Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Good morning. This is the House Appropriations Committee. It is Friday, 01/09/2026. We are wrapping up our very first week back in the legislative session of the year. We've just come from the floor, and we are going to have an update on ARPA spending and projects, etcetera, from the Agency of Commerce and Community Development. So we're glad to welcome Dan Dickinson and Sean Gilbert. Great to see you both. You've both been here before, right? So you're familiar or not?

[Sean Gilpin]: I have actually not been in this particular.

[Speaker 0]: You will introduce yourselves and then you guys can introduce yourselves and give us a presentation. Please, please to meet you. David Yacovone, represent the Lamoille Washington District. Welcome. John Kascenska from Bergen, represent 10 towns in the Essex Caledonia District, Northeast Kingdom. Hi, Mike Nigro, I represent Bennington and Powell.

[Martha Feltus]: This is Tom Stevens, who's not here today from Waterbury. I'm Martha Feltus from Linden, Caledonia through history.

[Speaker 0]: And I'm Robin Scheu from Middlebury and to my right is Tiffany Bluemle from the South End Of Burleigh. Trevor Squirrell from the Helen Carreville.

[Wayne Laroche]: Wayne Laroche, I did Franklin, Berkshire, and Richmond.

[Speaker 0]: Hi, I'm Michael Mrowicki, I'm from Southeast Vermont, I'm the leading four district of Windham West. Hi, I'm Lynn Dickinson, I represent St. Alden's Town. So we cover the state.

[Dan Dickinson]: Fantastic. My name is Dan Dickinson with the Agency of Commerce and Community Development. I'm the Administrative Services Director for the agency.

[Sean Gilpin]: And good morning, everyone. My name is Sean Gilpin. I am the Housing Division Director at the Department of Housing and Community Development. So imagine you'll be hearing mostly from Dan with the money elements today, but I'm happy to speak specifically about the accomplishments that that funding has achieved in our housing. Great.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Dan Dickinson]: So before I dive into this summary that I put together, I'll just sort of give the high level overview of where we started as an agency and sort of where we are today. We did receive a great deal of ARPA funding courtesy of of the legislature. So we are very appreciative that those funds gained both through the Department of Economic Development and Department of Housing and Community Development. Where things stand today and that probably totaled close to a $100,000,000. Where things stand today is as far as true ARPA, the federal money, we are down to our last roughly $600,000 to spend, which is, you know, a great testament to the work that all of our staff have done at the agency and is fine. Courtesy of or thanks to the recovery office, we were able to convert many of our ARPA dollars to general funds. And I think that happened with other agencies around the state. So I will say that we do have this converted general fund, more of those dollars that we still need to spend down, but we focused on spending as much of our ARPA as we can and get that funding out the door. And so where things stand is we're down to our last 600,000. This summary focuses on the Department of Housing and Community Development because of the fact that this is the only department with true ARPA remaining. So I will say, to give a really high level for where things stand at DD, there is converted general fund that still remains unspent, but it is obligated through the community recovery and revitalization program. It's roughly 18,000,000. So it's not an insignificant number.

[Speaker 0]: Is that the missing middle?

[Dan Dickinson]: That's not the missing middle. That's CRP. So it's it's funding that DD is coordinating with communities around the state through grant agreements to varietals downtowns and and different things.

[Speaker 0]: I'm wondering which one that we have when when the farm came in, we have a spreadsheet that has the stuff that get converted to general fund and then stuff that was still ARPA. So if I'm looking at the general fund one. Well, you're looking

[Dan Dickinson]: at my sheet, you're not going to see

[Speaker 0]: No, I'm looking at the one that So why don't we go through the sheet that you have, and then let's go back to the general fund and just chat about that for a bit so we understand. Okay?

[Dan Dickinson]: I'll jump right into my sheet. And, upfront, I'll note that there are two groupings of columns here. The one to the far right, encumbered and expended funds. This is what you would see if you pulled report from the Vision Financial System. The obligated funds is more just me looking at, okay, what was the original appropriations so that you can all see what's going on? What funds were reverted either because the recovery office came and said, hey, we're gonna swap x amount for general fund or at the end of the obligation deadline, we inform the recovery office, hey, we just can't get these funds obligated in time. Please take them back and deploy them elsewhere. So that's that column. Obligated is me scrubbing all of our agreements, making sure that, you know, legally, we are truly obligated with all those funds. And then as unobligated, there is one quirk there that, or one line that I'll I'll go into down the road. So the obligated is me sort of going in and and trying to paint a picture of where where things truly stand, and then the right is what you would see if you were looking at the Vision Financial System.

