Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: I'm used to general military and It's the military.

[Greg (Judiciary Security Official)]: Military. It's new here.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yeah, the use of the punishment committee. Yeah, a

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: lot of folks It's a

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: joint meeting with House Corrections and Institutions Committee and House General and House or House in general. I can't get it straight.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: You get

[Greg (Judiciary Security Official)]: the idea

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: which is what matters. This is Thursday, February 19. It's an afternoon meeting. We're going be discussing security within our state owned buildings as well as within our court system, our judicial buildings. It will be also talking about the security that we really provide to our employees in those buildings, the public coming in, as well as security possibly of the building itself. So I'm going to turn it over to, Department of Buildings and General Services. We have the chair we have the the chair. We have the commissioner and the deputy commissioner. So welcome. And if you both could introduce yourself for the record.

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: So good afternoon. I'm Wanda Manoille. I'm the commissioner of Buildings and General Services. I'm Lee Kasnow, Deputy Commissioner of Buildings and General Services. So Madam Chair, I took the seat for a moment, and I appreciate hearing the overview of the expectations and the discussions you would like to have today. We weren't quite sure if we were going go first or last, if we were going

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: to be

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: responding. So we know today is a fluid meeting and that may just go back and forth. One of the things that the deputy did working with our director of security is put a PowerPoint together that gives an overview of the security program. And we could start with that presentation just to bring everyone to give us a high level overview, if that's okay. And I'll be happy to come back to the chair if there's specific questions or join the team. With your permission, I'm going to shift back and I will have Bill come up and introduce himself and take you through the PowerPoint, if that's okay. That's fine, that works, thank you.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: Welcome. Hello, thank you. My name is William McSalis and I'm the director of EGF Safety and Security.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So off

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: the top before we get started, I'll just share the safety and security program. It's a program within BGS that has grown. I think Commissioner Moli really helped build it from the ground up, and it really started here a month later with some uniformed security officers. And it has grown, as we'll walk through, the function has grown, the need has grown, and I think it's a program that we can be proud of. Going through the presentation, I'm not going to read the statute, but under law, BGS, Commissioner BGS is responsible for ensuring security of all state facilities, with exceptions of the State House, the Supreme Court, and the courthouses. So we take that very seriously, and we accomplish that responsibility through a variety of methods that we're going to walk through. The mission statement of the office is to develop, coordinate, implement, and evaluate safety and security programs and related training in cooperation with all state organizations in support of the state's efforts to ensure and maintain a safe and supportive environment for all employees and visitors. And I read that because I think it's important grounding for the work that we do every day. Our focus again is safety of our state employees and the visitors to our buildings. Of course, the infrastructure itself is important, but it's related to people who are in spaces that we're working to protect every day. I will let Bill dig into this in more detail, but off the top, just share the office is led by Director McSalas, who has a law enforcement background as do many of our employees in the office. There are 23 FTEs. We accomplished our work through a mixture of deeper space funding with some capital bill funding that the corrections and institutions committee is very familiar with for some of the infrastructure improvements. But I'll let Bill walk through in the next slides the details of the sort of focus areas, but just a range of uniform services, which is your traditional security guard function that you might be familiar with. We have an extensive emergency procedure planning function, threat mitigation, security systems, that's some of the infrastructure badge systems and cameras that you might be familiar with. And then environmental and occupational safety. And that's an area where I really think that we've grown. Some of you know I was at BGS over a decade ago and have recently returned, and that's a function that I wasn't familiar with that we really grown and I think do a great job in. And again, of these FTEs, some of the staff have a law enforcement background as well, which is very helpful for us. If there are any questions for that sort of general framework, I'll let Bill start walking into uniformed services. Any questions from either

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: any of public? Great.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: So our uniformed services are most visible in the Capitol and at the Waterbury State Office Complex. They mostly do visitor screening and access control, but they also maintain patrols within the parking lots and respond to security concerns. They address lots of questions Occasionally well, they monitor cameras for both of those locations. If we have something that's of concern, we may monitor a particular area more consistently or more thoroughly, but that's pretty much with what they do. We also have contract security. Our third party contractor that we use currently is Securitas, and we've had those officers at Brattleboro, Burlington, Roblin, Saint Albans, Williston. And since the last time I gave testimony, we established a new role or position where we could address problems at Parker, Middlebury, or Springfield, or frankly, any other state office building. But we found that those three needed a little extra love once in a while. And so we established a goal where they can go there and address security concerns.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So I do have a question. So at some of our state office buildings, particularly the Waterbury State Complex, and it could be at some of our state office buildings, because we have state office buildings in those communities down at the bottom as well? Yes. With the return to work of our state employees, are you finding any pressure points in terms of more folks, employees are now coming into the building? Are you finding any pressure points in terms of your aspects of providing security for folks?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: I don't think so. I think some employees are concerned about the return to the office. And so sometimes they direct some of their concern at security, but I don't really think that we found too many issues particular to people returning to the office. When an officer has posted a state office building, they really do the same job whether it's a dozen visitors or 100 visitors, they're pretty much doing the same job. With more people returning to the office we may have an influx of clients but we really haven't seen that it seems to be pretty steady so I don't know that our work has changed dramatically.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Your commissioner has her hand up too.

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: It okay if I speak Thank from you. Think that's a great question. And one of the things that I'd like to remind the members is that the buildings were still open. The return to work has occurred, but we were still supporting those buildings because not everyone at the, using the Waterbury example or the Montpellier example, the Pavilion or 01/1933, the buildings weren't closed. We were still operating and we still had individuals in those buildings. I think so to Bill's point, the service level has remained the same in that the return to work hasn't increased a need on that level regarding providing those services immediately at check.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Do have a question here?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: James? Thank you. So you mentioned that those, I think, three facilities need a little extra love. Is there a particular reason why they might need the extra rover attention versus other facilities?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: Like, is there something going on? No. We have a system where we track our it's our SSIR system, safety and security incident report. So we look at the buildings that have SSIR, particularly those that are related to security as opposed to maybe an open door or something else. And we find that those three have a greater instance or a greater need for occasional security. Usually, it's a problematic client who's made a threat to one of the agencies, tenant agencies within the building. And we find that Hartford, Middlebury, and Springfield tend to have clients who make concerning threats more than for for example, than maybe at Newport or somewhere else.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Okay. Thank you. Appreciate it.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Question for you, the Securitas, how many kind of FTE equivalent is our contract with them, more or less?

