Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Good afternoon. This is the House Appropriations Committee. It is Monday, 03/16/2026. It's almost 02:30, and I know everybody's been waiting a long time for all of this information, and I just want to set expectations appropriately. We are not deciding anything today. We are just getting over to everybody's priorities are and how it's and we're going to have a conversation about it. This is not being posted. Our priorities are done, I believe, this sheet. They're anonymous. So we just see what people have put together. Are there more to be Yes. I'm sorry. I took them all. I'm going to invoke, you may hear me say this more than once this week, something that a former colleague on this committee said a few years ago, which is nothing is decided until everything is decided. So we may say tomorrow, oh, let's do this, and something else may happen and change. And Friday at 06:00, we're going to do something else. So nothing is decided until everything is decided, and everything will be decided Friday sometime. We hope it's Friday. So everybody get that? Sounds good. You may not like it, but that's the way this is going to go. So we are going to take a look at what James has put together. Thank you all for putting in your priorities. Just to remind people, what I asked you to do was to say, if you had zero to five million dollars to spend, how would you spend that first $5,000,000 How would you spend $5 to $10,000,000 or $6 to $10 and second $5,000,000 and how would you spend a third $5,000,000 if we had that? So that was the assignment. So that was $15,000,000 total. Didn't know if we had $15,000,000 when I gave you that assignment last week. And Emily is going come talk to us next about what sources of funds are. So we'll see if that's what we have, or if we have less, or if we have more. We'll find out from Emily after that. But I'm not expecting it to be if there is more. Aren't going to suddenly find $50,000,000 that we didn't have last week, unless some miracles happen last week. So James, do you want to talk to us about it? This is not being posted. This is a draft copy that we're talking about here. And if you just want to explain to us what we are looking at.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Sure. So in front of you are the anonymized submissions of the committee members, the results of the prioritization exercise that you all submitted. Each group of three tables represents one individual submission. So that first lateral grouping of tier one, two, and three represents one committee member submission. The next group of three, tier one, two, and three represents the next individual submission, and so on. So we have three individual committee members submissions on page one, three on page two, and so on. Subtotals for each tier are given within each tiered rankings and committee members. Some of you have sent me updated adjustments to your tiers as of this morning that this does not quite yet reflect. I've been running around chasing us information. So if you submitted anything to me this morning, adjusting your prioritization exercises, you likely will not see that reflected here. Items in bolded reflect potential global commitment items, just flagging those because those will be subject to further discussion as we nail down specific final amounts for those.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We told Nolan, and Nolan asked us, don't make him do all the potential global commitments until we know where there's a strong interest. Because it takes him a while, and it takes AHS a while. And we don't want to make work for people just to say, oh, that's nice and not do anything.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: And the committee has received information from committees of jurisdiction suggesting general fund global commitment splits for many of these items. What you see reflected in front of you are as the numbers came to me in the submissions from committee members. So some of those global commitments may be gross, others may be general fund subject for further discussion among committee. Right,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: so some of the numbers and I think sometimes some of us put down different amounts.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yes, and some of yeah, there's some dispersion about specific amounts submitted by committee members, working on some summary documents to show what was a high priority and what had differing suggestions for funding amounts from the committee. There are also some potential appropriation recipients that were of interest to multiple committee members, but perhaps for different uses as well as different amounts. A good example of that would be Vermont Legal Aid. So their FY twenty seven request consisted of a number of different appropriations for different purposes. Office of the Health Care Advocate, restoring map contract funding, immigrant attorney support, things of that nature. So those working on how to break that up for all of you, I have in front of me, which I can share on the screen, my preliminary highest vote getters across the tiers. Working on additional summary materials for you all to show how that breaks out within the tiers of funding. But wanted to flag that. So you'll see some appropriation items receive many votes, but maybe those votes are split between different suggested uses or different amounts. Great. Yeah. I will pull up. So while you have it in front of you, I'll go ahead and pull up list behind me.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: This is not a weighted. This is just on a straight number of votes.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yes, these are just the anonymized submissions from committee members.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: The numbers that you're going to put up now.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: These are just the number of votes. Unweighted, not weighted by tiers. The number of

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: don't know whether it's tier one, tier two, or tier three all equals one point or one vote. We didn't weight it. James and I talked about weighting them. So tier one is three, tier two is two, and tier three is one. At this point, we aren't doing that. If we need to, we can do that, but we're not doing it.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Well, that's hard too because saying that any of these are priority when they are all priority.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Right. So that's priority.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Because I really didn't weight my Yeah. Sit down in there.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. Some people did more than others. And so we're just we didn't go that route. We contemplated and didn't.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: And there were some adjustments to things within tiers and just still working through the information received from the committee and breaking that up into those tiers. So I will have that information for you all. But for now, these are the votes across the tiers. These are just raw vote totals.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That's good.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: And this will be updated as I work through the tiers. But as I worked through the results of tier one, What I did for this table is looked at the tier one items. What appeared in folks' tier one submissions? What were the total number of votes of those items received across all submissions? So what you're looking at behind me is items that appeared in tier one rankings and then the total number of votes they received across Regardless of which Regardless of whether they received It

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: started with tier

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: two or tier three.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And so that legal aid could be there were seven items for legal aid. And so that's not broken out. That's just

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: anybody Yes, because of the number of 10 people said, hey, I think we should do this for legal aid, or there were 10 individual votes for legal aid items. But they're very excuses.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, so we can get details on that. The

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Crop Cash program, the Organic Farming Association in Vermont, Free and referral clinics. And some of these were subject to different suggested funding numbers. So for example, with NOFA, that there was consensus around $500,000 meet the request that was submitted. Free and referral clinics, that will be a general fund potential global commitment split. And so some folks had different submissions for an amount there. So these are just the items that appeared in folks' submissions without final numbers attached quite yet. Meals on Wheels.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It looks like on Meals on Wheels, some people put in there was a million dollar request. Some people said, Let's do half 1,000,000. Eight people said, Let's do something.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yep. And I think the majority of those submissions suggested doing the $1,000,000 appropriation, but there were a handful that were smaller amounts. Six. Advance Vermont appeared in six different submissions. The nurturing parent program. This also appeared in advocate requests a request from prevent child abuse or the prevent child abuse program. So this is a sum total

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: of And human services said that they were the same thing or whatever. I remember child abuse, other people said nurturing parent, but in their letter, it was clear that that was the same program. The

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: requested $500,000 appropriation to Bridges to Health appeared in committee submissions, appeared in a number of tier one submissions. Funding contained in H seven seventy eight for dam safety. The secretary of state's office had requested additional funding for the Vermont Access Network, additional base funding in f y twenty seven in the amount of 450,000. The majority of votes suggested funding at that requested level. There were a number that smaller amounts. For example, one fifty. I believe there was a vote for a $200,000 base increase to Van. But that item appeared in in six different committee member submissions. Secretary of state election support, was a 450 also a $450,000 request in the tradition of doing additional appropriations to the secretary of state during even year for an off year fiscal year, but to support even year upcoming upcoming elections. There were two different Vermont two one one requests. There was the request to restore base funding that was proposed for removal in the governor's recommended budget. The restoration of base funding received five committee votes. I don't know that I have the $95,000 request for tech upgrades. I don't know if that appears in the final highest of getters. Next, Vermont labor relations mediator. There had been requests for two positions at the labor relations board, a mediator and an attorney. There was committee discussion of funding one of those positions at varying amounts, 125,000 or 150,000. Across those different amounts,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: there were five, five votes in the One was for they asked for two positions. One was the mediator and one was a general counsel, I believe. And so I think our focus had been on the mediator. Yeah.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Next was the treasurer's office request contained in H577. This is a $50,000 request to do marketing and outreach for the proposed ArrayRx program. These votes were, to my recollection, all at the proposed $50,000 funding level. Next, there were a number of of requests received both through the public hearings and from standing committee recommendations to do a one time general fund transfer in the amount of $450,000 to the domestic violence and sexual violence special fund.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: that request received five appeared in five committee member submissions. End Homelessness Vermont had made a funding request. The original amount requested by End Homelessness Vermont is escaping me, but they had requested funding

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: You're in 05/11.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Thank you. The original request was six eleven. Human services Five. Said 511. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay. So various amounts for the

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Various amounts for the End Homelessness Vermont submission or request. Several committee members also noted that there is potential FY '25 carry forward from an appropriation to leave the agency of human services that could be used to offset the total amount of this of this request in the amount of $168,000.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So we're looking into that. Yeah.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: The Human Rights Commission had proposed various appropriations to the committee. There had there were several requests for positions, requests for, I believe, restoration of vacancy savings that were assumed in the governor's recommended budget. Various committee members were in favor of making an additional appropriation to the Human Rights Commission. Very but for bit for varying uses. In addition to the Vermont Access Network request, the secretary of state office had requested base funding to make funding available to community radio stations, which I believe are housed under Vermont access.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That's the 90,000. And I'm wondering if that was part of the three fifty or was that separate from the three fifty?