[Speaker 0]: So I'm wondering about the that's a lot of reverted money. Yeah. And I'm wondering what happened. A couple of them are v the grants and rental housing investments. So what was going on?

[Dan Dickinson]: So almost all of those reversions were due to the recovery office swapping in general funds and swapping out ARPA. Okay. And so just to give an example, if this first VHFA grant, if you're looking at the department code 7110892213. So we started with a $5,000,000 ARPA appropriation.

[Speaker 0]: Mhmm.

[Dan Dickinson]: 3,330,000.00 was reverted, then reappropriated as general fund. So that's one of those instances where funds got swapped. The only true reversions where we simply gave up the funding completely is, here at the top, this water system improvement, the $87,500, we were not able to obligate or we were not gonna be able to obligate those funds in time for the federal I think it was the 12/3124 deadline. So we gave those back. And then further down, high efficiency devices. I should have numbering on these lines. I apologize. But there's 800,000. That was also money that we gave back.

[Speaker 0]: Remind me what the high efficiency devices are.

[Sean Gilpin]: I can speak to that. That was sort of a spin off of agency on natural resources water efficiency program. And we applied it specifically to Vermont housing improvement program upgrades and some upgrades. So trying to get replacing appliances with higher water efficiency, doing sewer and water upgrades or improvements in order to deal with water efficiency. Okay, thanks.

[Dan Dickinson]: So now that I've explained the different groupings, I'll just go line by line and walk through at least financially where things stand. And then if you have programmatic questions, I think Sean is prepared to cover most of these. I'll speak to one or two of them. So the water system improvements, we've obligated 100%. And when I say obligated, it's either an executed grant agreement, a contract, or the federal government did give us the ability to set funds aside that would cover staffing costs for those individuals that are working on those programs. So those are the three buckets. Of what's not spent but still encumbered, there's about 28,000 that I believe most of those funds are are to cover staff that are continuing to work on the program. And so we we would intend to get those funds out the door by I think it's the the June 30 deadline for the primary grantees that the recovery office has given. This first VHIP bucket, those funds are fully expended. So this next grouping, Salesforce grant system, this one gets a little more complicated and and I'll cover it. So we are almost completed with a process to incorporate, a program called Intelligrants into, a few of our grant programs across the agency, four of them. Sorry. Lost my train of thought. One sec. The four programs are the municipal planning grant program within DHCD, the Vermont economic growth incentive program within DD, Vermont training program within DD, and then the Vermont Community Development Programs. So they have CDBG recovery housing program. So those are the four big programs that are being brought into this grants management system with these funds. ADS is coordinating that effort, and they're the holders of the contract. And so the reason just to go all the way to the right here. The reason that you see an available amount of 439,000 is because for procurement activity, we are now using the VT buys system. And because we are not the holders of the contract, VT buys will not allow us to set aside those funds in that system. And so this event shows that they're available. But the reality is if you look over here to what obligated, the funds are almost fully obligated. The other quirk that I will explain is around the time that the recovery office came to us and said, hey, we want to swap ARPA for general fund. We had already spent $78,000 of ARPA. So, what we have to do is work with the recovery office to figure out, okay, we already spent this amount, we need to figure out a way to adjust that while also continuing to be in compliance with the federal ARPA requirements. So those are the two, my attempts to explain those two hook works for that.

[Speaker 0]: And for sure, is this relevant to the fact that

[Unidentified Committee Member]: this is a computer software, Salesforce is something that you're trying

[Speaker 0]: to implement into this that's new and more takes more time?

[Dan Dickinson]: In some ways, yes. I will note this was initially going to be us using Salesforce for grants management. We've since gone with a different program, which is, the Ag and Intelligrants. But yes, you know, ideally, because these funds were appropriated a while back, this would be done and the doors would be closed. But finding the right provider of this service took time and then working with ADS to get all of our ducks in a row and then get the process started and then get it implemented. It's all taken time. So to some extent, yes, it you know, because it's a complicated program and and relatively new within ACCD, there has been some delay. But we are on track. I believe we only have a program that has not gone live with using the platform. So we're we're really close.

