Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: Next video, do I have?

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Welcome back, everyone, to the House Committee on General and Housing, and it is Thursday, April 16. You had a paid leave update from four witnesses, and now we're going to move to back to s two thirty, which is kind of the omnibus senate labor bill, and we're gonna have just discussion and markup on one aspect of the bill, and our, that deals with non competes, and Sophie has been working on it, you want to take it away, Sophie, tell us where things are, we do have copies of 5.1. This is, by the way, we're on draft 5.1.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So Sophie Sedatney for the Office of Legislative Council. You said you have copies, but do you want me to go ahead and put it up? I

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: would put

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: it up. Yeah.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: As indicated, we're just looking at the

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Sophie, could you expand it a little? I will.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Let me just get that quickly first.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: There it is.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So this is the new subsection 3B, and this adds language that was provided from the medical society that you received testimony on yesterday.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Okay, forty two months, everybody see, this first is the one that prohibits agreements not to compete with employees who are nonexempt. Sophie, would you take a minute? I emailed Sophie and summarized for her Austin's testimony, saying he wondered if it wouldn't be better just to use the overtime cutoff, and Sophie was essentially inclined in the direction that the original language, which uses the Fair Labor Standards Act, nonexempt exempt differences, which is in a chart, remember, that was on her, because it was kind of more complete. I'm just summarizing to everybody remember. In addition, David Meckenburg testified, no. Was it David? It wasn't yesterday, we had testimony in which he also preferred this approach, it was you. He also preferred this approach because conceivably with someone, and then Sophie, I'm gonna summarize this and you tell me I'm wrong, okay? Two reasons. One is someone could exceed the threshold, the overtime threshold, and still really be non exempt because they kind have of authority to act independently and make discretionary authority, and that this was a of a more complete approach. And also responding to what you were saying, that the salary thresholds could change, and sometimes rather dramatic. Am I accurate in my summary of why we're staying in this draft if that happens?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right, I mean, it's obviously policy decision for the committee, but one of the benefits of the Benefit Standards Act, although there's a lot of regulation around it, it's something that employers should be familiar with because misclassification, where you misclassify somebody who's exempt when they should be not exempt, is a significant enforcement issue and a lot of employers have been challenged on that and in Vermont the same thing. There's actually language around misclassification in the Attorney General's office that was authorized to pursue those cases in support with the Department of Labor. So misclassification, confusing or potentially misclassifying somebody as exempt when they should be considered non exempt is a big issue. So again, although the Fair Labor Standards Act is complicated, It's something employers have an obligation to understand and to be familiar with. I would echo the concern around the salary threshold. So again, generally to be exempt, it's a two pronged test. Again, there are a lot of exemptions. Not everyone has to meet the salary threshold, but generally speaking, it's a two pronged test. It's a salary threshold, which is set pretty low. It's currently around $35,000 and then a duties test, like what are your duties? So if you hook it just to the salary threshold, the problem with that is that different administrations have come in and that number has ricocheted around. So an administration will come in, they'll put out a different salary threshold, and employers are scrambling because then they have to reclassify employees. If they don't take, if they're below that salary threshold, they've now got to reclassify them as non exempt, which means they've got to switch them over to being hourly. Mean, it's a very big challenge for employers. And then there's litigation and the courts say, yeah, no, we're not going to let you do that. So the employees have to scramble, put in more facts the way they were. So it's a very unpredictable amount of salary threshold. So that's still out there, that's still going to be a challenge for employers moving forward. But if you were to tie this to the federal salary threshold, it just seems like that would be problematic. If the committee wants to go with a fixed salary threshold, my recommendation would be to think about what H205 did, which was to use a percentage of the state minimum wage. So for example, under the H205, it had a list of, there were only certain circumstances under which non compete was allowed and one of the criteria for allowing a non compete had a salary threshold in it that was 300% of state minimum wage, which would be around $90,000 But the benefit about tying it to the state minimum wage is that increases at a very gradual rate, So it doesn't get stagnant. It's not like having a fixed amount where in fifteen years' time that amount is not appropriate, like we talked about with the housing, lodging allowance and stuff, although that does increase, but at a very, very tiny rate. So yeah, I think if this is something that the committee wants to do, I think tying it to the non exempt definition under the Fair Labor Standards Act makes sense, Because the goal really with the prohibitions on agreements not to compete is to protect the most vulnerable employees that are most susceptible to being exploited by employers, having very restrictive agreements not to compete, an ultimate position to push back against those more highly compensated employees, more sophisticated, highly educated employees are going to be in a better position to push back or to individually negotiate over an agreement not to compete. So this is really covering those folks that might be subject to an inappropriately restrictive agreement not to compete and are not in a position to push back against it.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Okay, so take us on. Oh, I'm sorry, before we Okay. Go on to

