Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Thank

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: you. Welcome back, everyone. After a short break, we are picking up our continued work on the budget memo process. We have spreadsheet in front of us with coupons items. And at this stage, what I'm hoping to do here is use this time to go through these items one by one, because we've had some more information trickle in and requests that have been added to this since the last we discussed, and just go down just go through the chart right now and start to really, like, refine this and the understanding, so then we can start making it a more formal we're taking more formal positions on it later later this week, which is presumably tomorrow. So I wanted to use this time to take a look at these things in a little bit more more nuance to everybody as a firm grasp of what we're looking at. That make sense?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Can I make a suggestion? Certainly. If we don't hear a discussion or disagreement, and we all seem to agree that a particular ask is a yes, that we check that box off right now, and move on to the more difficult items tomorrow. So we're not doing every single one tomorrow.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I'm happy with that.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: That. Who decides what's more difficult? Is it anything that we want to discuss that we're not unanimous on? Right.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: So if we have a unanimous ask today, just check it off with the appropriate color or yes. And then move on to the more complex, not difficult, but complex items tomorrow. So while Chair Birong is doing that, last year, we came up with a template to use, where we've had yes, a maybe, a no, and a taking no position. So we've got four options for what we can decide on. And we did try to be fairly unanimous last year in our recommendations. And this year, it just seems like we have a lot more asks. But I think part of that is we've uncovered a lot more pieces that belong to us.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yeah. So, I'm just looking through those real quick, just to scan my eyes over it one more time, and then just start going box by box in order.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: If somebody has a question like, did we hear from these folks, or when did we hear from these folks, we can figure that out and give everybody that information if you need to read more about it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So starting from the top, the first one is the request from the Vermont Food Bank, that also came through a lot of the other stakeholders, and that is for the Brewaters, Feeding, Vermonters program. The request is $2,000,000. The support for the food bank network of food shelves and meal sites, that is $2,000,000 and an additional million for ready response for food access in emergencies. That's something we've been talking about in building up for several years now in and around our emergency response call hasn't occurred. So, at total ask of $5,000,000,000 Any thoughts or conversation on it? Say

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: what I said the other day, I think if we're gonna spend money on anything, it's feeding people. Yeah. There being anything more important than that. So, I'm ready for the full amount.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: just want to say that I have not touched base with the Agriculture Committee on this, but they will also be making a recommendation to house appropriations, as well as the next item. Even though it says Human Services, Ag has a piece of that.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay. Yes, rep orders it.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I'm wondering, so if there are items on this budget list that we're going over right now, if we still need to get in touch with people, then are we not going to decide on it today?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I don't necessarily need to get in touch with agriculture. I just haven't talked to them to see what their recommend is because we're going to do our own recommend regardless what agriculture price.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Oh, okay. Oh, I thought you were saying you wanted to delay deciding on that one because you haven't talked to them. Okay. Thank you.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I guess weighing in with my opinion on this, I'm comfortable with putting this full ass forward just because of the nature of, like, what they're achieving to do here with in just the era that we are in with food insecurity. Hooper, right?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I would be uncomfortable with the alternative.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So that's inverted support?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I'm just saying we better recommend $5,000,000

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: They give them the whole on top of that.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: About 4,900,000.0

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: No? Sounds like we have consensus on

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: what's

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: So, going be based on

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: for the first line item for Vermont Food Bank, the last $5,000,000 that you put in agreement? Yeah. Alright. Let's do thumbs for just a record of action here. Yep. Thank you. Alright. Uh-oh. Next up, note from Vermont. Funding for farm viability to address food security, crop cash, farm share, $500,000.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I'm sorry, what was it?

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Drop in the bucket. Okay.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Any comment on that line item from.

[Mary-Katherine Stone (Member)]: Just going to say that full support and that it pairs well with the first.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay, show of thumbs.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: The first, Yes.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Next, the retirement and vision. So, the bill is referenced here, age five sixty seven over the notes section. This request is from the treasurer's office, policy and research, in and around their office and their jurisdiction with the retirement funds. Just a reminder, this one something disposition was in the bill that we wrote about, So that is included in that individual piece of legislation, but it is short. Yes, Robert.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: So it says none for the amount. I'm assuming that person is going to get paid. Is that one of the positions that's getting paid from a fund that Okay.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yes. That is the there was, like, two positions. And so the next one just, like, inter it interplays with this conversation, where that one is being funded by the fund itself. Uh-huh. So it's not a direct request of a general fund, but it's I mean, it's it's an interactive.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Comes out of the bank in total, like, end of the year and then they balance up. It's a true up

[Unidentified Committee Member]: at the end? Yeah.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Thank you for that clarity. Okay. Any comments on this one? So, thumbs in support?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Alright.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: So, they're involved in that or not?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: No. Because it's funded from the fund, and what Bob was just describing was, like, comes out of one pot, and then it's, that sum gets squared up at the end of the year with one transfer, if I'm saying it correctly. Alright. Next up is the VPIC one. That was also a conversation in and around the h five six seven. Now the committee decided to not include that language in the bill. So this is another vehicle for that ask. I, for one, we didn't put it in the bill. I was gonna leave this as a in a committee discussion on this one, don't want to guide the conversation. I'm going go Pinsonault and Waters Evans, then Hango.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: So, I'm correct, this is the one that was going to fund itself for the first year. Right? This new position?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Was

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Wasn't it going to fund itself the first year through the buying of unclaimed properties? Am I off?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: No, I think that was a technical name. I don't

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: think it's that one.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: No. That was the financial director.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Oh, you were thinking of no different department?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yeah, that was just something else.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Okay. This is a similar Okay.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I You

