Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Hello.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yeah. Welcome, folks. This is House Corrections and Institutions Committee. It is Thursday, March 19. We're still working on the capital bill, And we're working on some language that was proposed by DEC about loans for our water systems for a community that had manufactured homes. Those languages at the back of our book that came through. In the meantime, from the time our budget was introduced to now, DEC has proposed different language. So we'll bring the folks up. We'll sit both of both of you, Patrick and Emily. There's two chairs there if you both wanna come up. I know some of you are sitting. So we have some documents. We have the new language that's being proposed, and then we have this. Okay. So, We don't have a call. Going to get started. We can't take any action, but we're going to get started. Because if we don't start, the people don't realize, oh, I don't have to be in there because I don't miss anything. So let's get started.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Kevin's Beauty and the Bell Audit.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Oh, I know probably what that is. Maybe. Okay. Welcome, Patrick. And I know if you could both introduce yourself, Luca.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Thank you. Good morning. My name is Patrick Monks. I'm the program manager with the water infrastructure finance program at Vermont DEC.

[Emily Bird (Water Investment Director, Vermont DEC)]: And I'm Emily Bird. I'm the water investment director at Vermont DEC. Thank you for having us.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Okay. As noted, we were in a few weeks ago talking about the capital budget and including two policy proposals covered in sections eight, section nine. The first one, section eight, covers our definition for how we find disadvantaged communities. This applies to the drinking water state revolving loan fund. And as also, as noted by the chair, we have proposed change to our proposal. Apologize for the change. It is our hope that it will be a little simpler in the end than what was previously proposed. And we have no changes to our section nine proposal, which covers clean the water state revolving loan fund. And I'll plan to go over that one again as well.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: It would be helpful. And I know we've talked about this

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: thing Whatever. So I

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: mean, yes, slides. What the current how it currently operates. And then How do you propose to change that? Because this for a lot of folks, this is totally new in terms of the structure and how it actually operates.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Understandably, it's it's definitely inside the baseball when it comes to the state revolving loan funds.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yes. Hard to comprehend some.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So big picture, under the drinking water state revolving loan fund, communities that are defined as a disadvantaged municipality or just a disadvantaged community are able to receive certain adjustments to their loans, including extending the loan term up to forty years. So that lowers their annual payment in terms of repaying loan. A lower administrative fee. Tech technically, our loans don't include a 0% interest, but they do include an administrative fee, operates just like interest. And up to 50% loan forgiveness. It's we're required to make these provisions for disadvantaged communities as part of our federal capitalization grants that we get from EPA here. So I know that the next slide shows what disadvantaged municipalities. But how do you determine how do you define municipality in the context of this law?

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Not a disadvantage, but just how do you define it?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: In terms of defining a municipality, we use the state statute definition of municipality.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So that it could include solid waste district that could include

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: fire districts,

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: fire districts,

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: fire districts.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: And water districts, but still water districts or

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: is it

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: just the Champlain Water District, which I believe is a municipality.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: What about school districts? Is that considered a municipality?

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: No. No. Yes.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It did. Yeah. And so just to back up, our original proposal was to change the definition. And the problem obvious problem is that we want to include category of manufactured housing communities cooperatively owned and nonprofit. They aren't Not considered a municipality. Not a municipality. So the way the statute is set up, it defines disadvantaged municipality. And then for private borrowers, it says you can get those same benefits as a disadvantaged municipality if you meet the criteria, which I'll talk about. So it just started to get a little too confused. So that's why we came in with the change that I would talk about.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So a few years ago, because the feds allowed this, we could extend the drinking water loans to private entities. Correct. We did that a few years ago, but there is a structure around that. Troy?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Just very surface level, how

[Troy Headrick (Ranking Member)]: easy or hard is it

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: to get into that loan forgiveness? It's not that hard. There's a limited amount under each grant. And for some borrowers, especially manufactured housing communities, pulling the information together to demonstrate what their income is and describe what their water rates are, it's just one more thing they need to do when we know, in effect, they are disadvantaged. Than their user rates, their water rates that they're paying, that you live in a municipality that provides water, you get a water bill. If you're in a manufactured housing community, you get your lot rent, and it's all combined. And so parsing that out is just a mild obstacle that's looking to make going through this process a little easier for just that for that community. Thank you. Shawn?

