Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Gonna go over that one first. Yes. And then the and I'll explain the order.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Welcome to the

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: House Environment Committee. We are gonna continue testimony on S three twenty five with the Agency of Natural Resources. Welcome.

[Charles Martin (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Natural Resources)]: I'm Deputy Secretary Charles Martin with the Agency of Natural Resources, and I'm joined by Carla Ramundia, director of the CRJU. CRJU is the Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit. I supervise that unit. Carla directs it and does the day to day work and keeps our compliance on track and our Act 154 work on track. Today, we're gonna be primarily talking about act one fifty four. We're presenting some date pushes to the committee for your consideration. When I started at the agency about a year and a half ago, it was evident to me in a lot of our work areas, but particularly in the CRJU that we had some capacity concerns given the scope of the charges that were kind of laid out in act one eighty It's a really meaningful piece of law that Carlo will put a lot of detail into in a moment here. I think it's meaningful in the context of Act 181 and some of the public process shortcomings in that space, and it will hopefully be meaningful for years to come in the future when we continue to assess environmental benefit and burden. But with that, I'm gonna hand it off to Carla because her expertise are certainly a lot bigger than this case.

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Hi. My name is Carla Raibunti, director of civil rights and environmental justice unit. And I direct a tiny little unit composed of three staff person to environmental justice coordinators and myself. And within the A and R structure, the civil rights and environmental justice unit is the entity in charge of implementing the EJ law. And we're going to talk a little bit more about this. But I do want to thank you, you chair and members of the committee for having me and giving me the opportunity to talk about Act 154, or as we call it sometimes, the Vermont Environmental Justice Law. Thank you. Okay, so the chair has a handout and it's it has three different sections. The rest of you all have two sections, part two and part three. So what I am going to do today is walk you through three aspects of the environmental justice law. Number one, what the law is designed to do. Number two, progress made and that you have in front of you. And number three, a timeline realignment and why it is now necessary to ensure the success of the environmental justice law. Okay, so as a general question for framing and context, the EJ law is looking to answer this one important question. Do all Vermonters share fairly in environmental benefits? And are any communities carrying more than their fair share of environmental burdens? So this is the question that the Vermont Environmental Justice Law that you all enacted is looking to answer. How is the AJ Law looking to do that? Number one, the law created a governance structure. It created the Advisory Council and it created the Interagency Committee. And the idea is that to these two bodies are going to work with each other to balance outputs that the agencies need to implement in order to move forward with the sequence in the EJ law. So, the law is definitely an implementation law. It's actually asking agencies to build systems so that environmental justice becomes part of how they do business and engage with over monitors. So the law has three, four principles. Number one, identify need. And the law has prescribed how

[Unidentified Committee Member]: we're going to identify those needs. And it is through the creation of several tools like the mapping tool. And for example, the creation of a rule making process

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: that would yield a cumulative burden rule for all of the agencies to take into consideration. Improved decision making is the second core promise and include people meaningfully. So those are the three core components of the EJ law. This is how the EJ law is looking to implement its policy and answer the question regarding fair distribution of burdens and benefits. Like I mentioned earlier, law also created the Advisory Council, and the Advisory Council is an entity that's composed of 10 members of underserved historically marginalized communities and 10 covered agencies. And at the center of each of the deliverables in the EJ law, most prominently the more complex ones like the mapping tool and the cumulative burden rule, the Advisory Council is at the center of it. You would ask. By requiring consultation from the Council and seeking advisement from the Council. Now, a basic Egypt principle is that we engage and we consult very early in the process. So, in order for us to get the consultation and the advice from the advisory council that these 10 individuals who represent historically marginalized communities are going to provide, we need to also provide them with effective technical support. And so, this takes us to the second part and that you have in front of you. Second part of the conversation here today is progress made. And we cannot talk about progress made under the EJ law without talking about the responsibilities of the Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit that sits within the agency of natural resources. Implementation is underway. It is real, and it is producing concrete results on the ground. So, the question then becomes, what is the Agency of Natural Resources doing and supporting the implementation of the EJ law and its deliverables across 10 agencies and 10 individuals represented historically marginalized communities? Well, number one, the Agency of Natural Resources is providing technical assistance to the advisory councils. It is providing technical assistance to each of the covered agencies. And as you can imagine, the 10 agencies are very distinct from each other. So this really requires us developing an understanding on how each of the agencies work, their systems, their processes, and their core mission. We

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: very sorry, I have to go to another committee, so it's nothing personal. I'll be back as soon as I can be.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It's okay. It's okay. Thank

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: you. Sure. Then meeting facilitation is also an important aspect of A and R responsibilities that's actually spelled out in the EJ law. Research and policy development provide legal consultation, drafting tools, guidance, implementation, implementation materials, and coordinating the two bodies to ensure that they're actually speaking to each other as they are looking to implement each of the deliverables. And as I mentioned earlier, that consultation needs to happen very early on. Okay, so what have we been doing since 2022? Actually, 2023, because there was a pause. I had a bug on my

