Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Good morning. This is the House Appropriations Committee. It is still Wednesday, 01/07/2026. And we're going to switch gears a little bit and delighted to have Vermont Housing Conservation Board. Okay. Okay. Anyway, Vermont Housing Conservation Board to talk to us about ARPA, what's left, where they've come with ARPA money and what's left now, because we're getting to the end. For our viewing audience, a reminder that all of the ARPA money needs to now be spent by 12/31/2026. So that's this year. So welcome, if you would please introduce yourselves for the record.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Happy to do that. So for the record, I'm Gus Selig, I'm

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: the executive director for the Lamont Housing Conservation Board. And I'm Holly Major, I'm

[Holly Major (Policy Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: the policy director for the Lamont Housing Conservation Board.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I want to let you know that we have Martha Feltus joining us back from Ways and Needs coming back here, so we're delighted to have Marty as our Vice Chair now.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Great. Okay, well, unless you have a ton of questions, we'll give you some time back. I know that when Doug was in here a few months ago, he was giving you a report based on September 30 expenditures. We were well aware of all the ARPA deadlines in terms of commitment and in terms of expenditure, and I'm happy to report that of the $119,000,000 appropriation, we're down to $3,100,000 that needs to go out the door. It went into 1,000 units of housing in 36 projects in 20 communities all over the state. That $119,000,000 was leveraged another $63,000,000 in private equity and loans. There are also, in addition to that, there were some federal grants that also supported these projects. Just go back to the first slide. This is the Bristol Firehouse Apartments that I think Madam Chittenden visited at the grand opening. Some of you know Jonah Richardson, who's a developer in the Upper Valley, in the Bradford and the Upper Valley. That's four a unit or six unit development we did with him in the Upper Valley. And this last picture is from Putney, Vermont taken last fall. That's a project that would not have been fully expended at the time that Doug reported to you, but progress, I'm sure the representative from Putney can tell you, it's looking a little different today and getting compliments from the community. And it's attached to a community garden of an acre, so it's a dual whole project for us. And just across the street is the village's cooperative store.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: Is this the project that got held up for

[Rep. Michael Mrowicki (Member)]: four trips to the Supreme

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Court? Yes. Four trips.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: And now it's getting complimented about how nice it works. So like,

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: I was surprised. What I need to say about that, representative Stevens, is the community

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: as a

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: whole was very supportive of the project, but under our laws, all it takes is one person to object who went to court, took it to the Supreme Court twice. So I'll be in the general committee tomorrow. The view I've expressed to all of you is we should have our fights in the planning process. In this instance, village got a village designation approved locally. It was approved again by the Regional Planning Commission and then approved at the state level. And yet we took two trips to the Supreme Court to permit 25 units of housing. So we need to figure that out and talk with Chair Mahali about that more tomorrow,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: because I think the

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: appeals problems are still, they frighten developers. I should say in the way that we've managed this, we were very aware of the need to make sure projects would be done. Early on, there was a very large commitment to Gen High. When that got delayed in the way, we switched that project to general funds and put the ARPA dollars into something we knew we were sure would get closed earlier so that we wouldn't turn any funds back.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We've got Mike Murphy's question and then Wayne.

[Rep. Michael Mrowicki (Member)]: Sure. Just to follow-up a little bit and give it a little one piece perspective. Initially there were some questions about the project and as good information got out there, the questions were answered and there was general support. There was a small local and very well funded opposition that put put this in in the straights it was because of the the costs that were encountered. I think might have added another $3,000,000 to a $15,000,000 project. I'll have

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: those letters tomorrow when I go into chair Mahale's committee, but yes, because of the delay, because of the extreme increase in construction costs, it became a much more expensive deal to get done.

[Rep. Michael Mrowicki (Member)]: And since then, for example, your sister who worked for the Windham Windsor House and Trust organized a school trip so the local students could come in, see the project under construction, and get a sense of what it was going to look like and there's a group in the adjacent building that's been there for thirty years that houses mostly seniors that's starting up to create a welcome wagon, people

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: coming in. So

[Rep. Michael Mrowicki (Member)]: there's some efforts to really embrace this and the other piece I just shared with Gus is Saturday, we had two different meetings with two different constituents who had before this never expressed any perspective on this project. Said, you know, when you drive into town, it's starting to look like a village and I love the way these buildings look.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It's great. Yeah. Great. Wayne?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Yeah. Just on the project that went to court that many times. What was the nature of the complaint? What statute of law were they using to try to stop the project?

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: The first time the complainant had about, I can't remember, but dozens of complaints. I think it got down to two or three issues, including traffic gonna be an undue burden, if I'm remembering correctly. I can double check and get back to you on that. The second time, it went back, the Act two fifty had said, had issued a jurisdictional opinion that they had no oversight over the project because of the village center designation, and they appealed that saying that they really should need an Act two fifty permit, even though we've created all this law, and that had to go back again to the courts, and ultimately the Supreme Court said, That's silly. No, it doesn't need an act.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: You think that set some precedent coming out of the Supreme Court that might mitigate against future lawsuits then?