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: get No, I'm just trying to figure if that's only one.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: The right one, it was Evans.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: So, it was asked for in that same bill, the H567.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: They came in and offered testimony to include

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: It was an original ask, we removed it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: No, no, it was never in the bill.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: It was never in the bill.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: We opted to not include.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Okay, so it's not in the bill, there's no money appropriated, it wasn't in the governor's recommended budget.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: There

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: was an expense to it.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: So And it would be creating a position. Correct. I feel like that's several strikes against it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Mhmm. I mean, we did not put it in the bill.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Like, it's not in any legislation, nobody has any money for it. I maybe this is just something I heard other people say that they're not really in fights, although. I guess why would we fund it if we didn't put it in the bill? Because it doesn't exist. We would be creating the position through appropriations, right?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yes. Contrary to our policy decision as committees.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Okay. Then I feel like we shouldn't do that. That's right. Not even sure why it's on the list. Yeah.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Well, these are just all the asks. Right? That's what we're assessing out right now is like, like, all of the asks. But, yes, I I am am. Rep Hango, then Rep Uber Broken.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Yep. So we're being extra cautious this year because we missed some last year. So that's why things like this are on this spreadsheet. We just want to make sure we hit all bases. And we can defend ourselves afterwards when somebody comes and says, you didn't put my ask on your spreadsheet. So I am of the opinion that if we did not put it in the bill, we've already vetted that, that we're not supporting it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So,

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: some of the background on this is, you look at there's a new job, quote unquote, in the VPIC office that was transferred over from the treasurer's office to have funds, other post employment benefits. So somebody that's in the existing staff is going have to take over the investment mnemonic burden of that. It's odd to me that they would shift over programs without a staff person, but workload is gonna increase the people that manage money. Just a point of information about that.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Well, not to be sarcastic, but my ask would be, are they all back to work five days a week? They've act in the office or try to do something like that. Can't manage those kinds of monies from either at home. They could have to be in the office. So, is the staff back full time? That would be my ask.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I don't know what they're doing within their internal practices for remote work or in place.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Rep Coffin? I just because we didn't put it in the bill, intentionally said we're not doing this, that to try to put it in this way would be a backdoor of from the bill we already sent out of here. I wouldn't include it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yep, and that's just kind of reaffirming the point that was made a lot earlier.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Well, in this, we're basically saying to appropriations, put this on your list, It's high enough on our list that we would recommend it. It's not necessarily doing right.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: It's just a recommendation, but

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: So, I'm feeling like the consensus is not to recommend this at this point. Well, I have a couple questions. I don't think anyone in this room can answer. Well, one of my questions was if we did we already hear from the treasurer's office about this. We heard the testimony earlier. Okay. And they were like, we really need this.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: The treasurer's office with this, they were, if I recall correctly, this component, they were agnostic about.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Did they get that part? Were agnostic on? Okay.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: And they supported the passage of the bill out of committee.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: The way it was.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Okay. Alright. But I don't have questions. Correct.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yes. Okay. So, I guess what I'm going ask is a thumb to

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: Thumbs down.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I guess we'll thumbs down?

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Hey, everyone, thumbs down.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Thumbs down. Instead of inverting a question.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Yes.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Alright. Uh-oh. Up next is the Vermont Retired Surgee Queries Association. This was a conversation that we did also have. We had testimony on it in and around the same bill. And it was the language that we opted to not include in it, if I recall correctly. Yeah. Yep. So, it's very much sort of the same, very similar, if not identical, to the conversation we just had on the committee.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: So, we did not include it

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: in the bill. So, I would be inclined to say, I don't know, recommend, and let the stakeholders have that conversation with other corporations. Yes. Okay. Thumbs Seems weird doing that. Scene in a movie keeps hopping in line. Alright. Next up, Veterans Home. So, with this, the amount is $337,004.39 general fund money. And we heard from the home, about a gap that they were just trying to fill in their general appropriation. If, you know, it's the notes are over in the in the margin here. Higher costs, staffing operations, rep Wayne.

[Mary-Katherine Stone (Member)]: Just a quick question. Maybe a rep Hooper can answer this. It says not in the governor's recommend, but that the governor's recommend did include a normal inflationary increase. So what's do you know what the difference is between what they're asking, what the governor put in the in his recommend?

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: I do not. Yeah.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yeah. Wanna I'm I'm putting an ish on a very big number. I wanna say that they were asking for 1.2 ish, and then the inflationary adjustment was about another half a mil ish, and then this wears it up to about a 1.8, maybe it was 300,000. The gap, I believe it was about a 1.5. And then this gets them up to about 1.8. If I remember that conversation. This is the that's the gap. This is the gap. Okay.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Oh, yeah.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Not the full

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: gap. No. No. No. Because they did get an adjustment, but they're asking for more on top of the adjustment because of increased costs and some other variables. Gotcha. So there was a number floating around in my head that the number that was being proposed was around fifteen fourteen plus, but this plus gets it up to about a 18.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I'd rather

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: not make a decision on this till we have.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: Absolutely. That back. Yeah,

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I might be able to pull that right up. I'll just make it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: James? Yes, I'm sorry, wrote

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: this note. If you remember in years past, they used

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: to put in a budget figure, and then they would come back for the BAA, get budget adjustment. Last year was the first year they didn't do that. So this is their ask to make the budget full so they don't have to come back for the BAA every year. So this is to make the budget full and it's the shortfall from the Medicaid reimbursements and all the different adjustments. Then it So makes their budget full, that way they don't have to come back to the BAA every year. Thank for that, that was