[Unidentified Committee Member]: hand

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: so that I don't fall asleep. 2023, because there was a delay. There were some stipulations in sections in the law that were missing. But we've completed all of the following mandates on a timely basis. The core principles of community engagement. These are principles that the interagency committees develop in direct consultation with the advisory council, and the principles are intended to guide the community engagement plans that agencies are going to create. Environmental justice and civil rights reports complaints report to the Advisory Council. Ever since the EJ law was enacted, every year, we provide these reports to the Advisory Council. They respond with recommendations, and we work hard to implement those recommendations. Five year review process of definitions. Ever since the law was enacted, we've been having these conversations with the Advisory Council because this is one of their duties under the EJ law. Environmental benefits spending guidance, the Agency of Natural Resources was asked by the law to create a guidance document that would tell all of the covered agencies how to capture baseline expenditures and where those are being distributed. And this was supposed to be done like three years back. So it's a look back report capturing baseline expenditures. This was due July, 09/15/2025. So we just recently completed that one. That was a big, big undertaking. And then baseline spending reports. So the agencies use the guidance and actually gathered that information and produced it and gave it to the Advisory Council and joint recommendations for definitions and review of the terms in the definition sections, including environmental justice focused populations. That's what we've done. And now what are we working on currently? And I think this is really important to contextualize the following part, which is the recalibration of the deliverables. So, one, mapping tool development. We are actively working on the development of the mapping tool. Two, cumulative burden rulemaking. We are actively scoping the rule itself. Community engagement plans. We are actively working on providing technical assistance to both entities and a subgroup has actually been created that is composed of composed by members of the Advisory Council. And the goal of that subgroup is that they're going to create a guidance document that all of the agencies need to consider when creating their community engagement plan. So, is very important because we're getting feedback directly from community members. Baseline spending analysis. I mentioned earlier that all of the agencies provided baseline expenditures for three years. So now we're in the process of analyzing those baseline expenditures and working with the advisory council so that they can meaningfully engage with the reports themselves. As you may imagine, there are a lot of numbers and tables and programs that are included. So we're helping and supporting the Council in understanding and contextualizing those numbers and the story that they tell. Additionally, we're developing the proportional investment framework, a complaint intake mechanism, and annual agency integration reporting. All of this work is happening concurrently, and we are actively engaging both bodies in all of these areas of work, Which is an important reality to recognize the technical preparation and ensuring that we can have these conversations with the advisory council and the interagency committee is something that starts years prior to the deadline in the law. I'm going to give you an example. The mapping tool consultation started three years ago. The rulemaking orientation began two years ago. This is the Agency of Natural Resources working to provide technical information on the components of those deliverables so that when we consult the Advisory Council, they can actually provide us meaningful engagement. They feel comfortable with the information, and they can produce information to us that then we utilize to build policy. The Community Engagement Plan design started three years ago, and right now we are meeting and today actually we had a public meeting with the agencies, the corporate agencies about community engagement plans. So, this reflects the strong effort and commitment across agencies and community members with regard to the implementation of the EJ law. Part three. Why is the timeline realignment desirable at this time? The issue is that the success, the way that it was intended by the legislative body really requires and centers that the advisory council be meaningfully engaged with and consulted. In order for us to do that, we are providing technical assistance and having conversations with them about one, two, three, four, five, six, seven distinct deliverables in the eject. So, we hold meetings, we cover one topic, then we had another meeting, and we have a cadence. And the challenges that are at the core of this realignment are number one, too much concurrent consultation. This is feedback that we've received over and over from the Advisory Council, and it's been echoed also by the interagency committee members, right? The Advisory Council is concurrently asked to engage in a multiplicity of really complex deliverables. In order for us to do that, we need to engage with them in a way that is resonant to them. So, that means iterations of technical assistance. And so, that can definitely dilute participation. And, you know, if you have an opportunity to look at our public meetings, you'll see that often enough, we hear from Advisory Council members that it's hard to understand the deliverables themselves and how they can contribute to it. Second challenge, system change takes time. You know, these deliverables are really not paperwork. They have the ability to drastically modify the way that agencies engage in business and the outputs that they produce. So, they require agencies, the law requires that agencies provide internal processes, new systems, EJ principles into community engagement practices and permitting processes, etcetera. A challenge that was not foreseeable when the EJ law was drafted was the level of legal consultation. The level of legal consultation that is needed for us to proceed in a way that minimizes legal vulnerabilities and protects this work is extremely high. We are regularly meeting with our attorneys, the Attorney General's Office, the City Generals to ensure that we're moving forward in a way that is legally responsible, given everything that's happening in the national environment. Public engagement needs time. I don't need to say more about that. Engaging members of the public is fundamental, and we when we are working on six deliverables at the same time, and some of the deliverables are due the same day, it is very hard to do that. And then we have the Structural Sequencing Problem, which responds to the rule, the Cumulative Burden Rulemaking, and the mapping tool timing. So, the rule making process would require outputs of the mapping tool to be a meaningful rule that can be intentionally and correct the applied across the board with all of within all of the corporate agencies. So then that moves us to the proposed timeline realignment, which you have in front of you. And I don't think I need to go over the dates and the sections in the law. But these these are some of the complexities that we've been dealing with. So, if there are any questions at this moment, I would I'm more than happy to answer them.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: I have a question. Yes. So, Vermont needs kind of, I think it's twenty seven thousand to 41,000 houses by 2030 in order to have housing for everybody, affordable housing, get the workforce up here. And I'm just wondering, I'm concerned about the timeline, not that it doesn't make sense to me. I'm just concerned that by 2030, we're really hoping to have housing built, to attract people to move here, to attract workforce to move here, lower the cost for everybody in terms of the burden of taxes on people. So I'm just wondering how those two, your timeline and the need for housing to be built in the next four years, how that coincides.

[Charles Martin (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Natural Resources)]: I would I would probably just point out first and foremost that this timeline shift won't have any dilatory effect build

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Oh, okay. I thought we were going to be

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: paying rules and

[Charles Martin (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Natural Resources)]: It can totally support the process to get there and the regulatory process we take, but it'll in no way inhibit growth

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: in housing. I

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: just getting a little nervous. Yeah, no, I appreciate the question and the opportunity to reflect back to the committee that at the core of the EJ law is consideration of actions by agencies. You know, it requires agencies to look at the actions that they will be making. It's not to stop it nor postpone it. And it is the job of the agencies who are implementing the policy and the advisory council to inform ways in which that can be done so that needs on the ground are actually met because that's also at the core of the EJ law is identifying needs that are present within certain communities that are not met or have not been met. So, law, what it is looking to do is to ensure that there's proper consideration. And the mapping tool should be ready by 01/01/2028, and the mapping tool will be incredibly important to inform decision making.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Thank you for that clarification.

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Are there any other questions about what the law does, how we do it, any of the deliverables, the proposed timeline? Yes?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Thank you. I heard correctly before you mentioned step two would have 10 other agencies. What is the makeup of those agencies? Is it all from ANR, or is it scheduled out?

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Yes. So the cover agencies are 10 agencies, and let me see if I can remember all of them, so it is the Agency of Education, it is the Department of Health, the LERB, the Land Review Board, PUC, PSD, ANR is a covered agency.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Yes,

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: AFM, yeah, agriculture. How many have I mentioned?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Lost So

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: they're very distinct. They're very different from each other. And that is an important factor in how we provide technical assistance. And by we, I mean the Agency of Natural Resources by the Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: And the advisory council that this is made up of?

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Yes, and the advisory councils, thank you very much for this question. The advisory council is comprised of 10 members of historically marginalized communities, and there are representatives from food justice organizations, immigration communities, immigrant communities, BIPOC communities, indigenous populations. The Office of Racial Equity also is part of the implementation of the EJ Law. It has a seat on both entities. We also have representative for municipal for mobile homes. We have a municipal representative and we have BHCV.

[Charles Martin (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Natural Resources)]: And those members are tied to the focus populations that Act 154 kind of compels us to consider and kind of the universal thread there, I think that applies to probably everybody's district in this room is I I think category A for FBs for folks' populations is households who are below the median household income for the state of Vermont. So it's pretty widely agreeable demographic for us all to consider when we make

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: regulatory decisions. And so far, I've not heard a word I'm looking for. RPCs? Are they part of your system?

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: I appreciate that question so much, because I am in regular conversations with RPC. Actually, recently, we had a really productive meeting where they shared some of their recent reports that they've produced. And, you know, we are looking into very intentionally engaged with RPCs, specifically around the creation of the mapping tool. So one of our contractors specifically wrote in RPCs to be consulted and be engaged directly during the creation of the mapping tool. They have incredible expertise in this space, and they really know their municipalities.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Disposal planning groups.

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: I'm sorry?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Planning commissions. Planning commissions.