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: Just to ask. I don't mean to get in so deep, but isn't forty years an onerous thing to do to the people in the next generation? Like, it it seems like a like, if someone said to me, it just seems I understand why mathematically and financially you're doing it, but it just seems like, oh, yeah. We're I don't know. What's the why four years? Is it just to make it work financially for these tenants?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: And, you know, that I guess, obviously, that does pass that burden on to the next generation. We only go to forty years where the infrastructure has a useful life of that length. I guess the alternative is we only have so much loan forgiveness to offer, and then without I mean, those are our those are the tools we have. We can lower the administrative fee to zero. We can extend the loan as far as the useful life of the asset goes, and we can offer a maximum amount of principal forgiveness. Beyond that, there's really there's you know, the alternative is you you don't do the project, I guess, unless you can find some other fine financing funding. What what is the average or median admin fee? Generally, it's 2%. Private borrowers can be up to 2.75%. So if you're not disadvantaged, you're paying 2%. So, I mean, in forty year note, even if you were paying 3% over a forty year period that I mean, you're you're basically borrowing that the real value of of the money over that term is much less than than what you borrowed initially. So like, if I could pay for something with cash upfront or take a 3% note in four years, I would take a 3% note. It's just a better value. Yeah, but we're not talking about communities who have cash.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yeah. We're talking about disadvantaged.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: No, I understand that. I hear your point.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: It's absolutely valid, but

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: we're in a different ballpark. And where's the money coming from? Primarily federal government, EPA. The state provides a 20 match.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: The drinking water revolving loan fund needs to match those federal dollars. It's a one to five match.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Got it.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: But that's what you see on your spreadsheet for the drinking water revolving loan fund.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Okay. Alright. I know that the process that we use of first extending the loan term, then lowering the interest, and then applying principal forgiveness, that's all set in statute, and we're not proposing any changes there. This is just a Okay. Hopefully a limited change.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: And and that 50% loan up to 50% loan forgiveness is equivalent to a grant. That's what it ends up being.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Okay.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Did you have something, James?

[James Gregoire (Vice Chair)]: Well, I think maybe you answered it. I got lost in the shuffle. Say it's 2% off the top, so 2% of 10,000 or whatever, 100,000 right off the top or is it 2% monthly APR throughout the term of the loan?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It functions like a 90% Like an actual loan. Yes.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Okay. Let's go to the next slide here.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: And so this is this is current statute. This is the definition of disadvantaged municipality, and there's essentially two doors. One is if you if the sorry. Median household income of the borrower is less than the state median household income, so lower income. And if the user rate is more than 1% of their median household income, they qualify. So it's low income and high user rates. Then they are defined as a disadvantaged municipality. It's another option. And this is, again, focused on municipalities. We'll get to the private borrowers in a minute. For median household if median household income is greater than the state average, so not necessarily low income, but they have very high user rate that is more than 2.5% of their income, they also qualify. So these are the two existing categories. And the way the statute works first, it defines disadvantaged municipality and then in the section of statute, which I'll talk about. Second, It says if you're a private borrower and you meet this first door, first category a, then you're eligible for the same benefits of extended long term, low interest, and principal forgiveness.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So when you say a private, that is not a private homeowner. That would be a private developer.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It would be a it would be a private water system.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Private water. So

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: it's a public water system, meaning it's regulated. So it's not an individual homeowner. Has to be regulated. Water system regulated under the Safe Drinking Water Act.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: You can have a private water system for a housing development somewhere. And they wouldn't be under the term municipality. Right. They'd be under the or fire district. They'd be under the just a private you could have a a road with maybe six, seven houses on it, But the developer built a private system there for those specific houses for drinking water.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Correct. It's yes. It's maybe more around, I don't know, a dozen or 15 homes. The same idea. For the case in point, manufacturing housing community, someone builds an MHC, maybe it's got fifteen, twenty homes. That would if if it's a single water system, that serves it, that would be regulated. So it's a public water system, but it's privately owned by those residents.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So now they wouldn't be able to access any state money?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: They can access state money, and they can meet these They can currently come in and receive the same benefits as a disadvantaged municipality. What we are trying to do is make it easier. We hear from that sector that going through our various loan and regulatory processes is a burden. And so what their hope is that based Yeah. On So instead of an MHC coming to us and demonstrating what their median household income is and demonstrating what their water user rates are, they would be categorically eligible for those benefits that we described here.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Regardless of this.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Provided they are registered with a CCD and provided they're a nonprofit or Sorry about my backpack.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: It's okay.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Yeah, nonprofit and cooperatively owned.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Questions?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So this is, now we're getting into the section of statute that can't see the top of my slide, 24 BSA forty seven seventy one covers private loans. So first statute defines this finished municipality, then it gets into the private loan portion. And this is where we under the current statute, it says if you meet that first category that is below median household income, high user rates, you're eligible for the benefits I've described. This Did I go Did I skip one?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Thanks.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: I did. Sorry about that. Thank you.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yeah.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So, again, this portion of statute allows a private borrower to receive the same benefits as a disadvantaged municipality, provided they can demonstrate their income and user rates. Our language, our proposal here allows MHCs that are registered with Department of Commerce and Community Development, sorry, I said ACCP before, to receive those same benefits categorically.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Resides in a nonprofit resident manufactured housing community. So that language, is that tracking the language that came out of House General that deals with manufactured housing communities? I want to make sure we're talking the language in law is dealing with the same definition. That's my concern. John?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Can I jump in with a few things?