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: medication, Great, you want to so the highlighted sections, and there's quite a lot of them, this was the language that was provided by the Medical Society yesterday. So, of this language comes from H2O5, from panel that was in House of Commerce, and some of it is new language. So, I just want to flag when we get to that. Believe Jessa went through this language with you yesterday.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: You had a chance to Is this just their language? Have you had a chance

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: This is read just their language. I mean, were some minor changes just to conform to how we do statutes here, but essentially it was the language Jesuit provided. And I do have a question about one section in here. So this would essentially provide that contracts and agreements involving healthcare providers will be voided, unenforceable, and against public policy, and then it lists out if they include any of these things, then they would be unaffordable. So the first one is a restriction on the right for the health care provider to provide health care services in any geographical area for any period of time after the termination of partnership agreement or professional relationship. So that's typically your agreements not to compete are typically restricting somebody's, an employee's ability when they leave employment to work for a period of time in a certain area and engaged in certain types of work. So the second one is restricting the agility of a separating healthcare provider to provide notice of the provider's change of employment to individuals to whom the separating provider provided direct healthcare services. So what that's doing is it's allowing a health care provider when they leave their current employment to be able to notify their patients that they work directly with that they've changed position, what their new contact information is, and that the patient has the right to choose that provider. So this came out of language that was in H205 that dealt with non solicitation. So I'm curious why it didn't just say patient, is it just And again, this was language that came into H2O5 from the medical society originally. Yeah, no, think it's more consistent with current state statute in terms of how folks are referred to. And so does that basically say you can talk to your patients, but not Right, your you can't take someone's entire customer database and be like, And so that's how to keep it, the people that might want to follow you. I think the situation is if you go to your doctor's office, know, like I want to see, you know, I've got an appointment with Doctor Smith and it's like, well, Doctor Smith isn't here any longer, it's like, oh, Doctor Smith, we can't tell you. So it's just a way that you as the agent of that doctor and again, provider is a very broad term under state law, so it's not restricted just to doctors, it's a broad term. Narapist, yeah. Right. It's it's a it's a pretty comprehensive term.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: So I'm in the management. So I'm it was written, make sure I understand this. If the contractor agreement, a, b, c, d, so it nullifies the entire contract, not just portions that include the noncontracts, but I don't know.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes, essentially that is what it is saying right now. It's not severing those portions.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: It's just so they, sorry, so they have to, so if you have somebody that is traveling, they have to reestablish an entirely different contract for them traveling whatever if they're in Vermont. It doesn't just nullify the not compete in the other sections we're getting at, it limits the whole contract.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So the way this is written is any contract or agreement that includes these provisions shall be void unenforceable and against public policy.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: Is that standard?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I'm just wondering, there a reason that we nullify the entire contract and not the portions? That's certainly something the committee could think about doing, be to just say that that provision hasn't applied.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: From an HR, I don't know if there's an advance on where to go.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah, and again, this is not my field of expertise in terms of the kinds of contracts that happen in the medical The other question is,

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: are we talking about A or B or C, so on, or A, B and C, if there's It's two elements, but a or,

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I think.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: From D to E there's E.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right. So it's that Right. Right. A That's sufficient to make

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: any of these. Right. Where

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: is that? Or is that the end of the online meeting?