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Yes, planning commissions. No. No. An important an important consideration here is that the corporate agencies are identified, but that does not mean that other entities in governments are included and mandated by the policy statement in the EJ law to consider environmental justice. So, for example, this body falls under and is covered by the policy, the state policy captured in the EJ law. So it is an invitation for all entities in Vermont to consider this four principle.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Thank you.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Chittenden.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Thank you so much for reminding us about this really important work. I just wanted to confirm that the version of S3.25 that we're looking at right now, we had a new version come out this morning that I doubt we've had much of a chance to digest, but it does have the forward date changes that I believe you're requesting for here. I just wanted to either ask if you've seen that or I just wanted to make sure it was included in this conversation that we're working to make those changes. Yeah. PJ's timeline. I have seen them.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Are there any other questions?

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Just in terms of, is it health care part of this? Because I feel like a lot of times with certain communities where they live impacts their health by water, air. And I'm just wondering, is there another group that looks at that like healthcare, or is that included?

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: It is embedded in the EJ Law itself. So it permeates the deliverables, all of them. And the way that the EJ law captures health outputs is through an intentional, very deliberate consideration of where communities are located that are most impacted. And this is going to be an exercise that will be undertaken by the mapping tool project and also by the cumulative burden rule process. I think you want to say something. No, want to

[Charles Martin (Deputy Secretary, Agency of Natural Resources)]: that's fine. Yeah. I think, Representative Austin, more broadly, and this is Karl will probably punch me in the shoulder after this for oversimplifying Act 154. But you can think about that too in terms of if you have a municipal area that maybe needs a health clinic, but there's a number of regulatory prohibitions that prevent said health clinic from being constructed. The EJ law helps us contemplate kind of the byproduct of those protective conservation mechanisms and what they're doing to maybe it could be a health clinic, it could be a grocery store, it could be a lot of other things. So in that sense, it's accounting for it as well. There's something to contemplate. So

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: when you think about the geographic areas in Vermont, it's likely that there are several locations that come to mind when thinking about some of the benefits that other areas of Vermont perhaps have more. So let's let's let's take, for example, food. There's been conversation about food deserts. And so it is part of the EJ law that in consideration of actions taken by all of the agencies that they look at the outputs of the environmental justice mapping tool, and then they do an analysis of cumulative burdens and see whether there's a distribution that is equitable across Vermont when it comes to benefits and burdens. So it will definitely look at all of these aspects, including health outcomes, air quality. And so in making decisions, water quality, correct. In making decisions, this law compels that evaluation. And then the products, the outputs of the agencies should consider what comes out of the EJ law to better inform policy and decisions.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Thank you. Yes, you're very welcome. Thank you for that question.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: That's it. Thank you very much for your testimony.

[Carla Ramundia (Director, Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit, ANR)]: Thank you. You.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Thank you. Thank you very much.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Appreciate it from being lazy.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: You're good.

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: Good afternoon. My name is Billy Costa. I'm the director of planning and policy for the Agency of Natural Resources. I work closely with Charles and Carlo, who you just spoke from. Thank you for having me here this afternoon and for your continued work on S 325. Certainly appreciate the work to move forward a deep level of public engagement with Vermonters around these complex issues of land use, working lands, natural resource protection, rural economies, many of the issues that were at the heart of the conversations we've had around ACT-one 101. And I think doing that work proactively before new legislation or rules are proposed is really important. Similarly, interested in hearing more from the committee, the joint oversight committee, and the intent there. Certainly happy for our agency to participate with you all in whatever additional oversight you deem appropriate, but we'd love to hear some more about what's envisioned there and how we can support that work. Noting that both these provisions seem to be somewhat in response to the rollout of Act 181, I did think it was important just to step back and level set on the history a little bit, just so that we have a full picture of how we got here before we start to try to react to the past. And I just want to start off by saying that concerns with the impact of the road rule in tier three, especially in rural Vermont, did not start with the passage of act one eighty one. Those concerns had been clearly voiced and articulated through much of the debate over H six eighty seven, which was the bill that became Act 181. Those concerns were raised by throughout the legislative process through House members, Senate members from rural districts, advocates that represent rural economic businesses, and Vermonters who came to the State House and said, We appreciate what you're doing, but this feels like a lot to our communities. Those voices were raised again when H-six 87 came to the House and Senate floors and members stood up and explained their votes in opposition to it. And again, when the legislature overrode the governor's veto of H-six 87, folks stood up passionately and said, this is really damaging to our communities. You didn't listen to it. So again, I just want to level set that this was a concern that had been out there for a long time. And you can agree, you can disagree, but this was not something new that came after the fact. My agency, while we generally support the overall intent of AC-one 181, the balancing of incentives for growth and appropriate natural resources protections, we too did flag some of the concerns with how the World War two or three were framed in June. In mid February, I came to this committee and identified that the general nature of the definitions included in that bill had the tendency for tier three to potentially be very large, to include not only hundreds of thousands, but potentially millions of acres in the way those resources classes were defined. I pointed out that there would probably be value and benefit in trying to find better balance between the size of the areas where growth is being promoted through the 1A, 1B areas, and the size of the areas being protected in tier three, just as a good governance and a means to maintain the state's authorizing environment to implement such sweeping change. And I also recommended that tier three may be better served as a bottom up process, where the legislature gave some direction to regional planning commissions, but they work within municipalities and communities to actually identify what those critical areas in their communities and regions are. And I got a fair amount of pushback from this committee, especially on that idea that there had to be some balance and proportionality between increases in restrictions in rural areas and growth elsewhere. A week later, after my testimony, a biologist from our Fish and Wildlife Committee came in and echoed similar themes that, specifically looking at the habitat connector provision of tier three, that it would be difficult to identify just a handful of discrete habitat connectors of statewide significance. That it was probably possible, but it would take some time and a lot of additional analysis, and that our Vermont conservation design habitat connector blocks would be the basis of that. So from our perspective, that large map of Vermont, Vermont conservation design, and those habitat connectors was always gonna be the starting place for this analysis, And that getting to what I've articulated as some visions of a handful, a dozen of these connectors was not an easy task. So we're on the record in February 2024 with those concerns. There had been concerns raised by members throughout the World Caucus was very vocal throughout this time. And I'm not aware of any significant changes to the definitions of the resources included in tier three, the list of resources that were included. I'm not aware of any changes to the bill that explicitly narrowed the scope of any of those resources. Nothing that indicated it was legislative intent that only a handful of habitat connectors should be part of ultimately tier three. And I think those concerns persisted throughout the process, and I'm not aware of any drafting that was done to address them. It certainly may have been folks' intent, but that intent was never communicated to the written word. Later that spring and early March, a series of maps were published that showed the fullest extent of what the road rule and tier three jurisdiction could potentially implicate. And they're alarming. You may recall the whole state was red, with the road rule including really any lands more than 2,000 feet from a state highway, and then these other landscape scale features like headwaters and connecting habitat, there is a lot of potential area that could become tier three. There is, again, a lot of concern raised by legislators, folks from rural parts of the state. And again, I'm not aware of any significant changes to the bill that were made in response to those maps. We get to the spring, and in May, H-six 87 was passed by the legislature. There were some dissenting voices from rural communities who pointed out these concerns. And then again, in June, the legislature chose to override the governor's veto, again, with some rural communities dissenting. So that is the process. There is debate. The work you do is hard and important. There's different views and perspectives. But I just wanna be clear that these concerns around the road rule and tier three and the potential expansive nature of them were voiced by many. And while it may have been people's intent and thinking that they would be addressed, I'm not aware of specific actions taken by the legislature to be responsive to those concerns before that bill is passed.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Now, Act 181

