 Welcome back to the Vermont House Appropriations Committee. It is January 10th, 2024. We are just coming back after we had a public hearing on the budget adjustment and took a moment and trying to get caught up on some of the news in the buildings so we don't go to the floor often that some of the activities that are going on around the building are fascinating. But so why don't we take a couple minutes to kind of, if anybody has any things they'd like to talk about of what we've heard during the public hearing. And then I know Representative Lumele needs to be to the floor for a bill. And then why don't we, if there's anybody's budget areas that they feel that they've taken a look at or either the language or the dollars that we can just lightly pencil close, not close close, just check off that unless something happens, you're okay with it and we'll get a temperature check on the rest of the room to see how much, how much. And also tomorrow we'll be doing this exercise of a good amount of the afternoon, right? And tomorrow morning at nine, cannabis, 10 is Grady, 11, lunch, and then we're going to be just, I've got to come up with a better term than checking off or going through, going through what the BAA currently has and maybe talking about any kind of anything outstanding because all of us have been busy with our counterparts all over the place. We've got things that we know are coming that aren't in here. We've got to react to what's in here and react to thinking about what's not in here and how are we going to schedule all that. All right, so why don't we go to what people would like to talk about in reaction to what we heard at the public? So I have one thought, I know that others will bring up other things, but our first speaker, Jim, talked about the size and spending money without a plan around the dispatch. So are we going to, are we actually hearing from somebody about dispatch and the budget adjustment? Remains to be seen. Okay. Having some conversations with the chair of POSCA-LOPS, we're going to have another conversation tomorrow. They have had the Commissioner of Public Safety and the director of A911 who are co-chairs of that task force in to kind of give a overview update of where they were on the task force. They got tremendously behind last summer, as you might expect, with getting diverted towards the Public Safety Commissioner with the flooding and the emergency. So, but it is in process, Kurtly and I will be talking for you tomorrow and we'll, seeing where his committee is, we'll determine whether or not it would be productive to have them in here. We may need to do some changes to the language nonetheless because the language that is in the budget last year allowed for the Joint Fiscal Committee to okay certain funding. It expired at the end of 2023. So we could extend it or we could put the language in the BAA. So I'll know more after tomorrow. Okay. Yeah, because, you know, this whole dispatch thing started when you and I were approach in the 2021, 21, 22, 20, 30, that word English didn't matter as well as the word initial. Right, right. It's like we have a few of those topics where this happened. So, yeah, I think I feel like I sort of lost track of where all that is. And that sort of thing. One of the things that you told me about was that no one had forward and said they were looking to proceed money for a pilot. Yeah. But that's the sort of update would be good to me because this is a lot of money we're talking about. Yeah, I just want to be in sync with where it go up, please. Right. So I'll do it more tomorrow. Okay, great. So I can honestly say that, all right, and you guys correct me if I'm wrong, but we heard some terrific support repeatedly from certain places. So if we, eight space, all right. So I've got eight things that I think we heard of. Meals on wheels, food bank, V&A, that's the home health and hospice, the skilled nursing, adult ed, Vermont Housing Conservation Board, and I'm just going to end VHFA. Yeah. What about a question about that? The testimony we got from Amy Longbloss, I wouldn't have put it to you. Prosperity testimony, in addition to the 59s and V&CV and the 20s, some million for the missing middle, was there an assertion that the temporary shelter was about to be due? It wasn't. It was. And it won 12 million more. That's, I think that's the eight and the four that's already in the budget. Yeah. Yeah. That's, you know, it's rounded. So it's in the budget. It's in the budget adjustment. I think they're supporting it. I'm not sure they're supporting the way it's proposed to be used, but 12 minutes. 12 minutes. I wish it was 12 minutes. 12 million for that is what's in that. That's what I was talking about. But there was also some other stuff around that that I think Fred mapped. Let me just, yeah. We just got that. So that was, all right. So there was housing in a big circle. And then the New England Dairy Organic Farmers was one flood relief and the youth center. And then, right, that's what I have that look at the representative. Is there anything else in there that is would that I didn't categorize it at least. I missed adult taste. What? Adopted. Representative William said at the very beginning, what was the ask? Their ask is 10 million. 10 million. Which is 25 million. 25 million. 25 million. 25 million. 10 and 15. 10 and 15. 10 million. 15 is for the municipal tax remediation and 10 is for lifting homes up or restoring them. Or out. Yeah. Buyout or lift up. That was. Is the flood resilience community fund. Right. 10 million. Yeah. Yeah. So that was repeated twice. But if I may. The buyout program that we set up in place, it's not a special fund, but we set in place with our funds and we added 4.59 million of general funds a year or two ago. That was for the non FEMA eligible buyouts, but it did not include the landslide hazards. And so I think that's where they wanted the flexibility to address the landslide hazards. Was that the flood resilience? That's under that. It's not a special fund. It's that community. It's called, right now it's called I think flood recovery community fund. So that's the. But it's not a special fund. It's the 10 million. Does the 10 million go beyond. The landslides. It's not FEMA eligible. That's all we know. But we specified in the ARPA funds and the state dollars in prior years. To have that dollar, those dollars being used for flood only not the landslide related hazards that could be. Yeah, there's a gap there. Yeah. Representative Dickinson. Yes, I did a tower. You did. And I came out with the number one, there were seven of them requesting about $2 million more or less for food bank and other meals on wheels. And there was for 500,000 for adult learning. There was three and I'm counting one more in there. I don't see that regarding housing. She didn't mention the CDB but there was at least three that actually specifically mentioned that she and maybe in that for also having homeless. And then there was two for the very month piliers 25 million for the flood resilience. And then the rest of the more is like one time