate the additional demand that people would have for that high cost. So regardless of who's paying for it, that's the top line number. Currently this third box, that's maroon, that is the amount of money that's currently in the system. So these are funds from the federal government that fund things like Head Start. These are state funds that fund the current universal pre-kindergarten system in Vermont. So these are all, and then these are the funds that go into the current subsidy system, CC BAP, the Child Care Financial Assistance Program. So we're already paying 260 million dollars between federal and state? 125 million, that's the third box. 125 million. Yeah. So the family contribution depends on how the, how generous a subsidy schedule are. So this is one subsidy schedule that we think used closely to the spirit of Act 45. And so what we did is we said under this situation, how much would people demand health care, demand early, demand child care? So how many people would enter the system? Given the subsidy schedule, how much would they have to contribute out of their pocket? And then we added that up. And so that's a 260 million dollar number. So the subsidy schedules will cover all costs for everybody, right? Just depending on your income. So we anticipate that under this schedule, 260 million dollars would come from families. And so you take that, subtract it from 645. Oh, sorry. I have a little slope. Yeah. So the 125 would be, say approximately one third, if you just towards the higher end of what the new number would be? So the new number is 250, in this scenario is 258. Plus the 125? No, just the 258 is the gap. So what, under this scenario, you take the total cost, right? The 645, that's how much it's going to cost. Yeah. You already have 125 million in the system. So take that out. Families are going to contribute to 616. I'm not taking it out. So that's why we're disagreeing on the numbers. Right. So the goal here is to stay. Yes. 125 stays. It's not. Right, sure. I'm sorry. Yes, yes, yes. So 125 stays in the system. When I take it out, I mean, if you want to calculate what's left over, that we have to fund additionally. Thanks. The existing public subsidy state or federal is about one third of the new subsidy state or federal. Sure. Yeah. Just another way. Yeah, I got it. Yes, sure. Absolutely. Okay. The number of new employees that you project hard is how much? Depending on the situation between 600 and 2800. 600? To 20, 2800. Depending on the more generous subsidy schedules, we'll have more people under the labor force. Okay. How many new employees are going to be needed in child care sector? That's a good question. Lynn, do you have an estimate of that? I do not. We do not generate that number. It's possible to do so, but we did not generate that estimate. I mean, we know there's a shortage right now. I mean, people have it in and obviously hopefully one of the goals of this is to make sure we have enough child care lost through staffing. And I'm just trying to understand if we pick enough of it. Let's say we're going to create or bring 2000 people back to the work force that can't make it work today, right? And if we need 1500 in the child care industry, we're gaining a net of 500 or other employers, right? Whether that's government, whether it's private commercial. So it kind of begs the question, what's the cost of those 500 net gain? Cost? If you want to take all the costs and go into the net gain? I mean, we all want a bigger work force. Yes. And but everything is going to be balanced between cost and benefit. Sure. And I'm just. So the way I guess the way we kind of look at it when we try to model the whole economy, right, which I think is also what you're trying to keep in mind, is we say how many net entrants are going to happen, right? And so, you know, maybe 28, 2000 people are going to enter the work force, right? Some of them may go into ECE. If you pay ECE workers higher wages, that might draw somebody from another part of the sector into it, right? But on the balance about 2000, let's say given your scenario, is going to enter the work force. The way we look at it from a kind of a really high level, it was like, now that you have more workers, what benefit, how will that grow the Vermont economy as a whole? And that that's what we modeled that the real estate product would have, you know, on the short end, maybe 59 million, maybe on the high end, over 200 million. And so that's kind of how we look at it instead of trying to parcel out movements from one sector to another and then look at those costs. That's not quite how economists look at it. So that might make more sense to you as a representative. Yeah, it's a different lens. It's a lens depending on, you know, the good news is that there's positive. And finally, I'll shut up. So you had a chart in there on current wages. And I think childcare was like just under $15 an hour. I can bring that chart up for you in one second. Page nine of your remarks. Page nine of, oh yeah, we just, yeah, here we go. What I wanted to say, go ahead, please. Yeah, no, that's not right. There's no question that we would have a shortage based on those wages today. I mean, even McDonald's had signs of $17 an hour or more. I mean, that whole service sector is really being squeezed. And it's not just the service sector. You get into health areas and squeeze in different areas. So I get it, you know, we need to be competitive. Does your proposal, when you talk about the total crops, does it include bringing those average wages up and to what? So that's a great question. And so this is the current hourly wage for childcare workers, which is pretty low like you said. And pre-COVID, that creates the pressures of the system. And then once COVID happened, that created even more instability within the system. So we do model increases in wages. And if you bear with me, I can get you to that. And so these become the new increases in wages that we model. So we assume increases in credential as well. So that lead teachers would have a bachelor's degree and associate degree. But those would be the medium wages. And those are more comparable, but say a kindergarten teacher. Okay. And so you said it assumes a 26 percent for the benefit of those embedded in those salaries. Those are the cash salaries. But in the model, we embed a 26 percent for that. Yes. Okay. And what do we have for currently? It depends very, it varies a lot. And so there are some that provide none. And there are some that provide some. So it's kind of hard to say with the average. I don't know. Lynn, do we have an average statistic? It's pretty low if there is any. Yeah. There may be something from national data, but I'm not aware of anything that Vermont has collected that would tell you that it's not in the same government data that allows us to look at cash compensation. Does not collect data on non-wage benefits. So we mostly know about cash compensation and not the benefit structure. Okay. But I would think you would come up with a total number you need to have a set. So that's correct. And so that's the 26 percent for injury models series of benefits that we talk about in the report. Things like 30 days off for personal vacation retirement plans, health insurance, dental, paid both by the employee and the employee. Okay. Thank you. I'll be quiet. No, it's good. Thank you. Representative Schaik. Thanks. And I'll follow up with some similar questions. So following on that same slide that you just had up, the lead teacher at 69,420, that does not include the fringe benefits is what I'm hearing you say. Is that correct? So you have to add 26 percent. That's right. And if I look at elementary school teachers, their mean is 63,000. So this is $6,000 more. These are in twenty twenty two dollars. Lynn, do you? Is that correct? Yeah. One is that in showing current wage data, just because that comes out with a lag, that's in twenty nineteen dollars. In terms of these compensation levels, because we're modeling costs in twenty twenty two dollars, there is that difference. But I think the other important difference is that we're assuming these teachers in early care and education settings are working full time year round. And so this is what they'd earn annually. The teacher salaries are typically based on an academic year. So there's that difference in the number of hours represented in an annual salary. OK, that helps me. So this