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Part of the five forty. Part of five forty. Was five forty.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: So four fifty plus 90. We

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: did separate it out.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yep. Yep. And so some folks on the committee had said, I'm in favor of community radio and the Vermont Access Network appropriation. Some were just in favor of one or the other. So this includes anybody who bundles their van appropriations to vote with the community radio. So five votes for Vermont Access Network, four separate votes for community radio. You all have in front of you for consideration H seven seventy two, which would contain funding for the Vermont State Housing Authority's Tenant Rental Arriers Assistance Program. Funding for that program received four votes across the committee, believe, in the amount requested $1,000,000 appropriation. Right. The proposed 1,000,000 appropriation in age seven seventy two. There were four committee member recommendations for additional funding for skilled home health nurses in the form, I believe, of a rate increase. But there was some dispersion among members, whether that would be an approximately $330,000 gross appropriation, 3 and 30,000 just general fund and follow-up with some liquidity numbers. So TBD on the final amount there, but requested or recommended funding for skilled home health nurses range from There are two recommendations for 167 about and two separate ones for three thirty general fund. Four votes in favor of additional funding for the youth council in the form of a one time or additional new one time appropriation to the youth council. I believe from submitted testimony, this would be a preemptive backfilling or replacement of federal funds, which folks who organize the youth council fear maybe that they're not certain they'll be receiving that funding for their next funding cycle.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That's the Department of Health, which is interesting. That's where that's where the money has been. It's the Department of Health.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Think it might be federal grant that floats through the Department of Health.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That was appropriate too. Additional

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: four votes in favor of appropriation for the Flood Safety Act requests. So these were The request that was made was two FTEs to implement the Flood Safety Act in the amount of $300,000

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: There were three positions requested.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: And and yes. And various thank you. Three positions requested. Recommended positions ranged from two to three in in varying amounts. 300 to 450,000. Okay. The members.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. Okay.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Four committee members were in favor of additional funding for Sash. That would be a 2 and a half million dollar general fund appropriation as it was requested. And in the form of general fund, the BPS submit is.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Yeah,

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: I think that's right.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: That would be approximate 2,100,000.0 general fund appropriation. Then we're getting into items that received three votes or fewer. So serve, learn, earn additional funding for the elder care program. Were two submissions I need to follow-up with committee members about regarding the elder care program. Two were pertaining to rates for providers of elder care at the AAAs and the DAs. Then I believe there was a separate recommendation to restore funding for an elder care contract in one of the AHS departments. So some follow-up needed there with the committee members. Three votes in favor of home share expansion. Additional positions at the ethics commission in varying amounts. There are three votes in favor of the treasurer's requested $75,000 for the amortization task force that's contained or carried in h 567. The Land Access Opportunity Board had requested about a $105,000 in additional base for FY '27. There were two committee member votes in favor about additional base appropriation.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: You

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: all heard from several committees of jurisdiction as well as advocates during the public hearings in favor of additional funding of about $300,000 for the Natural Resource Conservation Service beyond the governor's recommended governor's recommended funding. This would be used to help make additional leverage for federal funding. There were two votes in favor of that requested appropriation. There is funding contained at H seven forty to go to the Agency of Natural Resources to develop and implement a greenhouse gas inventory. This would be a base appropriation. The bill, as it's currently drafted, contains a $500,000 appropriation. There were two votes overall in favor of this.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It's actually 400. There was a mistake There that was. Should only be 400.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Okay.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So even if the person voted for 500, it's actually 400. Great. So we know that. Yeah? Yeah. Scott Moore came back over afterwards and said that something that had been, he thought was separate was actually part of. And so anyway, he explained it all. It's 400 is the number, not 500.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: And then for our final three items that I have to highlight for all of you today, Healthy Homes Initiative. There were two committee votes in favor of additional funding for that program. The community outreach program, I believe, at the Howard Center had been proposed for a reduction in funding or elimination of funds in FY twenty seven in the amount of 160,000. There were two committee votes in favor of undoing that that recommended funding reduction. And then additionally, there were two requests received through the public hearings as well as from committee letters in favor of additional base funding for the Working Lands enterprise initiative. Believe it was a $500,000 request for additional base and a larger one time request. The additional base request for $505,500,000 received two committee member votes. And now we're getting into the bundle of the pack that received two or one votes. So

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I think on the community outreach program, we can identify at least three of us who put that in. So just FYI, can check later. Maybe it was said differently by people, and that's why it

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Dave? Could you go back to the top of the page, please? Yes. I'm just trying to focus on you, but

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Is that it? That's the top.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Yeah, could you go down to the, where you start with the sixes?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Up a little.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Did I see home health in there?

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: I don't want to say that I found myself confused about some of the asks, so it might be helpful for Dave at some point to clarify for us the differences between some of the asks that relate to

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: skilled nursing. I thought

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: I was shocked.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, I think there were a bunch of other issues because I think that more than one of us put in increases for the DAs and SSAs.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yes. So what I went through with you all, that is the preview of the highest vote getters. So anything with two votes and above should be captured there. That lower pack of two votes, one vote, I'm still working through the committee submissions. And that's not by any means an exhaustive list of what received.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So this is pretty preliminary right now. And I think we'll need to go back and do a little checking. Think there are things we don't always call them the same thing.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: I wanted to clarify that I looked at these as one time monies as opposed to base. So, example, the increase to the DAs as you say it's a three point or additional help in the judiciary department or additional contracts in the state's attorneys or in the public defenders. Consider those base items, not one time items. So, I put them on a separate little list, not as part of this. Because I thought we were supposed to be talking about one And

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: it could be both.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And I wasn't clear about that. But you have a list of I had suggested for base. Okay. Does James have that?

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Yeah, can adjust

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: your Okay. So I think some of these probably are a mix of one time and base. Well, there would be to see them on base we have.

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: On this list,

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: there are several items that are really base items, like the Vermont two eleven and the van, I presume, people want that as a base, or it was for some of those base, the Advance Vermont,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: several of those, I think, were suggested as face adjustments. And some of them may choose, some of them would be hard not to have a base, and some we can choose With one many, we can just do one time. So we have a lot to figure out. Did you have anything to add? Did you want to say something? I did.

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: Of course I had text James a couple of times to say no, okay, I changed this. You're a mess here.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Changed my mind.

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: And I know that I've really wrestled with I mean, this was hard. It was a good assignment. It's a hard assignment. And I could just as easily go back and recalibrate. I'm wondering what the next step might be for us.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I don't have an exact answer for you at this moment. I think we need to all digest what we're seeing, and I'm seeing this all for the first time myself as well. So we can talk about how we wanna go from here. Some of this is going to be hearing from Emily about what the revenue sources are so we know what we're actually dealing with. Emily, will you Are you going to be able to tell us base and one time amounts in revenue sources? So that may help us think about things. I'm perfectly fine with using base for one time, but obviously not the reverse. But if we use base for one time, from my perspective, that's okay. We don't have to fill up the base with base because all that it's going do

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: is make it harder next year. But I think an awful lot of things for requesting base.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Oh, everybody knows that word now.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Right, I

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: know. That's magic word. All of those people, then usually it's a page side. Exactly. Wayne?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Is this a spreadsheet? Yes, it's a little spreadsheet.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Where can I find it?

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: This is yes. This is in your emails.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Okay. And

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: you you can also look at what you've done and made. I'm sure you can all figure it. I don't know whose is which in here. I know mine, but that's it. But if you have changes now that you're seeing all this, we can also deal with that. John?

