Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: More.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: We're live.

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: We're good. We're live.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Hey, have a slip. Alright, ladies and gentlemen, if you're wondering, this is the House Committee on General of Housing, and today is Friday, 05/08/2026. Everybody's just a little way into Friday and into the birthday of our ranking member. But before we get to celebrate that birthday, we do have testimony for Home for All, an important effort in the housing area of the state, and one which we've heard from before, but are going to hear more today. I don't know the order that you guys have. I'd start with Ben and then John and then Dean. Is that what you want to do?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: We're going

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: to completely change it up from that. What we have is Sean, and then if Ordella gets back here and title the Ordella, if not, it will be me, and then to Benton, and then

[Unidentified Committee Member]: to John, and then we'll end with Saudia.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Okay, go ahead. Welcome.

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: All right.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: You know us, you've been here.

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: Indeed, good morning. My name is Sean Gilpin. I serve as the director of the housing movement in the Department of Housing and Community Development. Thanks for having us. We're really excited. This is one of those rare times I get to come in without an ask and just tell you about good news and work that we're doing. So really appreciate taking the time. So yeah, as Sarah indicated, we're here to talk about a really interesting innovative program called Homes for All that is in collaboration between the Department of Housing and Community Development and the Land Access Opportunity Board. And I'll let them introduce themselves and tell you a little bit more about that organization. But the goal of this program is really to try to ease some of the friction that we see around small scale infill development and to do it in a way that's Vermont specific. And the best way to do that is to empower Vermonters who are interested in investing in their own communities. So this is a one phase of a multi phase program. We started phase one where we developed quite a sizable toolkit that gave sort textbook of on how to go about developing everything from figuring out your financing, identifying a property, the things to think about with the general contractor. Sorry, you don't have one on your shelf. Need to

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: That's not before we

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: Oh yeah, there you go. Yep, all right. So that was phase one. Phase two and phase three are actually going concurrently. Phase two is what we're here to talk about today, which is a training operation. We're bringing in Vermonters from all over the state who are interested, who have various levels of experience in doing development, to a full day workshop. We've actually partnered with Incremental Development Alliance, which is a nationwide outfit that does this type of work. You're going to hear from some local builders today as well who are part of this partnership, as well as some consultants from over in New Hampshire that are part of the InkDev area. But the program is taking and having four workshops across the state, which you'll hear a little bit about more full day, really high level and some details about the challenges and opportunities of doing small scale development. And then we're going to be choosing folks who from those classes apply to a multi week academy, an online academy with incremental development and experts that they bring in to really take projects that folks have an idea in mind, they've got probably at least some thoughts about funding properties in mind, and really actually take it from zero to fully developed. And as an addendum to all of this, I shouldn't say an addendum, it's an integral part of it, the Land Access Opportunity Board is working with the same group of folks to create what we're calling a community of practice. So we don't want this to end when the last Is that

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: phase three or is there another phase three?

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: Phase three is what we're calling the eight zero two Homes program. So that's the catalog of designed homes. So that's phase three, which confusingly enough is running concurrently as phase two, but it's droppers.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: That's what I've always been a little confused as to whether Homes four All was a predecessor of eight zero two or what the relationship was. Can you say anything more institutionally?

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: Sure. So the entire, really the entire endeavor was intended to go from this, to basically have three sections of this project, which was the deliverable of this tool book, the classes and the class materials from those academies and some trained investors and developers. And then the sort of cherry on top was the eight zero two homes pre designed. The idea was that when all of our powers combine, we create a captain housing, and you'll have them all over Vermont, armed with some of these pre done designs that they can just run with. We got a little delayed with phase two for staffing capacity issues. So we started off phase, we split it up amongst the department and Chris Cochran's group is spearheading phase three with the eight zero two homes and my crew is working on the people parts. So

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: morning. We begin, as we always do, with our touchstones. And they are that we listen generously and we speak our truth from our heart and mind, that we make the way that we work together an example of what is possible, and that we trust that we each hold a piece of the puzzle, and that we need each other's pieces to understand the whole picture. Do y'all consent to working with these touchstones in mind today? Yeah, thank you so much. So today's agenda. We hope that today you walk away from this session with the following understandings. How a collaboration like this one between LAOB and DHDD enables us to build stronger, more effective programs than any of us could build on our own. We want you to take away that each component of our Homes For All developer training program and how it works, how the components fit together to help build the 7,000 houses our communities need each year. We also want you to especially understand how our community of practice pulls together individual community member experiences into active and creative tools that empower us to overcome, and that it is an active and creative tool that empowers to overcome the thorny system challenges. And we lastly want you to walk away today feeling inspired about the opportunities Home4All brings to our communities and constituencies. Does that agenda look good for

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: folks? Awesome.

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: As we're getting started, we'd like to invite and introduce all of our team. I'd love Ben to raise his hand, and Jamie, and Sean, and Gene, and Tay. I just want to make it very clear that you see one person, I mean, sometimes you see two people up here, but that everything we bring to the State House takes this big of a collaboration to make happen, and that we are a big group that have put this together for you all, just me or Sean. Throughout this morning's testimony and they're here to answer questions, too, if you have any questions for them. Throughout this morning's testimony, you will hear a theme of collaboration. Collaboration is powerful because it allows us to build the critical mass we need to overcome problems no one of us could solve on our own. Through collaboration, we can get more from each dollar invested by strategically sharing our special skills and expertise. Biologically, humans have evolved to solve problems together. Putting our mind, our bodies and energy together makes us more creative and resourceful. Unfortunately, the systems we currently live in and work in do not routinely promote this kind of collaboration. And successful collaboration also requires certain skills. It requires deep listening and caring for one another's needs and ideas. It requires trust. It requires accountability and self accountability. Accountability, not just to the intentions that we have when we set out to work together, but actually to deliver on those intentions. Collaboration is a strength, and it needs muscle. And like any other muscle, it needs to be exercised and ready for use. Over the last two years, DHCD and LAOB, with the support of our partners, have been exercising and building our ability to deliver this exciting multilayer training program. Before we dig into how the training program works, I want to show you where all collaborations, where all good collaborations start. This slide shows the visions of success in year one.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Nella, you think you can make it bigger?

