Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Hey. This is House Education on 04/02/2026. The committee is going to walk through the language as we have it. There may be an outstanding decision or two to make. Not much. Then we will break for a little bit to make any changes that need to be made. And then So the goal here is that we will be wrapped up with this morning. Period. Before or after lunch? Before. And then after lunch, if we're all wrapped up, there's a bigger room that we haven't been to in a while, and we'll spend some time up there.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Here we are more to ship here.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: All right. Okay, Beth, thank you very much for your work tonight and this morning, getting this to us in a timely fashion, and really appreciate that, and look forward to your walkthrough.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Thank you, Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel. There's a lot of highlighting in here. Most of that was to alert editing as to what needed to be edited. And I did not take the time between getting it back and sending it to Matt for posting to go back in and make it more tailored to what we have discussed and not discussed. So if you have questions about the highlighted language, if I skip over anything, please don't hesitate to ask. But if I do skip over highlighted language, because we have already looked at it, it just hadn't been edited. Would you like me to share my screen?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yes, please.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: We're looking at draft 9.1.

[Unidentified committee member]: I'm gonna need to refresh. Yeah.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So the first thing you'll notice is that the statement of purpose has been filled out, and this is just basically a list of everything that's in the bill. We're going to skip over it since you don't have any sign of what goes in there. This is my one area where I can So exert any the first thing you'll see is we've added some legislative intent language. I will say there is another section with legislative intent language on pre K. Personally, I think putting the pre K legislative intent right up front is confusing because it takes forever to get to the pre K language. I think it works fine nestling it further down. If you feel differently, I'm happy to make that change.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: So the legislative intent language is new. Felt that we needed to reiterate, one, some of the goals of Act 73, and then two, reflecting the conversations, discussions, and ultimately where we landed in this version built.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So to ensure each student is provided substantially equal educational opportunities that will prepare the student to thrive in a twenty first century world is the intent of the General Assembly to work strategically, intentionally, and thoughtfully to ensure that each incremental change from a public education system provides strength and support to its only constitutionally required governmental service. Where have you seen this language before? Someone who didn't give me this language.

[Unidentified committee member]: Yes,

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Act 73. Section B, the General Assembly recognizes that Vermont's schools anchor local economies and community identity, connecting young people to their homes while supporting workforce development and long term stability, and that different regions of Vermont have different needs, challenges, and opportunities. Further, it is the intent of the general assembly to ensure that local voice and community input retain an important role in Vermont's evolving education landscape. No, so we're gonna jump to section two, reader assistance heading, cooperative educational service areas. No changes until we get to page four, line three, section six zero three. This is where you are putting your new CSOs in statute. All of this is highlighted because it hadn't been edited before. It should reflect our conversation yesterday. I am the only human who has checked this. That should scare you. If you check this and you feel as though something is out of place, we can address it. But I am confident that this matches what we discussed yesterday.

[Unidentified committee member]: And I am not perfect.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Editors are not watching our testimony and making sure it tracks what we discussed. This will be an even more important advancement when we get to your groupings. Is there anything you wanna discuss specifically in here?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I would say anybody we will probably break. I might just spend some time sitting in the lounge going through this to Yeah.

[Unidentified committee member]: I checked it.

[Unidentified committee member]: So I think

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: it would be awesome. You didn't ask for a suggestion, I'm gonna give you one. Everyone was assigned pieces

[Unidentified committee member]: to

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: verify, and then we could get it done really quickly. And then we're all on the hook if there's a mistake, not just for you.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: And and I would just say, as we do that, the maps are posted today as well. We verify off of them.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Remember, I was the one doing the maps. I am not a mapping specialist. So it is entirely possible that those maps aren't accurate, which is why I think if there was some second round of verification, it would be really helpful. And I've gone through and I've marked up my education directory with Every school district that's listed in this has a check mark next to it, so I verify that they are listed in a group. And I have put the little number group that they belong to next to it. So if you also have an education directory, that is a handy dandy way to do whatever you are assigned to do. Should your chair make that assignment? Because I can't. Okay, so we're gonna leave verification for your seesaw groupings. We're gonna table that. I believe everything is accurate. Anyone listening? The islands are now all part of the same seesaw. Okay.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I have responded to an email. I'm also verifying that.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: We haven't made any changes to the bylaws. No changes to any of the CISA enabling language here.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: Scrolling on

