Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Good afternoon. This is the House Appropriations Committee. It is Wednesday, 01/21/2026. It's just after 01:15, 01:20, and we are our budget adjustment work and we have the DCF, the Department for Children and Families, coming in to talk to us. We learned some things from House Human Services last week when they came to present their budget information, and so we're really appreciated that you were able to come in so quickly and chat with us about some of the things that we have questions about. Why don't all of you introduce yourselves, and then we'll start. I think we have some people who've got some questions to start us off. So

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: Good afternoon. I'm Lily Sojourner, the director of the Office of Economic Opportunity, which is in the Department for Children and Families. Good afternoon. Miranda Graham, the deputy commissioner for the Economic Services Division.

[Michael Smetin (CFO, Vermont DCF)]: Michael Smetin, I'm the DCF CFO.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: And I'm Sandy Hoffman, the Interim Commissioner. We saw the memo that rep would read from, and we have answers to the questions. If you want to start with that, I

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: can just go through that. Some questions in between. I think Reverend Yacovone and Bluemle are of at your area, so they're going to be the most expert. And I see that we have Representative McGill from House Human Services here, too. So great. All right.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: All right. So the first By the way, before

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: we get started, did you send that to Autumn? So do we have it? No. Okay. We can. We can. Yeah, that would be great. Okay. And then do you

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: want to circulate the tables? I'll refer to these.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Okay. And then make sure that we

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: have electronic data, everything on Yep. So the second point that was in the memo well, thank you for having us here and allowing us to clear up some confusion. And we hope that what we testify to today will allay some of the concerns that were raised. So the first part about general assistance. Do you have the memos in front of you? Should I just

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: We should have the letter that Teresa said gave us. So that's what you're referring to. Yes. Item two, general assistance. Yes. It's on page three of her memo. Okay. Yes.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: Okay. So as you know, Vermont is a shelter first state as stated in legislative language in Act 27. General assistance emergency housing shall be provided in a community based shelter whenever possible. DCF acknowledges a sizable projected underspend through the first half of state fiscal year '26. Over the summer alone, we realized savings of $2,400,000 as we had budgeted at a much higher room utilization than materialized. When building budgets, we utilize the best information available to us at the time, which is often eighteen to twenty months in advance of actual operation of the program. And given that this program has not operated under the same rules for two years in a row since prior to the pandemic, we have limited data off of which to base projections. We saw lower demand than we anticipated over the summer months, and we feel it's important to make it very clear that DCF did not restrict days beyond what was outlined in the budget that the legislature passed. In order to provide a safer environment for children, DCF implemented family only hotels. This was only done in districts where there were enough hotels or motels to still allow other access. We know that there is a lot of illegal activity taking place at the hotels because unfortunately, we have put large groups of vulnerable people in a space where they can be easily preyed upon, given the lack of appropriate staff. This summer, a child was lured into a room by another hotel guest, and thankfully, there was quick action taken by hotel management. However, that type of risk is not an acceptable one, and DCF had to take action to address this, which led to some of the rooms remaining vacant. As stated in our response to Representative Wood, we estimate that it will be at least 5,500,000. This is perhaps better described as a range, though as we continue to see fluctuations in room availability and utilization. The spring months are particularly difficult to project, given the end of adverse weather and the renewal of the legislatively mandated 1,100 room cap. If we remain at that cap during the spring months, we may see even lower savings. In addition to the underutilization savings, the cost from our call center contract have been lower than we originally budgeted, and we are realizing some savings from vacant positions. All in all, we think a range of 5,500,000.0 to $6,800,000 is reasonable to assume. And that's the table that we sent around.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: So a question on that. Yes, so I'm seeing the table and we have the rooms budgeted. I guess, so July, August, September were quite a bit lower, but we still aren't up to the two we're 200 rooms lower than what we projected in January, February, and March. There's still 200 rooms that aren't being used. Am I reading that right? I'm trying to figure out how we get to the 5.5. We budgeted in advance of capacity of rooms. We built that budget eighteen, twenty months in advance. Right, so you projected you'd have 1,400. Does that mean we don't actually have fourteen twenty one rooms available, even if we wanted them?

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: I don't think We have just about 1,300 rooms now open, no, I don't think

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: that we have the 1,400 available. So we budgeted for 1,400, but there's 1,300 available? They're currently being used, if give or take.