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: If I can, I just want to jump in on, I think it's a contract that Bill has available for himself and for the team in the event we need to enhance the security? And I think what Bill said to you is really important. I'd like to say, I believe Bill has a great working relationship with all of the agencies, with, you know, AHS and with judiciary. And when there's a scenario or a situation of a potential threat that they've received, they work through Bill and we come up with a plan on how to address it. And that may be when he brings in the contracting, the contractors should be there, or we may place this individual at a location for a few days because we become aware of a potential threat. So it's always fluid and it's always addressing, we're ready to respond when the need is brought to our attention. And Bill and his team do a really good job around that. Bill's staff are sworn officers, they're security officers, but they're not sworn law enforcement officers. So he has within his toolbox the ability to heighten the level of security need, and maybe you could just expand on that, Bill, as part

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: of the contract. So we do have dedicated Securitas officers at some of those office building locations, and then do have the ability to flex up, like Bill described, the broker position where we see some additional attention needed. We also frequently work closely with the Sheriff's and State's Attorney's Office to contract for sheriff services. Again, if we're seeing a heightened need for security, for instance, if there's a specific threat or issue that we're aware of where we really do need that law enforcement presence. So that happens with some regularity where we're concerned and we're able to contract for those services.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: It happens most frequently with Economic Services Division and department no, family services division. Sometimes you confuse the two, but we will get where there's like a termination of parental rights hearing, something So like we expect in coordination certainly with the agency, but they may say we're very concerned about the behavior of this person when they find out that terrible news that they're gonna lose custody of their children. So we'd like some additional security at this building or sometimes just very overt where somebody sends an email like I

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Let me reflect back let me reflect back what I'm hearing just to make sure I understand it. You have 23 FTEs, and that's what I'm hearing is kind of your base security. And that it's not like Securitas is half again of what it's not like we're relying big time on a contractor to provide base services. What we rely on the contractor for and also other police is for kind of supplemental flexibility to flex up when something arises. Right? With the exception of you do have some dedicated securitas, but not a lot, like

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: We we have dedicated at Brattleboro, Burlington, Rockland, St. Albans, and Boston. Those are sort of They are performing similar functions as to our city employee uniformed officers, and they are at those locations.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Are we talking like one or two people each or are we talking like 10?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: We have approximately 10 seconduritas officers that we contract with. But I can tell you that

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: That's enough. Down the list. Yeah. That that's it.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: There's mostly one that every position, I think there's four in Burlington based upon the number of offices that are there. Thank you. And and our 23 FTEs are not simply security officers. They include people that do nothing but badges and public records requests and some other things. So those are not simply security officers. They're other people within our group.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So if there is a situation occurring in one of our state office buildings, how are you notified? Are you notified by the administrative staff that's there like for DCF or economic services or are you notified by the state employees themselves?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: We try to be proactive. So every two weeks have a meeting called the BiTEP meeting, it's the Vermont Interagency Threat Assessment Task Force, and we invite our stakeholders, mostly AHS, but DOC and a matter of fact, Rob Shell with the courts, And we meet and we try to proactively identify those offices that may have a security concern based upon, for example, an upcoming hearing, something like that. So we we try to do it that way, but of course, sometimes something just happens. Someone appears at a agency and they're behaving in a manner that's very concerning for us, so then we respond to it. So if we could be proactive, we try to do that, but sometimes we're just reactive. I would say most times I'm getting a call from an agency leadership that somebody's reported something to them and then we get that call. But occasionally we just get a call directly from our, you know, somebody working a client service window and they say someone's really misbehaving here, we need to address it, and then we take it right from there.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: And they can come in directly from employees who have concerns right on the backs of all of our badges is the number for safety and security. We do have a phone line that they can call 20 So again, depending on the nature of the incident and how much exams notice there is, that contact can reach us in a variety of ways, including directly.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: Thank you for your testimony. So you contract out for security. Some. Why aren't we hiring state employees? Like, we hired police officers.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: At this point, it's just based on how many positions we have and that they're deployed. We have our positions for security officers. We have a certain number. And where we see need for additional security, we contract that out.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: But can you hire state employees, hire people to be state employees? Wouldn't it be less expensive?

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: Commissioner Manoille, I think you're really, so we have the 23 FTEs and we're focused right now where we're using secure trust in these contracted areas. If And, we felt that we needed to change the level of security or manage those spaces differently, of course, we have a process to go through with our administration and request for FTEs. At this point in time, Bill, who has recommended that managing those particular sites with this service has been in their best interest. And Bill, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but I think Burlington, it's multiple sites and how we're using them. So, to answer your question, when we do an analysis and evaluation, we always have opportunity every budget cycle to, and we do look at our positions to request that. At this time, we have not moved forward in that manner. Thank you.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yes, go ahead.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank So, thank you for clarifying how you've responded to the needs, how you've chosen to respond. Think I just want piggyback off of the I think the question, the underlying question is like, why? Like maybe, can you explain to us a little bit of why that makes more sense? To contract out instead of employing Is that sorry.

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: I mean, Mary,

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: does that make sense? Is that what you're trying to get?

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I think what we're talking about is two different things. One is they have some limited people on that are acting as staff. So one is on a permanent basis, and the question is, should those be part of their budget and hire as staff employees? And then they have this flexible need situation, which they use Securitas for. There's there's two different situations. And I think the question is, if you had extra budget, would you like to hire state employees, or do you like, for some reason, Securitas?

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: So we have I I we have not sat down and done the evaluation that you're talking about and what would the structure look like, and so I don't think it's fair to think that it would be a one to one comparison. So, it's I don't think that we're really in a position to say, yes, it would make sense to expand our security force in these particular areas. And then what would that look like? Because it wouldn't be just one person where we're contracting for services, they are utilizing their employees. If we were to set up and we would have to do the analysis, Jared. I can't say it would be less expensive, it could be more expensive. We just simply, we don't have that information to share with the committee today. We have not, again, I think the methodology, I'm really gonna support Bill on this, the methodology is put in place and working with the needs of those agencies has functioned well in this particular area that he's talking about the contract services.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I appreciate that. I realize we have a lot to do and get to in an hour, an hour, but if there are additional questions from my team member.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Can I

[Unknown committee member]: just make an assumption, and you tell me if I'm right or wrong? My assumption is that when you are contracting out, you're contracting for hours rather than a specific person. I think from an HR side of things, when I'm doing that, if I'm hiring a person, then that's their salary, that's their benefits, that's everything. But it sounds like when you're contracting out, it's hours. So it might only be three hours a week, or three hours this week, but next week we're going to need you for eight hours. So it doesn't necessarily make sense to contract a person or hire a FTE or even a PTE. It's the hours that matter in