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: through. Let's see. Section four, we're going jump to page 20. This is the Seesaw grant program. So I've done a couple of things here. We're keeping the grant program the same for startup costs. We've bumped up the eligibility from $10 to $15.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Just to remind everybody that the $10 already existed and then the $5 was a recommendation from the currently existing CISA.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: We've kept the original appropriation the same because my understanding is only 10,000 of that 70,000 has been spent and AOE still has 60,000. And then we've added a new appropriation on page 21. 30,000 is appropriated from the general fund to the agency of education to provide additional funding for the Seesaw startup grant program created in subsection A of this section. We are going to jump to page 26. These are all the conforming amendments changing BOCES to Seesaw. We're gonna jump to section 11 Nope. Section 12 now. Seesaw transition. Subsections A and B remain the same as far as appointments and when they have to have their first meeting. But then I've added this language here, which I think suffices. I tried to be as simple as possible. The articles of agreement of VTLC in effect 06/30/2026 shall serve as the operating agreement of the VTLC unless and until amended. I didn't see you making any other substantive changes to the enabling law as far as requirements for a CSOP that, in my opinion, just reading the law would impact BTLC in any way. So if you get feedback that they're worried about something else, please let me know. We can address that. But I think this does the trick. Okay, section 13. Facilitator. So previously, was a green X on line 16 on page 27. And now we have, I've kept employer contract for the reasons I suggested yesterday. Please, I will change that at your direction. But so VTLC shall employer contract for the services of seven union school district formation facilitators. Everything else remains the same as far as what they're doing. And then on line 19, the BTLC shall also hire one lead facilitator who, in addition to facilitating study committees as necessary, shall oversee the work of the seven facilitators. So that's a total of eight. Is that accurate?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That is accurate.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And then same, no credential changes there. On page 28, line one, the VTLC shall assign one facilitator to each CSUN membership region. We haven't changed anything. I can see on page 28, line 10, there's an internal reference that I need to update. The groupings are not in section 13 anymore, so I'll make that change. No change to the information that the facilitator should be thinking about when making those groupings? So we don't make any changes to the section until we get to page 32 in the secretary's review. And actually, that is an example of language that we've already gone over that just hadn't been edited. That was the change from just 04/01/2028 for the Secretary's review, tying that to sixty days following receipt of the report. And then we had bumped back on page 33, the study committee status report from January 1 to February 1, so just to account for giving them an extra month to get going. So your report back from AOE on the status of the study committees would be 02/01/2027. And then section 14 is the guidance for study committee groupings. So you got it down to 21 groups. And this will be something that haven't looked at the PDF maps, but there were blank. When I sent the link to Matt yesterday, they were blank because we had smooshed groups together. So there were blanks. Right. When I went through last night, I got rid of all those blanks on my interactive map. And so it's just straight one through 21. So the numbers aren't necessarily going to match up to the PDF, depending on where the blanks were that I took out. So facilitators shall use school district groupings contained in subdivisions one through 21 section of guidance informing study committees pursuant to Section 13 of this act. Facilitators may form study committees that differ from the guidance contained in this section, provided, however, that a facilitator shall transmit the facilitator's rationale for such choices to the lead facilitator for inclusion in the report required pursuant to section 15. That's the final report back. And yesterday, we talked about, since the individual facilitators are likely to have wrapped up their work, that final report back would be coming from the lead facilitator. So this is starting on page 34, line three. This is where all those groups are. I believe this accurately represents yesterday. I implore you to double check my work. Again, it's all highlighted. So some of these haven't changed at all from yesterday. Some of them have changed significantly, depending on how we smooshed the groupings as they appeared in the last draft.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I would just say for the committee's sake, when people are going ask about this, that remind us that we sort of respected currently existing lines informing the CESAs, and then within the CESAs, we respected current SUSD lines such as they exist within that. That was really the basis for our

