Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: All right, so it's 05/21/2026, and this is the committee conference between Senate institutions and House institutions and Corrections. And this will likely be our, penalty. No. Meetings. Part E to the signing? Yes, I think it will. I know we did an idea check. Picture of that hand too. So, we'll we'll have tomorrow sign. Time for. Oh, okay. Tomorrow. Okay. Well Alright. So we have an agreement. What the goal is if we have an agreement today, George, and I think it was time for John to do the work and get it through editing. And then tomorrow, we can sign. And she'll be here on the.

[Rep. Joseph "Joe" Luneau]: I mean, if you'll be at home, you're out of the rest. Thanks.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: What? This is our anniversary. My my

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: daughter. At 13.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Oh, the big one. Yes. You gotta be home. Okay. So I believe we have resolved all of our, here what we do. Sure. I've been to Southern BC. I've never heard of them before. Yeah, we basically did, we added a notification of intent to sell in place of the, right of virtue, butyl. And, I think, while it's not as protected, it still does provide information and

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So, so we have

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: you would like to. So,

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: John Gray, counsel. I'm gonna screen share to just the 110 State Street session. People now look slightly differently. Previously, you'll recall that there was a lead in about certain conditions that need to be included with the agreement right, and you had multiple conditions, there was a list. The first was the covenants, the second was the right of first refusal. Because you've now stripped out the right of first refusal, it's no longer on the list. That's why the presentation has changed, but what you see at the start is the same as we talked about this morning. Commissioner is authorized to sell the property provided the commissioner includes in any contract for sale or appropriate covenants, developing consultation with historic preservation. List is strong.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: You get all the items except for the

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: different price. This is the same as this morning, but again, it looks slightly differently because the list is now altered. Commissioner Shaw provides to the chairs of the committee's jurisdiction copies of any related RFP and any executed contract for sale of 110 State Street Scheme Of Honolulu promptly after each becomes available. That's your notice provisions. Then we have our fairly modified income This

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: is what we talked about.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: It's multiple, yeah, we're including both earlier discussions and what you said from now. So, it's the intent to ensure solid F and B, talked about this this morning. Historic attributes protected for future generations, talked about that this morning, and now the updates. So the next clause, which I called this morning, that the chairs of the committees of jurisdiction receive timely notice of status updates on the disposition of the property. So that earlier today and the new language that resolved, I think, this last piece, and that the purchaser of the property provides notification of any intent to sell to the Secretary of Administration and the Commissioner of BGS, we shall then promptly notify the chairs of the committees of jurisdiction of the potential sale.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: So the purchaser of the property ten years down the road, besides with the building

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: on

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: the market, needs to notify the secretary of the administration, commissioner BGS, and they will turn on modifying the two chairs.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: And that is in the intent.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: Yes. Correct. I just had one question on that. Does that mean every time the building goes up, there's sale or ever?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: No, so the way that I read this or that I wrote it is that the purchaser of the So it's referencing that particular purchaser.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Initial purchase.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So it would expire. If you would like me to add initial, I could do that, but I would say that the the already makes it clear. But if you There's nothing wrong with adding initial. It's just up to you guys.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Would it clarify? It added the

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: If the therapist didn't have the question, it seems like it

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: would Yeah, I would put that on. Just to clarify. Yeah. That's fine. So two things. The note well, the notification is much less of lower status because it's not going to be in the deed or recorded even. I mean, it would just be in the I guess it would it would probably be in the sale document. Correct. And it's been helpful to have this conversation and to hear y'all's concerns because I do think that the capital complex does deserve a higher level of scrutiny than just care. So, I'm probably gonna look at this next year and just see if there's anything easier that we can work on at the last minute. So that's just one comment. Then item I thought we had regarding that the fair market value, I thought that that was, that's in statute and so we didn't do the notwithstanding. Correct. So that's still That's still there. And so it's more than just an intent.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: That's correct. There's statutory language to ensure that there's a process that goes out. I can even pull that up if