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: James, do you need any clarification from us? Because we may have labeled things a little bit differently that may have.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: I do. I have I have yeah. A couple notes to follow-up with with many members this afternoon and make adjustments accordingly and then prepare, you know, a higher level synthesis that shows building across tiers prioritization because you might

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: have taken something verbatim off the initial sheets that we did here for sure. And then the cause of trying to get one more thing in here to get to $5,000,000, put something in there was labeled differently. Or maybe, I know one thing I did, you asked me about, so I'll get clarification.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. And maybe you can put the same thing in twice under two different names, like nurturing parent. I think I originally, nurturing parent and prevent child abuse both in mine, Then and I finally figured out it was the same thing, so you only need to do it once. There may be some of that as Then

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: you get someone who knows, John follows instructions, I don't follow instructions.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Well, we know that.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Thank you for noting that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: A record show. I

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: was thinking, don't listen to AI.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Ask AI what AI thought. Any

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: questions you want me to ask? You can ask any kind of questions.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We can have a different conversation about that.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Let's say this process is really difficult and in some ways a little bit demeaning just because we listened for two months to the needs, whether it was the administration's wants and needs or whether it was an organization's wants and needs. I think we all understand that there's an element of the word game involved, but it's not. Part of the process of when I was sitting down with these, yeah, I'm like, well, how do you it's not a question of how do you choose? Like we were given a set amount of money to work with and so a whole category, at least when I was choosing, didn't even get hurt anymore. It didn't matter what the committee letter said, didn't matter what these votes are, it didn't matter what the testimony was, it became a game of, well, for instance, I didn't write down the Defender General or the State's Attorney. And a lot of times, the State's And I just felt like it was not I can't say it's a bad process because I don't have any other expectation of what we do. But I did feel like we asked folks to come in here and listen and share our thoughts. And in the back of our head, we're saying, oh, there's not enough money. There's not enough money. We don't know what we're gonna do. And I just think it's really hard. You put people out on the line to either, in a cheap way, say pitch their needs, express their needs, and then we end up with this number.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It's very hard.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: I just want to impress that for me personally, it's worse than hard. I think it's really at times And it's yes, it's back to austerity budgeting,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: where

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: we have a number and we have to budget to that rather than budgeting to the need. And without a system that will allow us to increase our revenues in order to take care of Vermonters. And I don't know well, what Emily has to say, but I just want to express that because it's been bothering me all weekend. It bothered me all week. It's bothered me probably for the last two months of knowing that this was going to happen like this and we're not even done. So this week it's going to be brutal. But I just wanted to share that because I everybody who's asked for our help and the people who won't get it, what are they going to do for the next

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. Just wanted It's to share very hard. I appreciate you sharing that. And there's no question about how hard this is.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Go ahead. Well,

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: are also things that I didn't know enough about, and so they didn't rise in casing. And my expectation is I'm going to talk to people. I tried this weekend and talked to as many people as I could to find out more about stuff that I was either absent or testament for. Just because something might get too mentioned doesn't mean that with discussion more of us will say, you know, that's really important. I mean, just think that what we were looking at is a preliminary way

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: of how it shouldered out,

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: given what we knew, each of us individually, and one more.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And what the committee letter said, and the testimony we've gotten. This is just not easy. There's no question about it. It is not easy. It's really hard. It hurts. It hurts not to be able to do everything that Imagine that he was feeling.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Madam Chair, you all are going to hear from Emily about available revenue in 2017. We're going follow-up with some members of the committee with some verifications on their submissions. And tomorrow, you all will receive the overview document of submissions across the tiers to help guide your next discussion. And you'll dig in more about priorities and individual members' priorities.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay. James will be around, and he'll reach out. Don't leave without talking to James today.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: We have more to come.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: But, anyway, but before you leave today, make sure that he and you are clarified on what your stuff is. That would be really helpful,

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: I think.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: He's done a lot of work for this and a lot of work over the weekend. And thank you, James, for trying to wrestle on this. He has 11 people from doing things their own way. It's always a challenge. So thank you very much. It's a auto. It's Can you jump in? Whenever you're ready. Great.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So I just sent the PowerPoint to Autumn. Actually, I'm going to have her print it for you after the fact, if you want to, so that you can't look ahead.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Gonna get in the Zoom.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: You said next Monday, next Monday we vote on this. We will

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: do straw poll Friday night and the final vote on Monday. And then we're on the floor Thursday and Friday of next week, and we are going That's to likely have a not my conclusion. We are likely to do a brief caucus of the whole next Wednesday morning before judicial retention. And then we're going to do our office hours thing that we did like we did last year in the well of the house. I haven't actually talked to Emily and James about this yet, Chris and everybody else, but probably at lunchtime on Wednesday. Last year, we remember we sat down and we had the highlight sheets and all that, and people came up and asked us questions. And mostly we said, Emily can answer that and James can answer that. So they were looking at stuff there. So that's sort of the plan. And then, so Wednesday is when all that happens, and then Thursday, Friday, we're on the floor, second reading, third reading. We will not meet after the floor on Friday, this Wednesday. We'll be done. It's done with the budget, and then everybody can go and enjoy your weekend.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: So, when will we have to have our floor report? When will we be on the floor with it?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Thursday. Thursday, but we have to have that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yep, And we'll have highlight sheets from during fiscal next week. That's all next week, not this week. Oh goodness, no. All right. You have something you want to pick up?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yeah, sure. So I have a presentation about some of the changes in sources of funds to the general fund since the governor's budget was recommended. And since your colleagues in ways and means they passed a bill on Friday night that changes some of the sources available to the general fund. So we'll walk through some of those things and the impact on the budget generally. Hopefully, it makes sense what Meryl does. So there are three sort of two and then two sub parts to the first one that we are going to talk about, this afternoon. So in the build out as passed by ways and means that I referenced that is on it will be here tomorrow afternoon. So, we get into some of the details about it, I'm not going to get into the specific details about the revenue pieces that have changed. Let's talk about the high level numbers. Pat Titterton from JFO and I will be here tomorrow to speak a little bit more. 99% Pat will be here. Budgetary questions, but, to talk about the changes that were in that bill. So it's the act relating to miscellaneous administrative and policy changes to the tax laws, the short name, the miscellaneous tax bill. So one of the

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: things that

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: changes is, and this is alluding to what we'll go through, but there, and the governor's recommend there's a $10,000,000 transfer from the education fund to make up for the shifting of the purchase and use tax Based on what was passed by ways and means, that $10,000,000 would no longer be needed if that bill were to move forward. And then there are some additional changes, and additional funding that's generated that's available from the income tax, primarily the corporate income tax, but a very little bit and the business and personal income tax piece. And then finally, in terms of the looking around in couch cushions, we identified that there is some interest in the technology modernization fund that has accumulated, which could be of use,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: if you wanted to

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: use it. So we'll talk a little bit more about that when we get there. But, so first we'll start with a miscellaneous tax bill and what changes were there. And first, we'll talk about specifically the changes in the allocations of the meals and rooms and the purchase and use tax. So as I just spoke to, recall in the governor's budget, he included $114,900,000 transfer from general fund to the education fund. Dollars 74,900,000.0 of that is from the fiscal year 2026 bottom line. So that was in the Budget Adjustment Act that you all just passed. '25. No, 2026 bottom line. '25 is done and closed and over. Was money forward into '26 carried money into '26. Then we built money. We did '26. And we're keeping it. And there's another, you put everything in the pot and then shake everything out. There's about 74,900,000.0 on the bottom line at the end projected to be on the bottom line at the end of FY '26. In addition to that, the governor proposed unreserving one of the $30,000,000 that was set aside from act 27. There was the first 30,000,000 was specifically for federal fund reductions. The second 30,000,000 legislature left it a little more open ended federal fund reductions, property tax relief, and a few other things that were identified. So the governor is proposing to unreserve one of those $30,000,000, set asides last year. And then an additional $10,000,000 to replace the reduction in the purchase and use tax redirected from the education fund to the transportation fund. So the governor had proposed was reduce the amount of purchase and use tax going to the education fund, increase the amount going to the transportation fund, What that in effect did was create a gap in the education fund in terms of revenue. And then the governor proposed to take 10,000,000 out of the general fund and put it in

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: the education fund to fill that gap. Three steps to get the money. Yes.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So in the issue with using this transfer construct to replace using one time transfer from the general fund to replace the purchase and use tax and the education fund is that's really one time in nature. So you transfer $10,000,000 this year, but the change to the purchase and use tax allocations was an ongoing change. So what happens next year? They sort of create a structural gap in the education fund if you only do it with a one time transfer. So you need to come up with another source that I just restated what I just said. So what ways and means is proposing is rather than do a one time transfer, they're proposing actually change the allocations of the taxes that go into each of those individual funds. So we'll start with the purchase and use tax. So current law for purchase and use says two thirds go to the transportation fund and one third goes to the education fund. So that would have put $51,900,000 of purchase and use tax into the education fund based on the twenty twenty six

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: January revenue forecast. That's that number in red.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: This is the language from the governor's recommended. This is a language packet that the governor gave you his recommendation. The governor recommended rather than have this one third of purchase and use going to the education fund, the governor recommend actually fixing the amount of purchase and use tax that goes to the education fund in FY '27 and then every year going forward and declining that by $10,000,000 a year. So the reduction, his budget was based on recommending $41,900,000 going to the education fund from the purchase and use tax versus the forecast of 51.9.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: So

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: You had a question, go ahead, Tash.

