Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Great. Welcome back. We are going to continue our conversation with DEC. Thank you.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: For the record again?

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: Oh, no. Okay. Back in the same.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: So moving on from stormwater impact fees, there's other two two other sections of the draft language that we just wanted to speak to, which was notice types for water quality restoration formula grants and timeline for developing accounting methodology. So the first one, turn your attention to pages ten and twelve, which is adjusting notice types relevant to the Water Quality Restoration Formula Grant program. And you'll see some of it was striking out Type three notice, some of it was striking out type four notice, and all of it is installing identical language about notice and a common period of not less than thirty days. And we have the same staff really working on building these different components of policy and guidance for this holistic grant program. So really, one of the main goals is just alignment of the time frames to thirty days and alignment of the public engagement strategies across all of these different components of standing up the program, whether that be the cost rate methodology that talks about what the average costs are by sector and project type, to guidance for the clean water service providers, to accounting methodologies for project and practice types. Another piece of it is that type three and type four notice speak to the use of the environmental notice bulletin platform. And that platform is really well designed and suited for noticing site specific permits to landowners and local communities and affected communities. This type of notice has not been the best fit for us proliferating updated draft guidance, cost rate methodology for a non regulatory funding program. It doesn't quite reach the stakeholders that we engage with often. And so it just hasn't been the best fit, honestly. We do have really robust public engagement on these products. We have regular stakeholder meetings, monthly clean water service provider meetings, quarterly or twice a year with the other funding program administrators, Quarterly meetings with We have parallel grant programs that operate in parallel with the Clean Water Service providers and entities that deliver funding for us on behalf of the state. And so we meet with them quarterly as well as the Clean Water Service Providers if any of these products impact them as well. We have two different listservs. We have lots of websites. So we do engage quite regularly with these folks, the intention is to maintain that And basically just seeking administrative simplicity and alignment with our target audience expectations for who we communicate with and how in this process. Don't know if there's any questions there, but just wanted to share why what the goal was in the language.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Folks have questions?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: And then the other piece is on page 11. This has to do with phosphorus pollutant accounting methodologies. And the draft language is trying to change it from establishing pollutant a reduction value or design life within sixty days to publishing a timeline not to exceed one year within sixty days. To be frank, sixty days is not enough time to establish the scientifically sound methodology, and we just really wanted to align it better, setting expectations for the public about what is realistic to do scientific research, literature reviews, peer reviews. A lot of these have taken more in the range of two to three years to establish. But maybe more critically to point out is that the department does keep a running list of project and practice types and the status of the accounting methodologies of them. And we prioritize which ones need to be moving forward. That priority changes over time. But there's two factors into how we prioritize those that really weigh heavily. And one is, what is the opportunity for that project or practice on the landscape? How many people are trained to do that? How many places can we implement that on the landscape? And then what is it likely to reduce in terms of pollution? And so obviously the things that have a lot of opportunity and a lot of potential pollution reduction are higher on our list to making sure that we've got a good methodology to count how much phosphorus we've reduced from that practice. And the challenge right now with this language is that we can receive a request from a partner for maybe a niche case or a practice that's not that common on the landscape. And it's diverting a lot of It could divert a lot of staff capacity in sixty days to try and create something there that may not be meaningful for the network in terms of us trying to have a robust accounting framework and ability. And I can share with you here a snapshot. This is within the Clean Water Initiative Performance Report. Deputy Commissioner Cameron suggested bringing in Claire Madden. She's their supervisor for the tracking accounting team, can speak to the whole performance report and our progress in phosphorus reduction. The new one's now live and linked here. But this is the very end of the report, page 144, 145. And it is the table of our different projects and practices. And you can see the first column is sort of the sector, what sector it's really addressing in the TNDL. And then we have a range of projects and practices that we invest in. And then the two middle columns speak about where are we at with our ability to count the phosphorus being reduced from that. And then the far right column is, sorry, let me show you. The far right column is speaking to our progress to date. So just because we don't have accounting for it doesn't mean we're not investing in those projects and practices. Have standards. A lot of them are eligible across different funding programs. So as an example, we have river corridor easements and wetland restoration easements. We've conserved thousands of acres of these easements, and we can count that. But the methodology for being able to say, what is the phosphorus reduced is still under development as a formula for it, and then applying it to the data that we have. I think those are the two columns, but Claire Madden can speak more to the difference there. But really just wanna show you that this is how we make public what's under development and why we're prioritizing what we can. So once we do have the methodology, for example, with the easements, we already have stuff that we've invested in and implemented on the ground that now we can account for and track and report back as well. So I hope that's helpful explaining why we're looking for that ability to maintain our capacity and focus on the priority practice types.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Yes. I'm curious, how many new project types have you been asked to evaluate?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: So far, and I'm a little bit removed from it at this point, but I think the main one that we've been asked to evaluate has been in gullies, in the gully space. And it was an interesting learning process because I think that there's different layers about being requested to develop methodology there. Some of it is site specific projects where DEC would actually define that as a different project type that already has accounting methodology in place. Like, actually, that's not a gully project. That's a river restoration project for these reasons. And look, we have accounting methodology for it. So some of it gets to the nuance of that, of when we're being asked to proceed. I think ultimately with the gullies, we didn't the suite of ones that were I'd have to double check with Claire. I wanna share misinformation here, but I can check-in with them if they've received the result of the gully one and if there's they've received other requests since.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: So we're talking about one so far?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah. And a and a significant amount of staff time to respond to that for sure.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: Oh, to one request for

