Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm an assistant for Vermont House Committee on Commerce and Economic Development. It is Tuesday, 03/31/2026 at 01:10 in the afternoon. We are here to start our journey on S-three 27, which is the economic development bill that was sent to us from the Senate. So we have Chair of Senate Economic Development with us, Senator Clarkson. Good afternoon, Senator. Thank you for joining us.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: It is a joy to be in this committee. I love this. I love this end of the 2nd Floor. Spend a lot of time here. Allison Clarkson, chair of Senate Economic Development Housing and General Affairs. I would like to pass out the actual bill that we passed out of our committee that was pretty much fully gutted by Senate appropriations. So I'd just like to have you see where the bill that we actually passed, not the bill that you got. I think that's a fair thing. As much as I appreciate our appropriations work, and it was interesting, I think Rick and I learned a lesson, which is all of the appropriations need to go to an appropriations section and not embedded in the language of the bill. So as you do this, I give you fair warning. So yeah, that was the mistake we made, but anyway, that's why we're passing out the bill as we passed it out of our committee. This bill, isn't this our, I wouldn't say this was our most exciting economic development bill. It builds on a lot of the things we've worked on before. It really builds, it really tries to further support key services and resources that our small businesses have come to really rely on. And we chose four of them to further invest in because as you all know, and you don't need to know, for me, it's a very tight budget year. So we were really trying to be cognizant of the supports. But this builds, this further invests in our downtown and village centers. It provides support, technical assistance and incentives for Vermont businesses of all sizes through all stages of development. And this is where Abbey, where is Abbey?

[Abbey Duke (Member)]: I'm behind you on the screen. I am here.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: I'm so glad you have my back. Have my back. There's a piece of this bill that is, I hope, near and dear to Herb Olson. So this bill, we chose to invest further in our downtown and village centers in supporting key resources for businesses that you'll see that rely on legal, technical, managerial advice and different forms of expertise. It invests further in continued support of our international trade office in Montreal, although we really want to push for more representation in Taiwan. We have a sister state that is really ready to work with us much more fully than we are working with them. And we chose not to spend more money on that this year, but we really are asking Tim and the Office of Economic Development, the Department of Economic Development, to really figure out how we can best resource a representative in Taiwan so that we can both encourage investment in Taiwan, Vermont investment in Taiwan, which we have some but not much, and in some ways more importantly, how can we have a representative who can funnel Taiwanese investments into Vermont businesses. As you probably know, because you may have heard from a Taiwanese delegation, I think they allocated $25,000,000,000 for investment in The States. And we need somebody whose hand is up saying, yes, over here, we have three or four. Not every business you thought is gonna be right for that, but certainly beta, for example. Y'all, we have beta right over here. We'd love to have you invest right over here. So we're in need of that. Also, there's no chance, I mean, we continue to be the champions for brownfield cleanup. A lot of our economic development cannot occur until we do our brownfield cleanup. And the governor put no money this year in brownfield cleanup. So first time ever I've seen a budget, no brownfield cleanup money in the head. It's essential to doing anything else we want to do, whether it's housing or economic development in our downtowns. And Abbey and I are very excited about the section that sets up that the Department of Economic Development has taken on, which is looking at a study. It's more than a study. It's really identifying the stages of development that our companies go through, startup, early stage, maturing, mature. What resources we want them to do an inventory of all the resources we offer in this state, both in and out of state government. What resources do we already offer them? Regional, technical, all sorts of advice to the council. What are we not offering? What are we not doing? And why do so few businesses take advantage of these incredible resources we have? So how can we better market and promote them? Which is a big challenge because we don't do a particularly good job on that. And it also continues to support our convention center task force that has not completed its work. So we had additional eight meetings for them to continue that work. So the downtown and village tax credits, you don't need me to sell you on this program. It's one of our best return on investments. We get like 17 to one. And we love this program. It's always oversubscribed. It never has enough money. I would rather have put in 5,000,000, but my committee ended up landing on 4. And then the governor, I think, still has three, which he's had for the last several years.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: And there was a big push up. Hopefully you support the miscellaneous tax. I