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Let me try. Sorry, I don't

[Unidentified Committee Member (“Gabby”)]: want to go slowly. Oh, okay, you're stuck.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: I'm the furthest away, but I have trouble reading. It's a little Okay. One more. I love that. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, good. Thank you. Thank you.

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: So, generated these visions of success together with LAOB, DHTD, and BHFA, and our training partners, Inc. Dev, and Health Construction Services. I won't read all of these now, but I want to point out how this discussion allowed the organizations and the people to be honest about what they needed to call this initiative as success. These visions of success go hand in hand with our programmatic North Star, our program goals. Fundamentally, we know we cannot get to the housing our communities need by relying exclusively on the developers who've landed us in the current situation. Together, we have a bottle Currently, we have a bottleneck in who develops housing in VT, and this program is strategically targeted approach to build a critical mass to overcome the systemic barriers that has created this bottleneck. We launched this program to the public in late January this year, and so far, we have nearly 300 enrollments from all 14 counties. This response and what we're learning from these new developers confirms our theory. Many more of our monitors want to help build the housing their communities need.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: That's 300 developers enrolled.

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: We're going to talk all about it.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Our impression that we've heard a lot in the community is that there's a shortage of developers and a shortage of contractors, a shortage of almost every level of skills, and so we're very interested in hearing how your program is specifically addressing this in terms of what is encouraging new entrants or how you're doing it.

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Absolutely. And I know that Tay and Ben and John going to, and John Bunbar are going to talk about that. I'm almost finished. These Vermonters come from diverse backgrounds and have diverse creative solutions and creative visions, and like to fend for themselves, beginning as small scale developers are discouraged by these systemic challenges. Given an opportunity to learn and work together with peers and trustworthy public bodies, the developers are resourced and empowered to overcome these challenges. From here, I'm going to hand it over to Benton, who's going to tell you more about how exactly the program works.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Thank you, Arnela. Thank you.

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: Hi, Benjamin Winter, grants management specialist with the Housing Division and Department of Housing and Community Development. I am the ACCD lead for the phase two developer training program. So if we look at the screen here, phase two is made up of multiple components and the goal is to create a system where there are multiple entrance points to cater to all the types of Vermonters that want to enter the field of development. So again, the folks that we have had coming to our workshops range from individuals who are simply interested in supporting housing development in their community, and they want to know how to be better champions of housing development in their community, all the way to active small scale developers and active construction workers who want to help build homes in their community and are not really sure how to become a landlord because, again, they're really used to doing the construction piece, but the financing, the development side of things are a little bit foreign to that. So the way the program is designed is we have a sort of gateway of our one day workshops where folks can learn a myriad of key development skills and really get an understanding of what small scale development looks like and how it can look in their communities.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Can I

[Unidentified Committee Member]: really quickly ask a question about managed by inc Development or Inc? Dev?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: Inc. Dev is the incremental development alliance. They've shortened it to Inc. Dev to make it a little bit easier. Yes.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Is that a Vermont based company?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So they are a national small scale development training firm. They're actually based out of Arkansas. But for the trainings, we've actually drawn upon local Vermont developers as well as regional developers out of New Hampshire to help guide both the curriculum and the training to make sure that it is as focused in on the Vermont development community and as valuable to Vermont developers.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Beautiful. Perfect. Thank you. When did you start this this first this one day workshop on where they are?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So our first one day workshop, was in February in Montpelier, and we just recently finished up with our second of four workshops in Middlebury. It was just recently on April 22.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: And how many attendees have we had so far in this one day?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So between the two workshops, we've averaged about 70 attendees per. In the Montpelier one, we had about 65 attendees who were willing to brave basically a blizzard to get there, which I think just really shows how much people are craving this knowledge. And in Middlebury, we had about 75 attendees, packed room, but again, really, really engaged crowd. Then from there, move to our classroom based learning, which is our developer academy. It's a six week online course, again, building upon the skills of the workshop. Really meant for folks to take their project visions or currently planned developments to work through those, figure out site selection, figure out the financing, budgeting, proformas, and really come out of that with an actual plan that they can then get shovel ready and actually build these homes. Same questions, I guess,

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: will be starting when, how many, who showed up.

