Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Remember I saw you, was an ag for years, but it's been a while, and I'm from Parkland.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Parkland.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: And I remember you, Charles.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: My name is Michelle Bos-Lun, I'm a chair, I'm not a chair, I'm a representative from Windham three, and I'm actually new to the community, this is my second Nice.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Richard Nelson, Orleans one up in Derby. Yeah, Richard.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Do you do you, Richard, do you deal with are you on the school board also? I am. With the Dwight Burnett. Dwight and I are buddies? Yes. You are. Dwight Dwight works with us very closely. Yeah. She does. And

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: and when we buy our wood chips to eat the school wood, they always give us the price per ton.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yep. But they sell them

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: to us by the load.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah. And Dwight goes, if

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: you can't do that No.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Dwight gets he talked to me about that. Yeah. And I and I know, part of what I told him was, you know, do you folks have a concern? You know, if this part of this is method of sale, but also if the buyer and seller are happy, if you're getting a good deal, you know

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Our price is very reasonable. Yeah. And we don't ever think we've been shorted. Yeah. Yeah. Same same company that's supplying us forever. Why don't we have you formally introduce yourself for the record?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yes. Thank you. My name is Mark Pocket. I work for the Vermont Agency of Agriculture Food and Markets in the weights and measures section.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We are looking forward, most of us, to visiting the facility in Randolph next week. I'm gonna say And most of us had not been there. I don't know, John, whether you ever were there. I think that at one point the committee, before my time anyway, might have stuck in. But we were planning to be in Randolph earlier in the morning to spend some time on the campus there, the state university campus, and figured while we were in town, while we were up on the hill, would stop in and see what the agency has there. So that's our plan for next week. And then it seemed to me that maybe having somebody come in and give us a bit of,

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: I don't know what to call it.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah, a little background before you get there. Would you like some of that? Yeah, absolutely. And I remember in the past being there where I think there was a joint group of House and Senate folks stopped by. We had a great talk.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We had a great track.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: What we'll do, we expect to I can't remember the date. I think it's on Thursday ish.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Next Thursday. Yeah.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Next Thursday. Anyway, we'll bring you through the the laboratory, and we'll show you some of the artifacts, some of the standards that we have. Our staff will be there. We're doing that in conjunction with a forklift training class, which is mandatory. So our whole staff will be there. So hopefully, you'll have a chance to get the feel of the number of our staff and some of the folks there. And I've got my counterpart, one of my metrologists down there who does the day to day, and he's ready and he's very enthused to see you folks, and we'll bring it down so you can have the visuals. I could have done some visuals here, but it'd been very redundant. We'd have done a a virtual tour and then see a real tour. So why don't why don't we just chat about the program a little bit?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I'd love