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: is law. It creates the new Land Use Review Board. They're seated in 2025. Act 181 requires the LERB to develop a final draft of the Tier three rule by February the next year. So in just about a year from when the LERB is seated, they need to engage in a stakeholder process, a public process, navigate these complex environmental science issues, and deliver a public draft of a rule for public consumption. Prior to the passage of Equity One, the then NRB chair sat in this room and said, That's not enough time for all the work that the LERB's gonna need to do. They're gonna need to just figure out how to be an entity. They're gonna have to have internal systems in place. They're gonna have to develop a working relationship, and then they're gonna have to do all this work. We need more time. And again, those calls were not heeded by the legislature. Eventually, the LERB convened the Tier three working group in April 2025. They had a clear prescribed group of stakeholders from Act 181 and a timeline that they had to operate under, to their credit, the LERB did broaden that stakeholder group to basically anyone who wanted to participate who had some expertise or interest in these issues. So it was a group that was more representative and broader than what was prescribed in ACT 181. By necessity, the LERB issued early draft maps that summer, because they had to go out to public hearings, they had a whole series of statewide events scheduled in the fall, and they had to deliver a final rule by that February. So, they needed to get that ball rolling, and they started at the most expansive place. Some people have criticized those initial maps as the thing that turned the car into the ditch. But I would say that the LER was doing what they interpreted, that they're implementing the letter of the law, they're doing what they believed legislative intent was, and they're doing what their stakeholder said. After those maps were published, members of that working group were advocating for further expansion of tier three. For some time, additional natural communities, some folks wanted prime ag soils added. So there was not the momentum of that group was not to narrow at that time, it was to further expand. In the 2025, the Laird did a series of public meetings around the state, and they started to hear it from people. And in response to those public meetings, they then took very seriously the message that these are going too far. We're hearing from these communities that are impacted, and began to work hard with the stakeholders to reduce both the area of the tier three coverage and to increase the exemptions for development within those areas. And they undertaking that work up until very recently when they stopped. I don't wanna cast blame, I don't wanna kinda dredge up the past, but as you're looking at means to provide oversight to the work of the executive branch and to engage the public, I just wanna be clear that these concerns began in the legislature. They began through your work crafting this law. And once the lawyer got it, their hands were largely tied on what the outcome would be. And many of us intended that tier three was to be this broad look at resources. We raised those concerns with the legislature. There was maps published that showed those concerns, and no action was taken in amending the law to clarify that that was not the intent. That was the assumption many of us had to operate under. So not casting blame, just sharing the history as I understand it. I know people are starting to think about, you know, when did this go off the rails? And I don't know that there was any one point, but I think not maybe heeding some of that early feedback from our rural communities may have been the spark to all of it. So, with that said, our agency supports the engagement that you're proposing the LERB undertake. I think being as less prescriptive as possible there and really framing that as a dialogue with the monitors around land use, economy, and regulatory issues, and especially non regulatory solutions to maintaining our open and working landscape is gonna be important. So I think you've struck a good balance there, but even being less prescriptive to really get the undirected feedback of Vermonters could be valuable. And I hope that you find the resources to do that work. And then I guess I would just have a question to you all on the joint oversight committee. Certainly, the legislature has a great deal of oversight of executive branch agencies. We come in at your behest during the session. You are able to promulgate laws that direct our activities. You approve our budgets. You review our rules through the LCAR process. And we're happy to do more if that's not sufficient, but it would be really helpful for us to understand what the focus may be. The current language is fairly broad. It's ANR and its permit processes. As you know, we implement dozens of permit programs across three departments. So, again, not saying that this is something we necessarily oppose, but the idea of potentially participating in joint hearings up to eight times during the off season could be a significant resource burden on us. So, we would just like to know what is missing in your current oversight. And if there's something we can do to fill those gaps, we're happy to do that. I'll also note that the joint oversight committees I'm aware of are usually more issue focused. I know there's one related to carbon reduction that the House Energy and Digital Services Committee was recently considering reinvigorating. They're less targeted on the specific operations of particular agencies. So that just it was another reason I wanted to kind of ask that question of, you know, is there something we're not doing? Is there information you're not getting through our normal lines of communication that is intended to be filled with the factory? So I'll leave it there and just put it to any questions or if there's things that our agency can provide to help you all kind of wrap this work up this session, we'd be happy to watch.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Thank you. If there are any questions for our presenter? Thanks,

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Billy. I'll respond a little bit to your last question, but also bring our chair into the conversation that she just returned from another committee. I think this is a piece we need to just finish getting specific on. I think the question to our committee is willing to engage in the legislative oversight, but would love to understand what it's really trying to get at. And I guess I just Personally, I have been articulating with people that I think if a group of legislators had been engaging with the lurb and really hearing monthly updates over the, particularly, felt consistent for past year, over this past off session. I think I personally would have felt much more prepared and would hope that our body would have been much more prepared to take earlier action this session, in line with what we're doing now, frankly. But potentially, we could have gone a lot further, like, for example, actually getting a public outreach and engagement process off the ground. So I guess I am looking for just the intensity, as you described, of what we charged the lurb with. I wish it had come with a very deep engagement during that So years of that's just what I see as the opportunity and have been sharing with folks. But I would love to turn this around and ask you a question about the resource intensive nature of these kinds of things. So I guess I'm curious in your experience, seeing how these sort of off session engagements can go. And it's not always oversight committees, sometimes it's some

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: other

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: work. Regardless, it takes staff time from agencies to often be presenting and be present. I guess I'd be curious to see here what's been most effective in your experience with off session engagement with legislative committees. Sure.