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: Yes. So our first Developer Academy is gonna run at the May and goes till June. And then we have another one scheduled for the July into September. And then the final run of that course will be in October and then run November. So, we wanted to make sure that we spaced it out not only to allow for individuals based on where they are within their development process, but also

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: How many census to enrollment for the May '1? So, currently for our

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: May Developer Academy, we have about 13 folks enrolled. So again, it's a much smaller cohort of folks who are able to take a project that's ready for development.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: It sounds that kind of what size are you imagining these things being?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: We were envisioning anywhere from 15 to 20 or so, really 10 to 20. So that spot at 13 to 15 is really what we consider a sweet spot. I mean, a classroom based learning.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Is it in person or is it

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: It's a virtual course, but there will be opportunities for office hours for these participants to troubleshoot some of their issues with our trainers.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Go ahead. Sorry if I'm getting ahead.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Not at all.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Somebody who goes to be part of these cohorts and does something like, go to the whole program, Besides knowledge, which is phenomenal, what do they get out of this? Is there some sort of certification that then the state is more willing to work with them, or is this just more of a knowledge phase, like we're trying to get people in the door, break down barriers?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So, yeah, there's not a specific certification. It's really more about trying to fill the gaps that exist within the system. So again, a lot of folks who are new to both construction and development need to freshen their skills in either construction, though, again, hopefully working with some of our existing construction folks. But again, the financing side and then from the construction side who maybe don't understand the financing development side and just want to get those skills so that they're going to be able to fully become small scale developers. And then I'll leave the one on one TA and Canadian practice to my colleague, Tay, who can go into more depth about those.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Go to our next slide here.

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So here's a map of where our four one day workshops are being held. So we've already held our first two in Mont Belier in Middlebury. We'll be in Brattleboro in June and then finishing up in September in Linden, just trying to make sure that folks from all across the state don't have to drive too far. But again, since launching in January, as Ramella already said, we've had almost 300 promoters from all 14 counties sign up with over 200 specifically enrolling within our community practice and one on one TA and just really great representation and turnout from our first two workshops. And we've even had a lot of interest from neighboring states who are trying to address their own housing crises, look at this kind of program as a beacon and a model of how they may be able to address their needs as well.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: And I'm sure you've taken pretty good attendance at these things. How would you characterize who these people are? I mean, how many of them are already experienced developers versus people who really do developers versus people who are just wanting to allocate? Alright. So

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: yeah, I mean, there's certainly a number of folks who have enrolled, who don't have any previous experience in development, either in the finance or construction side, but again, really wanna help build homes and support housing development in their communities. And that's kind of one of the really great things about the program is that there is a space for these folks to come and participate and gain knowledge, as little as learning about their area zoning or learning about initiatives within their area and how they can become involved to help spur on housing development in their communities. But again, we have a large number of folks who've enrolled in our program who do have previous experience either in construction, real estate, but have not necessarily been a developer of a property. So they're bringing some of their own previous skills to the table. But again, this workshop and the Developer Academy in this program is helping to fill these gaps to create full fledged small scale developers throughout our state. And even a few folks who are previous small scale developers who, again, this can just help them to get some new ideas, figure out how to work that new project. Because if you've done it once, you maybe haven't done it a million times, and each project is gonna look a little bit different. So here you can also see, these are in the stages that folks are entering the process in. A large number who simply have a strong vision for a project development. They drive by their community and they see a house that they go, well, is a vacant abandoned house, or they see a plot of land and they go, we could put housing here. Or they even have a property. I believe it was 76 our almost 200 or over two fifty developers have a piece of property. So either a home or a piece of land that they have a vision to build a property on. So again, this is not just a pie in the sky hoping to get some knowledge. These are folks with resources and plans to hopefully develop housing, and this program is here to really help move the needle. So again, a range of additional readiness pieces, so site designs, knowing who their project team is going to be, figuring out the zoning and permitting. But again, these are all points within the development process that this program is designed to help folks get over and complete to get them to a shovel ready project. Next slide here. This is just a quick survey here. We've asked folks where they intend to develop. So again, not only have we engaged folks from all 14 counties, but believe an intention to build in all 14 counties as well. So again, this is not just simply focused in the major development areas. Folks want to build homes within their rural communities because they want to see folks remain in their rural communities. The next one here. Yes, and then, so the workshop here. So this is a shot from our Middlebury workshop here. So again, a really, really packed crowd and just the engagement there was really great. And one of the other really big things about it is not only the knowledge that they're learning from our trainers, but the networking that folks can do with each other and learn from each other. That's really kind of the first step of what we see the community practices being is they can meet each other at the workshops and start to network and say, Oh, I'm a designer, or I'm a trades person, or I have the resources, I have the property, but we can figure out a team that can then come together to do this development project. But the workshop is really about providing these four skills. And this is just a little bit of feedback we've gotten from folks. So again, really valuing the content and the engagement that they're getting from these workshops, getting a better understanding of all the aspects of housing development in Vermont and how they can then impact them. And then also just again, the connection they're making with folks and how they're seeing that as one of the truly valuable pieces, how we can we, as Vermonters, can help each other to help our communities. Vincent, is this have you guys I'm just

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: looking here at your 14 counties, yeah, it's Washington, Chittenden, Madison are very heavily represented, but Essex, Franklin, Grand Isle, Lamoille, Orange, Orleans, and Rutland, less of. Have you reached out? How are you attracting people to these things?

