Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Oh,

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: hi. Welcome back, everybody. 02:00. And we have in with us Scott Giles and Patrick Lueders from Resac regarding Governor's proposed budget. And if you recall, there were some in our Vermont Department of Health along with AHEC, there were some cuts to both VSAC and ATAC. Before we get started, introduce us a little bit to VSAC. And also one of the things that we may need a refresher on is exactly what is it that we have regarding healthcare workforce, what types, what different programs do we have in place that we've been supporting through VSAC, whether they be loan repayment or scholarships, what have you.

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: Absolutely. Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify. My name is Scott Giles. I'm the president and CEO of the Vermont Student Assistance Corporation. And I'm joined by Patrick Lueders, who is our Chief Operating Officer. And what I'd like to do is provide just a very brief kind of reminder of VSAC. We are actually celebrating our sixtieth anniversary as an organization created by the legislature to help all Vermonters pursue the education or obtain the education and training they need to pursue their career goals. We administer the state grant program, which is the state need based financial aid program. Within that includes both kind of full time and part time grants, non degree grants, something that are often used by individuals who are kind of seeking to obtain the prerequisites necessary to pursue careers in nursing and other health professions. We administer the state five twenty nine plan, which is the college savings plan, the trades forgivable loan program, and then we provide career and education outreach services to middle school and high school students in 83 schools across the state of Vermont and provide career and education counseling to adult students. We support those activities through three federal grants, which is why Patrick and I are currently in DC right now. As you know, it's been in challenging time for all of us that have been partnering with the federal government on grant related funding. I'm kind of pleased to say that we've kind of secured two out of three of our grants, so we are kind of confident that we will be able to continue to provide those services. We have enjoyed a long partnership with this committee, particularly in the health workforce area, and have developed and executed a number of forgivable loan programs. These are programs, broadly speaking, that function as scholarships with work requirements, where an individual will receive a scholarship in exchange for a commitment to work in Vermont in that profession for each year that they have received scholarship. And what I thought I would do, given the committee's interest, is turn this over to Patrick, who can lay out the programs that we are actually administering on behalf of AHS that I think are the focus of your interest right now.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Great, thank you.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Great. Would you like me to share the presentation that we sent in advance, or would you like me just reference the page numbers as we go through?

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: You can share so that people watching online can see without having to pull up the documents.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Perfect. Let me bring that up then. All right. We've got a number of pages in this PowerPoint, but I think we want to jump ahead a little bit to the list of the healthcare workforce incentives, which is on page seven. As Scott mentioned, really appreciate the support of this committee in helping us to move this forward. Obviously there's lots of workforce demands within the healthcare space, and we've stood up a number of programs with your support to help in those areas. So this is the full list and we'll just walk through them relatively quickly. The Vermont Nursing Forgivable Loan Program was funded with about $3,200,000 That program's been around for a number of years, but during the COVID years, it received additional funding, And so that number got much larger, was allowing us to serve a much broader set of individuals. One of the larger programs that we administer in the healthcare space. Looking at the data for this past year, a majority of the programs that were being pursued under this were registered nurses, bachelor's, and then to a smaller degree, but still significant LPNs were all being pursued. If we look at the data across the state, every county has Vermonters that are participating in this program. And as Scott mentioned, these are scholarships that have a loan component if the service to Vermonters is not pursued after they graduate. We don't have yet a ton of data on this larger version of the program, because it's still relatively new and people are still in the pipeline. But if you look at the prior version of that nurse program, about 86% of that program participants were performing work in Vermont to pay back that debt, which is I think the goal of the program in the first place. We expect similar outcomes in this program. Right now about seventy percent of the people that have received funding in this program are still in some form of education or in their first year of verification where they're working. So we'll know more relatively soon if that has had similar outcomes. The Vermont Mental Health Professional Forgivable Loan Program, another significant program for us. And on the next slide, we can talk a little bit about some of the numbers on that program. That program was legislated in the '22, had similar funding opportunities there for ARPA funds as we did had in other programs, have robust participation in that program as well. There was not funding for that in the last year, so there was no mental health forgivable loan product available to Veroners last year. That is something that we have asked in our initial budget proposal to have considered for this next coming year. And we can talk a little bit more about some of the numbers, as I said, on the next page. The Nurse Faculty Forgivable Loan Incentive Program was funded with $500,000 That one had a little bit of a harder start to get a lot of attention on that program, but we're starting to see much more momentum on that program now. One of the factors that you, I'm sure, are probably aware of is there's almost a compensation disincentive for people to pursue that program of space. As a professor at the college, you are limited to those particular salaries as opposed to a different salary that you might get by not being in the faculty space. We continue to kind of innovate with employers and the institutions to see how we can kind of mitigate that risk for individuals. But as I said, we've seen a nice uptick in usage of that program. So we expect over the next year or so that'll continue to be of interest to people. The Vermont Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner, again, very similar, had not a lot of interest in that first year. I think largely just a more narrow program area. And so after a year or so, we've started to see much much more interest in this program, people becoming aware of it. So we've had a good pursuit of that this past year. We think we'll spend the remaining funds that are available in that program relatively soon. Vermont Dental Health, our dental hygienist program has been very popular, obviously not as large funding source there. But that program, I will just highlight, we've had, well, really the suite of these programs has started to catch the interest of other organizations as well. We were really pleased to see a philanthropic organization this past year approach us in this dental hygienist space, wanted to know if they could start a fund that would also be used in their own name for a dental hygienist forgivable loan program. So I think the modeling that you all have done by helping us create these programs has created a space for philanthropic organizations to also assist in that space. So that's exciting to see. The state dentist forgivable loan program, again even a smaller one. That one has seen obviously good usage over the last fifteen years or so and we've expended those funds. And then the final one is the Vermont AHEC Scholars Medical Student Incentive Scholarship. That one is much more of a partnership with ourselves, Department of Health, and the Longus School of Medicine. And that's got some very unique eligibility criteria. It's third or fourth year, can be serving, can be working in Chittenden County as a way to have that service and loan forgiven. And there's certain programs that you must be kind of working under in order to have that. So that's been an interesting dynamic to kind of navigate and AHEC selects those students with us and might be an additional resource for you if you want to know more about that particular program. Jumping to slide eight, this is some of the data that

