Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

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

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: All right. So thank you.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Okay. So Sophie Sedatney for the Office of Legislative Council. Yesterday, was in here testifying on H403, which is the minimum wage for agricultural workers bill. And there was conversation around if you increase agricultural workers to the state minimum wage, and that's an added cost for I mean, some farmers are already paying that, but some are not what happens with the housing allowance that's permitted? And yesterday I testified that you couldn't go below minimum wage. I followed up immediately after the hearing with the Department of Labor to get clarification, and they followed up with their division on wage and hour, who is the group that enforces the minimum wage laws. And they confirmed that you can deduct that housing allowance even if it brings an employee below the minimum wage. So I just wanted to be very clear with the committee to make sure there wasn't any confusion on that. The language around this, it's in rules, it's in statute, it's just not crystal clear. So I wanted to confirm.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thank you. Representative Brecht, Vermont Department of Labor?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Not federal.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. So our Vermont Department of Labor has a wage and hour division that enforces it. It's a complaint driven process.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: And then also, when you said housing, what about there's on that table that included food?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. Yes, that's Yeah, same thing for that as well. I just know that housing was the main concern that the committee had. Okay.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Representative O'Brien. So going in the other direction, if you were a farmer and you were paying a wage, below minimum wage, you would still have to, with that housing figure that's added to it, you'd still have to be above per month minimum wage.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: Yeah,

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So if you raised the individual workers' hourly rate up to the state minimum wage, you can then go ahead and deduct the housing allowance, even if that brings them below the state minimum wage. That was where the confusion was.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Okay, so I was just thinking in de facto terms, if you can't then hire an ag worker for $13 and then have the housing added into freedom above Vermont minimum wage.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right, you would need to do it as

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: The other way. Then how it's the same, ultimately.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right, right. Okay,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: so in doing so, it increases the FICA payments.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. And I did clarify with the with the department that the housing allowance comes off the gross wages,

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: if that's

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So it increases state taxes paid, federal taxes paid, PICA taxes paid.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So is that a question, or is that you're asserting that?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I am asserting that I did follow-up. Asking Representative Nelson. Oh,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: I'm clarifying. You didn't say the same sort.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So I think the question is, for the purposes of paying either federal tax, state tax, or Social Security, Medicare, that's calculated off of the gross wage. And then the employer can, under state law, deduct a certain amount if they're providing housing, and that becomes, along with all the other deductions, that becomes what the employee gets. That's right, okay. Richard?

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: I don't want to open up this box, but No, go ahead.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So if you're paying somebody already well above minimum wage and you're supplying them housing, do you have to put that on their wage too and make it gross wage so they have to pay tax on top of that as well?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I think it's up to the individual farmer whether you want to charge for the housing. If you haven't been charging for it, you don't have to charge for it. I mean, it's just it's an allowance. You're allowed to deduct that amount.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: All right. So if we're ready to move on, I will share the

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Let's sure. Let's go ahead and share that.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And just a quick run through from yesterday. So this is just going through again the definitions for an employee in terms of who has to be paid minimum wage in overtime And what this amendment does, as no change from yesterday, this scoops in now agricultural workers into the definition of employee. Students continue to be excluded. And then in Section two, agricultural workers would be entitled to the state minimum wage, which again is not specific in the statute, but the current calculation is $14.42 an hour. This bill would go into effect 01/01/2027, so likely the minimum wage will be a little bit higher come January. And then the second section provides that this now carves individuals working in agriculture out of the overtime provision. So consistent with federal law, they would be subject to state minimum wage, but not the state overtime requirements. And then this is the new language. This adds in a requirement for the Commissioner of Labor, in consultation with the Secretary of Agriculture, Food and Markets, to submit a written report to this committee, House General and Housing, and then the equivalent committees on the Senate side on the lodging allowance that employers are entitled to deduct from an employee's wages. If you wanted, that could also include the meals and things. But I know the housing was really the concern that the committee had. And then subsection lists what specifically you would want the report to address. So the background on how lodging rates are set, whether the current methodology for calculating lodging rates should be updated, whether there should be a separate lodging rate for farm worker housing, and any recommendations for legislative action. So that was the change to the bill. Again, same as before, this would provide that the minimum wage would go into effect 01/01/2027, and then change the name of the bill if it were to pass. Do

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: you have at your fingertips what the current housing allowable deduction is? Yes.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So these again are the numbers for 2026. These numbers would probably also go up a little bit in January. I know there was a question yesterday about where did they start in 2009, and the nightly lodging in 2009 when this calculation, when they started this, was $3.73 a day or a night, and $22.43 a week. 3.73. A day and 22.43 a week. That was in Adjusted every year. Right, and that's where we're at now. Using that calculation.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Okay. Go ahead, Charles. When it says the report shall address the background and how lodging rates are set, are we talking those?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes, yes. And again, it's specific to lodging. Again, if you wanted it to include the meals, we could include the meals. I just know that was not where the focus was for the committee.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Those meal prices are almost as good as the school lunch price.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Representative O'Brien. Sophie, did you find the equivalence for H2A?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I did. So this was from a presentation that I believe this committee received, And so I didn't have time to do a separate graphic for you, but this was what was presented. And again, this was an interim rule that was issued in October for the H2A program, and then it lists out the numbers at the bottom for Vermont. So what this new rule is seeking to do is coming up with two different tiers. There didn't used to be two tiers for H-2A. And so this is the new level. So $15.96 for the lowest paid folks, and then $14.53. So that Sorry, on the one side is the average for US workers. The maroon colored is the H2A over here. So fourteen thirty five is a little bit below the current fourteen forty two. So if this bill is passed, an agricultural worker, and I believe an H-2A worker, would then be entitled to the $14.42 rather than the fourteen thirty five. But this adverse compensation adjustment on the far side here, that deduction of $1.61 that's now to take into account the housing. Because before for H2A, you had to provide free housing. So you still have to provide free housing, but now the employer gets to have that deduction of the hourly rate.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So this is confusing. And I'm going say it's not you who are making it confusing, but I think we should understand. So it seems to me that it's a parallel situation that what we have here with that 161. That's the housing cost. So they're deducting that from the wage, or they're allowed to deduct that starting this coming year.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And that's a deduction on an hourly rate. Again, the Vermont one is structured a little bit different. It's a weekly rate rather than coming off the hourly rate.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So in this case, is the the blue number I can't really see. I can't really

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: see the number. Yes. I don't know if I can make I can probably make it bigger. The blue number is for US workers. Again, this is to do with the new rule that they have. The H2A in that same category. I think this is just to demonstrate at federal level that they're not disadvantaging US based workers.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thank you. Representative Bartholomew. Is

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: there anything in this that, if you have a farmer that's offering housing, does the worker have to take the housing? Are they required? Is there anything in this that requires them to take off the housing?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I mean, it's

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: They could say, I'm going to

[Rep. John L. Bartholomew (Vice Chair)]: take the wages, keep your housing, I'm going to go live somewhere else.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. Right. Yeah. I mean, unless I don't know if a farmer would say it's a condition of you working for me, is that you have to be in this housing, and that might be a separate issue. But the bill is not addressing that.