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Please do.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Please. So I have a question, but also to answer this. I don't think it's tied to the manufactured home bill, but I think it's easy to capture what is intended here. The reference 6,254 is mobile home park. We commonly hear the words manufactured housing community used. There's going to be conforming changes that come from the mobile home manufactured home bill that will make conforming changes throughout the statutes to update to manufactured home communities. So I think for here, I would probably just put mobile home parks because that's the current language, and it would be updated over the summer to reference the correct titles. That's an existing registration with, I guess, ACCP for these purposes.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So where it says manufactured housing community, you'd put in Mobile Home Park?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Exactly, which is what that statute calls out, but it would be updated to reflect current usage, I think, that's used for.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So what if that bill doesn't pass?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: I mean, we'll have time you know, in the institutions committee, this always goes to conference committee, there's time to If that doesn't pass, it remains multiple part, which is the existing law, so the language would match existing law. But the nice thing in that situation is that whether or not that bill passes, the correct term meaning consistent with what's used throughout statutes would be used. Now whether it's the term people always want in the future is a separate question, but it would be consistent with what's used in statutes. I do have some questions, if that's it.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Sure.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Just to make sure I understand that certain targeted users that reside in a nonprofit and resident owned, is that meant to be both owned by nonprofit and resident owned, or is it meant to be owned by a nonprofit or it's a resident of any factor? I know sometimes people use and to make sure that it's capturing both communities, but it can be suggested that the ownership structure needs to be both. So I think if it's a non profit mobile home car, you're wanting to serve that, and also if it's a resident fund, you want to serve that.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's my understanding So my

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: I put an order there just to make sure that's correct. The other question I had was, and I don't know if you'll have the background on this, but the first two lines of this subdivision, a privately owned nonprofit community type system. I just wondered, do you know why the community type is used as the phrasing? Because this checker has the images for community water system. This isn't something I necessarily would expect you guys to know. I just wondered why community type was used rather than community waters.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I think we used it as a way to try to define it, because that language came from this committee years ago.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Then I'm asking the wrong people, and I'm

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: sorry to No, no. I think it was just a way of trying to narrow the definition to what type of system, I don't know.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: If you're trying to call out a nonprofit owned, which would necessarily be a privately owned under the definition, and I know that DEC is not proposing to change this, but just making sure I understand what's intended, It'd just be a nonprofit, non community, which is probably an intuitive thing, but don't have to change it because it's clear that that's what's existing law and that's how DEC is operating. I just wanted to make sure that I understood. I don't think there's a problem to be solved here. That's more for my own understanding that there was something unique meant by community type that's used nowhere else in this chapter. Yeah. I remember looking into that at

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: one point. I don't recall whether I figured out why it says type. The only eligible borrowers under the drinking water SRF are community water systems.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: But that's

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: the intent and

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: That have been put in when we did expand it. Right. But we wanted to That's that's for very

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Water, I think.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: We want because we did that in this committee probably about six years ago.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That was regarding the Clean Water SRF. Private borrowers, private systems have been eligible under the drinking water SRF per month. They're regulated as a it's kind of confusing, as a public water system, but they're privately owned. So it was it was before I started with the SRF, but shortly before that you expanded the eligibility under the Clean Water SRF for a very narrow slice of projects under the Clean Water SRF. So not sure, but that might be what you're remembering.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yeah. But I think great. And then we did the drinking water when we did the disadvantaged municipalities. That was a long time ago. That was twenty years ago, at least, that we did that. And that might've been just the style of how we drafted legislation back then, privately owned nonprofit community type, that the type is a privately owned nonprofit. So yeah, I

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: mean I'm hesitant to this is just for my own notification to make sure I know what's being captured. I'm hesitant to suggest anything, an update without a deeper dive into the chapter itself, and I guess kind of my point is if folks operating the programs know what this applies to, and this is the way they've been operating for years, I would be hesitant to do anything without, you know, like my intuitive suggestion would be just not talk about community water systems and stuff like what you're talking about, but I'm guessing there's a reason I just don't know. So if I have time tonight, I'm trying to figure that out, but otherwise I've diverted you guys from the substance of this proposal, I will stop doing that.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So at this point, what John will do is take your recommended language, and then he will then change it to serves majority of users that reside in a nonprofit or resident owned mobile home park

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's right.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Instead of manufactured housing communities. And then we'll keep track of it as it goes through the process because there's this other bill that deals with manufactured housing communities. And if that bill doesn't pass, then