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Or, yeah. Okay. Where is that section on preemptive on other contracts?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So the question was the language, the opening language is, any contract or agreement that creates or establishes, blah blah blah, shall be void and unenforceable and against public policy if the contract or agreement event has

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Is been there a that's weird. Wasn't there a place that says about other states?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Here, the Goggle. Makes the agreement subject to the laws of another state. That's why you've gotten there yet.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Well go ahead and put it there, but I think, well actually, I don't wanna, why don't you take us through at the end and then come Okay, back to

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: all so B is the non sequestration piece, C is the one I have the most questions about, and we can come back to that one, but when you talked yesterday to Jessa, it was around non disparagement, So I do have questions about C. D is if the agreement is subject to the laws of another state, or E, requiring litigation arising from the agreement to be conducted in another state. And then this is on that notice, when you can communicate to the individual that you're providing healthcare services to, this is what can be in that notice. So these are the things you can say, the healthcare provider is continuing to practice the provider's profession, the healthcare provider is using professional contact information, and the recipient's right to choose a healthcare provider. And then there's subsection three, which is new language, we did not have this in H205, but this provides that the provisions of B1, so again that list of all the things that you can't have in a contract, don't apply to restrictions that limit a healthcare provider who contracts with a third party company, the non clinical business support services from opening a business within a specific territory supported by a different third party company providing non clinical services. I will admit, I do not fully understand what that is seeking to accomplish and it may be that you might want to get more information on that. Apply. So I think it's, if you had some Was that in 03/2005? No, this was not in 02/2005. It's a third party from being competed by another third party, like you can still I think it's basically if you've got a healthcare provider, but who's not doing, it's a contract that doesn't, it's a healthcare provider, but not doing healthcare provided services. Yeah,

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: you want ask?

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: At Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center, at the actual hospital, Mary Hitchcock Hospital, paperwork administration at each separate clinic or separate section of the department of the hospital is all administered through a separate company, a third party provider. My sister-in-law works for that company. And so I think they're talking about that, like a third party that comes into a clinic and does things like administration, still handles things that are, what do you call, classified.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It sounds here like what it is, is actually if you were brought here to work by a third party, that you are not allowed to go and open another third party type business. Or fourth party. So you're not allowed to

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Essentially saying the non compete provisions Does apply. Do not The prohibition on non compete provisions Allow me to compete. Does not apply to third party companies who provide non clinical business support services.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right, and I think what representative Burrows is saying makes sense, they're not

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: providing medical services, they're providing the support services for the medical Like the patient portability aspect does not apply necessarily to administrative.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay. Then can I ask a question? And it's just because this language sounded weird and made me think of another thing. Is there a definition of healthcare provider in Vermont state statute? Is there a definition? Yeah. Yes, and it's broad. So I'm thinking of like an aesthetician, where it could be licensed. Not sure if it's that broad, but I can I go ahead and was thinking of like, there are some medical, what I would consider medical procedures that are completed by somebody that has that licensing, but I'm just wondering if that would be considered a healthcare provider? I personally am not sure I would consider that, but again, would consider them a procedure, if that makes sense. In H2O5, there was, healthcare provider means a person licensed, certified or authorized by an award to provide professional healthcare service in the state to an individual's medical care, treatment or confinement. And then healthcare service was defined as any treatment or procedure delivered by a healthcare provider to maintain an individual's physical or mental health, to diagnose with the individual's physical or mental condition, including services ordered by a healthcare provider, chronic care management, professional care, wellness services medically necessary services to assist in the activities of daily living. So it was