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: There are some rooms, because of the self pay component, we have rooms that aren't available to us because people are in them, and they're paying for them themselves. And we have an ebb and flow that happens every start of the month with that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: And so that becomes complicated.

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: Are people being turned away? Every year, people are turned away, and this is no exception.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Just processing all this. All right, are there questions before we go on to the next thing? Thank you. Well, I don't know how, if we're gonna proceed, I don't believe we can resolve this issue, but I'm not sure that I have, I I have a kind of stepping way back. I a broader question, which is when the department anticipates a sizable surplus in an area. And I would say that there's a sizable surplus in reach up, there's a sizable surplus in this, and may even grow beyond the 5,500,000 to 8,000,000. And we have as many people who are unhoused as there are. What is the department's thinking about those surpluses? Is this just money you're going to plan to roll into next Or is this Yeah. Are you looking for ways to deploy it to meet the need

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: that exists? So this particular underspend is in the state fiscal year 'twenty seven budget to offset the housing initiative costs. So it's an $11,000,000 projection for that, and we only asked for $6,000,000

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: So you're going to use carry forwards of this for which housing initiative? We haven't gotten to all the details yet. No, we haven't. This is short '27. We Okay, guess I'm confused because I voted for a budget that anticipated serving a certain number of people, meeting certain number of needs that were spelled out that we agreed to. And now, what you're saying is that this money is actually going to

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: be used to supplement what wasn't available for next year's budget, right? No, I think what I'm saying is when we set the budget, we used our best projections to anticipate what we would have available to us, what we could purchase, in effect, to serve the Vermonters that need hotels and motels. That didn't come to fruition in the summer. It was less than we thought we would need. And now we don't have all the rooms available to us. In

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: the summer, wasn't the decrease in part because of the time limit that then immediately curtailed people's access to housing as of, I mean, I'm totally blanking on the number of days, but you know, and we tried to extend that from April through the end of the fiscal year. I mean, this is more of a, I understand budgeting, things don't turn out the way that you imagine. But in my community, in Burlington, it is a crisis. And I would think that we would want to do what we could do to find more hotel rooms, to identify I mean, I It's just a it's a lot of money that we anticipated spending and it is not that demand has actually declined. And I so my hope had been that the department would be aggressively trying to find alternatives, given the fact there is money, to help meet the existing demand in Rutland in my city and in the Greater Montpelier area. For out

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: of growth.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: I can tell you that we have been working hard with our partners in those communities to address the concerns that they have that do limit some of the hotels that we can use. And then the hotels and motels are private businesses, so they can choose whether or not to engage with us. We work with them to try to bring them on board, help them get the space they need so it's a safer place for the Vermonters that need to be in the hotels and motels.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: But we can't make that. Oh, I understand. I just wonder whether the Human Services Committee could have been notified earlier about how much the spent, how under spent things were so that they could work with you to figure out, well, how do we encourage motels or develop more community based shelter capacity. I think that my understanding is that the committee had to ask, how much have you spent down from what was appropriated for the GA program? And that was when they got that information, which is halfway through the year. I don't think your job is easy in this. I can't imagine managing it all. But I also know that it is seven degrees out there, and we have a policy that says at negative 10, that's when community emergency shelter is available to folks. Zero, right? Zero. At zero. We were told it was originally minus Minus 20, and then it moved to minus 10. Whatever the case actually. That's zero, P1, or pretty cold. I'm sorry, I don't mean to get on the soapbox, but I just feel that we could be working together to more closely, to share information about how things are going. I know you produce reports, but this piece of information was not available. And I mean, wasn't shared with the other information and knowing what we know about the number of people who are unhoused, I don't know how to square this. So I will now boy. Yeah, I'm confused. This part of your graph is 2026, is that correct? From June until July 1 until It's state fiscal year '26, correct? And according to the paper we got, there's a 5,500,000 underspend in general assistance as of January. It's a projected at the point that It's projected, but it's Yeah, that was So is there available for the rest of the year? Fiscal year, this year, '26. Yes, so we have projected that for the hotel motel portion of the GA budget, based on what we've seen happen through December and where we project we will be for the remainder of the year, and you can see in that last column is the projected authorized, the things that are shaded are projections. We would be at 5,500,000 of surplus. So, that's where that comes from. Okay. So, now you're talking about Let's keep this. We're talking about the BAA. And then you made some comment, maybe I heard it wrong, but it said that it was going to be, the '27 budget was going to include $11,000,000 but you only need $6,000,000 is what I heard. I don't know if that's right. Is that because you expect to anticipate that $5,500,000 that you can roll up to '27? Right. But we were looking for a different program,