only. And my favorite was Zachary Ralph. What's in which he was the habitat for humanity. It's also one thing in housing that actually is allowing people to build equity very well. Did you comment on the three for, or is that a separate category? No, that's a separate category because this is different enough from the others that I think it's, though it's certainly a housing issue. It's the missing middle. No, it's the middle of the missing middle. You can add that then to the others and say that that's, Yeah, you would say that that could be four or five depending on how you count the other one. So we have one for adult days in the youth center in Newport. One of the interesting things about the missing middle was the testimony we got earlier from, what's your name? The head of, from on House of Finance are Mora. Mora was saying they kind of, did she give us language? She was going to give us language because of the 29th eligibility. No, they want to change the language so that they can extend affordability to more of the missing middle. Because they don't think they would give it to us. They would testify to House General. You know what I mean? Or the committees of jurisdiction that might be coming in. Which is why communications are important. One question that I had that I wanted to follow up with representative. Williams on his testimony. Because if you remember in Douglas Farnham's testimony around the FEMA dollars. And that schedule that I had to do the whole FEMA translation thing for, you know, there's a 50 million. There's the municipal piece. Then they had the buyouts for 200 homes. So he's accounting for that in there for 200 homes. It's going to take two to three years. So I don't know, and that's something that's on my to do list is to find out is what the administration had on the FEMA report. The or his testimony. How does that relate to what Jonathan was asking for the buyouts for those houses? I don't know. And so also what's not in the BAA that I'm going to need to track down or we can all because we all work hard. In the budget adjustment, there is 30 million for FEMA match, which is my understanding is the state building. The state for now, for now, so down payment because I thought it was going to come in at 50 for just for now. So I was a little surprised to see it at 30. And then elsewhere in the language is the 6 million for FEMA municipal match. So if you look at what Douglas brought us, I thought that the 6 million for municipal match, which it still may be, and I just don't know the answer to. Is was the help where the FEMA come in at 90 1010 the state chips in the 5%. And then the other 5% of municipality is responsible for. So we were considering or people were considering do we help the municipality in the capacity of how pick it up 5% match. So I thought when I saw the 6 million that I had the question of that I am not. I don't think so based on what we've heard from Adam and others that that is strictly our 5% and that there is nothing for the municipalities. So I don't think this form of the whatever we call them the foot that are aware of that gap right now in in the in the BAA or in the thinking of help for municipalities. That's it. The administration did not from the best I can figure. So I need to get a handle on that. And when is that do and ask is that something that is that the municipal help. Need it before the asset we heard, or could that be something that's later and that what they're asking for is more that that they need now. So we'll continue to have that conversation between now and. And if I may recall that. The recovery officer did mention that the distribution of those funds are dictated by the Iraqi or the emergency relief assistance fund. And that when we triggered the 9010. So we are talking 10% non federal match. We also know that in that you have rule. It does say that there's already a built in incentive we contribute to on average half that amount but it really depends on the actions that the municipality has taken sometimes it's more sometimes it's exactly but it is dictated by that rule. We are the only state in the region and few in the country that actually contribute towards that non federal match. So we already are contributing. The reason why I'm mentioning this is because next year there'll be another flood following year it'll be another flight and the precedent that it sets for us override the existing rule does result in a precedent that could be I'm not suggesting we do I'm just trying to understand when they say it what did it include and what doesn't include just to get a handle of. So when you start when we start saying yeah let's do that we do do yeah we don't know what it means and what they're thinking. Yeah, I mean both the administration and our understanding of when we pass it when we say that line item. It's the I feel like it right now. And it's the just states share that we've traditionally done. And so the question that is like. We do not that we but the big and the reason I mentioned it or more every month member to floods that poor ripped and back to back to floods in one summer a month apart, both so called 100 year flood events, and it drove up their municipal costs substantially but they're on hook to address that and I for that their municipal share of the not federal so I just know that we should just have our eyes wide open and our eyes wide open to like where we're where certain municipalities are being hit hit hit hit when we may or we may not have the capacity you know you guys are looking at it we don't have the capacity to respond we may have bits and pieces to help. And so I'm trying to make sure that we place those chips. Can you their most possible about something I mean I completely understand those of these tasks. I don't understand why they're in the BAA. Here's why one part the municipal repeat they want because the voters have to vote. The voters are not going to have the results of the BAA by the time the town may be fast as much less than the second is in the budget. The fiscal 24 budget is going to be effective on July one. The BAA is effective what in April. I mean like big deal. I just wonder why. I got up on the town meeting week piece but it's just I mean I suppose I don't think I don't know if you think I'm wrong I don't think you can't be the city manager in Berkeley in the city manager in Montpelier isn't going to the council can adopt a budget for submittal for the voters now on the grounds of what the house has done in the BAA. Anyway we have flood relief. I'm going to go into the bill. All right. I'm going to lay into all of what we've discussed the one piece that I do want us to not lose sight of is that there was a request for a language around the AIDS. So that we want to be sure that was one of the things we heard about. And so we want to be sure we have language change in the bill that the governor recommended around that. But it might not be what they're thinking about. So I want to be sure that we don't. So I would recommend to that we take a moment. You know over the weekend that I don't know if I'm going to look to earn all of the submissions. We might give them a little time before we there will be on our web page to read any of the other documents. There are others that did not come in person or in zoom that submit things. So. And it was 50 million. It's somewhere else. I thought I heard 25 million. So 25 million was from VHFA. Right. I knew that. But I thought that VHCB was all. They have a there's two. Exactly. As the we need this in order to be able to work short for the the projects in the paper. Yeah. Then there's the can you send a signal for the projects that would be in pipeline. Yes. The signal is there. And you know that's always. I think we've made it a priority to find VHCB. I don't know how many signals we need to keep sending. In the end we actually do find VHCB. Yeah. Yeah. Well we hope think we'll be sending signals as much as we can. Let's see. They gave us one of the witnesses. Yeah. It was it was Nancy. Remember how she said. Maybe it's just everything. 