 Hello and welcome. This is June 9th. This is the education committee in the Vermont House of Representatives. And what we're looking at today is the COVID-19 response to education funding. With us today, we have the secretary of education who is going to just give us a little update on where we are in terms of what the next year may be looking like. So welcome, Secretary French. Good morning or good afternoon. It's good to see you all again. Yes, I appreciate the invitation to come and speak on this issue. I thought it would be useful if I provided you a quick update on our planning to reopen schools for in-person instruction. We've been working likewise in partnership with other legislative groups to work on the funding piece, but more or less on the front burner for me has been this reopening planning, which I think is really going to be useful to this funding question as well. So we have a group that's been working specifically on the public health guidance that will be used to inform the reopening conditions. We have groups in Worley working very effectively, largely led by Department of Health, but including very stakeholder groups in the education community, also augmented by other medical folks in the state, virologists, pediatricians and so forth. That guidance is fairly stable. I expect it to be published next week. That's our timeframe. You know, my takeaway from all that and just coordinating and discussing the issues with my national partners as well. I think we're very increasingly confident that we will be able to open school for in-person instruction. So that's the good news. I think the health guidance is very specific and will be very constructive to inform districts and their preparations for enacting in-person instruction. I think what we intend to do next is to explore, I think, what will be a necessary review of the decision making processes around what I'll call or the CDC would call reactive school closure. So we're going to be able to get very tight on, I think, the public health guidance relative to opening schools, but then we're going to have to contemplate schools, school districts, some being open, some being closed, some being doing remote learning, some being in a mix, perhaps, of hybrid disposition. And we'll need to articulate who's going to make those decisions and under what considerations those decisions get made. So that will sort of be the next phase of the work. But sort of strategically, we pointed very quickly on to get the public health guidance stable. We helped in a certain extent, but we had to work a lot with our public health experts in Vermont to define that further and then have that also be informed by the real world wisdom, if you will, the practitioners on the ground. So anyway, I just say that's forthcoming very soon. I'm sure you're probably aware of the National Organizations, the American Association of School Administrators and the National Organization for School Business Officials have released a modeling around reopening costs. And I thought that would be very useful if you hadn't seen that. Basically, we start thinking about costs relative to reopening, which is when I start thinking of CRF in particular. I think it's a good place to think the national modeling points to something like out of those groups at $490 per pupil. So for Vermont, that would translate to about $40 million. You know, that's that's as good as estimate as anyone has at this point. And I think it's that estimate includes things much more broadly than just conditioning school facilities and also includes staffing costs and so forth. But I thought that I just mentioned that if you hadn't seen that but that's where we'll go next once we sort of say lock in or publish this first iteration of our health guidance will be able to turn very quickly I think to the costing out of what would be necessary to carry this off in particular how do you see our funds to support that work. Thank you. Do you have a sense of, I guess, our calendars are set by the, by the, by the career and tech centers, I believe, is there any sense of timing of opening any early opening. Yeah, it's a good point I think we're, you know, this is a very complex planning process and I think there's a lot of many questions that surface including resources and funding. The idea was to at least get a definition of what the public health conditions would be for opening schools I mean you know the issues of social distancing and, you know, protective equipment and so forth what are those things actually look like and I think we have a good idea what by interjecting this out into the community and will also start to promote questions of I would say decision making but also the policy and regulatory ramifications that might be necessary so we will surface questions on student attendance counter day I'm sure and that that'll be in that sort of next layer of work about how how folks best see that to happen so as much as possible from my perspective I'd really like to public health guidance to sort of drive that conversation. But we couldn't do it all at once, it would be almost impossible to get the public health guidance done if we had to consider everything as one comprehensive guidance package so I think we're in a good place to get the public health guidance out. And that will stimulate a lot of other thinking around these lines. Thank you. Any questions for the secretary. Okay, what I'd like to do. We were given a task. I'm sorry representative Austin did you have a question for the secretary. Um, thank you, Secretary French. I am wondering about reading a research, an article in the New York Times by Dana Goldstein June 2020 and that research shows students falling months behind during virus disruptions. Research by September 2020 most students will have fallen behind where they would have been if they had standing classrooms with some losing the equivalent. Full school years academic gains racial and socio economic achievement gaps will most likely widen because of the disparities and access to computers home internet connections and direct instruction from teachers. I'm very concerned about this because I think in 2021, you know that they'll be budget cuts, I think to a lot of supporting that you know educators in terms of being able to catch students up. I'm just wondering if you thought about the possibility of and I don't know again I don't know how to do this but just for maybe four to six months, being able to hire resources in a special category to address these student gaps to catch them up so that they're on grade level. So, especially I think in math and literacy. So they just don't fall behind, you know, and maybe never be able to catch up. Yeah, I appreciate the question representative awesome I think for me that underscores the necessity to reopen school for a person instruction and you know just to back up a little bit on that. I think you know we certainly from a reactive standpoint have been emerging, managing a very, you know, significant historical event in terms of it being a national emergency and emergency in Vermont. And that's required a lot of rapid decision making and so forth and one of the after effects certainly has been we've created an opportunity in Vermont, largely due to our discipline approach to the social mitigation to plan for the next steps in our response a little more thoughtfully we have have a window of opportunity to do that. But for me it just underscores once again in spite of that and this and certainly the significance of the public health emergency around coven 19. I think I've increasingly come to acknowledge and many educators have there's also an educational emergency here that has to be addressed. And we're, we're, as you know, increasingly becoming comfortable with living with the virus. And we can't stay in a shutdown mode for a prolonged period of time and from an educational standpoint it really necessitates my conclusion is that we need to, you know, think very aggressively but very intentionally about the need to reopen school and why we need to do that. I think certainly a better part of the rationale to do that, not only to get the essential systems back up to support students and families but also to begin on a period of assessment so we can understand the effects that have happened. I think it would be premature to say there, we certainly can anticipate there being effects but I think part of the impetus and the urgency of my from my perspective to reopen school is to begin that assessment so we can start to ascertain the true effects. And I think they're going to be a priority for school districts, not only the assessment piece but also the remediation but you know, actually step one is just to reopen schools right now and that that's a big enough task and it's planning process. In itself, but certainly one of the objectives for reopening is to begin a period of assessment so we can understand the impact on student learning. Thank you, Secretary French I'm just wondering if there's a Serena. We're going to start to get into some of the things that we're going to be doing on how we're going to be getting money out to to folks so if we can keep that focused on here and there might be some opportunities on where we are with. Continuity of learning and learning loss will probably emerge here so I want to keep us moving because we've got to end up with a product and we have to have a product by tomorrow. Can I just ask one one question of the secretary. Go ahead. Thank you. I'm just wondering is there anything that we could do to help you have funding in place on hold. I think we need to access quickly after the assessments were done so that you could rapidly again address the needs of the students. I think a certainly an important strategy is to get the answer funds out the door. You know the 90% of the $30 million that's a direct shot in the arm so to speak to school districts. And as much as possible if we can target those funds to make the educational impact that you've alluded to I think that would be an important strategy so we've we've essentially put a hold on the SR application for a couple reasons one was to coordinate with legislative funds about the response to the Ed fund and so forth and the coordinate the use of CRF gear other funding that's on the table. But the answer funds, you know are directed, ideally towards the educational impact of the virus they're also they have a longer tail so we can effectively use those for a year at least. And I think that would be an important part of our flexibility so I think, you know, if we can sort of reserve the impact of those funds for the educational issues and try to address sort of the physical plant supplies and so forth through CRF as part of reopening I think that would be an important strategy. Thank you. I'm going to call you on you in a second I just want to set a picture of what we're where we're going from here. I'm going to call you on the speaker, and that is basically the big picture right now of the, we have 1.25 billion dollars of covert relief funds available to the state of that my understanding is 275 million have already been allocated either through the joint process budget adjustment transitional budgeting or municipal lending bill. And there's 400 million that's being held at the moment to fill budget holes, or for second tier priorities. And then there's 575 million that the speakers looking at for first tier committee priorities. She has given to me at numbers to work with is the first year priority is how would we spend $50 million second tier is $75 million. On the side there is the hundred and $50 million that it's not addressed in there that we're looking to figure out a way to deal with our current budget gap. And from the as you may remember from the work done by the ways and means committee, the bill that was put forward, it chose not to leave that 150 million to the property taxpayers, but was setting it aside as as possibly being something used for federal funds. We don't know yet we're still waiting for further guidance. So what what I want us to talk about today is the spending of $50 million first round $75 million