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: that? Okay. And this will give relief to you for that?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah, or potential asks that come down the line to be able to focus on the ones that are published in the Clean Water Performance Report.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And about how many will we find in the Clean Water Report?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Project types?

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Yeah.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Oh. That's a good question.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Like dozens, a 100, I mean

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Probably somewhere between those two.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Another couple more pages of this.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: I think this particular table is a couple pages long, but I can go back and count for you.

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: We do have quite a bit. I

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: just thought you might know. Other questions on this? Yeah, Representative Noyes.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: Just a quick clarification for me. The changes the previous slide have the word or in between each of the different pieces of data you're looking for. I was wondering, shouldn't we be asking for all of them? Timeline Yeah, timeline or pollution reduction value or design life? It seemed like all three of those things ought to be important for prioritization. Wouldn't we want ands in there rather than or? Just

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: stop being a little tricky here.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah. I believe that the second section is related to the type notice, if I'm correct. I'd have to go back and pull it up. The lines 18 to 19 where the or is referenced, I'd have to double check that. And so it would defer to you all the appropriateness of or versus the hands.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: Yeah, that's a good catch.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Representative Austin? Yep, in

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: the not established yet category, are any of those prioritized? I'm just wondering about the sewer overflow abatement. I live on Malice Bay and just like New Burlington and I don't know. I'm just wondering if that's a higher priority. If these are in order of priority or are they equal in terms of attention?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: This particular table in this report, I don't think is in order of priority. It's sort of by sector and the status of methodology. And again, that doesn't impact the investment in those projects. So those might still be moving forward, but our ability to account for it is what this is reflecting. And again, Claire Madden would be happy to speak to what our priorities are in terms of advancing methodology right now. Thank you. Yeah. Okay, great. So now I will pass it over to Chris Rutland to give an update on the formula grants.