is really a fully loaded compensation package that you put in your model with 30 days of CTO and dental and vision, all of those things that are being offered. That's the fully loaded top of the line. It is what it is. The way we read Act 45 is that you wanted compensation, which includes cash and benefits. That's commensurate to other people with the same credentials and experience. And so that would be comparable for let's say like a kindergarten teacher who would have these types of things. So I want to just be sure everybody understands that that's what you have done. Yes. And you have put this, have you graduated these numbers over four years? You said you had sort of a four year on ramp. So in your modeling, they don't start off with a lead teacher at 69,000% of it. Do they start off lower and you gradually work up? Or what did you do here? So what we modeled is just one situation and you can obviously look at different situations is we didn't model the phase in of parts of the system. What we did is we modeled the phase in of the gap that amount. I think one way you can kind of think about that is you would maybe perhaps subsidize the lower end of the income distribution first in this fully funded BCE program. And then as you phase it in more people up the income ladder until you get more into subsidy, you could phase it in perhaps of those types of things as well, but those types of details are a kind of implementation details that we thought you'd be best to think through. Okay. And I want to go back to your math with the 645 million. And then I want to ask you about the 125 million that's existing public funding. What is the split currently between federal and state of that 125 million? Yeah, so that's a great question. And I'll again share a slide where we kind of show that. So early head start and these are in 2018-19 dollars. So the one trick here is that these numbers add up to about 109 million because those are 2019 dollars. We inflate that to 125 million dollars because when we look at the gap we want everything. So it's going to be slightly lower. But early head start and head start which are federally funded are about 22.3 million per year. The universal pre-kate program which is state funded is about 41 million per year. And then CCFAP is both federal and state. And Lynn, I don't know if we know the ratio of federal to state within CCFAP. We don't have that breakdown. And so that's a combination. And then the federal and state child tax credits are lower but they're about seven and one. And then there's the title one yields. So title one is federal. Title one is federal. Okay. And the child tax credit, does that... That's the child care tax credit. So that doesn't include the child tax credit that we passed last year. Right. It's not related. Okay. So we have... So under 125 we have at least 43 million plus whatever share of CCFAP. And we don't know what our share of CCFAP is. Correct. So we have about a third of what's in there. Sort of. All right. I wouldn't be... If you're trying to dissect the 125... Yeah. I'm trying to figure out the 125. The state's already putting in money. I'm trying to get a sense of the entire state picture. Yeah. So if you look at all the federal minus CCFAP, you're looking at maybe around $30 to $35 million per year. Well, pre-K is 41. That's state. That's what I mean. Oh, sorry. Yeah. I'm looking for what state is. Oh, state would be... So 41... So around 43 plus whatever CCFAP is. Exactly. I'm sorry. 41. I think we'll actually come out closer to 50 or 50. I think you're right. Yeah. About 50% state. 50% state. Of that one. Yeah. Of the 125. Exactly. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I'm done for now. Thank you. All right. That's great. Anyone else? Just a... Representative Holcomb. Quick clarification. I know that the ratios you used are much higher, I believe, than the ratios that we currently see in practice in the state of Vermont. But did you estimate how many teachers would be necessary to implement this fully funded EC? No. So we were... Yeah. And we didn't model a number of new EC teachers specifically that we would need. Actually, the ratios that we used are consistent with licensing in Vermont. And the stars... They're the maximum ratios. Right. That's not... Right. So... And moreover, in the star system, it's not tied to achieving improved ratios as you move up the stars rating. So we use that baseline... What would be the licensing standard, but that's also consistent with what you would expect on accreditation agency to use as a ratio. So it is... We're viewing it as the high quality standard. Can I ask... I know there's been some interesting work by people like Erica Frankenberg recently around the stars and the idea of modeling subsidy rates in time to stars as having disproportionate racial impacts and possibly socioeconomic impacts. Are you aware of that? And is that something you evaluated as well? Not familiar with that work, but more generally, states have moved toward using tiered reimbursement systems that are tied to quality rating, such that providers that are higher on the rating scale have a higher per child reimbursement, whether it's at the infant toddler or preschool age. One of the issues is which providers reach those higher quality rating levels and therefore spending more resources and getting more resources. And there could definitely be implications in terms of children based on income or race and ethnicity. One of the things we did report on in some analysis we did of the state subsidy data was to look at whether children receiving CCFAP subsidies were any different in the quality ratings of the providers where they were being served compared to children to the overall ratings. And generally, we weren't seeing that there was a difference as you moved up the income level within CCFAP, but we don't know where necessarily where the children are on CCFAP at the higher income levels in terms of how they compare. I'll wait. Representative Dolan? Yes, thank you. And thank you for this report. I still try and get through it. Just a couple of general questions if I may. All the way through the report, we do refer to quality early childhood education Do we have a definition of that in terms of what the criteria are or what the standards are or what we're looking for to help establish that kind of standard or gold standard that we're trying to achieve here for our children? That's a great question. So we did model we obviously chose components that are consistent with the research base of what produces high quality ECB and how I'll do the summary from the slides I presented yesterday. So one of those things that we did model were the ratios or the group sizes. So how many how many adults per child have to be in the room? And so obviously the fewer children per adult will be more expensive, but they get more individualized care. So one of the high quality quality features would be having the ratios that are consistent than what we modeled. Another kind of cost driver is the teacher education. So we modeled having teachers having bachelor's and associate's degrees. We do this for a number of reasons. First are already a number of pre-K providers that require that, for example Head Start. If you look at the universal pre-kindergarten programs being instituted across the country, they also require it. And the theory behind this is that bachelor's degrees, and here we're specifically talking about ones in early childhood, development and education. A lot of the benefits that you get from early childhood education is helping the child learn. There's a lot of development in the child's brain that happens before five, but you have to structure your instruction in ways to capitalize that and promote that benefit. And so you need instruction. The instructors need instruction on how to do that and how to structure those learning experiences. And so going into these bachelor's or associate's degrees in that is a high-quality indicator. And then things like professional development. How can you make sure that their skills are refreshed and keep on with the latest? Do they have time off the plan so that they can actually plan the instruction well? Do they have access to high-quality evidence-based curricula? Do they use developmental screeners so they understand what the level the child is so that they can tailor their instruction to where the child is? Same thing