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: the sense.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: You're onto something. And what I will say is that when I contract with securitized, I say I need these hours filled up. Like someone start at this time and end at that time, but I don't necessarily have to figure out like how I'm gonna do that based upon one person or two people. It's their job to figure out how they staff those positions. It does offer some greater flexibility than me trying to figure out how am I going to take two bodies and build twenty hours in different spots.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank you. So let's keep going because maybe as you go through your document may answer some of these questions.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: So the next slide is emergency procedure planning. So those are basically the different problems that may or security issues or safety issues that may exist in a building. So we have a team that develops plans, trains those plans, implements the plan, evaluates the plan. They got up and soup the nuts and they, I think they do a very good job trying to get all these people trained up. We found that over the COVID period and beyond, that sometimes it was challenging to try to change, train as many people when so many people were working from home or alternate spaces, and some of the people that had dedicated positions weren't there all the time. So we changed our training to train everybody, not just safety wardens or some of the people that had a leadership role. We changed everybody to be a leader, and we found that to be pretty effective. It was a little challenging, you know, getting all the training done that we wanted to, when people weren't returning to work, but now that they are refining that, the training is a little bit easier to do, but not only do we do our emergency procedure planning, but we have other things such as CPR and therapy dogs and AEDs and a variety of other things that are related to that, but not emergency procedure per se.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: And I'll just share again, with a relatively small group of people, this team is able to do some fantastic trainings for state employees to help keep everybody safe and empower them to know how to respond when a situation arises. And this is just in the past year. 2,007 state employees received EPG training and almost half of that was in person, which is great. I think there's really meaningful exchange that happens. And again, I think that this is an area where we're really providing a great foundation.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: One of the good statistic that I was able to get after you were provided this was that since 2003 we've provided 70 CPR AED training courses. We trained over 500 state employees and we've deployed 40 AEDs in buildings throughout the state. It's just not a 100 slide.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So we have a question, Kevin.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: What are circumstances we need therapy dogs? We find that there are security concerns that put certain employees and buildings on edge. You know, they may have had, you know, a a threat in the building or some other calamity. And we've got together with Vermont therapy dogs, and we brought them into an office. And it's just amazing, the response where we don't certainly force the dogs in anybody, but we bring them in and people could pet the dogs. And it's amazing that the stress relief that we have, and we just use them. I will tell you that there was an agency that had some reductions in force, certainly put many of the people in that agency on edge, the idea that they were gonna lose their jobs. So we brought in a therapy dog and like they could feel the stress the other way. So like there's reasons to have that I certainly can't talk about.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Maybe need it in the state house.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I'm sorry.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Maybe we need it in the state house.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: If you thought that was something that you'd want, we could have therapy dogs available in teleconference Zoom and you could talk

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: to Or

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: like a medical event. I know that there, I've heard examples of a medical event happening. That can be very distressing to know that that happened to a colleague or to witness it. And so that's been an opportunity for people to come together, de stress, connect. And I do also want to highlight our action after action review function. The team will, after an incident or even a drill, will get together and talk about what happened and where it could be improved or go differently. So it's almost like every opportunity, every training is a learning experience. And the team takes that really seriously. And that's something that I appreciate as a leader is how they really learn from every situation that happens and then strengthen their procedures for next time.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: We have a group that focuses on threat mitigation and training. I talked about our safety and security incident report. We get about a thousand reported incidents annually they can be from anything to there's a slippery sidewalk or an open door to, I got a threat that was very concerning and someone threatened violence. We found that we get about 70 threats of violence a year, and that results probably in about once a month, maybe slightly less, where we have to contract with armed law enforcement, these are our sheriff's deputies to provide additional security based upon those heightened threats. They're all triaged by my team. Every single threat that come or every single incident is triaged and we can just determine if it's something that routine and maybe it's something that just requires a work order to replace a broken light or fix the door to getting together with our threat mitigation team, the VITAT or referring things to law enforcement based upon the concern.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So your commissioner has her hand up.

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: And I just wanna share with the committee, Bill's talking about one of our services that we provide. And I just want the committee to know these aren't just threats that may happen at the workplace. They could be individuals that have issues going on at home or outside of work. And we actually work with those individuals and with their agencies and sometimes with the department of HR in what's the best course and protection for that employee. And that's part of your 70 bill. And I think that's important to highlight. It's not just focused on them walking into the building. And it could be a domestic violence scenario. And Bill does works very closely with the individual and with the department or the agency that that employee is located at.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: Many of those are referred to law enforcement, we come up with a personal protection plan. So we talk to people about their home life. Do they have a dog or do they have a gun or do they have bushes or counters or lights and how might that affect their personal security at home on their way to work, what they should do. So we enjoyed it.

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: And we also would relocate those stuff. That's built. I think there is a crossover to work.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yes.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: Security systems, House Corrections and Institutions is probably most familiar with this function. This is right here in the steakhouse. The bag readers you'll see, there are also lockdown buttons, a camera system, panic buttons, client service model that's for client facing agencies and departments where we set up meeting rooms rather than having clients go back into individual offices. Airphones, intrusion alarms, other special equipment. So, again, there's a really strong network of technology that we're using to support security of state buildings, where we can't always have personnel in every place, but this allows us to have a presence and to help fortify buildings through these measures. Well said. We

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: have a group that's relatively new to us, our Environmental and Occupational Safety team. This used to be part of our operations and maintenance group, but now they're part of us because we feel it's just a little bit better fit. So when there's environmental concerns, smells, water issues, air quality issues, we send our team out there, but we find that many times there are related safety and security concerns. And then we also have a person who does like a OSHA related problems. So those occupational safety. So every time we have a slip and fall somewhere or someone gets hurt on the job, send our occupational safety officer out there to do a site review and many times our two environmental and occupational person go together and do a safety visit.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: Some of the other functions that safety and security does might not fall directly in their lane. Sometimes it does, but I view their role sometimes as a liaison. They're often the folks that are interacting directly with state employees on a regular basis. So sometimes things will their way that isn't a safety or security issue, and they'll point it in the right direction. So I really appreciate that. Again, thousand access badges for DGS buildings annually. They do parking monitoring and the hang tags for the Capital Complex. There is our SOB alert system, which is a tool where we notify building occupants of an issue in the building, whether it be a security issue or something else that they need to be aware of. That 20 answering service that we talked about, site visits for moves and new constructions to look at it from a security perspective and what infrastructure should be included as part of that project.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Just one question. The SOV alert, forgive my ignorance. It's okay. Is that does that

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: It's

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: reach out to individuals?