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: it's No, that's okay. That's what the notwithstanding is, right?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yep. Okay. Me scroll back up.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: That's why getting rid of

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: the Right,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: gains and all that.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yes. The notwithstanding is what allowed for sale below F and B and striking the outstanding restores the effect of that statute to this particular authority, so it would be subject to that process, including F and B.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Okay, good. I'm good. We're good. Are you yelling? We're good. Okay. That's the last fifth. Good. Unless something else drops out of those.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Do you guys want to see what the whole document would look like?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Don't think Cat would be four weeks, but yes for my grandma.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Okay. I haven't sent this to Tate, I'll have to send it afterward if that's okay. It's fine. And I'm just gonna

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: be sharing it from work.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: That's weird. All of this has

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: been happening from the chair.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: From your chair? Yes. Yep. Yep. Sorry.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Gonna Cherry gray. From cherry gray.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Please don't.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Well, they're not turning gray yet.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Oh. Oh.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Start it off. Yeah. Start it So, alright, that's all.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: It's a

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: beautiful color. Yeah. My favorite color, that's a color blenders. Okay, so this is what the form of the continuity report will look like. You're gonna have the strange lead in that no one's familiar with, except perhaps, and I'm sure you've seen this a million times, but it will say, has met and considered the bill, recommends the senate receive from its proposed amendment. This will decrease the amount of protestations I think to occur, and that the bill be amended by striking out all after the enacting clause and inserting a move there of the following. So this is not a form of a strike all. It's essentially every amendment that's happening to Act 33, last year's capital bill. So you start with your legislative intent, and it contains your total bonding for the full capital bill, that's what's authorized in section 16. As we talked about this morning, you fit within the total that the Senate proposal had, which included that 868,000 reallocation. The highlighted language reflects an update. There's a shifting in appropriations between FY twenty six and FY twenty seven. The line that you see here references the total FY twenty six appropriations, so that's why that's highlighted. In any event, Scott's looked over this several times, I will also look over it tonight and gentlemen. This

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: is what's hard on the second year of the two year because we don't have the full. We're amending last year's bill and that's what's tough to follow.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: State buildings, three acre parcels from our compliance. This has dropped to 500 ks. I think this was at 1,100,000 as discussed, not this morning. That's for FY '26 and FY '27, this is your total major maintenance. We spoke this morning that this is kind the catch all, so I think this figure is actually useless. As long as you confirm the other figures, it will make sense. We've returned the line item language for the State House entryway to reference the 2nd Floor acres design per Senator Harrison's request, and we've dropped the 1.35 from the Senate proposal back to the House proposal 1,300,000. The language that was not included this morning and that we discussed is the subsection D, on 01/15/2027, pressure RPGS to report to the committees of jurisdiction on the status of the designs for that entryway and second floor egress under that appropriation we just spoke to and on estimates for construction costing.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Does that work? Since this has the first time we've seen it. I think it's important that it should be the sergeant at arms and buildings and general services. So we hold the contract, our teamwork so that what our partnership is with the sergeant at arms who will be presenting to your special committee, right? So I would just I would like her to be included, to represent what she is proposing because programming is being led by her on behalf of the state. Like it's that. Just like magic. Thank you, if you all agree. Yes.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Nice. We'll confirm the totals. We spoke this morning about this. The FY '26 door control, four eighty ks added to the St. Johnsbury. FY '27, you have a bump of $3.20 ks to the St. Johnsbury Door Control. Removal of the recovery of the recovery house, which is a formerly listed item here. And then we have the piece related to the CRCF, which we spoke about this morning, maintenance, replacement, renovations at the CRCF for other correctional facilities utilized in response to overcrowding. And then we do have an update to Dean from this morning. Among the uses of the funds, PGS shall prioritize repairs of bathrooms and showers, CRCF, if the department applies funds to other correctional facilities to respond to overcrowding at the CRCF. That was additional specificity that was missing this morning. The Commissioner Shaw provided a review of the uses of the funds to Joint Legislative Justice Oversight and the committees. That was the other update at the committee's regularly scheduled meetings in calendar year '26.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: We wanna see. So first of all, it's the floor, showers, and toilet, or the bathroom. If you're gonna pull out, if you're gonna point out showers and toilets, it's also the flooring. And I think some of the floors are I just wanna be set. I don't want the correction sale. We're not gonna do the pool. Sure. I'm paying at Emily who's just there.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: I mean,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I think it's the bathroom.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: It's the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: bathroom. The toilets, the showers, Yes. And the That's