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: a Thank you, Sandy. That's what we were missing. Okay, I'm all for it. Changed my minds.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: And just to note, the notes section is very preliminary. It's something we asked Nick to do. And not knowing the policy, it's really hard to write the notes. That's

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So we're going go

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: with 1.5 plus. Well, they

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: just Okay. The conversation right now is about seven three four thirty nine in that column.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I do have their letter. If anybody would like, I can send it to the whole committee.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I forgot about that extra part of Rutland's and all just for Medicare's math.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: It was only three weeks ago, but it seems so hard to hear. Yeah, I know that BAA part was a piece of information. Thank you.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: So their total FY 'twenty seven budget is $30,996,762 Let's just call it moving one. They're requesting $10,000,000 in general funds, which is a point 9% increase, which is 337,439. So that's what we're seeing from FY 'twenty six. And the remainder of the budget comes from special funds and federal funds. So really, are 1.9% increase is pretty low, especially with the kind of services they deliver, having to pay for medical professionals and supplies. So, that is what their ask is from general funds.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay, with that clarity, are you comfortable taking a position on this? Favorable to thumbs up? Next up, the State Ethics Commission, about the two positions that they were requesting. We've taken a lot of testimony on this over the years.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: We asked the ethics commission to do this in 2024, and we gave them responsibilities. And right now it says, when you go to the ethics website, it says that they don't have enough money or staff to fulfill the duties that we gave to them. And I would like to, my feeling is that we should approve this amount.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: The ethical thing to do. I'm not trying to be funny, but we can't just put unfunded mandates on people and then watch them humble in front of our eyes. I think honestly this is a lowball ask of them. It's pitiful, the amount of work that we, as we have put on them, they barely have a staff as it is. So I think this is the least we can do. Guess on this. Here's that.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: I would agree, it's kind of hard to do something we've asked them to do if they don't have staff to do it. He's a one man show, correct?

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: They're two part time, and the director's on the leave of absence. And I do have a theory which is based on nothing but my own theories, which is that we've been hearing all this stuff about public records and how there are so many requests and it's difficult for municipalities to handle them. And I think if they had this avenue for questions about municipal complaints, then people wouldn't feel like they had to take matters into their own hands and request every email this like board chair ever sent to somebody. But maybe it would alleviate that. Can go hand in hand if that's all the problem.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Doctor. Nugent?

[Kate Nugent (Member)]: I do have some concerns about the oversight of that mission and how it's been operating. That makes me hesitate to support it wholeheartedly. I'd like to see some clarity around the roles and responsibilities of the board versus the staff. I don't think that either of these positions would be overseeing the municipal complaints. So the issue, I don't think they would resolve that either.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: One is actually for municipal, and then the other one is for the general counsel for the state side. So there's two positions with admin equipment hardware.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: I spoke to that in testimony about providing municipalities. So,

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Rebecca?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I've got their budget letter up, and I just want to through no fault of NICS, it says not, and governors recommend that has to do with the additional amount. So if you look over here under amount, it says what it really is. It's above the governor's recommend, because governor's recommend is 250,540. And then they want an additional $351,003.82 above that. And that's the two general counsel plus some additional operating costs. So I know we've been really sharply divided on this in the past. So I would like to propose one attorney to them and see how they go from there and then revisit this again next budget cycle. So, essence, it's kind of splitting the difference? Yep, that's my script.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: What I just wrote down.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: So, knowing that they need $49,000 worth of equipment, office space and computers and stuff, would you put that as part of the Would you do the 139 and

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: the 49 and say 175? I would split the 49 because additional computers would be for two individuals in office So I would take half of 49, and go over 139, and whatever that turns out to be, I've had an even

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: one sixty four, one sixty five if you round it.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: The Revoirs Evans has her hand up, but I just want to chime in here. I do totally understand the resource stress that's going on in there. I am more favorable to recommending the full ask, but if the committee wants to have more conversation on that, like that's the committee's decision as a group. But given the stress and workload on that, I'm leaning more towards the full recommend and then let appropriations continue to source themselves, Rev Waters Evans, Rev Boyden, Rev Bank up.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Your math was wrong, I just want to raise my hand, I'm sorry. My what? Your math was wrong.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: By what?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: The governor is recommending $2.50, and then my offer was It 165 on top of wasn't full the ask, but so 165 isn't the full ask.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So $3.51 is the additional.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: No, and I

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: knew that in my head. Just was Okay.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Thanks for taking me out of turn.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Wrap Waters Evans. Us with how you were calling hands.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I appreciate the offer of a compromise. Feel very much that, as I said earlier, we charged them with doing this job. It's our responsibility to make sure they can do it effectively. Second, I worry about only half funding over what they asked because we had the chair of the ethics commission in here asking or telling us that if it didn't get full funding or if they didn't get this money for the two staff positions, that they would cease to be able to operate. So I'm assuming that half might not cut it. And also, I say this every year when we talk about this, It's hard for me to digest looking at these budget items that are like $15,000,000, $2,000,000, like 1,200,000.0, 7.83580, like all these giant amounts of money. And we're like, this $160,000 for an extra attorney is really gonna put us over the edge here. When I think that when we don't have the I know that it's not our job to go into the small details of it. For me, it's more I think right now, more than ever is a time when we need to make sure people can trust not only their municipal government, but that they can trust their state government. And I worry especially about the municipal things we've heard over and over again a lot of times in those situations. The person you're complaining to is also the person you're complaining about or their cousin or the person who sits next to them. And it gets awkward and weird for people so they don't say anything. And I think having an external place, they're not making decisions, they're just advising. I think it's really going to help a lot of Vermonters. And I really I appreciate the offer of a half, but maybe we have to talk about it tomorrow if that's what we're going do, because I'm fully supportive of the whole amount.