157 are in develop quote unquote. 440 are in the pipeline. Right. We need 20 million to finance the existing pipeline. It's what I thought the ones. I don't even know if they have enough money. Do they have enough money to do the ones in development. I believe that when you talk with people that work where they're an often when I speak with entities like this I asked them when do you run out. I want to know where do I need to meet you on the calendar. You know. And so there are entities that are in more critical timing when I do believe that VHCB is is totally committed. So there is some desire to respond both not just from us. But OK it's just good to know. I didn't know where they're at. I'm sure government general housing general general housing. General housing is hearing and will have recommendations as well. I saw. I saw. Yeah. I wouldn't imagine. I'm sure we have conversations with them as well. Yeah. Representative Harrison has got his hand up. Thank you sir. So. I mean. Every one of the requests today is certainly a worthwhile. Parts. Challenge and I don't I don't pay a lot of attention to the multiples because a lot of the advocacy groups are part of a state network and they're doing a job. I've been an advocate before and I've been guilty of sharing my message to you know members around the state and we need the message delivered. So more power to it. I don't want to get anything away from any of the ask the challenge I have it's all about priorities. And we at least I don't know maybe you have a better idea of what we have to work with if anything. And additionally and while we like to get the BAA done before we look at the budget budget next year's budget. What we did last year which I don't have any problem with is that some of our one time asked one time for the recommend. In the budget we're going to use the part of that surplus going into this year's budget so you know if if they have a number 30 million and housing 50 million and housing in the budget we're going to get in a couple weeks. You know it's OK for me taken that and putting it up a month earlier but kind of like to know if they pitch it well because if we spend it here. And they weren't spending it in the other one. What do we now have to do without? I don't know. We're in an interesting box because it's a little bit more sobering this year, is the work around what we're going to be doing. Which maybe why you have more history is certainly on the committee. You don't do a lot of one time funding in the BAA. It's a lot of it's, you know, balancing the various accounts. And, you know, Medicaid is one way, always got to be balanced one way or another. And there's certainly some of DCF and whatnot. You know, I've got an overtime issue in public safety because, you know, the continual shortage of state police. But so you have to do those things. So it's difficult. I just don't know how to say, I mean, I have a thousand for Delta Ed. I want Delta Ed. I want people to get a high school education. They go get a job. Actually, I think it's a workforce. But what am I thinking it away from? I think it all then is a good example of what you're talking about. But I think you're saying, well, you're saying two different things. One is you're saying, gee, it'd be nice. You're saying, gee, it'd be nice if we had the budget when we made all these decisions on the BAA, right? That's one thing. But aside from that, unless you have some magic over there, we're not, that's not going to happen. So you're saying we ought to think of the BAA as a place to adjust, rather than as a place to make massive new appropriations, particularly when we don't have the money. Or we don't know if we have that. Or we don't know. Well, I think a good example of where that makes sense is the $500,000, because what happened was, is we appropriated $1.5 million. And Senator Weston, estimate Weston is to him, he was unhappy with the funding formula. And so he said zero. And then our conferees said, okay, how about $1 million summer study, and then we'll make up the other $500,000 at BAA. And that's where we are right now. So there's an example of something where kind of if we can work it out with the Senate, it's what we intended. So those are those are kinds of things. And another request that we've had years past, and I think shame on me if it only came to me, but my, our local community access television was looking for an adjustment. And I'm surprised because they're organizing surprisingly is make that pass today. Because I think it's coming in through another budget. If you recall last year, we moved where they're located. They're no longer in the survey. They are now housed in the Secretary of State. Yeah, I think it's going to come in their budget. I think it's back to the bill. So in my conversations with them, too, it's like, all right, the Secretary of State says, and I don't know if I'll do, you know, that's, but there's a really good place for their advocates. So that's why you didn't see them like normally. Okay. Yeah. So so we stay tuned. Maybe that's on the side. First watch that makes some sense. Thank you. I love it when I can actually make sense. I will say though, I do feel some discomfort because there are people who can't speak here and there are people who can't speak here at these meetings. And in particular, no one from an agency can come here and say no, we want to treat food insecurity. The most efficient way to do it is put my money in the snack because it doesn't require us to use scarce labor to deliver food. And it gets it everywhere to go. You know, and obviously there's some issues about being able to manage it. But my point is we get a very asymmetrical perception of the challenge. And these needs are great, but I don't know anyone who came today is either affiliated with someone who has the capacity of lobbying. And some of the people who have the most acute needs in the state, they can't afford to lobby or they represent an institution that can't lobby for some reason. So I think we have to read through what we hear. Exactly. And we listen. We have to read through it. So