if it's available. And the other thing is that I've also been tasked to make this to split between higher education and pre K 12. I have asked if we could flip that. So we could have 75 million in the first year and 50 in the second. I should know a little bit more about that tomorrow. The bill that the draft that Larry and Peter Conlon and I in an effort to be ready for our conversation today, met with joint fiscal office. We had a few other of the bees join us for a few of those meetings that these basically that the education advocacy groups to help us start with a first draft so what we have for you today is a first draft for this is something for us to talk about. So as we know those districts are being given this task, we have kind of a different picture because in a sense, we're trying to figure out how we're addressing the needs of 151 different school districts in 54 supervisor units I don't know if I have that number right I don't remember but it's about like that. So, and as we know those districts are going to have different needs those districts have already spent money differently. So being too prescriptive might help one district and hurt another. So we've put it, we've put this together as a first draft for the committee so we'll at least have a document to talk about. So from there, and now that I've set that I'm going to Jim speak but I want to make sure Caleb you you have an opportunity to ask a question or make a comment. A question for the secretary appreciating chair webs framework that she just kind of reiterated there's we're kind of talking about this $50 million and I was part of a conversation yesterday with some hunger advocates and also some members of some Senate committees who have kind of a different process. A question came up that I thought was a good one, which is just do we have a sense of how much of that 50 million might be spent already in other words, hear these districts and know I've been working with the agency of track COVID expenses. I guess I don't have a sense of how much of the 275 chair web alluded to this sort of already been spent might have gone to those already incurred expenses, or whether those expenses are basically coded and waiting for their first reimbursement, so that that reimbursement really needs to come out of this 50 million prior to any new goals is that is that I'm just kind of figuring out what percentage of that 50 million is essentially spent, even in a rough basis if we know that answer. Yeah, we're going to have an opportunity to talk about that and it will be totally specific I know that Brad James has been gathered gathering some information that I think can come forward as we look at how we're addressing this. I noticed that I did not include the state colleges or the university in this conversation that was a problem on my part, but at least, yeah, would it be okay to let the secretary take a shot at answering my question. Yes, and I also want you to know that that's going to be part of the conversation about the 50 million that we're talking about but go ahead. Secretary Prince. Yeah, I think, you know, Brad could certainly fill you and I am time limited today to 1230. But I think Brad's done some modeling on that in particular I think the area that's I think a very useful strategy to examine as to what costs for staffing that have occurred in fiscal year 20 as a result of the emergency order, meaning that we require districts to maintain payroll essentially as an economic stability measure. We increasingly are thinking that that could be used as a CRF. That's about $16 million or so just to give you a sense of the magnitude. And that in turn would, you know, limit the liability for towards the Ed fund for districts if those those costs were picked up by the CRF. Brad can fill you in on more specifically. And I think we're going to get to that when we get to that section of the document that we're talking about. So just to bear in mind that one of the things about the ESSER funds is they were more flexible in their use CRF is much tighter. So I think what you're going to see what we're going to look for here is instead of spending those on ESSER funds, the current thing that we're talking about is taking that what was the, the value of the ESSER funds and attributing them right away to CRF funds and bringing that forward so. Perhaps I'm going to have Jim present where we are and I think that that will stimulate conversations going forward. As to some of the details that people are interested in and Brad will have an opportunity to talk about what's been what his understanding of what what has been spent so far, and how it's currently being accounted for. So Jim, can you talk about what we've talked about and this is a started this is a draft. And we also have to finish it tomorrow so I'm going to every we're going to have to set up another meeting for tomorrow morning before four. Or tomorrow morning actually doesn't have to be before four. Okay, sir. Yes, please. Okay. So, Jim Dan, let's console. We are walking through draft 1.2 of this, this language about use of the CRF funding. So, some section a deals with appropriations for pre case of grade 12, and be which will come to this with appropriations for higher education. So, for this section here, some section. We have first $20 million being appropriated from the release fund to AOE in fiscal year 2020 for the purpose of reimbursing this year 2020 coronavirus costs incurred by school districts. The agency show a minister this reimbursement program issue guidance to school districts on reimbursable costs and establish a process for submission of reimbursement for these costs. So, this is an appropriation for next fiscal year so 20,000 is appropriate from the relief fund to the agency in fiscal year 2021 for the purpose of providing grant funding to supervisor unions to assist with the costs of reopening schools. So, the agency will minister this grant program issue guidance is us on costs are eligible and she'll allocate grant funding desks use and amount up to their proportional allocation of funding for title 18 funds. Sub division three is in preparation for fiscal year 21. And the amount of 45 million to the agency for the purposes of providing grant funding to us use to assist with the cost of helping students recover from very lost due to school closure and remote learning during the emergency. And the cost of providing social and emotional support to students in school staff resulting from the pandemic. Again, the agency will measure the grant program mission guidance on allocate the grant funding in accordance with the talent funds. So just to just to stop right there, what what is listed here is 40 million of the first 50 million. And that would be going to our pre K 12 schools related to the expenditures that they've already spent in 2020 that they would just be submitting to the agency for reimbursement. And an additional 20 to prepare for the coming school year. Have I got explained that correctly. Questions on that so far. And then the other 45 million comes from tier two, her second tier, Serena Austin, and then Peter Fagan. Can someone just explain the title one a funds. What, what does that mean, what, what, how are those defined. I think that'd be best for Brad to explain if you could. Yeah, Brad, I think you're you are the one to explain that most clearly. Title one is the federal program to offset poverty to work on poverty kids. And we get money based on, you know, poverty counts from this from federal folks. Then we allocate that money out. What this is referencing is that that the money that we're talking about allocating out now this extra money or the part of the estimate of the CRF money is not title one money is just going out on the same percentage title one is going out on currently. So if a district got 10% of the statewide which is a huge number 10% of the statewide title one money, then it would get 10% of this money. This is this is this was kind of this came about for the CRF money based on how the Esther money that other that other part of money was directed to be allocated by the federal government. That's related to funding for FY 21. Right. Whereas the first part is just covering your expenses, covering what you you paid, for example, to deliver food. Excess costs in one thing or another and you started to collect that correct. You started. I have, I have, I have rough numbers of SNS so people have not nothing in detail we will be collecting it in detail. Thank you, Kate. One comment and then I need to let you know when I'm going to have to leave for that meeting speaker. So the funds are not indicated for FY 20 funding. I would recommend that you put in something in there that states that any funds that are on allocated at the end of the fiscal year shall shall carry forward into the next fiscal year for expenditure. That way, that way they're they're not stuck and waiting for us to take a proactive, you know, stance on that doing that. So we do that with the with the appropriations bill where appropriate and I'd recommend you do it here because this may not get out until the 26th of June, something like that. I think we might I think that might be coming I think that's a really important point. There's a surplus piece at the bottom but it doesn't really talk to the to what I think I'm saying so. And I'm, I'm going to have to get off at about eight in about eight minutes. Okay, so we should we should get to what we're talking about with higher ed. No, that's okay you can, you know, I've read it and I yeah I think it's fine. I just again there's a piece in higher ed same thing, you know, on any funds that are not allocated as of end of the year shall carry forward. Of course, some of these funds have to be spent by the end by the end of the calendar year. Yeah. Oh, okay. Very confusing. Right. Thanks. Just the year should just start in July. Okay, we'll have an opportunity to go back and look at that everybody to see how we're how we're doing it, but this is just a big broad broad look so now we're looking at money that we're going to be spending for a start starting document for higher ed. And essentially this is a $10 million appropriation for fiscal year 20. The agency is not defined here and I'm not sure which it should be so we're hoping appropriations will have an answer for that. And it's for costs incurred by UVM and the Vermont State Colleges. And the agency will minister the reimbursement program issue guidance and savagery process and up to 5 million may be allocated to each of UVM and VSC recovery reimbursable costs. And the next subdivision is a appropriation of $30 million for fiscal year 21. And everything remaining in that subdivision is the same as they just went through so again, going to undefined agency to cover current costs for UVM and VSC, the agency will minister, etc. And $15 million will be each of UVM and VSC. One quick question I just let somebody in that ends five to six phone number. Is that you represent of matters. I believe that's Jeff Francis. Oh, that's Jeff Francis. Okay. Great. Thank you. Okay. And there's just a few more to go here. C says that consistent with the stated purposes or the funding above the guidance issued by ALE and the other agency shall offer for use of that funding to cover all costs permitted under law. So, this is obviously maybe comprehensive in terms of the ability to use these funds. E is language that we're putting into all these, all these bills coming out of various committees. Which says the joint assembly determines that the expenditure of monies, except for the section is necessary and is due to a resulting from COVID-19. Do the reasons that for the ball basically so on E is clarifying that the appropriations for pre K through 12 should not be used for cost incurred by pre K program that is now operated by a school district. So these funds are not designed to go to private childcare centers. And F says that essentially, when a district has surplus funds, let's say a district has surplus funds in the fiscal year 2020, normally they can't be used until fiscal year 2022, because they have to be audited first to confirm that