[Mary-Katherine Stone (Member)]: On a similar note, I think from a policy perspective, we should. They recommend the full amount or just circle back on this ask and allow the appropriations debate to either debate up. Maybe they recommend an amount that's similar to the full amount, but not quite or they make that kind of chopping decision.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Repando, did you?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: No. I guess my question would be, do we know what the $2.50 that the governor recommended is for? That's for the current staff that they have without the two Without it,

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: it's this. So this is above and beyond that.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: That's the addition, right?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: It's above

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: and Okay. That was my question. I so.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: I say go for it.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: You're on the preparations. There

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: needs to be something altered, asking for two positions, it's not that much, but without them, it's like they'll cease to exist. So, again, as supported as written. Just reaffirming what I said. Based on their testimony and our scope of.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So, you want to carry this one over for a later conversation or do you want to? If we're going to look

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: at it again tomorrow, we can look at this. There may be a handful like this. We need to look it over tomorrow, think on it. And I appreciate the fact that, hey, give them to appropriations, let them do it, but I also think they're looking for us to do so, that's why we have that.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: I say fool them out.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: I'm sorry,

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: what's that? I said fool them out.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Roughly a hundred seconds.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Is it possible to just take everybody's temperature and then talk about it tomorrow and see if if if we can yes or no, like, just kind of see what's going on? I promise I won't pressure anybody in the hallway. I'm just curious to know what people are I understand, I think, what people are concerned about. I'm just curious.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yeah, mean, this is like a formally informal conversation. We've got to like, marinate on stuff going into the next step. Mean, that's we spoke to that at the beginning of this, right? That's part of the practice with the presidency. That's all.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: I think marinating on it until tomorrow is good because I think there's others that we can make some big cuts to that would counter offset that.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: So at the outset, we decided we were only going to go quickly through this. And ones that we were unanimously agreed on, we would mark off with a yes or unanimously. So it makes sense off till tomorrow. We're only on page one. And this is due Friday. Yes. So the next one, Mark Nugent might need to.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yes, so the attorney general's office, and this has got a couple of different lines in it. So we did not hear directly from them.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: We might need to Insight,

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Thomas?

[Kate Nugent (Member)]: I don't know if I have anything in addition to what's on the page. Just I think they're getting more need. They have to do things. Sorry, I'm a little recovering from a cold, but I think they're getting more asks. Their workload has increased quite a bit.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Rebecca?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I think we need to hear from them directly about this. I apologize that we haven't heard from them yet.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay, so we'll reach out to them. And I just figured out where I was getting that weird 1.3 to 1.8 something that happened there.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: From Vermont

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Access Network? That's why I was conflating that request with Veterans Home and the Vina Access Network. Those are the numbers

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: that able start

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: with a b.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Call them. Three letters start

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: with a b. Right. So, yes. So this is something that this committee has been broadly supportive of in the past with our smaller market media and public media. And so this is the one that was the 1.35 in the that we're recommend, and then you got the $54,540,000 extra to help offset gaps in the funding.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Also keeping in mind that they now have the radio in that budget line, which has always been set very fast. Correct. So I'm in full support of this 1,890,000. Same.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Favorable sums? Same. Alright, favorable sums on that one. Common good vermouth. We heard testimony on this. It's funding to get to the offset the impacts of federal cuts and financial management and compliance systems for brand making and contracting systems.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: We didn't have anybody assigned to that because that was kind of a last minute letter that we received. Yes.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: We did have a representative from common goods did offer some testimony on this ask though. And it's, yeah, resourcing a resource for the smaller nonprofits.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: So we'll come back, circle back to

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: it then. Sure. Just so you can discuss ones that we I'm going to share

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: their letter with you all. So, everybody has the same information.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay. But that sounds like more information or more time to digest. Hold Are on

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: all of the letters also available on our website already, or were

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: they only sent to Shelby?

[Mary-Katherine Stone (Member)]: I see Nick nodding.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: We've been trying to catalog them as they come in. Perfect. Yep. It's been

[Unidentified Committee Member]: a steady flow in different ways. Yeah.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So,

[Unidentified Committee Member]: no, Nick has been doing a

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: very good job trying to warehouse all of that shelf workers to reference. Alright. Emergency management and disaster response. This is that we're The US.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: And

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: what I know.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Do we think we're going to try to build this into our omnibus bill?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Because if so, that's justification for supporting it. And that's something we haven't talked about at all. Yes. So this is a bigger, money conversation now because that FEMA request to be denied. So that has exacerbated the Zeed allocation such as this. As we continue to work on that all hazards emergency response bill, we were gonna have conversations about what type of dollars go in this direction and more broadly. And yeah, I think this is a better circle back conversation for the sake of moving aggressively. Let's see, we have up next Office of Racial Equity for one hundred and ten dollars zero. Right, this is a continuation for additional years. So this was really like it was an appropriation. It's in the governor's recommended. Mhmm. Alright. Let's support. Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Dollars 900,000. Again, in budget recommend. It's a completion of scope report. Ovens. Oh, that's a finger. Bugs or fingers? UBM $15,000,000 Higher Education Endowment Trust Fund. That is a big number, but it is not a budget recommended.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: What, I kind of

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: may not like you either. I said,

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I don't really like it. It takes a lot of money, and

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: they don't admit a lot students. Are a bunch of other that are now universities, Vermont State University, don't support them? Vermont State College.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Not at that level.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Not at that level, for sure. Think there's a huge spending problem there. What the president's standing up, okay? But she doesn't, or he doesn't, he's not. She. So

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: do we want to hold off on making a formal recommendation on this one right now?