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So would both be satisfied if it just said bathrooms? Because the discussion this morning was

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: They're separate showers except for the bathrooms. In some spaces. Yes, actually. They're separate. That's not all of the bathrooms, so it may be some showers. I understand. I think people are thinking a bathroom has the toilet and shower in a correctional facility. It's not designed that way. The shower's completely separate toilet and the sink. Right, so I understand.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So, bathrooms, flooring, showers, there's another item which maybe?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I think that was it. I think the flooring, you don't need the flooring because flooring is only and the shower. That's what I was saying. Is the flooring only in the bathroom and showers or some flooring? There's other flooring issues. Again, I did it toward the facility to look at maintenance needs and there are tiles that are coming up, is actually a safety risk. But is it in the facility as a whole? In just Generally, in the facility as a whole, there are also flooring needs. Okay. Alright, so let's leave it.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So you do want the three and you want it to be flooring beyond the bathrooms? Yeah. Okay. That's what this says. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Okay. So thank you. And then I think the next I think to do this, but in order to really be clear, should you put flooring and showers, because it almost looks like bathrooms, flooring showers, and showers, that the flooring is more connected to bathrooms and showers. I just don't want any confusion.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: I will do whatever y'all want.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I would put flooring at the beginning or at the end.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: There we go.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So now Is that the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Thank you, Chittenden. Yes. I know what happens. I know. You

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: don't want there to be inflation, that it's chlorine's exclusive to that.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: Yeah. I

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: think the I'm just gonna ask the committee, if I may, your intent. I really didn't wanna use that word today. Is the intent that the presentation to the Justice Oversight Committee is a collaborative because it really The DOC. The DOC is going to, so we're going to prioritize and then DOC and their planning and they say we want to take the gym over here and modify it for some overcrowding. We would do the work. We would identify the cost, but they would be doing the policy. So when I read that, it's sort of like we would be leaving that. I'm not sure if we want to. Can you scroll back? Let's see. Because I'm thinking okay. Right there to d. Scroll up so we can write

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: Yep.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: D. Okay. If the department of BGS, then what's next?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yes. If the department of closed. Applied spots.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: So it would just be commissioner and DOC would provide an overview of the use of the fonts. I think you need both Would you state both of them? Yeah. I think the Department of Corrections would propose other, I mean you want to see the proposal is that correct? Don't I'm going to be aware of it and what's detailed and you're going to end up moving women possibly into a male facility right and that's going to be that's a statue. That's gonna bring out the public. Yeah. As it should. That's gonna bring out a lot of concern. Yeah.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: We got both commissioners now.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I could spend it all on the back. Right.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Very overcrowded path. They are. Section four, this was the 200 ks bump to the major statewide historic sites that accompanied the removal of the Expert 100 ks for each of those building community screens. Nothing to section six. Nothing to 10. Nothing to 14. Nothing to the reallocations. I like the speed that Dave. Cash. We do have some things here. Spoke about them this morning. There's your statewide major maintenance total, and we also discussed an ascension between bonding and cash from this morning. As you recall, at least on the bonding side, some of that was triggered. Do you want me to pause there?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: And just the process kept up, they have this.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: They haven't given them the specific literal language yet, but their understanding of the flip flop, the records got more joint this moment, as well as the couple of little changes.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: So we did a reversion.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: It was a reactant. Reality