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: to Yeah. Mister mister Nicks.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: If you could put up if there's a way to attach the virtual to our committee page, I have an obligation that day, and I won't be able to make it. And could someone from committee please get wiped by that a hard time?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Representative Bartholomew. Metrologist. Yes.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: I went in. I gave my business card. I did a gas station inspection once, I left in my my card and state metrologist. And he started talking to me about the weather, and he said, I don't think it's gonna rain later this afternoon. I think they got the forecast wrong. And I was listening to the radio on the way back down, and and I said, I think you're right. And I was you know, and he kept asking me about that, and then I got in the vehicle, and I realized there must be some misunderstanding. A metrologist is not a meteorologist. It's interesting. I go to meetings all over the country, and the state metrologist from Montana used to be a meteorologist. And so he so it's it's kind of interesting. They're both science based. Metrology is the study of measurement. So if you're cur curious, if you can't sleep well some night and you've got your iPad there, you Google metrology, and you'll be in store for a treat. And in a little while, you may be dozing off. But if you are really into a science space, it really is fascinating. I've been with the agency in the Weights and Measures Department for thirty seven years as of this February. To me, I find it fascinating and interesting. To me, a test weight, you have a test weight, there's a test weight and this and that. And to me, it's what that test weight symbolizes. To me, it's static, but it's dynamic at the same time. It almost has a life of its own because of what it represents and what it does. To me, the whole issue is fascinating, and the issue of metrology is fascinating too. So our laboratory serves, and if folks have questions, just interrupt me. But our laboratory serves as a resource for both the Weights and Measures Inspection Program, but also as a resource for the weighing and measuring industry in the state of Vermont, but also as a technical resource to other businesses, retail weighing and measuring, and to other weighing and measuring businesses in the Northeast. Because we have people bringing artifacts for calibration from Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, and Massachusetts at times, based on the availability of their recognized certified calibration laboratories. So our little tiny, we have a little tiny program in the state of Vermont. We have seven people, and that's not the metrology program. That's everything we do. And we do all those different types of things. So we maintain state standards that are traceable. Traceable, traceable to what? And I was doing an inspection once, nice person in general store, and I put the test weights on. And he looked at me and he argued with me a little bit, he said, How do you know that your weights are accurate? It's a fair question. I know you're putting this on, and then a one pound weight, and it's reading 0.95. Well, how do you know my scale is wrong? How do I know it? So I went into the explanation, and I got really excited. And I kept talking and the more I talked, the more his eyes started going to the back of his head. And finally said, I believe you. I believe you. I believe you. I'll fix the scale. Please leave. So this is a little bit what the program is. There's an incredible amount to maintaining traceability. You'll see some beautiful standards down there in the laboratory, stainless steel. You you have have working standards and the standards you have field standards. The field standards are the stuff you can grab with your hands and get them all dirty. The working standards and the state standards you use gloves and handlers and you don't touch. Traceability to what standards? International standards is the SI. All of our standards are maintained to metric. It's called the SI standard. We follow ISO, the Organization for International Standardization, which internationally followed for metrology laboratory and traceability. And ideally, now I'll tell you the way it used to be for traceability, not very long ago, that at one point in time, and France did this in the late 1700s, they came up with a metric system and they came up with the golden kilogram weight. It was kept under lock and key in Paris, France. And all standards flowed from that one standard. So we have our federal partners in this National Institute of Standards and Technology that have no regulatory authority for any of the states because weights and measures programs are all state programs that have the authority of the state because it isn't something that comes under the federal guidelines. But they offer support to the states. And every few years, they would travel to Paris, France a briefcase under lock and key to Paris, France, and have their kilogram weight or weights recalibrated there in Paris, France, which is the location of the International Institute of Metrology. And it's, again, it's internationally recognized. And they would go in and they have security guards and keys, and then you bring your stuff in and they don't let anyone see this and they do their calibrations. They have their standard, which they calibrate working standards there, and then their working standards they use to check other people's standards there because they only want that kilogram weight touched every once in a while. That's how it used to do, Peeta, and our recognition and traceability is still provided by that kilogram weight because the system has been in place for so long. However, they have redefined the kilogram, partly to my grace chagrin, because I'm a traditionalist and very old fashioned, but they have redefined it using a different methodology than that one kilogram weight. Because they found during repeated testing that even that one kilogram weight is changing weight over time. And that's what you don't want to have happen. You want it to stay the same thing. So they come out with a different way of establishing a weight using what they call a walk balance. This was just done three years ago, four years ago. You can Google it, the new traceability standardization And they will now use a WAT balance, although everything has been placed with traceability to that one kilogram still. But over time, this will change. So over time-

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: What is that term? Walk?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Walk balance, W A T T. W A T T, okay. And some of this technology, I hate to say it, the old technology understood very, very well. This is a little over my head.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It's easy to grasp of something physical. Yes. Looks like a Yes. A block. Yes.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Why does that relate to, like, electrical water? Is it totally different? They they the Watt balance incorporates some some electricity, and and it's able to see what the mass, stainless steel or copper will have a different density. And so it can figure out the density and the mass plus the weight and combines everything and gives a value to it. Yeah, it's a different type of balance, a different type of, yeah, yes, Mr.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Thank you. You look into popcats from popcats full of poses?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: No, I get that asked frequently. Different colleagues are drawn. Different spelling. Yeah. Family. Okay. So go to