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: I think that we probably need to get to a place where once you've said this is a permittable use in a village or a downtown or a new neighborhood, that we stop giving people as much appeals rights as they currently have. Statutory change. There's probably a statutory change to be had there, is this my opinion? And I'm not saying nothing should ever be able to be appealed. Occasionally, make mistakes about, is it a flood plain or not? Is there gonna be a pollution problem? But I guess I would just say once we designate, once a community and then the regional commission and the state all say, this is where we wanna grow, We shouldn't have as much appeals rights as we have. They could have objected at the local level, they could have objected with the regional planning commission, they could have objected with the state board.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: So essentially the objection should be made at an earlier stage. Yes. If they're not made at those earlier stages, then that would forfeit their appeal rates in some way.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Would be my view of how we

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: could make things And work

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: where decisions should be made and do they all need to be made at that level. So I have Tom and Eileen.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: And just a quick comment and I'll be happy to share some of my experiences with dealing with this issue both with BHCb and with the judiciary about the need for it and the fears of it and why it's stuck in our statutory world of two different worlds of what and I don't want to take up time today, but I'd be happy to have that conversation. I know there's different proposals out there to shorten the appeals process. They're being considered, but they're nowhere near

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: being law yet. Right, yeah, thanks.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Lynn? Yeah, you know you're describing a situation that developers have been complaining about for most of the last fifty years. Act two fifty needs to be reformed. It's truly reformed. And don't know if you've never had this experience, but your groups have never had this experience. It depends on you. As we sit here with lots of bills that have gone up the State House to look at our two fifty, how would you change it, or would you change it? And it's a roadblock to anything. When you talk about housing of any kind, any kind of development.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Well, what I'm going to tell your colleagues tomorrow is that some of the changes that you've already made, I think, have the potential to be consequential. The Alimah Homes Act several years ago, you told all communities that they had to allow the permitting of shelters. And we can point to several examples that that's gone much more smoothly since that statute was passed. There was a dispute about a building that will be completed in Waterbury about how tall it was, could be. And when they looked at the Homes Act after initially deciding, no, they weren't gonna support the project, they changed their view and said, okay, we have to do this because we'll be out of compliance to law. And I think with the changes that you made at Act two fifty in launching on the path that we've gone, we are putting more of the We've basically said, we're not gonna have a statewide land use plan, but we are gonna ask locals and regions to say, here's where we wanna grow. It would probably be my recommendation that you gave these temporary expansions for two or three years, that we add another year to that for growth in certain areas and that's gonna help. But the biggest problem is that in both this instance and the Woodstock case, which also made two and a half trips to the Supreme Court over a decade is we give single person the right to appeal and appeal and appeal. And that's not a problem with Act two fifty, that's problem with how we empower any citizen and in the Woodstock case, they had a very good lawyer who worked with them for free for a decade that made that go slowly. So I've found in my experience, most of the time, problem has not been Act two fifty, that's not to say Act two fifty can't be improved, it's been, we give people at the local level, the right to appeal and appeal and appeal, and I'm just saying to you, once a community decides here's where we wanna grow, there should be much less appeal rates. And I

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: think that will help a lot.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Yeah, my district experienced that with Walmart going on for over twenty years. I just want to say that one of the issues that also has come up is the issue of on the record versus de novo. And I have heard there was an attempt a few years ago with the World Caucus to try to do something with the administration to do that. I've heard the head of the bureaucracy at one point explain that he really wanted to go On the Record because it cost his agency a lot of money to go to de novo. I heard John what's his name Grohman talk about how it costs his institution, his nonprofit money, to go to de novo. And developers have been saying this for years, that it costs them money to go to de novo on all the appeals process as well. And that's been something that's been put into a lot of those Act two fifty reform laws. And I know people who serve on the Act two fifty boards, and they say it prevents people from bringing their A plant by law. They sort of lie in the weeds until they get because they know they're going to go through two and three appeals down the road. And so they don't bring their stuff until later. Maybe that hasn't occurred with a lot of your projects, but that is the way it is. And other people are using it, the stalling of appeals.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: I can't speak. I don't have expertise on the commercial end of things. And what I've heard small communities say is on the record, we're not set up to do

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: No, you have to change the statute and make it more on the record.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Right, but they've said, I mean, I think about the development review board in Callis, Vermont, and their capacity to do on the record work has, and I think that's an issue worth taking up with the league on behalf of the municipalities, do they have the capacity or what would it take for them to