with formative assessments. Screeners also help you figure out if the child is special needs or is behind typically developing peers. And then finally, for the STAR system, do you have independent assessor of qualities looking at that deaf old bundle? So that's kind of how we envision what a high-quality early childhood education system would look like. And that's what we cost it out. Thank you. I'll just mention that these expectations, these requirements are consistent with STAR's rating system and a five-star rating, including the direction we understand the revised system is considering. May I ask a couple? Sure, it's my understanding. You didn't invent something new. This is what we have as our quality. It's our standard. It's our current standard. Yeah. Yeah, in some cases, currents are future planned standards, yes. Thank you. My next question is about getting to Representative Harrison's point about workforce impacts. We are already at a deficit of not having adequate workforce and you can look at the number of open vacancies or the actual demand for early childhood education and it's substantial in the thousands. And so what we're suggesting here in this report, the models and the outcomes are to include both to fill our current gap as well as how to achieve future quality of education to raise the opportunity for our workforce. Are we trying to accomplish both things today's gap as well? So this would be the cost kind of I guess assuming that we have the teachers and everything that we need, right? So probably this is not something that you can do tomorrow, right? You need to phase this in and part of why you need to phase this in is that you have to build the workforce needed for this high quality system. So things that are not included in this may be required are things like upskilling the current workforce, helping them achieve that bachelor's, building the capacity of universities and higher education institutions of Vermont to provide credentials that teach them the skills to provide the bachelors and the associates degrees. So this is kind of seen in investment in the overall Vermont economy. So this is probably not something that you can pass tomorrow and expect to happen in the next year, but over a few years this is something that we're delivering intensive investments you can build. And then my final question is in regards to the benefits cliff. It's something that you mentioned at the end of your presentation yesterday. And obviously there's an interest to try to mitigate that benefits cliff. Do you have you help to identify how we can potentially mitigate that? So the benefits right now, as we modeled, every one of our scenarios provides benefits up to 500 times the poverty level and to just give you a sense of what that means. So a family of three, that's $115,150 a year and $222 for a family of five, that's $162,350. So that under our current schedule, they would be subsidized in some way until that. Above 500,000, above 500%, then you would be no subsidy. To kind of give you a sense of what that is, the average Vermont household income is about $89,000. The middle third of the US households with children under 18 is between 60 and 130,000. So we're talking about a good chunk of it. Another way to think about it is that if you look at the 500% threshold that we modeled, that's gonna cover 80% of children under five in Vermont. So they would get some sort of subsidy. If you maintain the current system that does 3.5% of poverty, 3.5 times poverty, that covers about 60% of children under five in Vermont. So the higher ones cover a substantial the vast majority of children in Vermont, but there will always be some people at the higher end of the income who will not be subsidized. And could I just add on that point that these are schedules that we've assumed in part as illustrative of what the state could consider and what it would mean to go beyond, for example, the current threshold of 3.5 times poverty under the current subsidy system. And of course, you also have universal pre-K, which goes beyond that level. So there are ways to really mitigate any concern about where the benefits fall off. You can continue a schedule beyond five times poverty. Obviously it's just going to add a need for more public revenue to make up for whatever you're assuming families can afford and what would be left over. So this was intended to show what a more generous subsidy system would look like, but not one that goes to 100% subsidy, for example. So there's some potential to go beyond the even what we model in this report, but that's where the decisions are in terms of which families, how high would income go before the subsidy system would taper off or would end. And then within any given family income level, what's the expectation of what families can afford to pay? And so we've assumed, we've shown you schedules that in some cases it maxes at 10% and other cases at lower incomes, it might be 4% or 6%. That schedule could always be shifted to expecting families to pay more, in which case the public sector would pay less. So we're going to view these estimates in the context of assumptions we've made about what's affordable for families. And those are something that as policymakers could be adjusted such that the expectation is that families would be paying more than what we've assumed, which means the public sector contribution would be less. So just wanted to emphasize that. Representative Dolan, are you? Great. So here's the line. We've got Representative Harrison, Representative Shai, myself, Representative Brunley, Representative Olcomb, Representative Page, and Representative Dickinson. Just good. I think it's Jim, Representative Harrison, sorry. So a couple of extra clarifications of the current public, 125 million, and so approximately that is half of the state and half of the federal business. There's a little confusion is that who would be universal to be paid? Yes. Yes. Just a guess. Yeah. Sure. It's on page nine of the presentation. So in the other part of that that we've required, I will be the first to admit we've probably giggled around the edges because we've tried to put a little more dollars in a couple of years, a couple million there has, but it's not allowed. So this is obviously much bolder. But given where we are, do you have any idea in terms of state subsidies and health for child care? Where does Vermont rank today? Are we not very generous? You know, the top 10% of the states? I mean, I'm just curious. We try to do it as best we can, but we're a small state. So they're living. So I'm just curious as to where we are today. That's a good look at that. It's a great question. I'm not going to hazard a guess as to percentages, but Vermont is actually on the more generous side. So below 1.5% or below requires no contributions. 1.5% times poverty or below families that make that income have no contributions of the current system. Substances do go up to 3.5 times poverty. That's pretty generous. So if I, you know, immigrants do things. And then also the subsidy does not depend on family size. So you don't necessarily pay more because you have more kids in the system. That's also a generous feature of the Vermont system. So those combined makes, puts Vermont on the more generous side. Lynn, did you have more detail around that? Just a couple of other things. So that means that the schedule that Vermont is using is relatively more generous in terms of total dollars that Vermont is contributing to those subsidies relative to other states on a per capita basis. I'm not aware of any estimates like that that would allow you to do those comparisons. The other thing to look at is the state pre-K program. Vermont is one of just a handful of states that has a universal program. Although Vermont, because it's funding on a universal basis, 10 hours per week, that is lower than other states. For example, Oklahoma has a universal pre-K program, universal for all four year olds. That's a school day academic year program. So that's funding just four year olds, not threes and fours, but for a school day school year. And then even when states are funding programs like that, how much money, how much state funds are going in to the per child costs can vary considerably. There is an annual report that compares states in terms of their pre-K programs, the number of threes and fours that are covered and the amount of funding that goes into