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: a gas station. Yes. Swipe the car. Yep. Then you wait and probably go turns on. Yep. You squeeze the handle. Shit starts flaming. Nothing's coming out, then it starts coming out.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: If if that's in your gas tank, gas is coming out. It's got a solenoid. That solenoid's gonna slowly kick in. So you're gonna depress that. You're gonna see that, you know, a couple pennies, couple pennies, 6, seven, $8.09, 10, and then it really kicks in. That solenoid, the valve is releasing gas that's coming through your nozzle. And then that solenoid's gonna kick in. It's gonna kick in really hard, and and you're gonna feel.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: So we don't donate in $6.07, 8¢ for every No.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Because gas is coming out of that nostril.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Yeah.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yep. And we get complaints on that periodically.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: I just No. I'm not complaining. I just

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: just It's a of them.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: These are great questions. I like that.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: No. Because I I never think that's why I see them couple times a month. They they also are responsible for standardizing our pulp tanks or in our our situation, our piper, which mostly the amount of milk we put into the trucks. And to make sure that fertilizer we're buying and the grain we're buying is all accurate.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Is weight measures a division or a department? It is a section in the division of consumer protection food safety. Okay. And we're talking about petroleum products here, and I'm remembering you don't just deal with food or agricultural products, but also anything that involves

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Anytime a weight or measure is involved, it can loop us in regardless of the product. Feed, seed, fertilizer, all of those things. Fuel.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Representative Bartholomew? So you touched on the weights and the kilograms. So there must be a conversion that's accepted for conversion from kilogram to pounds. Oh, absolutely. And we convert everything. And maybe you're gonna get to this. How do you do volume?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah, so I can move on to following a little bit, and we'll show you the equipment. We calibrate different sizes of volumetric measurements that are used by our inspection program, but also by industry out there. And and that was mentioned, the gas pumps. Gas pumps, the typical test or what we do in a gas station inspection, we'll pull in unannounced, unannounced. We have cal laboratory calibrated test measures, five gallon with the sight glass. You can see how much fluid comes out based on the cubic inches, 231 cubic inches to the gallon, 1,155 cubic inches in a five gallon draft. And and we'll pump five gallons into that. It says five gallons on the pump, and you can see that sight glass to see how accurate that that pump is. What we do is we will, in the laboratory, we have our main beautiful stainless steel five gallon standard, and we will test and adjust when necessary those field standards that are used in the field for that testing. And also an expansion down in Randolph is when we were involved in scoping out the laboratory space. We were in Waterbury, and then we're flooded out. And then we were at a temporary spot in Berlin. It was gonna be very short lived, and we did seven and a half years there and made a renovated warehouse work. We closed everything in and made environmental controls in the rooms. It was very interesting what we did. And now we have the place in Randolph when we scoped up the space. We have room in the garage to do some larger items that we never were able to do. So we do 100 gallon proofer stainless steel proovers. And those are used primarily for oil trucks, oil truck meters. And so when we check an oil truck instead of gas pump, it's a five gallon pump. When we do an oil truck, it's 100 gallons off of that oil truck through that meter into the prover, check the ticket, check the measure, check the price, then we pump it back into the truck. And so the volume is done in a similar way. It's done with different sizes. We have a 25 gallon stainless steel drop, it allows us to check larger capacity items into 25 or fifty, seventy five, 100 gallon proovers. Our program has, I think, four one hundred gallon proovers now, which the staff employ.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Very so, but we had the international standard with a lot under lock and key in Paris. Was there something similar for volume? There must have been I mean, there must be temperature and all kinds of stuff.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah. Did they have they have the everything is metric, even even those countries that to have a deposit standard inch pound, and there's United States is one that accepts that. Although if you look at the labeling, everything is dual declaration. You have metric on almost everything. You have the both things declared. And volume, the volume is basically the liters based on the weight of so many kilograms or a kilogram. It's not a volumetric thing like the weight. It's how much water is a kilogram, I believe. It's done by that. So the leaders like how much, like 2.22 pounds of water in order to have to be sterile water. Now that's your leader. So that is based on weight, too. But once you establish that, then your traceability with our laboratories are done not by the weight, although you can do that. It's just based on those volume comparisons. But when we do, we had a great case in a dairy distributor, a large one, very, very large one. Had to complain on short measure. And when we go in and do that inspection, we do that based on weight. So it's all traceable really to that kilogram and weight. So we bring in our scales and our weights and check our scale periodically. And we have a flask and we put in X amount and decide the density of that milk and go on and to do the inspections. Very

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: complicated. You inspect grocery store scales annually on a surprise basis? Is that