[Rep. Thomas "Tosh" Stevens (Member)]: You just tell me about the status of doing something like that in statute where we are not supposed to handcuff future legislatures? So is this just something that is a suggestion for this particular year and next year someone can make a change to that? Or is it locked in like those tax relief on the federal level that seems to always be locked in?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So I think for the purposes of how to allocate revenue, that's not so much binding a future legislature in the same way that if this wasn't like an appropriation. Right? So rather than saying every year going forward, one third of this amount of money will go to the transportation fund or the education fund. This is saying that an amount will go to the education fund. So it's not, I mean, it's fine. It's saying like, this is the specific amount that gets allocated versus the specific percentage that gets allocated.

[Rep. Thomas "Tosh" Stevens (Member)]: But where does not withstand fit in? I mean, again, the property transfer tax, we took from that for years and years and years because we we not withstood that to take the cash out. So where does that fit in? I mean, I know that's a different it's a different use of a cash flow. How does that how does that work here? I mean, just because it says 41.9 or 31.9, what does that actually mean when we get to those dates? Is that set in stone?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yes. That's what the governor was proposing in this language.

[Rep. Thomas "Tosh" Stevens (Member)]: I'm just I'm just curious because I just I'm always wiggy about when we when we put something in statute that seems so definite and yet it either doesn't get fulfilled or it changes or there's workarounds to it.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yeah. And I think you could evolve if you had This type of language can be adopted and then always amended by future legislators. And that's the sort of You can always not withstand something. You could always change the statute.

[Rep. Thomas "Tosh" Stevens (Member)]: This was his construct in this moment in time.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yes. This

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: is what the governor recommended for the allocation of purchase and use tax to the education fund. So get rid of one third and make fixed dollar amount that decreased every year for ten years, or for five years.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Discussion on why it wasn't a percentage instead of a fixed amount. Could have done the same thing with a percentage, right?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: This is just the way the governor proposed to do it.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Which is a good segue into what Ways and Means did. So what Ways and Means has proposed is to actually change the percentage of what's going to the education fund versus what's going to the transportation fund. So current law is a third and two thirds. Ways and means is proposing increasing the allocation of purchase and use to the transportation fund to 73% and decreasing the amount going to the education funds to 27%. Of the purchase and use. Of the purchase and use tax. The net impact on the FY '27 receipts to the education fund and the transportation fund is a $9,900,000 increase decrease, the net zero impacts, but that's the shift. So this would move rather than transfer $10,000,000 rather than change the allocation of the purchasing use tax going to the education fund and then transfer general fund into the education fund. This would just say, of the money that's coming in, this much goes over there and this much goes over here.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Then And it's just the percentage of what we've been doing with these things, any way, percentages. That's part A. This is the beginning.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: That's part A. But

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: now you

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: have 9,900,000 hole in the education fund, if you will. So how do

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: you make the education fund?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: I just said whole. Now we need to make the education fund whole.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay. I've

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: been talking with my six year old about the word see and see a lot and the difference. And now I'm a homonym. Ole and hoe. Okay. Anyway, all right. So the curve for then we go to the meals and rooms tax. So the meals and rooms tax is split between the education fund to the general fund and the clean water fund. So, the ways and means is proposing is changing these allocations to make the education fund whole. So, this is current law, 25% of the education fund, 69% to the general fund and 6% to the clean water fund. It used to be one quarter, three quarter, but then the clean water fund contracts came in.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And I should note that the result of the issue with Lake Champlain, I remember when we did that to help fund, we were trying to figure out how to fund the cleanup, Champlain cleanup, which we were required in that law to do. And that's when we put that in. I had forgotten all about that. Thank you.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: We don't have to stop the transfer tax.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So the ways and means in the bill that they passed on Friday is proposing to change the allocation of meals and rooms tax to make up for the changes to the purchasing use tax allocation. So increasing the education fund allocation from meals and rooms to 29%, decreasing the general fund share to 65%, and then nothing happens to the clean water fund. It's just in there for

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: So it all adds to a 100.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: But what that does is puts $10,800,000 into the education fund and reduces the general fund revenue by $10,800,000

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: The governor has, we had assumed we were going to be reduced by 10,000,000, Whatever happened, however we did it, now we got another $800,000 cut under this proposal from the general fund.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: But the positive in this is that it's now structural,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: not one Yes, that's right. That's right. Which is an appropriate way to go. Even if we were getting similar outcome so far. Yes.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Right. So the net of the meals and rooms and the purchase and use changes. So the idea is to leave the education fund basically whole. So $9,900,000 going to the transportation fund from the education fund, and then $10,800,000 coming out of the general fund and going to the education fund. Leaves the education fund at a positive $0.99100000 dollars Transportation fund gets $9,900,000 and that leaves the education fund or the general fund with $10,800,000 less. And just recall, as we were just saying, so the gov rec proposes transferring $10,000,000 from the general fund to the education fund to make up for his change in purchase and use tax. Ways and means proposes to change the allocation of the rooms and meals tax to make up for its change in purchase and use tax. You got to do one or the other to keep the funds whole, but you don't have to do both. So effectively, by making the change in the allocations, you don't have to make the transfer to the education fund. So how that will reflect in the general fund operating statement and in the bill itself, the revenue changes will happen. So those will be seen in the sort of sources to the general fund in terms of revenue. And then the transfer to the education fund. If you adopt the ways and needs construct where you change the actual allocations, then you will reduce the amount that's being transferred from the general fund to the education fund by the $10,000,000 that was proposed by the governor. You don't have to

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: do the $10,000,000 transfer because it's put into this.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: And again, structurally, it's just there and it will happen. Whereas if we continue it as a one time thing for five years, we just have to remember that every year for five years.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And argue about it or not argue about it or whatever.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Just, yeah. But we're still losing $10,000,000 We

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: were going to lose $10,000,000 regardless. Right, right. Unless we didn't even want to do anything that the government wanted to do. But now we're going to lose $10,800,000 So we're losing $800,000 more out of the goodness

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: We're of our

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: paying extra to do it right. Right.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: In the universe of being your loss is the Ed Funds game. So it's, yes, the general fund is out $800,000 but

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: the Ed Fund has a couple thousand dollars. Sorry. It's not like it's going.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Nobody's losing it. It's not like it's going. It's just different than what we thought

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: we were going have. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. But I do like the notion of it being structural as opposed to arguing about it every single year. That makes a lot more sense, the set it and forget it kind of

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: thing. Okay.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Okay. So then another way to sort of slice it and look at it from the education fund perspective. So the governor recommended the purchase and use tax of 41,900,000.0, do a one time general fund transfer. And then the meals and rooms tax was gonna be 67.2, Ways and means, which was $119,100,000 to the education fund through those revenue sources. All else being equal, assume there's no other changes going on in the education fund. You compare those same things to what ways and means did. Ways and means purchase and use tax 42,000,000 to the education fund. And then the increase in the meals and rooms tax allocation to $78,000,000 to 120. The difference is that 0.9.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: That makes sense.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: This is just another way to think. People's brains work differently. So this is just another way to see.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Again, this is accepting without perhaps further discussion that we're moving 100 and some odd million dollars from the bottom line to is a solid conversation or lack of conversation? We're not going to have a conversation on what to do with that 180?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I believe that's going to be addressed in the Ways and Meets Yield Bill. This is the miscellaneous tax bill. It will be addressed in the yield bill.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Right, I'm just we're not looking in the landfill, I guess, more than the couch for money. Like if we can't touch the surplus funds for one time conversation, then

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: That's right. We need to make that assumption that that money is off limits.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Which is unfortunate, but that's just me.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So we talked to this, but the difference between GovREC and the House proposal coming out of Ways and Means, the governor transferred $10,000,000 from the general fund to the education fund. Ways and means is doing this reallocation of rooms tax. The difference between those two things is $800,000 So if the general assembly moves forward with the constructs as passed by ways and means, will in effect in quotes cost the general fund $800,000 which will need to be made up