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It's okay. Stay mobile. Yeah. It does. It'll still be okay. Thank you. And so the the other related change to the way the statute works is you can currently receive the extended loan term, lower administrative fee, and principal forgiveness up to the point where your user fees are no more than 1% of your median household income. Again, that creates a challenge in terms of collecting income information, but also water rates aren't typically split out versus part rent in an MHC. So this basically just sets it up such that the manufacturing housing community can receive the maximum benefits without having to not setting the cap that those benefits will result in user rates of less than 1% of their median household income.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So for this, you make the same changes. Correct?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Yes. And as I'm understanding it, the intent here is to keep the existing application to folks who are not part of nonprofit or within nonbanked housing communities, but to accept the particular assistance from the minimum job process. Yes. Perfect sense. And that's what this does.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Could you explain this section again, just to make sure we understand it? Because I think there's some blank stares in the committee as well as my own.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Let's say your community is coming in for a loan. And, you know, you're let's say you've got through that first test. You're established that you're a disadvantaged community. We follow a stepwise process set in statute that first extends the long term, and then we look at, alright, what what's your loan payment relative to your income? And then we will lower the administrative fee down to zero. Then we will start applying principal forgiveness, and we'll check along the way. We'll apply those measures to the point where your water rates are 1% of your median household income. Some disadvantaged communities, they qualify for a full forty years, 0%, 50% forgiveness, and the water rates may still be above 1% of your income. But you still have we've done the best we can, and your user rates are still gonna be high. This allows us, just for manufactured housing communities and sector of manufactured housing communities, this allows us to apply you know, give them the the maximum benefits without that check to ensure that their user rates are not less than 1% of their household income.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: It's an automatic for them.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: It's kind

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: of a carve out. You don't have to go through that checklist. Correct. System automatic that they would receive a loan or grant?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: This is a loan.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: But would it play out as a grant?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Potentially. I mean, it's in terms of if there would be a loan potentially depending on how much principal forgiveness we have available under the grant in a given year. Each grant basically says 30% of the grant shall go out as principal forgiveness. With the bill grants, it's essentially 50% of the grant has to go out as forgiveness. So, they'll get a loan and when they start repayment, upon that point, we apply the principal forgiveness so their loan is reduced by whatever degree of principal forgiveness we were able to offer them. So, yeah, it feels like a grant. Is

[James Gregoire (Vice Chair)]: it a one time thing or do you recalculate it every year or certain like, what if everybody's median income skyrockets? Not likely,

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: but let's pretend it did.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It's calculated at the time of loan application. So if things change in the future, it's not legal. No problem. Success.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Kevin?

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: And oversimplify, we're helping people who need financial help. Where is the the delta in cost? Who's picking up that tab? Who's who's who's not getting the interest that they would have gotten on the money that's being loaned at a lower rate?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: To the extent we are issuing loans with lower administrative fee, that reduces the administrative fees that come back to the department for administration of our programs. In terms of principal forgiveness, you know, we have a limited amount each year. It's set again by the terms of the grant. We have a $10,000,000 grant and the PA says 50% has to go out as to as forgiveness. We've got 5,000,000 to hand out. It may be that other borrowers who are that score lower on our priority list. By the time their loan is they that they're able to apply for a loan, we make it's conceivable we would be we would not have loan principal forgiveness. So it could be any other disadvantaged community. I would note that that manufactured housing community community is a tiny sector of the overall water systems that we serve under the SRF. The amount that they're drawing under the Supervolving Loan Fund program in a given year is tiny. So in terms of the impacts to our program and to other borrowers, it's very small. It's hard to know how it would play out in any given year.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: What's the maximum that would be if everyone if the program was utilized to the maximum? What's the maximum delta?

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So let's take a step back, because some members were not here to look at your first slide, explained the current setup for our drinking water revolving loan fund. This is our current setup for disadvantaged municipalities. This has been in place for twenty plus years, twenty five years at least. So this is the current structure of our drinking water revolving loan fund. And for the capital bill, the money that we put in water's revolving loan fund is for that federal match, that five to one federal match. So maybe because we had a lot of folks missing when we first started with this first slide. So, Patrick, if you could go over this, because this is currently existing for disadvantaged municipalities and how it plays out.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: I apologize for that.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: No. There folks we started. We didn't have a quorum, but we needed to get started. So this might help folks.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Yes. So as a quick recap, again, Greg, this is this is under this is in statute currently. This is how we administer administer our program for you know, we're required to have this disadvantaged municipality or disadvantaged community definition as part of the federal safe drinking water act that is used to capitalize our program. So we have to develop criteria and offer these benefits to disadvantaged communities. So for those that meet the requirements, they are eligible for a long term up to forty years, a lower administrative fee. The administrative fee works very similarly to interest. It's collected on an annual basis and up to 50% loan forgiveness. There's You wanna do

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So there's already a delta.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Yeah. So it's it's it's mandated by federal statute. Mhmm. Because we're just trying to meet the requirement of the fed because we want

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: These are our statutes.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Yes, our statute has to align with the Safe Drinking Water Act, and we have to have a definition, and statute has defined.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Thank you. So

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: just to be clear on Kevin's question, So we have this in place right now for disadvantaged municipalities. I have to qualify on these three bullets. So was your question more for the manufactured home piece, what the delta would be if we just open that up?