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: have the capacity

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: to do that? Because that's another piece that The whole issue of De Novo versus Yes, It's been a contributing factor to the appeals program.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Completely agree. Yeah, I just don't have I don't know what the solution is to that for small towns. Okay. So just to finish up on ARPA, we also got a small amount of grants to replace funding in the capital bill for water quality, which we have annually for about a decade gotten funding to do water quality grant work with farmers. And so $4.80 of the $600,000 was spent. These projects often rely upon a match from a federal source and that has sometimes slowed up. So there was $120,000 that was turned into revenue replacement rather than ARPA dollars, just to make sure that those last projects could be completed. They generated about $3,000,000 in leverage, so a good return on investment there. And then to the unexpended balance, this building is almost done. Wish it was right in her district, but it's about a block past representative Bloomley's district, 38 apartments. Occupancy should happen in March and the final draw should happen in April. So we expect to be fully expended with the ARPA well before the next December deadline. So that's the story we have to tell you today on ARPA, and I'm happy to answer more questions or have more discussion about our housing work across the state.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Well, it's great to see how much you're able to leverage. And I think you may be the first of the organizations that have gotten ARPA money to sort of give us a little summary of how it's all worked. And 1,000 units is pretty impressive, which is kind of what we've come to expect from you guys. Maybe that's not fair, but you do such a great job. It's just wonderful to see how well this works and how you leverage the money. I mean, I don't think any of us ever lacked confidence that you would get through all the ARPA money, because you know how to do this stuff. This is what you do. But it's good to get an update and hear, because it was 16,000,000. I wasn't worried about it, but it could just here and now.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Well, I think when we got done with the CRF funding, which was the very first, you'll recall,

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: of the pandemic money,

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: we got a little over $33,000,000 We had to get it out the door in nine months and returned about $300 So we're proud of that. That's impressive.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Wasn't that the year we had four budgets or something

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Something like like that. Year round.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Yeah. We're proud. And the last thing I really need to say is that our ability to do this really is about people that you represent in your communities. We are not the people that are having the fights at the local level about what's gonna be permitted and whatnot. So there's a whole bunch of people who bring us these projects and they include housing nonprofits, they include people like Jonah Richardson, they include organizations that are serving battered women and people who are homeless. We'll be reporting later to you, but we've now done, I think, five projects for persons with intellectual and developmental disabilities across the state. So there's been a lot of, there's a tremendous amount of home ownership work happening across the state. And I think the policy of permanent affordability, which is part of our statute, that framework has served us well because what happens is you don't have to ever think about replacing that housing, may have to upgrade it at some point, but in ten or twenty years, you don't lose it. We've had two fifty two fifty Vermont households become homeowners in homes that we subsidized many years ago when they came on the market over the last five years with no new subsidies. So people generally making $80,000 getting into what would otherwise be over $320,000 homes at an average cost of 180 because of the restrictions we put, the way we recycle the public investment forward. That's great. That's great. Yeah, I

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: just want to ask about the intellectually disabled housing. We did this last year in our budget, and we did put language in to have them work with you. Was the five people you're talking about or whatever you did, is that the third pilot that was not finished that we did authorize money for?

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: You authorized $2,800,000 for a project in Burlington, that's 10 apartments, that's under construction now. The other projects that we funded are in Moncton. There are two buildings, one in Berlin, and I think one in Waterbury, where some of the apartments are gonna be set aside for people with intellectual disabilities. There's a group living, the Moncton situation is more of a group living situation, as well as one in Randolph. And we just funded a project in Brattleboro that will also have some of the apartments set aside for people with those disabilities. Yeah, this

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: is a very, very vulnerable population. And I know that we have, as a state, tried to move away from institutionalized building, the Brandon School type. But one of the things that the constituent that I had, whose son came here, but it's not just me, there's lots of other people who've been interested in this. But one of the things that the family talked about, because there's a lot of adults who are aging out, adult children are now kind of left with no they've been at home after they get out of school. They have very little fear interaction. They don't have any friends. It's a very selective group of people. They have it in school. And not only are they living with their parents, with parents afraid that there's no place for them to go to, where they will get the care they need, the kind of supports they need, but they really do well. Guess apparently in some of the little pilots, they found out that they interact with each other, they have friends, they live together, not in big institutions, but in small And that was a major concern for the family, is that they really wanted They felt that this was an isolation.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: We've met with parents groups on numerous occasions over the last five years. We actually back when Brandon closed, if Con Hogan were alive today, he would have told you that we stayed and never could have closed Brandon, except that we helped create a whole bunch of living situations at that time. So we've been at this for many years, but I think you absolutely put your finger on it. You've heard from the parents groups who've been active here. You've heard from representative MacFone that the parents are getting, like all of us, they're getting older. Representative Laroche and I, were having a conversation all about our advancing ages. And so people are looking for new models. In the Burlington case, it's gonna be apartments with a modest level of support, in the Moncton case and the Randolph case, it's much more group living with much more intense support because the range of need is very different. So this is something we've been at over many years and we're happy to make this a big part of our work over the next several years. Really important.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So John and then Tom.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: So thanks for meeting with us here today, but we had a chance to meet last year here for a little bit. It's going to talk a bit about more rural parts of the state and things we're thinking about, you know, in the future here, whether it's this coming fiscal year or beyond here, because you know, small communities are they may not have to be the 25 unit facility here, but there's just a growing number of folks who are looking for something on the smaller end of that year perhaps, and maybe not hanging onto their house they've had for a very long time. Whatever reasons, if they need more of that support comes