[Benjamin Winter (Grants Management Specialist, Housing Division, DHCD)]: So we have we've done relatively extensive outreach. We have been advertising through both a lot of local partners. We've run front porch format. Typically, we've advertised most heavily where we're performing our workshops just to really let folks know about an opportunity that they can take advantage of in a more actionable way. And I would imagine, certainly as we go to Brattleboro and then eventually Linden, but again, since the beginning, tried to reach out to community partners in all corners of the state to let them know about the program, let their folks know about the program. So again, we would imagine that as we continue and people continue to hear about the program, that we'll continue to see engagement, especially from our more rural areas in the state. And then once folks do complete the workshop, they can move on to the Developer Academy. So the Developer Academy really see the barrier as having a strong project vision because the real key with the Developer Academy is folks are bringing their own project visions to work on. And so they need to have understanding of what their project is going to look like. So having a site in mind or having a building project in mind that they can apply the learning in the course to. So running through things like budgeting. If you know exactly where you're going to build and you've already done your site work and you know, oh, I want to put this building on it, you can then apply those numbers to it and figure out if that's going to pencil or, again, be able to tweak it before you've broken ground on it to a project that is not only going to pencil out but fit the site and fit what your community needs. So throughout the Developer Academy, they introduce topics like how to structure your business, how to identify your site or the additional pieces of site selection, how to put together a funding staff. Financing has been a major piece where folks don't necessarily know how to go because financing a development project is not necessarily a traditional financing structure. So they can go through some of that and then ultimately how to pitch a project if you're going to approach a financial institution or an investor. But throughout the academy, participants are even given homework opportunities. So again, reaching out to existing developers, finding comparable projects within their area. Again, all the things that as a developer, you're likely going to need for pitching your project or, again, just putting together your team to fully develop the project. Slide here. Actually, from there, I do want to hand it over to John Dunbar, who is not only a local developer, but is also part of our incremental development team providing our workshop trainings.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Thank you and good morning. And I recognize that you may have several questions for me as a developer having gone through some programs. My name is John Dunbar, I'm from Rockingham, Vermont. My twin brother and I got into real estate when our parents were elderly and had some properties and we realized that those properties while serving our family, were not necessarily serving our community at the maximum that they could. And so around 2019, we realized and we grew up in our town, we realized that it could be a tool to uplift our town by buying either dilapidated properties or buying vacant land in our community and putting better housing on there to support our community members. So we really found that it was a way to uplift our community. And that's where I think that this Homes For All program really excels. If you search for real estate development on Google and want to become an investor, you'll find all kinds of sites telling you that you can make $100,000 to $250,000 a year working three hours a week. Doesn't really happen. That's how they get you in there. What Homes four All does is it focuses on how you as a small scale developer can impact your community, and its sustainable impact. It's impact that will happen for generations. And so where I see this program really providing value is being able to go into individual communities, being able to tap into the motivation, what we're hearing in all of these programs, it's not people that are showing up saying, how do I make my $150,000 with three hours a week? It's, I love my community, I want to make it better, and this is how I think I can do that. And that's where this is excelling. So we are helping people realize, and really we look at it from a standpoint of farming. So how do you farm in your community? You're looking for areas that you can grow that crop and that you can help support your community with that. So that's the lens that incremental development does, is to look at it from that perspective, helping you realize the opportunities and challenges, and what that investment looks like for the long term in your community. So we are, again, really focused on that motivation, the impact that you'll have, more so than the financial gain that you could make as a developer. So the other aspects of this program, I think that Homes four All is really the foundation that is really needed for the other housing efforts that you guys are doing at the state level. I have participated in the VHIP program. My actual real job is weatherization and housing weatherization. So efficiency Vermont incentives and all those things. But without this Homes four All training, those are all silos. Those are all things that people can participate in, but they're really not connected. And Homes four All connects all of the housing tools that you guys are using to try to spearhead that and try to accelerate housing build. So I can go on and on. I'm pretty excited about this stuff, but I want to allow you guys some time to ask questions from the developer perspective or anything like that, if you have any questions.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: So you teach in the program? Yes. What do you teach?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: I am essentially the Vermont representative to be able to say, how do we take something that is taught nationally, but have it be Vermont specific? So there certainly are some areas of the country that you can create housing development at a much lower cost, different workforces, different zoning, very different in New England. So we're able to adjust that to the Vermont. Gayle?

[Rep. Gayle Pezzo (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: So what about manufactured home development?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Manufactured in terms of like mobile home or in terms of modular Off-site,

[Rep. Gayle Pezzo (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: what was called mobile home.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Okay, so I think there's two different, I used to work for an off-site construction company. So, Bessewood Homes or Unity Homes, which actually I think that they are represented in the eight zero two Homes program. So I was the first employee for their smaller division of off-site manufacturing called Unity Homes. And so I think that there's like a panelized and modular construction, and then there's more off-site mobile home construction, and they are quite different. So that's why I want to make that distinction. So if you're asking me about mobile homes or Mobile just home, I think there are different standards for construction for mobile homes versus

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Right, know that.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Yeah, and that's so that gets tricky. I think that they tend to from a land use perspective, I'm also on the planning commission in our town. Many times those are going in places that are riskier for the occupants to be in.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: In more sense.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Close to rivers and streams that could be flooding, or areas that aren't really as accessible as the occupants need because it's the cheapest land that they could put it on. So that's where they ended up.

[Rep. Gayle Pezzo (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: A modular home or a stick built.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Well, the design standards for, you guys already know the design standard differences, so it's just whether you can design it under the mobile home guidelines or designing it under, there's different criteria for

[Rep. Gayle Pezzo (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Meaning mobile home with the HUD criteria?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Yes, different energy code standards, different standards for actual construction being able to be traveled over the road.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Okay. So, I assume in your teaching, you're teaching sort of development economics, how they put together pro form a, all that kind of stuff. Do you find that a lot of people in the course don't know that stuff and this is new to them?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Well, I think there are certainly several people that have thought about budgeting, have heard about pro formas, but I don't think that they've actually gone into the detail that we go in and then what does that pro form a mean to a lender when you approach the lender? So think there's a lot of detail that we're going into.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: And so you're teaching also sort of how you approach, how you find equity sources, how you find debt sources, etcetera.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Yes, and we're going through that in a thinking outside the box. I think many people just think I need to go to a lender. But we're working in our own individual communities. Several of the properties that my twin brother and I invest in and have acquired over the years are from other people in our community. They're people that have properties but are looking to get out and they want to support their community as well. So their owner financing is a potential, which isn't really talked about in a lot of other programs. So we're looking at different ways of creating a funding stack, different ways of developing your team. So you asked questions about how you can't find contractors, that sort of thing. So developing your team, you as the individual developer may have certain skill sets, but how you acquire the team with the other skill sets. And so we talk to them about that, those things.