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: not for GA housing. We're looking at it as the when you're saying GA housing, you mean hotel motel. We're looking there's a whole housing initiative that we look forward to presenting to you. So we're looking at the whole picture and taking a holistic approach to it. So it's not just a certain amount. Okay. So we'll hear about that when

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: you But pop it I think one of the concerns that I think some of us are feeling is we have so many people that are homeless, and we gave you a budget, and it's not all being used for the purpose for which it was intended. And I get what you're doing in the constraints and the hotel rooms and all that, but it's really hard to feel good about the fact that we have all these people who don't have a place to stay, and yet we have all this extra money and we're not using it to help those people. Do you want to talk about some shelter stuff that was going on

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: to help? Sure. I can talk a little bit about the extreme cold weather shelter program and try to provide some updates. And I will say that we've been pleased over the past several years that we have seen the growth of year round shelters, which just provides a lot of stability to those who are housed and the organizations that are operating them. And so that continues to be a primary investment for us. And one of the reasons why is even running a weather dependent extreme cold weather shelter is just one tool in the toolbox. But it is complicated. And what we have found this year and so to provide some context, historically, the operational period was triggered by a negative 20 degrees. And this predates COVID. So it's, again, a historical evolution that goes back quite a while. Last year, the agency adjusted that to operate at negative 10. And we had two sites regionally that were able to be activated. Last year, with one time funding, we were able to stand up as new version of this program, a student called leather shelter program. We put out a notice of funding. We're working with Vermont Interfaith Action as our administrator. It is challenging to budget for a weather dependent program. And we've done a lot of analysis with our colleagues around the state and looked at weather over the past few years. But we want to make sure that we're budgeting responsibly so that we're not in a place February, for instance where we don't have money to even operate at a negative 10. So we put forward initial projections at negative 10. We work with Vermont Interfaith Action to have a funding opportunity for communities. Once we receive those responses, we have made awards in six communities. So we have coverage this year in Burlington, Rutland, Bennington, Brattleboro, Montpelier, and Newport for the Northeast Kingdom. We did budget analysis and realized, Okay, we have money to operate at a different threshold. So the policy allows for shelters to opt in at zero. It's mandatory at negative 10. They have to operate. That is the program. But if they have capacity, they can operate at zero. And what we have found is that funding is not the barrier for some of these programs. Some of them have staff constraints or constraints of volunteers. And some of them have space constraints, where they cannot operate their space more frequently. So for that program, throughout the winter, we're able to operate that program. Again, we've been able to operate it at zero. And it's not the money that is then prohibiting that from operating more frequently. We have a very close relationship with Vermont Interfaith Action, and it's been a wonderful partnership. Every month, we evaluate the budget and make sure that we have enough funding to continue operating at the optional zero. We are also talking with them to see, is there opportunity for expansion? Because we have some communities that have not been operating at zero. We have funding available. They're doing some assessment with their contacts to say, oh, are there other regions that may be interested? Or is there a T and TA that they can provide to other communities to help support them? There are a few communities that just have organic programs that don't necessarily want to have the strings attached of a state program, but maybe they could use some training and technical assistance from Vermont Interfaith Action. So we are continuing to really make sure that's supportive and accessible. And for that program in particular, funding is not what's preventing that from opening more. And then additionally, throughout the year, we have been able to support the requests that we've received for shelter expansion. So just for instance, in Montpelier last week, they opened a new seasonal shelter that we were able to support. And if it's helpful, I can talk through other projects that we have coming online. So we continue to just make those investments. And then, again, as the commissioner said, that continues to be a theme as we head into next year of how can we make those commitments and grow shelter capacity around the state and address gaps that currently still exist?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: And I have a follow-up on that. Yeah, so there's 2,000,000 OEO request for shelter capacity and sent in. Is this $2,000,000 to support that work that you're talking about?