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: to it We as have done work in small towns over the years. If you're a housing developer, whether you're a for profit or nonprofit, scale matters to you.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: That's the next question, we talked about that.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: And so that's one of the chief difficulties. With community energy, we did the smallest rental development we ever did is seven units in Cabot, Vermont. And it was because a community group said, we want a place for our seniors to be able to stay in Cabot. We have done our home ownership programs always serve rural communities. There was a proposal that actually failed in Greensboro to turn the Old Town Hall and a new building into 16 apartments. The voters ultimately said no. So representative Stevens can tell you about a building in Waterbury Center that the community back in the 60s and 70s had actually voted to demolish three times its old school seminary, and we turned it into 14 apartments in Waterbury Center. So I think the biggest obstacle in small communities is the question of infrastructure. And you pass the chip bill. I have a meeting next week with somebody from Vepcie who will tell me Where they currently are in their thinking. I think the question is, how well will that serve really small communities and small developers? Is that gonna be a game changer or not, or is it gonna need some additional assistance? When you pile on the cost of water and sewer to any development, that's a big add. It's a big block. But if any of you have constituents in small communities who wanna do something, make our phone ring, let's talk to them. If I have one thing,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I'll pick your phone. Okay, good. All right.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Good. So we're always happy to We opened a shelter in Hyde Park last year, not a big community. It's only about a mile up the road from the Route 15, Route 100 intersection and all the shopping, but we got something done in Hyde Park. So it's not as easy in a tiny town with no infrastructure, but it's one of the challenges we have to be mindful of. And I think that's one of the values, quite frankly, the VHIP program is that it is reaching into small communities. We don't run that program, but it is one of its chief values is that it can do something with a guy like Jonah Richardson, will try to do something on a very small level.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Small communities, I mean, I'm just gonna say this, really get really concerned about what the, we're trying to maintain the current landscape. Yes. Something gonna kind of stick out and sort of something that's a bad way to kind of phrase it here, but we want to kind of maintain that landscape and how do we best fit, you know, housing unit, square, if it's a seven unit facility or something different to the landscape. Yeah. And how's that gonna work and how might it serve maybe not just a town, but maybe towns that are kind of connected where it makes sense.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Happy to keep talking about that and brainstorming and trying new things.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Tom and then Lynn.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: Just on the developmentally disabled housing, I that I think what's being built and being finished were elements of what was considered a pilot of the same property. A series of pilots because they were all different kinds of housing. Think that's but by introduction to affordable housing or to VHDP or to other the communities had to show that they were committed to sustaining them. You know, there had to be a group of people or a nonprofit organization that it wasn't VHDB's problem to keep it going. It was they were there to help it get built. And so seeing the development of disabled projects, the ones that have happened along the Waterbury, they're all different. And I think it's really important because we're going to hear about this human services, we're to hear about this. They need 600 units. And we just saw 1,000 units built over the last three or four years for all kinds at a humongous cost. But getting it done to see that different, it's not one size fits all because there are going to be communities where group housing works and it's going to be communities like ours where I think three apartments are being put aside for individuals with developmental disability, but also one apartment being put for an employee of the organization to help not as a caretaker directly, but just be there to oversee. Different ideas and that was a result of years of those families asking for the promises made when Brandon was closed to get cashed in. And that's really, the model. It's slow, but they learned with a lot of advice how to do it and how to get it done and put on the front burner. It's really nice to see them all coming to fruition.

[Holly Major (Policy Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: And I think one of the real successes of that initial pilot program that you all funded several years ago is that, first of all, brought three projects online. So you created those homes. It tested out these different models. And it was really successful in allowing other projects to move forward. So we haven't just done three. This community has brought five projects forward and have more under development. And we participated in the working group that came out of Act 69 last year to look at what is that plan for 600 houses? How can we pay our rental assistance for the development to really help address this problem and look forward to talking more about that. Thanks.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Just real quick, and I don't know if I want to get into in detail, one of things with Chip or with any of these infrastructure questions. Much of what you've done has been done in designated state, designated particular group, settled areas. Have you thought about regionalization? Because when you're talking about small towns, you're talking about extending the infrastructure to places that are now open, that aren't maybe designated in anything, doesn't have the capacity, but certainly has the ability and the willingness, perhaps, that we need housing for more than just low income. We need lots of different kinds of sizes and varieties and price ranges of houses. Have you ever thought about the regionalization as it applies to something like infrastructure?