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: Chair Sheldon, committee, thank you for having me. Again, Rutland. I'm the technical project manager for the Clean Water Service Provider Network in DEC in the Water Investment Division. I have a colleague online, Ethan Swift. I'm going to carry the bulk of the presentation, but just want to acknowledge Ethan. Ethan, if you do chime in, he can announce himself for the record. As a technical project manager, I don't do this work alone. So do want to acknowledge that we do have a really fantastic team that supports this work. I've worked very closely with the watershed planning team, which Ethan is the supervisor and also work with my colleagues in the Clean Water Initiative program. Together we're really supporting the Clean Water Service Provider Network. I don't know if this rings a bell, but I was with you exactly one year to the day ago. And I was looking at my slides when I saw 01/22/2025. And happy to be back with you today. I just have a few slides, five, and I wanna give you just a little refresher on what Clean Water Service Providers are and some updates, high level updates on their pace of progress and happy to answer any questions as we go along. Oops, went one slide too far. So what is a clean water service provider? These are entities that were created under Act 76 of 2019, And they were developed with the idea of addressing non regulatory phosphorus pollution reductions in the Lake Champlain Basin and Lake Memphremagog Basin. So we're again having a conversation under the umbrella of our phosphorus reduction goals. And while we've been hearing quite a bit about regulatory progress, our source providers are very much focused on non regulatory progress. So they're trying to find, with the grant money they've been given, projects in their basin that will help address phosphorus pollution. The program was modeled after the designated agency program. And so these Clean Water Service Fighters have some longevity. We do monitor them periodically. They have five year terms and we are looking to see if they're making progress. The most important metric is the phosphorus target. So this is a very new mechanism and it really drives efficiency in the system. When we give a clean water service provider a grant every year, when there's new funding, we give them an amendment, add new money to their pot of money that they're administering. That money comes with a phosphorus reduction target. And so they have to use that money efficiently to go find projects on a voluntary basis out in the landscape. Each CHRIST is assigned to a basin and I'll show you that in the next slide. And CHRIST have to make adequate annual progress in order to stay in good graces in the system. So you can see a map of the state. And again, we're talking about the Lake Champlain Basin and Memphremagog Lake Basins. We do not currently have crisps on the eastern or southwestern side of the state. There are seven crisps, one for each for the Missisquoi, the Lemoyal, the Levenusky, the Otter Creek, the Northern Direct Lake, Champlain Drainage Basin, the Southern Direct and Lake Memphremagog. We have a CLIP staff member in the room. Just want to acknowledge Brian Voigt is here. Brian is the program manager for the Central Vermont Regional Planning Commission and the Winooski QISP. It's also important to acknowledge the role that basin water quality councils play in the system. It's a unique mechanism and exciting things are really happening in these basin councils. The basin councils are attached. There's one council each for each QISP and they're made up of nine seats, two regional planning commission seats, two watershed organization seats, two conservation district seats, two municipal seats, one land conservation organization seat. And the role that they play is almost like a loan committee, but it's more than that. They're voting on projects, they're approving spending, but they're a resource. They're made up of professionals that are working in the base and they're able to help identify projects. There's a lot of robust conversations happening in these meetings. And if you happen to have a chance to attend one, they're public and you'll see the exciting work that's happening in any given meeting. All right. So non regulatory. It's something you have to go looking for. There's a little bit of an entrepreneurial need in this system. And I've been observing over the last three years that the system is running, the Clean Water Service Fires are working with partners and really engaging in some, I would say, colloquially entrepreneurial hustle to look for projects and building relationships. There's some key drivers in the system because it is non regulatory and voluntary. Landowner willingness is a really it's almost the most important thing. You can go out and look for a project and look at a map or look at a lidar and say, hey, this would be a really great place for a floodplain project. But if your landowner isn't into it, that's it. The landowner has to be part of the system. So credibility of the Clean Water Service providers, the relationships, it all really matters to build momentum for reducing for implementing projects and addressing phosphorus reduction reductions. So as I gave some shout outs to the basin water quality councils, I also want to acknowledge all the partners that are in the system and contributing because in addition to landowner willingness, capacity of the system is also really important. Our watershed groups, our conservation districts, they already have relationships with a lot of landowners. They have a lot of credibility. They are not the only entities that are driving projects in the system, but they are a big part of bringing projects forward. And they do a lot of the heavy lifting. And they're a very important part of the system. And we're seeing in basins where there is very robust staff capacity, that's where we're seeing a lot of momentum. So there's a real direct relationship between not just what the CRISP was doing, but really also what's happening in the basin and staff capacity among the partners to implement projects. And it's really important that I put a pin on that. At startup, system was created. First got their first grants in FY 2023. They had three years of funding. We just completed our fourth year of funding, which is just now available to them this month, but they've had access to three years of funding. When the system started up, there was, I don't know, an expectation or thought that there were a lot of pent up projects that were just waiting there to be developed. And in some basins that true, but largely I don't think there was that much out there. There were some old projects that were waiting in wings, but with Clean Water Service Providers, I say this because Clean Service Providers really had to start from scratch and had to they're new entities, so they had to build their own relationships with the partners. There was some storming and forming and norming, if you're familiar with that. So there's been some momentum. And it's also worth noting that it does really take a while for some of these. Even the more simple projects can take a year, a buffer planting. The construction, the siding, working with the landowner could take maybe nine months, a year, whatever. And then the more complicated projects do take quite a long time. There's some highly engineered projects, dam removals or floodplain restoration projects. And you have to go through the multiple phases of project identification and development and then preliminary engineering and final design engineering and then implementation. And on average, it's taking two years. But my colleague Ethan was just mentioning he was involved in a project that took ten years. It's not because the engineer was slow, it was because there was some landowner willingness, but there's a lot of hurdles to go through. And it's just, maybe you were familiar with this dynamic, but it's important to understand you just can't wave a magic wand with this non regulatory work. You have to build time and let the process work its way through and clean water projects have a life cycle.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: Right. So