those programs. So that's another way to potentially compare Vermont. I will note that your neighbor in New Hampshire, where we've also done work, does not fund a pre-K program with a state money. So it's one of about six or seven states now that do not have any state funded pre-K. So it gives you a sense of the range. And the other question I had, you came up with, I have an estimate, maybe 2,000 more people would. And I'm estimating here, because I know there's a range. If you have two parents and one's making 60,000 a year and you look at today's environment, it's not worth it for the other spots to work and they stay home and there's other reasons as well. So let's just say the other spot says not opportunity to go into the market as well. And they are going to make 60,000. And so now you've got a combined income of 120,000. And if we limit it to 10%, they're not going to pay more than 12,000. But there are other factors now. Now they're a little higher tax bracket. Maybe they get less or maybe no help on their education, property tax. And if you factored in all those other equations to still, I mean, I hope we do gain quarters, but I mean, there are a lot of, it's not just the dollars and cents of paying for the childcare, which is very expensive. Yeah, exactly. And so we did model, for example, that you have an increase in tax revenue. So that goes into our estimates of what would happen to this state gross domestic card, gross state product, which would increase by, 60 to over $200 million, depending on the scenario. And the increased tax revenues that we talked about in terms of local and state tax revenues. So we take into account the kind of behavior changes that households would have once they are giving more wages because of the ECB or there's more workers that enter and now making the wage and that changes the kind of calculus of the family finances. Okay, thank you. Yep. Great. Representative Shai, then myself. Thanks. I'm not sure you address these, but these questions are coming to me, these issues that we'll have to address if you did not. And one of them is around governance. And did you have any conversation about where this would be housed in state government? What kind of additional staff would be needed and the cost of that or any of that is any of that factored into this? That's not factored into this because we saw that kind of as an implementation where we read Act 45 as kind of the what needs to be, what would be the required and not necessarily implemented. Do I do understand that building Bright Futures Commission, the governance study prior to ours and I think that report has some recommendation. So we also kind of saw that effort and said that's probably not something we need to do. Okay, I just, it's somewhere. Yeah. Yeah, if I could just clarify, we do build in assumptions about administrative costs for the system. We did not expressly try to price from the bottom up either the new governance system that has been proposed or the existing governance system. But there have been assumptions around having some core funding in there that recognizes there would be administrative costs. So we didn't try to figure out whether the revised governance would somehow be more efficient to them than the current system. Okay, so that's not in the $258 million basically. It is to the extent that we assumed a baseline of administrative costs really consistent with the current system rather than trying to factor in any changes in administrative costs because of a shift in governance. And if we want to read more about that governance piece, we should find the Building Bright Futures report. Is that what you're saying? Yeah. Okay, we'll find that. Yeah, they came out last July or somewhere around last July from that statement. Okay, thank you. Great, thank you. I just have one point that I just want to make sure that I'm understanding deeply, which I think I do, that you're here. The state of Vermont has, we were talking earlier today, that we're trying to address a lot of crises that in response to Vermonters' everyday life and what we've heard for many, many years is the conundrum around child care, lack of child care, low pay. How do we step in and start this in a new way? So our goal or problem that we're trying to solve is the crisis on child care. And there, in its solution, we'll hopefully have positive benefits within the greater economic world, but our goal is to not try to provide economic growth in the world through providing child care. I just want to make sure that we're trying to solve the child care problem, which to this point does not have any negative effect in any other area, but may have an incredible lift in those areas as well. You can't measure that, can you? Well, I would say that the charge of Act 45 was a high quality ECE system. System. So when I, when I think people like us hear something like that, it's beyond, it's child care in the sense that you are educating the child even at a very young age from zero to five in ways that support their development intellectually and emotionally, right? So it's beyond having and even nurturing adult in the room, it's about how does that adult interact in ways that support child development? And so that's the kind of system that we priced out. So I was trying to get to the very simple question of like, I own a business and if I help with child care, will I benefit from it, meaning in some way? And I would imagine, yes. Yeah, so we looked at it in aggregate and yes, there are some other benefits that we did not cost out, such as perhaps women or the family would work longer because now they have more stable child care or they have to, or they're there and there's less distractions because the child care emergencies are fewer. Those types of things are not necessarily in the report. There's a lot of anecdotal evidence that that happens in that country also. Because I hear from, maybe just personally too, from employers as well as families and we all know that there's a boondoggle that we're trying to unwind. All right, thank you. Representative Bloomley. And then recommend. Yes, thanks very much. And I heard something yesterday in your testimony that indicated you've done a lot of reports. You've done similar reports for other states or maybe even just, I don't know, but other entities and other people have done this, other organizations have done this too. And a lot of what's in a report like this are, I mean, there are assumptions that are made about, and so you're modeling things and I'm just wondering what you've learned through your own experience as Rand and through understanding the literature in the field. How accurate have those assumptions been? So Lynn has been actually the leader of many of those studies and so I'll let her she has the best vantage point for that type of question. Well, first of all, just acknowledge that indeed these kinds of analyses do involve assumptions. Everything from what constitutes quality and the relationship between quality and children's development, school readiness and subsequent success in school. To assumptions about what incomes families have and how they're going to respond in terms of the labor market based upon changes in childcare subsidies. We do draw on, I think the strongest literature is around identifying what constitutes quality in early care and education, what those features are and what they cost. So I think there's a lot of confidence around those numbers. One of the areas that we know and even in the reports and in appendix, one of the weakest areas is our understanding of how families respond to changes in childcare prices. So what might happen, for example, in their response around labor force participation and that's one of the reasons we give you a range of estimates there. So in an estimate that says 600 workers to several thousand, that it reflects the fact that there's uncertainty and our estimates of the responsiveness of parents, either the major earner in the family or the secondary earner in terms of whether they would choose to work or not based on a reduction in the cost that they face for childcare. So that's an area where there's more uncertainty and so we give you that range recognizing that it could be at that lower bound all the way to that upper bound. Likewise, I think in terms of the way that the system would work in terms of subsidies, those are things that states have experience with