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: We're still gonna go up. Yeah. But I understand. I'm good.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Okay.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: And I think the delta, as a result of the change, actually would likely be zero or close to it. Manufactured housing communities are generally going to be able to demonstrate that they are disadvantaged. This is about reducing the burden that they face trying to go through our process to invest in the infrastructure that's been largely underinvested in for many decades, most as far as It's

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: like giving the free Somebody's paying for the driver's licenses that we are providing. It's only $3 each, but somebody's paying for that. So that's what I'm trying to do. So

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: John will tweak this language as well. And then this was part of the governor's proposed capital budget, this language of the act. And then DC has come back in with more refined language from the one that they had originally proposed. And then John's gonna tweak this. So when we get our draft of the bill, it will include this language that's been tweaked. Okay? We have another slide there, Penner.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So, this is section nine. We talked about this last time. There's been no changes. We're going

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Please go over it again. Absolutely.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So, I've been talking about the drinking water state revolving loan fund. And so at this point, now we're talking about the clean water state revolving loan fund. Works very similarly. Funds, obviously, it's different types of projects.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: This is your wastewater sewer projects, not your drinking water.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Thank you. Yes. Clean water is a perfectly descriptive term.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Right. So it has different interpretations sometimes.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: We have a rule, the chapter two environmental protection rule that we use on the clean water side to establish our priority ranking system. So projects that are seeking construction funding need to be evaluated and scored. We typically have more demand than we have funds. Additionally, the chapter two rule has some requirements related to when a municipality wants to extend their sanitary sewer system or build a new sewer system. And that our existing rule was established and I think it was adopted around 2017. And there's this section of it, to my read, it definitely seems to be directed towards preventing better development, which isn't terribly well defined. But there was concern about sprawl, I assume. That if we extend a new sewer system willy nilly somewhere, that there's gonna be who knows what in terms of growth. So the rule includes a requirement, where it says current requirement that if a municipality wants to extend their wastewater treatment plant or their service outside a designated center, they must demonstrate that there's no reasonable alternatives and that that municipality has rules in place to prevent scatter development. And that there are significant health problems, failing on-site wastewater systems that are impairing a drinking water supply just for example. And that this extended sanitary sewer system would be the most cost effective way to address that problem. So it it's presently a high bar.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So this is in the rules. This is not in statute. Correct. But it's this rule is carrying out the intent of statute. That's important for people to understand. This is not the green books. Quite often, what we do is when we're doing legislation and statute, there are times that we put in maybe a program, but we're not going to define we define the overall intent of what the program needs to address. But when you fine tune how it actually gets carried out in the nuts and bolts, we will allow that department to promulgate rules to carry out the nuance of the program. The rules are put together by that respective department. They go through an internal process of review, and then it goes through LCAR, which is the Legislative Committee on Administrative Rules. And that's made up of house and senate members that meet every other week to go over those proposed rules. And it's up to LCAR to approve or not approve the rules. And then once the rules are approved, that department has to apply that program in conjunction and work through and I can't even

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: think of the words.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Just kind and they have to work through the rules and make sure that everything applies to the rules. It's the rules that really control the implementation of the law. So if you're changing a rule, you don't do it by statute. You have to go through the whole rules process again. So that's another layer. The rules are another layer of how statutes are implemented. Is that clear to new folks? Some new folks. This is another part of how government operates.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: I'm feeling stupid. I do not understand what the proposal says other than we're gonna satisfy the project requirements. I don't understand what the proposal says. All requirements to be satisfied for projects. That's what we're trying to help. Yep. That includes service to new housing.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: I will look to see if I have the actual slide, but the actual language with Right here.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Is this that's not what

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's no.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: That's That's the other

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's just the section eight.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So we need to go to our bill. Right?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: There's not a lot of language there, but, yeah, it'll take a minute. So essentially, it says is that the requirements of subchapter 300 will be met for projects that are providing housing. Instead of going through those steps of throwing the most cost effective solution to a significant health problem, etcetera, If that sewer extension is to provide housing or to reserve capacity for housing, then these requirements of the rule are satisfied.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Did they help? This doesn't help. I understand those words. But when I was building my home, they said, You can't put a septic system here because you've got a river here. I adding housing. There was a requirement to have a raised mound, and this sounds like we're just saying if we're servicing new housing, it passes.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's a good that's an important distinction. So this would only be for, like, a municipal wastewater treatment plant. I hear you. It would have no bearing on projects, you know, that are doing their own on-site wastewater disposal.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: I understand that you're gonna go versus projects. That's what I was trying to get a handle on. It just sounds like if it's if it's expanding new housing, then then they need it. That would just yes.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: It would be the pipes that would collect from a given residence down to the wastewater treatment plant.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Yeah. I also don't know if I said my name earlier. John Gray, ops, collection council for the record. I think what's helpful in part to think about is this is a section about making grants and works. Right? It's not about broader approvals for installation. It's saying the department makes grant awards in this section. They develop a system by priorities that are set out in rule that you don't see here. Those rules have to meet a set of considerations that the legislature identified as relevant and that are set out in statute. I can describe them if they're helpful, they're just the basis on which those rules would have been propagated or adopted. And now this is saying in those priorities, this requirement exists, but they have to demonstrate that there are rules in place to prevent scattered development. This is saying that as part of that grant award process, that particular consideration is deemed to be met effectively for folks that fall under the language proposal from GDC. Notwithstanding any other provision of law, those demonstration requirements set out in rule would be met when the municipality making the application certifies the project includes, and that's those particular conditions, serves to new housing units or wastewater capacities served for new housing units. So it is an expansion, and it basically deems you to have met a particular rule, but it's important to situate it within It's a section that's about awarding grants, not about the underlying permitting process or anything.