[Unidentified committee member]: decisions. One other word that I know will catch people's eye, you have to read the

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: whole

[Unidentified committee member]: sentence. Page 33, line 18, where it says facilitators shall, we all know what shall means, use the state listed groupings contained in subdivisions of this section as guidance. And guidance is the key word there. People get really upset about shallow because that requires you, but it's really shallow as guidance. I just think it's worth noting. It is just guidance. I'm saying that because of what I said at the end of the day yesterday. I mean, it's very easy to misconstrue when you get focused on maps that this is guidance.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: What if they change the word guidance to like exemplar?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Exemplar?

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: Like an exempt Well, or exam What if we changed it to example? Just to really drive home that you don't have to follow the guidance? Like, it is not the expectations to follow the guidance.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I just like guidance.

[Unidentified committee member]: I like guidance.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: I just, I'm worried that that's a thing that is going to be that's not necessarily acceptable.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I mean the people who are involved in doing the work will understand the word guidance.

[Unidentified committee member]: That I'm trying to communicate it to too already.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: It's more the people that don't even want it to get that

[Unidentified committee member]: far that I'm worried about.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: We can't break every contingency.

[Unidentified committee member]: Can I ask a question that might come off the works again? We had some conversation yesterday about some of these groups are an entire just school district on their own, so who are they talking to? And discuss maybe whether once we had all our groups done, if we wanted to then go back and say, should some of these groups come together as a larger group? Is that still on the table? Or do we think these 21 will be 21? I'm thinking like Mount Mansfield, Champlain, ground groups thirteen, fourteen, fifteen. Is that something We did never go back to that.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Did, because we put together Burlington, South Burlington, Kevan Ruskie.

[Unidentified committee member]: We put together probably then the bigger chunk of Ballpark.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That's right. We do have CVSD on its own and SX Westford on its own.

[Unidentified committee member]: So we do have some on their own, and I'm just wondering if we're just gonna leave that, or if that's something we need to address. Is it just those three?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Is those three, there's thirteen, fourteen and fifteen.

[Unidentified committee member]: I don't have a strong feeling one way or another. I just don't want to overlook that. Yeah, go ahead. Well, all three of those merged into Act 46. This is absolutely something for the feels to work out and what might make sense and be possible here. So anything, there's certainly options. But they are, well, CVSD, it's 4000, Essex Westford is just a couple 100 short of that. I'm fine with it. All three are doing significant Act 46, I don't know. Before final draft, I just It stops then. Thank you.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: We're moving to page 37, section 15, study committee results and analysis facilitator report. On or before 01/01/2029, the lead facilitator

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: When I first read this, I'm like, what? It's a lead facilitator.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, Jeremy, I'm sorry. 37. Sorry. So the lead facilitator submits a report with the results of each study committee overseen by each facilitator or employer contacted by BTLC. And I added that so that it was clear that the report back is on the facilitator led study committees, any study committees that form.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: On their own, under chapter 11.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And we haven't changed what the report back should be. We haven't changed anything about section 16, the supervisory union and CSA boundaries agency of education report recommendations to you all. Section 17 is the money section. So this is all new language. I have shared this language with JFO. I wouldn't be surprised if this language, as it travels on its way, sees some changes from the money committees. Okay, so starting with study committee reimbursement grant. And I went right I did not reinvent the wheel here. I went right to Act 153 from 2010, and I took this language. Thank you, Donna Russo Savage. The Agency of Education shall pay up to $10,000 to a study committee formed pursuant to Section 13 of this act to reimburse participating school districts for legal and other services necessary for the analysis and report required pursuant to current law and then the specifications that you have outlined in this act for both the advisable, which is subsection D or inadvisable recommendations with a subsection E or subdivision E of this act as applicable. I think it is entire This is a policy choice, but I think it is entirely possible that there are folks who come to the table and they immediately have an inadvisable report, and therefore, what they are going to be reimbursed for is probably slim to nothing. I do think it is entirely possible that people come to the table with every effort to try and have an advisable outcome and end up with inadvisable. And if you don't include that inadvisable, then those folks would be locked out of the reimbursements. So the way this is written is specifically to include any study committee can get reimbursed for their work. And since it is a reimbursement and not a lump sum, theoretically, the reimbursements would be in alignment with the amount of work effort done in the study committee. Does that match what you've been trying to achieve?

