Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: Live.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Alright. Welcome back everybody to House Energy and Digital Infrastructure. It's Thursday, March 10. And we are here to walk through, discuss, and hopefully vote on H753. So, I'm representative Kathleen James from the Bennington Board District.

[Rep. R. Scott Campbell (Vice Chair)]: Scott Campbell from Saint John's Barry. Richard Bailey, Lamoille too. Chris Morrow in the Windsor Bennington. Michael Caledonia too.

[Rep. Christopher Howland (Member)]: Christopher Howland, Robin Ford. Dara Torre, Washington, Sibilia.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: Bram Kleppner, Chittenden, 13, Burlington.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: And in the room? Maria Royal with legislative council. Super.

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Rick Hood with the PC.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great. Alright. So, Representative Torre, I think we have an updated draft.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: And Maria, are you going to

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: do a walk through with us?

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: I certainly can.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great. Does everybody have the draft? It's posted on our website. And I believe I sent it around to everybody's email. Should be, I think I have the right one. Is it 01/2002 Dated two '27 at 12:17PM? Yes. That's great.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: And so Maria Royal of Windsor Townsville, I'll just say that this is identical to the draft we reviewed before crossover. It's just been edited. So the editors made some technical changes. Correct. But other than that, no substantive changes. So we can quickly review it if that's helpful. I think review would be really helpful. Okay. So other than the short title, section two was a report that the commissioner of public service does, and it specifies that for the purpose of providing policy makers with the data necessary for monitoring and responding to trends in the residential electric and gas sectors, particularly with respect to safeguarding the welfare and ratepayers. The commissioner of public service shall conduct conduct an annual assessment of involuntary residential service disconnections. Assessment should take into consideration the monthly disconnection reports that are prepared by electric and gas utilities currently pursuant to PUC rule 3.308. In addition, relevant consumer assistance records maintained by Consumer Affairs and Public Information Division of the department and any other data deemed appropriate by the commissioner. And then having reviewed all of that information, the commissioner shall report findings and recommendations to this committee and other committees of jurisdiction on or before January 15 and annually thereafter. That would continue for five years. All reports continue for only five years unless you specify that they should continue longer than that. So, this would just be for five years. The report required by this section oh, maybe in the department's annual energy report or or a standalone report, and that's up to the commissioner's discretion.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Maria, is the five year is that just a blanket sunset that we have? Yeah.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: I forget the statute. Is it entitled if it's entitled one or entitled two, but it relatively new, but goes, actually goes back probably like seven more years ago. It's just specifying that any agency reporting requirements do sunset after five years, so there aren't these ongoing reporting requirements that are no longer relevant. However, you can always not withstand that five year limitation. So, it's up to you whether you wanted to continue indefinitely or whether you think five years

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: and then That sounds good. So

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: section three is a PUC rulemaking process. It specifies that on or before 01/01/2028, or upon the initiation of any rule making pertaining to PUC three point three hundred, which is the disconnection rule, whichever occurs first, The PUC shall adopt rules that curtail service disconnections during periods of extreme heat as defined by the commission, which may include a lower temperature threshold for households comprising persons who are 62 years of age or older, similar to the winter provisions. Claire, yeah? Can I

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: add one thing there? Sure. Would you like to continue? No. We did get we got some comments from Vermont Gas and specifically around line 10 here where it says curtail service disconnections with the request that we add electric utility services connections because high heat isn't an issue with the gas. It's gonna show more. You know? It's not used for cooling. It's not Okay.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Maria, do you have that letter from Vermont Gas? I think it's posted. I don't have it,

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: but I can find it. I can look for it online.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: It's posted. Is, yes. Okay, great. It just came in. Did folks have a chance to read that or should we take a look at that real quick?

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Yeah, sorry.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: So was just saying, we did get a letter from Vermont Gas recently that pointed out that natural gas is not used for cooling, and they wanted to make sure that they weren't sort of being inadvertently covered by a provision that doesn't apply to them. And I believe they checked around and

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: the utilities were out there. Utilities It

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: was okay with this. Yeah. So I don't know if that makes sense to folks in the committee, but if it does, we can ask Maria to add that.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: Alrighty. Marie, I think we just

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: add those two words.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Electric or tail electric. Electric utility.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: Yes. Electric utility service disconnections. Okay. And actually put it in.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Okay.