[Rep. John L. Bartholomew (Vice Chair)]: Is there anything that would keep the farmer from saying that if you want to rent housing, I'll I'll rent you this this space, but at fair market value, where that table wouldn't apply at all. The employee would say, take this or I'll, you know, go live somewhere else.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So I think you'd have to be very clear on on whether or not the housing is connected to the job. Right? So if you if you rent if you say, you can rent this house. I have this available. You can rent this house from me. That's a separate relationship. That's a landlord tenant relationship that you're establishing. If you're dissatisfied with that employee's work or whatever, you choose not to continue to employ that employee, you're going be bound by whatever the landlord tenant arrangement is.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Maybe this doesn't have to do so much of this way, but on the overtime side, do workers and let's say ag workers, what are you required to do after your forty hours? Like, can you, if you were an ag worker, could you tell your employer that you've done your forty hours and you don't want to work anymore? I mean, sometimes they may only work eighty hours, but I was just wondering what your rights are as an ag laborer when you're getting into those overtime hours.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So as the employer, you're required to pay the employee for all the hours that are worked, but right now they're not entitled to overtime. So from the employer's perspective, if somebody works sixty hours, you have to pay them for sixty hours. And again, if there's disagreements between the employer and the employee in terms of, I don't want to work sixty hours, that's just part of the normal employment relationship. Again, that's not really impacted by this.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Okay. But you potentially could be fired for not wanting to work over your forty hours a week?

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. I mean, there's different claims. Yeah, usually there's a whole lot of background that goes in behind something. So they may I don't want to suggest that you could never have a claim. You could certainly have a claim of some sort. If somebody takes the job understanding this is a dairy job, the hours are very long, that's the expectation. I think there are, again, there still would be subject to some of the rules around the ability to take sick leave, etcetera. So other employment laws would kick in. But yeah, the general principle is, yeah.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Great. Any other questions? So right now, that amendment that you have on the screen, Sophie, the only changes it makes to existing statute are removing the exemption for agriculture workers who are adults. Effectively, it does that, and it creates a study group or something at the end.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah, this wasn't framed Again, this was just simply asking Right. It was just simply asking the Commissioner of Labor and then in consultation with the Secretary of Agriculture, Food and Markets to just sort of revisit and then submit a report to the General Assembly. Presumably, these committees would want to have the Commissioner of Labor and or the Secretary of Agriculture, Food and Markets come in to discuss the housing allowance. Should that be tweaked in some way? Should there be a separate one? Again, I don't know how many employers offer housing these days beyond in the farm sector. But again, it would be just interesting to get an update, I think, the calculation itself hasn't changed since 2009.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Realistically, if we said today, here's what we think the rate should be, it should be adjusted by inflation going forward, that makes sense. What doesn't seem to make sense to me is how they came up with that number, three seventy three or whatever it was, first place in 2009 for a night under a roof. So once that report came back to the legislature, the legislature could then decide to change that number.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Right. So currently, in state statute, the authority is delegated to the Commissioner of Labor to set those to set the allowances. So again, depending on what information you receive, the legislature could take that away or provide some further direction on what those allowances should be. But right now, the Commissioner of Labor has the authority that's been delegated to the Commissioner by the General Assembly to make that determination.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We don't delegate, I'm just thinking out loud here, we don't delegate to the Department of Labor what the minimum wage should be. That's been the source of many contentious discussions in this building. And I'm not sure why that other number would be any different, but

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: We delegate at least a COLA increase in all those numbers?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Think that's-

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Not a specific dollar number, but the rate of federal increase.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. I mean, I think that that's what is delegated right now, short of, is that

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Because those aren't even close to following COLA if it's only gone up that much.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah, okay. I was assuming that it was following, but maybe it's not. No, it doesn't.

[Sophie Zdatny, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Currently, the calculation is increased by 5% or the percentage increase of the consumer price index. So it's seeking to do that, but I think it's, again, it started from a very low place.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Inflation was low for a number of years. It starts to get back the fastest.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It missed '22, I can tell you that.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Any other questions for Sophie? So any other questions about what currently this draft does, whether you like it or not? Think that's maybe the way to put it, because we're losing Sophie here. She has to go to her next committee. Thank you.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: You, Sophie.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Any other conversation on this? I'm not

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: sure that I care, but I'm wondering what the commissioner of labor would say about having to do this report. As I said, I'm not sure that

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I care. Yeah, no, that's a legitimate question. Yeah. I mean, normally, we we would if we were assigning a new report to the secretary of agriculture, we would get their you know, let them know and see what their reaction is.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. My thoughts on this is I hate dictating how much somebody's gonna pay when they don't have any control over what they get paid for the product they're selling. Sure. And and that's the issue I have.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So you're talking about dairy milk? Yeah. Yeah. I'm talking. Yeah. Dairy. Yeah. You're

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: you can't we're not allowed to raise our prices. We can't say the cost of our labor's gone up. We need to get paid for our product. And a couple states a couple states that have changed it, do so much more for their agriculture than we do here in Vermont, and we don't have the money here in Vermont to do so much more. But just the fact that if you change how that housing is figured and having to pay tax on it is another added burden. So it's just, you know, and and and dairy farmers cannot you know, right now, we're getting hit with fuel surcharges, which boy, Jack, they have a hard time remembering that fuel dropped back down to to cheaper price, don't you? You know? That fuel surcharge all of a sudden comes home. And And, you know, it's just, you know, farmers don't don't get a chance when wages go up in the school district, pass along taxes. When wages go up in a store, they can absorb so much and they raise their prices. Raises wages go up in a through union negotiations at shop. If they need to, they increase their the price of the product going out the door. In agriculture, we can't do that.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: As as whole lot. Yeah. It's