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: You going to go up against? Think we're going go up against the meeting.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I'm just going to say no. It's 09:00, want to get through a couple more lines. Can

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I make a suggestion? We have not heard from them at all about how they use this fund specifically and why they asked for that much money. So maybe we can put this one off and maybe get somebody to send us a written statement even.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: Might have a month's list.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Right. There's something more. Yeah. And if you wouldn't mind checking with your budget buddy to find out who they heard from on that rec stone, that would be great.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I had about a hand from Rutland, is that in Sinton Hall?

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I think everyone just discussed what I was going to ask, which is what exactly makes up that $15,000,000 Yes, huge revenue.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: And again, this is one of those things that we learned about really recently that's within our portfolio.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Rev, as well.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: I'm just going say the trick word here is endowment. To me, endowment means you're investing the money and not using it. So are they just taking the $15,000,000 investing it, and then using the interest off from it? What are they using the $50,000,000 for?

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: Okay, I'll message my budget buddy. So we're

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: going to get a personal agreement to hook into this more.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: A general question, not saying I want to miss the deadline, but this is our report is due on Friday. You said what happens if they miss it?

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: I think people have missed it.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: I don't think they want to miss it. I love a deadline, but I just listen to them. I'm

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: sure last year committees asked for extra time. All right, so it's possible, but we want to

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: be diligent and get our work done.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Like hitting deadlines. No, I understand the point. Like, don't think there is there is I think there is ability to request from the dispensation.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. It was just a little kind of a few of the people we haven't heard from yet. And I would like to hear from the person before we decide.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: And and we also had left. When we were doing again, that's why we had a good amount of time. That's right. Yeah.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Okay.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: So, alright. We're going to do one more to wrap up this page. We have the Vermont State Police, dollars 500 from radio equipment and incident special fund. And that is in the recommend.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Is that for the new nine eleven?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: No. No.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Just to read up hardware.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: The State Budget stuff is not my area of expertise, so it looks like this Vermont State Police Fund, this radio replacement special fund is the only one for the budget section that says fund transfers. Does that mean it's just coming from somewhere? Good question.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Peter, can you follow one?

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Oh, no. I'd have to ask.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Yeah. Could you find out from your budget funding, please?

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Well, that would be a one of

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: my questions. If that's just if that's just, like, kinda, like, column shifting from an existing fund.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: That much. Yeah.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Like to weigh in the restaurants.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: That's what it sounds like. It might be they just wanna set aside so when they need it, it's there.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: It's a different thing. That's good. It's kinda sweet. I don't if I'm okay. So that's where's that two pages of wood? Two. That leaves us with two pages plus a soft third.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Great enough.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: There it is. Alright. Let's I'll talk more time.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Yeah. We'll

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: We're at

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: We're at three or eight now for this, but we're, like, a little light on our only have to be able to speak to this bill. Perhaps when we do this, perhaps let's see what the clock looks like. Maybe we could circle back into this for, like, fifteen minutes, twenty minutes, and get a little bit more work done. I think it would be good each of men's of moving on this on this spreadsheet. So, all right, with that, we are going to take the conversation on page 93. And, page 93, an actor listening to the creation and maintenance of a database of veterans in Vermont. I I think wanna open up with Josiah if that's for today. How you doing, sir? Good. Cool. Thanks for having me. Thank you for joining.

[Chea Waters Evans (Ranking Member)]: Thanks, dear.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Go.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Alright. Hi. Hi. It's been a while since we had you in a chair here. Been a little bit. It has. How is, life with the shifted portfolio, or we don't see you as much? Plenty busy. Good. I yeah.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: Cool. Well, for the record, Dusayah Resh. I'm the chief data and AI officer for the state, and I am, within the agency of digital services. Yeah. So I have a couple of thoughts, but if you have questions, we can start with your questions, kind

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: of whichever way you would prefer to do it. Does anything have any, any questions right out of the gate? Represent Hooper?

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Oh, we're gonna make this happen.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: We're gonna make this happen.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Well, that gets to some of the things I wanna talk about. That's your recap.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So, this is I will just preface, what I'm going to say by saying this is a short form bill. So there is, you know, a lot of possible directions this could go. And, some of the specifics, of course, will vary depending on what what you wanna, do. But I think as I was initially reviewing this bill, it looked very similar to me to, the registries that we have throughout the state, I'd say the the Vermont Department of Health. And whenever we're doing a new data collection, there's always two questions that I ask. So this is letting you into my head and things that I think about when I'm, like, looking at, new data collections. One is around, protecting the data. So are there, you know, is this a high value target for nefarious actors? And in this case, I think most registries are. This one, I think, would be especially potentially high value for foreign state actors. So that's just a thing. It requires a higher level of protection than most other databases that we create. And there's always some inherent risk with just mixing certain types of data together, because if somebody were to get a hold of them, there's consequences. So that's something that I think is relatively high on this data set. Then the other kind of risk is, could this data be reused for something beyond our original intent and would that cause a problem? I think that is not such a big deal here, but it's another thing that I consider. I guess an example is we get a lot of requests right now from the feds for data that is collected at the state level. That's kind of a new thing over the last couple of years that state collected data is of interest at the federal level. And so that's just something we keep in mind whenever we're creating new data sets now. But so in general, I think my biggest concern on this one is the the potential privacy risk to Vermont veterans and also the fact that this would become a a high value target for, for bad guys. So, I think one question that I have that you all don't have to answer right now, but I'm excited to see the long form version of this bill to answer is what the purpose of this registry is. So last week, when you all took testimony, Pennsylvania and Oklahoma were mentioned as states that already have something similar. I reviewed their systems just at a high level, and they really take very different approaches to to how they built this. So Pennsylvania, it's basically a big mailing list. You don't have to be a veteran to sign up. You just have to have interest in veterans related programs. And so it's veterans and spouses and advocacy organizations. And like like, I can go sign up and find out what Pennsylvania has on offer and and job postings, and it's it's basically a mailing list. Oklahoma has taken a very different approach. You have to have your discharge papers and send them to them. You have to or an active duty, military ID card, And then they verify the authenticity of that, and it's used to grant access to some tax benefits. And it's much more of a eligibility verification type of a registry. And in the conversation last week, it seemed like we could be leaning either way and knowing which of those we're doing is going to be important to be able to comment on, you know, is how how could we approach actually operationalizing this? And then the other thing I wanted to mention is, you know, if we are primarily focused on creating awareness, about programs, a registry may not be the most effective way to do that because there are quite a few folks who actually won't choose to opt in to a registry. I did a very informal straw poll of veterans who I interact with regularly over the weekend, and I was like, hey. Would you sign up? And they're like, no. Or maybe, you know, like, it it it really kind of varied. So, we're not gonna get, kind of robust coverage, through an opt in type of a registry, which depending on the purpose might be okay. But if our goal is to reach some of the populations of veterans that are a bit harder to contact because their contact information changes regularly, for example, folks who