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yes, we do. The law states within twelve months. So we do it, we define it as during the calendar year. So we try, we try, and we do our best. And I'll be very transparent. Sometimes we don't get to everything within twelve months, and that's based on staffing and other issues and workload and complaints and everything else. But we try to get in there and do all of our devices within a twelve month period of time. Grocery stores unannounced, we check the scales. We do package weighing. If it's labeled one pound or one and a half pounds or two pounds or it's done metric and it has the conversion into pounds, then we check that. And then we have our scale, we have our test traceable weights that are checked in our laboratory and we check our scale. It's imperative that this is that the process is followed. You're not accusing people of short waiting people if they're not doing it. And we have we have national standards. We have books like this that have a process for dried goods or volume goods or liquid goods on how to do this. And we have a computer program that helps us win win that walks us through that. So we'll go in and we'll do package win, and then we'll look at some of the labels. Then we'll look at some of the labeling. The big thing, a big

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: thing we do in the stores is the price verification and scanner inspections also. You encountered just in the same way that you were talking about that standard sort of degraded over time, even the one in France. Just do everyday scales in grocery stores tend to go out of compliance enough that you, by being there, will just help bring them back in even if there's no punishment?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah. We issue Our little section issues lots of fines and penalties. But we issue very few fines and penalties over devices. If those are used used heavily, they can float out of calibration. And this is just maintenance. Truck scales.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Yeah, so I wanted to actually get trucks.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Truck scales. You know, you got these big trucks. I've still got my CDL license for twenty years. I did every truck scale in the state of Vermont and hopper scales. And, you know, I used to stand by and walk. The trucks are never overweight. And they're really, really, they really can damage those scales and really shake them up really hard. They need regular maintenance. Our inspection program makes sure we get there once a year and then we'll have them correct. If they're not, we issue a rejection order. They get the service companies in, they adjust them, they fix them, we get the notification and or go back if it's really bad to make sure those are accurate and correct. Gas pumps. Gas pumps, I think of a gas pump as like an old car engine or it's got a piston. It's got a measuring chamber and that chamber fills and then the piston pushes out, pushes out, pushes it up repeatedly over time. It'll wear. Electronic scales, they can float based on power surges. So there's a lot of different things. Regular maintenance, if there's no sign of intentionality or tampering with calibrator, there's calibration switches on there, lead and wire seals, service companies embossed initials on there. If there's no indication of tampering, those are simply rejected and given x amount of days to be adjusted. If they are way, way out and damaging to the public, they're closed on the use. So

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: how do you calibrate, like, Northeast agriculture had in Lindenville had a big, you know, platform scales that drive trucks on to how do you check the weights of those? I mean, how do you get a truck there with a predetermined weight to check it, or do you bring in five, six hundred pounds on the truck and then put

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: it there? So what we have and we purchased the we upgraded. I I had my CDL, and we upgraded five years ago to a state of the art scale truck. And this scale truck holds 21,000 pound certified weights and a 5,000 pound weight cart, which gives us 25,000 pounds of traceable certified weight that we drive to the truck scales. And I don't know if it's still on the scale truck. It's at the lab. I think it's put away for the the season, which is unfortunate because I'd love to show it to you. But we we can show you I can have Scott explain how we would check a weight cart, a 5,000 pound weight cart. We do that with a load cell and and a hanging scale. We hang it in the laboratory there in the garage. We have a huge I beam, 12,000 pound capacity I beam, and we hang that. Anyway, we make sure that that 25,000 pounds is accurate and correct. There's a way to test those. Underneath the scale, have one, two, three, four, four different independent weighing elements. And so if you park here, primarily two of those elements on a short wheel based truck are gonna take that weight and then it funnels everything into your indicator. If you got a long truck and off board, those are gonna add the weights up and funnel it through. And if you stand on the very, very end or with a weight cart, then it's gonna just take that one weight and funnel it through and give you your total weight. So that weight cart can check all of those individual weighing segments at 25,000 pounds, make sure they're accurate and correct. If one of them are off, the service person can adjust that right on to where it needs to be. And then we will check the overall weight to make sure it's clear within 25,000 pounds, which on a 100,000 pound truck scale, don't like because there's a big range that you don't catch. So what we do is we use the gross weight of our vehicle once we've proved it to 25,000 pounds. We drive our truck on, which is another 35,000 pounds, and then we have our 25,000 pound accurate block. We drive it on so we can use a dead weight to have a new reference point and get the weight up to at least 50% of the used capacity.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: And do you worry about the difference in fuel level in your tanks?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: I mean That with our with our weight cart has the little a gas tank this big, and it's got a fuel gauge. If it goes down to there, we have counterweights, tiny little counterweights that will bring that in because the tolerance on a 5,000 pound weight cart is about a tenth of a pound.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: And