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: increase. As Maddie said, the the farmer that said to her, well, if I have to pay my worker time and a half to pick an extra box of bok choy, can I charge 150% for that box of bok choy? And I know that you took overtime out of that. And and, the labor market is so tight. It's so tight as you saw driving in the other day. You know? If you're not paying your employees well, you're not gonna have employees. Well,

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: what you're saying too, I mean, it's interesting that if we changed it, the real wage for the ag worker might stay exactly the same. So you pay the minimum wage, but then you deduct. So they're getting $13.69, say, an hour, as opposed to you're paying them $13.69 dollars and they get free housing.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: And they get free house without paying. But do

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: you say the farmer gets dinged if we change it?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: What are the stakeholders like migrant justice, etcetera? Migrant justice was very much in favor of all three changes, two changes plus the survey that they testified. And the Farm Bureau didn't really stake out a position other than to share survey results, which included some percentage in the twenties, I think of of their members who've said that they paid less than minimum wage. And I don't know how big that survey was, Amber didn't know for sure. NOFA supported the first and third pieces. The Dairy Producers Alliance did not want to come and testify. They wrote that they did not support the overtime and they did not think that the survey was helpful. They didn't address the minimum wage letter. That's posted on our page. So, We can ruminate on that. This morning, we had on our agenda the baby food bills just to discuss, and we didn't get a chance to talk about that. We will have Katie coming in tomorrow morning before we go onto the floor to be with us and hear any thoughts on that. But I just wanted to see if anybody in the committee after the testimony we had last week, or I'm sorry, this week, yesterday, the day before, had any thoughts on any changes we might wanna make to that, or if we like the bill the way that it's currently drafted. So the testimony was from the Infant Formula Association, and the latest draft had or does incorporate removes that exemption for an infant formula. So just wanted to see whether anybody had any reaction to that that you wanted to discuss or try and get

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: into. I was not persuaded that we should change the legislation that we had drafted. I like having infant formula in there.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: They're not accepting it?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: It feels like it's backwards to say. I would just say, I think we should have both baby food and infant formula included as things that Vermonters will be able to assess.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I just wanna be sure that that is all confusing.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: It seemed like, echoing that, it seemed like a lot of the argument was that having the word toxin on the label would convince people that this is a toxic product, and that seemed like a weird argument.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It was interesting to find out that the FDA is now doing research and studies into it And being sincere, Dan would say, I thought Maryland would be further ahead with theirs. And I don't know if they really are not gonna go with it or if they are. I do worry that I don't know how many babies we have on formal at any one time, but 10,000, that's a

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: pretty small number in the whole scheme of In Vermont?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Or Yeah. In Vermont. Yeah. Well, they had 200 births a year at North Country Hospital.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: It's a major.

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

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We had 5,000

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: school grads. This nurse needs this.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: 4,000. And they're all important, every one of them, but are is that enough babies to make industry care, does industry say? They can drink almond milk, which would be just terrible. But, yeah, tell me, alright. Anyway, so, you know, I worry about, you know, if we were gonna go ahead with formula, I maybe would put even a further kick out date with a with a request that legislature look at it to make sure it's good to go before it goes. If you understand what I'm saying, instead of saying, you know, this is it. I'd rather say, you know, kick it out even another year and and wait to see what Maryland and California, Illinois, Virginia do so that we're not going it alone. But and and then if

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: I

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: don't know. I that's where I'm coming from. Just I mean, I I wanna do something and and absolutely on the food, and and I think it's important those kids all have something clean. Like, we've gotta, you know, have respect for the process too. And I'm hoping I'll keep waiting for your guy, Bobby Kennedy, keep coming ahead with the strong

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: food thing.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: On the record.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: The food thing, Michelle. Constituents.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: There's libel or slander or something here.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Yeah. Yeah. Let's just back pedal. We'll erase that.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: We're notwithstanding any allegiances here that we're just matching. I actually was swayed by the testimony we received the other day about some of the possible impacts of of young mothers cannot like they cannot like it, whatever, of being doing homemade formulas presented more risks than whatever the industry is currently at. It's with a lot of protections. So I'd be more moderate than Rep Bos-Lun or Rep Bartholomew, and I would I'm leaning to support obviously the baby food bill excluding formula.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thank you. Any other, I don't know whether your physicians were just correctly represented there, representative of autism and breathality.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Yeah, I want to be sure that I

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: But you're saying that you're

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: not gonna

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: I I can just say that, I mean, part of what the gentleman who testified about formula said was, Oh, mothers will see if they test a certain baby formula product and it's toxic, then they'll say, Oh, this is all terrible. Now I'm gonna go get some totally different product that isn't infant formula. And I just think that is actually honestly a ridiculous statement because there are dozens of possible infant formulas. And if I were a mother or anyone were a mother and they picked up a bottle and they tested a certain one and they're like, Oh, brand X has this level. I'm not gonna serve brand X to my baby. I'm gonna go over here and check brand Y. Oh, brand Y is lower. Great. Because there are lots of choices in infant formula. He was oversimplifying it and making it really almost absurd because it's like saying, Oh, I'm not gonna eat any fruit because I found a worm in my apple. That's just silly. Like, I think it's I don't think that that's really how people are gonna react.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: If I may read to you what it says on the Gerber baby food QR code, because I went and said, check it. No, so

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

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: There is a baby food bottle, there's a QR code, you scan it. Their transparency, you deserve. Our commitment to caregivers. Feeding tiny tummies comes with big responsibility.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: This is after you cue hard.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, it's after cue hard, it's the first thing came We know the presence of heavy metals and baby foods can be concerning. We are here to provide you with the peace of mind you deserve. Our quality standards are industry leading. We quality check our 300 plus ingredients before crafting each of our foods and test every single finished product for heavy metals. If you have any questions, our parent resource center is here 247. Love the Gerber family. And then you go to the next page, the piece of and it says, the peace of mind you deserve, and it shows where they tested in at. I then went to a another product, scanned it, and I could have done better. And and it and it how we ensure quality of every step. Happy family organics. And we are on a mission to change the trajectory of children's health through nutrition. We are proud to be a leader in baby food industry with among the strictest quality and safety standards in US led by our passionate team of quality and food safety experts. And then it says check your product. And and then here it gave a list of the different products and what their levels were. And they're all very low, and they're below the set of standards at the FDA, but because if they were above the standards, it would, go to feed the rodents outside

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Quick by the bait question, and then we'll move on to the next topic here. Does the package, I don't know if you got a picture of the package, does it say toxic on the label? I

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: didn't see anywhere where it said that, John.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I can't even remember. I don't like the belly button.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: No, I wouldn't put that on anything.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: No, and why would you list that? You list the concerns, it's all the wordsmith.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So the only reason I can imagine you would list it is if somebody told you that you had to, yep.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Okay, Ellen.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Hi. Would you like to come up to the table?