[Unidentified Committee Member]: have trouble

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: with housing, we may be better just to do traditional advertising and be able to reach out to them that way, maybe equally effective and not have any of the the potential risks. So those are some initial thoughts based on the short form bill, but I'm really happy to answer questions. I think in order to I I believe in the testimony last week, there was some concern about, you know, the technology is really the hang up here. I think that if we have more about the intent and how the registry is intended to be used, we can speak to how much does it cost, how much would it need. But a system like Pennsylvania versus a system like Oklahoma are like really different in the amount of resources that they need to maintain them, the complexity of building them. And I think there are I just wanted to point out that there are potential risks. And, you know, we need to make sure that before we go create a database of, you know, everyone who knows how to use, weapons well in the state that we may wanna just consider what are

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: the potential consequences of having that

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: and if it's worth the benefit of Visa to get to that.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: Those are some initial thoughts, but happy to answer any other questions.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Representative Hango. So I'm hearing you say that we would have to make a policy decision of whether we want this to be a mailing list for creating awareness, or we want it to be a database for folks seeking programs to verify their eligibility. And also, I heard you say that you can't really comment on the cost without knowing the scope, correct? Yep. And that's fair, I understand that. Yep. Thank you.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Okay. Anything else? Robert Hooper? Something between Pennsylvania and veteran exclusive would really have no difference in terms of the bill or policy.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: If you were only allowing veterans and spouses, for example? Yes. Yes. I think it's hard to guarantee it's only veterans unless you do some sort of verification. That makes sense?

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Well, our goal I think is to finish for the Veterans Center. I mean part of the rationalization of building this is because we think we have 3,000.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: think we would also try to gather some information from the Fed. I we don't have any tax benefits to my knowledge that would go through here. The veterans tax benefit for the retirement thing that come off of October, so it wouldn't have anything to do with this. It it should be pretty simple. Revolution?

[Kate Nugent (Member)]: I was wondering if you had any thoughts about the census tracks this as well, and how that would potentially interact with the kind of our system being set up at the state level?

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: In general, we don't get any identified data from the census. We only get the identified kind of census tract level. So people live in this area type of information. Mhmm. That can be useful for program design, but it's not useful for contact.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: But with having a more refined proposal, we're kinda just we're at that stage right now where it's gotta be refined so we don't understand the the cost and the implementation scope.

[Josiah Raiche, Chief Data & AI Officer, Agency of Digital Services]: And I would say my from from a perspective of preserving privacy, my preference is if we're doing this more like Pennsylvania where the fact that you're on this list does not necessarily imply that you're a veteran. It just means that you're interested in programs. That also is nice for, like, if you're a child who's a caretaker of a parent. Right? Like, it just offers more flexibility there.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Anything else? Or yes? Thank you for the feedback. Hi, Mr. Berger. How are you? Well. How are you?

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Good. So I am Robert Burke. I am the director of the Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Nick, are you going be

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: able to bring up that slide? Those slides, I sent.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I'll take it in. Do we have them on our?

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: We do. It's on our page. If we have