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: we're making progress. On the screen, you can see we started at zero, twenty twenty three. That was when we were just building the entities and giving them their initial grants. And you can see on this slide different phases of work. So there's implementation projects that are in the bank. There's final design projects that are moving along, call it like a conveyor belt or the pipeline of projects. And you have to jump through the hoops early stages to get to the end. And you can see that when you account for all the projects in the various phases, have over 1,600 kilograms of phosphorus that reduction potential in the clean water service provider system, which is significant. And the rate of progress is increasing. So momentum is building and the storming and forming is kind of subsiding. And there's, I'm not saying everything is perfect, but there's a lot of norming happening and the number of challenges are reducing and there's forward momentum and people are really identifying some cool projects. Yeah, 159 separate clean water projects have been supported through the CleanWire service provider network over the past three years. When it's voluntary, like that's that's a real significant achievement.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: You also have the how much you've spent on those projects in here?

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: I have that on the next slide. I was pretty sure you wanted to know that. So when you look at the amount of project funding that's been available to the CRISPs over the first three years of funding, totals around $19,500,000 When you add in the fourth year, which is now come online, it's about 25,000,000. This have allocated or committed through their book votes, 7,000,000, 7,200,000.0 to projects. And when you look at the phasing of the projects and projects in the system, there's another 13,100,000.0 in identified needs. So there could be a project in design. We know, hey, we've got a it's going to be a $2,000,000 floodplain project. I've already allocated $50 for engineering. So the future need for these projects that are rolling through the conveyor belt of the system is 13.1, rolling over $20,000,000 in identified need for the system. So that's more than the 19,000,000 than was allocated in the first three years of funding. So we're exceeding the need that's been given to the converter service providers and identified projects as of this moment. With the year four funding, the conveyor route will keep rolling. And that availability funding is really key. A Clean Water Certified won't really if you think about how it works, they're not really going to be able to go out shopping for a project unless they know that money is there. So it's like anything that you do, you need to go to the bank first and see what your line of credit is before you can do your home repair, right? If I can't get 30,000, I can't do a $30,000 project. There are many projects and my colleague Brian here behind me can speak to this. There are many projects that are in the hopper. Someone commits for, say, final design engineering for 50,000. But we know the project's a $2,000,000 project. If that $2,000,000 is there is not there, the CLMRS certified is really going to be unable to commit that 50 because they just won't they can't follow the project all the way through. So having some because it takes two years to develop a project, the system almost really needs two years of funding to make projects move forward. Yeah, so that's my top line for you on the numbers. And another really important number I want to highlight is the cost efficiency metric for these projects. The average phosphorus reduction efficiency at the implementation phase for clean water service provider implemented projects across the system is $8,000 a kilogram, which I don't know, you can talk to any other program what they're getting. Like, I'll put that up against anyone for these implementers. And that's really driven by the targets. The targets that these implementers are having is requiring them and their base water quality councils to look for what's efficient, look at what's a good project. And before that wasn't required. So some projects might not be funded, but they're not efficient. So that's that's what's happening. And the good projects are getting funded. You were talking about this in your presentation about efficiency. And this is a really good investment of state dollars at the $8,000 a kilogram. We have developed some other tools of the Clean Water Action Plan. We've received a lot of feedback from our partners and with our limited staff capacity in DEC, plan is really our way of triaging while identifying all the things that need to happen for improving the system and triaging that with our time. And we've made some progress on that. And there's some really exciting projects. I don't want to tip my hand too much, but there's an exciting floodplain project here with the Central Vermont RPC in Waterbury. Again, it's very early phases, but it's it would be a marquee jewel if that gets funded. And there's even some really cool stormwater non regulatory stormwater projects that the Basin five Windwater Service Provider has found. In the midst of all the regulatory stormwater, they were able to find this really awesome project in the South End Of Burlington that they could do above and beyond stormwater work in the middle of on a HOA's property. And so our service partner was able to come in and say, hey, we'll pay for it. If you just give us the land next to your existing stormwater facility, your retention pond, we're going to capture some other stormwater that's flowing from uphill going through your land. And yeah, for the technical experts to give you the full presentation, it's I don't know. I'm excited for the work that's happening. So good things are happening. And yeah, that's my high level.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: You're done.