[James Gregoire (Vice Chair)]: Which assumes if you got

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: this fire, you already have the approval. So

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: this proposed new rule change, is that what you're gonna be proposing through the administrative rules process? Because when I see proposal and I see what you're doing there, what are you proposing to where?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Well, that that would be the legislative proposal. So my understanding is this proposal would statutorily and this is not a legal you know, maybe this isn't the correct legal term. It would essentially preempt the rule. The statute would come in and say, yep. Rule is there. However, this section of the rule is met for projects. It's basically more SR funding.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Where's the language for this? Because I don't

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: It's just

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: 10 VSA sixteen twenty eight? Are you doing that? And just saying that for this particular rule, we're preempting it?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: There's two different ways you could do this. One is the way that's proposed here, which is quicker, which is just to omit that section, which sets out the grant award criteria and establishes rulemaking authority to establish those criteria, which is set up in the rules here. This is saying if there's, notwithstanding anything to the contrary, those demonstration requirements are met for this particular set of municipalities. So you could do that. That would be in statute that it says this. Another way you see people approach this, but obviously it takes longer to do because you have to go through the rulemaking process, is to direct the department to update its rules to reflect this change. You could get at the same subject outcome, but it's a longer process because you may not have to go through the initial process. How,

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: not very often did we over just say by statute that we are putting this rule aside, and we're gonna do it this way. That's basically what we're saying.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Yeah.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: But there's not we don't usually do it this way. Yeah. And I'm just you know, this ties in so much to other committees such as general because of housing and also our environment committee for environmental. They were just overstepping the rule and saying, we're exempting the rule for these particular housing developments. And I think that's beyond the bailiwick of this committee to weigh in on that. I mean, granted it's grant money, and some of that grant money comes through the capital bill. But this is a real policy change.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: So so Troy?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: No. No question.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I I just I mean, this was exempting that rule for is it just for manufactured housing communities?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: This has nothing to do with manufactured housing communities. So your separate proposal, this is for projects seeking funding under the Clean Water State Revolving Health Fund. Could be any so, typically, the the the benefactors of the change will be municipality who has a wastewater treatment system. That is which is a treatment plant facility that's looking to extend it to provide service to an area that's not currently served and to allow them to not have to make the demonstrations that are currently in.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: I mean, I agree. I think it has implications for other committees in the way that the Section eight proposal doesn't have the same implications for other committees. I think one practical question I would have is, I assume there's a priority list maintained for these projects and folks have been on there for, or municipalities have been on there for years, I assume.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Some may go on be on for a year?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: I guess my question would be, is one of the practical effects of proposal to disrupt the existing priority list, meaning that someone has been on there for some time and has kind of risen to higher up, but now you'd have municipalities deemed to have met conditions that might otherwise keep them lower in the priority list or suddenly push back? I guess I'm just asking if it disrupts the existing

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: priority list.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Wouldn't it wouldn't I don't think it would disrupt the existing priority list. Projects need to be eligible to get on the priority list. So a project wouldn't if they weren't able to currently meet the demonstrations of the rule, they wouldn't score they wouldn't be eligible, so they wouldn't really be on the priority list. They would be sort of stuck more in the planning stage. So I think if this change were made, we would likely see additional projects coming in for funding on subsequent years, priority lists. But would they bump

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: other people because their priority might end up being higher? They're not coming in now because they're not allowed because it could create scattered development where they're not in a designated center. So now we've opened up that door and they're coming in. Would they then due to their they could have a higher priority, then they bump other folks along?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Correct. That that's possible. Like, either they may not be very high scoring projects to the extent they're not addressing a problem. They're providing important service. This is all related to making development of housing easier. But it's certainly conceivable that they would bump our lower scoring project. We have certainly going to have a funding line on this year's big block priorities.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Is this part of the governor's executive order? That's no fault.

[Emily Bird (Water Investment Director, Vermont DEC)]: Sorry, this is Emma Woodward. This was not included as part of the executive order, but it is related to making it easier for housing projects to access.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Was this brought up while some of these other committees are working on providing more housing? Was this brought up at those committees at all?

[Emma Woodward (DEC staff)]: I was not directly involved, but my understanding was that this was packaged in the housing bill last year.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: And it didn't get through. Is that the chip bill or was it something else?