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: somewhere.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: The good news is there are some other changes to the general fund that may help deal with that. So also in the miscellaneous tax bill is the link up, which you may all recall say the link up or the lack thereof a link up this year or change to the link up this year. Annually, typically, general assembly has to decide how and if to link up to the federal income tax code. So I think it might have been in the budget last year actually, but every year, to the extent that IRS makes changes, the federal government makes changes to the income tax code and to the extent our personal income tax code is linked and corporate income tax code are linked to the federal IRS code, general assembly have to make a proactive decision how and if and what year to link up to. Most years, it's a pretty straightforward process. There aren't a lot of changes, but in some years that's not the case. The last time that there was not a pretty strict link up was after the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. Right. And a lot of decisions were made about where in the tax code to link up and how that changes happen. We're seeing this again this year for the conversations that happened in ways and means and with the tax department. The OBVBA or HR1, the federal law that passed over the summer, right? Had a lot of changes to the tax code, which complicates the decision if and how to link up and what to link up to and how all that works. Again, I mentioned at the beginning, but Pat will be here tomorrow to talk more about that. Forecast The that was done assumes current law. So the forecast itself is sort of silent on what happens.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: The consensus revenue forecast that we got in January just assumed we were going to keep doing whatever we're doing now.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So there had to be some choices made to ensure that we both had the revenue that we are going to need and then make some decisions based on what the federal government did. So without getting into those details. So the bill that was passed by Ways and Means as a result of making decisions about what to link up to and what to decouple from at the federal level, and also looking at some of the changes in tax credits and how to implement some of those things and how some of those could be changed based on the changes happening due to linking and decoupling from the federal tax provisions resulted in an additional projected general fund revenue in FY 2017 of $14,250,000 It also results in a loss of projected revenue in FY '26 of $3,960,000 They'll have to account for that in FY '26, and then we'll have those additional funds in FY '27. It also appropriated $100,000 to the joint fiscal office for the ten year tax study that we take, that we do every year. I believe that was It on your was in the ways of means letter, but that is actively done in that letter. You all will decide whether or not to leave that in that bill or not. But for the purposes of all of the things that were in that bill, that changes in there. So that leaves in FY '26, again, negative 3,960,000 and in FY '27,

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: a positive $14,150,000 in the general fund.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: And I know I said we would talk about base and one time for this for the twenties anything that happens in '26 at that this point is effectively one time because you're sort of amending two things simultaneously. FY '27, though, we've talked about it internally. This is base change to

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: mostly corporate and business income taxes. So that's base, not one. This is base, yep. Marty? So the 14 for FY27 is

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: greater than we had before. 13 for '28, is that another 13 over the 14 or is that 13 more compared to where we are now? 13 compared to the FY '28 adopted revenue forecast. Adopted. What we did in January. For '28? For '28, yep.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: The revenue forecast says five years.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, gotcha. So for the FY '27 budget's purpose, we should really like what we'll get

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: at fourteen, fifteen, we subtract the three points.

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

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So for purposes of more than the

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: 3,000,000 that I thought

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: we might have. What's available? There's the additional revenue from link for the coupling and linking up as ways and means has done. Less the true up necessary due to the meals and rooms allocation change adopted in that bill as well. And then, making sure that FY '26, is trued up. And the way that we would do that likely in the budget bill, assuming you all approved is we would reduce. So in FY 2020, and this is circling all the way back to the beginning when we talked about the education funding or the amount that's left on the bottom line, we would effectively reduce the amount that's projected to be on the bottom line at the end of FY '26 from the 74.9 to 71 whatever, '71, right? And then in FY '27, we would just have to increase that would come out of all the general fund. We would increase, that would be part of the transfer. We would still transfer the same amount to the education fund, just the amount that's coming from the '26 bottom line would be reduced, and it would just be coming from the 27 available funds. The impact, they'll

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: do the mechanics. The impact is that number. That's what we need to know. Yes.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So at the end of the day, 9,400,000.0 on the bottom line in FY27. Does that make sense? Clear as mud? Okay. So then the second piece in terms of looking for funds, finding what's available is some interest in the Technology Modernization Fund. So the Technology Modernization Fund was created in 2022. It's administered by the agency of digital services. It's to provide funds to purchase and implement and upgrade technology platform systems, cybersecurity services, in state government. In 'twenty two and in 'twenty three, when there was a lot of excess general fund picking around, the general assembly decided to transfer pretty large sums of money, like $50,000,000 and $40,000,000 I believe, to that fund to fund some pretty big technology modernization projects. I pulled the balance of the funds just in the last two fiscal years. But that fund accrues interest. And per the statute of that fund, the interest that accrues in that fund stays in that fund. I don't know at the time of when the fund was set up, what the specific discussion was about what happens with that interest. It has to be actively appropriated by the general assembly. But at this time, because the interest that was accrued in that fund, there's been no request for it to be appropriated nor has the general assembly appropriated, it's sitting in that fund. So in FY23, it was $2300000.0.24 almost $4,000,000 and then accrued about 3,300,000.0 for a total of interest of $9,530,000

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: of interest in the tech modernization fund today. So that fund doesn't have any revenue stream, just it was a one time thing?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Correct. It's just transfers made by the general assembly to that fund at this time.

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

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: What's the relationship of the technology modern mutation fund to anything that we're doing with ADS?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: So the Tech Mod Fund pays for specific projects. So the funds that have been appropriated on the fund like the enterprise resource planning, the ERP, which is the replacement of the state accounting system and payroll system. The money for that project was transferred to this fund and then is appropriated out of that fund. The unemployment insurance project was in that, and the DMV modernization funds were in this fund. I think part of the intent was that these IT projects, right? They're not done in one fiscal year. They go over multiple fiscal years. So in effect, it was to create a place to set those funds aside for the funds to be appropriated as needed for those projects, right, sort of in big chunks. And then when those projects were done, then the money would be spent

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: out of that fund. So this is more modernization can be transformation, but ADS's annual usage is that like We heard that two years ago or whatever ADS was a million dollars in the bladder, now it's $25,000,000 in the red.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yes, this is a That

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: red is not being pulled from this fund.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: It's not this fund. This is a totally separate fund specifically for specific projects. Not the operations of the agency of digital service.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Who was here when the whole thing was set up and she had

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: this as her portfolio. This was in the ARPA days and we had tons of money and we needed new DMV, we needed unemployment, we needed the ERP system, we needed a whole bunch of stuff to replace our thirty year old systems that everybody complained about. And we had this money and we said, okay, we had estimates for some of those really large projects. And we said, let's put it aside in a totally separate fund. So as we developed the actual implementation of these and get quotes and get further details on how we're going to use it, we have a chunk of money sitting here that we could pull from. And yes, it was supposed to sit in this fund and the interest was going to accrue to that fund. At the time, the idea was that the interest would stay in that fund because at a later time, we might wanna put $20,000,000 in there or $30,000,000 in there. We had it, more things are gonna need to be upgraded over time. And then with legislative approval, we would agree, okay, we're gonna spend 20,000,000 on the DMV and we're gonna take it out of this money. And the interest was supposed to keep going because we were gonna use that model for handling the really big things that come along. So, that's there and it has nothing to do with the general operation of ADS. And this

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: is just the interest part, not

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: the principal. Right, right. No, I understand that. I'm just clarifying, I know you know that.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: So, second question then. So, you mentioned that the money is supposed to stay in the fund, but we're raising the question whether or not we can use it for the general fund this year. Is there an issue with this having been ARPA funds where it's audited or has been washed in the way that we've watched a lot

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: of This is not ARPA money because it's interest. Right. I have the spread.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Right. The base was general funds. Okay.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: That was Good question. It was during that time. Right.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Are because we had those extra funds available.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, I mean I think great

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: question not in a negative way, but for instance we got so much money from COVID and then we got sales taxes from all the stuff that we were buying which was then our money. And so it may not be the

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: same as that, I just

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: This is our money. So

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: the way I see the question is, I mean, we know that modernization is going to be ongoing forever. Question is, do we leave it in there knowing that it's always going to be needed? Or do we have a more compelling immediate need for that money than we go someplace else? And so that's how you're thinking about it. So we got money that's intended for the purpose of improving our IT through time, projects, not operational projects. We know there's always going to be conflicts. So merely a matter of do have a compelling reason to use the money now? Or do we anticipate we won't be able to put the money back in later if we needed it?

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: The balance stays the same, right? The balance stays the same, so it's going to generate $3,000,000 a year in interest or so.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Well, I'll go back to that.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: They're spending that money. They're implementing these projects. It is

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: The principal If you think of it as principal right now, at the '25, there's $64,200,000 in principal, not the interest. Just the principal available to do the projects. And we put money in and I think identified specific projects at a time that that was going to be used for. And then the money is throwing off interest that is separate, and only the general assembly has the authority to appropriate the $9,500,000 of interest. So it's not attached to a project or anything like that at this point. Can I just finish to have Emily just finish one more piece of this, and then I've got John and Wayne to ask more questions, which is about interest going forward? We had a thought about the interest. This is what the interest is now through 2025.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Correct. So is how much interest has been earned to date, depending on if you are, again, interested in redeploying it or not, leaving it behind for future major IT projects or moving it into the general funds we used for higher priorities at this That's sort of up for discussion. There is

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: it's future interest idea of possibly where future interest could go.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yes. So, rep Shai and I talked about, rep Stevens, to your point, to the extent the, the CIT Information Technology. I can't remember what that's, computer information technology fund or whatever, the CIT fund. Thank you. The fund that ADS operates, I believe deputy commissioner Merrill from finance and management talked about how it's projected to have about a $25,000,000 deficit at the end of this year. Is it worth deploying any future interest generated by the technology modernization fund to buy down that deficit? At some point, there's going to have to be some decision made in terms of how that deficit gets dealt with. And is this a source of revenue effectively, the interest from this fund as a way to chip away at that deficit over time?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Say again, where's the deficit?