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: Yeah, it's the intent of the department to increase shelter beds and to strengthen the existing shelter bed system, including expanding seasonal shelters where possible. Shelter expansion work is often sensitive in communities and involves zoning and other reviews, and often involves a competitive procurement process. And sometimes the projects come to fruition and sometimes they don't. We have potential projects that would increase capacity, and we can't currently share all the details about it, but as soon as we can, we will.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Is it likely that they would become operational in this fiscal year? FY '26. So that's why it's in the VA? Yes. So that So you sort of jumped down to that to five. I did, yes. It is the latest thing you're talking about. Because it's an OAO request. And these are year round shelters or seasonal, this $2,000,000 that you want room?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: Year round, we're hoping that they'll create year round capacity, in particular those, yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: And where are you getting the $2,000,000 from to do there? The BAA. Right. So what we heard was, maybe they're two separate things. So if we move on to community partners, that's also OEO on the back page, the 1,322,000, it sounded like the state reduced POP grant, POP money here, and is maybe using that money for the shelters over the other states?

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: No, those are separate That was one time money that was used, And it, I guess, has become an expectation. But it was one time money that was used for the providers. For how? For financial

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: assistance, yeah, the primary driver is the winding down of significant one time federal and state funding, which was an insurgence of money issued to the providers over the past few years, really, starting in state fiscal year 'twenty one, we had significant influx specifically, the coronavirus relief funds were used for two years to create flexible financial assistance for individuals. Then starting in state fiscal year 'twenty three, we've had some significant one time investments of state general funds, have supported financial assistance. And those are just winding down. And so for instance, at times, we've had almost $4,000,000 of this one time funding. And at this state, we have about $500,000 left that we're using this year. So that is really the primary driver

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: this. So $1.3

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: was not in the budget that we passed last year? It was a one time appropriation. But we made a one time appropriation of this amount, or that was included in a larger amount. We appropriated this money to be used for HOP.

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: Not always over the past five years. Over the past several years, there have been a number of one time 5,000,000 or $10,000,000 that have been issued in conjunction with sometimes these changes in the General Assistance Emergency Housing Program, they've often been not direct HOP appropriations that have had much larger budget language around helping with community based services. So the language has been quite large. And we've used subsets of that money to help support financial assistance during this time. Again, if you go back to pre COVID, we supported this activity through HOF at about $1,300,000 And currently, this year, it's about 2,400,000.0 We've

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: had a lot of inflation in raising costs. Right, so

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: it's a combination of about $1,800,000 in base and then $500,000 in one time. So we appreciate that it's an important resource. And unfortunately, like other things over the past several years, when we've seen the reduction in federal funds and then sometimes these one time state general funds, that's a challenging dynamic as we continue to then prioritize investments. So what I'm trying to get at, I'm not very good

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: at asking these questions. Me try to be clearer on this. Did we appropriate this money for a specific purpose in the budget? Did the General Assembly appropriate this for the and then is it being reduced and being used for some other purpose than we originally appropriated the money for? This is an up in our budget. It's not a one for one down with anything else. So I would say no to that. The funding that you're talking about is in a different appropriation, and we are not reducing that. It's a one time appropriation. We've been spending it down. And that's once one time appropriations are spent. And so in so much as any time you do an up in a BAA, there's oftentimes we're working with a set budget for the year. I would say that this is not connected with the financial assistance one time allocation at all. It's an offer that we're asking for, for investments in shelter capacity. So you're asking for an increase in shelter capacity. Yep, that's on page three. So back up page four, this reduction totaling $1,322,000 what is being reduced? They're just not getting the money again because the one time funding has ended. So we never appropriated it in the budget in the first place? For this year. So we rolled money that was appropriated as one time funding last year into this year. We still have $500,000 left, like Lilly said. But the money was not appropriated for this year. And so we are utilizing what's left, and then the one time money is gone. I guess I'd like to ask, what's a lot? By not using this money for community based providers, what services are lost?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: My apologies for dumping you. So specifically, it is what we refer to as an eligible entity under the Housing Opportunity Grant Program for direct financial assistance to households. So it's money for things like security deposit, help with utility assistance. So it's that portion. It's not staff services. It's that direct. And that, again, pre COVID, were about 1,300,000.0 Within future and one time funds, sometimes we've been able to avoid as much as $5,000,000 And this year, we're back to 2,400,000.0 So again, it's just the end