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

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So representative Lipsky, I don't know whether you were following the environment committee's testimony today, this afternoon even.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: I didn't know Jed was.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: He wasn't Jed. So the wood products manufacturing legislation that we looked at, I think we had a show at the end the other day supporting it. We didn't formally vote it out because the environment community is having a drive by, and they had that this afternoon. Yes. You were there, I guess, Ellen? Yes. And I heard through the grapevine that they didn't have any concerns. Is that your sense as well? Yes. Do we need to look at that bill? No. I think unless somebody wants to see it again, we could just have a vote then. So just the part that

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: they take no, amendments or kind of a scratch.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Is that why you're here, Helen?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, no, I think I was invited for the other committee bell. We just hold regulation, but I'm also happy to do what the committee's pleasure is.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Well, I

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: think it would be our I don't know if it would be our pleasure, but rather than have you sit there while we take a vote, because you're busy, if you wanted to give us an update on the other. I don't know if you were here to do that, because I haven't heard other committee.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: The environment committee did have concerns about the other committee bill seven seventy two municipal regulation of agriculture. They're concerned about the use of the tier one areas as part of that legislation.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Tier one tier one A and B. Okay. So not A and B, it's just tier one as A? Yes. Okay.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes, because those tiers haven't actually been finalized. We don't know how large those areas are or where they are yet.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Beyond that, is there anything that you were deputized to tell us?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I think the only thing the only other thing specifically I mean, they did have a long discussion this morning with Steve Collier and Josh Hanford, and we're pleased that there's continued to be collaboration between them. The only small suggestion I think I got was that if you're continuing with the study at the end of the bill, they would like to be one of the committees that receives the report.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Oh, yeah, we got that. Yeah, sorry. Okay. Yeah.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Then I think they also did they talked about the bill quite a bit. They did talk about the issue. You all did start to discuss when I was here last about when should farming have been taking place on that site. For your for purpose of your exemption, did you want it to be historically farmed or farming taking place at the time of this new regulation?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Right, yeah. And I did talk to Chair Sheldon about that and said that my belief was that we were trying to say very specifically that farming needed to be taking place now or at the time of passage or signature or enactment, whatever. So not previously, but it had to be taking place now. And I know it's confusing otherwise, that's what I think we wanted to do.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And so I made that change moments ago. So if you would like to see a version with that, I can give you that.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Well, I think that maybe what we should do is wait and hear from them about their concern. Why don't you bring it up? You're here. We've got a few minutes. Okay.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I never bring my laptop to committee because I get really nervous that you all are gonna ask me to do something. However, I brought it today in case you wanted to vote this out quickly. So I'm not rushing you. You have tomorrow.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yes.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: But if I can put it on the screen. Oh, okay. You only have six? I've got more than that. Maybe

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: we have more. Think

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: we have a couple more. Maybe it's eight. Although it's very tempting to vote it up quickly, I think that we shouldn't because we did ask the other committee to raise and we haven't heard back officially from them.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: What about other committee? America. That's America.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: We have to talk about sap and beets.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Are you ready for that conversation? Maple sugar. Cameron, how much time are you able to give us here?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: I have to

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: be in ways and means at 03:15.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. We'll try this.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So the l's and l's.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Okay. When I was sitting over there, I was attempting to send this to Patricia, so I will do that as I am able to momentarily. There were a couple of just small changes. So this would be draft 6.1, but there are only a couple small changes that you all were just discussing. We all were just discussing. Okay. The findings have not changed. Neither has section one.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Is it tier one or tier one and B? I mean, sounds I say tier one, two parts of tier It looks like it's saying A and B that just flashed by.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. Okay, so I was saying tier one as a whole because they have an issue with the whole concept of using any tiers. Your bill does reference specifically both tier 1A and tier 1B.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: That Charles, is that

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Well, so what do we want as committee? Like, did they say no, they don't approve it, and then we need to come up with a different idea? We've got their own opinion and we just keep what we had before?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So we're not really, I think, making that decision right now. This is what we sent them with to review. It's what we had left in front of us, it was one a and one b. Yeah. Or just one for convenience sake. But for some reason, they would prefer everyone likes us to say one A and one B rather than one.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: You've seen different criteria in the

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: law to qualify for an expediency. They prefer not to use that reference at all.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. So they don't like the idea of our bill having anything tier related, period, that we just heard, at least through alleged counsel. But this is what we sent them, and there are a few other things that were just cleaned up that Ellen is showing us. And this is just a refresher. Here's what we sent them with these few things cleaned up.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes. They did also discuss whether or not you should take out or line thirteen and fourteen be taken out, given that it is slightly redundant, because if a building is open to the public, it will need to comply with the Building and Life Safety Code.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Yeah. I I think we had come to a similar conclusion.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And then for your exemption or your carve out here down on line 19, this is what we were just discussing. So a parcel refarming is taking place as of 07/01/2026 that has changed from your prior draft 5.1. That has been conserved agricultural purposes or, and this is I also wanted to follow-up on this farm structures built prior to 07/01/2026. Did you want to keep that? Yes. Okay. So that is one change that's in draft 6.1. And then, I guess the other one is just here at the top of page five. At the top of page five in your prior drafts, what was subsection c was a provision that said, municipality may be less restrictive and not do this. In briefly talking to the chair a little while ago, you had indicated that perhaps that should come out. And so that's why when as I was drafting this a little while ago, I took that out. You can put that back in. I can go either way on that because I do think you do use may language in this section, so a town may or may not choose to regulate under this version regardless.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So I think that the I just wanted to pull up the previous version.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And that was 5.1.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Couple of Sorry. I'm coming in wrong place here. Page five. It's used in this section.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And so the previous language was subsection c. Less

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: restrictive.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Yes, less restrictive.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Municipality may adopt a bylaw concerning farming that is less restrictive. And you're saying that we know that, we don't need to say it?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah, because in the language above this, it does say may. So they may choose to do this in tier tier one A or B or they may not.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. I think it's fine to leave it out. Think fewer words is better if you're accomplishing the same thing. And

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: then the only other change I was literally typing was adding the committee down at the bottom, the environment committee.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay, adding the Senate committee, I think, should get it as well.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, okay. Yep.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: House Environmental Committee is getting it. Okay. Are you ready for questions about sap and bees?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, Cameron is here, and so we can't do a lot of hypotheticals about sap.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah, we have five minutes for

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: I have a different question.