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: Yes.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: So if you have your, you have our cell phone numbers and it comes up on our cell phone?

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: Yep, it can come through email or cell phone. Great. Yes.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: Okay. But your particular one is addressed by the Capitol Police. Right. So we're not going to send you a message unless you were to somehow be a part of our system, but it works in a similar manner. Okay.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: Also, flood awareness and coordination, part of the picture on there is one of our infrared cameras that's looking at flood levels right here on the river across the street. And then infants in the workplace program. This is something we do in coordination with the Department of Human Resources that safety and security will go do a workplace safety check for an employee who might have an infant in the workplace through that program. So that's, again, another

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: That super cute baby is the baby of one of our directors of the fleet services. So she gets full photo credits for that. Yeah.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: So just a parting thought again. I think we take this responsibility incredibly seriously. Those 23 FTEs, they are state employees. Many of them members of the Vermont State Employees Association take their roles very seriously. We're always open to feedback and collaboration on how we can improve or where there are particular concerns. Again, we hear of what we hear of, and if there are broader concerns or feedback, we're always willing to have a conversation about it.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank you. Anything? Fair enough.

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: Yeah, sure. Thanks very much. I was hoping we could talk parking lots for a bit. I represent LaMont earlier. I probably have more state employees than anybody in the state. And the majority of the anxiety that I hear is state workers walk into their car after work at night. We've got the cameras, but they're not actively being monitored. It's passive. And it's very dark sometimes. And as the hotel voucher program wound down, I think we've found ourselves in this horrible position where people really have nowhere to go. So some of them are sleeping, staying in parking lots. But in addition to that, I think you have maybe like an ex boyfriend waiting outside. So the question is, what policies are there outlining who is allowed in the state parking lot? Do they have to be doing state business? Is there a law? Or is a parking lot just carte blanche for state government, which I think makes it really scary for folks.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: So I mean, generally, a parking lot is public property. State property is, unless it's secured. So I don't think there's formal guidelines other than the signs that you're probably familiar with that during the work day, those lots are reserved for state employee parking. And we do often open it up to other uses like the farmer's market when we're not outside of the state of employee work hours. But we do recognize that this is a concern for employees' parking lot safety. We do have the cameras, at least in areas where we do have a uniformed officer presence. We do have a schedule where we do walkthroughs and patrols, definitely in the early morning hours, after work where we're trying to catch folks who might be in a parking lot again where people are starting to arrive. So we do do that and we do also offer escort services. So if someone's feeling unsafe going to their car, where we do have it again, a security presence in the building that they're coming, in the area that they're working, they can call and receive an escort to their car. Do you have anything else to add?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: With regard to transients or maybe in the Capital Complex, think our officers have a good appreciation for where those people may be sleeping or where they frequent. So we kind of have a good handle of where those some of those people are and we try to reach out to them. We try to actually develop a relationship if we can, so that if they know that we're treating them fairly and respectfully, then we ask them to leave or clean their stuff up. They're more likely to do that when we develop a relationship. So we try to be proactive, but also I would say that if anybody asks for assistance, like seriously walking to their car, that kind of thing, we try to do that. We just also try to be present. So we just hired a temporary employee to sit in different parking lots and just have the flashing lights go and just so everybody knows like, hey, there's a security presence here and it maintains like a a visible deterrent to poor behavior. So we try to move that person around in different parking lots to let everybody know that if you wanna do something, don't do it here.

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: Are there emergency phones anywhere in parking lots?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: No, we don't have them.

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: The UBM campus, see it has them all over the place, right? Or go pick up

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: a brief phone or something. We don't have that. For the record,

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: we don't have them on campus anymore. It's all phone based now.

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: Oh, did at one point,

[Wanda Manoille (Commissioner of Buildings & General Services)]: Yeah. Elizabeth,

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: do you have a question? I do. Thank you very much. I wondered whether BGS has a designated person responsible for ensuring accessibility in all of the state buildings? Thanks.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: We hired a supervisor. His name is Adam Bundy. And Adam, one of his jobs he has a kind of collection of different things he does, but he he addresses ADA issues in buildings. So when we hear of a problem, we usually Adam addresses it and it's things like the number appropriate number of handicap spots and where they are and if we have door actuators that open like a door for a person with mobility issues, do the doors work in sequence? Because you can't have the door in the middle of if you can't have the first door and the last door, the middle door doesn't matter. So when these kinds of things are brought to our attention, Adam typically addresses them, but it's like he's also proactive. He supervises our environmental person and the vocea person. So when they go out to look at smells and other things, Adam's typically there to also try to be proactive, like with ADA type issues.

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: And I'll also add that our separate office, our division of design construction, ADA requirements and issues are built in. So, if we're doing a new construction or renovation, they are all very aware of that and build it into the process if we're doing that kind of work. So I think those seem as more responsive to issues that come up that we're aware of in an existing space, but we also build it into our process for new spaces or spaces that we're working on.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Thank you. Well, we got

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: to really move along because we finish up here at 02:30, and Thomas had other testimony scheduled at 02:30.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: So Mary, do you want

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: me to move it to this think

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: that to get to the parking situation, Asa Bloomer Building in Rutland.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Yes, ma'am.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: There is a parking deck, and then there is the transit center. And I wondered if you've had any issues because at one point, the transit center was moved to correct some of the problems there, and now it's back. So,

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: there were a number of issues with the transit center, including safety concerns as well as cleanliness concerns. There was pigeons, among other So, we worked closely with the director of the transit center. Our team, security, operations, maintenance have really given it a lot of attention and they've coordinated with local law enforcement as well to put in additional cameras to address safety concerns.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: There's lighting, picture a lot

[Lee Kasnow (Deputy Commissioner, Buildings & General Services)]: of lighting. Yeah, covered some dark areas. So we did do a number of improvements, to our own processes for cleaning, as well as some infrastructure improvements that have improved the situation.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: And also, having worked in the A. S. Bloomberg Building in the state's attorney's office, I'm very familiar with the threat warnings. If I could make a suggestion, at that office, there is a waiting room before you go into their office.