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: So I think having a really clearly articulated kind of scope and intent, why are we gathering? What is the information or the question that you all have for us? Is there information we can provide you in advance to make those meetings more efficient? You know, good advance notice so that we can be prepared for those always helpful. But that's kind of why I asked that question of, you know, is there something missing? Is there something specific you're looking for from our agency here? Because we do have a lot of transparency in our work. You know, the LERB example you gave, all their stakeholder meetings were almost all of them were public. They're recorded. They did public meetings broadly. You know, there was, you know, any legislator who was interested in that work was certainly welcome to engage through that pretty transparent process. Similarly, you know, all of the permits that we issue have many of them have public comment periods and, you know, ways for folks to have transparency into that work. So again, I would just ask if the charge seems very broad, the agency processes, if there's something specific, I acknowledge there's been a lot of conversations about, well, it's permitting this year, right? Is that a tension point that you would like to focus on more than you're able to during the session? If so, we can figure out a way to do that. But without knowing the kind of nature of the oversight or the gaps that exist, it's hard for me to say what that resource impact will be. If it's just me or Charles showing up and giving you a briefing on something, that's, we can manage that. If we're bringing program staff in during their field season to give presentations or walk through complex rules, that's another level of resource drain that we're certainly willing to do if there's a real necessity for it, but just trying to understand that a little bit more before we get into it.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Others have questions? Senator Boston.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: So I'm just thinking, like four years ago, I think from a lot of just meetings, very clear to us that it was unaffordable to live here. And we heard that really, really loud. And I feel like the legislature has taken three different avenues, housing, healthcare and education to lower the costs of the monitors. And it just seemed, I don't want to go on a rant here, but I do want to just talk about the proposals that we've been making. And I think in-

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Representative Elsa, I want to make sure we're talking about 03/25. We have legislative council to walk us through the next draft right now. So you can keep it to

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Well, just wanna say,

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: think the legislator has been doing what they think to respond to the affordability issue. I see I I guess if you have any solutions that we haven't thought of, let us know, because I think that's what we're trying to do.

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: Sure, happy to think some more about that.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: Okay, great.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And just to respond to your questions about the oversight committee. For me, I think it is about, in fact, engaging legislators in what we should be doing, anyway, but it gives us a structure to do it and be able to engage with the LERB and the Agency of Natural Resources on legislative intent questions before they come up. I also will say that, in particular around Act two fifty, but also to some extent in the Agency of Natural Resources permitting, there are frequent constituent issues that come up, they get brought to their representative. And then a statewide statutory change is proposed based on something that may or may not warrant that. And so for me, is an avenue for those help, I'm having trouble with this to facilitate a conversation and dive in a little bit deeper and say, is this a systemic problem that we need to look to a statutory change, or is this a one off problem from any number of potential sources that needs to just be addressed within existing statute and resources? So for me, it's like just facilitating conversations around those things, which is, just to follow-up, broadened a little bit from what Representative Chapin said, which is our tangible experience of that this year. But it goes on every year.

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: No, I think that framing is helpful and, I think, really positive to say, how is this stuff working? I think the more that you all can understand our day to day work, the better. It is incredibly complicated. You deal with a lot during the session. It's hard to get at that level. Yeah, again, that sounds reasonable to me. Think to the extent that there's ability to kind of frame up a little bit more clarity around what that engagement looks like, I think the kind of nomenclature of an oversight committee kind of suggests more of like a directive relationship than an information sharing relationship. And that may be the intent. And if so, that's fine. But you know, I think the way, Chair Sheldon, you framed it was more of us all just working together to make sure folks are understanding how things work, what's going on, whether, legislative action is necessary and appropriate, and give you a space to think about that rather than someone just showing up here in January and trying to make it out.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Do you feel better at work for us?

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: You don't have to think about exploration. We've up twenty four hours. Yeah, I'll think about it. Like exploration, I don't know, I'll think about it.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: I think We'll think

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: about it. This was helpful for our context. Yeah, I think, again, we're happy to engage with you always. My understanding, I wasn't here, but we did some kind of deeper dives into our budget and some other stuff right after crossover when we had a slower agenda that seemed like it was a well received. So it seems like it's those sorts of conversations when we go the next level into our room.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: All right,

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: thank you. Representative Norton?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Yes, I would suggest, actually, that last topic, already do that on a regular basis. I don't need to be part of what do want to call it, legislative environmental oversight committee. Already, point B, when I get a constituent calling me with issue, I find the right person at ANR and point them there. And if they don't get the answer that they need or that they want, then they get me involved and we have a conversation. And then if it does turn out, oh, that's something that we ought to bring forth, then we can come back in January and bring it forth. I don't know if we need mean, we all should be doing exactly that every day with our constituents and appointing them to the proper, whether it's ANR or anybody else, any other agency. I see the need for a standing committee of just a few of us to have special privilege over making those kinds of decisions. I really strongly disagree with the final.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Representative Pritchard?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: I'm assuming we'll get we can the time to bring that up is during committee discussion about them. Okay? Yep.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Thank you.

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: Great. Thank you. Good afternoon. Stay

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: cool. Yeah. We need a fan. Much cooler in appropriations. Do folks need a break? Know Ellen's right outside the door so we can get going on the walk through. Please join us.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Ellen Chittenden, Office of Legislative Counsel. I'm here on S three twenty five, draft 3.2, dated 04/28. The changes from the prior draft are highlighted in yellow. Would you like me to jump to the first highlighted change? Okay. So the first change is on page four. This is in the interim housing exemption section. And this is your committee has been discussing about changing the phrasing for interim housing exemption number two, which is the 50 units of housing for either in the village centers and a quarter mile around it or the urbanized areas. And so you were discussing a couple of different changes because originally from the Senate, it came over with some of the language around 10 acres struck. But I think based on the discussion you were having, you're more interested in it being about acreage of disturbed land. So, the exemption so the language on the top of page four now reads, notwithstanding any other provision of law to the contrary, until 01/01/2028, no permit or permit amendment is required for the construction of housing with 50 units with 50 or fewer units constructed or maintained on a tract or tracts of land with 10 acres or less of disturbed land and then located entirely within. So, I think you were considering a proposal to strike reference to the tracks of land. And all of the Act two fifty jurisdictional triggers have that phrase in it. They all have construction of improvements or construction constructed or maintained on a tract or tract of land. So, I do think you should be a little cautious about taking that out. And especially if what you're going for is about disturbance as opposed to I just think it's a little more clear to say which aspect of it you're trying to incorporate.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Talk about why people may be concerned or unable to just subdivide. To what? Subdivide. This is all about existing language that two people don't want to subdivide.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So I do think some of the existing language in Act two fifty is about making sure people don't disguise their project by subdividing. And so that's why tract or tracts of land is there in case they put in a, you know, a parcel division between two things, which is actually one parcel or actually one just just one project.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Project two parcels.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah. And so that so so doing that when it is actually going to just be one project, it's one developer doing one thing, has been in Act two fifty as a as a decision that that is not a way you can get out of the statute. I'm not sure I've heard test I haven't heard a lot of the testimony you all have heard recently, so I'm not sure if I can