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: a very broad gap in the journey. Very broad.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Be broad. I don't know if that's something you would want to add in here. It's just gonna get Yeah, I'm doing it.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: It was just something in this language that made me think about it.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right. And then C is just renumbered, that's what was currently in before when we had just the client on compete language, which again, this is the discharge, you know, retaliation, etcetera, and penalty provisions. And then the justice language included that this section would apply to agreements not to compete entered into on or after 07/01/2026. But rather than limiting that just to the health care provisions, I put it here so it would also apply to the non exempt employees only because then you're not disrupting any pre existing agreements not to complete, so that would make this section prospective in its application.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I do have a couple of reactions here. Just, when I'm to frame this, remember, this is a markup session, and this allows us to, without committing to something, it allows us to sort of frame it, get it to the language we like, and then we can always say yes or no. I think B1's introductory statement needs work. I don't think the whole contract should be voided because of this. I think it is, I mean, you know, a contract for employment can take all kinds of stuff. I think it should say something like, the term of any contract or agreement, that, or something like that. In other words, what should be voided is the non compete clause, etcetera, and I think, let's see, yeah, I think you've done that with A, mean, an agreement not to compete would either be, if you look at A, it just says the agreement is not to compete. That would be interpreted, I think, fairly, by the agency to be, well, the term of the contract, it contains the agreement not to compete, or if it's a separate agreement, etcetera. I'd say the term or terms here are something like that. I don't think this is a policy matter. Mean, I want a reaction from the committee as to whether it's fair to give her the instructions I'm about to do. One is that. Another, it says, Do we really want to make it void if it makes the agreement subject to the laws of another state or requires litigation to be conducted in another state as long as don't we mean that the provisions of this section shall prevail? In other words, let's say I'm employed in New York, and I have a long contract for employment in New York, and then I come to Vermont and I provide healthcare for a while, or for some patients, or whatever, do we really want to say that we're avoiding of course, the New York statute's gonna say this this is subject to the laws of New York. Don't we mean subject to the laws of New York that are not in contradiction with this section section in some way. In other words, I don't know that we want to be in the business of just avoiding contracts left and right, whole contracts of employment. All we care about is that if there is a litigation in New York State, it has to ensure that the contract is essentially modified by this language, so that if there was litigation in New York, the employee would be able to say, Well, I was provided that service in Vermont, and there's this law in Vermont, and it prevails. I don't know if that's doable or how to do it, but I'm just raising that issue. In other words, I just think generally what we care about here is non compete. We don't care about the others, it's non disparagement, non compete, etcetera, we don't care about what, you know, all the other terms of these contracts. Is that doable?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: To come up with some language, I bet I could certainly have a go.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: What do people think? Am I being too narrow?

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: My general thought, initially, when Tom brought up the point, I was fully on boarded. So that part of the contract is now, you know, going forward, not the entire thing. But then I realized it's a contract, there's probably lot of negotiating going on between give here, take there. And it seems like a very one-sided thing to be like, if part of what they got with the non compete part of it was that, then maybe there's something I wouldn't have offered as well or something you are getting or maybe you do just start over. Well, don't so if it was only sorry. If it only if it only avoids those portions of the contract in contradiction to statute, the option still exists to renegotiate the contract.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Yes. And, generally, the way this is a fairly common problem. It's one of the reasons that to be careful about state law changes that affect con contracts just for the reasons that Joe said. People negotiated a contract and they It's balanced whole. It's balanced whole. Well, if it is arm's length, sometimes it's not arm's length, but anyway, yeah, theoretically. So the way you deal with that is to make it applicable prospectively, because people who negotiate contracts have to understand what basic state law is, and they should have people advising them, people who are like my esteemed vice chair, they're HR people, they've to go with stuff. But I think the way to deal with that problem, which is not an uncommon problem when you have a body of state regulation, is make it prospective. So does

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: the line 18 effectively, actually it effectively cancels any out of state contract for health care professionals.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: The way it's written, it does.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: Makes the agreement if it makes the agreement, it's in store or or if it makes the agreement subject to laws of another state.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Yeah. That's why I'm saying I think it should be narrowed somehow. Yeah. Or at least it'd be weirdly ambiguous. How would you

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: So if you have a Dartmouth, or even UBM has got facilities in New York. The government has got facilities in Vermont. If you have a clinician who spends time on a boat, do you need two

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: contracts? Yes?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: A policy employee.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: So What does that mean? Because he doesn't know.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: What's that mean in English?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: The

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: contract, what follows the employee?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Where they live, or where, it's that, it would answer it better.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: But this applies whether their residency is at the moment or not, if they're traveling, if they live in Ohio, and that's where their contract is from, doesn't follow them if this applies. Right,