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: May interrupt we've for just a second? So I think one of the confusions has been, there's this notion that we're replacing we can make these cuts because we're replacing with rural health transformation money. But we can't use that money for loan forgiveness. So you're calling these forgivable loans, but are these I'm wondering, are these I'm thinking about the students who are taking these up. Are these loans given before a student obtains the education or are they loans that are given once the education has already been provided and you're forgiving loans afterwards?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Sorry to interrupt you. Yeah, that's a great question. Really are they're given in advance, right? The normal cycle would be the student would apply for scholarships or loans, and those funds would be awarded and then given to the school to pay for their education. I would say these are best described as scholarships that can turn into a loan if the service obligation is not met.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay. And are distributed sort of on an annual basis? So let's say I want

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: to become a

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: nurse and I apply to VSAC for one of these and I'm awarded this. Is it for my entire education or is it just maybe one year? I think one of the concerns is if we cut this funding, people who have already begun their education might possibly thinking that they will have funding throughout their education, that all of a sudden that funding might go away.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yeah, I think that's a really good point. So they would apply for this for the next academic year, and then they would reapply if they wanted to try to pursue that the following year to get their second year in. And your point about returning students is something that we're being very thoughtful about as well. In this past year, on nursing, those 176 students you'll see on there, most of those are returning students, right? There's about 30 in there or so that are first time students to receive that loan, but a majority of them are returning. So they would have already applied the prior year, received funding and that are applying again. So for each of those funding cycles, if they went three years, for example, at the end of that, they would have a three year service obligation because they got three years of funding.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay. If we is the funds that you're awarding, say, currently for the next academic year, are those funds based upon money that was appropriated in FY '26 budget or in this new budget FY '27? Sort of in the hopes that they would be appropriated in FY twenty seven.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yeah, it is the latter. So if we're accepting applications right now, would be for funding that would be appropriated during this session.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay. So it is very conceivable that there are students who have applied and receive returning students who have and are kind of under the impression that they'd be able to continue to finish their education if not for the state of Vermont deciding to no longer create these funds?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: That is a fair statement. Yes, I think we've got about three fifty or so. The last time I checked applicants into the nursing program, obviously the larger of these. I'm sure we have some of the other programs as well. We are obviously in conversations with AHS and the Department of Health and the Rural Health Transformation Grant. As a matter of fact, have a meeting with them tomorrow morning to start thinking through how will that kind of program add programs or replace programs. I know there is some language in that it can actually just replace a program. It has to be something a little bit different. Our first kind of material conversation with them, although we've been in a couple of meetings, is probably going to be tomorrow to start getting some guardrails on what this would look like. Obviously, we're similar to your, I think, the core of your question, we are also concerned about how we helping students navigate either a transition or dual track set of programs so they could make the best choices for themselves. Yeah.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay. Thank you. You can go ahead onto the slide. Sorry to interrupt you.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: No, no, no. That's perfect. Thank you for that. So really what I wanted to highlight here on this slide, if you look at nursing, for example, we had 176 students funded in this last cycle that consumed the $3,000,000 We had another three twenty two students that applied that because the funding obviously has some limits, we could not fund. So that next column of 5,000,000 really what we could have potentially funded for a total, if we wanted to fund everybody that wanted to pursue that program last year, of 8,000,000 or 500,000.0. So we've given you those numbers across these health programs. So you could just see the potential capacity potential for Vermonters and the interest that Vermonters have in that space. The mental health professionals obviously from the prior year since we did not have funding this last year, but this gives you some idea of what we could spend if there was a large bucket available.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: So we have over 400 and some mental health professionals apply.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yes. So that's really I think we wanted to give you a breakdown of all the health related forgivable loan programs or the scholarships that can turn into loans. Let me stop there. Scott, anything you would like to add or we can take some questions?