[Unidentified committee member]: Yeah.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Study committee shall forward invoices to the agency on a quarterly basis. The agency shall reimburse one half of the total amount reflected in each set of invoices upon receipt and the remaining one half upon completion of the final report required pursuant to either subsection or subdivision D or E as applicable. Provided, however, that no payment should cause the total amount of funds paid to a study committee to exceed the $10,000 limit. So like I said, this is taken directly from Act 153. You can format this reimbursement process any way you want. Here's what I got for you this morning. And then subdivision two of this subsection is $210,000 appropriated from the general fund to AOE in fiscal year twenty twenty seven for the purpose of awarding study committee reimbursement grants. The study committees formed pursuant to section 13 of this act in accordance with subdivision one of the subsection. That is simply 10,000 times 21. It is entirely possible that you will have more study committees than that. It's also possible you'll have less study committees than that. I think that amount is entirely a policy choice for you all to make.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah, I know you're absolutely right. We could have more and we could have fewer. So I guess we gotta sort of pick the middle spot. And then if that appropriation needs to be updated, that can be a job of next year's legislature absent the BAA. What

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: would you like it to see?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: What's

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: that? Do you want to leave it at twenty? Okay. Subsection B, facilitator appropriation reports. The sum of $442,000 is appropriated from the general fund to VTLC in fiscal year twenty seven the purpose of hiring or contracting for seven facilitators and one lead facilitator pursuant to Section 13A of this act, as well as for administrative and costs associated with contracting for the facilitators. BTLC may use up to $32,000 of the funds appropriated pursuant to the subsection for administrative costs. So that 442,000 is 50 times six plus 60 plus 32. Sorry, 50 times seven plus six. I mean, plus yeah. 50 times seven

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Six.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: Plus six.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: No. We need facilitators.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Facilitators, seven.

[Unidentified committee member]: And we need facilitators.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That's the plus 60. Yep.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And less the 32,000 for administration.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Make sure.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Perfect. Don't be mean to me if my math was wrong. But that is the intent here. I did not specify that it would be $50,000 for each. Can certainly do that. This gives them the bucket of money and makes it very clear what they can use for administrative costs. So anything over those administrative costs need to be going to the facilitator hiring. JFO may have further feedback on that. Beginning on 10/01/2026, and every three months thereafter for the next year, the Remote Learning Collaborative shall submit written quarterly reports to the General Assembly with a detailed accounting of the funds expended pursuant to the subsection. I really didn't know what to do here. I think general assembly is a little you could just say general assembly. There's nothing legally wrong with that. But do you have a specific place where these reports should be going?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That would help them to know where it should go. Let me say House and Senate appropriations, House and Senate education.

[Unidentified committee member]: You need to go to Ways and Means also.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: In Senate,

[Unidentified committee member]: it's finance.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Is there appropriations and finance?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: No, it's just finance.

[Unidentified committee member]: It's all together.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah. So student money committees and education committees.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Well, appropriations are separate. Appropriation committees are separate. Yeah. So you want appropriations committees, education committees and money committees? Yeah. Detailed accounting of the fund expended pursuant to the subsection.