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

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: So, Ellen, on the piece that says properties that were conserved for farming, does that sentence say it, Are those two different things if you go there?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Are two different things.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: So one exception is where farming's been taking place. Another, so it's or essentially.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: There are three options in this sentence, yes.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: So is that Can you be conserved for agricultural purposes but not be farming when this law takes effect?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes, that is how it is phrased currently. If you would like to change that, you can.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: I'm just confused on what that

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: scenario looks like. So that is a scenario where we have multiple existing programs where land is conserved for agricultural purposes.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: No ag is taking but no farming is taking place.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Correct. And I don't know the universe of how many there are, but I thought it was I thought it was something you might want to include here. If you don't want to, you can take that out.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It's not by nature. Fluffside Farm in Newport. Land Trust bought it all. A lot of it right now is sitting by their the way they got it set up, in trails and and kind of foul light hand going on, and someday they may change your mind up. It's some of the greatest agronomic soils in Orleans County with the best growing.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: But in the easement, it says it's conserved for farming?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It's conserved for farming. So

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Okay. I was saying.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: No. So,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: you know, it and we wanna be careful that if it sits it is well, as I said before, it's where Heather should be farming.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Right. Yeah.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Right there in Newport, right in town with 20 Jersey cows. Representative Bennington?

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: Well, it is. I think you see there's a considerable amount of land in the state that's been conserved. The farms have gone out of business, and it's sitting there growing up to fresh. Right. The other thing I wanted to Ellen, you said that they didn't want that in in tier one, they just they didn't like the term tier one a and b because they don't know what it is.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And it's not for that reason. It's they know what it is. They don't think we all Well. Know the universe yet. And so knowing how much land this actually involves is difficult right now to predict because that process is not finished yet. So when we're reviewing

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: Act two fifty applications, we don't need to talk about it yet because it hasn't been decided.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It doesn't exist.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: Yeah. So why, Bob?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. Because it will invest yards. It's been in two years. Representative Lipsky.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Yeah. I I actually

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Is that Greg? It was a great mistake.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: I actually concur with the reasoning of the environment committee that the maps haven't been created, the districts haven't been created, it's a concept, so I see no problem with their suggestion.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Well, their suggestion, like, have to start from square one. That that's

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: the only I do. Just take that one sentence.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Well, taking that one sentence out moves everything from this bill. It's all based on

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Well, then I don't hate her.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: I was

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: gonna take your temper to this bill.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I can see that they have a certain logic that's been saying that, and Jack just expressed that like that. Yeah, think that would be good, very well. But it would really take the heart of the bill out and not leave much. It would not solve the problem we're trying to solve.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: We might not be able to grow vegetables in a wildlife

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

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Also, the negotiations between the stakeholders like the league have used this language. Right?

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. Representative Burtt has his hand raised, and I just emailed Patricia. I is the what I I put on the screen so that it can be posted. I apologize. Yep.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: It's Alright. And then Okay. Representative Burtt, go ahead.

[Rep. Gregory “Greg” Burtt (Member)]: Yeah. I guess I'm more inclined to is it is it possible I'm I I'm on that same side of because we don't really know what tier specifically tier one b, I'm more concerned about is actually gonna look like to I think it's a I don't feel comfortable putting in being able to vote in favor of legislation that's using tier one b right now because I just don't know what the extent of that is. I would I've been thinking that maybe language like, you know, parcels that have access to both municipal sewer and water. To me, that's more straightforward for delineating. I I I at least I offhand. I don't know. Obviously, that opens up a can of worms, but I I don't think I can vote for anything that says tier one b because I just don't know what it is, and I don't wanna make a mistake on that. So I just wanna say that.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay. Thank you, Greg, and I appreciate your, you know, brainstorming on alternatives because that's maybe where we would have to go. You know? Before we let Ellen go, is there anything else that you wanted to ask about this draft and any anything? Please feel free to ask. What's up there? So so this is again, this is pretty much what we looked at last Tuesday and sent it to house environment. They've been looking at it. They flagged a couple of little things, and that's what we just talked about here. And now we will have to decide what are we gonna do. Real quick. Yep.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Wasn't the league in favor this and tier one a and one b? Yes. Yeah. Okay. And and. Overmont and NOFA. Kind of in favor of having tier one a

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: and one b. I think that all three stakeholders went into the house and environment committee and said they would be okay

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: with

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Greg, you're not muted. Yes. If you were there, maybe Ellen, I don't know if that is in fact what you observed, but.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: The testimony today was that from PLCT was that they had proposed a tier 1A and 1B. However, their language was different.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Their language different.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Their language was different.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: All right. A little bit. Why don't we thank Ellen for that Intel Thanks, update. We will stay in close touch over the next twenty four hours. We are, before we go to the floor at 03:30, gonna vote out the other bill. So don't let me forget to do that. Which one was that? The wood products. Left, yes.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: They're on that written on the

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: record of action. Cameron, come on up.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: An act relating to regulation forestry under act two fifty. Yes. And then I have this h seven h seven. Yes. When I go on this Internet device that the government by forming and type h seven eighty seven. It's not

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: h seven eighty seven. No. That's yeah.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: It says Theresa Wood is the

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: smartest No.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: That's a different bill.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yep. So what is the actual bill name?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So it is 26, and it's 26 dash instead of h. So make that note, and we'll take a vote

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: to support the

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Dash. Seven eighty

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: seven. No H. No H, yeah. It's because it's a committee bill. And it will be assigned a committee bill as soon as it is on the notice calendar, And then Gets an H. Get an H, yeah. Assign the committee number.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: So,