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: Yeah, that's it. I wanted to hit the highlights and I know it's short and because there's other things that you're hearing from today, but I wanted to extend an offer if you wanted more time on this and we'd be happy to come back and I would love to bring a clean water service provider or two along for the ride. Kind of breeze through the slide, the clean water service providers are VHCB for the Metforminagog, and then we have a lot of regional planning corporations for the other basins. Then in the South Lake, it's a partnership between Poten Meadoway Natural Resource Conservation District and the Rutland Regional Planning Commission for the South Lake.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Thank you. Representative Tagliavia.

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: You said with respect to the one in Winooski, you have you just give us the land. Is that an easement, or is it actual deed to the land to be able to do what you're doing? So there are easements that are required for certain things. So another unique aspect that I didn't focus on for this work that we have not funded before is operation and maintenance. So in the four times we would build a project and like the oven commercial, you set it and forget it, and we wouldn't pay attention to it. And now we've built in this requirement for the Clean Water Service Fires to come back and steward those projects to make sure they're still achieving the phosphorus that they were built to achieve. So we do require an operations and maintenance easement. We also have an easement for access or for yeah, just for accessing the property if the project is very large. So it's a risk reward sort of balance. And we said, okay, if you're going to spend over $200,000 on a project, we want to make sure there's some longevity and that the project stays in the system. So we want to have an easement for that project. So if it's an expensive project, there will be an easement for the design life, which is typically fifteen years. It could vary on the project type, but yes. Maintenance. What kind of maintenance is done? It depends on the practice, right? So if it's a rain garden garden versus a stormwater basin, stormwater basins have to be cleaned out. If it's buffer planting, not a lot. I mean, you just need to make sure that the plants are growing. And so if they died or if they're affected by a flood, then you might have to replant or whatever. So it depends on there's a wide range of costs and practices depending on what the project is that you're implementing. A dam removal might not have a lot of, operation maintenance unless you're doing some floodplain work on a side, and then there'd be o and m on the on the floodplain, itself.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And sorry if I missed this, how are you dividing the money up among the clean water service providers? Like you said, the Windusky one happens, it might be worth pooling some funds. Or how would that higher level decision get made on allocation of resources?

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: Yeah, that happens every year when there's an appropriation and it's based on the phosphorus target underneath the TMDL. And the math is a little bit I rely on my colleagues to do that math but it is formulaic in nature. And so some basins get more than others.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Every year though they get.

[Chris Rutland (DEC Technical Project Manager, Clean Water Service Provider Network)]: Yes. And it's based on the available money. So in general, we've been funding the clean water service providers around $7,000,000 for the system per year. They're allowed some money for admin 15%. And we've tried to fund the smaller basins with a smaller target at a level that can sustain at least one FTE. So that is around a 100,000 and with the math between 8515%, that's around $600,000 for a minimal size of a grant. And then the larger grants, the Missisquoi is the larger basin. Think the Winooski is the second largest in terms of size of grants. We can get you the numbers if you want, but just for ballpark, the Missisquoi is getting somewhere around 1.8 to 2,000,000, depending on, you know, dollars 2,000,000 a year. So there's quite a bit of money flowing into the Missisquay.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: And this slide hopefully gives you a very rough cut at that. Although Chris was speaking to sort of the tweaking that we do for baseline funding, A lot of that's articulated in statute for us that we start with for this first row of what phosphorus can we get out of the regulatory side of the world and what's left.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Where do we find that slide? Is it in our slide deck?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: It's not shared, but I'm happy to follow. This is a backup slide in case you asked. But happy to share it.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: You don't have a backup slide.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: How much time