the ability to administer those subsidies. We have systems already in place the kind of modifications that might be required. That's quite well known. So I think in terms of is this a feasible system that one could implement? We have more confidence there because these are systems that build on what exists already either in Vermont or in other parts of the country. I could turn it over to our colleague Aaron just to talk a little bit about the larger what we call study two in the economic forecast. But there again, we're building on decades of work in that area. So maybe Aaron, if you want to just say a few words about the level of confidence and the assumptions and modeling that we have there, I think that would be helpful for people here. Sure. So the models that we're using, we use two different models to think about sort of the macroeconomic impacts of macroeconomic and sort of state revenue impacts. The first is what's known as an input-output model. And that's really if you hire somebody to do an economic impact analysis, that's usually what they're going to use. And so they've been around since the 30s. We have a lot of confidence in those models for marginal changes in the economy. Adding an additional hotel, what is the economic impact? That's a lot of what those models are used. We've also built up a more complex model that allows for greater substitution. And those models have been around 40, 50 years and have just gotten better because of computing power. We have really good confidence in these if the underlying assumptions or sort of the inputs to them are correct. And sort of that's the other that's the big piece. The other way that we sort of validated our results was we worked with the JFO sort of our initial results on how much revenue would be generated by this tax or that tax. We worked with the JFO to say, our estimates in line with what they would have estimated given a different set of data and they were in sort of a rough order of magnitude. Is it 84? Is it 86? Those to me are roughly the same number. So we've done that validation step to say to use different data to say do we get the same results out? Thank you. You're welcome. Representative Holcomb, then Representative Page, Representative Dickinson, Representative Tolino and then we're done. We have our next witness coming in at 1130. You get a moment to stretch. Go ahead. So I understand the focus of the report on demand side subsidies. That's what you were asked to do. And I also understand that it's something familiar from an implementation perspective. But in my own experience, sometimes when you move from a targeted program that's reactive to an identified need to a system at scale, keeping the same model can have unanticipated consequences. So for example, when we rolled out the universal pre-K vouchers, we added significantly to the resources available pre-K, but we lost 7% of the child care capacity in the state in the same window. And so what I would like to know is what do you identify as the risks of a demand side model, particularly in a state that has an extremely constrained labor supply so tight that literally families are hiring the teachers out of child cares because it's cheaper to hire the teacher to be your man than it is to send your child care right now. That's how bad it is. And what are those potential risks of demand side subsidies and what is being done in other places, particularly places that are trying to move to the scale that we're contemplating around other ways to provide resources to support this sector? I've read interesting things about contracting directly with providers, for example. What are other things that we should be asking as custodians of the state's precious wallet to try to make sure that we're getting the most value for the dollars, for the families, and the children that need them? Linda, do you want to? Yeah, happy to address that. So indeed, I think one thing that I was going to say earlier and didn't get a chance is part of the way that the issue around recruiting and retaining a workforce is through the improved compensation that we have modeled. So one of the challenges now is that compensation is so low that the alternatives, whether it's working at Walmart or being a nanny, look attractive to our, you know, the skilled qualified workforce that you have rather than working in, say, a center-based setting. And so with the kinds of increases in compensation, both cash compensation and benefits, I think that that is a strategy, certainly that most other states are investing in as a way to address the workforce challenge. Now, how do you enforce, for example, a compensation schedule like we proposed? Well, one solution is through the use of contracts. So I'm glad that you mentioned that. And it's something that we make a reference to as well, which is how do you bring about some of these changes in the way in which you want the workforce to be compensated in the way providers are reimbursed to recognize that you want any increase in reimbursement to be directed toward the workforce and their compensation, not to buying other inputs into producing childcare. So we make some references to that being a strategy. Be happy to provide you with others. There are good examples, I think, of where those strategies are being used to sort of change the way we think about the set of providers, how they relate to both the public and private sectors and supporting a mixed delivery. So even Vermont in instituting universal pre-K has tried to do that by allowing qualified private providers to participate in that funding stream. And so to the extent that that's not being successful, looking for strategies that provide for better integration of both public schools and private providers delivering the pre-K program, whatever it looks like, you know, those are things as well to pay attention to. And I think where you can learn from other states and localities in terms of what they're doing. Good. Representative Page. Yes, just a couple of questions. When you discuss wages earlier, those standardized wages will they be the same throughout the state or will there be different rates in different areas of the state? So we modeled in that average wage and then underlying that average is a distribution. Some would be paid less and some would be paid more. And often that's tied to cost of living. So you would expect perhaps in the more rural parts of the state for cost of living might be less. Those wages might be a little bit less in more urban parts of the state. Those wages would be more. So we kind of assumed that the market conditions would have some impact. But when we cost it out, we say all of that variation is going to become in those averages and that's what we showed you. So there is some variation. And Representative Schuy raised the issue about governance that we've been covering this report, which I got to concern with whether it would be under Department of Education and some other entity as well as whether we have to create new facilities for this system as well, which wasn't preferred in this report. So I guess the let's go kids report. Right. We didn't look at whether you would have need more facilities. If there's a higher care, you probably wouldn't need more facilities. There's different ways you can go about that. One thing that came up in a past committee meeting is it's been declining school enrollment. And so some schools have empty spaces. And so for a modest investment of retrofitting those, those can become early childcare facilities. So you kind of have to look at the total facility use in the state and see where there maybe is some places where you can kind of reallocate them in addition to potentially building one. And then finally, I heard on the way in to work this morning and last evening that there's a report on Vermont's educational testing scores that the trend has gone down over the last few years. And I guess it's actually throughout the country. Those trends have become with such a program that you're suggesting put forward in other states where there is such a program. What effect has it had on you know, changing you know, our testing standards? Sure. So I wouldn't say that the a lot of media attention that's happening because of those decreased tests for us throughout the country has been primarily because of COVID. And so, you know, if you look at the nays, the kind of national test, we've seen