there are surplus funds and with the amount is this says that you can carry over those funds in fiscal year 2021 without waiting for an audit. If the school has a reasonable basis to believe that has a surplus funds. So it basically cuts off a year and allows them to be used more quickly. The next page is like that's the language you want beefed up is that what you're saying. Yes, Kate, I think we need to because that speaks just to the education fund, normal funding, and the fact that you're going to be able to use it quicker we're talking about the, we need to also do a piece in there regarding the coronavirus funds, and that they may be carry forward if they cannot be spent in FY 20. And then next page, we'll have to go through the rest of this. This is language that will be in the appropriations bill applies to all of this. All these provisions from all the different policy committees so I won't go through this and let's run me to basically just FYI. And with tier one. We have 40 million for public schools and 10 million for our public institutes of higher learning. And then in tier two. We have 45 in public schools and 30 I think 30 in higher ed. So we need to clarify do we do we need to. Are we required to include the independent colleges. That's part of the asset fund there. Okay. I think that's part of this. Oh, okay. So we don't have to account for it in this. Can you help me there. Nobody at AOE does higher. Education. Yeah, secretary French. Yeah, I think answer is has nothing to do with higher ed. There's a piece in the gear act funding, which is 4.4 million that could be applied to institutes of higher learning education, excuse me. Okay. So I think that's part of the equitable share provision of SR, which requires school districts to share some of their funding with independent cake 12 institutions, not higher ed institutions. Okay. But the CRF funds. We don't necessarily have to share at some proportion with. Independent colleges. That you're aware of. Okay. You know, in accordance with the program. Okay. Thank you, Peter Fagan for joining us. We will miss you. Kathleen James. Thanks. I just wanted to clarify, and I'm pretty sure I know the reason, but I'm assuming that any cares funding for private pre K providers would be coming in a different part of the overall package coming through the human services committee or something like that. That's my understanding is if you're looking at who needs PPE and masks and those kind of things that's going to be picked up in childcare. One thing that is probably a question is what about continuity of learning. We haven't necessarily addressed, but in terms of buildings and childcare. That's happening in the other committee. How we reconcile Peter Conlon, do you have an answer to that? No, I was on a different topic. I'm just waiting my turn. Thank you. Okay. But it is, it is a question Kathleen that, that we may need to be addressing at the moment. And I just to clarify, and maybe Chip can help us as well. And as well as Jim, this document that we're, we're putting together is really just a recommendation to appropriations. And they are ultimately going to be looking at everything. Maybe piles of money moved from one place to another that we don't know about. But this was our opportunity to address at least this section of it. In terms of higher ad, I can tell you that they could use the full 50. They've already given me all the ways to spend it. I just want to make sure that we're supposed to that our direction of funds is supposed to be limited. And I guess to public that we're not supposed to be thinking here about private childcare providers, because I know they're in trouble too. And I assume that's beyond the scope of our committee and what we're looking at here. We talked about that the other day. Chelsea was helpful in that as well. And I see Chip, are you going to respond to this topic? I'm not going to respond to anything else. And anything else. Not, not that, not about whether or not. Private childcare is being considered here. Yeah. Okay, that just finished with that. So private childcare is being addressed in house human services. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. So health and safety. That'll be childcare. Continuity of learning that gets a little squishier. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Chip. Just to your question about, or your point about this being a recommendation. I, I, I, we're going to be looking at it as more than a recommendation. I mean, this is, we're going to hear from all the committees about how the amount of money that they have been told by the speaker is sort of within their purview to, you know, given, as you pointed out, the time constraints here, we're not going to be able to take testimony where we're going to take the committees. Recommendations, if you want to call them that. As really that they're, they're telling us how we should be spending that money. As always, you know, the appropriations committee is going to have, you know, I don't think that we're going to be able to do that. Based on the information we have, but. I don't. I would take this, you know, what comes to our committee. Should be really what you believe is the best way to spend the money. And, and not think that we're going to can, you know, massage that in any real way. But you could take some out and you could put some in. You know, you know, I don't think that we're going to be able to have people at a little bit higher level than I am to really give an answer. But I, I have not been under the impression that. We are going to be adjusting the amounts that the committees have to spend. That's, that's a decision that, you know, I speaking just for myself, I believe has been made at the speakers level, perhaps in consultation with chairs, I don't think our committee is going to say, no, the house ed has less than, than the $50 million you said, or more. I think we're going to take what you send us and. And as long as we know that that's within what the speaker sort of designated as, as an appropriate amount for your committee. But just to clarify on this, this is not something that goes to the floor and gets. You know what the procedure is on this. I'm a little confused. Well, am I understanding again? Yeah. I'm telling you what I know from where I said, but. Is that we're going to put it most, most of the recommendations from the committees is going to come to our committee and get put into a single bill. The commerce committee is separate. They're going to have a separate bill, but other than that, pretty much we're going to have a single bill. That will leave our committee and go to the floor in that form. And then of course, you know, anyone can amend the bill or. Make up. Thank you. Peter. And then I want to get some feedback from the field. I just wanted to, I don't think this came out, but. And that is the division of the money in the first 50. The, the 10 for higher ed versus the 40 for. Pre-K to 12. It's largely based on some math that Brad James did at looking at the numbers of students involved in, in each organization. So I just wanted to let people know that. Yeah, maybe, maybe Brad, you could talk to us about that. So we've come up with 20,000, 20 million. Yeah. I mean, it was, it was just, I was kind of rolling numbers around in my head. I was looking kind of at roughly what, what, how many, how many students are in the public system? How many students are in the college system? Just kind of very rough ideas. And recognizing that the cost of college is more than the cost of the elementary school. I just, and I made the suggestion of, of taking that $50 million, taking roughly 20% of it. Yes. I think it ended up with 20% of it and applying that to the higher education. Yeah. And I threw it out there simply because people were talking back with the numbers. There's, there's no hard number behind that. It's just the numbers that I'm familiar with and kind of thinking of. Okay. Chloe, do you have anything to add? Cause you've been pretty involved in this. I don't have anything to add. I think that sort of shows the cost buckets. But other than that, I mean, I, I. Really when it comes down to, to the, to the numbers, it was, you know, you could spend all of the money on all of these things. So it's sort of just a balancing act, like what Brad was just talking about. So the first part, we're just looking at refunding basically. Brad. I'm not sure if this is the right time to bring it up, but, but I did look at the language that Jim had drafted and went through. And, and in, in sub second, we're talking about the surplus. My understanding from the conversations we were having yesterday was that people wanted to make sure that that money that was reimbursed by the CRF money in FY 20 was shall be rolled forward into FY 21. I think the way Jim has it drafted, it's, it's may use it. And I think it'd be, I think the idea, if I remember correctly, was to say that money would be used in FY 21 to offset the deficit. And I can send Jim some suggested language on that if he'd like, or if that's the way the committee would like to go. And you've seen that language, correct? Jim. No, he has not right now. Oh, you have. Yeah. I said to him. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Kayla. Thank you. So I have a couple, a couple of questions. I think that I get the basic framework and it seems helpful. I, there's 125 million dollars that I count here and that makes sense because we had 50 tier one and 75 tier two. I know we're doing some creative replacing with the Essar money, which I'm going to call $28 million as a school share. Correct me if I got that wrong, but I'm just going to roll with 28 million. I don't understand how that dovetails with this money. And I want to make sure that that Essar money is clearly over and above anything from the tier one that we give the schools. That's entirely the schools. So in the long term, whatever, whatever the schools get here, I want to just make sure they're getting 28 million in addition from Essar at some point. So that's, that's just kind of, I'm putting that out as my assumption and please correct me if I've got that wrong. I know there's some, you know, there's some stuff with the title one allocations and the independent schools and it's been held back, but there's more flexibility anyway. So with that said, what I see of the 50 million here, I would like maximum flexibility in the 40 for the public schools because whether they're covering costs incurred in FY 20 or they're covering anticipated costs for FY 21, we're still in FY 21 and yet schools are closed. And yet I know in our district, we've been spending $5,000 a day on busing. So that's 60 days. We've got about $300,000 just into busing. Now our food service has actually been a net revenue gainer because we're getting a higher level of compensation from the federal system. But the busing is a critical cost and, and it's a critical cost. It's not exactly a school year reimbursement and it's not exactly preparing during FY 21. So I just want to see that any of these dollars that have to be spent through September, it's just like an open grant program for the districts to access for these things. Cause I know some districts are saying, Hey, we're not going to do food services summer. We cannot afford it. Again, I, Chloe had mentioned maybe this adds that, well, if we gave the whole 50 million to the districts, it was going to be a half a million each. If we give 10 to the colleges is 400,000 each. I think our districts already spent 300,000. So we just need some clarity about. Tracking what you've already spent, how much you're already going to get for the districts to access for these things. Because I know some districts are saying, Hey, we're not going to do food service this summer. We cannot afford it. Again, I Chloe had mentioned maybe this adds that. Well, if we gave the whole 50 million to the districts, it's going to be a half a million each. So we just need some clarity about how much you're already going to get. And then if there's anything left of that. That you have total flexibility to use it. And then also saying, and by the way, this is other 28 million from Essar. If all that's true, that's great. I just want to make sure that their 28 million isn't somehow in this 40. Because that's to me would not be equitable division with this, with the college system. Thanks. That was long. I know. Thanks for hearing me out. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So really what we had been thinking is that we want the flexibility for people to be submitting. COVID eligible. Expenses. That the agency would be able to clarify. So is it COVID related? The agency knows. And would be proven is to provide guidance. Is that correct, Jim? It is correct in terms of the guidance. We have three appropriations. For pre K through 12. The first is brought broad like. Older mentioned for any, any expense. But the second and third are more targeted. Based on our conversation. So the second is to assist with the cost of reopening schools. That's less broad than for any, any use, obviously. But the third is to assist with the cost of reopening schools. And the fourth is to help the students recover from learning loss. And for social and emotional support. That's one narrow. So you can broaden those two others who out to be for any. Eligible. COVID cost. But that's not how it's drafted currently. And I think that's definitely. Something that the committee will, will review needs to review. Brad, please. I see as representative elders direct question. No, the money that we're talking about right now. It is not. A little, a little louder, Brad. I'm sorry. Yeah. I apparently have an internet issues here. Yeah. The answer is no, the money that we're talking about right now. Coronavirus relief money. It is not. The extra money is separate from this. And Chloe will certainly correct me if I'm wrong. But we are not talking about that $28 million. We're talking about the extra money. We're talking about the extra money. And what we tried to do was because the schools are thinking about that extra money. How can we give them what they were expecting? Only we're going to take it out of a different, different bucket. Correct. This, the, the, the CRF money we're talking about now is far more restrictive in its use. That is the extra money. So we're trying to use the CRF money for the eligible costs that are being incurred right now up through June 30th. And then we're going to, we're going to get the extra money. And then we're going to get the extra money. And then we're going to get the extra money that Jim was talking about that $20 million that would be reimbursable. And then there's going to be new costs that are not in there, but for FY 21. That's what that second $20 million. Of course, when we get to FY 21, which department grant program. And then the extra money on top of that at some point. And then the extra money is separate from both those. Yes. Yes. And hopefully that's something that we can do to perhaps address that. That would be, that would be a hope. So basically, if your school has been spending money, not busing students, but busing food. Because of, of coronavirus, that would be an eligible cost that you could submit for reimbursement. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Kathy and James. Hope you mute it again. Thanks. I actually found what I was looking for. It's in the section. Low the general guidance that sounds to me like is going to apply to the entire bill. I was going to ask whether we shouldn't be reminding schools that the money needs to be. Spent by December 31st. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. You know, not willy-nilly, but if school spent it on ineligible costs and I see it's addressed there. So I'm good to go. Thanks. Right. So the definition in the first funds is just go ahead and reimburse. And in the second, it's a grant. But basically it's being sent out to districts. Based on title one. Based on your title one count. One thing for that. It's up to. So it's, um, they won't just get a grant funding of a proportional amount. Of course it's all one. Um, they'll apply for the grant funding. I believe. And the maximum they'll get. Is their proportional amount. They get under title one. So. So, you know, I can agree to be saying how money unless they actually have the cost, right? So it has to, it's a maximum. And this came up because we wanted to make sure that some really sophisticated districts didn't go in there and get all the money. So we were looking for a way to, to make it so that there's access that's. That's what we're looking for. So we're looking for a way to make sure that there's a way to get all the money. That's what we're looking for. That's what we're looking for. That's what we're looking for. That's what we're looking for. Are people comfortable with then the definition. For. Number two. Based on. On that. I'm. Serita Austin. Yes. I just want to ask clarifying question. Again, this article talks about. The increase in a cheap and gaps on with socio. And that's what we're looking for. That's what we're looking for. I'm with, you know, poorer children. The title one allocation in the waiting study. It was found. That it was inequitable kind of the reimbursement that students were getting. That were at a lower so socio-economic. Level. I'm wondering is that formula being used to reimburse students? I mean, I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm just to have a task force. And I understand that. For the waiting study. But is that. It's a reimbursement. The title one, because I was wondering what the grants. If schools identified or districts identified in the waiting study. I mean, they're going to get like a double whammy. Already. They're already. Inequitable in terms of. The waiting stunning findings. And now with COVID. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm just wondering what the students. So I'm just wondering what the grants is there a way to. Provide them more funding to meet their students needs. So Chelsea buyers, maybe you can help because this was a conversation we had yesterday on how to fairly make sure that districts have access to these funds, particularly related to learning loss was one of the main topics that we had as well as fairness to districts. So. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Our Chelsea Myers BSA. I just want to first say thank you for taking this up. And. What we had the discussion on was if we are truly thinking about the CRF funds, funding replacing the anticipated ESSER funds. Then it would be reasonable to expect. That funding to be allocated. That funding to be taken based on the federal dollars. And the way that they intended for them to be allocated. And in that case, it was title one dollars. Which. Essentially is. Different than waiting. And the waiting study, but it does take into account poverty. I don't know that we could ever suggest a perfect. For example, For example, Those students that. Yeah, are a greater economic disadvantage. Those systems, I should say, with greater proportions of. Economically disadvantaged students. Can I ask one more question? Yes, chair. So is there a way with the grants, the way they're allocated to. Schools with a higher levels of students in poverty. Or. Is that already taken into consideration. Brad. We don't, we don't, I'm not sure I ever said this. Record brand names, agency of education. Just case. We can see you so. Okay. We don't, we don't grant directly to schools in general. When, when we're granting the federal monies, we are granting them to the LEAs. And in our case in Vermont's case, the LEA for federal purposes are the supervisory. And then the supervisory union level, the supervisory union is the one to disperse the money out. Schools themselves. We don't do that as an agent. It's a complex thing on how to make sure that the money gets distributed or is available to districts. It's a, it's not, it's not an easy answer. We looked at it. We looked at it as enrollment. We looked at it as equalized pupil. We looked at it as ADM and all of it seemed to run, you know, smack into the waiting study. So it seemed like using. Title one, which was what the schools were expecting was probably our best resource. Title one makes sense to me. I just worry that we've got this unresolved. We are talking about the U S. Ed situation. Don't we run guidance with the Essar money where it's title one plus distributing to independent schools, whereas this bill just does title one. And that's just a very fine difference. And we're kind of like trying to get people money for what, you know, it's like, am I correct that we're still waiting. To put out the Essar money precisely because of this question of whether it can be done strictly on title one or on title one. I think we're just that what we were focused on was just trying to spend the money. The first. That has the greatest number of restrictions. To spend that first. So don't spend Essar money on on your buses because we can spend CRF money on that. And that's what we're trying to do. And that's what we're trying to do. And that is tied to very, you know, tight specific guidelines. Right. But there is an explicit title one. Peace to Essar dollars that we heard testimony on that was unresolved. That's all. Yeah, it was. And actually it was. I don't. That's why we were told that originally wasn't being released. That's like why the Essar money isn't already out. But the other thing that we did, um, was that the last week at some point, there were the, the Essar money was initially that case was initially held up because of your point that that while the, the cares accent, sent out on title one allocations, the guidance from the U. S. Education Department. Broadened that to make, instead of just based on poverty and independence, will for equitable services. It's not to suck the number of kids. But they based it on enrollment instead. The other reason why the rollout was delayed was because the legislature asked us to do some of the committees, asked the agency to hold on to the money so they could have some maximum flexibility. Because, again, as I've said before and other people said, the extra money is much more flexible than the CRF money. They basically want to use the ideas to use the CRF money first and then the extra money later because it's more flexible. Going to. And more time, too. Going back to the title, one question, what I understood from Secretary Friend's last, what he was talking about, I believe, was you guys last week or maybe it was another committee here. You're starting to blend in, sorry to say that. But he said that USN was not changing their guidance on that. They were still saying that they should be sent out on that title one plus, if you put it, allocation method. And some, I understand, some states are choosing to ignore it. Chelsea. And I also make sure that I hear from the field your reaction as well, our committee really wants to hear from you. Chelsea, did you have something to add? Yeah, I will just say that the immediate release of these CRF funds are not restricted in the same way that the ESSER funds are in terms of the independent school guidance because the guidance applies to the ESSER funds and not to the CRF funds. You all can determine what allocation strategy, for the most part, you use. So the independent school question does not need to be addressed until it's decided that the ESSER funds are to be released. Thank you. Kathleen, James? Yeah, could somebody just give me a very quick recap of the independent school question? If that's going to be relevant, thanks. Brad? In the CARES Act, when they're talking about the ESSER funds, they're saying that some of the money that goes out to the LEAs must be used for equitable services to independent schools that have students who've been placed there by their parents to accommodate their needs and such. So what they said is that it goes out based on the title one formula. Currently under title one, the SUs get their allocation. And then the independent schools apply for some of that money for equitable services that the SU provides or they pay for it somehow or another. And so when the ESSER money was specified how it was going to be allocated in turn from the