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I'll defer to Sophie. Yeah, we can get a couple more. So generally, state law as well, employment law in general really hasn't caught up to the reality that a lot of people work remotely or work in other states from where they live. So it sort of depends. So if you have a remote employee that's working in Florida, they're going to be, Florida law is going to apply to their workers' compensation and employment insurance, possibly their taxes. If you have discrimination laws in Vermont and Florida, although they're working in Florida, it may be that Vermont's discrimination laws are more employee friendly, And if they wanted to allege a discrimination claim against their employer, they may want to then choose to use Vermont law. So it's very fact specific, but the state laws have not really caught up with the reality that employees, may reside in one state and work in another, but generally if you have a tortious situation, you're injured, that's sort of where did that injury happen. If you have a contract, may specify a contract, it may be where the contract was negotiated, where the waters are. Mean, are all these choice and law issues and what's to deal with that all the time, right, when someone files a lawsuit, like, well, which states the law is going to apply to this situation? That's a whole school class, The choice of law is,

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: you have stumbled on, like I said, we have all these pseudo lawyers in this committee, you have stumbled on a really complicated area of litigation, which is choice of law, and I want to try to get instructions to Sophie so we can move on to our next item, with the understanding this is going to come back. Can I ask one I just want

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: to be sure, this is for employees only and not the 90,000,000 contractors, correct? That's my understanding of what the intent was, but I Is it in that? It says healthcare provider, so any contract or agreement that creates or establishes the terms of a partnership, employment or any other form of professional relationship with a healthcare provider.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: So it would apply to anyone who contracts with a healthcare provider, anyone. Would be a secretary of a healthcare provider.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So they're not an employee. Got it. Like an independent? So normally for those situations, you would be governed by whatever the employment costs, like if you're a temporary worker or something, you'd be governed by what the terms of the contract are. So this is trying to But I was wondering With a healthcare provider, because I'm wondering if a contract or a ten ninety nine could be, like, terms of partnership, employment, or relationship regarding the provider's provision of healthcare services.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I'm mulling this over, sorry, others can share their thoughts. You had a question about C.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I have a question about C.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: This is the section on disparagement.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right, which was I did check with so it comes from H five eighty three as introduced, which is not my bill. It's not an H five eighty three that passed the House and went over to the Senate, it's currently in the Senate. So I did check with the attorney who drafted H five eighty three and she said that this language comes from the National Academy of the State Health Policy, so I think it also came from an advocate, and it's in a bill H. Five eighty three, it's an act relating to clinical decision making. I just think it's very complicated. If it's intended to say, you know, non disparagement, then I just think there may be easier, more direct ways to say it.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I I think you should you're our counsel, I think you should come up with the least complicated but successful way of saying it. I think, you know, in the next draft that you submit to us. Also, if it didn't pass the committee

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right, that was just in the as introduced bill.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: No, well, the question is, I'm wondering why it didn't pass the committee.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I don't know on that.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Do we know, was it Senate Health Care or our health care?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: No, was in the House Committee on Health Care, and now it's, so age five eighty three passed the House, but it's not in the version that passed the House, and it's now pending in the Senate Committee on Health and Welfare.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Did the underlying bill in commerce, H30? H2O5, did I include that? Did it go to healthcare? No,

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I think they were keeping an eye on it. They took some of the language, they had language in bills that they took out because of H. Two zero five and they thought H. Two zero five would be the vehicle for those provisions around non compete. So there was language originally in, to some understanding, language in bills originally in front of the health committees that came out. Right, but

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: this bill, aside from C, is this language similar to language that came out of the Commerce Committee in its bill?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Most of it is, but not C and not subsection three that's on page six. And if we add the What about the nonclinical

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: If we add the healthcare provision, does it need a fly by in there?

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: What I'm asking is, given that the language, most of the language, not the non disparagement agreement, did D and E, were they in there?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: No, not really. So generally, H2O5 generally precluded health care provided agreements not to compete. They had a section that any contract or agreement that creates or establishes the terms for partnership, employment, or any other form of professional relationship with a health care provider regarding the provider's provision of health care services in this state shall be void unaffordable and against public policy of the contract or agreement. And then it has three things. So the first one is the same as A, the second one was the same as D, and the third one was the same as phi. So it did have make agreement subject to the laws of

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: another state or requiring litigation. It didn't have b?