[Unidentified committee member]: Yeah. Is that good?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That's I think that

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Does that work?

[Unidentified committee member]: That's correct.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Seesaw executive director grant appropriation. From funds appropriated to the agency of education for this purpose, the agency shall award a grant in the amount of $50,000 to each Seesaw created 16 BSA subsection 603A to be used by the CSO to hire an executive director, provided, however, that BTLC shall not be eligible for a grant under this subsection. The sum of $300,000 is appropriated from the general fund to AOE fiscal year '27 for the purposes of awarding a CISA executive director grants in accordance with subdivision one of the subsection. So that's 50 times six. And I believe that was it for money. So you've got buried up in section four, you've got your current Seesaw startup grant, and we've added five ks to the total amount of money that a new Seesaw could get in startup costs. And we've added the $30,000 needed for that as a separate appropriation up in section four. And then I believe everything else is living here in this section 17. Have I missed any of the money pieces?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Not that occurred to me.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Action 18, does anyone want to tee this up?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yes, so Act 73 talks about sort of the effective date of the foundation formula being when we move to newer, larger districts that would be mandated by the state. This envisions a different path toward that, and so required some adjustment for the effective date for when the foundation formula would take place. So this is to reflect that. Does it move it up? To coincide with wait and see. Okay.

[Jana Brown (Clerk)]: With the goal being to sort of align, make updates that match up with

[Unidentified committee member]: the work that we've done.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Right. I think below that, as we get into the yellow, we will see the conditions.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, so

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Jana, you worked on some of this. If you would have further teeing up, that would be helpful.

[Jana Brown (Clerk)]: Well, think it does a couple of things that are responsive to the work that we've been doing this year. One is sort of the concept of the path forward that we see in this bill. We need to sort of align language from what passed in Act 73 to sort of account for this, how we're getting to meet our larger school districts. Otherwise, we just have these threads that are no longer part of that. And then some suggested language I think, for ways and means about all of the different pieces and parts of the foundation formula that still need to be accounted for in the consultants work that we'll get back in January 2027. And I think we've talked about it in this committee here and there as we've worked through this, but all the pieces and parts that need to be in the foundation formula to make it adequate to fund education.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: So, we sort of needed to define what is a newer, larger school district that is now operational, which you'll see, I think, in Section A, and then sort of pulling together all the other pieces that need to go into the creation of the foundation formula. Would that be accurate to say? Yeah.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, so section 18 amends section 70 in Act 73, which is your effective date section. I've highlighted subsection E in green because it's a tax provision, and I don't know what to do with it. So I'm flagging it, and I think this is probably something best for ways and means to handle because I don't have an understanding of what 61A is.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Okay.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Subsection F of Section 70 of Act 73 is the effective date section for the foundation formula. This language amends the effective date of the foundation formula and all of the other sections that are specified within subsection F, but very specifically, this is where the foundation formula effective dates live. So it keeps the effective date contingent, and we'll walk through what those contingencies are, but it pushes out that contingent effective date from 07/01/2028 to 07/01/2030.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Or to reflect the process that we've laid out.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah. So just to play through that, let's say you had all of the votes for whether or not to form new union school districts occurring in the 2028. School budgets are already being developed for the next school year. And so we wouldn't know if the foundation formula had been triggered and effective in time for those budgets to be developed, taking into account the foundation formula. So you are essentially pushing this out to the second July one after those new school districts' votes have happened. Okay. So here are the contingencies. It's no longer that new school districts contemplated by this act, meaning Act 73, have assumed responsibility for the education of all resident students. The new contingency on page 41, line 12, states that the clerk of each school district voting on a proposal to form a unified union school district on or before 11/07/2028, which is the drop dead date, hire up for all of your study committees, facilitator led study committees to have their vote occur. Pursuant to, and this is an open I need to confer with some colleagues as to how to refer to this act in this language, gonna work on that, has certified the results of that vote to the Secretary of Education. So that would account for recounts and all of that kind of stuff. So the votes have happened and the results have been certified. That's the contingency. It's not tied to the substantive outcome of those votes. Subdivision B remains the same. The expert tasked with developing a cost factor foundation formula has provided you with the 45A report. That remains the same, Zack 73. Subdivision C remains the same in concept, but with much more detail. Oh, I'm sorry, no. Subdivision C is brand new. The Joint Fiscal Office has So remember, we're in a list of contingencies. JFO has provided the legislature with an analysis that shows the combined approved fiscal twenty twenty seven education spending for the school districts consolidated into new school districts in each new school district compared with the estimated educational opportunity payment under the revised proposed foundation formula for each district. I don't know what that means. I think this would be a great place for wordsmithing in ways and means. And then