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: them on our page, we're good with that, Mr. Burke.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: Yeah, so, one of the questions, I'll get into the specifics of H-ninety three, but one of the other questions was, Are there any other federal resources available? So, I put together a couple of quick slides. And the first one is a link to the VA National Database Center for Veterans Analysis and Statistics, and you can slice and dice and sort all sorts of reports and data. It's based on VA data, it's based on census data, and a couple of other models. And on the website there, you can really dig down deep and understand where that data comes from and how they come up with their numbers. They do a good job in justifying and trying to explain, okay, how did we get these numbers? The second slide is a good link, and so that's the Vermont summary. So, that gives you everything from population broken down by age, by war period, non war period. It'll show you the number of facilities that the VA is operating in the state, how much building and equipment money goes into that, how much compensation and pension monies are being expended to the state. So, that's a overview. Now, the problem with a lot of the DA's data is it's a couple to a few fiscal years behind. So, data that you're looking at are not necessarily from 2024 or 2023, they may be older than that. But it's a good snapshot, and you can do it. In the population tables, from the first page, there, a little where all the people are standing. If you look at those, again, you can slice and dice. I did this just I just ran a quick one, and it's for We only have one congressional district, it's pretty easy. You can pull the whole state, and this one is just male and female, 65, 65. And again, you can sort it by period of time served, by specific age categories, and I just did a ten year projection, '23 to 2033. So, you can see, obviously, we're aging veteran populations, so our numbers decline every year. We'll be we'll be, you know, half of what we are now in ten years in terms of veterans. So they don't do a projection on potential ads. Right? Who knows how many people are gonna join? Who knows how many people are gonna end up coming back here? Who knows how many people are gonna join either the regard, air, army, any of the reserve components. So that's that's harder to come up with. Okay, we're gonna add x number each year. You know, we know from from age estimates how many we're gonna lose per year. We can pretty accurately forecast how many veterans we're gonna lose per year, just by attrition. So that's in terms of federal data that's out there, and and one of my main go to sources when I'm looking for detail, veteran data on specifics of periods served, you know, race, sex. You can do it, you can break it down by county. So Chittenden County is the highest population of veterans, Franklin County is the second. So you can break those numbers down too. And that's when you open up that state report, the first thing is a map and it shows you color coded by population density. You can see Chittenden County highest, then it goes down to Rutland County and down after that. Any questions on those resources?

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Nope. Looks like we're good. Yep.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: So do you have go ahead. Do it quick. So we took this up last year. Mhmm. We've taken it up again at the prodding test to be back. Things behind it besides knowing a little more certainly who's here and who's Well, I

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: think that's it. It's it's I think in their mind, it's being able to fall back on our own data versus relying on somebody else's. Now, you know, this is my fifteenth year in the position, so I've I've never had homegrown data. So I've always relied on the federal data, which is, you know, fairly correct as far as I can tell. But again, you know, I can only find out about new people coming here if they come in to apply for a driver's license or they apply for the, you know, tax reduction, property tax reduction. But ones that leave or pass away, unless I'm reading an obituary, or we're burying them in our cemetery, I know those numbers, and I think, know, Josiah made a good point, and I made the point last year, what's our purpose? What's the objective? And I'm not sure, you know, in you got Gary DeGaston, the GBAT chair, he sent in some written testimony. Yes. And he brings up, which has been floating around for a number of years, the Paris match, and that's to try and offload state benefits to people who are eligible for federal benefits. So, it's to make sure that you're maximizing your federal benefits, while not double dipping, but relying on state benefits when there are federal benefits available to you for a number of different purposes. So, yeah, and certainly the risk is out there, the value of the mailing list versus the eligibility verification list. Again, sixty five percent of our veteran population is age 55 or older. One of the first, and I think I mentioned this last year, I mentioned it a lot, one of the first questions we ask when somebody calls is, do you use a computer? If you don't, okay, then I'm going to mail you out cemetery application, I'm going mail you out the DMV eligibility form for you to fill out, etcetera, etcetera. So, that's an issue also. I'm a twenty eight year Navy veteran retired. Would I be opting in? I don't know. Yeah. I retired in 2012, and at some point, the office must have sent me a package because a couple years later, I found a package from my then office of Veterans Affairs, State Street. I was like, I wonder what this was. Because at that point, I was done, and I was moving on. So there is that sentiment out there. And there is still the initial pushback years and years ago was privacy and what is going to happen with that data that I give to the state. Right? Whether it's Department of Labor, EMV, it's completely voluntary, but if you want that veteran designation on your driver's license or a registration plate, well, there's a verification method through that, and also with labor for certain programs that they have just for for veterans. Yeah, so, and just I said, what do you want depends on how it gets developed and operationalized, and that gives you the cost and resources required. Forever. So I brought this up a couple of years,

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: and it's always been associated with the license plate. They're discounted or free license plate for veterans. And this registry, it's a tag along with it. Now it looks like we have a wagon looking for a horse. So you know what time? That's like, but To wrap Morgan?

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Yeah, just to pile on to Bob, I think I'm coming to the spot. Yeah. I'm starting to wonder, yeah, full appreciation for you bringing it forward, but I'm starting to wonder, is it really going to accomplish anything, or is it a maybe a bit of an archaic mindset if we create a bill or not a bill, a registry, veterans are gonna get something more. I've I've been kind of mirror, Bert's story of I retired. Granted, was in the state. He retired active duty, but nevertheless, resources, or I should say, mailers or, you know, like the, possibility of getting, you know, homestead tax relief, that kind of thing. It all came in the mail to me. I occasionally talk to veterans because people know I am one, so a

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: lot of times, like, I've

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: got one right here. So he wants you know, they're from not my district, but I'll absolutely call him back about what's available out there. So I suppose you could make an argument that now and then there's a miss, but I don't think this is gonna capture a miss, if that makes sense. I think it

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: I I I understand what you're saying.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Yeah. I think it's I think it's yeah. Think it's, like, yeah, like Bob said, maybe it's a maybe he's coming to that same realization.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: I don't know. Or am I or did

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: I misread what you said? I'm not trying to put words in your mouth. But.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Well, cart looking for a horse.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Yes, thank you there.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: And the only thing firmly that we have put down on the table that would be beneficial for us if we're another burn fit in, fourteen, two fourteen, turned into something else that went back. You'd want to make sure everybody was notified that it would help them. Hope that the VA is doing that. Oh, yes. But I think I think they loss too. I think

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: they do a fairly good job.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Oh, I'm sorry.

