Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Ernest "Buster" Caswell]: With rural Vermont, I had a a short little brief thing overall, but, sure, I I'd be more than happy to talk about farmworker housing.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Great. If you just wanna introduce yourself so that those those folks listening out in the rest of the world know who you're you are and what you do.

[Ernest "Buster" Caswell]: Sure. My name is Ernest Caswell, commonly known as Buster. My grandmother wanted a Buster, so here I am. I work at Champlain Orchards. I live in Bristol, Vermont, and I wanna make it clear that I'm not speaking on behalf of champagne orchards at all. And I've former board member of Pastone Corporation, which is in nine states and Puerto Rico. Pastone administers the federally funded National Farm Workers Jobs Program, which has two areas in that federal funding that gets administrated to off 50 streets in Puerto Rico. One of it is employment and training and safety. And then the other one is housing. During the last administration, the National Farm Workers Jobs Program on the housing bucket, Vermont was not on the list. It seemed like the West Coast got a lot of priority of, but it's not. And and the housing bucket of that federally funded program did many things, included emergency services for farm workers and technical support. For example, our community development, bringing folks together and so on. I haven't evaluated specifically H four zero three, But farm worker housing needs a lot of attention, and I'm hoping that farm worker housing is in the budget as a line item because the funding's coming from Vermont Housing and Conservation Board. And we wanna keep that ongoing because the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board can make its own decisions. And when they get allocated, that's in the budget specifically for farm worker housing. It adds additional leverage to keep the programs that had just started a couple years ago on going and and it's been very successful, underfunded, and it's Champlain Housing Trust that that is working on those kinds of things. And along with farm work housing, Champlain Housing Trust also has compliance. They just inspect the homes, making sure they're up to the state codes and other things. They have a specific checklist and I think it's very useful tool and a very useful resource, but that's just focusing on the farm. Something that's missing in Vermont. Yes, we do have a farm worker housing needs assessment that came out in '21, published by the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board and it's only 65 pages if you haven't read it yet, I suggest you do. And it focuses again on the farm housing and then it was that report as well as the work of the farm worker housing Addison Group. I've been suggesting we create and formalize that ad hoc group. And once it created and formalized, it could bring you folks and housing developers many recommendations and suggestions that in the housing world, they don't have. Okay. In order to invest in farm worker housing, you have to demonstrate the needs. I may name I know the needs. The farmers know the needs. The farm workers know the needs. But it's not on paper and it hasn't been demonstrated within this state of Vermont much like it has in other states. Other states have working groups. They've got committees. They've got task force, depending on what state you look on. Oregon even has a tax credit in many strategies how to get there. Many legislators have put in place a working task force or a working group just so they can make the best decisions on developing homes, both on the farm and off the farm and in agricultural communities that they might not find in their normal housing needs assessment because your normal housing seeds needs assessment is one complicated and its main focus is on the work that they've been doing for several years. Build homes for seniors, build homes for low income folks, build shelters for the homeless, and address other community needs. Now, the Vermont Finance Agency, it's outside their box. They don't know agriculture. Agriculture doesn't know housing. You bring those together like the ad hoc groups have done, you have success. And we have to continue that success. And to grow homes, to meet our food securities of the future, and hope that COVID never comes again. We need to be prepared. And during the COVID pandemic for the first time in history, farm workers are essential. I know that they always have been, but for the first time they were essential. And a few years ago the USDA, because of the work in the critical nature of providing food to our communities, the USDA established a food and farm worker relief grant that brought $600 into agricultural workers' pockets if they applied for it. And many organizations, nonprofits have agencies of agriculture's farm worker organizations. They all work hard to go after those grants and then once they would, they were awarded, they went out and did lots of outreach to provide those food and farm workers with the $600 that was established during the COVID period for our farm workers. Now here in Vermont, our farm workers need to be considered essential much like our nurses and our firefighters, and we should be developing homes and off the farms in communities where farm workers live. You know, it's a necessity. Farmers need a home to live and so do their employees and housing in Vermont. As we all know, it has many problems. Some people call it a crisis. You might look at it that way if you're in need of an affordable home and there's simply no access to it. The waiting list on some of these nonprofit affordable housing units can be. So to continue providing food in our communities, much needed food grown here in Vermont, our farmers and farm workers need access to the land and they need to be able to build homes on that land if necessary and it also needs less regulation in our food supply system and farmers and farm workers, beginning farmers, you might think me anyways, that some farm workers certainly have the capacity and given the opportunities, they too can be farmers. And that includes all farm workers regardless of where they come from and we need to acknowledge them whether they come from Mexico, Jamaica, South Africa, Canada, we all work together providing food and they all deserve dignity and respect. And we need dialogue, careful dialogue in listening to our farm worker organizations. And I'm gonna go a little off whip. We need not have fear yet. We need to be working with migrant justice and Melkwood dignity and other organizations. Migrant justice and Melkwood dignity have made many accomplishments And they structured their organization much like an organization in Florida, where they look at the deplorable conditions, unsafe conditions, and they amplify it and they bring it to the public attention. And then they strategize and they go after big corporate, like the one in Florida, their target is like Walmart in Wendy's, whereas the Migrant Justice and Not With Dignity, their focus has been Bennington Jerry's and now Hannaford's. But when you understand how their organization is structured and why, and there's many other organizations that are structured differently, you can come to appreciate all the accomplishments they have achieved over the years. And you'll have a less fear of listening to those folks when you understand how the organization is structured. We should be welcoming everybody who's willing to work on their farms no matter where they come from. Because they have such great skills and talents and they're willing to do the work that no one else wants to do, but they need a home to do that. They need privacy. They need respect and they need dignity and they need opportunity and they need compliance to make sure those homes are safe, just like other homes must be in compliance, like farm safety codes and whatnot. And one element, the h two a workers, when they come and they work on our farms, the farmers are required to have those homes inspected and make sure they come in to compliance. I don't know what agency within the state of Vermont is charged with that. It could be the agency of agriculture it could be the Department of Labor State Monitor Advocates System. Now the State Monitor Advocates System is charged out of federal DOL laws and they get funding and their duties are to listen to any complaints to advocate for the voices of the agricultural community. And I would have you look up how the State Monitor Advocate System works throughout the country. And here in Vermont, the State Monitor Advocate has been absent in over the last several years, except for the last two or three, I believe they have one, maybe two staff workers and they speak English and Spanish and they are trying to do their duties as well. And the only way we can work on this is to have freedom and unity and a lesson from Reverend Jesse Jackson. You cannot plant a seed and pick the fruit the next morning. We cannot plant a seed and pick the fruit the next morning. That farm worker housing repair program is a seed that got planted and it grew and it takes time. And the farm worker housing needs more time to develop. And I want to spare my time because you may have questions to ask.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: That's good. Thank you. Yeah. We have a few more minutes, and then very shortly, we'll have to stop and go downstairs and be on the house floor. But I'll see if there are questions, and thank you for your testimony. I know you've been very immersed in this issue for a long time and have done a lot of thinking about, a lot of investigating into what other states have done and thinking about what Vermont could do, And I think that, as you say, this is not a situation or this is not something that we can fix overnight and that we've made some strides with the the program through the Housing Conservation Board and wanna continue to invest in that. But there may be other things that we can do too. Let me see if if committee members have any other questions or comments. And that you're still there, right? I think you shut off your screen, I wanna be sure that we didn't lose you. Representative Bos-Lun has a question.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Yeah. So you mentioned a farm worker housing group and and Oh, he's not there? Oh,