[Unidentified Committee Member (“Gabby”)]: Thank you. Other questions, Gabby? I don't even know how to ask the question. It's you know, if you have let's say you have a piece of property

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Mhmm.

[Unidentified Committee Member (“Gabby”)]: And you're too old to develop it. Like, you just don't have the energy for that to happen. But you've gone through brownfield cleanup phase one and two and all that. And, I mean, it's not like a huge piece. Maybe a couple acres. How like, how do you go and find those people that have that property, or how does that person that has that property find you? And would you do the same thing where you would maybe buy it over time from the owner?

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: How does that work?

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: That's a great question. And how we've been able to manage that in our community is, in several communities around the state, either a housing committee or some sort of related group that may not be part of the municipal government, but is a group of interested parties. I know Putney has a housing coalition. In Rockingham, we started the Rockingham Incremental Development Working Group. So by supporting those groups and letting them hear or go through trainings like this, they're then able to kind of take all of the resources in your community and connect people. So connecting a person that has that lot that has brownfields that's getting cleaned up, you want to develop it, but you don't have the skills or maybe not even the desire to do that or the energy. Connecting with the people that are either the developers or may need whatever that missing piece is. So that's been super successful in our area. I know that many of the other towns locally in Southern Vermont are looking to do more of a regional, like why should Rockingham and Putney and Westminster have their own individual ones when we could all work together.

[Unidentified Committee Member (“Gabby”)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: You're welcome. Other questions? Thank you. You're welcome.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Have a feeling we'll be seeing you again. All right. Thanks, Ram. Ram. Hello, thanks for having us.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I'm Tay Marjison. I'm a small scale developer program manager for the land access and opportunity. Tell me your name again.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Tay Marjison. Okay. Yeah. And

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: I'm along with Ben, we're heading up the full programming. As Ben mentioned, he's working on the academy course and the one day workshop. And then the other two components of this programming are one on one TA, technical assistance, and our community of practice. And all four pieces work together really well because it makes While we have multiple entry points into this program, there's also a choose your own adventure style to the actual programming itself. So while we have the workshop and the academy are spaced out around the year, people also always have access to the community of practice and the one on one TA. And while we have over two fifty people in the program, at least it goes up every day, there's at least two twenty people who have opted in for the community of practice and one on one technical assistance. We have a singular intake form that people will get, whether they try to get into a workshop, they try to get into the academy, they try to do anything, they have one point to go through and to opt into the COP and the one on one TA requires extra questions and extra demographic information. And people are really stepping up to do that and get into these other parts of the programming. And so while we recognize online academy is great, we also recognize that not everybody learns in the same way and that a once weekly two hour session in online course may not be the way that they learn. And also, some of these folks are actually mid project right now. And so starting from square one of a development course might not be the need that they have right in this moment. I've had folks who've contacted me and been like, I have stripped down a fourplex, and I am not sure if I need to call my plumber or the electrician or what should I do. And I'm like, you should get into TA.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: That's what you should do.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: And so we have LEOB, through generous grant from BHFA, has contracted with Helm Construction Solutions, which is a Vermont based construction management and and technical assistance company to do our one on one technical assistance and advising for us. And so they can do everything from just reviewing the project to helping with the nitty gritties of a pro form a. Maybe somebody has a really hard finance stack to get through. Any piece of the predevelopment feasibility analysis, all the way up and through actual management of the construction and the development of the property. And these folks have a lot of network. I have so many people that have been like, oh, we're using Helm. They're like, yeah, we know them. We know And so we have a really great overlay of collaboration with them and all of our other partners that we work with in housing. And so it's been really nice to be able to just meet developers where they're at. So the way that that usually works is that someone will contact me. I have open office hours every day. I talk to these developers almost every day. And they get into a meeting with me, they tell me about their project, and sometimes the answer is, you should really read the developer toolkit. Let us start there. And sometimes the answer is, I see you've done all this work. You've gotten your perform a done, you've got your finance stack, but you think you're going to do zoning next week and you are not ready. We need to get these other holes filled for you. And that's where the TA comes in. And then they oftentimes also are registered to do the academy and it's just not there yet. And so they're like, I wanna do that. I wanna start from the beginning and I need help right this minute. So when it comes to, we were talking about what do folks get out of this program other than education, We've talked to lenders, we've talked to other financing agencies, and the idea that these folks are moving through this coursework and this specific TA where Helm knows what their project is and does a feasibility study with them, and it's pretty rock solid, is a huge step forward and a huge decrease in risk for these lenders. So they feel more confident when folks are coming in with this plan that's backed by this professional help that they've gotten. And I've also found it to be really helpful when we need specific some of those industry specialists that they know who to call or they know who's

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: in a specific area. Where's

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Helm Helm Space, Space? I do believe they have offices in Brattleboro, but our two folks are based pretty much out of Montcalier. We have one advisor who lives in Roxbury.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: So they're a Vermont out there.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Very much. Yes. They're really cool. They also do things nationally, but they're Vermont based, and they also do a lot

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: of work in the trade field too and do workshops and things like that. Do you know what is the relationship, if any, between this effort, I think I know, and, like, the associated general contractors have a whole sort of educational effort. My impression is they're you're trying to train developers, and they're trying to train contractors. That's an only trick. Yeah.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: And so when we talk about the lack of trades professionals, the developers are showing up en masse now and going, we don't have trade professionals. Right? And so part of LAOB and the way that we love to collaborate is that then we talk to all those kinds of organizations or we talk to Helm and say, do we tell? Get all these people in the same room to like, let's address how we can get that done.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Do you have any relationship with the Vermont State Colleges?