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Maybe what you could help us with is just remind us of the number of parcels over the number of years. I don't know if that was part of the concern, but that then would trigger Act two fifty. But in both of these cases, I think we're talking about one subdivide, one divide going towards your it's different in one acre versus 10 acre towns. Can you remind us of that? How many parcels can you subdivide before triggering?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Sure. So for subdivisions, it does have a 10 acre town versus one acre town distinction. In towns that are zoning and are known as 10 acre towns, the subdivision of 10 or more lots triggers an Act two fifty review. In town without zoning, which is normally a one acre town, six or more lots being subdivided triggers the review. There's also a special rule for if they're going to be if lots are going to be sold by public auction, it's five or more lots being subdivided. So that has come up before. For the housing construction jurisdictional trigger that exists outside of the interim housing exemptions, there is this concept of the 10x5x5 rule. Not sure if that's an issue here, but for the general jurisdictional trigger of the construction of 10 or more housing units, it's 10 or more housing units within five miles within five years. Again, that concept of making sure that people don't disguise their projects by slowly spacing them out in order to not have to go through review, a project that is actually going to be large, but it's then stretched out, which may have further sprawl impacts, is captured by whether or not the project is going to be completed within five years of other construction and within five miles of it. And then, but the 10 acres or less, I feel like I'm missing part of your question. Did I address your question?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Think so. Okay.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So there's some slightly different considerations here because it is an interim housing exemption.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Yeah. Was that a?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Wasn't this it was discussed by Senator Matas when he came in and testified. He was talking about a specific piece of land that actually was larger than 10 acres, but like rock outcropping behind us here, not all of it was actually usable.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Is this a question for representative?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I'm just trying to reorient what this specific amendment was trying to address. Is the 10 acres seem to be the question? And if it's a 12 acre or a 15 acre piece, but only 10 acres is actually usable because of slope or something like that, I thought that's why this actually came about. It just didn't want us to lose sight of why this is actually in here.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: I think they were just large parcels. There's two examples of large parcels that didn't want to subdivide. Do members have further questions, John? Go ahead. Representative Nora?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: I think to point of this, the College Council, that if you have two abutting parcels, and my understanding that after 52 abutting parcels that are owned by the same person, that's counted as one, right? You can't just subdivided off the claim, oh, now I'm going to just do this, and the Act two fifty permit applies to the whole thing.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It may be. So it is part of the overall, yes.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: There was some discussion about the definition of disturbed land and whether that aligned with the rule of the municipal exemption. Can you help shed any more light on that? I wasn't here for the end of that. Maybe I missed the punch line. Did I miss the punch line from the attorney? Oh, no. She didn't go back to us, actually. The lawyer of attorney.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: There are some people listening nearby, potentially if you'd like to hear from the Land Use Review Board.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: They'll talk about it? They

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: only let me know that they had submitted some language. So so in statute for the commercial jurisdictional trigger, it's 10 acre 10 acres or more in terms of zoning, one or more acre in towns without zoning. And the phrasing on that is involving 10 or more acre or one or more acre. And then the same is true for the public projects, municipal, county or state, 10 or more acres involved. The distinction is made in the rules, however, that for these two different types of projects, commercial versus public, the area referred to as involved land is different. For commercial or industrial projects, it is the entire parcel. That is what the 10 acres is referring to. But for the public projects, it is the land that is physically disturbed. And so the language that's being used on page four, the grammar doesn't line up with some of the other phrasing. And so I was trying to capture what you were discussing about disturbance. So when you use disturbance, physically disturbed is a higher amount of land. It's more than just it. It's about the amount of land that has been physically disturbed by the construction. So that's more

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: land. It'll be less than involving.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It takes more land to trigger that because it's a larger amount. Whereas in a commercial project, it's the size of the partial regardless of how much land is being physically disturbed on the site.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: We're coming at it from the opposite side. That's fair. Yeah. And I think the other thing is, I think for stormwater, they use disturbed land, which is why it's a word that was in my mind.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So I think making sure that I'm clear on what your intent is would be important just because if you introduce a new kind of phrase here, having different language than is used for other parts of Act two fifty can cause some confusion or ambiguity.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Any more thoughts on this?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: It makes sense to me.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: What I heard from the Lord today, this afternoon, was that they didn't think this quite was the right balance, and they were going to get back to you or to us. I personally don't feel like I'm involved with acres versus disturbed. Anything in that range, I think gets at what we're trying to do here as a committee, trying to be responsive to the concerns we heard from the Senate and the two developers that came in. I think anything in this realm of involved or disturbed, if one is a little bit more acres than the other, to me either one would be exceptional.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: They bring back. Thank you.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: The next change is on page seven. This is, section eight. This is about the public engagement plan that you're asking the LERB to develop with a consultant. So there's been a few additions here. On or before 01/15/2027, the Land Use Review shall contract with a non governmental organization to develop recommendations for a public engagement plan inclusive of the full range of stakeholders. This plan shall be in compliance and coordinated with the requirements of 3VSA Chapter 72, the Environmental Justice Chapter. And it then has the requirements that the contractor shall have expertise and all these things, and that hasn't changed. The purpose of the public engagement plan would be to gather statewide input from Vermonters to inform the General Assembly on the risks of losing working lands, both agricultural and forest land, and critical natural resources not already well protected by current land use policy, permitting programs, or other regulatory tools, including rare natural communities. Onto the page eight, forest blocks, habitat connectors of statewide significance and headwaters. An equitable, efficient and effective regulatory and non regulatory tools to protect those working land these working lands and critical natural resources. On or before 03/15/2027, the Board shall submit the report with the recommended public engagement plan to the House and Senate committees. And then there is also a proposal for an appropriation here. So in fiscal year 2027, some amount of money is appropriated from the general fund to the board to hire the contractor for the public engagement plan design. Just one small flag I should have said, I just wanted to make sure you all knew. This bill was reviewed by the editors in our office, so there are a couple of small things that were changed that I didn't highlight. Like on the prior page, commas were changed to semi polans. So there's a couple of small grammatical things. And, like, statewide was capitalized in the prior version, and they have corrected that. So there's a couple of those throughout the bill as well.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: There's an issue where in the beginning it says a plan with recommendations and at the end it says a report. So I was thinking it should say on line 10 on page seven, nongovernmental organizations have developed a report with recommendations. Okay. And that's clear. And it's clear that the NGO is developing the report.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Sorry, Sarah, what's up, please?

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Page seven, line 10. I think we should add the word report in there to make it aligned with the The engagement plan report. To develop a report, including recommendations for a public engagement plan or something like that. On that last sentence where commas were switched out, I think with Or no. There were four items in this sentence that goes from line 13 to 16. There's sort of four bullets that got made into a long sentence with semicolons, one of them was taken out. So the last thing says, and facilitation on public policy topics and a proven history. Don't think that makes sense. Think facilitation on public policy topics, this would be the third thing.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Another.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: And then another semicolon, and then and a proven history. He's found on page seven. See that? I've been on 15. Okay. I've been four things with semi colons before, and now there's A change of debris.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Another just technical question on verbiage on line 11 of page seven, where it says comma and then the new little phrase inclusive of the full range of stakeholders. Does that phrase inclusive of the full range of stakeholders apply to the plan or to the nongovernmental organization? What does that mean? That's a great question.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Says a public engagement plan that includes the full

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: That would make more sense to me. Let's see if it

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: does, though. That includes we're going to engage public.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Plan has to engage stakeholders. We're going to just include

[Billy Costa (Director of Planning and Policy, Agency of Natural Resources)]: Engagement of stakeholders? Sure.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: What are you proposing changing that