I think I think that's what you're at. So members asked if we could have a moment to just debrief what we are in this fight. So we, yeah, this is my 16th year of hearing public. I'm surprised that well, what are you surprised about that there's not that, you know, in the past would be 98 people. Well, we had a hundred people. We had a hundred and two testify at the budget. So it's fair. But what's also striking is the areas where we heard they all deal with one or two agencies and they all deal with what we have on policy issues. Well, to your point though, I mean, the notice that went out in the last week about the hearing, unless you're paying attention, you know, looking at the state website every day, you know, then you might want to get another life. But, you know, you're not, you're not going to even know or get elected. You can get elected. Yeah. Anyway, I don't want to beat up. I just wanted a moment to honor people that wanted to maybe have something to say. It's not like we're making decisions and it's now 320. So unless it's critical, we didn't mention, I think a person named by the name of Theresa talked about a $500 $500,000 need for Vermont care. I don't think we mentioned it when we're going down. It's in the language also that we have the language. Okay. So 500 more. Right. So from 300 to 800 and her language shows that. So that would be something that I just want to mention. I don't know about you. This is just, you know, do you, but I keep asking you. It gives me their name. So I spell it right. And then where they're from, and I can make notes. And then I use this as my guidebook that goes into the public hearing. And as we start to tear apart at the end, it's a good reference. Well, I was waiting for that Yeah. By the way, Aaron, a thousand thank yous for delivering that to us electronically, because for the first time, you could make able to take notes on it. Yeah. Thank you. Sometimes I don't know. It's just a personal note. And I don't know. Well, that Lynn Dickinson, go next. This my, this, this role is I have to, I have to not look at the screen. How about, how about we, and it's so far behind. Don't incorporate $20 million to Dale. We appropriate 19 million. Well, we have to actually, we have to, you have to figure out where that goes, but we're even 18. Yeah. Um, we, we have the capacity to do a lot of things. I want to cut them. I just want to send a strong message. I mean, what would happen to if we, they don't have, what happened to them? You know, they would just turn that, well, you know, they probably find the money somewhere else and they're fine. That's what they do. So this is the good to carry forward. They're infinite. Yeah. I just want to add to that that what I hear Jim saying is that we have needs and we have wants. We have needs that absolutely have to be covered because they need these things. Absolutely. Whether it's the, whether you like it or not, the traveling nurses for Dale or the traveling nurses for the hospital, the traveling nurses for whatever or other things that absolutely have to be done because we absolutely have to do them versus the things that are nice. And you're right. This is statewide. The statewide organizations, they can come in here and they can just list it. You know, they all can say the same thing and they all, so the tally was probably not the most accurate than I could have done. But, you know, I think that there's something to be said. So sitting down and really, what are the needs of homeowners that we absolutely have to make sure that these agencies or these institutions can do, but they're going to be there and we need to do them. So those are the priorities we have to sit down and we will sort out a lot. But here's now that you have your budgets, right? And you've been working on your budgets. I would ask you to look in your budgets, not just the BAA, but the next one you get in a couple weeks. And we're going to need to find money when we want to move something to a priority. Yeah. And people are, I don't know what this group has worked. He's understood that when you, when, you know, when we say, can you find, go and find a million dollars out of, out of Dale, go and find 2 million out of DCF or out of, out of judiciary, that if we want to be able to do something, we are going to have, and even if we didn't need any money at all, there is a real good reason for the fact of finding out in your, this is your budget, you know, the 17 million now for the emergency relief at nursing home to look underneath. This is what your job is, is to look under the hood of that, find out how many places, what it is, what did it do, what did it get us, could they get away, could 15 million do it? Why couldn't 15, why is it 17 and not 15? That's the tough questions now. You'll have interactions with your budget areas, right? And the same is true for these nonprofits. I mean, like, 2 million dollars for meals on wheels. Well, I mean, I guess I can understand that, but I could accept 1.5. I just don't know. It could be anything that's on there that, you know, parent child centers were in here or something like that. But even if we had no, no need of fit on the, if we didn't have any need, we have an incredible important role as overseers of these dollars. And we're never going to be able to do it all because we can't. So narrow down your scope to three things that you really want to dig into. That's the most important things that you need to find out about. Go ahead, ma'am. And then we'll switch. I think that's a wonderful thing to say. And in that thing, what I was struck by how many people are talking about the workforce shortage, we also need to think about whether the way we're doing a service is the most effective way to do it, given that workforce shortage. And there are times when we are investing, I think it'd be most labor-intensive, right? And if we really have a profound workforce shortage, maybe we need to be asking, is there a different way to make this investment that doesn't tie up every single carryhands in the state? Because, you know, when you look at, I'm, I am sick to my stomach about the fact that construction costs went up 30% last year. That means we lost a third of our investment right in the case. That's a workforce issue as well. We can't have everybody working in food, like food distribution. We don't have enough people for that. So we have to think about ways to address the price, the needs, the interests, the food insecurity, and not the individual programs because we do not have enough people and we do not have enough dollars. Oh, I hear you. So that's, that's a good, we work on, what, three, four levels? We've got like our immediate things that we have to balance the budget and what we're doing right here to get to the short term. Then we've got a long-term look. And then we've got the big policy switches that take, that's the glacier piece, but it took a decade to get certain things done. To be around, I'm, I'm just privileged enough to have been around to watch a glacier move and make some changes. But then there are opportunities