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: It's was all there. So, we don't need that to be highlighted.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: No, no. This is just changes

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Yeah, from from From after that. Exactly. Got it. Okay.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: I think you have the real

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: That was before. Yep. Was before

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: the Senate proposal. Exactly. Thank you. You flipped the 2.7 that had gone to general door controls. It's now 2.7 to the St. John's area door controls, similar to what you saw in the earlier bonding sections. Do you need to do anything with this cash call out? If you remember, there was a disjunction between these because of the sequencing of the budget and the capital bill.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: This is for the same thing.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So, do you want the exact

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: got same $5.98 in bond and you got half 1,000,000 in cash, which is for the same projects. Correct. So you can cut the pennies.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: That's what

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I We all did. We did cut off a piece of paper. We did. You don't have to do that. That is a big part

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: to you. I'll come back and do that. I'll come back and do that one.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: That's the blue suit. We

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: did. So, what I may do, and previously since I had the night to do this, you saw the reporting provision that was tied to just the bond piece earlier for this line item. I may move that to a policy section so I can call back to the cross references in both bonding and cash just for the same purpose. It'll look slightly different, but it's the same substance. And I think it was slower,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I'm sorry. I don't know if I followed you, but I'm

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Trust me. Yeah, I trust you.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I have faith. Thank you.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: You may find you just bought a building statement.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Well, I can't sell it unless I tell it's me. I love it. Is that the year?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: She ate it.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: No, well, we already did that one.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Okay, so this one is really unfortunate in how it looks, but this captures everything you guys talked about earlier.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Maybe we don't have what we're talking about at every dinner.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So this is what used to be the Wi Fi piece, mean it still is, but it's quite reworded. So, to DOC to work with ADS, just gonna pause after a bunch of moments, to develop a plan and begin implementation prioritizing communication services of the provision of network connectivity in state correctional facilities.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Is it communication services? Did we hear that in the previous?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: No, this was not

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: in your denial. Know what you were saying that it's really helping all the communications, But if you're looking at communication services, that's kind of a look at how they're communicating. I mean, this is the offender management system. This is working with staffing and their scheduling. This is working with I don't know if it gets into time. It took notification. When you say communication, communication when it comes to your phone. It's more like internet connectivity. So it gets broader than internet. Well, when I'm, my goal is to get the inmates able to be able to use tablets effectively and the folks who are there, the employees to be able to have access to the, again, to the web. I'm not the expert in this, but I think the provision of the network connectivity is where you're going. And I think DOC and ADS, there's a broader communication piece on transfer. And so I think they look what I heard is that the system and the evaluation has to look at it holistically. Right. Well So I think that's why so I think your network connectivity piece is I think that language is addressing what you were concerned about. But that's just what I heard. I do not see prioritization in there and they could go to what, laying the foundation for future capabilities or there was some other stuff, but TAM was processes and reduced reliance on paper. I just want to have a statement of priority. But we still have all the other things. Right, because it's the processes that they're going through right now to the IT project so. Right. I mean it's more than communication. The tablet system is they're on their own separate network. It's not a DOC network. It's through the contractor that we contract for the So what we're talking about is to digitize all the work that DOC does now because they do a lot of paper. If somebody's coming into booking, that's all paper. We wanna digitize that. They can't do it unless they have Wi Fi to do that. Well, they have a system. They have a system, but it's all paper. Right now with your the DOC, with your inmates and their records, All of that is entered by paper, and Wi Fi would allow DOC officers or staff to enter it digitally with a Wi Fi network. So that's what we're talking about. That's one of the things that we're talking about. Right. Yeah and that's still there. It's just as far as implementation goes we've been pretending that we have a system and our system isn't effective for people to communicate. So that's what I hear as big a problem. It's the operations of DOC. Right. It's the operations of our facilities. So, they prioritize operations first, then do the other communications last, that's a problem. It could take years.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: I guess one question for John Gray is does praising it this way make DOC or ATS prioritize in a certain order? Must they work in a certain order? Must one come before another?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: The way that I think of this, develop a plan and then the prioritizing communication services is specific to the beginning implementation, and I would say that it is because no other priority is named, right? Otherwise, we're saying it's develop a plan of network connectivity that does A, B, C, D. Prioritizing communication services is the number one thing. Like if I read this, I would say that is, once you begin to implement that, is what's on top.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: And I guess I would say, just under Harrison's concern, that when we were on our tours and talking to the COs and to the inmates, communications was part of what they were frustrated with, but it was also entertainment, it was also access to education, and that's just on the incarcerated side of things. I find it hard to put one above others. I dig what you're saying. It's really important to me that these folks are able to communicate with their people too, but I don't know if I prioritize that ahead of, for instance, COs having access to current information to inmates having access to education.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Oh, I think education access is also