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: Yeah. Well, I'd just like to go back to, you know, kind of Representative Black's question, you know, about the timing of all of this and just say that we, you know, kind of share the concern that you have raised and are sharing that same concern with our partners at AHS. There's always a challenge when you offer a program. We've advertised it, as we normally would, particularly since this program has been so consistently funded through the global commitment budget. And, you know, one of the things that I think, you know, is, a strength, at least I hope, we go into our conversations with AHS about the Rural Health Care Transformation Grant, they are going to be under substantial pressure to try and get money out the door. And we do have students who are looking for support in order to be able to pursue these critical professions in the kind of healthcare field. And we stand ready to do everything that we can to help them successfully both create those opportunities and move this money both efficiently and effectively.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Go ahead, Daisy.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Your chart of students funded and funding not met is really shocking. Are those numbers of individuals funded and not funded for one year or during the length of each program? And I'm particularly interested in the mental health professionals because there's such a gap there. And I'm curious, that program was started in 2022, I think, with the ARPA money. And if there's such a demand, why is that program not extended

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: completely?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Great question. So those numbers are from this last application year, so last year's cycle. That is not the life of those programs. So last year in the mental health professional, we funded 54 students and we used 752,000, which is what was remaining from the original appropriation. So that is fully expended. And there was three seventy students, again, just last year that also applied. We don't evaluate the eligibility of those applicants once we're out of funding because we are out of funding. So we wouldn't have probably had three seventy, but we would have had something close to that of students that would have been eligible for that if we had additional funding.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Thank you. You're welcome.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Leslie. Yeah, I'm sorry. I was a few minutes late and maybe you addressed this. But I'm wondering, I've been here like this is my sixth year, and I'm noticing a lot of these loans and scholarships started in 'twenty two. Do you have any data about how many students were funded and how many students have entered the workforce because of this money? Yes,

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: that's a great question. I

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: just want to understand what we're losing. The

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Vermont nursing program, which is the first of what we call internally Nurse two now, which is the larger funded program with some different parameters to it, that one had an 86%, what we call success If success is they are working in Vermont after they graduate, so they did not repay that loan. A number of students in that program now are still either in the education cycle or they are just getting out and we're about to verify their employment. So we'll have more data on that soon. But for most of these programs, historically, we've seen a really high percentage of students completing their education and then working in Vermont.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Yeah, I think it would be helpful to have some data on that because once again, as I said, I want to know what we're not going to have.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yep, happy to gather that together.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: I'm just, oh, go ahead, Eff.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: 176 student nursing, and I think you told me this last year, are these applications all Vermonters? Are we accepting out of state?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Great question. Yes, the way the legislation was passed, Vermont resident is not a requirement. It is just a requirement that they commit to working in Vermont. A vast majority of them are Vermonters. I could gather the data on that, but it's a very small percentage in that nursing program in particular that are not residents of Vermont. I think, we have a breakdown by county that also includes, the out of state so we can make that available to the committee.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: And do they have to stay here and work?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: They would have to stay here for every year of tuition that They you would have a year of commitment.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Question, Bill? Yeah.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: It's a little big, doesn't mean a question. Thank you for So being here