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: haven't gotten to it yet. 17 page more book that Charlie gave you, sixty four secondtions.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: There's an additional 1,000,000 for downtown tax credit.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: That would be landing where we landed. 4,000,000. Okay. So we ended up with 4,000,000. It just it's one of the key you know, we didn't create much new here, but we sure did support what works well. And I think that's what we have to really, in this type of care, do better, which is support the things that really work well and support them better. That's section two. Section three is the sort of key support for key resources and technical assistance and legal assistance for our businesses. As you all know, 93 you have Abbey on this, maybe, so you don't need me. But 93% of all Vermont businesses considered small, employing less than 20 people. You all know this. There are roughly 27,000 businesses that fit this profile, and they employ over 22,000 people, and they support about $1.3 in wages. Most of the businesses are the lifeblood of our communities, and they have all benefited from the resources that we've identified here and many other resources that we felt these were sort of the key ones. We have a micro business which supports lower income, low income Vermonters trying to have a leg up. I can remember when Patty and I go back to our class, our class of 'five, which Mike and I are members of. And Patty Conlon was a member of that class. And I asked Patty, why was she a Republican? And she said, because I believe in giving people a handout and not a handout. And this, the micro business support is such a handout because it enables low income people, our wonderful community action programs educate people about how to manage their money and then they enable them to start the businesses with their dreams. Switchback, as we know, is a poster child for this program, but there are a gazillion lawn service companies, sewing businesses, home care businesses. There are a bunch of businesses that have been started that are small, that were all dependent on, came out of micro business. So we support low income Vermonters with micro business, we support businesses that need legal advice. Too few of our businesses, they get into really hot water because they haven't gotten good legal advice from the get go. And they haven't figured out how to form or what's the right legal formation for them to be adopting. So we give the Vermont Legal Center, Small Business Legal Center to money, or at least we try to, and so was Kevin. We also give, of course, the backbone of our support for small businesses is our Vermont Small Business Development Centers. Linda Rossi does such a great job, and that's an essential business. And then, of course, our Vermont professionals of color, which we had thought they were included in the budget, they have not. That was a residual piece of granting money out, it wasn't money for them. They do a terrific job bringing on board

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: In professionals of the house budget, they're 75,000.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Oh great, That's a rocket job. So those four are business resources we chose to support in this year's tight budget. And so you can see that, and then we, I love my particular favorites, Brownfields micro business. You have to have some favorites, right? Then we get to in section four, we get to the micro business. Hi Jonathan, I'm sorry to see you at a normal time of day. Jonathan's a member of the lounge lasers. We were very late at night. I often leave him at midnight when he's still there. The Outdoor Rec Business Alliance this year came to us with a very specific request asking for $200,000 to do an economic impact study. They want to better understand pretty much almost every aspect of what affects their business. They want this to be an investment tool guide for themselves. They want to be able to know where to better invest. Should we be investing more in resiliency? Should we be investing more in local economies? They're looking at future investments that will be most valuable by analyzing the benefits of Vermont's local economies, the risk factors facing this sector, strategic issues or investments that support growth and increase resiliency, stewardship. I mean, for example, the whole issue of public private land. So many of our trails aren't private land. How do we do a better job and consistent job of keeping them and satisfying their needs too? So that's an economic development impact and economic impact study that they're very keen on having. And given that this is a sector that has just grown like topsy, I mean, it's, as you know, grown to about a $2,100,000,000 sector. It's an important sector for us to be supporting. The international trade, I've already talked to about that section five. Is the house budget as well. At 150 or more?

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: 150. Yeah, same. We tried for the section five. So

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: we were going to ask for another 75 for Taiwan and then we really thought, you know, Lyle and Tim need to get us a really strong proposal on that for next year. And I think they will because there's a lot at stake with it. Section six is the brownfield cleanup money. We've put in $3,000,000 for that. It's critically important for us to be cleaning up brownfields. Why am I now so out of sync with myself? And so you've got that section seven is the business resources and growth inventory and study, which we, Lyle Jepsen, our new commissioner of economic development has put his hand up and said, I'd like our office to do this. This is important for us. And so they have taken on this work, which you can see that they're really going to be doing the inventory of resources, what isn't there, what do we need, how can we better market our resources, how can we better serve business in all stages of development here in Vermont. And they will be continuing to work on exploring succession planning, identifying additional resources and capital access opportunities, the whole range. And I'm looking forward to seeing the results of their work. Section eight is what I've already mentioned, the convention center continuing the task force's work. I'm very keen to see what they come up with because it continues to be something that our chamber in particular has many lots of business aspects in Vermont are very keen on our convention center and a bigger performance space, performance bench, which sort of goes into your ticketing bill. Thank you for your ticketing bill. We're having fun with it already. Section nine, okay. The Senate has gotten this over the line at least five years of trial. I am charging the house with doing the same thing, which is repealing the veggie sunset. You can do it, Marcotte. What's the