federal government, they said along the lines of title one. And they specifically said, including the equitable services piece, I'm certainly paraphrasing here, but they said including that equitable services piece. And then the US Ed guidance, that equitable service was currently based on the number of kids from a poverty background, poverty count basically. Then when US Ed guidance came out about how to disperse this money, how to allocate the ESSER money, they changed the equitable services allocation from the number of poverty kids and the dependent schools versus the poverty kids in total to enrollment in independent schools versus enrollment in total. And so what that did is that changed the percentage of money that would go out to the independent schools. That's not resolved. So there's just a hang up right now with how the ESSER money should be or will be distributed to independent schools. What formula will be used? That's what the whole applies. And it sounds like I think Secretary of Friends is going to follow the guidance. I'm not certain about that. Okay, thanks. Okay. Can we hear from the field, response from the field? Superintendent Chelsea and Jeff, do you have anything that you'd like to say in regards to any changes that you would make in this language so far? Thank you, Chair Webb. And thanks for the opportunity to participate in the conversation. Is my audio working okay here today? It's good. Okay, great. So the comments that Chelsea made show really the thoroughness with which we're trying to consider this. And we realize that this is the approach that's under consideration by the House. We don't know what the Senate will do yet. And we also haven't heard the specific plan from the administration. So the navigation involves each of the parties that I just referenced. And from the perspective of the field, we've got several interests that I want to convey. The first is I want to just let you know that because of the pace with which this proposal has come about, while we've participated in the conversations, we haven't had any real opportunity to confer with either superintendents or business managers. So my comments are basically qualified by the fact that when this plan takes shape and I realize that it might be affirmed overnight, we will do our best to convey to superintendents and I think by extension business managers what the proposal is. So I wanted to be very clear about that. The second thing that I want to offer contextually is while these are large sums of money that are being discussed, we don't have a really good idea yet how much money is either bent spent or will be spent in the field. And I know that Brad has done some estimates as a result of conversations with business managers and our association did a rough survey of school districts. There was a small sample survey to try to understand not only what was being spent but what it was being spent on. But within the constraints of the program that's being articulated, we're not really sure what we're gonna see in terms of reimbursable expenses or projected costs or actual costs as we navigate to the start of school and beyond. I thought that representative elders explanation of the district that he's involved with was both accurate and insightful in terms of the context that he's set. So in some instances schools are spending, as he indicated, thousands of dollars a day to try to maintain services through the end of this school year, which is about the end, there's considerations that are gonna be made over the summer that have pressures associated with them. And then there's the navigation to the start of school. So my point is this, I think that you've got a reasonable approach here. We're not sure how things are gonna unfold. And this is understood to everybody that the house deliberation on this issue. So those are my contextual comments and I just wanted to make clear, qualify I guess the remaining comments that I'm gonna make. With regard to the proposal that's been presented to the committee, we understand the rationale and I think are generally supportive of it. So when you take a look at section A and the identification of $20 million that would be available for reimbursements to school districts for costs that they have incurred. That makes sense. Obviously we'd be interested in getting that money backed out to schools because reimbursement connotes that it's money that is spent or will be spent in the very near future. We wanna get those resources to schools as soon as possible that seems to do that. With regard to the transition into fiscal year 21, you're talking about a grant program which is based on title one, which was how the extra money was to have been allocated. That makes sense and you've discussed that already. I think that title one is a useful measure to make sure that the school districts that could be construed to have a higher need is a good allocation formula. With regard to part three in section A, the 45 million, I think that that may beg a little bit more explanation because my understanding was that some of these funds may be held in reserve to contend with $150 million shortfall in the education fund. So even though the number is 45 million, it's not exactly clear to me how that money could be utilized in the future either by school districts or, and I think that this is probably a synonymous concept to address the deficit in the education fund. What I wanna say on that point is that our association understands the deficit in the education fund and we understand that from a local level, we have to participate in the address of that because when you consider the education funding system, we basically have a state system which is localized and you really can't separate a community or communities from the education fund overall. So the first two uses, the 20 and $20 million sums, I think it's consistent with trying to get the money out and get it out fairly. The picture becomes a little less clear as you get into what is being referred to as tier two money. And I'll end by saying that the utilization of the ESSER monies as more flexible and a longer timeline does make sense in my mind as we try to navigate through FY 21 and 22 entirely. So in general, I think we understood what you're trying to do. I think that we're supportive of the approach in the context of the limitations that I cited. We don't know what the ultimate result will be as the Senate weighs in, presumed providing that this passes the House, the Senate weighs in and the administration weighs in, but I would say you're off to a good, I'm respectful of the work that you've done and it makes sense. I'll be eager to hear from superintendents and business managers to see if their views are consistent with mine, but I think that the work that you've done so far is a good work. So thank you. If I could just add one thing to Jeff is just, in the reimbursement method that first $20,000, if you all could be as clear as possible in terms of the methodology of that, that making sure that it is an equitable distribution of reimbursement funds so that those who are on the ball and operationally have more capacity that they're not the ones getting the lion's share of the funds. And also we have heard from some in the field that we need to make the guidance around reimbursement and the uses of the grant funding extremely clear, providing examples and having huge education efforts to the field. And I'm sure we would be happy to collaborate on that effort. So if there's any language that needs to be tightened up here to make sure that the agency is preparing that guidance for districts, it does need to be really clear and would agree. I wanna go to Sandra and Sue from the school boards. Good afternoon, Chair Webb. This is Sue Siglowski from Vermont School Board Association. Just wanted to thank you very much for your work on this bill and provide you with a few preliminary comments. I was just able to take a look at it when I received it about an hour before the hearing. And we think it's important to include the carryover of surplus funds. That's something that school boards have been asking for the ability to do and that is in this bill and also includes it also would be important to include the point made earlier about being able to carry over any coronavirus funds that can't be spent in FY 20 to be able to carry those over into FY 21. Another point is that it would be very helpful to have maximum flexibility for public schools in this bill. We wouldn't want to narrow the gap the ways that they could spend the funds beyond what has already been narrowly defined by the federal government. And in the section A2, I wondered about the language regarding costs of reopening schools, whether that was perhaps a little bit, could be interpreted a little bit too narrowly because there's certainly gonna be a lot of costs that have to do with not just the actual reopening but operating once they do reopen in this new world. There's a lot of costs that they'll be having that are new and different. So it may be worth taking a look at that language of reopening and perhaps broadening it a little bit. If you could send those to us, that'd be great. So Sandra, anything? Hello, good afternoon. I think Sue summed it up. I would like to review this a little bit more. I was attending another webinar from noon to one, I apologize, but I would like an opportunity to read this a little bit more and we'll be back with any questions. Okay, great. The Teacher's Association, Jeff and Colin. Hi, good afternoon. Jeff Anand from Vermoninier. I know Colin's out there in somewhere, so he's capable of certainly speaking up if he thinks I run off the rails here a little bit. So thank you very much for doing this. I do think it's a reasonable approach. I think it was Jeff Francis that described it as that. I largely agree with Jeff and Chelsea and Sue. At just a couple of points, I think I'd like to make though, I think the approach is the right one to address the kid's needs. And we're certainly, I don't wanna be a broken record here, but the kids coming back will be significantly, their needs are gonna be significantly greater. Their social, emotional needs are gonna be greater. Their academic needs are gonna be greater. The learning loss is real. And it's across the board though, right? Not too many kids are falling behind. Everybody's falling behind if you will. And so that's why I think the first several months, and I don't know how to quantify this, of school when we reopen, is going to be remedial in nature. And I would argue, in theory, therefore it's covered by the CARES Act, right? I mean, everything that we're gonna be doing in school when we come back will be remedial in some way in nature to catch kids back up. And only because of the pandemic are we doing that work. But for the pandemic, we wouldn't be doing the work. And so several months, I think of expenditures and work are going to be that nature. I think we had to account for it and be thoughtful and creative about how we account for that. So I think your approach is the right way to do that. So I think that's the wise approach. And finally, we've conducted a parent survey some weeks ago and we're just getting back the results now. And so I've got some preliminary stuff, but two thirds of the parents said their top concern were the social isolation of their kids. I mean, this is real. Parents have not liked the distance learning, neither have kids. Third say that their kids are sad. 36% say their students have checked, their kids have checked out. And half said their children are stressed out. So I think what we're seeing now is parents reporting back that this has not been great, that when they come back in the fall, it's going to be a lot of remedial work, social, emotional, as well as academic. And I think the approach you've taken here and using the federal monies to do that work is the right approach. So I applaud you for it. It's a long way to go. I know the process is never easy. So I wish us all luck in that endeavor. Any questions? I'm happy to answer those two. Colin, did I miss something? Shine in, I'm sure. Thank you. Let's go to Tracy for