[Wayne Laroche]: Go ahead, Mike. So in the reverted column, the first line and then the $800,000 line, those were reverted to the federal government.

[Dan Dickinson]: No. These were reverted. It was reverted back to essentially the I don't think it went directly to the recovery office, but it was reverted at the direction of the recovery office where I think they would then make the decision of, okay, where can we plug in this ARPA money to ensure that it's spent or at least obligated by

[Wayne Laroche]: Reallocated into some other area.

[Dan Dickinson]: Yeah. And that would be as far as where the funds went, that would be a question that

[Wayne Laroche]: We didn't go back to that. Just so you didn't have a separate problem. Answer.

[Dan Dickinson]: I don't believe we've sent any funds back to the feds yet. That would I think you have to ask that question. So this next program, the VHFA grant, these funds are fully expended, although there was a swap from our proto general fund, but but we've fully obligated and fully spent all

[Sean Gilpin]: of those

[Dan Dickinson]: dollars. The next one Vermont, what what's called here, the Vermont rental housing investment program, but became, the Vermont housing improvement program.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah.

[Dan Dickinson]: So here, we still have both ARPA and general fund dollars remaining. And I will I'll let Sean speak to sort of where things stand as far as getting those last bits of money out the door. Sure.

[Sean Gilpin]: So all of all of this money has been so we work, with VHIP through the five home ownership centers in the state that cover all of the counties collectively. They all have been promised all of these funds down the last dollar. We're working right now, we're probably within the next two weeks probably going to see the last of the ARPA funded VHIP units come to completion. We will have created more than 1,000 units through the VHIP program once once that comes to pass. So, this is all is all spoken for. However, it is a reimbursement program and so it's not until work is there's there's several payment there's a payment schedule for private property owners who use these funds but it is reimbursed. So we wouldn't expect to see that completely zeroed out until all of these units are leased up and actually serving the purpose that they've been ascribed to.

[Wayne Laroche]: So there's no reserve, you know, we got AARPER deadlines, but there's no deadline for that.

[Sean Gilpin]: There is a deadline for that. We've actually worked with the homeownership centers to establish a couple sort of soft internal deadlines, if you will, to make sure people are moving along. We left a little bit of flexibility intentionally knowing how difficult it is to get contractors and the timing of these things is always a little hard. But we fully expect any funds that any projects that will not complete by the deadline have been reassigned to other funding sources. And we're removing ARPA around the home ownership centers to make sure that we're not reverting any back to DC and that it's actually gonna be used. We have enormous wait lists of property owners interested in VHIP funding, so there's not a lack of appetite for projects that can be completed for, I'll say it out loud, pretty much March 1 is kind of our our more than soft deadline for folks. Although we've told pretty much everybody in the program right now is lined up to finish by February 1.

[Speaker 0]: John, it's a question. How many units are tied to that?

[Sean Gilpin]: Right now, Viib's gone through a couple of different iterations, and so we had money prior to ARPA, full ARPA funding, but by the end of this month, I expect that we'll have about ten sixteen units that were created by VHIP, a majority of which are serving people who exited homelessness, although that tenancy eligibility is broadening because our goal is really unit creation. It's supply issue and that's the goal. We did focus, as many folks know, primarily on exiting people from homelessness at the sort of the peak of the COVID epidemic because we were trying to keep people out of shelters. Now we're, so the program's matured a little bit and is now focusing more broadly on affordable rental units for a broader populous than just that. Although plenty of people are still signing up, we have some incentives to encourage people to do that extra level of service. And that's still attractive to a lot of folks who are recognizing their role in really supporting communities. It's been a heartwarming humanity story as well as a really impressive fiscal one.

[Speaker 0]: Great, thank you. Yeah.

[Martha Feltus]: You mentioned a thousand units from the VHIP program through its various iterations. How much of that has been funded by the ARPA month?