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I have a little wordsmithing question. Sometimes we say general assembly, sometimes we say legislature. Mine has

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: not been edited yet. So I just haven't

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I just didn't know if there was any

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes, rule to general assembly is the term that we should use. It'll get fixed. Just a

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: little curiosity, nothing else. Thank you.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Subdivision D on line three, page 42. Fourth contingency. Legislation has been enacted. So that means it's become law that addresses suitable geographic measures for determining sparsity within the foundation formula, whether it costs more to educate a secondary student than an elementary student in Vermont, and if so, an appropriate way to capture the cost differential how to account for the provision of CTE how to account for regional differences in operating costs, including those driven by regional differences in cost of living and legacy collective bargaining agreements, how to fund special education services, school construction renovation and repayment of school district debt, transportation and universal pre K, and any other aspect of the foundation formula General Assembly deems prudent to address.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Most of these things are currently part of ongoing studies.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So all four of those contingencies need to happen in order for these sections to take effect. There's definitely tax stuff in here, and most of that tax stuff is related to the foundation formula. But the thing that we think of when we think of these sections is the foundation formula. Also amending subsection G in the effective date section of Act 73. This very specific to changes made to the tuition statute, but only subsections B and C. And that was related to getting information back on whether it costs more to educate students in grades nine through 12. The contingency language on line 17 through 20 remains unchanged, only changing that contingency related to school districts becoming operational to match the contingency language for subsection F related to the votes happening and being certified. And then that was it for the contingency changes. And then starting on page 44, section 19, a huge thank you to Kate McCann, who took the lead on drafting this.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I'll tee this up for a second. So this is the pre K language that we have presented to us. We had the language presented. We asked lots of questions. We had superintendents come in and testify. Erin and I met with folks in human services, sort of hashed out the concerns that were brought up. So you'll see that this is now down to essentially intent language and the additional study work for the current work that's going on regarding pre K. It no longer carries the language that would require a public school to provide pre K if no pre K was available. It no longer carries the language that codifies the practice of superintendents signing provisional licenses. We heard concerns about that. We also heard that CDD and AOE are trying to work out a way that the state can handle that rather than superintendents doing it. So you'll see a lot of those concerns addressed in the removal of a lot of the language of what we received. So