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: At the state's

[Rep. Conor Casey (Member, Montpelier)]: attorney's office.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: At the state's attorney's office, if you could put some sort of, don't know what you call it, voice box or speaker or something outside the waiting room so that someone could come in, press it, and someone could ask who they were, the reason for their visit, because many times people would come in the waiting room and

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: That device that you're wanting to that you're discussing, it's called an A Phone. It's like a sophisticated ring doorbell. Yeah. And there's a way for the client or the visitor to call and the person on the inside could not only see them on video but could talk to them Yes. And kind of we call it taking their temperature. They could take their temperature a little bit, see if the person's appears to be reasonable or or if their behavior is concerning. Right. And if everything's going good, they could remotely unlock the door for them. Yes. So I'm happy to talk to the state's attorney there in Rutland, and we could work on getting an a phone.

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: So Yeah. That would be Ian Sullivan. I think that would be a a tremendous help, because there were times when people came into the waiting room and they were very upset and threatening.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: You know what, when I'm done with

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: my testimony, hopefully, that'll be great today, but I will give the state's attorney Sullivan

[Greg (Judiciary Security Official)]: a call and see what we can work on. That'd be great.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank you

[Rep. Mary E. Howard (Member, Rutland)]: so much. I appreciate it. Thank you for

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: your testimony.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Yeah, I'm gonna move this along because we got two other. So, judiciary folks, come on up. Is it two, three of you? Yes. Grab another chair if you need to.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Karen Larson, our State Board Administrator, and we take one of the as our Chief of Finance and Administration, which encompasses courthouse buildings. And Emilie Krasnow is our Director of Tradition and Security. Great. Welcome. Thank you so much for this opportunity. We aren't certain of what specific information you might be looking for just based on the agenda, but we thought we'd provide a general overview of what happens against security functions. Some of them may be a little bit repetitive because we do occupy some state buildings at AGS at the Franklin City as well. I'm happy to answer whatever questions might come about. Just from the outset, and this quote actually referenced in the material, is that the Constitution gives the Vermont Supreme Court authority over the administration of justice in courthouses. And the legislature enacted statutes that acknowledges that the Supreme Court has authority and jurisdiction over security matters encompassed under that authority over the administration of justice. So ultimately, Supreme Court dictates security policies and protocols within all the state courthouses. And in Vermont, each county has at least one courthouse. The larger counties have two. You might have noticed in your counties, typically the older courthouse, if you have two, is the county courthouse. That's owned by the county, the assistant judges overseeing the impeachment for county courthouses. And then state courthouses, which developed when the state divisions, the Family Law, State Division, and Criminal Division developed, state courthouses were built. And those are operated by BGS. You can rent fee for space for the use of those courthouses. We provide security whether it's a county courthouse or a state courthouse. I guess speaking to the numbers, we have approximately secondurity personnel throughout all the state court houses in Vermont. And that includes 40 clerks currently, so 10 seconduritas, as well as 28 either court security officers or safety and security officers. You all may recall that in late twenty twenty three, we were tasked with preparing an S-seventeen report to the legislature that looked at security needs throughout the state. And it made recommendations in terms of personnel and personnel choices. In response to your question about why have securitas, historically, sheriffs provided security for all the courthouses and for decades. And then in the 1990s, there were state court employees that were added to the Chittenden Costello Courthouse for circumstances that were unique to Burlington. Then in about 2016, sheriffs weren't able to accommodate meet all the security needs at courthouses in several counties, and that's when we brought on secure tests in terms of being able to meet security needs. And partly as a result of the F-seventeen report, we also have state court employees that are continuing to provide and fill the gap in those counties that don't have enough shared personnel to provide them, to meet the security needs. Our every courthouse has at least one armed security personnel. Once the sheriffs or securitas, which is armed, they're typically at the screener. They're at the main entrance. The idea of being that if you can prevent weapons from entering the courthouse, you're going to reduce the risk of security risk there. So every courthouse has an armed security presence at the main entrance to that courthouse. And then you have a security officer in each criminal hearing and in each family hearing. And then as needed, it may be civil or probate. But that's how the security officers are spread throughout at the main entrance. It the courtrooms for those types of cases and also rovers to be able to respond. The court security officers which came out of the report and the personnel that we were given positions for as a result are specifically trained for courthouse security or courtroom security. They're involved in, you know, all the details in terms of the screening. They're not armed personnel. That's the difference. The sheriffs are certified law enforcement, security officers aren't. So that is part of the reason in those areas where we don't have enough surety, we could have a securitized personnel. And they are a contract versus a position. We had requested a certain number of positions in conjunction with the SRT before I got some of them. So where we don't know the position numbers, that's another reason where secure tests might be used because we don't have a position number to be able to hire an employee to meet the numbers that's needed statewide. And along the lines of what Mr. Excelsius was indicating, of the security detail involves now, and I think they've done a ton, I know the SMC report showed within the past ten years, we have the cameras, we have the security cameras, we have the monitors. They're digitized so that law can, from a central location, see every courthouse statewide. We have the panic duress about these. A variety of measures have been implemented to modernize the security functions. And as Mr. Exal has indicated, there's increasing number of threats. We also have a digitized security incident report process so that we can tap that and we can think of these threats that you've seen probably the video of the person jumping over the judge's bench. It's trying to be able to respond to each and every type of scenario that might have. We also have the training aspects of it. Every courthouse has once a month an in service day and that's a half day each month where the court is closed to the public and it's dedicated and available for courthouse training where judiciary groups and they all can receive training, whether it has to do with electronic filing, case management, etc, but also training security related. We have PPR training, first aid training, de escalation training, how to identify signs of mental illness and how to best respond to it. For this coming year, new one is an exergency training, basically, where we, during those in service periods, go and try and respond to an employee's request for what kind of training we need. So that's kind of a very broad overview in terms of the security personnel, the security processes. Bob basically has the most detailed information because he's in daily communication with all of the officers and with the courts and keeps abreast of whatever the threats might be on any particular day.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: I think that's a really good overview that can lead to some questions for Marc Anything? Any questions?

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I do have one. I'm just curious. In terms of a panic button or a button that was do the judges have

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: them? Yes.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: On their diets?

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Each judge's chamber and the bench.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: And the bench. And the clerk?

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: You can just scroll down and just Clerk.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yes. Our courtrooms are equipped with various ways to with duress buttons. So there's

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: I'm gonna

[Greg (Judiciary Security Official)]: get into

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: more specific details.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Yeah, don't wanna tell us where they are. However,

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: our courtrooms are, we'll say robustly equipped as our court buildings are with capabilities to acclimate the rest of us.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Thank you. But you

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: have to protect not just the public, you have to protect the employees there as well. Yeah.