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Well, let me give you an example of something that I think maybe is to your point and goes also to the question serving rural communities. I don't know how many of you know that we have a village called Algiers south of Brattleboro, but No, we do. And some years ago, through Senator Leahy's work, can't remember if it's a water line or the sewer line from Brattleboro was extended to that village. That made hydrants possible, made fire safety easier, and we developed in the form of kind of an old mill building, a 17 unit development, it also helped them reopen their village store by a nonprofit. I mean, I don't think we, the Housing Conservation Board drive infrastructure decisions, but I think that's a good example of what did it take to serve Algiers and get some housing into Algiers Village in a thoughtful way. And it took the availability of that infrastructure to make a 17 unit development possible, but it also got them a new store.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: So Brattleboro and Algiers got along with each other and one was willing to help the other. That doesn't always exist. Our rural communities are. But you

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: know what I mean. I do know what you mean. I think the other take I'm going to give you on the question of regionalization is a little bit different, which is when we began the Champlain Housing Trust, which now has 3,000 folks, had a staff of one and a half. And you asked us in our statute to build the capacity to take on this work all over the state. We've done that. Over the last decade, however, we have been at work in partnership with local organizations to help them consolidate when they've chosen that. So in the last two years, three organizations in Rutland and Bennington have become one organization. Downstreet, which serves Central Vermont, took on Lamoille County. They're now looking at taking over the portfolio of a group that was Randolph only. So I'm very proud that we're doing that work around the state. Rural Edge went into hard work as

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: part of

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: the expansion, elimination of what was the Lamoille Housing Partnership, which tried to hire a new director when a long time director left and they just couldn't do it. I know that for every community, identity is really important. And I think one of the challenges we'll see over the next couple of years is the ability of a more regional network to make sure they're serving every part of their service area. But we've been at that work trying to gain more efficiency, to build more financial strength in those organizations all over the state.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: So you did that in your world. I'm talking more like a Champlain Water District that was set up way back in the 50s, I think, in Chittenden County. And that every town has kind of added to it over the years. And it has been an infrastructure that has benefited much of Chittman County. Now, a lot of what you do is benefited by the fact that they have that. So that's the kind of regionalization. Because one of the things with Chip is that developers can now have a choice to suggest doing something and maybe help with the infrastructure. But the infrastructure is so expensive to do anything. No town can do it by itself.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: No, and if you live in a town like mine, Callas, we have four villages. The only infrastructure is we 56 families in the East Callas Fire District, and without some public investment, if you live at the far end of the system in the summer when it hasn't rained much, you're not

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: gonna take a good shower.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: So much less, we could add housing in a few places in East Calis and grow that village, but not without somebody doing something significant, making a significant investment

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: in water system. Thank you.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay. Well, as always, we really enjoy hearing what you're talking about and what you've done, and it's pretty exciting. And thank you so much for all your hard work and making a difference in Vermont. And we'll see you back here for FY27. But it's great to know that you've done so much for the ARPA money.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Thank you

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: very much.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Thanks for coming in. You. Okay, committee, we have one more thing.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Yeah, well that's another great example of how rural community and that came out of conservation projects.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We're still live. We're still live, folks. We are still on live. So let's continue. And if there need to be other conversations, which is great, they can happen outside the room or later. So the last thing we have for today is a memo that I received from the chair of the of Military Affairs. Those of you who have been around for a while will recall that we have a lot of reports, and we periodically need to look at them and say, do we still want to keep getting these reports? So Autumn just went to get spreadsheets for everybody because you're going to need a paper spreadsheet for It this will be big, sorry Tom. And the task is, we have the spreadsheet of all the reports that come to appropriations. I would like everybody to look at the spreadsheet and decide, choose a column which says no longer useful, so we want to repeal the report, don't have to do it anymore. Seems good, but maybe we don't need it forever. Let's review it again in five years. So that's extend. And then the third option, it's fundamental and therefore should be permanently required, which is retain. So Autumn will now hand out spreadsheets to people that don't have them.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: I'm wondering, I mean, we looking specifically at the areas that are in our portfolio or looking at them all?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I would like you all to look at them all. You're probably going to have more, but you don't have to have an opinion on everything. But where you have an opinion, mark one of the columns. And I've asked Mike to take meaningful information and putting this all together. We have to turn this in by the January 23. So that's two weeks from Friday. So I'm giving you all this free time so you have to look at these things. And I think there are links. I was going

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: to say, in the original email that you received, there were links to, for example, the most recent report on one of them. So, if you, we should send you that email. That's the link.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I think Autumn has sent, did you send the email to everybody? Autumn sent it today.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: So you can pull up the actual report or you can go to the whole legislative works website, you can want to know where to find that in his JFO, well it's on the

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Legion website. It also can be on our committee page, there's where we have the date, the bill, the documents that says reports of resources. So some of those will be there.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: We need to look at them and determine if it's still Pull it up as an example of the most recent one and say, gee, is that something that I can use? Is it something that I review? Is it helpful

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: or not?