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: we will do that. The weight of the scale truck is irrelevant because once we've proved it to 25, we're starting at a strain load test weight of 35,000 pounds. So the weight is what the weight What is that 25,000 pound traceable weight that's gonna give us the accuracy of the process of what we're doing.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay, makes sense. Do you, go ahead, John.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Going back to the grocery stores, how many different scales you walk into a big store, I'm thinking, deli's got one, the meat department would have them, every checkout including all those have, you check all

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: of those? Yeah, anything that's direct sale. So in other words, the customer's presence. Our program and the law doesn't define scales that are used for processing or packaging or those that are in factories don't come under our purview. The factories, if they're in factories and they're using the production of or the packaging of, our law impacts devices that are used where the customer is present. Or in truck scales, you can't be there where they weigh it, but you should be able to. So we we do that. We we define that one as a direct sale even though you're not there. But, you know, gas gas stations, customers there at the deli, the customer is there at a home delivery of fuel oil. The customer has the right to be there and to to witness the delivery and to look at that meter. And so direct sale to the customer. So prepackaged factory scales are those that are used in the meat room. We sometimes don't do. Sometimes you do them as a courtesy, but we will weigh the packages. Because even if the scale is totally accurate, correct, that doesn't mean they're using it the way it needs to be used. You know, we have a packaging material. You have a tenth of a pound packaging material. They put they put a a $12 pound lobster in, and they don't account for that packaging material, and they're charging it $12 a pound for packaging material. And it's against the law to do that. It's against that you can't grow gross way. They can't grow. So it's got to be a net weight.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So for me, it's you're doing the weight on after it's packaged. You don't check the scale that we're using to pack it.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Often, no. Often, no. But we'll check the packages, which actually is it's a more definitive check of what they're doing with their business. And I'll add the grocery stores, scanner inspections. We we do do a lot of those. The inspectors are in the stores now. They're very active and biz busy. Eight weeks ago, I think, nine weeks ago, 10, there was a press release from the attorney general's office on Walgreens. And that was our was our case. That was all of our work that we worked with them on and handed that over to them.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: There was an issue of of scanning Yep. An item and the price that ended up being charged was differing from