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: Okay. And then also clarify that under the rule, a licensed physician assistant or nurse practitioner may issue a physician certificate to prevent disconnections for people who are vulnerable for health reasons, they have a health hazard, and also require due consideration of medical judgment regarding the duration of a health hazard indicated in a physician certificate when establishing the disconnection protection period for a health hazard.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Chris?

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Questions for Maria? We took out the IRP language. Does anybody have questions for Maria? She's gonna add the, start to line 10. I just did that.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: So oh, great. I can

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: save it as a new draft.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: There it is. Okay. Super. And I believe, R. Torre, can you remind us who all we've kinda heard from on this? Yeah.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: So we heard from Carol Flint, from Kathy. And also we laughed and met. I reached out to mister Favor, who's here with us, and he replied via email, but we can certainly invite any comments. Oh, did you hear no. From.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Yeah. We'd ask Greg, were you able to provide written testimony?

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: On this?

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Uh-huh. I think

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: remember. I think I did testify on it, though.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Okay. And there was a a follow-up email to the latest draft. Okay.

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Right. I did I did have email, of course, on the Yeah. Directory. Yeah.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Okay. It was the PUC requested. It sounded like

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Oh, we're fine with this.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: You weren't flagging anything for us.

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: That's right.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Alright. So, Kathy, it's okay with this. Can you see is okay. I know we've heard from the department. Gas. PETs. PETs. PETs. Can they be in the room? Certainly.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: All the utilities.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: I think all the utilities testified on this bill

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: at one point or the other. Alrighty.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Well, so we had we had scheduled a committee vote. I know rep Sibilia wants to be here for that. So if folks are feeling ready, feel like we've taken a lot of testimony and really pared the bill down to some common sense stuff. So if folks would like to if folks are ready to vote, I can get rep Sibilia there.

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Yeah. I don't know. I don't have anything more to add. Okay. Like I said, I'm just

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: Does that end the discussion on

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: the bill? I appreciate the work that Torre put in there.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Great. Thank you. Okay. Let me see. Why don't we take a oh, yeah. We're

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: So when we call for the vote, that ends the discussion, or do we have opportunity to comment when we make our votes?

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: No. We talk now, and it's not like the floor where you explain your vote. This is fuck now. Whatever you have to say about the bills, say it, and then we'll vote. And then we're then we kinda are done.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: Well, I just wanna reiterate this. This bill, as simple as it might be, may still add to the accumulated balance that customers experience. I was thinking on the way up today that the problem with being behind on your bill when it's coming in August really started way back in June or May. Know, they first started being the mind on their bills. And I think it's going to add to the accumulated dialogue with the utilities ability to. To collect.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Okay.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Yeah. I mean, for me, this is in the setting of larger work that the Department of Public Service is committed to doing around energy assistance. And it's just it helps the legislature stay a little more on top of one day or, like, which is the accumulation of a lot of things that happen. How successfully we get energy assistance out there in terms of weatherization, how well we coordinate programs for Vermonters. It kinda trickles down and how well utilities communicate their offerings, how often. It's a big ecosystem, So I feel like this is one step towards a larger coordination effort that's going to be underway. So hopefully, we won't see that. I know. And that debt on the employee level.

[Rep. Bram Kleppner (Member)]: I hear you. No. I think that was a testimony of some of the co ops that they're they're small membership. And any revenue that that what they don't collect They know. Become suburban of other members.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Oh, yeah. Absolutely. We talked about all the time around this tip, and it happens. But we also learned a lot from the utilities as far as what a personal touch can do and that the smaller communities have the ability to do and to understand and be proactive around that might be a little harder in our larger equally setting. But I feel like having more information and having the Department of Public Service kind of include some of this for us in the annual reporting Just paints a picture that will be helpful in terms of overall optimization and coordination of energy systems.

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: And what they're already currently doing in practice.

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: Exactly.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: I do have a question

[Rep. Dara Torre (Clerk)]: though in terms of being the clerk. Is there gonna be a new draft number that we should get?

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: It's draft 1.3.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: K. Do we have more committee conversation? Because if not, we could adjourn. I could call you know, I could call the vote for, 305, and I that would give me time to go get Sibilia. And does that sound good?

[Rick Hood (Vermont Public Utility Commission staff)]: Sure.

[Rep. Kathleen James (Chair)]: Sure. Okay. So why don't we go off live, and we'll be back at 03:05 to vote on age seven fifty three. Thanks for

[Maria Royal (Legislative Counsel)]: your work, Rick Perry.