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: Right. If you look at that and the way it reads in provision of network connectivity, network connectivity, incentive access to, and the ability to expand those other areas that you just referred to. Well, I guess I go back to John Gray, and then there's this way that you're reading it, Senator. That's the prioritizing design of the provision of network connectivity as well as communication services, that they're co equals.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: I mean, the whole thing is about developing a plan and beginning implementation of network connectivity. That is the request. But when you have the choice of implementing the network connectivity, what is meant to be prioritized is communication services. That's the way that I

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Right, but that would include the training opportunities too and connectivity for the staff.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: I mean, the other way to think about it is if you had no priority language and you said to develop a plan and begin implementation of vision of network connectivity that does da da da da, it has to do all of these things. That's what's required here. So if you're satisfied with the list of things, that is what has to be achieved.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: But I can tell you right now, phone calls are gonna be placed in July. If we're confused, if we're trying to defy prioritizing communication services here, with six people, I can guarantee you there will be a phone call to a number of us in July. What do you mean by communication services? I can guarantee it. It's like LinkedIn. And then forth. And then there's gonna be this back and forth with nobody being clear in terms of what it means.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: I think you're right I mean to me and this is in my area of expertise but until you have the plan you don't know what piece has to go first in order to make it all work and the fact that you are requiring them to report on a regular basis would give you the opportunity to help steer the direction as the plan comes before you where that other board could say here's what we really want you to get going first I don't know. That's just the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Can you go to the language of that?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: That's exactly what I was gonna point out is that this is not an appropriation in isolation. This is tied to a section. Yeah, there it is. This is the Commissioner case. Of Corrections on the State of Chief Information Officer of Digital Services, Constitution of Commissioner M. V. G. S. Shall report to the Joint Legislative Justice Oversight at each scheduled meeting of the committee on the plan for providing the work and accepting. The other question I was going to ask on the cash piece is just where all that $7.50 ks is extending, because if it's used up on planning, the implementation part is less meaningful effectively is what happens.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: You could add in that second section on the plan and the implementation.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: The discussion we had with the secretary of ADS was that they have already contractors that they work with to help on some of this and that's where the mine minister And so in that we put in we go towards ADS has statewide contracts where they have people already that they that they could use. And DOC stated to the members that they've already started working on some of these and they're looking at their staff and reassigning and having the special the experts. So I'm I'm just reiterating what I what you said and and what I heard. So the money is going to be used to have the expertise help develop and put this planning and the evaluations because what we don't know is that the systems, and I'm using that word very broadly, may look different in one facility than another because of the construction and what it is. And that's the unknown. So they have the goals, They have the intent, but they they need to layer that over what does implementation look like and what's the real cost going to be. Because it it isn't just a lot of what I understand. It's not just a Wi Fi system. It's really the policy and and a lot of layers. So so I think that's the intent to be brought in this language as I heard Mhmm. To cover and the money to help do all of that. So

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: you're concerned, though, senator Harrison, that there's gonna be

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: a limited amount of money in