historic decreases in student achievement throughout the country because of just the disruptions in learning that the past few years have happened. When it comes to early childhood programs, there is this phenomenon we see where there's often a short term boost in test scores. And over time, many maybe not all, but in many cases those kind of fade out. But then, we also see longer term even after those test scores have fade out that you have longer term favorable outcomes like longer, they stay in school longer, achieve more education. And you get paid better paying jobs in the future. So I would say that there's this kind of fade out test score that the field is trying to grapple with. Why does that happen? Part of the reason might be that you are supporting whole child development. So there could be the academics that other people catch up with, but if you're developing the whole child in early preschool, you build competencies that test scores do not measure that then show up in these longer term outcomes. Others, some really new work shows that maybe even the highest quality of them preserve test score advantages for longer than we thought of. So that's an area of active research in the field. I would say that test scores are obviously mean a lot, a lot of bait into it, but they're not everything. And so part of the reason why we think early childhood education is a good investment is because whether or not in the long term test score changed because of it, there are these other kind of consequential aspects of child development that have tangible consequences for the child that pop up later on. Thank you. Thank you. Great. One minute. Well, we've gotten two questions. All right. So Representative Dickinson, be quick. And then Representative Polino, and then we were, we were, all right. I'll make this quick. One of the things you mentioned in the report was in the summary part that I read because I haven't read at all, but one of the things you mentioned is the rural nature of our communities. We had a blue ribbon commissioned maybe six, eight years ago. This also released to governance. It was decided to put it in education and human services together and what I understand listening to people that hasn't worked out that well. But we went from, we ended up with our new criteria and all of the, you know, it was like the, the perfect was, good was destroyed by the perfect basically. Right. We lost a lot of home care providers who do in fact provide a lot of care, had previously provided a lot of care, especially in rural areas. You mentioned that briefly. What exactly did that, how did that fit into your model? So what, if you, if you look at the distribution of the size of, of child care centers and family child care homes in Vermont, they are smaller than a lot of other states, particularly because Vermont has a large rural, substantial rural population. And so what, that ends up happening is that they usually cost more per child, right? Because you're unable to spread the costs of running a center across a higher enrollment. And so what we do is we kind of bake that cost into it. So, so these costs that we say kind of take into the distribution the size of the facilities, which are often smaller because of rural areas. But we assume compensation that would be fair and keep all the quality targets the same so that people have a good education no matter where they are in the state. But that is kind of baked into our cost estimate. Okay. The other thing is the educational level of the people who run these things. Someone don't meet those educational. Well, our model assumes that the people working with them have that bachelor's or master's degrees. Oh, okay. Exactly. Okay. Thank you. Great. Representative Tolino. I will pass so that they can get to it. Oh, aren't we sweet? I was I was going to remind the good men or the good Nolan that we're we have we have now absorbed the lateness and turning it around on time. So I would like a little check in our credit box that says we fix things again. I can't pretend I'm not showing that. This is going in my very special folder that says yes, because we may need to pull that out and they need our own time back some time. All right. Thank you, sir. 10% of the gap. Thank you. Here we go. Thank you. We can go offline. Welcome back to the Vermont House Appropriations Committee. It is Thursday, January 19th, 2023. We're back in at 1130 after a little short stretching break. And we have with us we're going to hear on the budget adjustment act from public safety. They have a couple of short things. But before we do that, Representative Harrison has some is going to report on reports. Yeah, I just wanted to keep up as we the chair mentioned last week there's a lot of reports that will come to us. Pretty much fast and furious right about now. And there was one the end of last week that I've already passed on to Representative Schi but I don't think I mentioned it in committee and that was the act for 163 state appraisal and litigation assistance program cost estimate which is on our website. And then this morning Aaron passed on two reports but they're the same area and it's basically the 2023 tax expenditure views. I assume that goes to Representative Schi as well. As I think probably everyone is aware tax expenditures kind of is numbers put together by the Joint Fiscal Office on if we have an exemption taxes for something there's another way to call that is an expenditure because we really otherwise got foregone revenue. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Hang on. So there is on there and because Representative Representative Schi loves these reports I'm going to hold them to her. Thank you. You're welcome. Everybody should read them. It's very interesting. Oh, it is very interesting. Is that it, sir? That's it. We have the benefit of having two members who that's it. Who? Aaron, thank you. We have their teeth cutting in ways and means before they erect here. So they're very familiar with that. So Commissioner, Deputy Commissioner. Commissioner. Commissioner. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Good morning. Good morning. So you haven't met all of us yet? No, ma'am. I have not. I know Representative Brennan from way, way back. And I know. We won't ask about that. Why don't we introduce ourselves? All right. And then and then you can introduce yourself and your team. And then we'll hear what you have to say about budget adjustment. So I'll start. I'm Representative of Diane Lanford, Living Virgin's, and I represent Addison 3. All right, we'll go. Robin's here. Okay. Okay. So I'm Robin Shai and I'm from Middlebury. Welcome. Pat Brennan. Cole Chester. Definitely. Robin's in. Kristin's on your bathroom. Harry Nolan. Druxbury faced in more town. Waits till they walk. Lynn Dickinson. St. Olden's Town. Hi, I'm Mark Mahaly. Plainfield, Marshfield, and Calis. Trevor Squirtle. Underhill and Jericho. Woody Page. Jim Harrison. Chittenden, Mendon, Killington, and Pittsfield. Good morning. Rebecca Holcomb. Sharon Norwitz. Straford and Thepford. Nice to see you. And I think you've interacted with our committee assistant, Erin, Erin, and JFO Maria. So please. Oh, yes. So thank you, Madam Chair. My name is Jennifer Morrison. I'm the commissioner of public safety. And I don't need a whole team when I have my director of finance, Rick Hallenbeck with me. So we are a dynamic duo today. If you, if there's information that you need that we don't have, we have people on standby on the call bringing for what should be a relatively straightforward discussion. So with that, I will let Rick introduce himself and to take things away. Sure, I am for the record, I'm Rick Hallenbeck, I'm the director of finance and administration at Public Safety. And Madam Chair, if they do, I'll go through these two lines on the budget adjustment form. Great. And I see we have someone else. Oh, that's not with you. He's with the administration, but he's with the doll. Hi, Josh. Okay, go ahead. Walk us through your changes. Offline, the large number of 3.3 million dollars cost the new Vermont Troopers Association collective bargaining. Change the pay charts to an 8% increase over the previous pay chart. So this represents the salary and all of those related items based off of the salary or hourly rate such as overtime, the standby A, and also the shift differential rates were increased in both the PTA contract and the state's