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: do got now?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: If this is helpful for you or, like Chris suggested, a longer term deeper dive, we were happy to come back and give you more explanation about this. But this is part of what's also being proposed to edit is the noticing of what we call the cost rate methodology. So we have this first approach of how much phosphorus by the ag sector, by the river sector, by the forest sector should be assigned to each clean water service provider based on what we can't achieve from the the regulations in that sector. And then we say, is the average cost by sector to reduce phosphorus? And that's a whole cost rate methodology that we publish and have noticing requirements around. And we assign it dollar per phosphorus for forest area, for ag, whatnot. And then we look at how much budget is available based on what the Clean Water Board has recommended and the legislature has allocated. And so oftentimes, the full target and the full cost is much greater. We get an annual allocation. So we scale those down proportionately. Then we tweak it for things like baseline funding for keeping a person there.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Do others have questions on this topic? Calculator come out. Representative North.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: I'm actually not gonna ask the calculator question, but

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: I wish I could get

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: with you offline to talk about how those numbers pencil out. So I'd

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: wanna just just talk about

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: that. I would be very interested. But in terms of penciling out the numbers, I'm wondering if your if your slide back on number 13, I think it is, where it seems like we don't yet have accounting methods for quite a few of the project types, and I'm wondering if your numbers would actually be higher. Or how much higher do you think they would be if we had accounting types for all those red dots? We had accounting methods.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Terms of what's been reduced. Yeah. Yeah.

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: Then the chart 18 would be even higher, because you'd have actual numbers of margin.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: It's an interesting question. And again, Claire Madden may be the best to speak to this. But I'm showing you a snapshot of this cost rate methodology, which is one of these policy documents that talk about what are the costs to implement the project and then translate it back to what could we get per pound of phosphorus. And so what's integrated into it are the project types where we have the methodology established, and what's excluded from it are the ones where we don't. And so depending on the ones that are still missing, that could increase or lower the average sector cost rate for a certain thing. But there's a lot of science and math and work that our colleagues, Ben Kopans and Claire Madden, if you'd like to speak to them offline, or we can connect them with you. But this is sort of a snapshot to show, for example, for developed lands, what we use to get a sector, a weighted average, is we use the stormwater treatment practices, road erosion control practices, riparian buffer restoration on developed lands and the cost of those, and then what proportion of those practice types really happen on developed lands, and then they kind of factors into $1 So it's a long document, and it's available on this link. And again, we could follow-up with a more detailed dive if you're interested in the math.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Questions? Thank you. Thank you.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: And so one more slide, and I appreciate it. Would you still like to get an update on the regional storm audio?

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: We have until noon. So we would love to hear more and maybe go through the backup slides. But I want this was a specific request, and so I wanna make sure we have time for this.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah. Sure. So this is the Regional Stormwater Utility Study Committee. This committee was very engaged in supporting the passage of Act 37 last year, and we have launched the study committee. It launched in October. We've had four meetings to date. The links on this slide get you to a website that we've launched so that people can access when the meetings are happening. The second bullet is all of the recordings. It includes other recordings that the Clean Water Initiative manages like the Clean Water Board, but you could also direct access the storm water utility materials from the committee website. The first few meetings have been sort of early introductions with the committee members, an overview, getting folks up to speed on what is a TMDL, some of the challenges that the legislators all heard about with implementing the three acre permit and some of those inequity concerns, and then the charge of Act 37. Since then, the committee, the study committee has broken out into work groups around sort of three ish main themes. One is around formation, the incentives and disincentives for forming a utility and how it might operate, the cost to operate that. The second group is about permitting, what it would look like to take sort of the three acre site specific permits and move it to a regional level. And the third work group is looking at revenue raising at both from the local level and then from the state opportunities from the state. So they've sort of themed the charges into these work groups and are tackling that. There's been a lot of creative brainstorming, a lot of diverse opinions on the scale of the solution, not just what is a regional utility. Is it municipal, regional, statewide? So a lot of great healthy dialogue there, But also what is the committee hoping to solve for? And so this nested egg I'm sharing with you, it's just a visual that the committee has used in the last few meetings to think about the scale of the solution with the red being sort of the current state that three acre sites, other than offsets, are trying to treat on-site. The next scale up is that regional stormwater utilities are helping three acre sites. The next scale up is stormwater utilities are helping with all regulatory load reductions within their region, And the next scale up is regional utilities helping with everything that has to be reduced in their region. And so I'd say the committee is very diverse in where they would like to see a solution land. May not get to consensus on all of it, but our goal is to get a work product to you all that really weighs some of the pros and cons at these different scales. So that's what the work groups are wrestling with. And we've had some great healthy interest from other members of the public. The conservation districts attended quite a few meetings and some guest appearances from legislators, including representative Moore and senator Harrison so far. That's that's the update in brief. Happy to take questions.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Questions? Rob, you wanted this update. Do you have more that you would like us to