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: the folks who actually have been visiting some of these are gonna be sort of on that. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Great. So senator Harrison, I can and you could talk to ADS and DOC. There's no intent to use this money to install anything because they don't know what to install. I I is that is that what the mean, I'll take chair Emmons. Is that what you heard too? That they're not using this money to They're not installing. They're not installing it because they don't know. What they don't even know at the first time, it might be a sharpener for them. So I missed some of those conversations. Just looking at the next of, like, flags connectivity. Is that what we changed to never?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yes. But you need it here because this is one of the outcomes listed in the business project.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: What did you say would be on the low end of the total?

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: I was trying to understand better about senator Harrison. You're getting out with the communications concern, and it sounds like she is worried, I get it, that the folks who actually live here are the incarcerated are gonna be last man in line, the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: next woman who's not calling us. Because we haven't provided effective communications, as far as I know, ever.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: If you're getting a telecommunications report.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Yeah, if you're gonna have that telecommunications report, that might help. No, I'm serious. True. Oh, Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's why I'm eager to do it. Because that would really help this piece. It's kind of, you know, connected. We're gonna get it done before the end of gotta get a ten

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: or twelve.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: We're out of here on Tuesday. That would Mhmm. Interesting. That's what I'm hearing. Don't know. It's not a job. Mhmm. I say that at home all the time. His name is John too. So

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Alright. If we arrive at, like, conclusion of this one, do we want to just not have the begin implementation piece if that's not happening? It is just developing the plan and then adding.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: How about, so the plan is going to have a priority. Would hope the plan would include prioritizing and a schedule.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Will be getting that at each scheduled meeting in the off session what the plan is. So I don't know if you,

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden]: Yeah. Understood ADS this morning to be giving us five different buckets of things that were being worked on. I did not understand this one was more important than that one. These are the fives, and they're going come back with what sort of made sense without the prioritization if this one is more important.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Right and so for them it might make sense to do the internal processes. But that's where you point back to joint justice and joint justice is here on joint justice. That's where we can give some pushback. That's why we want both DOC and ADS at the table in front of joint justice so we can give some pushback and directions saying, we need to maybe focus more on this than what you're focusing on. And to keep their feet to the fire.

[Rep. Joseph "Joe" Luneau]: So, your experience with, you know, we're already having this discussion on this language. It sounds like John's suggestions, if we don't think they're gonna implement anything, it's just take out the implementation part, have it be a plan, and joint justice. Each meeting, we talk to talking about the priorities or anything. And it won't be something in statute, but it's something that they'll they'll know that we could easily put in statutes as soon as January turns are, right?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Yeah, well, but the problem is with these plans, I mean, gets very complicated, right? And if they don't prioritize the immediate needs that really might go to the bottom and they'll say, oh gee, that's gonna work its plan.

[Rep. Joseph "Joe" Luneau]: Right. I don't when we're first meeting, but

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Well, we gotta figure that out.