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: of the working capital. Does this money often help people stay in housing?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: It often is used, I would say, most frequently at two moments in time, I think, when people first exit homelessness and get into housing. Again, so security deposit, addressing that surge in costs when you leave, for instance, a shelter at GA and get into housing. That's a significant driver. Another significant driver is that it has a limited amount of ability to help with rental arrears. So it can help if people have, for instance, they get sick, they fall behind and run for a month, they need a little bit of help to maintain their apartment, that's another eligible request. So it's used in both of those capacities.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I'm taking it in, thank you. Okay, Dave?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: Back to the 5.5 to 6,500,000.0 savings in GA, notwithstanding the proposal that will be coming to do more shelters or other initiatives. We could in BAA, could we not? I'm using this for illustrative purposes to make that point. We could say, you know, there's unused funds, this amount. We think it's good policy to extend the winter program from March 31 to April 30. And we believe that will cost, the department would tell us, that will cost X amount, surely not the whole 5 and a half million, I would think, based on the way it's going. Or we could do something, say, instead of zero degrees or negative 10, we could up that temperature too. That's within our BA in FY26, with funds expended to GA. Madam Chair, is that type of thing within our authority?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: It might be. It might be. I'm not sure I have a definitive answer for you on that I see we I'm not sure I have a definitive answer.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: Oh, okay. Thought you

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: said I did hear Lily say that the temperature didn't seem to be the issue with the emergency shelter. It was the constraints around not having the people to be able to open those shelters at certain temperatures. That may not I don't know, maybe that's in some places not, and others that would require a little bit more information. But I hear what you're saying.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: There is a part of me that says, in the moment, now, the monitor is in harm's way. There's some good programs that might happen in the future, but it's a big policy question. Do you say I'm sorry to those who are knocking on your door, because we've got other plans? And that's within government's prerogative. I'm just trying to understand it fully.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Foray, Yeah, it's foray. Thank you. Wayne? Oh, Nolan and then Can I have

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: a question, follow-up to Representative? Yes. I can go for the record, and I'll let you the about this. In your fiscal year 'twenty seven budget, might you assume savings from 'twenty six out of 'twenty seven? And how much?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: We are projecting to be able to roll out the housing initiative that we proposed, that we would need $11,000,000 of funding for shelter capacity building. And we reduced that to $6,000,000 in the ask, accounting for the $5,000,000 that we have.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: Do you assume this time that happened again? Very full of that. Okay, so to that point, any of the money that you decided to spend or use within DAA on the twenty seventh, that's what I've been doing.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Right. Yeah. Thank you. Wayne?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: Let's just start out with, I have concerns of course all of this. We start out with actual number of people eaten, housed per night. You have numbers of people that were housed in the G. A. Broken in the hotels for every night so that you have a tally of the total number of You also have a tally of the total number of people used on a per night cumulative basis for your shelters. And so the question would be, is there any change in that distribution? Are more people going to the shelters than GA housing? Have you had these shipped? And is it more expensive in the GA housing versus putting somebody in the shelter? Does that impact any of this conversation on the marketing spend? Do you know those numbers?

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: I can speak to GA. We do know how many people we house every single night, and then also how many people are also staying in the hotel because they have to pay for their own stay for a certain number of nights when you have income. So I can tell you, as of Monday this week, we had twelve fifty seven households that we were paying for. And then there's an additional amount of folks who were doing their self pay. So we're just under that $1,300 It is $80 per night in a hotel room. The cost that isn't factored in is the cost of the municipal services for the community where those hotels are. And those can be quite significant. And we are hoping that we will have some communities come forward with those costs because their ambulance, their fire, and their police services are often going to these hotels because of the needs of

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: folks. So had I always had concerns about the monitors and before they're eligible for the monitors there. And I know there are some ways to gain that system. So given the fact that AeroMone is involved, was the last time you was this program ever audited?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: This is a general fund funded program, the emergency housing program.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: It's all of the emergency shelter parts? The shelter part

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: is separate. So the hotel motel program is 100% general funds. Lily can speak to each of the shelter.