that are, that there's the quick change and a well thought out change. And, and when the shooting or the almost shooting and fair payment, I watched this whole entire building and the administration changed 180 degrees in six weeks and signed on the front steps. Oh, that does not happen. So big changes. We don't see it as an emergency, right? Well, you know, the big changes take legislation, doggedness, takes 10, 15 years to make big changes. And unfortunately, Vermont is changing faster than some of our ability to keep up with. And that's, that's, that's the bigger picture. All right. So on that happy note, it's 330. Can I switch gears from great, keep this, you know where to keep this, right? Now move to, does anyone, I'll just leave the floor open, does anybody have anything in their budgets that they would like us to go to that they would like to either bring an enlightenment, tell us like how it's terrific and you don't have any problem or how it's so terrible that you want to strike it out and or you want to change life. You want to go by this friendship or you want to go by where you would love us to go? I will start to dictate tomorrow afternoon that we will go from starting at a and go down to z just to go through it quickly. But right now it's just like, okay, is there anything so we don't take 10 minutes to get to something that you've been waiting for? Okay. And I go to like one of the very, the very first item on this spreadsheet. So for those that are watching it, the 209 public safety 1.81 billion. And as I explained here, it's over time due to homicide and additional criminal investigations, totally understandable. I reached out to my director DPS and when I received back and if this isn't satisfactory, we certainly haven't met but I just wanted to read it to you. The overtime is being driven by incidents. We know about the high number of homicide which calls in the state police each time in the activation of special teams. So when you have rescue missions, for example, as we've had with the flooding, you know, that's all part of DPS, major crime units and crime scene search teams as well as overnight recovery shifts from both sworn officers. We know about 55, they were taking vacancies in the state police and the PSAPs. That's been a chronic problem with not enough staff for the dispatch services. So what they did, what the finance director did is he took the actual school in November and then put the average staff through the 11 pay period, came up with how much overtime they were spending versus what was in the fiscal year 24 budget and it was 1.81 million in change. Different. So he projected what they ran for the 11 pay periods to the rest of the year, 26 pay period. So that's how it came out to, I don't have anything I can propose into it. If you would like more, certainly invite them to come in. I'm satisfied with that. We know about the staffing shortage. We know about some of the extraordinary activities, especially with the murder investigations that we've had. So, yes, this is a pressure that we'll hear on the court's piece. We have 88 homicides being prosecuted right now in Vermont. 88. Does that seem like that? That goes back quite a while. Yeah, exactly. That seems like a big number. All right. So this is for the committee. Representative Harrison has now, this is his section of the budget. He's to take a look at it. He's got a recommendation. He's not feeling that this is anything that you want to take more time with unless the committee wants to have public safety next week too. Otherwise, we can check it off that this is highly likely. Anything we check off, and I'm saying this to the people in the middle of it, we are just saying we're not going to ask for any more testimony on it. We can always change our mind. Nothing is decided until everything is decided. I was just about to come up. Nothing is decided until everything is decided. We've learned. But we do need to knit one in Pearl too. So if we move along. So I have a question. Just a comment to make. I think I think what you're proposing makes sense. I just think this is a good example. Wouldn't it be nice if we knew what was in the FY 25 budget at the same time? Not that we would change this on here, but it would be helpful if I should. Whatever. I want the budgets to be your best honest, you know, the estimate of what's going to take place. Right. You know, every year we're back here for the veterans all night. We know there's a nursing issue that they're going to have to use next to stop and turn around next year. So be honest so that we may not have any funds the next BAA. Right. Well, the same thing with the ERFs, 17 million that we heard about from Dale and the veterans. And so we know every year. It's a curious problem too. How do you send the message about where we're headed as opposed to talking to anything in BAA? I'm not suggesting that. I've heard that here first. Right. Our this is an accounting thing in a map, you know, policy pieces. It's our documents do represent some of our best values. But we're here to manage the site. Is this what we want? Okay. You know, here's an example of what maybe if representative Harrison said, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if they actually really did all that over time and I need to go look. Right. You know, so we don't have as much check the time cards. Do you remember you remember not long before the gentleman got caught? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we've had, yeah, we're not everybody in the government. And not to pick on state police, but evidently, six were put on leave for some alleged infraction or not. And then that will you know that's going to mean over time for the upper up in the kingdom. There are there are many times I've been listening to me where I wanted to ask, why the hell didn't you think of that before when you were doing your budget? Particularly, for example, the 10 million and the numbers are huge, like the 10 million dollars from the agency. What was it? They just, we have a $10 million number for one of the agencies. Sorry, I can't remember. And it was I just thought, oh, it was staff time for to implement the enterprise software. Oh, that's and I was just thinking, yeah, we're everybody knows that I'm holding my enterprise software. There's huge staff time and right. Yeah, one change, I feel like one change, why, you know, and in some ways, the problem is how do you enforce that this seems to me the only way to enforce it for us is to say no. We have that on that subject. So I just want people that the activity that happens is so much that happens not always at this table because you guys do your work. Last year was our first time through now you have your budgets and now you go back and really refine and refine again. People have people have a meeting on that very subject, sir. Just so you know, is it okay? But representative shy, you know, has the budget for HR and representative Harrison has the budget for ADS. And we have our JFO IT consultant because if somebody sat in front of me and said I need $100 