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: We do. We have a yep. Yep. We do. There's a wide web of anyone and everyone we can talk to about an issue a developer is having is a meeting we wanna have. And so we do have contacts. I started in October with this program pre launch, but Gina and Ornela, my co directors, are like I always go to them and be like, Who do we know? Who do we know over here? Do you wanna talk to the collaborations with our team?

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: You might answer my question, so I'll

[Unidentified Committee Member]: wait. I'll just

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: send We out the

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: don't have to wait. She's sitting right here.

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Well, she might answer it.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: I'll say that we still

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Can you just send me

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: your screen?

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Oh yes, I'm so sorry. My name is Jean Hamilton. I am one of the co directors of the Land Access and Opportunity Board. And that this question of, but what about the trades and how do we connect with the workforce training programs and the workforce development programs? So we have this whole map out on our walls of where are all these nodes of the system and where do we need to draw the connections? And so we are, in part inspired by a conversation we had a few months ago, Charmavalli, thinking about like, okay, what is this workforce development committee research projects that's going on right now? How do we connect it with VSAC, which I think was your And then in a conversation about farm worker housing, which drew us into the Votek programs and the career technical education centers, how do we really build a similar kind of network approach to breaking down these barriers and challenges, which so often just fall right between those gaps in our silos. So we are really bringing this sort of community of practice across the ecosystem to say, Hey, let's all be in a community of practice together of creating thriving from our community. So Ted did

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: not answer my question.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Do you wanna throw up

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: that slide for me though, while you ask me your question? The COP side is So the

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: love this, love the practice, but I wanna go back to the certifications because what you all are providing is such a remarkable tool and a resource. And I love continuing education. I'm a collector of

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: certificates. So,

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: how can you connect with the boards so that you can get some sort of CTEs or certifications, whether it's an official certification, because there's a difference, right? And I know that because I was a recovery coach before we were certified recovery coaches, right? In a recovery coach program, then that program had to get authenticated so that we could become certified with that program. I think this is on a similar level. And because the banks and folks are looking at it and taking in that weight, I think it's really great for folks to be able to have like, I took this training and I have this certificate as a developer, as member as of this community of practice to go with me. Have you all looked at

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: that at all? We did look at certificates and a way in which we have seen that this is going to support, I don't know if Gayle, you want to share the fact about the ways that it can impact financing.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Yeah, well, that's what you're saying. Yeah, it's like the certification would help with that. See, Eugene.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Can I say, LeMont, I really love this idea and we have been holding out? I'm glad you brought it back because we can still pursue this now that we've launched this, let's add this. And that this certification, I wanna just say out loud so everyone can really understand how important this kind of credentializing is for people who are not as trusted, for people who show up with identities as women, as people of color, as people who have not previously had access to capital, to go into institutions like a bank or an investor and say, Hey, I did all this program. I have a project that has been feasibility assessed with these partners and I am a certified, whatever we're gonna call it, that that is such an important step for helping to overcome the inequities and the sort of prejudices that are so embroiled in our banking and capital. And

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: then I think the stepping stone there is that we need to have a consistent program after this year that actually we can bank on to provide the curriculum that we need to

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: have a certification program. Is the VHFA financing, what's the duration?

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Yeah, so the VHFA is financed, our contract with HELM, and it's by the hour. We had enough money to do one

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: thousand hours upfront, I think. We basically received $100,000