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yes. Overcharges. So if the shelf label said $3.99 and you go to the front and it's $4.99, then that's not good.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It falls under your purview.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yes. Yes, it does. Yeah.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: You do fuel oil, heating oil? We do. And propane. And what about something like wood pellets?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: So we yes. We do the we do the trucks that are used for home delivery for oil. And I think we have around 400 trucks we check a year. And we do the propane delivery trucks. I should say meters. You know, we don't we don't inspect the trucks. You know, if the trucks don't if they don't have an inspection sticker on the truck, it's not our purview. It's that meter. We we we want we want our sticker on the meter. And then the delivery trucks for the wood pellets, yes, also. And the the propane and oil are done volumetrically, and the pellets are done by weight, and the scales are on those wood pellet trucks. And so we will go with the service company that has their their weights. They usually can hang off one corner of each truck, 4,000 pounds of certified weight. We do a strain load test, 4,000 pounds of certified weight. We take the weights off. We have them drop 4,000 pounds of pellets in, and then we hang the weights again for 8,000 pounds. And we take the weights off, another 4,000 pounds of pellets, and then we hang the weights up so we can check the scale to capacity.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: For heating, we don't.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Well, we do do consumer complaints for that. It's it's a challenging that is very challenging.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: And and that you'd be a a town office position. Yeah. What do they call it?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: They had No. Like he said, the fence viewer. The fence viewer and the wood wood checker. The measures. Yeah. The measure of wood. We get complaints on wood. It's very problematic. We do the best we can. By law, there has to be 128 cubic feet in a cord when the wood is stacked stacked and stowed appropriately. So it has to be stacked. And we we get complaints. You know, I I wish we could do a better job with it, but it's hard. We're not there for the delivery. And often the customer doesn't ask for a receipt and often the customer pays them cash. And sometimes the person doesn't really even know who this person is. They saw it on Craigslist and they had them deliver and they dump the load. And they said, oh, it's three quarter firewood. And that'll be it's very expensive now. You know, a thousand dollars and they pay $1,000 in cash. And then they start stacking the firewood and they're very, very upset. And then they call us and you're, what can and we we do our best. Sometimes we can get a refund. Sometimes we can't. We've had people who I think they of I think they needed their firewood stacked, so they gave us the cut off because it wasn't stacked. The inspectors showed up and said, Can you Oh, it has to be stacked. We usually stack it over there. Maybe you've No, we don't do that. And I had one party. I remember this from Stowe and she called me. And there's another issue. And you know, had a cord of wood delivered, and we stacked. We we we stacked it, and and we took a picture of it, we looked at it, and we don't believe that we had a quart of wood. So I said, okay. We can send an inspector there to look, and we'll do a measurement. And I said, you know, we weren't there for the delivery or this or that, but once we have a certified measurement, then sometimes if you share this with the dealer, they'll make up or give you the refund. I said, Oh, well, we've burned most of the wood.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: You gotta wait for the ash?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: And I said, I can't. There's nothing I can really do. And she was so she was very angry and upset. And she said, well, we built a rack that holds exactly one cord of wood. And if you show up to our place, well, I can send you a picture of exactly and point where that wood was when we stacked it, and that our cord, and I'm sorry, we can't do that. And she really was not happy that we could not do that. So it's a challenging, challenging thing. I've had cases where personalities got involved, and I was at one of the agency meetings, and I was on the phone back and forth, and the wood dealer called me and there was a complaint, and he was there at the place and he was trying to do a measurement. And we had measured and found it discrepancy. And he went to measure himself and to see stuff that was going on. And he just showed up and they got on the phone and they called the police. And the state police were coming, and he was on the phone with me. He goes, I'm trying to settle this. And they called the police, and they're like, they're driving in now as I speak. And I just say, you know, go and tell them you're chatting with me, and tell them you're here to make everything right and that it's all good and you're not causing it. So we get into some of those issues with fire.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I didn't expect such a robust answer to that. As I heard, say no, don't do that. I do wonder about, back to trucking, truck scales, when it's law enforcement related, are you involved with those, which never seem to be used anymore? No, they're used up. The one in Bennington, which is on the state highway there, has been closed for a decade, I think.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: A lot of them, the ones on the side of the road, a lot of them have been used. Excuse me, closed. They have some scales. They're more portable trailers that they use. But the thing that they they use a lot and our inspector, Dwight Burtt, is a lead on this. The DMV has what they call portable wheel load wires, and the DMV inspectors, road enforcement folks all have a set of these. They carry them in their vehicles. They are they're very thin. They're about this tall, very thin, and they slide them in. They carry they each carry around eight, and they're designed to put in front of a truck tire and have the truck go forward and weigh on that. They have a little dial. They have a capacity of 20,000 pounds. So they would put those in front of every tire and then add the weights up. And we certify those and weights and measures has some authority over devices used in law enforcement. And we have a really great program. December Dwight met, and they did 220 of those scales. Were they accurate? Yeah. Most of them. I'm sorry. I most of them are are accurate. Most most of them are accurate. But, again, with all devices, they can float off. And the DMV inspectors themselves have gone to training and classes. We work cooperatively with them, and they have capability to make adjustments and do repairs on those that float out of tolerance. Once in a while, one will just break and we just you know, it can't be repaired or it can't be adjusted enough. So we advise them to throw it out.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Those those big truck scales, whether the platform or whatever, it's when the truck pulls on to them and slam the brakes on. It's really, really hard, Sean.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: And the scale? Yes.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah. It is. It is very, very, very hard on that. I was called into court many, many years ago. Been here thirty seven, twenty five years ago. It was down close to the Connecticut River gravel pit that was at the bottom of a hill. And it was an old mechanical truck scale and in very good condition, but someone came off of that hill and very, very heavy truck, a 10 wheel truck, and they came onto that scale. And so they told me, I don't know what happened, told me they came onto that scale way too fast and they hit the brakes. And from what I heard the description that the scale went they're designed to float a little bit and you creep onto them and they float. And that hit that hit the wall, cut bang. That way, hit the wall to bang that way. Hit the wall to bang that way. And then it did this, and then everything collapsed on the pit. The scale of the truck and everything collapsed in a six