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: It's like, I'm sorry, the first one on the list is just homelessness emergency shelter grant. It has been, and then what's on page two? That one expired in 2017, but then there are four lines down on page two. There's homelessness emergency shelter grants and management submitted with annual budget testimony that was expiring in twenty twenty something.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It looks like it's two different. So one was act 162 from 2012 and the other one is 2011. Yeah,

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: at least on such a counter, it's the same information. It seems

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: like there's some redundancy. I bet this was really hard to put this together, the spreadsheet, because we're not the only committee getting this, every committee is, I imagine, but human services. And they put in who are all the other committees that are getting this information?

[Rep. Michael Mrowicki (Member)]: Correct.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: There's another one.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: It's the same

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: length of your plot.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Yeah, it's one of the same words.

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: Yeah. Looks like you'll actually have to read it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: You might have to read it. But you do not have to fill out every report. If it's not in your wheelhouse, you don't know anything about it, just leave it blank.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: And the point is, does appropriations need it? Right. Some of these other committees may still want it. Human services wants it, but appropriations doesn't need it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That's right. So, if you go five down on the first page, it's a weatherization thing that only comes to house and standard appropriations, use of appropriations. What's weatherization, household weatherization? Okay, so TIF will look at that. I mean, we can all look at it. But TIF will take a look and say, what are we getting, do we need it? And it looks like the one right below it is similar with data as manager. I'm guessing that some of these are minor differences from each other,

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: and yet we have to report.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: But on that, almost as if it looks like they were all continued. Right. There must have been some, you know, just like it probably was a similar process as this.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: Right, right. And so we still want it, but we want one more parameter to be required. Right, exactly.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: Or we still find it useful. Right, exactly.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Right. So what we, you can always check, so the email that Autumn sent, Tucker Anderson is the one who sent the email, so that's the copy to you. So we could always reach out. He says if you have questions, don't talk to him. Reach out to Joint Fiscal Office or Legislative Council attorneys. Well, we don't have anybody who regularly works with our committee, but I think we could talk to Joint Fiscal Office and say, why do we have these three, what's the one we want? Right, right.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: So, Lynn? Yeah, the reason for preparations is probably put in here in so many of these is because these were budgeted items that at that time might have seemed really important and even really necessary. It depends on when it was because sometimes we had money and sometimes we didn't have as much money. So you wanted to go back and see if we needed to give it more or we wanted to, you know, can we afford to do that? So lot of times we really, somebody should really, in appropriation, be looking at anything that affects us simply because we're going to have times where people want more money And and we may not have it. Or the money was spent yesterday on a thing that had to do with workforce development, leftover from 'twenty two. And in the end, they decided it was a pilot program. In the end, they decided that they didn't want to fund it after all.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, so then we don't need to report it because you could have a final report and then that would be

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: it. Yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So a lot of these things have expired in 2017, 2018. So if you look all the way across, you have the citation, when it was amended, where it's from, who gets it, what the topic is, when it's due, and then when it expires. A whole lot of these things have already expired. Yeah.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Yeah, so what

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: do we

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So it may be Well, if it's not something that you know anything about and don't want to know anything about, you can leave that parplay. There will be somebody in here who knows everything, but definitely Look at them all. If you have an opinion, put it down. If we end up with a tie, it'll default to the person who's it's in their budget portfolio, because they should know the most about it.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: And I think it's important in this mention from Tucker is that just because you discontinue the report doesn't mean that the agency is going to discontinue the work that this is aimed at. So you're just not getting this routine report back. If they integrated whatever this new policy was within their procedures then that should continue on its own. But do we need to report on it every year? Every three years?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So what do you think, Marty, if we have everybody return things to you by Then

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: you can

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: collate it all and get it by the twenty third. Yes votes and the no votes. Exactly. And we'll get a new spreadsheet. So by Tuesday the twentieth.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: And somebody can help me find out all these reports, because I would like to at least prove some of them to Steve.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, and this

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: is the link to the law

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: that they first wrote. That's right, which is the report itself, right? And put your name on the top when you turn it into Marty so she knows who it is.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: I feel like this is a school

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: assignment. So any questions on this? We'll probably have some as we go along with. Okay, so that is our agenda for today. You now have time to work on these reports, should you choose to. We have the governor's state of the address, state of the state at two, and we've been asked to be in our seats by 01:45. You've probably noticed the Vermont state police are around, and I think they'll have the dogs going through and all the other stuff. So it's important for us to be in our seats at 01:45. Then All these things to