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: We do have some federal funding that we incorporate into the program budget. It is primarily general fund, but we do receive funding through HUD through the Emergency Solutions Grant. And that does support some shelter operations within the state.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: I've been asking this kind of question from various people coming in because I'm concerned that if something happens at the federal level, that it could have burden us in some way that we don't anticipate. Okay, thanks.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Okay, let's continue.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: I think that covers the first one. Question now, we'll go on to reach up. And we appreciate the recommendation to accept the reach up adjustment, but want to address the misconception that's a perennial negative adjustment. In state fiscal year 'twenty four, we had a pressure of 8,400,000 up in our budget for reach up caseload, and in state fiscal year '21, we added 5,100,000.0. And those fluctuations in projected caseload represent complexities of macroeconomic conditions and can change quickly with little notice. Changing rates would result in even larger budget pressures when cases inevitably trend upwards once more.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I'm just wondering, so what will that $2,320,000 be used for? So I can't say on a one for one basis, it's not like we're taking it down and putting it somewhere else. We are saying that our kids are below that amount, below what was budgeted. And so that money is referring to the general fund. There are pressures everywhere, so I can't say one for one what it would be spent on. So any aversions to the general fund are not specified, which is how you have to do it. We did learn that about reversions. If you want to repurpose it, it has to be reverted to the general fund and then reallocated somewhere else, so it's a two step process as opposed to using carryforward. But no, there seems to be no appetite for having carryforward within that program, even though you think inevitably it's going to pull up again. Our current projections show trending downwards through '27. And we a consultant who does those macroeconomic projections for us. Is this the one where we're using, we're assuming housing costs from 2001? The readable reduction? How come we're doing that? Help educate me on why we would do something that's 25 years old.

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: So we did produce a report two years ago that looked into what it would cost to change the ratable and to be able to increase people's benefits. I think at that time, was to increase it from the current 4.96 to 0.6. We needed $5,500,000 to be able to make that increase. What we don't know is how many more households would then become eligible for this benefit because you would be increasing that threshold. And so that's a little bit of an unknown for us and could also increase what we would need. So I think it has been investigated, I'm happy to produce the report because it's probably very different. I'm lost

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: the report. You haven't updated. How many people, households who are on Reach Up are also in the hotel motel token?

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: We do have that. I don't have the number off the top

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: of my head, and unfortunately, the

[Miranda Graham (Deputy Commissioner, Economic Services Division, DCF)]: phone a friend that I normally would have could get it to me in moments notice is on vacation. But I can get that for you. But we do have Proctober, yeah, there. I can get you the I'd be interested

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: to know if it's 3 or 300 or somewhere in between. That would be great to know what we're talking about, because that feels like we're defeating ourselves if that's happening. And I know a lot of this is coming down to money for you, but if we're using 2021, I don't think any of us could live on what people are getting when housing crisis are so vastly different, and then that throws them into another program where they need services. It can be a self defeating cycle, which is very frustrating. Yeah, Dave.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: If we could also find out how many of the recipients or households are receiving what we call Section eight vouchers?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: On Reach Up? Yeah.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I'll reach out. Keep going.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: Okay, the OEO positions, those positions are active now and are critical to ensuring program safety and integrity, as well as maintaining compliance with federal requirements to ensure access to federal funds. So that speaks to the potential audit that was just mentioned. This is number four? Yes.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Me just read what she said here. This also came from Bob? Yes. Yeah. So, two limited service positions that are So, why are we changing it from grants to personal services? Say that again, I'm sorry. Decrease? So as the Creating two new positions?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: As the program has grown dramatically, we've needed additional roles to help ensure program safety and integrity, as well as maintain compliance with our federal requirements. So these positions develop and maintain training technical assistance policies and procedures. They support statewide data collection and reporting systems. For instance, that reporting helps ensure that the grant awards are actually fully spent and utilized. Through our quarterly reports, we can identify issues such as vacancy issues, issues with the emergency departments being online, that help us end up with programs and ensure that they are on track to spend their awarded dollars. So it, in some ways, helps make sure we stay on track with spending down the awards as in their agreements. And then really critically, they conduct monitoring. So this is crucial programmatic monitoring. So it will be case files, policies, to ensure that our standards are being followed in these programs. And then also annual habitability inspections, which is on the ground monitoring of shelter projects. Not only has capacity grown, but the number of separate shelter projects has grown. So for instance, we had 28 separate programs in state fiscal year 'twenty three. Right now, we have 41. We are also regularly called upon to help do site reviews as shelters develop new projects. So we're often going around looking at physical sites with shelter providers to say, yes, we think this has the potential for renovation, or here are some things you might want to talk to your architect about. And so we were doing annually about 23 inspections a year pre COVID. And last year, we did 47. So all of this is really creating pressure and the need for these physicians to ensure that sheltered guests and other recipients of this funding to help support them are really getting quality and safe services that can meet their needs.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: So what would happen why does this have to be a budget adjustment? What would happen if we waited till the FY 'twenty seven budget to do this? So these are existing limited service positions that were authorized to support emergency housing. And given that the emergency housing language specifies where shelter first stayed and it's still supporting housing, they've now been moved to OEO. But the budget to support those positions does not exist in OEO. Where does the budget to support them exist now? They were funded with one time funds in prior situations in a one time appropriation. So you're moving into base? Your proposal is to move into base. This is BIA, so this is one time. But I think you could say that it's an ongoing need. So what happens if we didn't do it in the budget adjustment and waited till the FY27 budget? We would have a budget pressure for these positions, their filled positions. They've already been moved, and this is sort of a retroactive asking for the money? I'm just trying to understand this, sorry. Yes, we're adjusting the positions in the budget as And there's money coming out of where to fund OEO? What's being reduced? So overall, we are proposing an increase to the HOP budget in BAA, but a portion of that is going from the HOP allocation up to personal services within OEO to support OEO's ability to oversee that budget. So the positions are using money that would otherwise be used for direct services to people? I think, yes, and you can't provide direct services if you don't have the supports around there to ensure that they're providing quality. You can tell I'm not an expert on this. I'm just trying to find my way through. John and then Wayne. Trying to