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: foot scale.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Ouch.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: And that ended up being, I don't know, back then twenty five years ago, a half $1,000,000 lawsuit. And we had had the pleasure of just being there, I

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: don't

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: know, eight weeks before the accident and approved it and had our sticker on it as it was. It was very interesting. I saw pictures of this truck in the pit and and broken pieces everywhere. It was fascinating to see. So, yeah, there's a lot of wear and tear on a truck's go.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Well, yeah, go

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: ahead. My mind keeps going back to this gold kilogram. Okay. I'm just wondering, how in the world could it change if it's sealed, it's not gonna absorb water or anything, if it doesn't have fingerprints on it or dust, how did it change?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Yeah. Well, I'll tell you right off the bat how I can understand some weights change. And we have standards that in our laboratory with environmental controls and this and that, check standards. And we monitor I don't want to bore you, but we have control charts. We run check standards. We have our standards that really good traceability. We run our check standards through and we monitor their condition. And we run these charts with data points. Then you can see how that weight is going. That weight's going like this. That's when all of a sudden starts floating off and then starts floating off. So we had one in our lab that did that. And they can do that once in a while. The one that was in Paris, France, the environmental controls and everything else, it took a long time for that to happen. But you're talking when that was established. If you're talking a century, the metal itself ages over time. There can be some, I understand, a little bit of loss. Wait, you're talking The amount that they check for is unbelievably precise. And they had multiple labs. I believe it was Traumner out of New Jersey that's done air weights before that they checked some of their standards coming out of there and monitored the change that they picked up. It is so tiny.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: And I shouldn't be speculating out loud on this, but whether it's atomic, like how it's atomic Yeah. Levels

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: could get down to that, that just some of the changes in that. We see a change without even being used on a brand new 25 pound cast iron weight. Hasn't been used. Know, they have a pretty new or whatever. And that cast iron, those new ones will change some weight over time. The cast is just about cast iron is not held in environment in a laboratory or made out of the stuff that this isn't. But that type of material will.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: I see at the atomic level, then there electrons and protons and metal changes and electrons don't weigh much, but for centuries, can go out. I guess that makes sense. So

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: is there a lot of excitement at all of my gold stuff when you have to when you get the chance to work on an old Fairbanks scales?

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: But a lot of my staff, they're they're I'm old schooled. I enjoyed working on the old stuff. And if you look at the history of the state of Vermont with Fairbank scales and and house scales, you can weigh Vermont at one point in time was the center of the weighing industry for the world. And Fairbanks and St. Johnsbury came up with a method of how to create a platform scale, and that design stayed in place for a hundred and fifty years. It's a beautiful thing to see, to go under a truck scale. But, you know, you have a platform scale, the old ones, the mechanical ones, you pop one of those up and you take a look and then you go under a truck scale. It's all the same. The designs are the same. The the theory behind it is the same. It's all done on levers and and conversions because if you know, if if on the truck scale, you know, everything is weighed and it all feeds into this big lever that feeds into that that that arm. It's all based on ratios based on certain things. And there was an old service person, Mr. Bernard William St. Johnsbury, who started his business in 1941. And he worked until he was almost 90 with his son took it over. But he had the capability to get a truck scale and get your arm that feeds into that beam. And he could put your ratios, hang a 10 pound weight, for example, on that beam and correctly calibrate that truck scale using a 10 pound weight to 10,000 pounds. All based on ratios. And it was a it was a. A there science, but there was an art to it that's now lost. You use to me, scales used to have a personality. You know, I could tell you what its characteristics were, how it was gonna operate. You know, it's almost like it had its own character to it. And the service companies could adjust it almost. It was an art form to do it. The new the new guys, they just wanna put a weight on it and and read the and read the note. And they they want that for everything they do.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Young people today, they're This has been fascinating, Mark.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: It it