our special administrators. Great, thank you so much, Chair Webb and all. I also jumped off another call. So I've just seen this draft while we've been on today, but it does seem like a reasonable approach to us as well and agree that it really needs to be equitable. We're happy to see the focus, specifically on recovery from learning loss and social, emotional support. As I said last week in my testimony, those are huge areas for successful reopening and to get through the year. So just thinking about, I've been in the weeds last weekend this week around the health and safety, health and safe reopening task force that others in the room are also have been part of. And just for example, school nurses are gonna have to play a much larger role in schools and there's a special population of children that they're gonna be challenged to follow public health guidance. And it's gonna take really some care coordination and truly team-based care. So we've been talking about the costs associated just in that area. So as everyone knows, it's not gonna be easy and we're gonna have to have enough funding to get us through this in several areas. And it just is also so uncertain. We don't really know what's gonna happen or beyond next year. So flexibility will be important too. So there's just a lot of areas I need to be paying attention to, but I think this is the right approach and it looks good. I'm hearing from a lot of words, a lot of requests to make sure it's flexible enough. If everybody could really take a look and see if the language allows for that and provide some opportunity, I think that that is an interest for us to provide flexibility given that we have very different communities. Madam Speaker, may I add something? Just like everybody else, we've just looked at it and really catching up and your mention of the word flexibility is a great one. And one thing that we've been thinking about, I know we've mentioned to you is that the vote by mail, Essex Westford did a nice job with that. I think their town clerk said it cost them about $9,000 to do it. So if monies are available for that, it might be a helpful thing to do. They had enormous turnout over the prior years and their budget pass. I think it's a shout out to those on the committee wherever you are, or some of GM Batista. I know a lot of people will work on it, but it worked and it worked well. A lot more people voted. That's great for democracy. And we have two more districts voting today. So let's see what happens there. Can I comment on the flexibility point? Yes, please. So if you look at the language, maybe everybody can pull it back up there. Thank you. Okay, so if you go up to the top of the bill, okay, subdivision one, if you look at the line six, it's for reimbursing current costs incurred by school districts. That is as broad as you can be. So that has all the flexibility there. Right. Two and three are more restricted. Two says on line 1213, it can be used to assist through the cost of reopening schools. That's more restrictive. So that can be changed to mirror what's in one, which is to use it for any eligible current cost. So that's more restrictive. And three is more restrictive too, because on line 20 and 21, it's the cost of helping students recover from a learning loss and with social emotional support. So those two, two and three are more restrictive and they could change to be like one, which gives maximum flexibility to cover any eligible current costs. So just to mention, if you wanted to make it more flexible, my recommendation would be to mirror within one in two and three. Okay, I'm gonna have us think about that. And Avery, if you can find a time for us to meet tomorrow, that'd be great. When are we on the floor? Two, we're on the floor at two tomorrow. Oh, okay, so there is time. You could find a time for us to check back in, give committee members a chance to do that. I think what we're gonna need to do is move on to higher ed. And we have nobody here in the room. I did ask, I did speak with UVM and I addition from, from the Chancellor, let me just pull this up. Oh, it's not there, I'm sorry. Let me take over for a minute. Okay, actually, I think I found it. Caleb, did you wanna say something before we move to higher ed? Well, yeah, just on this thought of flexibility and what could be done with the language, I had some thoughts on that. I agree with Jim that one under A is the most flexible. I think everything of the 40 million should be moved into that. And I think that the line about Title IA funds should apply to all of it. And that it should just cover FY20 and FY21 and should make it clear that anytime between June 10th and the beginning of FY21 is also covered. Just to make sure that anybody who is questioning whether running a summer school meals program is a cost that they can get money for, they know that to the extent these funds cover it, the answer is yes. So that's all just, I think it should be one section. I personally think three with a 45 million should be different. I can save that comment, but I think our tier two money, I believe should be segregated under the heading. If we can use it for revenue replacement, all 75 million goes to the ed fund. If we can't, here's our plan. And so I would like to see that a more segregated section. So anyway, we can talk about that later, but I just kind of feel like the place for that 45 million isn't actually on the first page. So you do know also just to be clear that the money that we're working on right now does not include the 150 million set aside for the ed fund. So that's considered, there's thoughts about that out there as well. So that we're just doing this part of it, but the 150 everybody knows is there. And it'd be great if everybody can take a look and we'll do our House Ed Committee noodling with it tomorrow. Kathleen, you're okay? Okay, yeah. Okay, so I spoke with, I spoke with Wendy at UVM and I asked her what she was looking for. And they were looking for financial aid for families affected by COVID-19. And what they'd like is about 20 million to that, which is going to be a little hard. They're looking for funds. They would spend it on technology, equipment to outfit classrooms for online learning. You know, for example, if you had a 101 course going on with 200 students, maybe you're going to do there, you're going to divide the class up Monday, Wednesday, Friday, and you know, one third of the students will go on each day and the rest is online. Professional development for online learning, they've discovered that teaching remotely and teaching in the classroom is very different. And the other one was they have 41 research projects related to COVID-19 that they've applied for federal funds and they're hoping to get it. In terms of the things that the community colleges recommended, they were looking for example, two million for community college of Vermont students to help with childcare and transportation and housing. They were looking for maybe 300,000 to help with devices for remote learning. The residential colleges, they're looking at testing and contact tracing, they're looking at instructional design assistance, campus safety technology, PPEs, emergency funds for enrolled students, isolation unit expenses, including medical care and food delivery and basically dealing with scholarships and discounts of tuition. Personnel costs in terms of addressing paid six leave and I guess that's it, it lost revenue. So those are the kind of issues that we're talking about. So there's 50 million that we just spent right there but we don't have it to spend. We have 10 million that we were looking at for tier one and 35, 30 million I think. Peter Conlon, did you have a comment? No comment, I just had a question actually. A lot of what you read are things that they'd like to have money to spend money on as opposed to looking for reimbursement for COVID-19 related expenses in FY 2020. And I just wondered if you or maybe anybody else here got the expertise can just give us a little rundown of money that hasn't been talked about here that colleges and universities are already receiving from other pots. I think we just gave them 15 million each, didn't we? And the last, was that in Dylan, do you remember? In the bill we passed a few days ago. Yeah, I don't have the numbers right in front of me but there was five million that was put in for bridge funds and there was no, I think it was 10 million. So I would have to look at the document but I know a piece was the reserve of the bridge funding portion. Could we bring up the bill again Avery to look at higher ed? One thing you find out is that nobody really keeps track of higher ed in the state. The agency of education doesn't really, Congress pays some attention but and it used to be the school board, I mean the state board I'll see if we can get the colleges in on tomorrow if we can find a time to meet. I appreciate that sense of patience on getting from the committee as we try to work on this without having had two days to work on it. Not an easy task. I think you're good to schedule some time tomorrow so we have a chance to digest a lot of this. Right, I think so too. So Avery, I'm looking for that document if you can find it. The other, while she's doing that, the other comment I would make about those requests you just read is, again, the cares or that this money has the restrictions gotta be expended by December 31st. I'm not sure a whole lot of that, that it can happen. So let's see how we handle this in the bill. You're different from other committees in terms of what we're doing. Oops, that's the wrong one. Let's not bring that one up again. We're done with that one. Sorry about that. Would you mind giving me a number for the bill? Is it, it's not the current one that we're discussing but was it one in, what was the number? It's the one we were just discussing. Oh, the one we were just discussing, okay. Sorry about that. In the meantime, did you have something you wanted to say? I think this relates to Caleb's question, which is why I raised my hand and then said nevermind, but now I'm back to it. So if all of the spending that we've outlined in this bill totals 75 million, no, totals 125 million. 125. Yep. And we have been allotted 50 million for first tier needs and 75 million for second tier needs. But the 75 million of second tier needs could be part of the money that the legislature has set aside to fill the budget gap if we indeed realize we can use it for that, which I think would be everybody's, well, it would be probably my first choice. So I think pursuant to Caleb's question, shouldn't we designate that somewhere or say that somewhere? 