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Karen, since we don't know how we've only got you for a minute here. You updated the Breakthrough Garden. I had it edited.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And then you have a new draft 1.2 that I did provide to committee assistant. And there was, I think, two minor changes that our editing team made based on drafting style. So I think where we left off from this morning, we were talking about the regulation of structure and permanent versus temporary structure and whether or not it made sense to further develop that, either limiting the association in the language that you have or allowing the associations that ability to regulate amongst themselves. So I think that was one piece that we had left off with this morning is further discussion. But you do have a draft 1.2 based on the editing back from the team. Okay.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Where that's that's called strike all on our page. So does anybody feel strongly one way or the other? And if we don't hear anybody feeling strongly and inclined to leave things, generally speaking, the way they are. So, Kim, do you want to bring it up? Let's start with some. Representative Basil.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Yeah, I would just say, I mean, in terms of what Cameron was alluding to a moment ago, I feel giving maybe three examples of the type of structures that we think should not be restricted could be beneficial, naming particularly a see through fence, tomato cages and trellises or other support items to grow vegetables in a garden plot or something like that. Because I just feel like if we say, oh, we'll let the homeowners decide what's appropriate, they don't necessarily know what you need for gardening. And they might say, oh, that's so unsightly, that tomato page, it's made out of plastic and we don't like plastic or whatever. And so it just feels to me like a few basics that give the hint, like, this is what you mean. We need these basic things for gardening. You don't get to exclude those. You can exclude that it can't be twelve feet tall or something, but I don't know.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Page is that for? Page four, yes, sir. We're reviewing the subd division here. Seem to work.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. It's it's listed strike all.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: I think it would be under number one. Cameron. Let's see.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: When I hit strike all, it says this page doesn't exist. But when I

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Alright. Hang on a second here. Up at all. So under today's date Mhmm. If you look at Cameron Mhmm. See here. We've got version 1.2 amendment strike call.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It says version one amendment strike all.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Right. So refresh your page there and see if a new thing pops up because

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

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Things are happening quickly here.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yep, there it is. Thank you, chair.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Looking at page four. So as we discussed, I'm gonna scroll back to the bottom of page three. So you have the prohibition saying the association cannot unreasonably restrict or prohibit the use of a vegetable garden. And then in this section, you're saying

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Is that supposed to say unreasonably? Because it says reasonably. No, sir. I'm saying above in the sub b. Oh, okay. Yep. Yep. Yep.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And in the sub b up here on page, two. Yes, sir, page two. So we're saying that page two, line sixteen and seventeen, the association cannot prohibit or unreasonably restrict the installation or use of a vegetable garden. And then when we get to that page three and four, that's sub C, we're saying, but you can reasonably restrict these things. And

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: one of

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: them that was added based on the conversation from the other day about whether to give the association the authority to reasonably regulate certain structures that may be built on a vegetable garden. There's also concern about potential soil disruption, etcetera. So I added as a starting point the subdivision one. So it would give the association the authority to provide reasonable regulation of erection and installation of permanent or temporary structures. And you've been talking about whether or not to exclude from that specific types of structures, to say you can regulate your structures,

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: but you can't regulate these structures. So within, I would say, did you say a fence?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: I mean, fence, in thinking about it, it feels like maybe a fence would be the only thing that would really count as a structure. I I think, could it be so petty to say that you're that you're not I mean, because it wouldn't be the the other ones would be temporary. Yeah. But the offense would be a little bit more I mean, offense would be potentially in that category and could be helpful in having a garden and could be argued against by people who were concerned about aesthetics or something.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: You mean a fence around the garden or the rugs or

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: the peas to draw on?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: No, around the garden.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Would we solve that issue if we agreed that's what we wanted to do by saying at the end of one there in line four, with the exception of or excluding fences?

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah, I would think about it two ways. First off, keep in mind any regulations they put into place would have to be reasonable. And that's both in this section and separate. So there is the argument currently with the language as it is that anything that would be unreasonable would not be authorized. But as we talked this morning, and I mentioned directly, something that you may think is unreasonable, I may think is reasonable. So that's going to then just be up to the association itself as they're discussing how they want to regulate themselves. You can exclude entirely certain things. So you could say you can reasonably regulate the erection and insulation of permanent or temporary structures, except a see through fence to protect the garden itself or something to that effect, in which case you're saying you can't regulate that. And that's where I was mentioning this morning, depending on whether you want to mandate that or allow the community to resolve those things on their own is the policy direction that you all would have to choose which way you want to go. If you make that exception, though, keep in mind, you could be opening up a lot of points of potential issue. If you say, except that you can't regulate the erection of temporary see through fence to protect the garden, you then open up a lot of questions about what does that look like.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: What makes it a see

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: through bench? What is or isn't? Or to the point that was being raised, if there are certain aesthetic requirements that the community wants to meet or uphold, And so I put up a fence that the entire community thinks is unsightly and to use the word, to use the phrase that was used they wouldn't be able to do anything about it if you make just a blanket exception. And that's a policy decision for you all. I'm not telling you

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Just before we go any further with this, I suggested this morning, and maybe I am misinterpreting it, but that that language above that says you can't, doesn't say this word for word, but you can't functionally exclude or prevent somebody from having a garden. And if you are saying you can't have a fence and animals are coming in and eating everything, you have essentially prevented somebody from having a garden, in my interpretation. But you as the association might think differently, and then that court might ultimately decide. Yes, sir. Instead of that, okay.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: And so I think what you could say, we could try to get even a little clearer specific. Could draft it to say they can reasonably regulate the erection and installation of permanent or temporary structures. However, I could try to figure out how to word in there that the association must allow some sort of erection of a barrier to protect the garden, but the association can regulate the aesthetics of what that barrier looks like. We could go two steps down the thought. That way, you're allowing the community to have some management of what the thing looks like, but you're saying that you still need to allow somebody to erect some sort of protective barrier in place.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. The only thing I thought of just now, if you put a fence up and who has liability to that fence? Is it a person that has a garden, or is it the whole association? Because it's on association property. You know, somebody trips up. Someone runs in, falls on it. It doesn't I and hey, it I need to put a better fence up because the deer in our neighborhood love to eat Swiss chark. Yeah.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So I would just say to answer that, that was one of the concerns that was raised by Ms. Jensen when she testified was you're talking about allowing the use of common elements. Now, it's limited that the language is restricted to a limited common element. So it is for the exclusive use of the individual unit owner, but still a common element, is typically maintained by the association itself. And so the association would carry the insurance coverage on those spaces, etcetera. You do have in the language, however, that the unit owner would be responsible for any damage resulting from what is installed. Whether that includes some liability coverage, you could include that.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay, things get complicated quickly. I