bargaining agreement with civilians through the PTA rate. All of those including PTA changes in the shift differential rates. And I'll pause there and get to the questions on that. Representative Shia has a question. I'm just wondering how many individuals are in this collective bargaining agreement? The association, I believe the number is 3.34. Okay, thank you. That's not true. That's our sworn, that's the number of sworn positions. There are a few positions in senior management that would not be in the PTA and state groups and tenants and I believe the Troopers Association. So if you would like... 300. It's about 300 in the Troopers Association, approximately. Thank you. Representative Harrison, if you... Yeah. Thank you, Rick. But you mentioned the adjustment here for the pay act was about 8% of your total appropriation for state police. Is that an un-understanding? About 8% of the total appropriation. It's the pay chart that shows their hourly rates. So say you're on a particular step and you have a particular hourly rate, the new pay chart represents exactly the 8% increase over that previous rate. If I could just interrupt you, we're getting a little garbling on the voice. I don't know if it's something with your microphone or a West. It's 8%? Yeah. So... Be cognizant of that or pass the baton to the commissioner. So I was led to believe or my understanding was that when we did the pay act in last year's budget, the Troopers contract was not settled. So I thought human resources kind of put an estimate in there because obviously we couldn't keep extending this session. And so I don't know what they ended up putting in there, but I thought they were looking at whatever the state employees was and then if that was 4%, they put that in and then whatever we resolved with was more, we had to put the difference in. But do you recall that in terms of what was actually allocated for Troopers or should we get that from DHR? Yeah, I don't have that figure representative. If you could, I could be happy to reach out to DHR and get that if you'd like. Well, I'm just trying to understand what pay rate change was made for the Troopers with the contract. Was it 8%? In FY23, it is 8%. In FY24, it will be 2% from there. Okay. And did it include the one-time payment that I think was in the VSA BSEA contract as well? No, it doesn't have the one-time payment the way the civilian contracts do. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Sure. I feel like Representative Harrison, I know this is your budget and you've got, it feels like you've got some questions that you're going to go search. We'll get that information from DHR. I didn't get the number that they actually put in there or an estimate as part of the poll. Yeah. So you're trying to tie up that there was money that there was already there and you're just wondering, is this on top of that? Yeah, exactly because I'm looking at the 3.3 million, which is about 8% of the 46. So maybe I'm looking at the wrong numbers. Well, we wouldn't want that to happen. No, no, but that's all I have on that. Yeah, exactly. And then the cross-border that was sent over. Okay. So we can follow up. Okay. Thank you. And then there's only one other line item, which is the vacancy savings. Yes, we due to vacancies in recruitment difficulties in both the sworn ranks and in our PSAPs. As of Monday, we had 23 vacancies in the PSAPs and 40 vacancies on the sworn side. So what's the number? I'm sorry, how many have 23 vacancy savings in the BSAPs and how many in the other? There were 40 as of Monday on the sworn side. 48? 40 on the sworn side. 40, 40. Sorry if my microphone isn't cooperating. All right, can you repeat that? 40. On what side of the 23 was on the what? I got 20 that PSAP. But what was the 44? What is that? Troopers. Swarm officers. Thank you. So we have so we have 40 vacancies in the troopers and right now out of a force of 300. 330. 330. Okay. It seems it's high. I'm sorry. You know, I know you know that. It was 50 as on Sunday. And then we started a class of 10 troopers in pre-basic training on Monday. Now, of note, they won all make it 40 vacancies, but they're all still in one position number until they finish the academy. So if you were to check HR numbers, you'd still think we have 49 vacancies, right? As of Monday, but in terms of who we're paying, we have 40 vacancies. And we're not 100% sure all of them will make it through training, right? That's correct. But we're rooting for them. Of course we are. I'm sorry. We're rooting for the next class. So the 23 vacancies in the PSAPs help us to understand how many total. So what is it? 66. 66 total positions in the two PSAPs in Westminster and Williston. Those are the public safety answering points, which are 9-1-1 call taking feats, but also dispatching for all of, you know, police fire and EMS. So of 66 positions, we currently have 23 vacancies. So the impact on the workload on the number that's left is enormous. It's terrible. And it's a lot of long, you know, forced over time. The more, the more higher a vacancy rate you carry, the more quicker you lose people because they can't get any time off. And, you know, it's that cycle spiral. Yep. Because you don't have a lot more other than these two lines, correct? Correct. Right. So can you can you take a moment to tell us about what what's out there for the recruiting for this? Sure. On the civilian side of the house, we obviously follow the general human resources protocols and advertise the positions. A lot of the positions seem to get filled by word of mouth, which makes it even more incumbent upon us to create a decent work life balance for our existing employees. And we have a very high turnover rate. Retention is very hard in the PSAPs. And that is one of one of one of many drivers of our push, our significant push to make regional dispatch come to fruition. We currently dispatch for approximately 100 agencies out of those two PSAPs and the complexity of work is too high. And we hear that consistently in our exit interviews with employees who are leaving. And then, as I mentioned already, when we get low on staff, people get forced into overtime shifts. They don't have a lot of control over their schedule. And it causes people to say this is not for them and I get it. So on the recruiting front, on the PSAP side, we sell those vacancies the same as we do for any other vacancy other than troopers. For sworn personnel, we have engaged in several new initiatives, marketing campaigns. We've received some consulting input. We have engaged in some contracts with WCAX and other traditional media platforms. We have begun advertising at historically black colleges and universities. We have been taking our recruiting efforts to states and places and cities where we've never put our initiatives. We've hired a civilian recruitment specialist who is very, very adept at digital media. And he has been creating a lot of content for social media sites and the places where younger people, far younger than I, would be likely to find their information on TikTok and other things to grab. So we've been aggressively recruiting, but I would be remiss if I didn't say, this is not a Vermont problem. This is a nationwide problem. It is an unbelievably difficult landscape to recruit in. Our retirements and departures are outpacing the ability to bring people in the door. And even once we do, ma'am, it's about a year before an officer can get out on their own in a car and answer calls for service without being supervised. So it's a long time of training. And so we're going to be wrestling with this for probably the next three to five years at least. Well, let me ask this. The potential regional dispatching centers that are under development, I don't know where it is in the development, but some places are farther ahead than others. Is there an expectation then with those that 66 and the PSAPs will be reduced? I mean, a number of people or just the stress? Well, first off, the stress and complexity of the work would absolutely be reduced if we can find the right workload balance, right? If we can find the right distribution of personnel. And by moving to a diffuse regional model, of course, you're able to tap into different workforce pools, right? So we don't know if the 66 will be reduced because we don't know how many agencies will shed. But certainly that would be a topic of ongoing analysis and discussion that if we are