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: incentive? Know. Promoting economic growth incentive.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Sorry. Promoting economic growth. Gross incentive. Anyway, the House has more reluctance than myself does in repealing that. And section 10 is near and dear, I think, to Abbey and my heart, which is, as you all know during, well, actually some of you were new to Montpelier, but we used to have here in Montpelier, our New England culinarians, which not only educated and built our pipeline of really strong chefs, sous chefs, and all sorts of restaurant related expertise. But it also had, I think at 1.3 restaurants, and most of our lifetime, two main restaurants and bakeries, La Brioche and Main Street, and we are missing them terribly here. But more importantly, the state is missing a workforce pipeline in the culinary arena, which is a critically important part of our tourism sector. And so This is a study work that is being convened by our newly formed office of workforce strategy development to get that conversation, to convene that conversation. And they're going to consult with all the stakeholders and try and figure out how we can establish a new culinary institute. It may need to be done in phases. It can use all our incredible culinary CTE centers. There are all sorts of exciting ways we could be doing this, but we desperately need to reestablish a culinary student. We need to bring people into Vermont to train and we need to train Vermonters. Right now, our culinary CTE students don't have a place in state that they can go. They have to go to the Adirondacks or to Queensborough, they have to go to Johnsonville, wherever they go, they're going out of state. We want to keep up here, move on more people too. And it obviously is perfect the compliments are especially food sector and our farm to plate work and I don't need the same on this. Does it make you national recognize? Yes, good point. We would hope our Vermont Culinary Institute would be as well. Are you Abbey? Yes, she said. David Weeks was the Rutland County. So this is a Rutland County request. And it really is, we stole it from transportation because it really is an economic corridor, the corridor between Burlington and New York State, 22A. 22A is in terrible shape. Yes. We have confirmation here. I have Rutland on my left. And so it charges the Vermont Association of Planners and Development Agencies to study how best to connect the persons and economies of Vermont and New York, and to come up with some short term and long term solutions to what we do with this road, which is such an important corridor for trucks and people, for commerce and people. And sometimes people are it brings our but it's a study, and hopefully they will come back to us with some recommendations of what they can do

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: in terms of the long

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: term, because it's a hazard that grows. So we heard from over 30 people. We get you the list. It's a mod, it's not a huge economic development bill, but it's one you can build on, and we hope you will. And we also hope you'll support the initiatives that we've included here. We hope that these efforts help our people and our businesses and grow and flourish, what's good for Vermont's economy is good for all of us. With that, I wish you well, and thank you for taking the time. Thank you, madam. Any

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: other?

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: We will be sending you back some pennies.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Some what?

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Pennies. Pennies.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Don't want pennies. I want quarters.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: That would be, I mean, not too far.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Pennies, what pennies would

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: I even be able to make pennies?

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: That's precisely, there'll be something in there for you on pennies.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Oh, oh, oh, you are really setting. Oh, that's right, you mentioned this.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Let's just say we're gonna get nickeled and dined. Unless your two sons were

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Oh, I could see that the cabaret act for Congress. Anyway, thank you. Thank you for being such good partners on economic terms. We really appreciate it. We're grateful for the sister state and for the ticketing bill. I think those are the two bills that you have sent us. And data privacy. And and data brokers is coming our way. I think data privacy may end up going to institutions.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: We're

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: hoping you will get it back. But thank you for your work and thank you for working out together and more to follow and thank you for, oh, I would be remiss in not saying thank you for your CTE work, which I know you didn't get across the line in time for crossover, but we sent you an aspirational bill for you to build on.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: We much appreciate that so that we can continue to work on CTE. It's something for you to at least get the conversation started. Which is great. Much appreciated.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: You know where to reach me if you need me. I can find out. But you've got it ready.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Questions for the chair? Thank you for coming in.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: This was great. Into the square you parked. Already? I thought I was due at 01:45.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Carry it over.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Okay, I've warmed this up for you, Ray. Thank you. Thank you all. Really appreciate you taking the time with this.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Thank you. Yeah,

[Tony Micklus (Member)]: thanks, Allison.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Thanks, Abbey. Great. Thanks. Good luck. It's a wild fun. Enjoy. Thank you for the photo.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Thank you.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Good afternoon.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Good afternoon.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I'm Kirk Sable with the Office of Election of Counsel.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Here's my screen.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Well, we got a good walk through from Frederick Larson. What can I do for the community? Should I go through I think