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: find my way through. So thanks for explaining all this. I know it's complex, there's lots of moving parts here as well, but I'm trying to understand, just as a follow-up to here. These, the two limited positions, have already been in any place, correct? Yes. So those were moving from where they are now, which is currently?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: They're currently, oh, they were in ESDs.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: They're now moving to REOB, so we don't need extra money for it, is that correct? The funding already exists for those two positions in a place, but it's simply shifting where that's going to be in OEE. That make sense? The question I'm asking, you're kind of asking if

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I was asking sort of the

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: same Sort of the same thing, I'm just asking a little different. The money So if you have money in place for a couple of limited positions, those positions need to be shifted in a year with money that's already currently funded for those, we don't need extra money to the VA for those two positions. Do understand my question?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I think I understand your question.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: Because we've seen some come through VA where sometimes that are often a different location here, perhaps money's already been allocated for those two positions. So it's really just kind of a shift.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: So I think they're asking for retroactive approval. So like they've moved the people, and now they already moved the people. Now they want the money to follow the people, do I have that right?

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: You just said, you're shift to where that's going, so you need additional money.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: We're whispering and we can't hear you. Okay.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: don't know that there was money, because I think what Megan's saying is that it was one time money that we didn't have. And so that's why we're making a change as they ship this fiscal year. I don't know that there is much there.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: There's no So the money is down.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: Oh, sorry. You might change your

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: answer. So

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: the one time money has already been appropriated for these two positions.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I don't know if I would say that it has been appropriated. These were previously funded of one time money.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: From which year? From '5. Twenty five fiscal year, '26 fiscal year.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: So did we we didn't fund the positions in February 26

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member, House Appropriations)]: at

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: all? Because we didn't need them any longer. So they were at economic services. Correct. And so they were So you eliminated two positions that were vacant. Limited service. And now you want

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: two new positions. Those positions to run that program, to make sure we're doing the stuff that we need to do in that program so it can continue. But it needs to be funded. We have the positions that we can use, but they just Were they

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: from the pool or from They were from the economic services, and it's all under the emergency housing. So the positions were transferred from economic services to OEO, but there wasn't any money for that. So now you're asking for money, but you're taking the money from somewhere else. Because this is net neutral, it says, right?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: Right, we're utilizing the money. So as the Housing Opportunity Grant program has grown, I think it was 7,000,000 or $8,000,000 pre COVID, and now it's over $30,000,000 There has not been additional corresponding administrative and operational support. And so that's the investment here. So while it is shooked away from the grant line item, for us, it really is important because, again, if we can't go out there and say, yes, the shelter is safe, they can't open. If we can't go out

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: there and

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: say, yes, you've sufficiently resolved this issue after you had a fire or flood, they can't reopen.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: The resources to do the work.

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: Right. And again, when we do our quarterly monitoring review of reports, we're getting information and

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: able to

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: follow-up on, oh, there's an issue with these emergency housing apartments. They haven't been able to come online for the past two weeks. That lets us then follow-up and say, hey, what's your remediation plan? Because if we're going do this money, we want to make sure you shut it down. It needs to get out the door to Vermonters. So I think while it is a shift, think, again, in some ways, is needed to help them get So the money out the

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: then my question is, why wasn't this in the FY 'twenty six budget at the beginning?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: I think it was a timing issue just due to the process of how long

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Yes, I don't know if we do. Like I said earlier, to build this budget eighteen to twenty months in advance, so it's hard to know until you know what the GA program is that you're operating, what resources you need internally. So I think a combination of the timing of we have these resources available, OEO has a need, we can merge those two things, move the positions. And May or how it went?