able to get to a point where we can shrink the number of people required to run the two PSAPs, that would result at some level of cost savings that could theoretically be put back into the regional dispatch effort. I know that we're standing between lunch on this, but, you know, I just wanted you to hear that we're concerned. We know that this crisis is there. Vermonner's safety is paramount and having a really good functioning system. So I know that this whole building would, you know, has a great deal of sympathy and would want this to succeed. Well, we do too. No one wants this more. I mean, you know, when you think about you just we want somebody to be there to answer the phone when citizens in distress or visitors in distress call. And likewise, we want somebody to be there to answer the radio when first responders need something, need something for their safety or to help the safety of other people. We are in a bit of a moment, shall we say right now, this legislative session. We have 20 million dollars that can potentially be in play to assist these centers with getting up and running. But we have to answer the two fundamental questions the governor is seeking an answer to. One is, is a statewide system of emergency responders communication a fundamental obligation of state government? If the answer is yes, that's a very different path from the path that we have been on for the last three years. And the other question is related to funding. What is the long term funding? So we know we have projects that are willing to become regional centers, but they will not invest money, time and human resource into the planning and all the work that needs to be done to get there until they know what the back end funding is in the long term. So, you know, I think the biggest challenge right now is determining the long term funding and what is an equitable way of paying for this service across the state. So are you an intricate part of that conversation with them? Yes. Good. How's it going? We're at a crossroads. I mean, we are. We are. It's a logical pause because we were approved for funding from the Joint Fiscal Committee for approximately two million dollars to get some projects moving. But in that same lump of money was money to hire a technical consultant on contract and a project manager on contract. Those RFPs are on the street and responses are due tomorrow. So then, of course, there would be the inevitable review and determining if we're going to engage with someone. So we have like this kind of two week time out while things settle on that front. And I know the governor wants the legislature's help in answering these really fundamental big questions. But I would be remiss if I did not express the sense of urgency that this has been studied to death over 55 years. The report after report after report has come to the same conclusion that a system of regional centers is right for Vermont. How we get there and how we fund it in the long term, the long term funding is really the key. So we should not miss this opportunity. We have received the congressionally directed spending from Leahy's office to the tune of nine million dollars. Of course, your committee with the big bill H740 last year at the 11 million appropriation in two different chunks. So it's it now's the moment. Well, I've now taken up enough time that we have two other questions, Representative Harrison and then Representative Dickinson. And then we're going to go to lunch. Okay, Commissioner. I certainly want to be one of delaying lunch because that's very important to me and others. But, you know, as you know, last year, we set up a study group over the various stakeholders. And I don't know how I wasn't involved with that. So I probably miscarried it, but it sounded like there was sort of like a meltdown of that process because there is no recommendations. And we can talk further, but we kind of need, I guess, a little bit more buy-in and more groups to get somewhere where that somewhere is. So any comment on that stakeholder group? I don't know if you were involved with it or some of your people were. Yes, some of my people were and it was, you know, it was hours to turn in the report, but it was supposed to be a report crafted by this working group, which, you know, with many working groups, these are folks for whom that's another thing on their plate and they're not being compensated for the time to come to the extensive meetings, et cetera. So those groups are inherently difficult at times. And I recognize that the recommendations they made were not the one magic bullet. They concluded after talking to a wide variety of experts across the state that they could not come up with a recommendation that did not result in a new tax or fee. And that was what they were challenged to do. And so the question is, can you guys come up with something that's not a new tax or fee? And it was a great group of people, but yeah, there was definitely a strong difference of opinion that some people in the group thought that we had to answer different questions and they didn't want to stay on task with what the assignment from the piece of legislation was. So we got a laundry list of an a la carte menu of recommendations, not a one top level recommendation. Okay, thank you. You're welcome. Representative Dickinson, take us home. Thank you very much, Commissioner. I remember a few years back that there was a lot of controversy over the idea of regionalizing or cutting back the dispatch centers. I think we were going to go to two. I'm not sure where we are now. It sounds like it's sort of being regionalized, but never quite got there. Where are we? How many do we have? So what you're referring to is that we had four state run PSAPs. They were consolidated from four to two by some of my predecessors. That has created some very difficult circumstances in terms of reducing the available workforce to pull from and increasing the complexity of the work that I just described about the number of agencies being dispatched out of two PSAPs. Where we are in the Vermont landscape looks like this. There are many municipalities and sheriff's departments who have always dispatched for themselves perhaps for their own fire and rescue as well like South Burlington, Burlington, Colchester, etc. Those entities continue to operate today and I don't know what their future looks like if we went to a fully regionalized scheme. There are de facto regional dispatch centers, although they have no official impromptu of such, but for instance in Shelburne, the Shelburne Police Department contracts with approximately 15 or more other agencies. They have their own governance system and they have their own scheme for paying fair share. Likewise in St. Albans, they dispatch for more than 30 entities up that way. Same thing, they have a different way of charging customers than what Shelburne uses and both of those are different from how the Lamoille County Sheriff's Office who is also a de facto regional dispatch center, they all charge differently but they all appear to have pretty good customer service success, they have happy customers. The biggest issue is that we have inequity across the state in that many agencies that are being dispatched by our PSAPs don't pay and they never have and so they have no incentive to go to a new model that would require them to pay. Oh, we've heard for them. Yeah, I'm sure and I get it. Like it's, you know, as a former police chief, dispatching is a big chunk of your operating budget but it's also necessary if you're going to deploy emergency responders to situations though and answer phone from the public. Yeah, so that's where we are is that there's a very, there's a big disparity of the types of center that exist. The two formal state run ones are a consolidation of the previous four PSAPs and then we are surrounded by either standalone dispatch entities in municipalities and these de facto regional entities who have figured out a way to make it maybe profitable but at least cost neutral by taking on other customers. Thank you. You're welcome. Well, we will let you go. It was great that you had a very simple one because we get to take a moment to talk about other things. So thank you for your time and your testimony. And Representative Harrison has your budget and so you can follow up with him and he can do the same. All right, you are good to go. So committee, it is exactly 12 o'clock.