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: from them.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Yes, so at $150 an hour, that's our banked number of hours we have. And the way that we contracted was to try and spread that out for as long as we could with their schedules too. So they're doing about thirty six, forty hours blocks a month to try and get us through till about this time next year was kind of our plan to keep it spaced out. And we're doing that a bit differently too, in that we are really trying to show up for folks when they need it. And so instead of like dropping a ton of hours on one developer who maybe takes six months a year or a year to get through them, or maybe falls off, it's like we really are doing it in smaller chunks as we go in a very collaborative way of going back and forth with our TAs to be like, I feel like they need another 20 and we give them some 20 and we see how far that takes them. So as people emerge who need this kind of help, it's there and we don't have to say sorry, like we gave it all to somebody already. We're hoping to keep, and it's been pretty fluid. It's been pretty great. Do believe I have six folks in ongoing TA right now, and every week or so we have two or three more who go through a meeting with me that are identified as having done enough milestones to be ready for one on one TA. So we're starting to pick up speed a little bit as more folks are ready. There's definitely one of those backslides of demographics, a big chunk of folks who are still doing their research and aren't quite sure where they're at yet. So I think it's gonna gain some momentum. But yeah, so then the final piece of this programming is this community of practice, which you can essentially think of as kind of like a developer cohort. It is the space where folks can get together, talk about their projects. It really does start, as Ben said, for a lot of these folks in the workshops and they see each other face to face, they see us, they feel more comfortable. And then we have an online platform for them where I get to put in all sorts of resources that come from DHFA or DHCD or anyone that we're working with who says, oh, I have a housing thing. And I'm like, great, let's put it in there. We send out emails to everybody. We give them notices. Like today, we put on there for folks to come to breakfast this morning. We had some developers come hang out with us, which was really great. And so that's kind of a hub for folks to get to know each other. It's also a place where we get to post projects. So we have these smaller groups, we're calling affinity groups, which are essentially through all of these communications with folks, through what they've expressed in their intake form from our meetings, we're seeing that there's a wide variety of housing needs that are not just the downtown infill style housing that Homes For All initiative is really focused on, which is great. But I live in Walden. We don't have a post office. We do not have a downtown. If we want housing in Walden, we are rural, rural. So people have come expressing a lot of interest in these kind of alternative housing projects, whether that's starting a community land trust that buys up land and does cluster housing projects or other types of community outreach projects. Cooperative land projects would be like when folks wanna buy land together and how do we do that? And we're also working with NOFA on that around access to farmland for groups of farmers who need to live where they work and need to figure out how to own that land together and build their housing, which also kind of goes along the lines of intentional communities or other organizations that are like, we really would love a hub of housing for our group. And so that doesn't always have to be rural, but it is tricky. And then we also have accessible housing, which is a big one for us. So housing that is accessible for folks with both physical and developmental disabilities. And then there's really key differences to what that housing looks like and what that architecture even looks like, or how that's even planned, especially for folks with intellectual and developmental disabilities, because they might need four efficiency units, but with a big central space where everyone can get supervision to do cooking or house chores or things like that. So really looking at a lot of different housing that is definitely in need within our marginalized communities. And so then farm worker housing is another big one and other rural cluster housing, shelters and transitional housing for folks coming out of incarceration or out of rehabilitation facilities. There's a huge gap there between getting out and then having an apartment. And then also the trades folk network, which is, as we saw in those previous slides, there's a ton of people in this program who come from construction, architecture, land use of different types, zoning boards, and trying to get just those folks network together, but also how do we do this trades work we were just talking about with vocational and then the enormous number of hours some of these folks have to put in between getting a certificate and having their license and how do we get them through that middle gap of finding someone that they can work for and still afford to live here because a lot of folks get through a certification program and beat feet somewhere where it's cheaper to live when they're working through an apprenticeship. So we're trying to solve some of those issues. And that's what's really great about the community of practice to me is that it's not only a place that supports these developers, but then we get so much information out of that, that we can then go to all of our collaborating partners, including DHCD. We're working with them on the State Land Bank project, which I'm super excited about because a lot, I'm seeing these issues and I'm like, I know, I think we have a way to deal with some of this stuff. So you wanna give me another side, Gene?

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Thank you.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: And so like I was saying on our intake form, all those previous graphs are all from our intake form. Those are all questions we ask when people come into the program, see where they're at, what's going on. And this is also one of those questions about where are you stuck already before we even talk to you? And you'll see a lot of folks are like, I don't have the skills or valid, right? But a lot of it is things like zoning and permitting. Financing is a huge one. We know a lot of these, but they're suitable property, short of trade professionals, and so that's a really great place for us to start. I look at all this stuff when I have a meeting with them. I have a huge spreadsheet and I can see where they're at, and then they tell me about their project, which if you go to the next one, then I get to get the nitty gritty details of like, what does it mean you can't get zoning? Oh, it means that the zoning board is all a lot of people who really don't want more housing in this town, or I don't know how to not trigger Act two fifty permitting with this project. And we know what these issues are, but it's so valuable to have the lived experience of how it's actually playing out for folks. I have a developer in New Haven who has this amazing project to keep rural Vermonters rural after they retire and need more kind of service accessible housing. So she's doing this like 55 plus rural retirement community, but in order for it to pencil out, she needs to do five single family home or 10 single family homes on 11 acres. She wants to do one central septic. She wants to do all these things. She's ready to go. She's hitting act two fifty, of course. Right? And like, this will be a great project, but these are, you know, some of the things that So this has given us tons of information, a ton of case studies. It's been like really great to be able to work through these individual projects so that we can then take it back to y'all and all of our collaborators and see like, do we work with policy or even just programming to change some of these things. Yeah, you wanna roll the last one? So basically, for all that, just want y'all to know that as big as this is and as many barriers no one's gonna make money adding all these things, these folks are ready to build housing. They don't care. They wanna do it. It's great. I mean, I went through that first work. I go to all the workshops and everything and I'm listening to like the numbers and I'm like really worried that we're gonna have people walking out and I had 65 people at the end of the day be like, great, let's do it. You know, so like they're they're ready and like we're here to support them and knock down whatever barriers and make access as easy as possible. Yeah, thanks to the whole team. DHCD has been amazing to work with. We've had

[Unidentified Committee Member]: a great time and I'm really looking forward to seeing where this goes, because we're just getting started.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Thank you, Jake. Thank y'all.

[Ornela (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Any questions?

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Yeah, do you

[Unidentified Committee Member]: have any questions for me, for me?

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: I do have a question. And only in the spirit of asking everyone who comes in here the same question, because we've been hearing a lot, so I love this. And this is all about development. Is anything in here or with your work or with your developers? Like you had mentioned, the person was like, took down my four units and

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: was doing them.