[Emily Bird (Water Investment Director, Vermont DEC)]: I'm sorry, I'll have to follow-up on that or John, I don't know if you

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So it didn't come through. So this is another bite at the app. See if you can get it through and put it through our committee when we're not really attuned to all the housing nuances. John?

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: I don't think I have any.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Did that answer your question? What? No, but Johnny's

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: answer. I think I understand the answer to the question, which is that some may bump, but some may not be on the list and may be at the end of the list and why could they join because they weren't on the bus?

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Circumventing a rule and doing it by statute.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Think we'll get this

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: yanked by the committee anyways if we put it on the floor.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I got some real issue. I just never think we've really done that by statue before. Just not sure. Shawn

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: Just wondering if this you know, I know we have a lot of centers now in Vermont.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Designated centers.

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: Designated centers that are also designated flood zones. Does this help those towns like Montpelier be able to go out to higher ground to to is that what this is kinda trying to do as well? Because there's there's I mean, I've been in the Northeast Kingdom. I've been in these places that they can't build in the city centers anymore because they're prone to flooding. So is this one of the ways that they they kind of are trying to make it a little easier for those towns to build? Because to me, that's a good thing.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: That's a really interesting question. I I don't know if that was the intent. Okay. But I I I think it's a valid point, and it certainly could help, given municipality allowed for development to occur outside of a flood zone. Yes.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Thank you. It So alright to simply ask, what prompted your effort to bring this proposal forward? Who asked for this change? What problem are we solving with this solution? I understand that we're minimizing the paperwork, and I'm all for eliminating regulations that are not necessary, but who asked for this and who will be helped with this? I am saying a group that'll be helped, but who asked for this change?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: I'm not Administration is not for it. Oh, okay. Who's helped, I think, if there's statewide implications for making development of housing easier, more affordable.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: It's an attempt to help. So

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: what's before us is we don't agree to do this, period. I just leave it status quo. We accept this and know that we're exempting a rule by statute. I see. Or we Is that legal

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: to do? We

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: do not with sailing all the time.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Well, sure. It's not a very good practice than this one. Or we could say, yes, go through this, but you need to promulgate rules through the administrative rules process. So those are kind of the three options there for us. One other thing that we could ask is that Patrick and Emily sit down with the three chairs with our legal counsel. The three chairs would be myself, the chair of environment, and the chair of general, and talk this through.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: I like that idea best.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yes. With our legal counsel from all those committees. So that would be the legal counsel for general, which may be John on this, we don't know. And Michael O'Grady, I would assume for environment.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: O'Grady is the primary person you talk to. Those are some perspectives I would

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I mean, this is beyond our knowledge base. Now maybe this has already been talked about in concept in those other two committees, and we don't know about it. Mhmm. But I'm not willing to go out with something like this that undermines two other of our legislative colleagues and committee process. This is a big shift with no testimony because we've been tied up with other things. So we haven't had the chance to vet this. And we're taking this up after crossover, which is not your fault. It's the legislative timing in our world in this committee

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: as well. And I don't mind doing it if housing, for example, agrees, but I would want to hear from them. So your plan of talking to the chairs is the best option. Other folks?

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I agree. Brian.

[Brian Minier (Member)]: It's a question to make sure I'm on board. And as you all know, I walked in at about 09:00, so I know.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Didn't start till quarter of nine.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Drove fast.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: You're not here yet. You're only a water bear.

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: Yeah, I'm catching up right now. So it seems to me there are two portions to the question. One is

[Brian Minier (Member)]: the appropriate way to deal

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: with it. And I think I buy what you're saying.

[Brian Minier (Member)]: But the other, I want to make sure I understand the underlying reason for it. And it seems I think I understand that if you've been permitted process to say, do we get this money in the development of this housing? When you're asking for that money,

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: when you're applying for that grant, you're both like others.

[Brian Minier (Member)]: Are you in fact just checking all the same damn boxes that have been checked when you've gone through the permitting process to build this housing? Because I remember, my second my first biennium, I was on education. And there were lots of little schools who couldn't apply for grants because they didn't want the person to write the grants because they were so onerous, even though they could have received them anyway. Is that a fair analogy? Are they checking all the same sandboxes for

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: the money that they were for the permitting of the building for housing? I

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: think that at the time the rule was adopted, the degree of zoning in the effect of municipalities wasn't as evolved as it is now. I think there were fewer safeguards in place to prevent better development, whatever exactly that means, or stall. Whether whether all affected municipalities have adequate how we define that zoning in place now to to meet the those same anti sprawl goals. Right. I don't know. Right. I think it's a fair question. I think in some municipalities, you know, the the level of I don't know, that we're this is adding a lot other than the requirement to demonstrate that they're addressing a significant environmental health problem. I think that may be at odds with a community that has adequate zoning and is simply looking to extend sewer sewer service lines to promote housing, our firm would make that a challenge. I dig that. But yeah, then I

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: think that's all the reason to support the approach that you're suggesting, if there's daylight between the two.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So I will it's okay with the committee. I will reach out with the chair of environment, the chair of housing and ledge council and Patrick and Emily, and maybe the next day. They sort of say tomorrow Friday. Mhmm. All of us have