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: was wondering, is there some catch all way, instead of getting more specific, of saying essentially like these vegetable gardeners, as long as they're following essentially like AMPs, can use whatever structures community feels have traditionally been used or used. Just when you said 12 foot high, I'm thinking, well, you could have full beans grow on 12 foot high stakes. So if you wanted to grow hops on a 20 foot, it's like there are certain methods for doing it that if they were accepted from growers out there, whether it's NOFA or anybody else, those would be fine. So we could catch them all that way. And if there was a dispute, you'd get somebody and say, yeah, this is actually, you need fencing versus charred, or you need 12 foot high stakes for

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I think you have to

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: go Cameron. I'll say just very quickly in response to that point, you have in the definition, you've excluded activities that are subject to required agricultural practices. Practices.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Right, I'm just saying somewhere, no first or some sort of farming, gardening group would have exactly channel three, Paul Nargosi. Right, exactly. There could be references if there was a dispute. Regards come in and say, yeah, this isn't wild. This isn't spy events or whatever.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Thank you. I just wanted to say, while I'm thinking of it, that the resources that were sent to me originally with this bill when somebody said, Take a look at this, it's interesting. It was really talking about gardens that didn't grow very tall. And I think the intent was to say we should allow people to put gardens in that aren't going to be very disruptive. And you can imagine some things are less disruptive than others. Yes. And in some cases, you're just gonna need a fence period to keep out rabbits and good junk, so.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: Jack? Just wanted to say, I built a nine unit, three triplexes on my farm in Georgia ten years ago, and I had the pleasure of being the head of the HOA that I sold them

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: all. And

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: like he said, when you have that HOA meeting, you're gonna have nine different opinions, and it'll drag on for hours.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay, good hear you remember. I'm gonna step out and I'll step Thank you. Michelle?

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Yeah, I'm just thinking now as we're talking about what we expect would be allowed and what might not be allowed, should we put some size limitations on this? It was like, if you're talking about, I mean, the woman that came in to testify who kind of started this whole bill, as I understand it, there's a big common amount of ground and she wants to use a little plot right next to her house to have, I think she called it like a salsa garden or a salad garden or something like that. And so, should we put some kind of numbers on that? Because otherwise it really could get out of control. If there's a giant shared property and somebody gets a rototiller and plows something the size of a football field and like-

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah, don't think that we need to do anything more restrictive to the bill that wasn't suggested. I think that we heard from, so we gave the opportunity to those organizations to say, no, this is wide open.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Yeah.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Having said that, then I don't think we need to be.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: So the understanding is that they would just work it out with whoever the entity was that might want to compromise.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, let rules. Let them set their own rules.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: One more question, yeah. I'm wondering if we could address this by simply taking out the word temporary, and since installation of permanent structures. So that would mean sheds, that would mean a solid wooden fence that might be ejection, but temporary stuff, it's gone. They can't regulate temporary stuff. Yeah, that's

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: a very thoughtful idea. So the trellis is temporary. The wire Temporary. Wire The six

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: foot wire temporary. No. A month temporary. No. You down every one.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: If you hire a company that's a fence in this permanent.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: A six foot deer fence, you know, that's what but isn't as long as it's not permanent. Yeah. You think? Use those metal stakes, found them in, put

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: your wire around, and roll your wire up. Yeah. Take your balls in

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: your five mile. I don't It just seemed like a way because we're going round and round and round. Yep.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yep. And a reminder that we all agreed this morning that we don't have to get it right the first time, and that the other body will have a chance to correct all of our mistakes. So

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: should we vote? Should we

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: get let's get would you call the role on Not on this. Not on this. Yes. On the laws of products manufacture.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: I'm prepared to write it to do so, Chairman.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Alright. So do I let me first see if I have a motion to if Mike, this is a committee bill. What's our motion supposed to be?

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: You just move to approve the bill for introduction.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Right. So so if I have a motion to approve for introduction this draft, what's the draft number? 56Dash787. 787, and it has a number. Just get it right. 3.2. Let me sit next. Representative Brigham moved that. Is there any further discussion? Alright. Do a second for that? We don't. I don't think we do so that they're to control the rules.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Alright. We're voting on an act relating to regulation for its gender act two fifty. It's dated March 12, committee bill, draft 3.2. And John Bartholomew, have your vote. Yes. Michelle Bos-Lun? Yes. Jack Brigham? Yes. Greg Burtt? Yes. Yes. Jed Lipsky, yes. Yes. John O'Brien? Yes. Chairman David Durfee? Yes. Vote is eight zero zero.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Pass. Right. Thank you. There's a lot of Bs in

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: our committee now. Lot of Bs.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Rules limit how many times Greg can vote, make sure that he wants to use one of his votes.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yes, because it's his first vote. We did talk about that. Think there are only three, and we're only There's a lot of session left,

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: so just want to make sure

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: that he wants to use the Okay. Greg, we're just pointing out that John just reminded us that you get three days when you can vote remotely and Remote. Wanna be sure that you're okay using this vote for one of those days. And this is the only vote we're taking today.

[Rep. Gregory “Greg” Burtt (Member)]: Yeah. I mean, I guess given the unanimous nature of our voting, I could go without voting on this one, chair.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: We don't know what's coming in the end of

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: the session.

[Rep. Charles Kimbell (Member)]: Anyway, that's all my own, though.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Alright. Yeah. Thank you.

[Rep. Gregory “Greg” Burtt (Member)]: So I don't know. Is it possible to revoke my vote on this one or not?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: I'm not sure if it is, Greg. Okay. That's all see. We'll figure things out.

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

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. Thank you. And and before you go first of all, thank you everybody for all of the work that you did on that bill, and thank you, Jed, for reporting it. Who's reporting? Jed is reporting it. It'll be on notice tomorrow, Friday. So that means next Tuesday, it would be second meeting. Ellen can help you with your bill presentation. Yeah.

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: It's been delivered to Yep. So before we leave for the day,

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: we need to consult with the clerk on that. Yep.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So it's committee bill. The chair has to email drafting operations to approve it. And then Cameron needs Cameron's the

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: director or Ellen? Ellen. Ellen.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Ellen has to also email drafting operations to approve it. You don't need the vote yet. Ultimately, it will go to the clerk, but right now

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Chair Durfee makes those communications.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So it goes to drafting operations with a copy of the okay. And the reporter of the bill. Yeah. Okay. Mike is here not just to help us understand the way things work, but with some feedback on that KFO language that Jared and Richard talked about this morning. Mike, do want to come up?