million for, I don't know, step up whatever we've discovered that the legislature does not have always the expertise to evaluate a software package to find out if it's what it should be. So we hire Lisa who's in JFO to review IT projects and things with us and for us. She'll be here Friday, she'll be here Friday on this. So that activity is happening and they've met with her and they've met with. So guess who gets to come in to have to testify on that? Sarah Clark. She is the deputy secretary for AOA and Denise, who I can't think of her last name, Denise Riley Hughes, who is the acting or now secretary of ADS. So they're going to, they're coming in and I won't bother Aaron, but it's on our agenda. And Lisa from JFO will be here on that subject. Stay tuned. Yes. And they help us with what are appropriate performance measures to talk about ADS. I mean, I can tell you bluntly that when ADS was created, our budget went up, we got 20% less service and every contract took longer to contract. How do, they've been in, they've been here for seven years. Are we actually saving money and are we actually getting better service? And my guess is in some places maybe, but you know, you look at the, the, you know, we've got all these, you know, we're giving up federal money because of IT programs and multiple fronts in DCF. The state assessment was rolled out like two weeks before they had to administer it, which everyone knows is bad practice, but the contract itself took something like 20 months. Like what's going on? So I would take that, that's just me personally. And I would, to the esteemed member from Brattleboro, who's part of Ben and Pirate, I've been very knowledgeable in the measures and performance measures piece and the government accountability who created the 9, 10, 12, what are the recommendations? The recommendations where we measure. And so that subject is for us to ask and then government operations. Because it's cycle time, right? Or something like that, because the problem with the RPA is around your state fund, like what state funding do you control? And it's pretty, it's depending on the Asian side. That's not actually meaningful indicator. So your question is, is really well founded, especially when we're looking at dollars here and then saying, um, looking at working with putting in a bill next for where are we and talking with the chair of the account of the government accountability and asking them, are you looking at this or how those are those are the places and I might, um, do you have anything to add to that? Well, ultimately, I think it's, it's a, it's a fusion less about what happens in a committee and more about what happens in all the committees in terms of like how, how do we, when, when we get, for instance, in a few weeks, we're going to get the budget presentations, they're going to have outcome measures and those outcome measures are superficial and don't tell the story of the actual performance of that program. Anyone who's on our side of the table should be asking, why is that okay? How do you actually know? And the problem that we have, and this is where, you know, like RBA says, don't immediately cut budgets. It's trying to kind of encourage a more collaborative approach because the off with your head, if you don't perform, tends to lead to people not telling you what's really going on. So it's like, how do we stay in a collaborative mode around what real improvement looks like and talk about what's really going on? And that's where, like DCF, when I was asking him about those metrics, you know, with the commissioner, I was trying to get at like, well, I think it was the call. It was, it was, uh, Department of Corrections, what you did a really good 10% in a year. Yeah. Well, that was, you know, that was one. And then the other was the, uh, the call line, a contract for DCF, right? Where if the, if their purpose is just simply to reduce the amount of time that people are waiting, and they, then they're going to measure that differently and evaluate that differently. And then if their purpose is to help people actually get access to services faster and, you know, and then what they were reporting was essentially we've cut the wait times now, but nothing about the actual outcome for individual contractors. We should care about that. That's a $1.5 million. If we're just spending $1.5 million to not look incompetent, that should matter to us, right? If that's what's going on. Yeah. Or honestly, portray it as the fact that we were just trying to respond to the public pressure to not have people on the phone forever. And they didn't. Not the root cause. I mean, I got first came to the agency of education. The phones are ringing nonstop. It was teachers who couldn't get the licenses. Probably one of yours. There was a reason they did not have a functioning teacher licensing program. We fixed the program. There were no calls anymore from teachers. And so, you know, like here we're not, we're, we're focusing on call time. We're not focusing on the fact that there's just no place where these people not to, we're not focusing on call time. The Vermonters were focused on call time. And right or wrong, they responded. And it was not in probably, it was a very short term. It was Doritos for dinner. It was $2 million that you could have spent on housing, spent on the phones instead. I mean, it's, yeah. And so we'll back up that right up the stream even further that we wouldn't have had that problem if we had had that problem solved or this back here or plan or plan. But we're here. We're, you know, the reality is here. And then in the hallways, we can work on the bigger issues, but I appreciate it. So I think the question at the moment though, I'm just, does anybody need to have public safety come in or? Okay. So, okay. So what's just, we'll just pencil that off unless somebody from government office says, and trust me, they're looking, I'm loving our committees of jurisdiction, our home. They know that dollars are tight and that they can look under the hood. And they're asking the questions of life. What's this for in findings and pockets? You know, public safety, it's interesting. Public safety's got a vacancy rate current of current as of December 23rd of 20% in one part and 11% of the other. I'm not sure about the distinction between those two categories, which normally we would have find ridiculously high, but that's still a lot. So we're over, we came in last year as a 12% and it went down during the spring and it is back up to 20. We have 1093 vacancies for 80, 453 positions. So we're back at 11% statewide. And 103 of those are listed being in public safety. And I again, I don't know, based on the download from DHR's dashboard, why there's a distinction between one pool of 376 and 247 maybe Jim does. But there's 103 vacancies between those two. Well, I know there's 55 to rotate on the state police. I don't know how many. Yeah, is do you know which pool is 247 total and for us? So you, well, it's not a state police, but because the PSAC was under the state police, but the actual officer. I'm going