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: In the CIT fund. So, ADS is operating. They're changing a lot

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: in ADS, if you recall. And for the first time ever, we're being asked to put $9,000,000 in general fund into ADS to help support their programs, because they can't collect everything. Just a complicated thing. So that's new and that will be an ongoing appropriation to ADS from general fund. Ongoing, that 9,000,000 is not

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: a one time event that we probably base. Well, that's the intent. But putting up those three extra internal service funds may help reduce some of the deficit in the CIT funds, simply because they are more accurately charging back for their services. And so, the deficit in the CIT fund may slowly get reduced because of the reorganization. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, so I have Wayne John Tipp. John was first. John Wayne Tipp.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: That's okay. Whatever order we wanna go, thank That was kind of the thread of

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: question I had here, because while I'm

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: here, so you have this order went to 9,530,000.00 of interest here for the fiscal years. So the question is, you know, if you take all of that and use it towards something, do we take a portion of it to be used towards, think would be best to perhaps free up what Marty was just talking about there with?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Well, it would just stay in the fund unless we decided to appropriate it to the CIT There hasn't been an urgency on the part of the administration to use all these funds to pay down the deficit in the CIT fund. That's not been

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: That's my question, I guess, is something for us to think about, a question we have to consider. Do we do that, or do we take some portion of it to maybe

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: do something And we're throwing off 2,000,000 or whatever, 2.5 to 3,000,000 a year, that we could also say future interests should go to pay off the CIT fund. It's an option, a thing we couldn't do.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: I didn't know we were discussing that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: There's lots of possibilities. No decisions have been made. I'm pointing this out to the committee

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: of things about.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Would just say that in the past, the administration has not been, not administration, finance and management, everybody hasn't been too terribly concerned about deficits in internal service. That's right. I mean, built them up in lots of different places. And there are times where we need to plug the hole, like in the E911 board or the criminal record checks, those special ones where we don't have to put in a million dollars or $2,000,000 in order to make it all. We've had other internal service funds where they have pretty large debts.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So we just kind of model them. Yeah. And that's an option too. Absolutely. Wayne and then Tim. Just for general information,

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: is any or all of the money, the principal in that fund earmarked for specific projects or is it projects as they come along?

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: No, no. The particular fund was set up with specific projects in mind. I can dig out that file. Yes, they presented It's their all earmarked. Yes, yes. The principal, not the interest. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, tip, mic. Have one.

[Rep. Tiffany Bluemle (Ranking Member)]: Just reflections. You know, it's just interesting to me. As long as I've been on this committee, and it's only been four years, but ADS has always come in with multi million dollar asks. Yet we level fund many projects year after year after year. And that discrepancy is really frustrating to me. I feel that because I don't know what ADS really does and what it costs, I can't question a lot of those numbers. We're starving certain resources, systems, and we seem not to have and I perceive that we're kind of at the I am so inarticulate today, but we end up kind of destroying our hands in the air when it comes to something like ADS. Just as a comment and that I'm really wrestling with, because I don't know how you level fund services year after year after year when the state has put them in statute. That said, one of the things that I know we have to invest more in is the CCWIS, you know, the DCF database that had a big crash this fall, and why is that not a priority? And why wouldn't we, we've put some money in it, but it's going to need much more to do the kind of work. And we can't draw down it's not cost effective because we are missing out on federal funds that we could pull down if we had a Better system. Yeah, database. Takes the millions of dollars possible.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, I've got Mike, Lynn, then we'll go back to him. I'm wondering if this one was set up with specific projects in mind, if we have any sense of where do we stand with those projects, what remains, how I mean, we trending so the remaining principles should cover these projects? I'm looking at Marty. Can you check-in Yes, for

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: the slide that they showed mentions this was set up for the Enterprise Resource Planning Fund, a workplace information management system, fire safety modernization system and attorney general's case management system, a D and B or system modernization, which is complete, The it's unemployment insurance project, it's got 5,000,000 left, but I think that's expected to be done by the end of springtime. A state network modernization. So, there's remaining amount, it looks like of 27,000,000.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: This was a presentation they gave to us. Yes. And if we want to find it on our website, is there either a date or a person so we can

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: go find it? It's in this report. It's ADS, Denise Riley Hughes,

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: so dated February 3. February 3, okay. Different ways we can go find it. Okay, so that's Mike's question, but then I have Lynn and Lynn. Well, I'm

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: sorry, that's a report that went to Digital Energy, but it's in one of their other reports to us too.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: So, I was sort of asking the same type of question. I mean, it's drawn up, whatever it was, 3,000,000 in interest over three years, 9 over three years, nine and a half. If that money gets spent down, without any kind of further proper money or general fund money, that interest will decline as well.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Right, yes, the interest will decline. Time money and

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: then the like our opioid abuse, you know, When it's gone, it's gone. And it won't generate any more income. I mean, we're doing this, in fact, with our cash flow money. The treasurer's office, the question is, when a lot of that money gets spent by December '26 from ARPA, then we'll go back to being the more normal cash. That's going to

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: be pretty slow. They've got $1,500,000,000 in the treasury. So going be $700,000,000 next year.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: Yeah, and that one's healthier. But the point is that that's the problem with Moon Time money, that you're going to use the interest off of it to continue to fund things. And the other thing that I want to say, you know, that's a concern. But the other thing I want to say is that computers were sold to all of us, and I remember this with healthcare back when I was on the POC, back in the early 2000s, and everything else, it was all going to save us money. And there is no savings in computers. The thing gets obsolete after three years. You have to constantly upgrade it. You have to constantly buy new equipment. It just goes faster. It just does everything. And so, ADS is just, that's a normal situation. And if you don't have it, you will lose matching federal funds for something that you're counting on, will like UI has been around since, I don't know, the 60s or the 50s. Computers need to be maintained whether you like it or not, because we have all become so dependent on it. Whether it's you're keeping track not just the money, but the people, all sorts of things. So a ADS may not be at fault, but it's just part of the cost of doing business. It's an unfortunate thing to say, but that's, I don't see how you can get around it. I think this fund was set

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: up for these specific projects and no other projects are being funded through this fund. That a Correct.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: And so now if we need to think about ADS's change in their format in terms of the bespoke stop, which under their new system, my presumption is that if some other agency decides they need a new computer system, they're gonna do some calculation and they're gonna learn the ABS and they're gonna say, okay, it costs $20,000,000 to do whatever. That money, the $20,000,000 is gonna have to come from the agency. It's not gonna be going through ADS like these other items did in the past. The other items where they were actually part of the ADS budget, then we put aside this separate account. We said, okay, we know these are five things that we're gonna have to have in the next ten years. We think we know how much they cost, we're gonna set aside the money so that we can have it. But for future things that come along under this new funding mechanism that ADS set up, it'll be called the bespoke stuff and this particular agency will have to come up with the $20,000,000 I'm sure they're going to come to us saying, well, how do we do that? Say, we'll give you $2,000,000 a year for ten years, whatever, in order to make that work. Or, I'm not sure how we're going

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: to do that in the future.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: But I agree with you, We all complain about the cost of IT, but everything runs on IT. And the example of things in agency of human services that are losing money because they don't have the right software in order to present the right data to the federal government according to their rules so that you then qualify for things. Somebody has to measure that and decide, are we really losing money? Is it really important enough to upgrade the equipment so we can get more money? Or what's the trade off by doing that? And that decision has to be made. You don't know what's gonna be changing in the future in terms of requirements, granting authorities. So what do we have to prepare people in order to have a robust enough system so that you can modify it to meet future requirements in order to ask for principal grants.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I think Wayne Laroche, and Dave, I've got

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: you after

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Wayne. Just a few down. Principal is all earmarked. So that's just me that the interest is not earmarked, which means for that to be spent, we'd have to set a purpose for it. Even if it stays in that fund, we have to set a purpose for it. And I share just concerned about everything that had that concern for many, many years about how we decide on these things. If I was king, then I could decide it wrong. Even if we were king, the process would be a lot easier. But we don't. But then the $9,000,000 when we got a pot of money sitting like that, if there was any way that we could leverage federal money that we couldn't otherwise leverage with that money to make it $18,000,000 or $27,000,000 then I could prefer that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Well, some of it one could use, and then we have global commitment or get brought down federal funds by using some of these funds for that. So that would be a way to leverage it. Some of the things on our list are just straight cash out, but other things do have global commitment impacts, and we could draw down with that.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: That's enough

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: thoughts. Put it on all

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: that stuff, I'll probably

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Okay, figure that's Dave?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: Lynn, I think you said it well. Computers need to be maintained. It's cost doing business. From where I sit, I also believe strongly people need to be maintained. It's not the cost of doing business, it's the cost and purpose of government. I wish somebody in years time would set aside funds where interest could be earned so that we could invest it. We didn't have a thousand kids a year in foster care because they've been abused or neglected. But my real point, when I heard Marty read the list of programs that the funds were for, I didn't hear, though I may have missed it, I didn't hear the agency of human services and a integrated eligibility system.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Nope. Did you? It's not on anybody?