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: maybe go through the bill that's passed the Senate would be helpful for the committee to know exactly what we are looking at and what we're not looking at.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, this is three twenty seven as passed by the Senate. What this eventually passed is the three studies and the bedsheet repeal, sunset repeal. That's kind of the way I think about it, it's all the And the purpose statement, which doesn't match the bill. I asked members to, if they want to change that, their purpose to reflect what came out of the Senate, they didn't want to. So the purpose does not reflect a lot of votes in the bill. The first paragraph does not, the bill does not do that. So just have some background there. So three studies and the bed sheet repeal, I'll show you there's the purpose statement, it's the same as what Senator Clarkson just showed you. It's really the second sentence is what the Act does, it has those three studies. Section two was the business small business appropriations section three. Section three, I'm sorry, section two was the downtown billet center tax credit. Just an update there, that is 4,000,000 of the governor's and the house budget.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: So yeah it's in the miscellaneous type bill.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Is it? Okay so that language is made across

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: not this bill but the capital. Section

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: three that was the small business appropriations allocations and just an update on that. This is from Padsden, just want to show you a couple things. This $3.88 is in the house budget for the small business development center. This $4.93 is in the house budget for the micro business development program. And I think it's 75 for professionals of color, and then 150 for trade division. There's no money for brownfields under Clark Kent, there's no money to my

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: knowledge, so I just want to correct that.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, section four was the bill right, the outdoor recreation economic legislation. There is $500,000 in the house budget, that's base budget funds. This bill would have added $200 for

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: a study that was removed. The borate funds that are self budgeted are one time dollars? I

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: They were one time.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yes, we had recommended this.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Section six of five is the trade division, the $1.50 is in the house budget as was in senate bill. Section six, that was the brownfields, 3,000,000 was to be appropriated. It was removed from the bill. Okay, section seven is the business growth and development study. This is a study that the commissioner of economic development will take on in constitutional stakeholders for the purpose of determining how the state can better enable and support the growth of Vermont businesses, really without reading the whole thing though. They are going to create an inventory of resources that businesses can use to grow and develop that can be utilized in the state. They will determine how to improve succession planning for mature businesses, identify what resources are available to businesses to access capital, determine the state of capital access opportunities, including the investment environment in New England and Vermont, availability of tax credits to leverage private capital, and requirements to maintain the monetary designation. They also identify investor education opportunities for high net worth individuals interested in investing in commodities. So this report is due 12/15/2026. They will send a report to this committee and the Senate Economic Development Committee. Okay, section eight was the Convention Center Task Force, which you all created last year. Their bill as it went through their committee would have increased the meetings from eight to 14 to give them roughly six more meetings and also add the president at UVM to the task force because that had an appropriation that was removed by the setting. So that task force still exists, but they can't beat and get pregame because they've met already eight times. So it would have gone from eight to 14 meetings and adding the president of Union to the task force.

[Herb Olson (Member)]: Sorry, just to They can still meet, there just aren't any per diems? Correct.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: That's six times. Yeah. So And then they go to, so they wanna meet eight more. So that's it. The bill would

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: have made it 14. How many times it met.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yeah, so the proposition will feed more than eight. Right.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: But it didn't extend the report date. It didn't extend the termination of the task force date. Those, I think, the end of this year is when they were set

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: to fire. We can have that conversation with our appropriations committee to see what they think.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And it wasn't a reflection of the policy that the appropriations committee said whatever, if it's gonna cost money we have to strike it.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Truthfully, they didn't have a budget to work on, so it makes it difficult for them to put money into something they don't have budget to deliver.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Section nine state of the bill, this is the veggie sunset appeal. So we haven't talked a lot about Veggie in this committee. It is the Vermont Employment, the Consentative Growth Program, not the economic. I trip up in the same way as most people do. The Vermont Economic Employment, I'm sorry, I just said it again, Vermont Employment Growth Incentive. So you can see here that the VEGI program has been set to repeal several times over the past ten years and occasionally the general assembly kind of pushes back that date. The current sunset is 01/01/2027. So if you don't act in the session, it's not going to go away, but what this language says is they shall not accept DEVSY, shall not accept or approve an application for vegging. So current awardees will keep getting their awards, but they won't submit applications and the program would eventually cease to revive. So you can repeal the sunset, which means this would live on indefinitely. You could further push back the date to whatever date you think is the best policy wise.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Okay, we'll be hearing from Jess Hartley from Laura, the program and reviewing the sunset. She's also gonna give us a little update on the chip program as well tomorrow.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, section 10. I think Senator Clarkson explained the Culinary Institute studies quite well. That is in the bill. It's a study. It is cost neutral, there's no appropriation for the study. Section 11 is the Route 22A study that Senator Clarkson mentioned about some of the weeks that was this bill originally that we put in this bill as a study. And I do want to give you kind of what they're looking at. It's not just 22A, but one of their tasks is to look at 22A, the current and projected usage and condition of the road, the rate and severity of accidents on the road, options available to improve the integrity of the road and the flow of traffic and safety of the road.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Is 22A completely improvised? I don't have it.