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: wish for that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, right. And then we'll have the house floor after that, and then we're done with the day. And then tomorrow morning, Jill Mazza also is going talk about the Rural Health Transformation Grant. That's $195,000,000 Apparently, we thought we were maybe going to get 100,000,000 so that's kind of good news. But it also is how it has to be used. So we'll hear a bit about that. And then Agency of Transportation is going to come in and talk about budget adjustment, some EV stuff. Then something Oh, there's a T Fund and what's happening in the T Fund. So we'll get kind of some background. You all may recall that they had to do a rescission earlier this year because they got a downgrade. And so they came to the Joint Fiscal Committee and they had to terminate people. So we also want to hear how that went. The Joint Fiscal heard, but we ought to be hearing about that as well. And then we do have some things that we're starting to line up for tomorrow afternoon. So there's still some TBDs on there. And then Friday, we'll have more ARPA updates. And our budget workshop is at twelve and I'm hoping that you all can join the budget workshop if our committees will be on. I did a run through with fiscal last night, and it looks good. I think it's going to be a great. Thing. This is the first time we've ever done it, Ways and Means does it, but we haven't done a budget block of appropriation. So I think it'll be good.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: The more people we can educate, the better. Are they assuming that this number of people is going to be there plus more? I mean, want I more people back. Yes.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: They're going to assume the committee is going be there so that he can sit at the table sort of behind and then there'll be be chairs for people to sit and bring in more. If for some reason we get autos taking care of the signups, and if we get an explosion in signups, they'll run it again. They've already said we can do more than one of these. We just, it's our first time, so we don't know. But they wanted to have people sign up so we'd have the right number of materials without printing 100 copies and needing eight or vice versa.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Yeah, when is the emergency board meeting? We

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: are meeting on the sixteenth, so a week from Friday, and it's at 10:00, and then Tom Kavette's going to come, is it joint with Sarah?

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: It's like house raising in.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Oh, house raising, we're joint with house raising, I knew we were joining somebody, in the afternoon that Friday to have Thomas that morning. It's going to be a big deal. I mean, we'll find out what the revenue forecast looks like. I have no secret intelligence somewhere. Have no idea. I really, truly don't. Cross my heart. Know, all I know is it seemed like November was not a great month, but November was kind of a weird month, I guess, and one month isn't a trend. I don't know if we'll get January numbers before we hear the, I mean December numbers before we hear the e board, we may not. It's kind of around the same week that we hear things, but we may not. Right. So I'm guessing they'll probably wait till the

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: They'll try to get the December numbers in, think.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, but they may give it. Anyway, that will be a big day to hear that information be telling. So we will, and next week we'll also, have to remember we have to do markup on the budget adjustments. So we should be thinking about your areas and if you need to talk to anybody else. We don't have a lot more people coming in, but if there are issues and I don't think we, oh, did we decide we're going have a public hearing also? We have to pick a date for that. Probably next week. We'll pick a date. We'll just do it like an hour. I can't remember what we did. For the VA.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: We weren't sure. We checked it

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: last night. I was with JFO. We checked it last night. Is but we did it back in 2017. So before COVID, we were doing it. So I was thinking we started it because of COVID, but when they checked back, it turns out this is kind of a virtual hearing. Yes, people can come in or they can call in. And is it joint? No, this one is just us. The public hearings for the budget, FY27 budget, will be joint Okay. But we'll just do one. I'll be reminding Senate approves today that we're doing one, they might consider doing it when they get it as well, if they want to. So it'll be quick, it'll be here. The update? I don't want to get too far

[Gus Seelig (Executive Director, Vermont Housing & Conservation Board)]: out ahead, but if we're going to be required or asked to do some type of community public hearing for the FY '27, the sooner I could know that it's finding a place and scheduling

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We do know. We just do them here. Great. Agree. And as everybody has you do you're fine. We could we'll be in Room 11 and join with a second like we did before. So Zoom option and in person option. We don't have those dates yet, obviously, but let you know when we have. Monday

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: meetings. Are you going to do any or what's this?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We will be doing it, but not next Monday. And the following Monday is, a holiday, so we won't be doing it then either. Then we may be doing it the weekend after that, the Monday after that. So you're kind of doing pretty well in January, So the twenty sixth, at this point, assume it's Monday the twenty sixth that we'll be here, because we'll be working on FY '27. The governor's doing the budget address on the twentieth. So we're going to start taking off then. So assume that we'll be meeting on the twenty sixth. Afternoon? Yeah. Do you think? Yes. When you have when we started, did we start at one last year?

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Yeah, did, it was

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: 01:00.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Was one to four. Right, it was hard to start at twelve when people really want to have lunch and you know eating on the screen is not ideal. So at least for me, I'll still. That'll probably be our first Monday. And again, I have no secret intel on what the budget's going to look like, so we'll all find out on the twentieth. Anything else?

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: Just in terms of items coming up on the agenda this Friday, since we don't have anything after lunchtime, after the budget announcement, if any of you are really interested in the chip bill, if there's a joint hearings in Commerce, waste and beans from one to three in Room 11 from the people that are working on the chip bill and all the rules that they've developed and that kind of thing.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So is Pepsi coming in to talk about it? Yes.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Okay.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yes, so they're coming in.