to look to Maria when she's, when you're done, I didn't know. I want to check in because she's broke. Check. We are okay with that first thing on the spreadsheet. Oh, that's still, still have pause around the vacancy rates. But we're, I think we could do the second one, Woody. What do you think your, your choice? I don't want the military air service contract. Yes, I have no problems with that because it goes back to pre COVID issues. Right. I do have a question regarding the state police. Oh, okay. Sorry. Now we're with it. It's serious. This overtime, is that for support for Burlington? No, I asked that question for the contractual agreement. That's a different line item and there's revenue that then produces those contracted agreements. And then obviously extra costs. So not a part of this. That's fine. Okay. You just wanted to make sure. No, I have no question when the commissioner of finance was in, if there's a shortfall there, is that part of this? Because there was a state police force in Burlington helping out. Yeah. I was going to come in for John to change something. I was very pleased at Fish and Wildlife. They just made a way to cover that. It was just a weekend in Raleigh with their game board sticking it over for the city police. Right. That was a very nice thing. It was an extraordinarily nice gesture. And I told the commissioner went to the funeral. They have by far the best dressed uniforms. They look like royal mountains. They really do. Then you go like, what's in, is that in the budget? And you can afford shoes? Yeah. Probably the only time they wear normal activities. Yeah. Exactly. Probably have. So, are you feeling, so representative Page has put on the table that the B216, as he's recommending that there is no further need to look at this and that you're good with it. Everybody okay? All right. I'm going to, I'm going to, you know, it gets hard. We have to like count. But unless somebody says, oh my, no, ma'am, stop. I got to look at this again. 10 minutes. Anybody else? Cannabis is coming into my room. Agency of Human Services is a big deal. Sorry. I want to hear from education. Do we? Well, yes, we do. Okay. Friday morning, right? There's a lot to talk about there. Yep. So that's not going to happen. What about the vet's home? Our late Christian White born. Pat's not here though. Let's see this. That was the request for classification. I have a feeling we kind of have to do that. I think we have to do that. You know, which one are we on? Just which one are we on? Yeah. Do the state colleges have an O2s at the top of page? Just show three at a time. Yeah. That's the allied health thing. Yeah. It's on the state of Washington. Yeah. Okay. And we could probably check that out. Can I do that, Mark? All right. Thank you. All right. We all are folks. The, um, the allied health for the state colleges. I'm taking on that. It's a watch that I understand that it makes sense. I call it a pass. Absolutely. The only thing I thought about it was like, bring an idea. Why don't you think about it? So do you want to check it off or do you want to leave it? No, it's not quite there though. All right. So we can do fish in one of them. It happens every year though, right? No, this is new. The allied health is brand new. Yeah. Is this whole new thing in the last five years? Yeah, it's like this new thing. Fairly new. Good. Yeah. I don't know. Why didn't that happen before? Probably because they were too busy. Do you want to do that? And we got a new waiver. The C-11-15 waivers new. Anyway, I don't know the answer to that. I'm just saying that there's things that may have prevented them from doing it before. Yeah. And then if you have an aha and somebody comes in and says, why can't we? There's the arithmetic error. Okay. Oh, yeah. Yeah. The $1.9 million error, I think error. I think the only thing on education I'm going to look at is the grammar psychologist. So you dump a hug. I'll leave. Yeah. Yeah. We're not, we're just, we're not going. That's because if people are just shouting out certain things, we'll wait. We got five minutes. Sharon Scott is the one who can explain that probably the best. There's a swap. Oh, the allied health? Yeah. Yeah. It's a swap. It comes in. I don't think rolled out paper. I mean, I don't know when we'll close. I would just talk to the DCF. But 318 is receipt of the big grant, the preschool development grant, which is just federal money coming in. It couldn't be counted for. And then the 25,000 down, we could find out what it covered, but that's actually a production in federal funds. So would you like to go to B318? Yeah. We can have people go. It's on the second page, near the bottom. We'll let her talk to her. What Chris explained is that this is receipt. I mean, we can confer with confirm, but it's receipt of federal receipts and not receipt of federal grants. But they got 25,000 last when they thought they'd get on the community base. But this is not a DCF initiated cut. This is just the feds gave them 25,000. That was what I expected. And the other big input is the preschool development grant program. Right. And that's all federal dollars. Yeah. So it's nothing to be shaper. And so your resolution is that you're comfortable with checking that out? Check on the first day. That's awesome. Is everybody okay? Yes. And I'll be creating, creating. We'll give it a close. Unless we hear something. Chuck, I think someone else. That's true. That's right. That's progress. All right. So this is what we're going to do tomorrow in the afternoon. We could start as a chop and then what I do is that we comb through each one to see if people are like, no, I'm not ready. Man, you know, old old or go to week. So you might want to take a look at your stuff. See if you want to bring anything up early. So for those of us who are in heated and contentious divisions, my assumption is we wait in services to wait. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. This is why we often say to the cameras that we're checking it off saying that we're, we're waiting for an input. And it's a little bit different in BAA because of the short, short, short turnaround time we're not doing the whole form or whatnot. Although I think human services last. They are such a big piece of it. Be able to write to us. Right. Agriculture in the hall might be able to just have a conversation. Right. Yeah. Right. So I mean, I'm comfortable at least with the variety of ways that fits both the committee and the level of their, their changes and work that they do, having it coming in a lot. Some other chairs were like, everybody should be the same. It's like, well, but we're not. We're not all the same. Right. All right. So floor update. Give us the whole floor. Yeah. How's she doing? So age 27 passed on a voice vote. Obviously there's no. We'll call her. We don't know. We know there's going to be a roll call on 72. Human services just finished. Their bill section. So Emily Kornheiser from Ways and Means is going to get her report. And Tiff will be up after Emily. Oh my goodness. If we close, we could be up there for her with her. Right. Yes. We can go support Tiff. Yeah. Anybody or do you have anything else you want to throw on the table before we go? Because we can't go home. Where if we leave here, we have to go to the floor. Which I'm fine. If there's anything else, the representative Harrison is ready. He's got something. No. Okay. We have education coming in. Is that what I heard? Yeah. Yes. Okay. Education is tomorrow? Can you say when? No. Next week. Tuesday. Tuesday. Oh, Tuesday. Next week. Okay. Would you? Do the numbers. Are you going to do the language? Whatever. Yeah. We go where you right now. It's about where do people want to go first? Well, I got a very little one. Okay. That we can do it when we do this. And it's in the, what do you call it? Reversion. Precision. Reversions. Reversions. Yep. 35. That's why I keep a language packet and then a number packet. There was 15,000 for. Can you just tell me what page before I move over? 35. Oh, page 35? Yeah. It starts really on 34 and it goes through. There we go. Yeah. Okay. So in the middle of that, 233,002. 