150? No, the 75. Am I making, am I being clear? Yeah, I think the confusion is that the 70 for the, the 150, there is 150 already set aside. So this is above the 75 that we're talking about is above the 150. But isn't the 75 like the size of the FY20 budget shortfall and the 150 is the size of the estimated FY21 budget shortfall? I don't know that it broke it out that way, but I see chip conquests and just want to make sure that perhaps he has something to say in relation to this. Yeah, a couple of things. My understanding is that the money that you're all are talking about here for your consideration of CRF spending is completely separate from the money that has been set aside to make up the Ed fund. Those two, at least in any near term future are not going to come together. So the 150 has been set aside or has been, we've said we're not going to look at spending that until we find out whether we can use it to replace lost revenue and therefore make up the Ed fund. Okay. I want to point out that the Ed fund shortfall continues to shrink. And last I saw, which was I think this morning it is less than it's somewhere just over a hundred million dollars between FY20 and 21. So I think the amount of money that's there is sufficient to cover any of the expected shortfall in the Ed fund. So the money we've set aside chip in the hopes that we might be able to use it to cover the gap in the education fund is set aside in a different pot and we're not double allocating it here. Correct. Okay, thanks. So the other thing I wanted to bring up is the difference between tier one and tier two. And I've been trying to converse with my committee chair and haven't been able to get ahold of her but I've talked to the vice chair a little bit. So what we're hoping to get from you all is what is your tier one proposal in some detail as you have here in the bill that's or the draft here? Tier two is, and this is what I'm trying to get an understanding of. Tier two, my understanding is that that amount of money may vary in all the committees to once we sort of have a determination of what is available to spend. And mostly it may vary, at least again, in my understanding, it may increase because we find that some committees aren't spending as much as they have total. We may find out other uses of the CRF money but what we'd like to get from you is basically a list of here if we get to tier two or when we get to tier two here are the things we're thinking about but the detail is really needs to be about what we're spending in tier one. And so I, and what I'm trying to get a sense from my committee chairs is what's the lag time between tier one money going out and tier two money going out? Because I think you all need to know that in order to make decisions about what you wanna put in tier one relative to what you think might best be in tier two. So things you wanna get out the door, you feel like you need to get out the door right away should be in the tier one category. And I just don't know what the lag time between those two is and that's what I'm trying to find out. So, sorry, just to, okay. So the, great. I was confusing the tier two money. I thought that the tier two funds were part of the set aside. So we're either gonna use those for the set aside or if they get freed up we'll use them for tier two. So thanks for clarifying that. And just so I further understand. So what you need from us in this bill is a very clear delineation, not just the whole 125 million, but a very clear delineation between the first 50 and the second 75. Or as Kate was saying, the first 75 and the second 50. So we've listed it as one and two are actually our tier one and three in this is our tier two. And I don't know if that's clear but that language has to be clarified. Jim, do you have a thought on that? And then we've got to get to the colleges. Well, we're using the terms tier one and tier two in this bill so far. I mean, that's more of a kind of a structure that's being used by appropriations but that language isn't here. So I don't think it's intended to be in the bill language. So probably we could have a letter accompany it. Yeah. Yeah, okay. So I will get a little more clarity tonight sometime and email the chair, chair Webb, about what it is as specifically as I can get at what it is we're expecting from you but to Jim Demera's point, I think that that's why I brought it up is because there's nothing in here that designates what you expect to spend in tier one and one in tier two. And so I think that'll need to be clear in some fashion to our committee. Okay. Let's pull up the next section for Vermont State Colleges and UVM, our tier one and tier two. Would you mind giving me a line number or a page number for that? Keep going. Okay, there you go. B, on line eight, we start. Thank you. And note that this language here is like the number one in the first section, subsection has maximum flexibility is for any eligible coronavirus costs. That's true for both fiscal year 20 and below in number two fiscal year 21. This is a very flexible language here for higher education. So we also have, I'm looking at, thank you Dylan for sending out the first quarter budget. And in that there is 15.355 million to UVM and 15.258 million to the Vermont State Colleges for distance learning equipment, supplies, facilities. So that's to me seems like that's some of their past spending. Is that a sense that you would have? We don't have Peter Pagan in the room anymore. So it almost seems, is it possible that this is really more money that's going forward? Do you know anybody? Madam chair. Yeah. I mean, I won't speak specifically to what this particular sum of money would be, but I think it probably is anticipating future costs. The money within the quarter one budget that was passed, I can speak to the Vermont State Colleges certainly for identified reimbursable expenses that were viewed as coronavirus relief fund eligible. And so those were put in. And then also in the bill just saying now there's also $5 million set aside for reserves with the intent of bridge funding. So I think that this is a conversation starter probably with the Senate as this process moves forward. Okay, so we've written it right now. The way we have it written is that it's similar to our pre-K-12. Does that need to change? I personally think it's too much to the colleges and I feel bad saying that, but I look at the whole 50 million tier one and I have to think schools have already spent 25, 30 million that'll need to be revert, I don't know. It's just to give a full 20% of that money to the colleges when they already got 30 million and the schools haven't gotten a dime yet. It seems like too much of the first 50 to me. I won't belabor it, but that's just my kind of first look. Others, Peter, Colin. Just remember that we're not giving them $10 million. They have to have eligible expenses. So it only counts if they have the money to spend. And Brad has indicated that in fact, schools really are at about probably at most 10 million ineligible costs at this point. So I think we're gonna have, if anything, trouble allocating all this money for eligible expenses. So we've allowed the greatest flexibility possible in their use, but we're still, it's important to remember that we're still highly restricted by the rules of the coronavirus relief fund strings. Anybody else? Looks like Brad had a comment. Yeah, yeah, could I jump in? Just the quick clarification. Yeah. Just a quick clarification on what we said, that roughly 10 million number that I meant that I'm estimating does not include costs of people that we were to test yesterday in terms of their personnel costs being eligible and they're doing remote learning planning. And we figured that that's, what would you say, 200 minutes per week or something? Is that what I- Yeah, I'm not certain what it would really be. I know that a superintendent said that, I don't know without really can people and talking to people. But I think the number that I put out there that Secretary of Friends was about $15 to $16 million was a rough back of the end of the calculation. And from the reaction. Oops, we're losing you. You just muted. It's my fat thumb, it hits the button. There we go. So I'm not sure where you're crossing, but my back of the envelope estimate was about $15, $16 million, as the Secretary said, based on some of the conversations that we were hearing yesterday with the superintendent of business management and special education director. It sounded like they did have significant times that they would be able to code to this. So I don't know what the real number would be without talking to people in a much more detail. Thank you. Sarita? Yeah, I'm just wondering if you can refresh my memory. This money can be used or could be used for reimbursing students for food and residential costs. And do we know what those are so far? I don't think we have anybody in the room that has that information. Okay. Wasn't there a discussion that the state colleges were gonna receive five million and UVM to reimburse students for, I'm pretty sure that that was in the... That was in the CARES money. Yeah. Yes, they did get money. Everybody got money and half of it went to the institution and half went to students. That's right. Okay. For the FY20 school year. Peter? Sorry, just to take my hand down. I apologize. Okay. Avery, can you bring that language back up because we gotta do something with it? I think we probably need to have Wendy and Sophie come in and speak to us. And I'll send them a copy of this draft. And see if we can get some of your questions answered between now and 24 hours. So we're giving them 10 million right now upfront at the moment. And that's for a reimbursable costs. And then we have 30 million. Can you scroll up a little bit on that, Avery? Keep go, go, go, go, yeah. I wanna get to... I'm sorry, let's scroll the other way. Yeah, let's go down, I guess. So, yeah. So this is just basically doing reimbursement again. Boy, I'm looking at all the things that they're looking for, money to help students with childcare, residential health and safety issues, research. I don't know. I don't have your committee. I don't have any quick good answer here whether we're getting this right or not. We don't have anybody in the room at the moment. Let me pass this on to the state colleges. Let me pass this on to the state colleges and UVM. And Avery, would you pass this on to them and see if you can get them to join us tomorrow? I just mentioned, Sherweb, that to the extent that those, that list that they provide to you, that list includes COVID related costs, this will help cover that. Yes. You said that this includes things that are not COVID related, this bill can't cover that. Yeah. So, yep. So COVID related research, you think, wouldn't probably not be? I'm not sure. I'm not giving an opinion on the list. I'm just saying, whoever is on the list that's COVID related, this could cover, but this can't cover anything that's not COVID related. So, we'll have to be there separately. So we've basically very broadly included everything that's COVID related. Yeah. And we haven't delineated who gets the money. It's just to be distributed to. Well, it's going to the schools. So they decide how to use it, yeah. But we haven't said you get this much and you get this much, right? Yeah. So, the 10 million appropriation above, it's five and five. Oh, it is, okay. 30 million appropriations, you're going to have to line two and three and the next page is 15. Oh, okay. Okay, excellent. Kathleen, James? I just, sorry. Just when you reach out to the colleges, I guess I'd be interested in that question about how, you know, I guess just making sure since they're already getting money in the first quarter budget, you know, how this additional money squares up with that. That's fair. I don't know if it's possible for tomorrow to hear from anybody about school food service, but I am hearing that like some really big districts that usually operate summer meals have just declared they're not going to. And we have an ask from a bunch of different groups for a $12 million cost to help cover that. I know that would be a really hard thing to like plug into a bill like this, but to the extent other committee members are interested in that, we all have it in our email. And I personally would love to see us do anything that at the very least makes it clear to schools that they can access these funds to pay for those costs if that is what their districts are endeavoring to do. Now here's a piece of good news because I brought this up with the speaker in a conversation with her yesterday and she said, we are not going to leave anybody hungry. And which committee ends up where the money comes from, she's not sure yet, but she's very clear that hunger is an issue that the legislature will be dealing with. So I was really- The programs are being shut down like right now. Yeah. I believe Human Services is working on that appropriation for the 12 million or seven food programs. Great. Thank you. If you know where that is that that would make our committee feel a little bit more comfortable that would appreciate it. Is that, is Katie working on that? She's working on that, I think with Reptue. Okay. Is, Caleb, is this the letter from Hunger Free Vermont, NOFA, Vermont Food Bank? Yes, it came out last week and there's a newer version that just came out this morning. Yep. I'm just looking at that. Okay. So is summer delivery of food? I'm just wondering where that fits in the educational bearing in mind. I want to see those kids get fat and I want these programs to work. Does that fall into the education category? My understanding just is that