[John Gray (Legislative Counsel, Vermont Legislature)]: sit down

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: and go through this. I know that there's always been concern from the other two committees, particularly in housing, the general committee, that it's the infrastructure access that tends to be the stumble. And I think we all agree to that. The process of exempting a particular rule for this, doing that through statutes, a little

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: different process.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Might wanna refine the language, so it's not as broad if we decide to do this. Or they may say, you gotta go through the administrative goals process. So let's see if we can set up, and Tate will be in touch with Patrick and Emily. I'd like to do it today. I don't know if we'll be able to. Maybe tomorrow.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Gotta do it today. That's like a very reasonable approach. I appreciate the consideration you've given it.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: And I want to apologize. I mean, I know we did some preliminary testimony back at the February. And then we shifted gears and really focused more on corrections bills. And we just haven't come back to the capital bill until this week. So we're we're really playing catch up in this committee where normally we would have been doing our due diligence on this language and proposal more in February than we are now. So I want to apologize for that, but our workload just ended up going in a different direction because we didn't have to put together a full two year budget for the capital budget. It was a budget adjustment. So it doesn't take as much time, but it does take time.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Totally understand. No apologies.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I apologize.

[James Gregoire (Vice Chair)]: We just work hard.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Anything else?

[James Gregoire (Vice Chair)]: We just gotta

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: get this in.

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: I applaud you trying creative ways

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: to get

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: housing built in our state because we are dying on the vine, and I'm gonna keep saying that. If we don't build housing for people, we're gonna keep running into all the big problems we're running into. So thank you for trying.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: You're welcome. Thank you for that. I think that, to the yes, having statute amend rule is different. If there's a justification, would be to avoid the time frame necessary to go through the administrative process. My experience that you're talking to you.

[Shawn Sweeney (Clerk)]: You know? But I understand what this chair is saying. We gotta do it the right way.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: I totally respect that as well.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So I've also asked, Patrick and Emily, we looked through yesterday, the drinking the drinking water revolving loan fund, the clean water revolving loan fund municipal pollution grants list of communities in terms of what their project costs were, where they were in the pipeline, how much money, how far down the list the money can go. So I've asked for a more updated list for those three. And now that town meeting is over, some of that may change because there may have been some bond votes that approved the project. So then that kicks in the state share. Also, I've asked them to the municipal pollution. Quite often for those projects, those are grants. And there are some loans come through that as well.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Typically, a project will receive most of their financing in the form of a loan, and they may receive a pollution control grant in addition.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: So in the past, a lot of the municipalities completed their project, but they had not gotten the municipal pollution grant money. And we owed that. And we spent quite a bit of time meeting that backlog obligation. And I just want to know, are we still in the backlog situation with the pollution control grants for that?

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: To make sure I understand that request, so a project can come in, they'll receive a loan. They're above the funding line in terms of being able to receive loan, but they're not the highest scoring project. So they may come to us, receive their loan, do their project, loan starts repayment, So they don't get a pollution control grant because they never scored high enough. The amount, you know, we might do $40,000,000 in loans this year, and we have 4,000,000 in pollution. There are a lot of projects that never float high enough and get their pollution control grant. So when you say we owe them, I think we do try to make clear that most projects will not receive a pollution control grant.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: It's those that will qualify for the pollution control grants.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Well, there's there's there's qualifying and being eligible. So eligible is you have eligible wastewater treatment plant expenses. So you have a project that is an eligible category, and our priority list will show how much they are eligible for. It's a source of confusion to some degree because they, in most cases, will never receive that money. So if we've if we've if we've started like, some projects will come in, and they do get to the top, and we see some amount of pollution control grant. But at the time they receive that grant, we aren't able to fund their full eligibility. So that is a more discrete category, That's

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: common.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Okay. Thank you. Okay.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: That's what I'm looking. Because we were in love with

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: We reasonably caught up there. We do have some very large projects that will sit at the top for a while, meaning we can partially fund their eligibility right now. They'll have to wait until the following year, and the following year before they're fully funded. But it's a relatively small number of That's

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: what need to know. That really targeted amount.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Anything else? Anything

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: else from the committee?

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Thank you. Thank you so much for

[Emily Bird (Water Investment Director, Vermont DEC)]: your time.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Thank you for the conversation. We'll look forward to hearing from you.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Yeah, we'll set up something. I'm to talk to the other two chairs, see what the time frame is. That's the first thing. Thank you.

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: Thank you. Thank you, chair.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: Let's take a quick break here. We've got the vets home. And they're gonna be here No. It's, yeah, around 10:30. But let's take let's take a ten, fifteen minute break.

[Kevin Winter (Member)]: Okay. Yeah.

[Alice M. Emmons (Chair)]: I can touch base

[Patrick Monks (Program Manager, Water Infrastructure Finance Program, Vermont DEC)]: with