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: May, October. October and this month.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: So it sounds to me like these positions would help you deal with the concerns that I have about accountability and related things.

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

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: I think also provide better support to our recipients. That combination of support and accountability is more responsive, but then also address any issues with errors.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I think we understand it better. You. Sorry for all our questions, we're Until we're not the Human Services Committee. Okay, so, and then the next one is the shelter, higher than anticipated costs.

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: And we talked about that already.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Yeah. Did we say where the money was coming from? It's just coming from the revenue upgrade? The up in the $2,000,000 So it's a BAA app, so I think going back to what we talked about before, that's start. To So we're at Sierra Residential? Oh, the committee recommended except for that. Right, but there were concerns about a full picture of the annualised funding needed has yet to be presented. Can I just get a general question about that? I think I saw a spreadsheet last year that indicated that the ask for last year did not represent the total cost of this and was funded through past one time money that had been carried forward. And I just am wondering what is the total cost of this line item? Of which line item? Secure residential treatment facilities. So we have shared numbers, I believe we've shared numbers now, about our projected needs for secure residential treatment facilities. We have a variety of funding sources available. We've got a one time appropriation that we can draw down on. We have carry forwards that we have brought from last year that didn't get spent. And we have the base budget and the BAAF. So all of those combined to a total of $11,600,000 for the state fiscal year that we project utilizing. So the 1.9 is part of the 11.6? Correct. And the stopgap method to fund crisis stabilization service. Is this because we don't have a wood side replacement, or is this something else? Yes, this was the budget that was intended to cover the costs of a permanent secure treatment facility within the state. We do have West River Haydron operating, which is a three bed permanent facility that does short term stabilization. And then we have Red Clover as well. And red clover is funded somewhere else, right? It's through the one time appropriations. Yes. And I may be mixing up my fiscal years now, just with So red the 11.6, that would then be an annual I mean we could expect we haven't had the budget presentation but then in the coming year with this 11,600,000 I mean, what is the cost of this line item? Do you have that on hand? For '27? Yeah. Yes, I do have that. It's less next year. We hope. We are projecting $8,800,000 next year. And is that because we don't actually have a place? We're in negotiations now. Yeah, your tongue's a charm. We've had West River Haven. It enables us to move away from some of these high end crisis placement and stabilizations. So the goal is to have a more cost efficient approach moving forward. I feel like we've had the 1.9. I'm why we need that in the budget adjustment. We need it in the budget adjustment because without that, we would see $1,900,000 short at the less than $600,000 that we project the meeting between our various funding streams. And we didn't know that at budget time. We did not know that. So the West River Haven facility, we had anticipated two beds, we were able to get three beds. And that's the full reason for the 1.9, or is that just part of Web group events. In fact, it's about $4,300,000 in total. Thank you.

[Lily Sojourner (Director, Office of Economic Opportunity, DCF)]: All right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Okay, so we did the OEO. I'm sure I could explain it intellectually, but we did it. Talked Recovery Centers are in the game. What else are we missing? What other questions does the committee have? Or what else would you like us to know, if there's anything else you'd like us to know?

[Sandy Hoffman (Interim Commissioner, Vermont DCF)]: I think that's it. Hopefully that clarified things.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: I may need to follow-up with you because there are a few things that I don't yet understand. And I'll be following up with human psoriasis as well. I swear. Dave, are you good on your questions at this point?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member, House Appropriations)]: You are? Okay. Anybody else? He didn't come up, so. Okay. Right, it's not inviting.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: Well, lots for us to ponder and chew on, as always, when we hear from you. Thank you so much for coming in. We do appreciate it. Thank you.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member, House Appropriations)]: Thank you all for looking.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair, House Appropriations)]: And if you want to submit your mark, that would be great. Thank you. And then submit electronically this sheet too so we can post that. Thank you very much. Right, ready? I'm back again. Let's take a ten minute break. Emily is here to go up and stuff, but we need to have a ten minute break and clear our head and gun.