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: I'm hearing about the slide and what we heard there.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Thank you. Representative?

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: Yeah, I guess my comment is just that it seems like we can't get there fast enough in order to address the issues that we're having with three acre sites, for example, it seems like that this poses a potential solution to those barriers that we're running up against for certain sites and the inability for those property owners to offset other sites that they own, if we can take a more regional approach to planning for even residential stormwater mitigation, then it seems like we can deliver the phosphorus reductions that are required by the TMDL at a lower cost to residential property owners in particular. That's my guts. Yeah, that's what we're trying to achieve with this.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: That makes me want to make it into a question, which is, can you update us on some of the, other I know we've covered some of them already, but I think it was Richmond. There was a I think there's been some forward progress on some of these things, and so an update would be helpful for this committee if one of you is able to do that.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: On challenging sites? Yeah. I think it was you know, we were

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: hitting a learning curve moment and that maybe some of the some of those projects or sites have have found a way forward. And if you can share any of that with us, that would be great.

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: I can offer Southview of Richmond that the town, I don't know if it's completed yet. They are pursuing a special assessment district, I believe. And they have the ARPA funding and the related milestones. Gianna and Rutland recently requested an extension related to part of the funding. So they're moving ahead, I think, with the idea that the town would probably stay as the only permittee, but the residents would be a part of that special assessment district that they would form. And they possibly have

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: access to other dollars

[Representative Rob North (Member)]: through ARPA, or they

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: have access to other dollars.

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: They do have the ARPA PON, permanent containment and assistance.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: We do these stormwater utilities, do you all envision that they would be permanent? Or, I mean, we are right now retrofitting and dealing with preexisting conditions that weren't designed with stormwater issues in mind. But if there's future forward, thinking of nonprofits who have as part of their mission the end of their organization because something they're working on has been addressed. And I'm wondering if you see that as the future of a stormwater utility where, yeah, new development needs to address these things, but it happens in design. Is there an end to insight if we stand up stormwater utilities?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: I think it really depends on the scale that the legislature decides to take up and might be recommended out of the study committee. If the focus is very much on solving for providing funding for three acre projects across the landscape, that feels more short term. But if the scale is to take on other regulatory obligations, like all of the municipal roads within their boundaries and all of their MS4 permit obligations, those might be longer term requirements to continue to invest in the maintenance as such as utilities do. Implement projects, but then they have ongoing operation expenses, whether that be the permitting fees or the maintenance expenses themselves to upkeep the infrastructure. I mean, even with three acre, I suppose there's the infrastructure to upkeep over time and the ability and technical assistance that could be aggregated at a professional level utility versus an individual homeowner or site. So big answer. Probably longer term is is a guess, but remains to be seen, I suppose, what the committee recommends.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And are you familiar with these utilities happening in other states and the scale they've operated at?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: I just read this weekend that there are 2,000 stormwater utilities across the country. There's a great recurring piece of research coming out of Kentucky. Happy to share it with you. It's part of the resources that we share with the study committee about the size and scale of stormwater utilities. Ranges hugely across the country, some of them municipal, some of them sort of multi municipal. Vermont has its own history of exploring stormwater utilities, including state level. And we have seven municipal level ones. So we are aware of a lot of them. Actually, our next study committee meeting in February is inviting a regional utility to come speak to the committee members. They've been around since 2007. I think they're in Colorado. I

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: think so. Yeah.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: And so they're gonna speak to some of the challenges of formation of at a regional level and what their recommendations might be as well. Does that answer?