[Sean Gilpin]: Probably close to three quarters, I want to say. I wouldn't take that from the bank, but that was most of the funding that we've got has been ARPA, yep. And yeah, we're hoping for base funding this year, we'll what happens there.

[Speaker 0]: Continue, please.

[Dan Dickinson]: So moving on next to high efficiency devices. This is a program that falls within the VHIP universe. We've got about 130,000 remaining unspent, but the funds are obligated through those VHIP grant agreements. And I would imagine as the VHIP funds continue to go out the door, these will as well. There is a small portion of of this also that's set aside for, covering staffing expenditures much like the 28,000 above. Next, this predevelopment grants. This is a program, that doesn't fall strictly within the the housing program universe, but it's within our, community planning and revitalization program under DHCD. I believe there are five grant agreements with different municipalities for these funds. Those grant agreements are close to the end of our life, their life, and and we should be able to get what is now just general funds out the door, hopefully, this calendar year, I would say, if not if not sooner.

[Speaker 0]: So you reverted 06/20 and but you got a million $6.20. So there's another million that was ARPA that kept stayed in ARPA?

[Dan Dickinson]: So we we got a million of ARPA. $6.20 of that was reverted and became general funds. By that point, we had already spent 380,000 of of ARPA. Okay. So so now it's a little bit of ARPA, little bit of general fund. This next one is another VHFA grant. I believe they're both, just like the one above, they're both tied to the missing middle revolving loan program. And so this is a as a note, it's a grant agreement that we have with Vermont Housing Finance Agency. The funds that were originally ARPA have been fully expended, although we we do have a decent amount of of general funds remaining. I believe this is also reimbursement based program, so there's some lag. But I I can if you have more in-depth questions on the status, I can let Sean speak to that.

[Speaker 0]: So this is the revolving loan fund. And I think I saw on the general fund one, so it looks like is that the $1,816,800,000.0 is still general fund that's been unspent? Yes. But obligated?

[Sean Gilpin]: So it's been obligated to the housing finance agency. This is for development of multifamily units. So it takes a while for any of these projects to come to fruition. My understanding is that nearly all of this has been promised to projects, but again, we deal with reimbursements so that we can be good stewards of public dollars. So many of these projects are still in the process and will be given these funds once they show the process progress has been made.

[Speaker 0]: Do you have any sense of a time frame for when those because I know in the budget last year, we put something in about giving projects that have been swapped for general fund extra time beyond FY '26. James, I don't remember what that is in the budget, but that would be good just for us to rely on. And I it it whether it went till December 2027 or whether we just gave it a few months into 2027. But the point was that we didn't want these projects that were originally ARPA projects to have the general fund hanging out there because this is all just being held and this general fund we're not using for other things. So we were in the budget. We said you can have the money beyond the twenty sixth date because we gave you general fund, but it can't go on forever. So I can't remember what that deadline is.

[Sean Gilpin]: Right. I've just sent a message to one of my colleagues who's probably watching the live feed. There's about a two minute delay on the YouTube. So we'll see if we get an answer if

[Speaker 0]: It's like Back to the Future. Wayne?

[Wayne Laroche]: The two phone numbers, 22047 and 10000. What's the what's the difference?

[Dan Dickinson]: Oh, yeah. Yeah. I should explain that. The 22047 is the federal ARPA, and then the the one the 10,000 is general fund.

[Speaker 0]: So my crackerjack staff said it's 12/31/2027. So these the general fund swap gets another twelve months. But that's it. Then we take it back.

[Dan Dickinson]: I think internally, our our goal is to still get things completed by the end of the ARPA That's pretty '26. I I can't you know, going back quickly to DD, I think there are a few of those CRP projects that we had identified as not so much risky for purposes of, like, not being completed, but Right. Could fall past that. So I I think there are a few there that could go past 12/3126. But I think at least from what I've heard, by and large, we're still trying to get things done by the end of this calendar year.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. But just letting you know well ahead of time that '28 is going be all new.

[Sean Gilpin]: We've bought future calendars, it's highlighted.

[Speaker 0]: Excellent, great, thank you. So the only

[Dan Dickinson]: other item here, these these three lines are another one of the the successful programs that really was possible thanks to the ARPA dollars that has transformed into a base funded initiative, the the manufactured housing improvement investment and repair program. Improvement repair. Yeah.