[Unknown committee member]: I was just gonna ask, so we've heard that there's been an increase in threats. Has there been a change in types of threats? Like from what you're hearing, how people are acting in those situations?

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yes, don't know. Greg actually can you

[Greg (Judiciary Security Official)]: We talk to have an incident report filing system. Last year in 2025, we had three twenty five incident reports. That's up from about 175 from the year before. So we are seeing an increase. Most of the increase is in the types of incidences that are not necessarily violent or physical. We do some nonstop assault, but most of the increases are really around a disturbance in a courtroom, suspicious activity, inappropriate communications, oral threat, really a decrease in stability that is increasing the most. But we also have some very serious bomb threats through email and social media threats to assaults. So we do have a gamut and that's why we try to have law enforcement at least one at the courthouse.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Those emotions run by in a courthouse. Other questions?

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: That was terrific. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. There aren't any absent, I don't think the presenters here, but we actually had a situation, the other courthouse there was a decree over there, and then courthouse personnel were trained as our sheriff personnel and there was an episode of the Addison Courthouse. The courthouse where it wasn't in the courthouse but next door there's a park with pickleball courts and there's a lot of pickleball court and the court operations manager was trapped within EMS and he contacted her. She and the sheriff deputy took the deed for later and basically they've been credited with saving a person's life to move over and to avoid until that person's not alive. So on legislators day in Middlebury, we had a ceremony following that. That's great. That's great. Yeah, it was good. Well, thank you. Thank you. That was very solid. If the person makes sound, it's the most of her. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So,

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Steve, why don't you come on up and give us a state employee perspective now that we've heard it from the operations of state office buildings as well as the operations from the courthouse because there are state employees that are housed in both of those entities.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Yeah, well, thank you, Madam Chair, members of the committee. My name is Gayle Howard. I'm the executive director of the Vermont State Employees Association. And I wanna thank you for your attention to this issue. It's an issue that is it's frankly doesn't receive as much attention as it should. The government in the press and perhaps elsewhere. So I really appreciate you dedicating some time to this issue. As we sit here today, it's about eleven years since the tragic murder of Lara Sobel, who was walking innocently out of her workplace in Barrie and was gunned down by a very angry client. And I'm sad to say that since that tragic moment, we've made mild progress, but in the eyes of the state employees, not nearly enough. It's certainly not enough to match what you've heard today as a repeated theme, an increasing level of threat and violence that our members experience in their work sites in an environment in which it seems to be permissible to be violent and to be aggressive when dealing with public employees. VSEA tragically, I think sadly, if our members were standing here speaking directly to you, they would say that we're all just waiting for the next tragedy to occur. And what they would tell you is that they know what will come is that politicians in power, maybe not folks here, particularly in the executive branch, will offer their thoughts and prayers. But they won't take the suggestions that frontline workers are making and have been making over the last eleven years seriously. And I'll just remind folks, and many people have heard this certainly on the corrections institution side. Just a few weeks before Lara was tragically murdered, The members of the VSEA working in family services warned their management that something like this was going to happen, that something bad was going to happen, potentially worse than bad in a parking lot. And I'm so glad to hear representative Casey raised the issue of parking lots because we identified that as the nobody did anything, something horrible happened in a parking lot, almost exactly as our members described. And the only reason I raised that is because we're here again asking for a more aggressive stance by the administration and by the legislature and by the state. It turns out enforcing the laws that you pass in this building that the governor signs is a lot more dangerous than many people would suspect. Whether it's protecting children who are in neglect in a situation where they're being neglected or abused and having to go into a house and take those children out. Or if it's a variety of other functions that state employees perform on a daily basis. A lot of this does happen in state office buildings, but even more occurs in the field. And a great number of state employees that work in the field. And often it's the policies that come from management that don't include the perspective of the frontline employees, they say, fall from the air and land in your inbox. They don't reflect the actual experience of workers that really concern us the most. So I'll give you an example. There was one that just came out a day or two ago from DCF, not just in family services, but in economic services that requires a reach of case managers on a weekly basis to meet with their clients in hotel rooms for forty five minutes to an hour. Now these are folks who had some de escalation training. They have no self defense training, they have no security expertise. And they're being asked to literally go into somebody's bedroom and sit with them for forty five minutes to an hour. And management also would like these folks who are trying to establish a relationship with their clients to report on the condition of the room. This is a situation that leaves our members in very difficult circumstances because the state hasn't given folks in the front lines of economic services a lot of resources to offer people. As representative Casey said, optimists, your ADAs are up, good luck. Because it's not a lot they can do. I've heard in just the past twenty four hours from economic services workers who have said to me I used every single possible de escalation skill I had to calm someone who I had a positive relationship with down as I informed them that their eighty days were up and they had to leave. So it's building security, but there's also the approach the administration takes to policy and whether they include the workers in the development of that policy so that it reflects their actual experience. That is, I think, an important thing to consider. And certainly, if you're going to ask somebody to go into a home that law enforcement will go into, which often happens with family services workers, it is happening now with economic services workers, you should at least give them some training and some updates on what's the latest situation in this particular environment. So our members are happy to participate in that training. They want to be updated regularly. They just, I think, frankly, think it's inappropriate that they would be asked to go into hotel rooms. And it should be addressed, I think, by the leadership of DCF and potentially the legislature can ask DCF about these policies. One thing that has worked well, I will say family services in just, I think out of sheer self preservation and I think an acknowledgement that not much was gonna happen after Lara's murder, did establish a safety coordinator for family services. And that has been helpful. And I would recommend that we do that also on the economic services side. That we have somebody who is looking out for the safety of our members as they're implementing state policy. Policies that by the way they did not develop. They just aren't implementing those. There's a number of other examples that BSEA believes the state can, the action the state can take that will improve the safety of our frontline personnel. Probation and parole. Our members have asked and are requesting of Governor Scott that he them to carry voluntarily after going through a comprehensive training program, defensive weapons that they could use only in the case when they're being fired upon while they're enforcing conditions of probation. And often what you'll hear from probation officers is it's not the person who's on probation that is the issue. It's the other people in the house who think that law enforcement has just arrived. Some of those people may have outstanding warrants. Some of those people may be involved in extracurricular commerce. But they think law enforcement has arrived. Probation and parole go into these homes, increasingly violent, increasingly threatening environments with pepper spray and a bulletproof vest. We are just waiting for something tragic to happen in probation and parole. Governor Scott can direct the commissioner of corrections to allow this to go forward on a voluntary basis to them. And we hope you will.