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: okay. Oh. Let's let's wait a second and see if he comes back. Yeah. You're still there, Richard? That's Richard. Are you still in the car, Representative Nelson?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Are you driving to Burlington or Bradley or where are you going? Austin. Portsmouth. Oh, wow. That's a long drive. He's back. Okay.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Alright, Buster, can you hear us?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Buster, are you there? He's muted.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: He can hear us. Alright, why don't you ask your question again?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Okay. So Buster, you mentioned a farm worker housing group, but you didn't say exactly, you know, you said you wished it was more official, and then it could have more efficacy. But I'm wondering, do you have any specific

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Great.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Requirement. I mean, I was just wondering if he had any particular things that he thought we should be working on that he had learned from this group that he's in.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Yep. But

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: I can send him You have an email? He's written to us before. Yeah.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Yep. You know, if you wanna follow-up with an email, think that would be good. I think he has thought about that and would welcome having more of a conversation about it. Okay. So we're in the middle of a couple of things, and I know that some of us aren't here to Write this on. No. It's okay. Can leave

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: I'll leave participating, but I won't physically be here.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Okay. We're not planning to vote on anything tomorrow. Just wanted to say that we'll be off then for a week and back on Tuesday. And then we'll have four days and we'll be hoping to move forward with a full budget. Yeah. There will be work happening, but we're not here. Some of us will be some of us will be

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: Richard mute. He's gonna he might be remote tomorrow.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Okay. Alright. Good. Good.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun]: We'll both be remote, Richard.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Yeah. Anyway, if you're if you're working on a bill, thank you for helping to shepherd it forward. And and what would be most helpful, think, is for those of you who are taking a lead on adult to talk to other people about what is in the bill and what is working, what isn't working for you. Today is Thursday, but I'll be back tomorrow. So I think I'll give that speech again tomorrow.

[Unidentified committee member]: I'm going to be in environment testing fine.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: In the morning? Okay. For a while. Okay.

[Unidentified committee member]: Who knows how long I'm in it. I don't know where I am on the line.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: I think tomorrow's house floor won't be terribly long necessarily. So we will be here after the house floor, whenever that is. And Jill does report,

[Unidentified committee member]: I don't know that everyone, but that there are additional things today that are getting kicked down the road because I think a reporter is. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So And it's not just one bill. Might be maybe it won't So long

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: if we're think if we're done early and anybody wants to come back here just to chat informally, we won't be meeting, but I'll be here.

[Unidentified committee member]: That's not right this afternoon. Yeah. If anybody wants to stop back and just check-in. I'll check-in. Okay.

[Committee Chair (unidentified)]: Alright. We're good.