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: Representative North? When and where are the meetings? Yes, forgot to ask that.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: I was looking. I'm on the webpage. I'm not seeing it.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah, think there's the two I don't know if it's on the landing page, but there's two sub buttons. One is all the materials and one is meetings. And it might be on the landing page or it might be in the meetings one that has all the dates of the upcoming meetings. We also if folks sign up for our listserv, which is linked on that website, we do announcements as meetings are coming up so you can access. And when a meeting is coming up, we'll post the it's a you can come in person. We host them in person at National Life, or there's a hybrid option for anyone to join.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: February 12 from two to 4PM. Representative Logan.

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: Yeah. I'm looking at the list of the members, and I know that this study idea kind of came together very quickly as a need to resolve some unresolvable conflict at the time. And I'm noticing now, it seems like Department of Transportation should be at this table and maybe the conservation districts? Or there seem like some missing voices there in the group. I'm sure they attend they might attend the meetings or something because they're paying attention. But it seems would it be helpful for them to be formally included in this process?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: It's interesting that you mentioned the two of them because we certainly have had conversations with the agency of transportation. You folks are are most likely aware they have their own TS four permit, and they also pay into local stormwater utilities where they exist. So we've already conversed with them and brought them up to speed on the existence of the study committee, invited them to engage with us, and that we're hoping to capture in the recommendations coming out of it, anything that might create some duplicity in revenue raising or sort of double double billing there. And then, yes, the Natural Resource Conservation Districts have had representation at the meetings and have contacted DEC looking for some more formal representation, but we certainly defer to you all to speak to those folks directly if there's interest in changing the committee makeup.

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: Didn't speak agency or transportation method.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Remind us what your timeline is for this work group.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: It'll be longer, but

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: no. That request.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: The report is due next legislative session. So we're hoping to try and get it all wrapped up by the fall and finalized. We're baking in a month or two extra. We do have a timeline that we drafted with the committee that's posted on the website. It is changing by meeting, to be honest, about how we're approaching this work. We've punted to maybe mid summer, early summer, what we're calling the policy discussion. So in terms of what we're doing now is the meat of what do we know about permitting, what do we know about revenue raising, and then what are the key policy questions and trying to bake as much time as we can in the summer for dialogue over where the pieces are that are not what we already know, but more envisioning and scoping. Sorry. I didn't know if you meant the due date or how we're operating.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Great. But you said end of session or begin before the session?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yes, before the next, I believe it would be January 15, as ones usually are, but I can double check report date.

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: Other questions on this?

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Further questions on anything that we've covered with the folks this morning? I am curious about your backup slides.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Gonna get my hand too. You're asking. Yeah. Well, it's a slide deck of 75. So I don't know if you really have backup slides, but You

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: say there's 75 of them?

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah, but also, this is Oh! No, we copy and paste, so some of them may not all be relevant to this. It's messy.

[Representative Kate Logan (Member)]: But we

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: found them. That's awesome. Thank you so much.

[Unidentified DEC staff presenter (Clean Water Initiative/Water Investment Division)]: Yeah. Thank you for your time.

[Ethan Swift (DEC Watershed Planning Supervisor)]: Thank you. Very helpful.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you. Do members have thoughts about what we've heard? We're making our way through the miscellaneous bill section by section, but not in order of appearance. A couple more sections this afternoon. And walk through the markup with my below grading next week where we are. So let me know if you think of anything else along the way that you want to hear about. And then I think we've identified I did talk with Chair Durfee about CAFO changes, and they will look at those. And then we'll check-in with the Ops on the request for emergency rules. That, I guess do you have a question?

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: I just was thinking that it might be, this is just an idea, but I would be interested in visiting some of these sites, like in the spring, you know, and just maybe look

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Clean at different water service provider project sites? Or storm water sites.

[Representative Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: And just look at, you know, for different sites, for different landscapes, what kind of treatment is out there.

[Representative Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: You might be shopping at some of these sites. Mean, really, I would just look at a map. You might be visiting them and not know it.