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: Okay. You have a particular interest in that bill, you may wanna sit in and watch that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Great, and I assume that'll be recorded too, so we'll

[Autumn (Committee Assistant)]: be able Yes, to see able to see it again later. You don't wanna go committee. Yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, good to know people know about other things.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Just as an aside, there is a big development plan by our developer that's looking to take advantage of the Chip bill, Chipman County, and the town is coming out against it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Well, this is what we have in this state, and you can't legislate nimbyism. And you can. So one of the things that and some of you have brought this up, Gus certainly brought it up, is at what level do we make these decisions? And so if everything is made at the community level, this is what happens. I mean, I know of four instances across the state right now where people have said no to any kind of housing's great. It's a crisis over there. And so if we always leave it to the towns, I mean, is a bigger conversation, I'm sure housing is going be taking up, but at what level do these decisions get made? And Gus was pretty eloquent about it got passed, It was approved by all these places, and then one person could still come in, and that wasn't Act two fifty. Yeah. So people like to blame Act two fifty for everything, and it's not always Act two fifty.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: No, and the issue is that when we started talking about a bill that would limit appeals to a certain level, it's based, at least the original concepts or original conversations that I had up in general with Gus and others. New Hampshire did something which was very controversial at the time as well and so and our judiciary came in and testified against the concept of limiting appeals because they felt like justice denied is you know, and you're kind of like, yeah, but there's this sweet spot that we're talking about here is not justice denied.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: It

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: is, if it's approved, as Gus was saying, if it's approved at three or four different levels, yes, there's always room for another for appeals, but the Putney experience is not unique. Woodstock had a 28 unit home, 28 homes wanting to be built. It took them ten years of court battles, raised the cost of it by 35% at a time before the rank inflation that we've seen in the last five years. So there is a fundamental issue between not just developers but builders and the need to develop housing and using the system that we've put into place that people complain about but it is necessary and then having a judiciary system that allows for people who can afford because the Woodstock thing was very similar to Putney where it was a group of 12 or it was actually an individual, and so the proposals have been to limit not only number of people who can, the kind of people, whether it's a Butters or whatever, to oppose something and to bring it to an environmental court, but we have a long process of de novo stuff that is really, really difficult and I'm not bad mouthing the judiciary by saying they're sensitive to change as well and so switching from the de novo to them is a radical change but that's we know adds months at least to any kind of appeal. And who has private status? Right, I mean Right, but that's and so if you try to limit that you have to I mean, again, judiciary in the introductory hearings that we had two years ago, they were very, very wary of changing anything even with further discussion and again that's not to pit one against the other, it's simply to say that the silos don't always have the same interests in mind. So that's what we're up against and that's what the committee will be up against with talking about appeals and because of course you can do it wrong. Yes. That's just

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It's never happened, stop. What do you mean? People who think we

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: have done it wrong because we allow appeals to come in from all sorts of places with one person or three people and they can

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: Right. Somebody's taking advantage of the system or they're using the system or they're abusing the system however you want to interpret it, but you can do it wrong by creating loopholes that don't make any difference. You could, I mean, process, you know, we start with a golden idea no matter what that idea is, no matter whether it's the most restrictive or the most open or the and it gets compromised down and the trick is what are the unendocrine consequences of changing the system that's been in place for fifty years or more. And again, people have that, I mean you see that even in the conversations of not just Act two fifty but any change that's happened with, I mean the problem with Act two fifty is in Act two fifty for some of us, it's the fact that we didn't do zoning at the same time. That law was intended to have zoning and in Vermont fashion we punted on it and we're still dealing with the lack of local zoning that we're fixing it piece by piece, but we didn't fix it in the 70s when we created a system that we wanted, you know, that we

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: wanted to create the whole system.

[Rep. Thomas Stevens (Member)]: Nor do we usually enforce it and so until years later, until you see what the abuses are. So get the need to break it down, but until we have the conversation again, then it's going to create delays. The thing in Waterbury was painful to watch because we had just passed the Home Act and what the it wasn't just about the height of the buildings that our design review board opposed. It was a project that our village supported by three or four to one in a public vote and the design review board was made up of some nimbies who didn't like the modern design of the building and the design review board held the vote rather postpone until everybody was present, held it while the leader of the while the chair of the DRB was out of town and so they voted they were able to vote against it on a very close vote, but they put the point of not understanding that they shouldn't have even had the vote that they had because the home recently enacted HOME Act, but then those decisions being made by the DRB. So it was just, it was yeah you know it got overturned but they almost killed a project that the whole village wanted you know and it'll open hopefully sometime this year finally, but it is one of those things where you're like but all, if can't, if you're going to complain about the lack of housing, make sure you don't add those people for those people to the end of your sentence, because that's essentially what was happening when everybody opposes and that's why I made a comment about doesn't it look great, isn't it going to be great for the community because every single affordable housing project, which isn't many that's been done in Waterbury, has had that opposition of those people, and every time it's finished in ten or fifteen or twenty or thirty years later, it's a gem in the community, and yet there's always an element where it's opposed and delayed until it happens. Yeah, well, could talk about this for

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: a long time. Anyway, so thank you. We are done in this committee room for the day, we'll see you your