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: It's not on that list.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: And yet I think this is the third year in a row that the agency, and it could be more than that, has had $37,000,000 in a fund that draws the excess federal receipts. And we're told that 21,000,000, and correct me if I'm wrong, Emily, roughly 21,000,000 has been targeted for some type of IT project, all above the $64,000,000,000 funds or anything that we've heard before.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Separate separate fund.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: And it sounds mysterious to me because I never seen any transparency around it. But I'm not a great mathematician. I know if there's 37, somebody's highlighted 21, that leaves something left over. And I just keep wondering if and whether we could have even a little bone from that, or some of that.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: How do we look into that, Emily?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: We have, right, Emily? Yeah. Done some good work on it, but it hasn't yielded a bone.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Yeah, it's not too much of a bone. So, in talking with the agency of human services about the account that representative Yacovone has referred to, the earned federal receipts account, there is a transfer annually from that account to the general fund. I believe it's 4,600,000.0 annually. Of the money that's in that fund right now, I believe it is about 37,000,000. 21,000,000 is set aside for the integrated eligibility project. So that is not being paid for out of the technology modernization fund. It's the agency is proposing utilizing the fund that they have. The remaining money in that fund, and I may have to go back and look at it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It sounds like it's 4.6 is coming to the general fund and they have So that's like 25 being 26 being

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: I believe some of the additional money in that fund is being set aside for the CCWIS. CCWIS. CCWIS that was brought up. I believe that one is having some increased cost pressures over and above what was initially appropriated. There's also in the Budget Adjustment Act, the change that was made related to the DS payment reform. It was decided that no additional money would be appropriated for that purpose. Believe the agency is has money in this fund and depending on how it all. Sugars off, right? Like, it's a lot of money that moves through that agency over the course of a twelve month period. And depending on how it was, you know, the agency was told to figure that out. It may mean that figuring that out translates to utilizing the balance in that fund to ensure that the DS payment reform. Works within the existing budget construct of the agency. And then typically given the size of the agency and the amount

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: of payments go out, a

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: little bit of money is sort of left in that fund just for if and when there's an emergency or something is needed. So, it's not all completely accounted for, as I understand. It's sort of the Between you are all this conversation with the executive branch, what's the level of how much should remain in that fund for the agency needed and the IT projects and the other priorities you all have?

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Dave, do you have more you want to add to that?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: No, no, but from my sense is, that's kept in case there's emergencies, are a lot of emergencies. When our cheats that we saw out there, a lot of those are emergent, from nurturing, well, I don't need to repeat them, everybody can see them for themselves. A little bit of relief could go a long ways and prevent even additional expenditures to solve and soften the pain of some of those emergencies. I would suggest we take and appropriate some, a prudent amount of that to go into whatever amount we ended up with here.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, Which is what we're still working on. I don't know if this is the other slide, but James, do you wanna add something to that?

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: I just wanted to add, James, project this whole discussion of the tech mod fund. As our fellows pointed out, ADX has a list of their budget presentations from this year of current appropriations that are active from the tech mod fund to various agencies. There are

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: I sent you guys the budget.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: Seven projects towards appropriations from tech mod fund have been made and several of those have spent down their appropriations significantly and some are only about halfway through, for example, spending the appropriation that had been made to them from the tech mod fund. And so to representative Yacovone's point about potential uses of the IT modernization fund, Tech Bond Fund for projects in this year, administration ABS would probably have some color to add about their expectation for needing additional funds for some

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: of these projects out of the Tech Modifier going forward.

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: So you might end up in a situation where you make money on the funding, you guys plan on renting for projects and office and

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: unpaid financing in a few years. Right. Okay. My And the if I'm looking at the same chart that you are, the expenditures and remaining amount don't add up to the appropriation. Is that is that so which appropriation? To the to the I guess 77,000,000, I think, is what is that what was originally appropriated in three years into the fund? No. That was those are the cost of those specific projects. I think we put 90,000,000 in the fund. We did 50 and 40 or something like that is what I heard somebody say. I got a pink one. I do remember a 60 also, but we must have done

[James (Appropriations Committee staff analyst)]: More than that. There have been three transfers in FY twenty two. There were 60,000,000 transferred. One was 50,000,000 transfer, one was 16 or a change or 7,000,000 and then an additional $10,000,000 transfer in fiscal year twenty three. So that adds up to the 77. Well, they're calling this slide that you sent around, I'm sure, the $77,000,000 legislative budget out of the tech fund. That's the total of the legislative budget is the total of transfers that have been made to the tech fund of the legislative budget. And then the subsequent slides show expenditures from those subsequent appropriations remaining in act. So you have the transfers into the fund, the appropriations out of the fund and the remaining balances of those appropriations.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So the out and the remaining, why wouldn't those equal the appropriation? Yeah, maybe it's gonna be less. The expenditures are 32.7 and the remaining amount is 27 and that adds up to $60,000,002.00 2. Right. We can look into it. We can look into it. So, right, where's the other $17,000,000?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Not sure

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: if something came in under budget or funds came from someplace else that were expected to come through this. Well, at the moment, it looks like unemployment insurance modernization isn't close to spending. That seems to be where the rub is, if I were to pick a There's a $30,000,000 given to that, and they've spent 8.9. And it says they have 5.2 left. So it seems to me that maybe that's more money.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: Maybe because the expenditures, I don't see through,

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: it's not right because I know they've spent, or they intend to spend their whole thirty minutes.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So, something's weird there. The other ones seem to work out fine, but the UI one is not working out. The math is working out, and that's where

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: the difference is. You can look at it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: If you can look at it, that would be great.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: The UI Fund has never worked out.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Since the UI Fund. Of course, it's the UI Fund.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: I want to change now.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Do you have another slide that adds things and takes that? So, the other thing, so there's a possibility of using 9.5 from this slide in interest. That's a choice that we can make. We have 39. 9.39 for sure. We possibly could use 9.5. The other thing that we haven't talked about, Emily, and I don't know if it's too early because we don't know yet, is Pay Act.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Sure. What I do know at this time, which is it's only Monday, so we'll know tomorrow by Friday. We've been reviewing the administration as part of pay act puts forward the appropriations that they estimate is needed for the executive branch, the legislative branch, and the judicial branch. The JFO has been reviewing the amount that was allocated to the legislative Pay Act amount, and it appears that it's not going to be sufficient based on the contract that was approved and based on how the things carried forward into for the legislative employees and legislators. So we're looking at what that number should be, and it probably needs a couple $100,000 more added to it to make sure that there's enough money in the legislative budget for PAC in FY twenty seven. The other is at the judiciary. They're doing the same exercise to see if what the executive branch calculated is sufficient to cover what the judiciary anticipates their PAC need to be. We did have a conversation with Greg Mosley. I don't know if he's the CFO. I think he's the CFO. And he indicated that there was in the judiciary bargaining, there was a reclass of a group of judicial employees. So typically with the executive branch, we saw it in the budget adjustment. If there's a request for reclassification that's approved in the budget adjustment, I think it was the game wardens. We saw there was an increase related to the game wardens. And I think there was also in the budget last year was that they thought it was going be one step turns out

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: to be

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: two pay grades, excuse me. The judiciary actually bargained it. So, they have sort of a one time increase associated with a change, a reclass of their employees. So, that was not part of what was included in what the executive branch put forward for pay act needs. So there may be some additional cost pressures associated with. So it could be

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: 1,000,000 to $2,000,000 possibly, is what we're talking about, that we therefore have to reduce. Have to come from subpar. We'd have to find that too. It's not in the budget. So let's call it two. I don't know. We'll know more next. We'll But know let's assume for now, for the purpose of that there's 2,000,000. So if we go with just the 9.39, that's now down to 7.39. If we take some or all of the tech, the IT interest, that could be as much as 9.5, or it could be some lesser amount that we use to get up to something else. That's why this is hard to sober.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: A place to begin.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah, think she had a lovely answer for us all. Mean, guys have done such good work trying to find And Emily found this, or somebody, people found this, it was found as a possibility, and we need to think about what we wanna do and what our priorities are. So that exercise plays into how we wanna spend our money.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: And we need to think about next year too. We need to think about next year because we'll gain 13 more or less from the Next year. Next year, from the Waves and Means changes with the tax, but if we use the income from the tax month, then we won't have that next year. Unless you use it on one time.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We use it on one time, but we don't have to be on one time.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: On one

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: time. But we'll get back to

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: the whole question of one time uses or longer term base things. If we're talking about extra personnel or rate increases, various agencies, those are Those are base.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Those are base. So that's part of the question of like, how much do we have in base? And I think most of the tax we can consider base. So the $9,000,000 there could be considered base. The other would be one time. Is that right? Yes, that would be one time. So sort of half and half at the moment. If we were to use all of both things, it would be half and half. So it definitely limits what the base is. Dave?