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: section 19 is findings. So again, you'll see a reader heading on line three on page 44, section 19 findings. The General Assembly finds that despite being colloquially known as the Universal Prekindergarten Program, not all children three and four years of age in the state have equal access to a pre qualified pre kindergarten provider. Vermont ranks second in the country with regard to access to pre K education by children who are four years of age, with 76% of eligible four year old children receiving pre K education, and that Vermont is one of two states in which more than 70% of children who are four years of age receive pre K services. Only 11% of eligible children are enrolled in pre K services in Essex County. There is considerable geographic disparity in the state with regard to the number of pre K slots available. And as a result, 95% of eligible children in Windsor and Windham Counties, 93% of eligible children in Chittenden County have access to a pre qualified pre kindergarten provider, as compared to 55% in Franklin County and 61% in Grand Isle County. And while a substantial portion of states provide a full school day of four or more hours of pre K education daily, less than 5% of Vermont's pre qualified pre kindergarten providers provide a full day of four or more hours of pre kindergarten. Section 20 is legislative intent language. Subdivision one is the same language that was traveling in human services pre K language. It is the intent of the general assembly to ensure that pre K is included as an integral part of Vermont's education system, as the right to education is fundamental for the success of Vermont's children in all grades, pre kindergarten through grade 12. New intent language. It's the general assembly's intent to determine a locus of responsibility to ensure there is access to pre K education within all school districts, provide access to licensed teachers in the classrooms of both pre K public and private providers, including access to support and provisional status, and equalize financial resources for all pre qualified providers of pre kindergarten education. Section 21 is the request for JFO to contract with a contractor of expertise in Vermont's education funding system to make recommendations regarding how to account for the provision of pre K education within Vermont's education finance system. Everything not highlighted, you've already reviewed. It came from human services. So there was no changes to the

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: report piece.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Still requires alignment between the 45A report and this report. The pre K report would be coming back to 01/15/2027. And there's a $50,000 appropriation to JFO from the general fund to hire that contractor. And then your effective date section, section 22, it's still 07/01/2026.

[Unidentified committee member]: Is that it? Alright.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I would like to ask that we take a half hour break during which volunteers or those volunteered will do a little checking up on the list. The maps are available on our website.

[Unidentified committee member]: In taking a quick look at the map, we still have it still looks to me like District 13 is being cut by the CSA.

[Unidentified committee member]: Which map are you looking at?

[Unidentified committee member]: 3.1. The districts with CSA map.

[Unidentified committee member]: Can I ask

[Unidentified committee member]: a question about the hospital?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah, yes, sorry.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: I'm not sure and I'm getting feedback, it's actually about that same part. Maybe I did this, I think it's easy to understand that everyone was exhausted yesterday, but maybe I suggested that Walter at Cross Creek Greensboro hardwood, woodgrain standard be put in the wrong one because if we're suggesting in the completely voluntary graphic organizer that they be in district thirteen, I think maybe they should also be in the CISA conversations with District thirteen. Would that be a hugely consequential change to wrap that last couple chunk for the CCEP map.

[Unidentified committee member]: That's exactly what I'm saying.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: I probably just said the wrong thing.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: I'm just trying to

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: open maps here. I think it was a committee discussion.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Beth, go ahead.

[Beth Quimby (Member)]: I have the supervisory union map open, and the CECL line does not cut supervisory unions apart. Correct. Crasberry, Greensboro, Wolcott, Hardwick, Woodbury, Standard are a supervisory youth. Yes, they are. And Albany, Glover, Irisburg, Barton, Brownington, Westmore are a supervisory youth. So the CSA line does not cut those two supervisory needs apart.

[Unidentified committee member]: No. But the purple color,

[Unidentified committee member]: I guess, is what I Yeah,

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: and I think the reason maybe we put them in District 17 is because they go currently to the Green Mountain Technical Career Center. However, knowing that they're ready to have conversations with schools in District 13, I wonder if they should just start those conversations in this piece. Does it matter which this is so complicated.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah. So I I totally appreciate what you're saying. And I think that the hope would be that that would be worked out locally. As we were going through this, because we were having this debate yesterday when Emily suggested that we maintain SU boundaries, but they did keep coming up like, well, some of the district talks may do that, but that the people who are there on the ground will, because we've built in so much flexibility, we'll be able to sort of gather that and figure out the best way to move forward.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: And that was exactly my response. Was like, if you don't like those PISA lines, then change them during the other CISA.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Now the CISA lines are a different matter.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: Well, right.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: But I will say, I will say about the CECL lines, of course, is that once mergers happen, if they happen, then there may be some adjustments to be made in the CECL lines.