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It did not have b or c. Well, b, had in, but in a separate place, it had it under the non solicitation.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Okay. Alright.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So c is the one that that's completely different that was not part of 02/2005.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I guess you should try to simplify and see at the moment, but with the committee's permission, I will share this with the chair of healthcare.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: You have your permission,

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: but what I can say is that the introductory paragraph of B and A and B and E, these were in H two zero five,

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And B and two on the top of page six were also in H2O5, but they were in a separate part of this patient. B3 and So B1 through that's on page five, line 10 through 12, and then two that's at the top of page six, lines one through seven, that was also in h two five.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: As nine scores did.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Right. And three was not, so lines eight through 12 on page six was not in h two zero five. That's new.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: Okay.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: So, let's move on. Sophie, will you provide us a new draft when you can? Yes. Thank you.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I would

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: if I may, mister chair.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Please.

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: I would really I would really like to request that we'd not have this amendment discussed at the moment,

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: because I'm Which amendment? I'm sorry. The s two thirty Three

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: twenty eight.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: Three twenty eight. Yeah. Oh, you're you're amended.

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Yep. Yeah. I would my preference would be is it my preference would be that we could have it at a different time because I'm having to split my mind into three separate ways, I really would like to be able

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: to focus solely on him. I'm comfortable with, let's talk for a minute, process. We could simply have counsel. I did not expect, let's put it this way, here's what I was thinking. Counsel would just walk through it. And then, I think the initial decision in the committee was to make, to talk through, was, do we want to go further with this at this time as an amendment to three twenty eight? We want to think it's important and want to take it up later. What do we want to do? Just basically. Then, if the decision of the committee was, either we want to make it part of two thirty eight, or if you just want to hold hearings on it, then we would have witnesses. You'd have to have witnesses. And I have some ideas of witnesses, but I'm sure you do too. What I was thinking we would do, given the short time, is just the first thing. I need to leave at 11:45 to go meet John Caledonia. Okay, You know what, I'm sorry for the disruption in your schedule, if it's okay with the committee, we'll just adjourn, and we'll take this We won't take it up, I don't know how much time we're going have tomorrow, because of education. Everybody should be on the floor for education. It's coming out today, I don't know if it will be resolved today. It might be resolved at 08:00 tonight, I don't really know. But I don't know what will happen, but next, I will definitely schedule this, and that would be our order.

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Thank you, Michael.

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: In other words, just first, presentation, second of all, what do we want to do with this? Do we want to? I mean, we have choices, we could decide to put it in 03/28, we could decide not to, and still hold hearings, have hearings and try to figure it out. It just wouldn't take the foreign legislation this year, or we can decide to do nothing. Anyway, I just felt like that was a committee decision. I appreciate

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: that, and

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I appreciate you being really well here. Then we have witnesses, okay? Yep. Alright, everyone. We are adjourned for the day. Oh, sure. And we start tomorrow after the floor, whenever that is.

[Elizabeth Burrows (Member)]: Is there a for you, is there a cutoff tomorrow if the floor lasts past a certain time that you'll

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: I think if the floor goes beyond 08:00, we won't need to know. Hilarious! I would say, generally, it depends what we're doing instead. Just a minute here, let me look. Where did I put it? Friday at the moment, yeah. No.

[Sophie Sedatney (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Elizabeth, we're still live.

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: So

[Marc Mihaly (Chair)]: wait, I'm just saying, tomorrow, I think that what's on the agenda is more of 03:28. It depends partly, I don't know what we're going to do. If Sophie is ready with another draft of 02:30, we might take that up, just to sort of have her present the new draft, that's short. If we're going to take up 03:28, it would be to do what we were just talking about, and so I would say, board goes beyond, like, 03:30, I don't know that we want to, you know, or four, We'd have to have something very short. On a Friday, I don't want us to stay late unnecessarily, but I'll make the call as we go, and I'll text you all, okay, or Miriam will bug me and bug me, which she does, periodically, once an hour. Well, her, and she will just sort of nominally include me in the decisions she makes. Alright, we can go

[Joseph Parsons (Member)]: off