[Rep. Joseph "Joe" Luneau]: In July. Probably July. Right. Say, what's the plan?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: What's your priority?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Well, why don't we have some general language that would be separate from this?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Yes. Exactly. You could add to the You could add to the report language that we were just talking about before. It's a report of the plan and you could boost that to be including any priorities. So that you would get an indication as to whether or not they have taken a stance on priorities.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Right? But then the summer committee doesn't really have the authority to change those priorities or dictate those priorities.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: But if you also do what So this is what it would look like with what Senator Pluneau just described. The money is now exclusively available for developing a plan. So the implementation is gonna require further legislative action that is informed by the reports that you're getting off session where you can request that prioritization information. But in any event, the legislature's gonna have a say. It's not gonna have the summer, but they will have a say at the point that you know what a plan is.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: They're gonna have money. They've gotta have money somewhere to go forward with implementing it. Either general fund dollars or something like that, the IT committee on your side. We have an IT committee on our side and that's where you kind of point back all of us. I would have suffered. Yeah. It's not. It's just I can see it going down. We'll just and and we are three of eight I think. Okay. So, yeah.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: So, it's half of?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: It looks like it.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Okay. Policy, we're gonna skip over. These are agreed. The DEC pieces. This is agreed, the solicitation piece. This one you saw this morning, I don't have any highlighting here, because I stripped out the highlighting, but this is the new section B commissioner to report to the chairs status of these negotiations. The people that you're mentioning that you might want us.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: How big of a deal is if it's two weeks And prior to you're gonna be gone? Yes. Well, that's on or before? I know, but then I want right along. That's the point. You want before you're gonna be leaving? Yes.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: You want it to be on this one?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Yes. That would be that would be good. If they could get midway through their negotiations. How long have you gone through? The last two weeks, August or Yeah. Could do the seventh. August 7. Does that work? I mean, that's only a week. It's it's saying on and before August 7. Right. Yeah. And it's status. They're not done. We have them come back. Well, it's middle of their negotiations, and now they have to come up to us when it's completed. So it's just to give us a check-in half. I've been worried on this. Oh, you know what, actually the fifteenth is fine. There you go. Yeah, sorry. Okay, good. Good, afterwards.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: This is Southern State Correctional, the zone could be there. That's part of the Southern State Correctional. Okay, section 16, we just went over this. Yep. I I did wanna do this.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Initial. Yep. Yep. And this, my end, this is you picked up the language from the email you received from the

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: call Yeah, I circulated it to the budget team. So, Emily and Grady and Galfetti Katie McLennan, my colleague and LC, and so they're aware that this is what's happening here. It may be pulled from the budget because you only needed to travel at one place. Otherwise, you'd have duplicative music.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Right. And it came from the house came from Theresa Wood. Right? Exactly. Yeah. So If you look on b, this is where it really has us.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Technically, don't need the notwithstanding language anymore. No. But whatever. Because that's what the email said. I'm including it, and I'm

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: not disrupting any agreements. What did you put in?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: I when the email when representative would submit the email, it, you know, contained, like, a little highlighting markup. Clearly, it was agreed. I didn't just rough It has notwithstanding language that you no longer need because you're not prohibiting spitting, but I don't care. So, yeah. Yeah. That was, GCF, EGS, for the approved design docs, charter approval of the lease, we just submit their approved design to you guys separately at the same time you submit it.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: How come you pair up all the location parts at the same time, or am I seeing this?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: You were seeing that I view a format where you can see spacing probably too, because I have to double specify. This is the ADS report. I guess it's both. Network connectivity. I think you wanted to add something here related to priorities. So Commissioner Correction, State Chief Information Officer of Digital Services, Consultation with PGS, report to Joint Legislative Justice Oversight, and she's got meeting in calendar year '26 on the plan for providing network connectivity instead of correctional facilities, offering this person to dub dub dub, including any prioritization scheme?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: Yeah, or schedule, really. Prioritization and schedule.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Okay. These are already agreed, I think. It's probably going to tell these pieces. We do still have this special committee for the injury by design.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: So that was put on by Senate, probably some of

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: the Exactly. I assume this is still agreed. I didn't know if any of the earlier discussions disrupted this, but

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: I know. But it wasn't changed Not changed. Recently?

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Okay. No. Okay. No. Not changed at all. Back to passage and the herald names. Okay. Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: So our next step, we're we're all in agreement. Right? Yes. The next steps be so that we're talking about here. It's about time to put this form subject to editing. So I'm gonna assume by tomorrow morning, we can have a clean copy to some. Correct?

[Rep. Joseph "Joe" Luneau]: Yes. It takes five minutes.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair, Senate Institutions Committee)]: 09:30. Have a committee at 08:30. It should be done by 09:30. Yes. Just say that. Yeah. Then we can see when you're. Okay. Alice, I can't see you.

[John Gray, Legislative Counsel]: Oh, good. Yeah.