[Vermont Judiciary Representative (name not clearly stated)]: Can I ask a quick question? Sure.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So if I'm a parole officer, if I want to go out and buy my own bulletproof vest,

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: The bulletproof vest is provided. It's provided. It's the gun. It's

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: the weapon that would allow them to defend themselves if they're being fired. 36 other states allow, Vermont doesn't allow. And we're hoping that the governor will direct the commissioner to allow it.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I have a question. When did you make that recommendation to the administration?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: I think we're going back five or six years now.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: And their answer has been?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: It's sort of varied. Initially it was, well, we want the legislature to approve it. The governor has the power to do it now. And there are correctional officers who do carry firearms, who are treating, who are required as part

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: of their work to carry

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: firearms. Superintendents are allowed to carry firearms. So we are just asking that this be extended to rank and file probation and parole officers. I would also talk with you an issue that certainly, I think many of probably have heard me talk about this before, but chronic understaffing is also a safety issue. Whether it's at the state hospital, at the vet's home or in corrections. We have correctional officers who are working in facilities from some of the most violent offenders Vermont has ever had. They are working sixteen hour shift after sixteen hour shift. They are exhausted and they need help. This is a safety issue. And in many of the conversations you have with correctional officers, there's a whole series of ramifications. But one of the concerns they have is that it's just a matter of time before we lose control of the correctional facility here in Vermont. And that is gonna, I think can be tragic. And of course, our members are afraid that despite the fact that they have been warning about the impacts of understaffing, and there's been a slow role or slow approach to responding to it from those in power, they'll be blamed when that does occur. We believe, and this is a new hot issue for our staff at this psychiatric care hospital and for our staff in correctional facilities, that there does need to be a forensic facility established in Vermont.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank you.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: And I know that has been a ongoing discussion and that several attempts have been made. I don't know if it needs to be in a correctional facility. That I think raises a level of questions and particularly in Southern State where there's a ton of pressure on Southern State and not enough staff to run the facility as it is, that may be a question we might wanna examine. But we do need a forensic facility because we also need to look at our laws around involuntary medication. Our members, it's a lot of debate about this issue and it's a lot of debate in this building and even among our membership. But when you know people are sick and are acting in a way because of their illness, and they could be treated and maybe treated in the same way that we treat somebody who's having a heart attack. In a more expedited manner, they can be cared for in a way that increases the safety for them and the safety for our members. So some of this is building related, some of this is policy related. I also just wanna point out there are some things that people don't often think about around safety and security. Our folks at ANR who go out to enforce environmental regulations on land in areas sometimes they don't have cell phone service. They get a ton of threats when they're doing that. At the Secretary of State's office, a lot, the number of threats that have come to this, our members of the Secretary of State's office around the elections, has been off the charts. Now the prosecutors, judicial staff. So we have a number of concerns. We have buildings that we think need more attention. White River Junction, State Office Building recently, well, in the last year or so, experienced having a citizen out sitting ironically on the Larissa Bell Memorial Picnic table with an automatic weapon. No security in that building at all. None. You could walk right into the building, walk all around. Nobody would even know you're in there. That, as you might consider, is a disruptive effect on your ability to do your job, especially because DCF and probation and parole are in that building. Today, there is still no VGS staff in that building. If you want to go into the building, you have to buzz the person you're trying to get to and they have to let you in and hope that nobody's behind them, following them. The public has to decide if the person behind them can come in with them. It's an inadequate situation. Asa Bloomer, that represent Howard mentioned, we had a suicide there that was just a disaster. Somebody jumped from one of the top floors into the lobby. Nobody knew how to handle it. Nobody was in charge. Securitas was a security force there. Luckily, we had somebody who worked previously in security and took control of the situation, but had to fight with managers about whether to close the building while somebody was lying on the floor or die. Whether or not to live in public while somebody was lying on the floor die Shouldn't happen. And I would also raise some concerns about whether we want to have securitas in these buildings, and certainly armed securitas in these buildings. It's one thing to have certified law enforcement that have been trained. Our members raised some concerns about securitas and whether they are up to the job and what they should be in the building and should be honored. So I would raise that as a concern. What does the USDA suggest? We suggest you pass H-three 49. And there are some key components of that. First of all, we believe H-three 49 is necessary to establish Vermont State Board of Security. A security board that is made up of appointees by the governor, legislature and the VSEA that employs a director of safety and security that reports to the board, not to the Secretary of Administration, not to a politician. Because what has happened over the years is that we have had security personnel in this position come to the SCA and say, there are serious problems with safety and security. And I've been told I cannot speak to you because we are not going to spend any money on upgrading safety and security. So that needs to be depoliticized. It needs to be independent. We need this director to be obligated to come to the state legislature and to the governor with an annual report about the safety and security threats in state office buildings across the state and to request an appropriation that cannot be vetoed by the secretary of administration. Not this current secretary of administration, but any secretary of administration. That is something our members believe is really important. De politicize it independent, make sure there's an annual requirement that something come to the legislature for that. And additionally, in that bill, we believe that our members across state government who are enforcing the laws you pass should have at least the same level of security that you have in this bill. And we believe there should be a state building and courthouse police force. As part of the Department of Public Safety, obviously would have to be a memorandum of understanding and agreement with the Supreme Court to provide consistency throughout the state, a consistent level of training throughout the state and control by the state. But the presence of a sworn law enforcement officer in every single state building is necessary to meet the threat that our members are experiencing and that your constituents are experiencing when they go into state office buildings or when they go into courthouses. Now, I know that's controversial, but our members believe it is necessary. We also believe that parking lots need to

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: be secured. We've

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: said that before, the tragic day when Lara was murdered. We say that now. These parking lots at the State House are secure. They should be, but so should be the parking lots where DCF caseworkers are walking in after a court hearing or a prosecutor is leaving to go home to their kids. Those parking lots should also be secured, not with just random patrols that might be there at the right time, but all the time. Because that is where a significant amount of the threat presents itself. So we come with a lot of issues, a lot of concerns, but our members have put a great deal of thought into what they think the solutions are. And so we have wanted to bring those to you as well. And again, I'd wanna say thank you for making sure this issue got this time on your agenda. I know you have a lot of issues to deal with. This is an issue of pressing concern for our that,

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I'm happy to take any questions or advice you have.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Thank you, Steve. You put a lot of thoughts on the table, so I think now would be a good time for members to ask some questions here. How do you decide what are pressing concerns for your members?