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: with? We're able to engagement plan that includes the full range of stakeholders.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Okay. Change the little comma. Take the comma out and just put it back, and then change it to include to place above.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: And then a little farther down, in this section B1, so I suppose there were some changes made there, both by my request, but then also I think by the editors. So it used to say the risks of losing critical natural resources and then including agricultural soil, forest blocks and working lands in that. And then we put working lands at the risks of losing working lands and critical natural resources. But ag soils and forest blocks are both working lands and critical natural resources. So there's just overlap between our natural resources and our working lands. So I'm trying to not totally separate them because I'd love to see ag soils back in this list of the end. It looks like somebody took out ag soils. I can suggest just adding ag soils before rare natural communities. I think that's what I would prefer to do.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Why does it say oh. That's

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: a little awkward because working lands and critical natural resources overlap, so I think that's creating a challenge a little bit. So can you say it again?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: I would just add. Let's just start with the problem we're trying to solve, which is just that ag soils were taken out. I think, like, what do you think that we should put them in? We're definitely losing them from that report, which is a And then you're suggesting before rare.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Or after that piece got put in.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Just a river to be with the working lands and agricultural. What

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: are you on, man? On page eight? I

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: guess so.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: That's fine. You're suggesting

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: I'm on page seven.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Ag soil. Sorry,

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: go ahead with your suggestion. Including? So I would leave the first two lines, and then I would just say after regulatory tools, including greater natural communities and conserving ag soils at a little better.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: So in the lure of the testimony today, they have questions that they would ask, this public engagement plan. It looks like this section, section eight answers your questions. So I'm just trying to see that we have thought about that. Is that a good? Yeah, when I answered some of her questions when they were here, she said the rest

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: of this is probably not really pertinent in that case.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: North. Thank you,

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: madam chair. This one question is more for us rather than for those council, I'm wondering if we might be so bold as to specify a nongovernmental organization or organizations that we're interested in suggest we heard specifically from the LAOB and BCRD, Gene Hamilton and Paul Costello, that seemed like they would be really good at this. I don't know if we would be so bold as specifically say those are the two we'd be interested in, or leave it up to the learner.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Well, so we explored that and actually found there's very little precedent. We don't usually do that in statute, and it's a little awkward, particularly given that they may do a competitive bid. We may yeah.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: And that organization might not be required in statute since they're not governmental?

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: I can just think of some organizations that

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I would rather not do. Yeah, fair. I

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: think we have a good oversight committee.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: We'd like to back to the committee for approval.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And that's why there's some language about the expertise required to try to suggest organizations that have that expertise. Limit

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: the list of possibilities.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And we're going to hear from two tomorrow, two others. Directly from the current director of the CR, Rural Development and the Conservation Districts.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And so there is no so in subsection D on page eight, there's there is an affirm amount here. And so you for the appropriation. So if you'd like to include an appropriation, you're going to have to pick a number before you voted out.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: It seems to me like it might be helpful to take testimony from the groups you were talking about tomorrow to hear sort of like back of the envelope. That's the plan. Okay, great. About how much it would cost

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: to do something. Yeah. Great.

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: I just want to kind of I really like Paul Costello's process. I mean, it may not have to be dim, but I really appreciate his process. It seems like it would come out with a fair, what about outcomes?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: And he's retired. So part of why we invited him was to just kind of get an objective, I've done this for my career, but he's been out of it for a number of years now, Perspective. Try to why we invited him in.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: All right. So next, there are a couple of very small changes in Section nine. Section nine is creating the Joint Legislative Environmental Oversight Committee. So this is the committee that's set up with five members of the legislature to oversee the Land Industry Review Board and the Agency of Natural Resources. So, on page nine, there are two small changes that were requested by JFO. I don't know. Did you guys have JFO in? No. Okay. Well, JFO looked at this and was trying to calculate how much this committee was going to cost. So you did have already in here that the committee may meet eight times during adjournment. They wanted to be clear that that is eight times per year, given that at the moment this committee is going to last for three years. Perhaps it could be extended longer. They just wanted to make sure that it was very clear so they can plan for that. And then also on line 16, administrative, it previously said administrative and technical administrative, technical and legal services from Joint Fiscal and the Office of Legislative Council. It didn't seem like this committee is doing highly technical other than reviewing statutes and or maybe budgets. And so maybe technical is confusing about and or vague about what these offices would be required to do. In the past, there have been more in-depth committees that have required, you know, economic modelling. And so, this is just clarifying that it will be administrative and legal services. JFO believes their fiscal calculations and advice about budgets falls under administrative, not technical. Those are those changes.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Is there an estimate from JFO on the cost that they do well? Fiscal?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: They have a formula for how much meetings cost based on how many members there are. It's approximately $275 per legislator per meeting. So that's less than $1,500 per meeting for five legislators times eight, so 9,000. 24 meetings. Yeah.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Twenty four years, right?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah. And so every year in the general assembly's budget, there's a set aside for standing committees for the amount that they intend to have those meetings. So that is a cost that they build into the budget if things are enacted.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Okay.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Next

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: change is on page 16. This is in section 11. It's the elements of the regional plan. And so I think think you heard testimony about this language last week, but language is being added to the downtown and village center land use category. And then similar language is also being added later in the bill because this is about the Community Investment Program. So page 16, line 11. Only centres containing buildings that are listed on or eligible for the National Register of Historic Places qualify for benefits from the State Community Investment Program established under Chapter 139 of this title. So there is some more discussion of this later in the bill, but you will recall that the State Community Investment Plan program has the Downtown and Village Center designation, the Planned Growth Area, and then the neighborhood designation. And those areas have access to a number of incentives. And for downtown and village centers, it is based on the number of criteria that each centre addresses and or has incorporated into the town. And so it's a step system. And currently, is a requirement for the higher steps that there be part of the centre eligible or on the National Register of Historic Places, which means the buildings are older than 50 years old. Other newer, younger buildings are going to be centers are going to be eligible now under this program. And so, this adding a change that only those older centers will actually be able to qualify. And I'm happy to talk about that more if you want to jump to the other language.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: We did some testimony that testimony with this, and so I think I'm going to ask if you'll read their input and help us find our way here, because we're still sorting out how future land use maps interact with the community investment program. And I We're very aware of time and how much this is sort of complicated, but if there's a thing we can do to start to help us understand and define that relationship better in the new paradigm, that'd be great. Otherwise, I think we have to also keep in mind that we need to move on.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: Do you think it could take a lot of our effort?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Do you want to jump to the rest of that language?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: A good idea.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Because the only other change in between there is an editor proposed change, which is that on page 19 in the definition section, generally now in statute, we say as used in this chapter, and it's then the definition. So taking out the rest of that sort of longer sentence. But otherwise, jumping to page 25, this is section 16, title 24, fifty eight zero three about the designation of downtown and village centers. So you're already making a couple of small changes in this section. But based on the request for that change in the regional planning section, I wanted to make sure it lined up with the statutory requirement in the designation section. So on page 25, this starts to talk about what the requirements are for this this designation. And so line six, step one is established to create an accessible designation for all villages throughout the state to become eligible for funding and technical assistance to support site based improvements and planning. And currently it says all downtown and village centers shall automatically reach step one upon approval of future land use the regional map by the LERB. So the regional planning commissions, they're going through their updates to their maps and their plans. They're using the new land use categories that are established in eight 4348A. And any areas that they're designating as downtown and village centers under that category automatically become designated downtown village centers in the new community investment program.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: That's in statute now. Yes. That's what it