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Existing structures. Yes. Where are we on existing structures and utilizing or developing

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: existing structures. Yeah, got you. So, I mean, we really are trying to, like, there's a piece of this that is, you can get into development by taking on something that's a fully functioning rental with renters in it, but that's not really the creation of units that we're trying to go for. So the main focus of education is rehabbing rentals that are not fit for use right now, rehabbing something and then, hey, can you also, you already have that, but can you put something new in the back? Any, like, there is a lot of space for doing those kinds of, like what you're talking rehabs. And then in the rehab process, sometimes you can squeeze another unit into that building or do something else. That is a really great place for developers to start, is that if they can get their hands on a piece of property that already has something built and it's got good bones and they can do that. Like I said, that's what we're seeing from a lot of folks. I think I'm seeing a lot of new development from folks who are coming out of construction and architecture and forming these kind of town teams to, like, they've got somebody's got the land, somebody's an architect, somebody's, you know, in construction, and we can keep our costs down by literally, we have the GC, we have the trade spoke, it's not gonna cost us the surcharges of getting this done. We're not getting, our supplies are at wholesale prices, we're paying all of our workers directly, all that sort of thing. So those are both and, They're both happening and yeah, I love a good restoration. And we're seeing, I would say we've seen more of that in the, like the more urban centers places where there is more housing available. I think we're seeing both the barriers and the new construction happening in these more rural areas because a lot of towns don't have even the ACT 181 exemptions in the downtowns, let alone in places where we don't have those. And they're also dealing with the costs of septic and wells and how do we make this vessel out? So, yeah.

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: I just want to add that it's exactly right. And that in those more urban centers, again from Rockingham

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: and Dallas Falls and I'm on the

[John Dunbar (Local developer; Vermont representative on Incremental Development team)]: train commission, when you were only allowed by right to do two units of housing on a single lot, very difficult to make a two unit that's allowed in any way, shape or form. The minute that the state legislature said, let's allow four, I was able to take a project that was going to be just two duplexes rehabs and create four one bedroom apartments, which our town really, really needs one bedroom units. So it was extremely important. As Tay said, there are people that are not pro housing in your community or density is a bad word. Yeah. And we're able to help reframe that to your housing and the need are mismatched. And all we're trying to do is match the need with the housing. And that may mean more units, but it's not more people necessarily.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Or necessarily bigger, big buildings, right? Like you don't even know that that duplex is now a fourplex. It all looks the same, everything is okay. So yeah, totally.

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: I just gonna just finish the statement with that. And I say that because we just heard testimony yesterday from a scientist around, is the conversation, is there not enough housing or is there housing available, but it's not affordable? So is there a cost problem or a stock problem? It's a mixed conversation, right? And as well as versus population. So I'm always looking at those things. So I'm appreciating that you all are factoring that in and that this is beneficial in addressing those needs with minimizing the visual aspect of it because that's something that also plays in.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: I appreciate it. Yeah, We put a heavy lean on community engagement with these folks too. If I see a project come through that's big, and I'm like, Have you talked to anybody? How may all of your neighbors feel before we go here? And it's a big part of the one on one CA. And that's like another piece of that collaboration. Like, I let them know, like, Hey, heads up, these are the projects that are coming through. I think they're gonna need a little bit of convincing that maybe, you know, this should go in there, On it, got it. Let's make this work for everybody, for the towns, for the community, for everybody. Yeah. And a lot of these developers are very engaged in their towns, which I really love seeing. That's helping them. We're working a little bit around Chip and how do we And we work also with Verda and municipal TA and how do we make sure that the towns have what they need and then can get it to the developers and vice versa. There's a lot of collaboration that goes both ways, which

[Rep. Saudia LaMont (Member, House Committee on General and Housing)]: is really good. Last thing. So when folks wanna engage, if folks are watching and they're like, Oh, I wanna do that. Do they contact these, or how do they connect? How do they sign up for the workshops? How do they get engaged?

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Yes. Well, you don't have that on the slide, do you, Jane?

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: I wish they the land practice?

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: No, I think if you wanna throw that last slide back up there, always welcome to email me or Ben. Also, if you go to the DHC website and you go to the Homes For All initiative, there's a whole webpage for phase two, which is small scale developer program. And right at the top, there's the intake form. And then basically any attempt you make at trying to get into any of our programming is gonna throw the intake form in front of you. So if you go to the Inc. Dev website and you see our workshop, that's gonna send you to the intake form anywhere like that. But please just reach out to us. I love talking to all these people about stuff. Thank you. Yeah, and I'm just putting

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: up here, sorry. It's like taking forever to load, land access, do you see that? And then if you want- In

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: tape form.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Small scale developers. This is the online community and practice platform. It's so cool. You all take It's really cool.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: But you don't get to see it unless you're in

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: the program.

[Tay Marjison (Small-Scale Developer Program Manager, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: So I like that. But we do have, I do publicly post events. So things that are happening all across the state that I get let in on that is development or housing related goes up here too.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Jean, did you wanna conclude? Because we should end before noon. Yeah, we're concluded. We're done. Thank you. Thank you. Has been really good, really interesting. Much appreciated.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Very hopeful for having us.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Yeah, thank Nice day. We normally use kids.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: And I think, is there anything else before we adjourn?

[Sean Gilpin (Vermont Department of Housing and Community Development)]: Yeah, I'd like to make a speech.

[Rep. Marc Mihaly (Chair, House Committee on General and Housing)]: Okay, quick announcement. Here, do you want us to offer I have a very, very large announcement. Oh, a long announcement. She's being facetious. Am being honest.

[Jean Hamilton (Co-Director, Land Access and Opportunity Board)]: Editors, we're still