[Unidentified committee member]: And I'll give you an example of that. When you look at District 9 and adding Park 308 to it under the district, if it's outside of the CISA, we can't change the CISA line right now. It will have to be changed in the end by a general assembly if they choose to join that, but they're part of the guidance map for District 9, even though they're not within the CSAT right now, because we're bound to keep the CSAT line. So, yeah, think we'll Who gets?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Got the built in flexibility.

[Unidentified committee member]: So the same thing happened in my region. We'd moved Cal co op in because they're already having conversations, but once we decided to stick with supervisor union boundaries, move them back, they have the flexibility on the ground to make that decision.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: That's right.

[Unidentified committee member]: So that's the same situation. Yeah, no

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: perfect way to do it to have all the lines aligned, hence the guidance and flexibility.

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: Yes, Josh. Any chance we can get secretary Saunders in just to wait for the AOE to wait on our final draft, just to

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: kinda hear what their perspective is? I think that we are gonna vote this out in a little bit. And it's also incomplete because it's supposed to go through two other committees. However, thereafter, potentially, I think we I think we we had them here Friday, and I think we got a pretty clear understanding of where they feel we should be going.

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: I was thinking if they had any put on, like, outside of where they think we should be going. Right? Take that off the table. Like, where we are going. Right? So what's your 2¢ on what we're where we're at now?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah. I'm I'm not sure we would hear it much different than what we heard on Friday.

[Unidentified committee member]: Staff goes to someone I thought they were still here, but they left. Okay,

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: so let's do some CISA divisions here. Beth, would you take District twelve to kind of look over?

[Unidentified committee member]: So District twelve I'm sorry, CISA CISA number Northeast Region CISA?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yeah, exactly.

[Unidentified committee member]: And make sure that that CISA line does not cut any supervisory union

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: boundaries or anything like Okay. No, the task is to make sure that the contents of that reflect the contents that are written in the bill you just looked at. So the purple section,

[Unidentified committee member]: has everybody listed correctly? Exactly. I'm looking at 1112, 13. Yes. Yep. To make sure the list matches the map.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Yep.

[Unidentified committee member]: I can do that.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Leland, since we've gone back and forth over the Chittenden Central Region, assign that to you if you don't mind. And that is just to make sure that the words in the bill match the words on the map. I will take the Champlain Valley region. Josh, you wanna do the Windusky Valley? Sure. Great. Thank you. Emily, would you take Southeast? I sort of put everybody where they live. Anybody else want to volunteer, lead a Champlain Valley North region? Kate, just do that. Again, the the task here is just to look at the language to make sure that the CISA is listed correctly and that the districts are listed correctly. Thank you. Thank you. Bruce?

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: I'm speaking sure. Understand. See this.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: In the Valley North. Yeah. What we got left here, we have Southwest. Oh, that's a Rob.

[Robert Hunter (Member)]: Yep. Already on it.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: We got that's it, I think. Did I do it?

[Unidentified committee member]: Our stores are seven that's selling.

[Unidentified committee member]: Two, three, four,

[Unidentified committee member]: six. I'm guessing what you're doing, seven? But Rob's doing, so that's one. Raise your hand if you're doing one. Should be seven, right? One,

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: Kate's up 2. I think the new guy needs four. Just put your hand up. 56.

[Unidentified committee member]: Give me a 7. Northeast.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Are we 7?

[Unidentified committee member]: I think that's 7.

[Beth St. James (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Raise them. Just like in a glass round.

[Unidentified committee member]: 234567.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: We're doing this big straw poll.

[Leanne Harple (Member)]: We're not. A sneaky straw poll.

[Unidentified committee member]: I wouldn't mind if someone who isn't signed sat with me and sort of

[Unidentified committee member]: read and looked. What do you do

[Unidentified committee member]: for that?

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Best lucky buddy.

[Unidentified committee member]: I'll help that. Buddy?

[Joshua Dobrovich (Member)]: You're dead to me.

[Peter Conlon (Chair)]: Will go off live. We'll come back on at eleven to verify everything.