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: says on page 25. And so I've added language here to try to match that language we're just discussing, which is that all downtown and village centers with areas that are listed on or eligible for the National Register of Historic Places shall automatically reach. I'll take a step back for a second. So, the Regional Planning Commission goes through its mapping process. They identify the areas that are downtowns and village centers, which is one category. When they go to the LERB and if it's approved, those areas automatically become designated downtown centres and village centres, and they automatically reach step one. Step one has a few incentives that go along with it. There are also step two and step three. As you rise up the steps, more additional incentives become available to the town. So some of them are tax credits that are referenced in the next section of this bill. But there are a number of other grant programs associated with the community investment program that towns would have access to. So the prior state designated area program required more work on behalf of the town, the new community investment program had sort of an automatic first step. Any town that the RPC had mapped a downtown and village center on automatically were put into this program. So I do think that did envision a lot more towns being able to join, being added to the program because the town itself didn't necessarily have to do much work to reach step one. And so you were discussing last week the testimony that this language is related to about a lot more towns being added to the program, but the program capacities maybe not being added as increased proportionally. So I think that's what you were considering with this language here that's being added.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: They're Oh, it's Carol.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: They're Chapin. So what we're hearing from the lurb and from, we also got a message from Charlie Baker the RPCs is that their review of today's bill is that it has the impact of disqualifying a lot of towns from having centers that are already on the RPC future land use maps. And I don't really follow that. It certainly doesn't feel like our intent at all. I don't really see how that's true in this language. But I'd like to hear your opinion on that. What we heard from the LARR today and now also the RPC.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Mean, I think it could do that. Yeah. Explain how it would Yeah. Well, sure. So it says that only those centers that have buildings eligible, so 50 years or older, would be eligible for the State and Community Investment Program. And then only those centers with areas eligible for listing will automatically reach step one. So, I don't know the universe of towns that have no buildings eligible or areas eligible for the National Historic Place, but there probably are some.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: I don't know what steps. Is that a community investment program steps? Yes. So this is sort of like a under these regional plan land use categories for right now, downtown and village centers as a land use category for regional mapping. And so basically in this section at the top of page 16, there's a circular reference. It says village centers seeking benefits under investment program will be part of this downtown and then only centers without the historic element are eligible for the community investment program. Is this the circular reference that's the problem?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Names of these two things are the same, and they are tied to each other.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Names of which two things?

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: The regional plan future land use map land use categories are directly tied to the community investment program categories. So something that is mapped as a downtown or a village center automatically under the community investment program becomes a step one center, a downtown and village center. I do think it is confusing that they have the same name,

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: but they are direct Same definition. They are Yes, they're directly linked. So, okay. So then we also heard of somewhere, I can't remember who was in testimony or on the side conversation, that the Department of Housing and Community Development could make rules that would address this. We don't need to do this. Is there an easier way to do what we're trying

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: to do? It does really depend on what you're trying to do.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Yeah. The thing that we're working around is the line eight and nine.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: We're trying to borrow Yeah, I'm still confused. I thought it was line four and five, where it says, Village Center's superintendent benefits under the Community Investment Program. But is it the new edit, lines eight and nine,

[Rep. Sarah "Sarita" Austin (Clerk)]: that will raise the circular reference?

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Well, no, but it expands the program to non historic areas. And the concern we're hearing is that there's already not enough resources to do this work, and historically, we're trying to narrow their request, which would also just take out changes in eight

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: and nine. Right. I think we've also heard really good testimony in one way or another that municipalities, especially those that have seen a lot of flooding the last number of years, really need the opportunity to create new village centers.

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: You just answered one question.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: That's what I was going bring up. We're going encourage development outside of an area that may be historic, but is flooded, how are we gonna do that?

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: And I hear you, Ellen, saying we don't really know how many municipalities would want to take advantage of that. It's unknown universe right now.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: That are eligible for historic register? No. That are kind of

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: the emerging new centers. Oh,

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I I don't have any idea.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Also, the village area versus the village center. And village centers are not required to have public water, wastewater zoning or subdivision bylaws. But they could be a planned new emergency center without any of those things. Who's

[Rep. Rob North (Member)]: planning it

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: if they don't even have those things? That's lines 91011.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Water and wastewater makes sense.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: That's it for the changes from the last draft.

[Ellen Chittenden (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes. Oh, no. No, it's not. I did just want to say one other thing, that I do think the language is being added. This is a policy that is a statutory change that it's a policy change that needs to happen via statute. The department does have some authority about guidance around this program, but if you're intending to limit or change the eligibility that needs to happen in statute. And then finally, on page 26, the the date changes for the environmental justice are added. And so there are four date changes, and I believe you just heard about them a little while ago. So everything in section 18 is new. So it's state environmental justice implementation of state policies. So this is the environmental justice state policy. Beginning on, and this is pushing back from 01/15/2028 to 01/15/2029, the covered agency shall either integrate the following information into an existing spending reports or issue annual spending reports. So they have to implement the state policy and address it through their spending reports, and they're pushing back that deadline to 01/15/2029. Next, the Agency of Natural Resources in consultation with the Environmental Justice Advisory Council and the Interagency Environmental Justice Committee are supposed to adopt rules related to the environmental justice policy, and they're pushing back that date a year and a half. So, 07/01/2027 to 01/01/2029. And then because the other covered agencies are also supposed to be adopting rules based on the rules that ANR adopts, that date is also being pushed back eighteen months. So, 07/01/2028 to 01/01/2030. And then finally, the environmental justice mapping tool, that date is being pushed back as well. So it was currently due 01/01/2027 being pushed back to 01/01/2028.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: Yes. Mapping, then rulemaking, then implementation. Well, the thing that's different is that community engagement plan, which isn't referenced in this draft at all, the date for that is staying the same. So that is going to continue to be due July 2027, and then everything else is being pushed back in a different sequence after that. Because it was rulemaking. It was mapping, then community engagement, then rulemaking. So they're just kind of leaving They're making community engagement the next step. The community engagement plan is the next step, and then mapping, rulemaking, implementation.

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: Well, the mapping is pushed only a year, the others are two years. Yes. Two eighteen months.

[Rep. Ela Chapin (Member)]: So the report can't happen until after rulemaking. Report is based on mapping. The 01/15/2029 report is based on the maps. So they

[Rep. Amy Sheldon (Chair)]: yeah. Make sure it's with the order they want. Oh, yeah. Good. Further questions for Ellen? Further discussion for right now? I just