[Kate Nugent (Member)]: Oh, go ahead.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Go ahead.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: Megan, just again, that federal level that Bob Burke is alluding to is that all the time I just got one while we were sitting here, like, an hour ago, a notification on, you know, you see things come through all the time going, hey, you know, what's what's out there? You know, what's available? This new thing is available. So I think generally they they do

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: a pretty good job of pushing that.

[Michael Morgan (Member)]: I

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: got a hand from our witness.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: So, again, I think just I brought up a good point about advertising and awareness. You know, we have a it's a chocolate walk full website which discusses all of the benefits, federal and state, that are available to include this cemetery, and how to contact us, how to get applications, how to get information. I have a list of it's probably close to 70 or so mailing email distribution list where I send out things to different veteran organizations.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Representative Hango.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Thank you. I'm glad you brought that up because I wasn't certain how that all happened, but you must have a database of the VFWs and the American regions and the auxiliaries that you can blast out information that's really needed, that's important and crucial and time sensitive. So that's great to know.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: And it includes organizations like Vermont Adaptive and Blue Stone Brothers Dissolved, but Blue Stone Brothers, Joshua's House, all of those, everybody gets I try not to spam everybody too much, but I did send one out this morning about that movie, you may have seen it, about PTSD growth. They're not they're calling it very good. The movie is called Sheepdog, and so it's available now to stream online. It was shown at the I can't think of what the theater was down in Dartmouth, New Hampshire around Dartmouth College, and I know I got feedback from a few people who were able to go and see the screening there, but that was the only place kind of within our catchment. You know, with the the federal VA, the White River, they talk about the catchment, and it's three counties in New Hampshire, and then it's the majority counties in Vermont, Unless you get really close, Brattleboro, make it all be so they look at it in that sort of catchment area term. It

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: seems to me that this is just an observation since we first talked about this bill a very long time ago, probably six or seven years ago. The communication channels have gotten easier for people to use. More and more people are using social media and email blasts and things like that, front porch forum. So it seems like it's easier to get information out. I mean, I remember we were trying to figure out ways to call every VFW and American Legion in the state when the burn pit registry was first started. So, I think we've made some progress on this already.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: Organizationally, so for those organizations, I can go through the state headquarters through the adjutant. Right now, I do have the super super listening paper of all the posts and their phone numbers and, you know, good luck with that. It's the adjutant's job to put that out to all their posts. And I have kind of a check and balance where I kind of check around, hey. Did you guys hear about you know, that's oh, yeah. We did get that email. But, it's only if somebody opens it and reads it. Yeah.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Okay. Any other questions for mister Burke right now? Not seeing any hands. Alright. Thank you, sir. Thank you. So I think we gotta, like, noodle on this one just given some of the, like, the we got these resources that exist. How does this more rarely, what cost would it be with the scope of implementing it, which fashion? So what I do wanna talk about briefly is we have that larger bill that we're putting components of the military and veterans bills into. And one of the things I wanted to discuss with the committee after this testimony was whether or not to include this in that conversation or in that vehicle, or it can be this standalone because I think I'm feeling like this needs more attention than the other vehicle is kind of allotting time for. Rep Hango, then Rep Stone.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Yeah, having been part of working on this bill for literally seven years, I do feel that it should be a standalone bill. So that's where the direction I think we should go and whether it makes crossover or not will depend on any further information that we get, I think, because it seems like there are two camps for this. One that we really don't need this bill to make this happen, and another, if you read the letter on our website, that there has to be a bill to make this happen. And I think it's all about servicing our veterans with easy, accessible information about what is available to them in the

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: state. Representatives.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: I'm in support

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: of keeping it as its own bill because I have two concerns. One is data privacy, making sure that our state is equipped to keep this information on lockdown because it's a vulnerable population. And then two, just being really clear about the why of this, because right now, like Representative Hooper said, yes, there's a license plate and it would keep veterans from having to carry their DD214 around to get that, I guess, if they were on this list, that could be an example of something maybe that they could look at and whatever. But other than that, we need to be really clear on what it is that we want to be sharing with veterans and or their family, etcetera. It just seems like we need to be a little bit more organized on this before we put words on a page and vote on it. That's my opinion.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: And that's like kind of speaking to the core of the conversation right now about because the piece we're at right now is whether or not to include this in the other piece. So I'm feeling a broad agreement that this should stay separate. Yep. Cool. Alright. Check that box. And then it's how does this get refined in a way that addresses these concerns. Right? Like, I'm kind of have the what Rob Hango said, that this has been an evolving conversation for many, many, many years now. And so, as that conversation evolved, the technology and the things that we have in and around concerns with security breaches for data privacy and things of that nature have changed exponentially from when this conversation first started because, wow, a lot's changed in that world in seven years.

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: Don't know.

[VL Coffin IV (Member)]: Grab Hooper. I suggest that we, book colonel de Costa, who's chairing the governor's Veterans Advisory Commission, just in case he wants to add something more than he's written.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: He did submit written testimony today.

[Robert Hooper (Member, Appropriations)]: There was

[Sandra "Sandy" Pinsonault (Member)]: he was

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: trying to join us.

[Lisa Hango (Vice Chair)]: Yeah. He was unable to join us. Yeah. So, his testimony is on our webpage.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: Okay,

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: excluding it from the omnibus bill, Yeah. Understanding that there's concerns and barriers right now. And so we can continue to work on this and refine it on the side. But until that point, we'll keep moving forward with the other piece of legislation and be just independent. All right, great. Thank you, Mr. Burke.

[Robert Burke, Director, Vermont Office of Veterans Affairs]: Back to your spreadsheet. Thank you.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: 345. Call a time out real quick for a bio

[Unidentified Committee Member]: break.

[Matthew Birong (Chair)]: Stay gonna stop, Nick.