basically these programs are typically operated in the summer but because there were over expenditures that kind of blue budgets related to food service and FY20 until those reimbursements are realized there is not the money to do it particularly here in the last three weeks of FY20. Those dollars were gone. So getting those reimbursements would let them pay forward in some cases but I think districts are saying, hey, we're under water for FY20 food service budget. We've got to stop right now. And so the typically delivery isn't part of that but there are districts that just run that federal summer school meals that are saying we can't do it because we don't have the staff we don't have the staffing budget because we already spent that money on the extraordinary cost of FY20. Right. So it's a revenue problem. Yeah, that's right. I was just going to say, Caleb's points a good one and we've certainly heard this from the field that at a minimum school districts want an assurance that they're going to be getting this money as quickly as possible so they can at least in a way deficit spend with some guarantee that they will be reimbursed for the food distribution that's gone on so far. You know, I'm not sure in terms of the summer program I'm not sure school districts have ever funded them. I think they were federally funded. It looks like the letter has some specific attachments that I haven't clicked on yet with budget numbers. Have you seen that document, Jim? Sorry, I have not. You haven't. Perhaps we need someone from the human services committee to just give us a little progress update on that because I'm with you, Caleb, that it's a priority for the state. At least for me, at least. Absolutely. Sarita. Do you know if the meals program is a universal program or if it's needs-based? Does anybody know that? I think some school districts have universal and some don't. Okay. I mean, I definitely would support a needs-based at this point, you know, when there's not a lot of money to go around. I don't know if I would support a universal program at this point. I think when we were taking, when we took testimony on the universal school meals. Topic, was it 25%? Caleb, do you remember? There was some percentage of districts or schools that offered universal school meals, but I don't remember it off the top of my head. Yeah, but we do remember that we're a bunch of schools that were hoping to put that into their budgets this year and then just kind of got sidelined by COVID-19. So expecting that to perhaps not come this year. But in terms of summer programs, I guess I would assume that's a needs-based, but can't speak for sure. Okay. So for tomorrow, Avery's gonna try to find a slot for us. And Avery's, you're gonna reach out to Sophie and Wendy, right? And Chip Conquest, when do you need this beautiful document? So I believe that committees are asked to get it to us by noon tomorrow. By noon, excellent. Yeah. I mean, I probably shouldn't say it, but I think there's an expectation that we won't get them all by noon. I would imagine that would be true. And I did just was able to talk to the chair. So I just wanted to leave you with a little bit more clarity about tier one and tier two. So the tier one is the stuff that we're going to have basically on the floor, probably next week. We're gonna have it in our committee. We may even try to vote it out by Friday, if not, probably by Monday. So it's the stuff that's gonna go quickly, get out the door and get, well, at least we'll get to the Senate. I can't speak for them, but the intent is that this is money that will go out very quickly. Tier two really remains to be seen. It depends to some degree on what the federal government tells us in terms of their guidance for spending of the CRF dollars that we have as time goes on. And so we want to hear from committees about what their priorities are. For a next level of spending, but when or to what degree we'll be able to do that is not clear at this point. So I guess I would just say that anything that you all, that your committee feels is really the most critical needs that you wanna make sure you're addressing really ought to be in the tier one and the stuff that we're gonna be voting on probably next week on the floor. Okay. Okay, committee. Avery, you don't have anything, anything sorted out yet? Do you for tomorrow? We've given you, I've given you so much notice. I actually, I did reach out to the committee services team and there are a lot of meetings happening right now. So in order for it to be staffed, it would be ideal if it happened before 1030. That's good to me. Jim, are you gonna be available? I'm completely available, but if we have to turn around for noon, I'd recommend we meet first thing because I'll need time to revise it and have it edited. 830? Can we do 830? 9 o'clock. I'm meeting at 8. Could I? Cancel it. I wish I could. I've done that twice already. Can you, can you meet at 830? Probably 9 o'clock. 9 o'clock. 9? 845? I'm pressing 9 o'clock. That I'm pressing, I'm pushing hard. Well, fortunately, you've been involved in this conversation pretty directly for a while. So you're pretty, you're up to speed whereas the rest of the committee is not. So there's probably a lot more background that committee members are gonna need that you're not gonna need. So we'll go with 9 o'clock. Jim, best I can do. And hoping that we can get the colleges in to speak to us. And any of the other folks, Brad and Chloe, whatever would be great. And Chloe, actually, do you wanna take the last couple of minutes that we've already gone over and just talk to us about the current the status of the Ed funds? See if Chloe's, there she is. Yeah, sorry, I was muted and locked out of my iPad. So I don't know how you do that. So yeah, I would be happy to do that. I sent, let's see, what's the best way to, Avery, I don't know if you have a copy of this, but since you have screen control, no, so not this one. Oh, but that one's really handy. Put that one on our website because I think we never quite got to that. It's really a handy thing for everybody can look at. Right, that is that sort of tabular view of Jim's draft. And I think potentially that could be something that gets sent along with the draft to appropriations so that they can clearly delineate sort of your thoughts on tier one and tier two. Yeah, I can turn my video on so you can see me. Hello. So in terms of the education fund, Avery, I think the easiest way for you to, would be to pull down an education fund outlook from that was just presented in ways and means that would be on their website. That might be the easiest way for us to get it quickly. I can also maybe forward to you an email. Do, do, do, do, because then that would be... Avery, since we're... Oh my gosh, look at that. Woo! Nice. Sorry, Kathleen, do you want to continue your question? Nope, I thought we were gonna have more of a gap. Okay. Well, so basically what we're seeing here is that last night at 9.30, we got an updated revenue forecast. It actually basically shows that we're much better off in the education fund than we thought that we were. And that's primarily because consumption taxes, sales taxes, particularly are coming in stronger than anticipated. And so where we were previously looking at a $150 million deficit. Oh, again, trying to scroll down on a screen. I don't control. If you go to the bottom, you can see the final line. Keep on. It's now 106.4. It was previously 156. So essentially what you're seeing here is previously the... So sort of like taking January as our starting place, we were previously projecting a revenue shortfall from what we were anticipating in January of negative $55 million in FY20. That has subsequently been reduced to approximately negative $31 million. So that's a $25 million sort of, let's call it gain in FY20. That means that we don't end FY20 with a deficit. We actually end with 19.5 million in the stabilization reserve. So that's a reserve about 2.7%. So that helps us because we essentially carry forward that $25 million that we weren't anticipating. And we don't have to refill the reserve in... We don't have to completely refill the reserve in FY21. We only have to refil... We only have to provide an additional 18.5 million to refill that FY21 reserve. The FY21 revenues are also projected to come in a little bit better. Previously, we were projecting a shortfall of negative $100 million and now that's about... Let's scroll back up to the... You're talking about that one or? Well, yeah, so it's both of these columns. It's the final two columns, both FY20, both of these columns, the revenues that we're talking about are sales and use tax, purchase and use, meals and rooms and the lottery transfer. So we were previously projecting a negative $100 million sort of incremental loss in those than what we were expecting in January and now we're looking at negative $75 million. So the $25 million from FY20 and the $25 million better in FY21 bring our problem down amazingly $50 million. So that's good news, but I do want to sort of... A little bit, have you take that with a grain of salt because consumption taxes are obviously extremely volatile. And if there were in the same way that we've been getting forecasts that show that we're every time they've been getting a little bit better, they just as easily could get a little bit worse if, for example, there was another outbreak in the fall. So it's extremely sort of difficult to model this, but we can take the good news for right now, but I just want you to have a little bit of a reminder in your back of your head about just the volatility of those consumption taxes. Well, it's nice to have a little bit of good news. Right, yeah, it's good. I mean, only $100 million, excellent. Yeah, and I mean, what that may end up doing is freeing up some additional CRF funds to go into sort of... Having more funds available to address some of the problems that you just spent the last two hours talking about. You know, loss of learning, food stability, you know, all of those good things. Yeah. So by August, we should have no deficit. Is that the plan? That's what we're gonna do. I don't know, it depends. I hope, are all of you guys going out and spending your $1,200 from the federal government? Oh, that was well spent. So I think that that's really largely what you're seeing here is that you are seeing the effect of that stimulus money here. Grant Campbell can speak to that a little bit more from our office, but with the unemployment rates that we are seeing and we know that we have, the fact that we are seeing increased performance in our sales and use taxes really does sort of reflect that stimulus money. You know, people are still spending, whereas normally you lose your job, you don't continue to buy washing machines and you know, whatever. But I think one of the theories is that a lot of people are home doing some home improvement projects. And because of the stimulus money, people do have more disposable income than they normally would, especially some of the lower income people with the generosity of the UI program, which was essentially $600 a week, which is $15 an hour, which is more than those people are potentially used to making. But that stimulus is currently scheduled to run out in July. So it'll be very interesting to see what happens after that. Any questions? Thank you. Yeah, no problem. Thanks so much. And do send your document to Avery and I think that it's a little bit easier to read than legislation. The draft, yeah. He actually already had that. I just wanted to sort of see how the discussion went before posting. So we'll pull that up again tomorrow. Yeah, and I will be, I will be available for tomorrow's meeting as well. So I can go over that. Are any other comments before we end? Anyone from the field that needed to say, they have one last thing to say. All right. I miss I miss seeing you in the halls. That's for sure. It's a little easier in the halls. It really is. Yeah. Poke your head in the committee. Yeah, I mean, in good news that they're thinking about reopening schools. So the good news, really good news. Well, I think with that we can we can go off live.