[Unknown committee member]: I mean, you have a lot of members in a lot of different departments for the state. Is it specific surveys? Do you just send out an email saying, hey, let us know and then you

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: rank them? How does that happen? And what's the reply rate on if it is a survey?

[Unknown committee member]: How many of your members actually fill that out? Do you have that data?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: I have it off the top of my head. It depends on the issue. If it's an issue of top concern.

[Unknown committee member]: But how do you decide on what is a

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: top concern for your members?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: So our members decide what the priorities are and what they would like the union to focus on. And it happens in multiple ways. We have a board of trustees that are of elected members who meet monthly. We have a assembly, basically a council of about 200 members from departments and chapters all over the state that meet quarterly and discuss what the issues that they want brought forward. We have a legislative committee, actually chaired by Leonora Dodge, who many of you know is a probation officer in Brattleboro. They review each year what the legislative priorities are, what the political priorities are, and they recommend them to the assembly and to the council and to the board of trustees. We do often do surveys. It's not a regular survey. Think we have in the most recent past done surveys about what the legislative priorities will be. It really depends on the rate of return is not always great. We also, we have a vigilant travel schedule for our union reps and for our organizers and often the executive director to visit work sites on a very regular basis. And we let our members know we'll be there and they come talk to us usually at lunchtime. We have meetings with them and they tell us what the problems are in the building.

[Unknown committee member]: Can I just really quickly follow-up? So it sounds I don't wanna invalidate any of the things you've heard, but it sounds anecdotal. Do you have data that is something you could provide for these committees of like what you're hearing? Like 50% of our members are concerned about security. Well, maybe the other 50% have never had a security issue, but they're concerned about returning to work.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: So we do have data. It would be up to the members. I don't have the authority to share it with you. Would be up to them to decide whether they want to share that. A lot of that's considered internal communication. I do want to correct one thing just because it does drive our members nuts. We call it return to commute. We don't call it return to work because our members have been working through pandemics and floods and snowstorms and other natural disasters from their kitchen tables by necessity. It's return from our view, it's return to commute. We've been working the whole time. I know you didn't mean anything by that, but just want to make sure for the record I correct it because I can hear our members who are watching this say, why didn't they say something? But I can certainly ask them about that. I think they use that data to inform their decisions, and then they send us to present their priorities to you.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Sure. Thanks. Other questions?

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I have a question. A lot of the issues you've raised have to do with budget, of course. But just to give me an idea, I'm pretty new to this. One of the things that's been mentioned is securing a parking lot. What does it take to secure parking?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Well, you need fencing in a gate and somebody monitoring parking lots. I would say particular parking lots that have particular work sites. So anything that involves the judiciary, anything that involves prosecution, anything that involves DCF or enforcement of regulations, those parking lots need to be prioritized. We would recommend that there at least be a BGS presence in those parking lots. We'll monitoring and watching what's happening and making and regulating who gets in and out of those parking lots. I think that is, those are at least a couple of suggestions that our members have made. The state police barracks, if you ever go to drive by state police barracks, you'll notice that those parking lots are secured where the officers actually go in and park and get out. And that's the kind of level of security that we think we should see at state office buildings as well. There's a member calling me to tell me, say something.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: Other questions? Movers?

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: And I think I know the answer to The DC app personnel that are asked to do these in room visits, I assume that they are going in alone. Yes.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Thank you. Yeah. And I'll say that's on the economic services side, and we don't often think about that. On the family services side, you know, we still have situations where family service workers are going into homes where law enforcement won't go in, law enforcement will stand outside the home, but they feel it's too dangerous to go inside them. Family service workers have to go in. Now, we've done some work on trying to improve some of this, but a lot of these folks don't live where there happens to be cell power. So they're often in communities where there is just no access. They do have some new they have some extra security gear that they have available to them that we pray works. Usually it does. Hopefully, can be able to work when we need it. But I say it because it's, I think when people think of state employees, don't often think of

[William McSalis (Director of Safety & Security, BGS)]: this as part of the work that state employees do.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: And to our members and family services and economic services, those children and those families that they're serving, they'll often put their needs ahead of their own safety. Even if their union tells them not to.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Kevin. You may not be the right person to ask this question or ask the question, but do our correctional officers or police officers wear body cams yet?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: I believe that law enforcement officers do in many cases. I don't know all cases. I believe there is some deployment of body cams among supervisors in some of the correctional facilities. And the issue with the full deployment of cameras in correctional facilities is an issue of collective bargaining, choirs collective bargaining than we are. That is an issue that's still pending with the administration.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: So they don't want to wear them?

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: I wouldn't say they don't want to wear them. I would say there's a lot of additional issues that need to be spelled out ahead of time. Issues like where the workload that's added, when can the camera be turned on and off, where does the footage go, where is it stored, how can that be used. There's a lot of issues that require under the law and the contracts, the administration to bargain with us. And that bargaining, I think will occur, but it is much more complicated than I think the average person would understand.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I'm sure it's complicated, but I would think they're on the front line and from a safety and security standpoint, that seems like a pretty obvious solution to safety and security.

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: Yeah, one issue that, I'll tell you, one of the things that sparked the body camera discussion was a situation where the press reported on one correctional facility, where over a nine year period, the vast majority of allegations that were made by the incarcerated were unfounded. There's a whole story about it. And in that case, even though names were used in story, was out to public, zero discipline, zero discipline, because it could not be substantiated. And that I think is unfortunate. And unfortunately, what happens is the press gets a story, they write the story and they think they have credible sources. And then when you look into it, the evidence isn't there. Yeah, it's definitely, it's got an issue we have to, I think we'll be wrestling with soon.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: So I'm looking at some of us do have testimony

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: at 02:30. We have testimony at 02:40. Right. Yeah. I

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: would suggest that folks wanna pursue some of these conversations, you can have private conversations with the parties that are here. We're set up times for further questions if folks would like. Anything else? Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all. We will call this joint meeting to a close, and then the two committees will be going back to their respective committee rooms for further testimony on other items.

[Rep. Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: General and housing, we have

[Steve Howard (Executive Director, Vermont State Employees’ Association)]: testimony in ten minutes.

[Rep. Alice Emmons (Chair, House Corrections & Institutions)]: We