[Sean Gilpin]: We play around with eyes.

[Dan Dickinson]: By and large, those funds have all been spent. Did you know, just looking at vision, I did identify these $3 that are sort of hanging out there. Although going back to the grant agreements, we had all the funds obligated. So I think it's just a matter of the finance team figuring out where we where we missed $3 of a payment that went out.

[Speaker 0]: Coffee, you know.

[Dan Dickinson]: So pretty pretty small amount that we'll we'll work to get resolved. So beyond that, that's the DHCDA ARPA, simply the state and local fiscal recovery funds universe.

[Speaker 0]: That's helpful. Thank you. So if we can look at the you don't have this in front you, the general fund.

[Dan Dickinson]: I don't, I've seen that though.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah, okay, so I mean a lot of it's ANR, but I'm just checking, there is some, missing middle.

[Dan Dickinson]: I believe that that document has numbers that were current as of ninethirtytwenty five. Right,

[Speaker 0]: yeah, one of those is the rental housing investment program and that had 15,600,000.0. Okay,

[Dan Dickinson]: that's probably the missing middle.

[Sean Gilpin]: Rental housing and investment program is actually probably another name for VHIP and those funds have definitely.

[Speaker 0]: Is that what that's?

[Sean Gilpin]: Yeah, VHIP has gone through a few different.

[Speaker 0]: It's all the same thing as being I'm

[Dan Dickinson]: trying really hard.

[Speaker 0]: You have enough acronyms without multiple acronyms for the same program. I

[Sean Gilpin]: actually got stuck in alphabet soup. I

[Speaker 0]: know. Yeah, so yeah, the community recovery grant, so I'm seeing there's quite a bit that needs to be spent on a couple of different projects. Remind us a little bit more about, talk a little bit more about what those programs are, something about helping municipalities, but tell us a little bit more about that.

[Dan Dickinson]: I think that's the one question that I can't answer off the top of my head.

[Sean Gilpin]: I will say I'll jump in a That little bit actually is a program that's run through our community planning and revitalization crew. I'm sure you folks are familiar with Chris Cochran, who deals a lot with land use. That's the group that the division that he oversees. So they typically go towards planning for revitalization, everything from doing community events all the way to transportation upgrades in downtowns and areas like that. I'm paraphrasing a little, trying to channel Chris, but those are mostly, yeah, downtown revitalization planning grants.

[Speaker 0]: Does revitalization also include flood resilience? Yes. This money could be spent for that. So the municipalities apply for this money? Correct. We all know if there's this, it seems like there's a chunk left over and I'm wondering if all the municipalities really aware of

[Dan Dickinson]: every dollar of what we have. It's just a matter of just like with VHIP and with the VHFA work, it's physical projects that have to be contracted and subcontracted and completed and monitored and and so there's there's just a process that's still playing out. So there's no balance remaining there.

[Speaker 0]: It's already been identified. There's no obligated balance. There's

[Dan Dickinson]: But every every dollar is committed at this point.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. I

[Martha Feltus]: think those those downtown revitalization, like that money that you were talking about is it's not granted I don't believe to the regional development or regional economic development and planning commissions, but they are they were instructed to work with their communities in terms of promotion and getting applications and that sort of stuff. So for instance in my area, I know that our regional planning commission is working with the communities to try to figure out how to use these

[Speaker 0]: And I think that was part of the idea wasn't it because so many small communities don't have grant writers and they have full time staff to do this sort

[Martha Feltus]: of stuff. Right. So, Regional Planning Commission is helping out and hopefully promoting it enough so that they get applications in.

[Wayne Laroche]: And

[Sean Gilpin]: in fairness to the RBCs, as we affectionately call them, they do a lot of preeminent work even before an application. So they try to get communities ready so that they can be successful and not, especially when you're dealing with a community that's heavily reliant on volunteers. You can't burn that energy, necessarily.

[Speaker 0]: Anybody have any more questions about your stuff? So it sounds like you're on track. You might have to find $3 but otherwise you're gonna spend, you know

[Dan Dickinson]: I'll write personal checks.

[Speaker 0]: You know, for $3 at what point is it worth it?

[Sean Gilpin]: Close the door on this.