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: really is. I I am

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: sad I'm I'm missing that day. Yeah. Well Uh-huh. Well But if he sends us the the walk through to our web page, I will look

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: at we'll have somebody over the phone taking us Maybe we're experience. Yeah.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: But please, someone has gotta give, you know, Dwight Burtt had a hard time or say, poor Dwight, you have to sit with Nelson and committees. He's bad in your committee as he is an hour.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Welcome, mister.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We will yeah. We'll be sure

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: to do that. He's a great guy. Thanks.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: And, would it be okay if I just shared a couple closing comments if And that would be we may be back in front of you folks testifying, look forward to it if we can be helpful or answer any questions. But we talked about a lot of older technology and and standard traditional things that we've done. But you're really on our our list that we're doing a lot of work on are the electric vehicle service equipment for electric cars. And so they were really involved in that. And my counterpart who I I'm I'm so pleased with his performance. We're in Alabama at the interim NCWM meeting last week last week, Tuesday, and he gave a a ten minute PowerPoint presentation in front of 200 people from all over the country, regulators on what the state of Vermont is doing. And the state of Vermont is very well known now nationally for our efforts with this. It's difficult, confusing, challenging, frustrating, but we're making headway. And I'm so proud of those folks. I wanted to mention that. Cannabis scales, the cannabis industry. We, again, so proud of my staff, a different type of commodity, incredibly high priced. I ran the numbers, roughly $5,000 a pound. And we advised, it took us a while. We will slow out of the gate, but it took us a while. And we've been working with cannabis for a little bit and advising them on the proper devices, scales to get. And again, where it's a direct sales scale to make sure the customers are protected. And we've done some package weighing, which is incredibly challenging on weights that are so fine. We had a lot of debates. Believe it or not,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: just mentioned the product.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Oh, yes. We have to be I've had some debates with some of the folks internally and a couple around the country. I can't believe thirty seven years ago, would even discuss this. But if you have a joint and they're selling by weight, just the paper, is it cannabis or is it not cannabis? Is it part of the product or is it tear weight? Is it packaging weight? $5,000 a pound. And I had a gentleman of the cannabis industry call me and he said, I know what I'm going to buy for scale. I'm so happy. I know where you're getting it on. It's on Amazon and it's this and that. And so dual shipping scale and bathroom scale. And I said I don't usually raise my voice or yell, but I think I raised my voice, I yelled a little. I just said, no. I was so, from my point of view, metrology, no.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: And he

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: said, what do you mean? And I said, just think $5,000 a pound. This is your cash register. What's your division size? If you're a division you know, you have an ounce in here that's point o six pounds, you can it it'll round in turn. The scale will round up or down. I said it can be accurate, but the rounding alone, you've got dollars and dollars and dollars of.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I know.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Almost like losing a penny. You know, when you say, no big deal, it's a penny. Well, if you do 12,000 transactions, you lose 2¢ on every one.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: I know. Know. And the last thing I was just going to mention, the unit pricing update, that's been a big initiative we've been working on. You folks may want us to answer some questions on it.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah, so unit pricing and then EV measuring equipment. That It's

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: called EVSC, electric vehicle supply equipment.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: We're gonna see that EV stuff.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Oh yes, we have the testers down there, absolutely. If there's anything you would like to see, and we forget you prompt us, please.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay? We will talk to you if we don't see it. Thank you.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: And thank you so much for the chance to come and chat. It's very enjoyable. Always like talking about our program.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Look forward to seeing you again on Thursday then.

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: Thank you so much.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So just last thing before we go, and we'll stay on, so back to this chart. Gonna suggest that we green light everything, although maybe yellow light the MOU one at the bottom, just to take care that we did look at these. We didn't just say,

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: we

[Marc Paquette, Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets (Weights & Measures Section Chief / State Metrologist)]: don't have

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: time on this. But I think that that's probably appropriate. And I think everything else here, honestly, feels like we should continue this. And

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: as we get them, we can say, yeah. Yeah. Don't keep. Yeah. And there's often questions about the chart, but I

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: don't we'll have to see you guys.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: See you. Take care. Turn this off. I'll have to grab the command and it's going out again. Or baby Tucker. We can go off.