0000 liquor enforcement license, 15,000. That was money budgeted for body camps. Oh, yes. They don't use body camps because they are drinking. No. They're playing the lottery. They're not uniform officers. They're, they go into liquorice. Yeah. They're under cover. So it would be kind of, it would be under cover if you were wearing a body camp. You really don't see me, but I got this camera. Again, smile. So anyhow, that's, that's fine. All right. So if anybody, if hearing no objections, we can check that off. That's what we need to have for, if, if you recall as a member on the floor and you would get this call, think about it from their perspective of like they see, oh, $4 million out of workforce recruitment. What's that about? That would spark like we need an explanation. So could we, could we make a wild assumption that anything under $100 is like okay on the reversions? I'm sorry. So somebody is checking 20 cents and. Yeah. St. George. I'm actually going to pass on the 200. St. Joseph's Orphan. Remember we gave him 25. Department of Tourism and Marketing. I don't know what that's. That's also a safe bet. Okay. You, you've got something on that. That's a big one. Well, that has to do with education. And you have, you have individuals that are, you know, deployed and they're not able to access the education while they're deployed. So we make that note. Deployed individuals, not stable. That's on page 35. It's 100,000. It's 100,782 dollars. Use this education. It's for education. Push and assistance. One and a second. That's what we need. Just the explanation. I don't, you know, that makes sense. Okay. I'm, if you're okay, I'll check it out. I won't say no. You're okay. I'm okay. Huh. Well, we could discuss that. Which one? Oh, that, if you're okay. Anything else? Um, okay. It's 39 and 40 and 41. 39, 39, 40 and 41. Yep. And I think I am, I am a proud people. I'm okay with the change today. At the top of page 40, because it carries out the intent of the language that's originally proposed. I would like to discuss that. Okay. I hope we can't close that yet. I am not okay with the strikeout on page 40 and 41. I have corresponded with Adam and he says, keep the exit surplus, but he doesn't think there's a problem leaving it in. I would like to leave it in. Okay. That is not, we're trying not, not accept. So your recommendation, do not accept that last strikeout, which proves it up to the, at BAA. Yeah. I know that you're not, you're not, we're not going to vote on it because I know it's not, but it's just like, okay, that's, we'll be your recommendation. But if it's worse, discuss it. At least discuss it for four. Why don't you, you can talk with Mark off this. Okay. Chris, could you explain it? As something as well, or is there something? Oh, the $237 on for tourism and the $1 for economic development. Those are safe to cross. We're not going to chase down. The 70 or, you know, we could start at the top and just take a look at them. Quick, we're going to be here. That was 30. We're back on 34 and 35 is the version. And don't forget, like, Hardy's not coming tomorrow, right? He's coming. Writing? Okay. So we will be comfortable. And then he's going to come in and walk us through it. And he can shorten what he has to. He's probably paying attention right now to Hardy. Why don't we just say anything under two? You're $100. We're going to be okay with it. This is true, but we'll need to make sure everybody knows it's on the same page of where that's at. So if we go from page 34, there's nothing there. But at the top of 35, it's $3 and 37 cents. We checked that out. Just come down from now, $88. We're good. Okay. Go down, go down, go down, go down, go down. I have no idea what $136 on adult education. And we're looking to probably find out. $136, 13. Do you, no, you're fine. I think the three cents for administration is okay. Are we okay? Yep. Three cents, talk. I think we have to go to the map. Now come to top. So there's three cents, 136. Let's come. There's 385 from parks. I love it. No other appropriations committing these dates would do this kind of stuff. Longer safety. The longer safety is enough. Yep. For me, unless somebody says no. Okay. And 20 cents for water, $1.86, 71 cents. Are you okay with the department of furor as an architect? I am. I'm willing to chase it down if people would like this. Do you know what it is? Okay. I don't. I don't. Yeah. I'm out of water. We'll check it out. I'll check it out. Why does it say not, why do we have to say here, not understanding any other provision of water in the country? You know, on page 34. Because what is, because this is transportation, fiscal year 2024, the following amounts rebirth. It says it from every one of the other. Yeah. Notwithstanding. Notwithstanding the budget. Any provision of water, contrary. It says, provision this. Well, if the budget says that we're going to spend that much, it says, even though the budget is so bad. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Yes. Very good. Thank you. This is the rest of the bill. We're going to look at the final amount. Oh, don't just follow. You can't wait. Okay. Okay. Now that we've talked about tourism. That was meant to be. Now the way, now that Jim's asked me to chase down the 230, I'll do it. Go chase it. Chase it. Just don't watch out. I've got a heavy bottle here. All right. Anything else? Otherwise, maybe we'll go to the floor. So they have passed the amendment that Theresa brought to the floor on age 72 by voice vote. And now they're talking about the bill, isn't it? People might want to. Okay. So we know we will be going to that. We are going to go ahead at some point. Yeah. Because there will be a little problem. So if we're going to go to the floor, take your book with you. And get ready for tomorrow. And get ready for tomorrow. Let's see what's going on. That sounds like a good idea. That's so wonderful. We need to borrow those. And I'm going to have a meeting at which time. Oh, that might be cool. I'll go to the floor and come back for that.