[Speaker 0]: Says the person who balances their check with a penny every month. I can't stand it.

[Sean Gilpin]: We hunted down 25¢ off the $50,000,000 homeowner assistance program. Yeah, we found it.

[Speaker 0]: Alright. You guys know how to look under the sofa. Great. Alright. Well, thank you very much for coming in, and appreciate hearing a little bit more about the work that you're doing with these funds. It's good to kind of get a recap on that. We'll see you back here for FY27 when he learns. Not very long, we have to get through the consensus revenue forecast first. Thank all. Happy weekend. Thanks. So committee, that is our budget workshop at twelve. We have how many people signed up? 18 people, so now there are more How many? No, yeah, what I was going to say Dave, is now there are more people participating than there are committees. So we like that. And so it's in Room 10 Or 12 right at noon, you can bring your lunch, we'll just maybe sit at the table with like the committee table and have them be at the audience.

[Wayne Laroche]: Are you supposed to know anything?

[Speaker 0]: Not occasionally. This is our chance to. So so it will be recorded except that the last thing is an activity and we're going to turn off the cameras because In the meantime, for budget adjustments, I've been going through the spreadsheet to see are there things that we need to let committee chairs know about? Most of them are not. There's a few we've kind of asked some of you, I've spoken with you just to see. Most of it's, or I've talked to the committee chair already, so that should be fine. But if you have questions on any of your things here, due to a little deeper dive, I know a couple of you are checking with the people that presented to say, tell me

[Martha Feltus]: a little bit more about this.

[Speaker 0]: And I'm hoping that we will We're gonna take some testimony. Chair Wood will be here next Thursday to talk about their recommendations. That's where most of the budget adjustment thing is happening. And then there may be another committee member too that comes and talks to

[Martha Feltus]: us about a couple of things. I have to

[Speaker 0]: check out healthcare as well and see how we are on that. But I think, as I said before, it's not a wildly crazy budget adjustment this year, which should be nice. We may have some surprises, but that's what we have for now. So that's what we have. We are not going to meet this Monday. Enjoy your Monday. The following Monday is a federal holiday, MLK, June's the day, so we will not meet that day. Enjoy your Monday. Get ready for the following Monday. That'll be we'll have the budget presented on the twenty third no, the twentieth, sorry. And Arty will be here that afternoon after the budget speech to start going over things, and we'll start meeting Mondays after that and it'll be again Monday afternoon like before and we've done before to four or 04:30 depending on how that's up. Do you

[Wayne Laroche]: think we'll be on the floor with the BAA?

[Speaker 0]: In my perfect world, it will be the week after next. Really? Which means we would probably vote this out on Tuesday, the twentieth, unless there's something that I learn about the budget that makes more sense for us to wait until we hear about the budget. I have no intel right now, nothing. But that's my ideal world. So if we get that out on that Tuesday, it'll be unnoticed Wednesday, on the floor that Thursday and Friday. Everything's kind of backed up. It's earlier by a week this year because of when we started, so good. You know, it'd be great to

[Martha Feltus]: get that out before we start working

[Speaker 0]: on that. Yeah, so there may be that overlap of that week, but we're just starting it on the budget, it's not, we're not totally, so that would be, and I, you know, unless anybody objects, I'll just present the budget adjustment on the floor, but you guys can be ready for questions in your areas. So that's kind of the plan. Does that all make sense? You're good with that? So we're not

[Unidentified Committee Member]: going to do a particular last year where we go on

[Speaker 0]: and on and on on. We hope so. You mean like we have two budget adjustments on our wall? Is that kind of on and on? Yeah, that kind of going out. Hope not. Yeah, yeah. You know, I'm hearing little things might be cropping up with some changes on the budget adjustment. Sent a text to Adam, so we'll see if there's some changes. Remember last year they came to us with provider stabilization and they wanted to up that and reduce something else because we learned more about the nursing homes. So sometimes things happen like that that we need to put in the budget. But otherwise, and there's sometimes things in their section c of the f y twenty seven budget that maybe we pull out. We did that last year. Pulled a few links into the budget adjustment instead. Haven't heard from Adam, but, you know, next week is a long way away, so things could happen. But otherwise, that's that's kinda what I know for now. So okay. So why don't we go off