[Herb Olson (Member)]: This piece they're talking about here, I'm assuming it's the piece from

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: therapy generally dies back in.

[Herb Olson (Member)]: So from root four up to root seven, That's all up in grade. That's the whole thing? It does go south to 22 in New York.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: So maybe they are considering that part goes down from Fairhaven down past Polkney, it's a much shorter segment,

[Unidentified Committee Member]: and it's not the major truck routes that everyone

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I'm just wondering if because I don't see anyone on this study on the New York side. Yeah. So is this it would be nice to know if we're just talking about the Vermont side, or if we're talking about Italian to the New York side, where we may want to work with people for New York as well.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It Yeah. Did the same for Vermont or 22A.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yeah. Maybe. I'm wondering if there's more to it than I really Yeah,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: I know it sounds small.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Section two. Yeah, so section two, a potential route for a new limited access highway to connect Burlington to Interstate 87 in New York and estimated costs associated with constructing such a route and the feasibility of a rail system better connecting a few states to find review of the latest versions of the Vermont Rail Plan and the Ibrahim Lach Freight Plan. Stakeholders include, so it is the Ibrahim Association of Planning and Development Agencies who will conduct the study. They will consult with AFT, ANR, Land Use Review Board, the Vermont Chamber, and RDCs. They can include more, but if you want to be specific, this would be the place to say please consult with these people.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Seems like they should be consulting with their neighbors to the West, New York as well. Because if they had no interest in connecting Burlington to Eighty Seven on their side, then why would they be doing that?

[Tony Micklus (Member)]: Do we have interstate compacts already that are being governed?

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: This is all out of our beer I and

[Tony Micklus (Member)]: just imagine if we do it, shouldn't get those folks involved. I also would just say too, we share borders with the reinsurer in Massachusetts as well. I've been wondering how to raise that one. I mean, that would definitely endorse the scope.

[Kirk Sable (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Paper report is due on April 4, 01/15/2027 and the entire act takes effect 07/01/2026. The

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Office of Workforce Strategy Development, Subhana, you're here. Are able to speak

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: to that now? Culinary report.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: We're very supportive of it. We've studied a lot with different stakeholders together.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Do you want to come up and we can tackle it back?

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Sure.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Or do you want to come back? I don't want to put you on the spot, because I know we didn't ask you.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Yeah, I can speak to it a little bit then

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I can. Okay. Yeah.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Hello, for the record, I'm Simone Haskell, Office of Workforce Strategy and Development. We've been in committee, Senate committee while this was all being discussed and the different testimony that was taken. The goal would be that we'd be the convener of the study and bring all of the different stakeholders together, the culinary CTEs, independent restaurants, other employers like that, and just bring everybody together and start that process about how, what the goals are, would we be able to roll it out and where would it be? Would it be in multiple locations? I mean, were a lot of different types of conversations like that. But I I think we felt like we could be the home a bit while it starts in, you know, in this, you know, summer through the winter. Yeah.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Just wondering, number one, you're always an office right here. You have a lot of things that are going on right now, and whether or not this puts too much on your plate as you're just starting. Yeah. And trying to understand how the office of workforce strategy and development, you're working on workforce, and this is more creating a school.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: I think it would take a direction once people start coming together and talking about how it would roll out, but as we all know, hospitality and leisure is one of our top five sectors in the state, And there's been a lot of conversations, I'm not recalling at the moment, but with people who are studying this, they leave the state and they don't come back. If we had something that we could keep them here, that would be really wonderful, like we used to.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I worry for the two person office, but I don't want to overwhelm you Henry. Yeah. Because you have a lot of other duty things to see, I'm wondering if there's someone else that would be better equipped to do

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: To do the convening? I'm not gonna say we don't have full plates because we do it as you know. That's what concerns me.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yeah. But we I the idea is good. I think it's I think we should look at it. I don't know if you're the right place, you're the right convener. Maybe we should politics maybe. We should think about that. Okay.