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: If I may, just a few minutes, because I don't know where the agenda is going, and I don't want to

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: include it. I don't know either, Dave. We're all just I thinking about

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: just wanted to suggest the possibility of whether the 2,000,000 that the governors recommend as for the stabilization fund is something to consider putting into this conversation. It's members will remember last year we appropriated 10,000,000. This year's budget, the government FY '27 budget, governor recommended 2,000,000. Now as I sit and reflect on that, the the surest way to make sure we would need that 2,000,000 is by not funding our providers properly, because they will break, they will come to the point of being in great need and have to come for the money. Whereas if we strategically invested that into our provider system, maybe we could shore up the DAs and home health and others that are fragile, because it is base funding. It's not

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: 3,000,000 is not base funding, that's one

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: time Well, that's I'd like to find out whether it is or isn't, I would just spend it differently then. So I appreciate that some might say, don't go there, we need a cushion, but I wanna put it on the table because I think you'll surely need a cushion if we don't provide some help in some areas.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Thank you. It's time. It's one time? 2,000,000 is one time.

[Emily Byrne (Commissioner, Department of Finance & Management)]: Can I throw one more thing out there? I think I would be remiss if I didn't mention, and we can potentially talk about it more tomorrow when Pat is here. But a lot of the changes in the Ways and Means bill are related to corporate income tax and how we link up to the related to business and corporate stuff, which is one of the most volatile sources of revenue. That's not to say that I have any crystal ball or any idea of where corporate tax is going or has been or what will happen, but just to the extent that it's base revenue, assuming all else equal and we sort of keep going on and the forecast holds, that's fine.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: But that is just a thing to be aware of when thinking about how to utilize it for what it's worth. All of our tax revenue is variable and subject to fluctuations.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Corporate tends to be more volatile versus income.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: We have that. And rooms and meals, taxes are pretty darn stable. Rooms and meals

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: and sales taxes have been fairly stable. The rate of growth may be slowing, but it doesn't change. So, we have a lot to think about.

[Rep. Eileen “Lynn” Dickinson (Member)]: I'm not happy.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Would check-in with James before you go today to make sure that he understands all of your stuff and doesn't have any questions. So that's the task you need to do. I'm switching topics now to Bill's. Thank you, Emily. You're welcome to stay on. It's really nice to look at you instead of the screen. So whatever you want to do. Thank you for putting this all together. Appreciate it. You guys just never would be without you. We were sent 12 bills on Friday. We have about 12 bills or so that we still have on the wall. So we're going be going through around 25 bills this week. As I said to you in my email over the weekend, we are not going to relitigate all the work that the policy committees did. We're going to do thirty minutes of bill, except for a couple of big ones, the Human Services, Homelessness Housing Initiative, which is taking what the governor did and doing it. We're going to spend time on that because we need to know what that is. No new money. It's all the same money in the government. I mean, it's the same amount of money. But we need to understand the program. Everything else, almost everything else, I'm pretty much allowing thirty minutes. So we're going to do high level, understand it, go to the money, great. We have a lot of possible votes on there. We'll get a sense of whether the committee's ready to vote or wants to vote later. We have a whole bunch of bills that we've heard that we haven't voted on yet. So we'll probably take forty five minutes or an hour later in the week and just vote those bills out one way or another. We'll probably be taking money out. If there's some of these bills, we've said we want to fund certain things in some of these bills. And if we decide to do that, we can leave the money in the bill but account for it at the budget. We can make that. So We don't put the bill in the budget, we just, we can account for the money in the budget, because it's the same pot of money that the region gets generated from. So we will be voting on a lot of those bills by the end of year. But tomorrow, we're going to hear a lot of bills for the first time. So just remember, we're not digging in deep to every little detail and every word in the bill.

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: But it suggests something that whoever's coming in to present Yeah. Just let them present everything they wanna present before we start asking questions. It just adds that we know that it's kind of.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Yeah. Write down your questions. Spot. What's the

[Rep. John Kascenska (Member)]: nice spot here, too? Yeah. They're halfway through and you got nine minutes or.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Right, and then you get your brain. We joked one year that we never got past page three of the presentation. So we don't really wanna do that.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Have made

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We do wanna let them go through it. Yeah. And then we'll ask questions at the end. And that will help all of us go faster.

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: And it would really be expedited if they just focus on the need for the appropriation.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Although if we're going to think about what the appropriation is for, we kind of want to know what it's for. We don't need to know all the details and how the policy

[Rep. David Yacovone (Member)]: The purpose line on the bill.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: It's a high level. Dollars 30,000 fee. Understand it. Take us to the money. Yeah. What I think. Yeah. So we all have a role to play in getting ourselves through all this, right? And we'll try to minimize later nights, but I don't know. As I said to you, we may have some late nights. This night might not be one

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: of them, but I'll get to it. Please go ahead, Marty. When you say we'll take the money out of the bill, then as an example, we say, okay, well, our amendment is to eliminate these last three sections of your bill and it will go to the floor? Yes, yes.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: And what it may say is the last three sections are contingent or the bill is contingent upon available funds. It depends on how the bill is written. So there may be a couple of different ways that we do it. So the whole bill may be contingent upon available funds. So there might be a section. So last week, we had a bill and we took out the positions. But we passed the bill, and that was easy to do because it was kind of a separate thing. Some of these other bills may have an appropriation for one area, but the policy is important to go. That's what we do with S-sixty, the Farm and Forest bill. We didn't appropriate any money because at the end of the session, there's money that the community of conference can decide to appropriate money to that. So there's several different ways to do it. I'd like to get, as much as possible, I'd like to get bills out of here and get them over to the Senate so we get

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: to make a way. But we may be establishing a program, but no money.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: But we won't establish the program might be contingent upon establishing

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: the funding. Right, but it will go to the floor and people will understand that that's contingent upon. We did a lot of that in the last couple of years.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Yeah, We just have a six piece, which was the fund. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: But then it's all ready to go. If we find money that we can fund it with, then the program's ready to go. We don't have to go through a whole legislation thing again. So it's frustrating in one hand and then sort of efficient a little bit on the other. We don't know what the Senate's gonna

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: do with those sorts of things.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: So that is talking about bills. And yeah, so you have the agenda, you have the list. We'll keep updating that. Don't, well, no.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: We may get more bills tomorrow.

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: I don't

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: think so. Are we going get any more bills? I think we've got all the bills we're going to get.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: We're getting that. It's fine for the good reason.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Oh, that's right, ways and means has bills. No, we're not done yet. I knew we were done yet. Five more bills are coming.

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: Don't worry, Ben.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: Don't worry. So, we're starting tomorrow at 08:30. James is presenting, miscellaneous public utility subjects. There actually isn't any money. You might recall we get bills that don't have any money, but if the underlying original bill had money, it still comes to us. So that should be an easy one. And then, Ralph Alone is going to come in and talk about the Ethics Commission. He has some language he'd like us to add in, he may have some other things, but there's budget language he wants to talk to us about with regard to the Ethics Commission. And then we have something for another thing from judiciary, late activism, emergency management bill. That's coming from gov ops and has a lot of different appropriations. That may be more than thirty minutes, but we'll see. We'll let them talk and then we'll see it's there. We have another one with no money in it. Again, about health care, financial transactions. Again, underlying bill had some money, this one doesn't. We're going hear miscellaneous tax. We've already gotten an idea of what miscellaneous tax is gonna be like. It's good to hear it more than once. And then three other bills in the afternoon, ending with Theresa's bill

[Rep. Martha "Marty" Feltus (Vice Chair)]: on the housing and homelessness initiative. So that will be

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: when we finish the bill. The more to come. It's that. Just that. That's Tuesday. All right. Any other thoughts or things anybody wants to say before we go above?

[Rep. Wayne Laroche (Member)]: Wayne? Just a thought. We always say it's all about the money, but we have made some significant improvements to some of the bills that come through here in terms of policy wise, from what we've said. And we all have to vote on these bills. So it's not like we're separated from the policy.

[Rep. Robin Scheu (Chair)]: We are. And we can vote on the floor for the whole bill as well. You So get two chances in some cases. Alright. So 08:30 sharp tomorrow morning, and