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: I share the screen?

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. Patricia will see.

[Ellen Czajkowski, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes. I've given you

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Thank you.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: You're just part of this KFO?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Pardon me?

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: You've part of the KFO study group?

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I haven't been going. No. I've just been getting updates. But Bradley gave me this language earlier today and have a lot of questions and concerns. And you'll need additional amendments to law if you wanna make this work.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Okay.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So last year in act 67, the bill that created the or transferred more authority to ANR regarding the regulation of concentrated animal feeding operations, we created a community study stakeholder group. And it was just a broad directive to ANR to engage key key stakeholders regarding the implementation and transition to a concentrated animal feeding program that conforms with the Clean Water Act. There wasn't there were no specific members. There were no specific dates. The only date in the bill is to report back by February '26, basically the results of the stakeholder group. Stakeholder group is ongoing. No report has been provided. Miscellaneous environmental amendments bill will postpone the CAFO general permit until September 2027. And so I have just language issues. This isn't an extension of the Act sixty seven stakeholder group because it's an entirely new group. So you should just call it whatever you wanna call it, but not an extension. First, other issue is that there's you're not gonna be able to convene this by July 2026. You probably won't pass any legislation that relates to this. And even if it's effective on passage, you're gonna have to get nine members appointed to this commission. You're not gonna get it done by 07/01/2026. So just be aware of that. And then you look at who is appointed. Actually, this sentence right here, if changes to the process are needed, the stakeholder group shall have direct access to the secretary of ANR and secretary of ag. I don't know what that means.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: What does that mean? Direct access. Yeah.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So I think that needs clarification. And then for the stakeholder group, who is appointing them? It doesn't say. And then it says livestock farmers that are in full compliance in good stead. I don't know what that means either. There's a definition of good standing in statute, which says that you don't have an enforcement action against you or a pending enforcement action against you. If that's the intent, would say replace full compliance in good stead with better in good standing with the agencies as defined under six PSA 48.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: you have the appointment issue. You have the appointment issue. Well, for the three ag tech service providers, you've named two. Why not just name the third? Or to or specify who's appointing who? Again, who's appointing the representatives from the environmental community? The executive director of the Conservation District. That's ex officio, that's fine. I will note that it's an unbalanced study group. You have eight members of the agricultural community and three members of the environmental community. And that may be what you want, But I just have to point that out. At the first meeting, they elect co chairs. Would not suggest co chairs. Co chairs, especially with this type of dynamic, can go really bad. I would recommend just having a chair elected by the group. And then this is where you get to the point where you might need amendment to other law. So discussions at the stakeholder group meetings regarding individual farms and possible permit violations will be considered confidential. This study group and study groups like this have been determined by the Vermont courts to be instrumentalities of the state. Instrumentalities of the state are subject to the Public Records Act and the Open Meetings Law. Because it's, a, a public body, the meetings have to be public. And the only way you can have confidential discussions is if you go into executive session. There isn't a specific executive session allowance that would allow this. So if you want this to be confidential and allow for discussions at these public meetings, you should probably specify that.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: We're supposed to be downstairs right about now.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I have a few other things. Okay.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Where did this liners come from?

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: It came from one of the three.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: Actually have to go 200 points,

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: so have to head out. So one of the three.

[Rep. Michelle Bos-Lun (Member)]: We're not voting on anything, man. Are we this way, he's like Alright. See tomorrow.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So the final thing says, I don't know when this stakeholder group ends. It seems like it goes on forever. And it's reporting quarterly, but it doesn't have to have any formal report. And that's really a decision for you. Then you have a third party auditor that is overseeing ANR's inspections. I think that that's gonna be problematic to EPA because part of what EPA wanted was ANR to be clearly in control of its CAFO program. And then you have a contract. This is gonna require an appropriation. I would think an auditor over two years that is educated and versed in this is probably at least $200,000.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: I may, if if this isn't gonna start until 2027 now, as you alluded to earlier, this is something that could be taken up next session.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, I

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: don't I don't know what the intent of this is.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Well, the intent so the intent was the stakeholders of the group in New York, the stakeholders still meet, and they've had their program for long time. Fifteen years. Yeah. And their stakeholders still meet and and and look at the program and say, you know, what can we do to make it better? Where is it working? Where is it? Where it isn't? And they still need and I don't know, after fifteen years what they're still looking at, but they still need. So we wanted to set up the same thing here in Vermont, that we could watch and and watch how the program develops and grows and

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: and and I clearly get it now. Do you want to the members to be reimbursed because it's gonna potentially at least four meetings a year because they're meeting quarterly.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: And and as I told the the farmer party, the folks in said $50, we leave the farm to go to a meeting because it's important to the farm. If we we're not doing it for the retire retirement benefits. I'm sure some, and I'm speaking, maybe I should care what I'm speaking for, but, you know, the TSPs and other people will be paid by their respective groups. Okay. So, but again, if the process isn't going to start for a whole another year, we can work on this next session and it, yeah. So this is kinda thrown together and it was brought down in the senate and your person was concerned that it wasn't gonna make it through on the senate miscellaneous bill. So we've got on it to us last night. And

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Well, if if you want me to work on it, I can work on it and make it better. I might not be able to do that by tomorrow.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: Yeah. I think that given the timing and the the times that Yeah. If there if this is critical, we'll find something to attach it

[Rep. Jack Brigham (Member)]: to. Well well that's crossover.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Just what I was thinking. Yeah. Had a germaniums probably.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: No. This is this is now germane to the environmental amendments bill because that pushes out the CAFO date and makes multiple amendments to that. Yeah. You could easily attach it.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. So we can work it up there and then attach it to there.

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: So that's something you can do, Richard, on your own. Yeah.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. I mean, and that still has to go to the senate. Yeah. And so it's definitely got an opportunity. Okay.

[Rep. Jed Lipsky (Clerk)]: Alright. I'll

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Okay.

[Rep. Richard Nelson (Ranking Member)]: Look you up next week. Yeah. I'll this or you slammed up hard next week too and look you up the week after.

[Michael O’Grady, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I will I will have something for you Monday or Tuesday.

[Rep. John O’Brien (Member)]: Appreciate you. Yeah, thanks for coming

[Rep. David Durfee (Chair)]: in. All right, we should we should wrap up for the day. Thank you everybody for your, patience jumping around. Tomorrow. We're Quarter after nine. Yeah. Quarter after nine. And if if everybody could be