[Abbey Duke (Member)]: Yeah. That's what I was gonna suggest as well is that is the is the state university perhaps would be a good convener or an alternate option.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yes.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: I have so many questions about this one.

[Herb Olson (Member)]: Was a for profit company that went out of business.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: I just have a lot of questions about putting state resources into consumption like price.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I think we'll have to talk to the state colleges, the university, because if that's an area where they would like to expand upon, they would be the ones, I think, that would be the place where we would most likely want to see a culinary institute start, if they could do it, maybe this is what that's looking for.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Just as a little bit of left turn here, there was also a conversation about if there could be apprenticeships with different restaurants and all of that. Just to throw that there as well.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Kind of in the same line of what they're doing at the Diesel and Auto Mechanic program, Is there that was a two year associates degree, now they're turning it into a certification.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: Right. Was

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: in the news this morning. Yeah. And utilizing apprenticeships with the area of business, similar to what we do with electricians and plumbers, too. So is there a way that they could do the same thing in the probably range? I love?

[Tony Micklus (Member)]: Two things about the film because Stafford in Rutland is a really great example. They've had a culinary program for agents that have sent a lot. I know, at least from my generation, a whole lot of people went into the culinary world, started businesses, etcetera. And then also, I was looking over the list of folks to be on this study, and the Vermont Small Business Development Center is not on it. I think they should be. Even if it does go through state colleges and universities, there's such

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: a business component to running a restaurant or running a food based business.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: And I'll make sure that on the economic level you did not bring up not wanting to do this. No worries. Thank you. This is just when I'm looking at it, it really I'm just concerned for your office. It's brand new. I don't want

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: to put more. Yeah. Understood.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Yeah. And I I know Drake will be in the committee tomorrow. Yeah. So, yeah.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: We can continue chatting about that. I think so. I think that's all we have in mind. Abbey, good question?

[Abbey Duke (Member)]: Oh, it was really just a comment kind of continuing on what you were talking about with the Culinary Institute idea, which is I mean, I think the reason for profit culinary institutes across the country have failed in the past number of years is because the economics really aren't there. I mean, you can't be a culinary student and pay private school prices based on what the jobs are coming out. The value proposition is not there. I I do think that the idea of a culinary program that is also essentially, it's a adult c whether it's adult CTE, it's CTE, it's adult CTE, potentially certificate. You know, it's really I I I don't feel like it's a stand alone thing. It's like, but can we but I do like the idea of exploring how we can expand training opportunity, affordable training opportunities for students and adults as well. So anyway, just a thought when we're thinking about what that study would look like.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Yep. Yep. Sure. Okay. Alright. There will be some language in there that you'll see tomorrow that I got to work with draft. It's on, like, Regional Infrastructure Development. Rural Industry Development Grant Program. That was a program that we, I don't know if I think of it, started I think 2023, paid $5,000,000 in there and it was basically for the RDCs that have industrial parks, who would be able to access this $5,000,000 as part of their portfolio, trying to go inspect buildings in an industrial environment and sell them. They could get 20% of the cost through this program, and they wouldn't have revolving funds, but they wouldn't have to pay it back until they sold the building. So right now there's, I think, half of the money has been allocated for different projects. We still have 2 and a half million sitting in. We need to make it work. There's proposition that we'll bringing that we'll look at tomorrow that would turn it into a grant program of 50% instead of 20%. There's a caveat that if you're in a downtown designated downtown, if you're in a REIT zone, or if you're in the investor, you can access up to 100%, up to $2,000,000,000 So this would help. There's a couple of communities I can think of right now that two ports one, three or three other.

[Tony Micklus (Member)]: And would it stay still stay focused on the warehouse? No. So

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: used exterior used, so it could be then could be used for commercial property.

[Simone Haskell (Office of Workforce Strategy and Development)]: Oh, okay.

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: Could be used for residential housing. Yep. But it's in the designated downtown too. So Yeah. So we'll look at that tomorrow. Have everybody take a look at it and start thinking about that. We'll hear from, like, a number of people. I don't really have anything else. Thought we'd go a little more. So remember 02:45, are we back in here, Edye? Yes, we

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Economic Development, Housing & General Affairs)]: are meeting here at 02:45 with the Taiwan delegation. So

[Michael Marcotte (Chair)]: I think that's it for us for today, since for now until 02:45, Any questions, committee? So we'll go offline and we'll be back at 02:45.