[Unidentified committee member referred to as 'Bill']: just an example, nursing, you accepted 176, and there's a jump of the amount of appropriations you had for acceptance. So there's a pretty big gap there. Should you have had enough money, you could have accepted three twenty two. Do you see that gap? Is that fairly new just this past year? Or is that growing over the last however many years?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yeah, it's a great question. It really would be who we could have funded would be the addition of 176 plus three twenty two would have been what was potentially available if we had the funding. And that is a similar range that we saw the prior year. So once that funding became really available and it was kind of well known to the population that this was available, we've seen numbers that high every year.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Oh, great.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: I Oh, don't know if you can answer this and I'm sitting here trying to find the answer myself, but AHS had a presentation in front of the Joint Fiscal Committee last week and laid out all the things that they're hoping to do with Rural Health Transformation and how much they're allocated for it. I'm seeing sort of financial assistance to students in just healthcare related fields, nurses, radiology technicians, medical technicians, 4,812,500.0000. And I'm looking at your health related forgivable loans and yes, 4.8125 the plants, what we've already funded. But it seems like we have such potential for greater need. And we know workforce is so critical in our health care system right now. I'm wondering why it's not more because we have such an opportunity with these funds. Are are do you think that what they're proposing will make up for what they're cutting?

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: Well, I wonder if Patrick, let me if I can step in.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Either

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: one. And maybe if if I can reverse the question and kind of respond kind of this way. And that is to say that the budget proposal that we submitted to the administration included a request for an additional $2,000,000 for that nursing program that would not clearly, given the demand that we saw, have fully funded that program, but we were attempting to be responsible in the con just understanding that the budget context that you well, I shouldn't say you, that we all are operating within with all the uncertainty. And we also kind of made the recommendation that the administration consider reinstating the mental health forgivable loan program.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: I am seeing that that has that is just seems to be gone.

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: That is correct. It was not funded last year. And, I will say that at the end of the session, we had begun conversations, with folks about whether or not global commitment was a potential source for that, like, you know, like nursing, and that was why we proposed to the the governor's team that that be considered this year.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: And as far as you know, that that is not in the proposal under the Rural Health Transformation

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: Patrick, I think you've been in more direct conversation with the team at AHS. I don't know if you have any more information or if you're planning to learn that tomorrow.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yeah, I think that is probably where we stand. We know that they were in negotiations with CMS the last time we talked to them, so we were trying to give them some space get that completed. We know that there's obviously some efforts there with the workforce. I'm not sure if the number that you represented chair is the number, but we'll be chatting with them tomorrow and we'll probably have more information then.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Okay. Go ahead, Leslie. So I'm looking at the same thing that Alyssa's looking at, and it says for that 4,800,000.0, they say VSAC, invest in attracting and retaining, etcetera, etcetera. What would it take to transfer from your current state of design to a new state of design under rural health? What do we lose in time and effort? Does the whole thing get redesigned? Do you start from scratch? Do you lose all these people in the current cohort? Yeah, I'm just very curious about this translation.

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: Yeah, I'm happy to take a shot at that, Scott. Think we have similar questions in our minds, right? We are trying to make things as smooth as possible for students that are pursuing these programs. I know we've got initial thoughts about what the program could look like, but we really need to chat with AHS and see what their vision is for how this would work, and then we can think through what is the right way to transition students from a program, if we need to, to a different program. We've been pretty successful in the past with standing up programs relatively quickly when there's a need. As Scott started earlier, our team is ready. We just need to work with AHS, which is we're very optimistic about working with them in a very positive way. We've always had a good relationship. So we expect we'll have some clarity really soon and we'll start building the system and we'll have some good answers for how we want to navigate that with students.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Thank you. I'm looking forward to that. I'm just curious to know about the translation from slide eight to 4,800,000 through rural transformation and maybe you can come back or they can come back or so we can understand that better.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: I'd like to ask an indelicate question, which maybe you don't want to answer. I'm wondering when you learned that the funding was not in the Governor's recommend. Think And were you surprised or were you happy or were you That's a great question. What were your feelings?

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: We were not privy to the details of the governor's budget before it was presented to the legislature. So in that regard, I would say that we were surprised. What I will say is that as the team at AHS was getting ready to submit the application to CMS for the Rural Health Care Transformation Committee, they did reach out to us to say that there was going to be a workforce component to that, and that they were hoping that we would be willing to partner with them in both the design and the execution of those programs. We had a discussion about the potential fragility of global commitment dollars long term because of the fact that the waiver is going to be up for renegotiation, I believe within the next two years. I would defer to your knowledge on that. And they're concerned that these workforce programs that we were currently funding through that mechanism might have a sunset attached to them that they felt they needed to plan for.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay, thank you. Any other questions? Allen, go ahead.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: I guess it's a criticism, I'm sorry. Just going down through, and we're asking for budgets from the taxpayers of Vermont here. But I see that you're supplying 73 colleges, or students rather, out of state. It says Norwich 39, UVM 78, Vermont State University 159, out of state 73. Know you're doing great work and I appreciate everything you do for these students. But 73 students going to out of state colleges, that could have been 73 attending our state colleges. Anybody can.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: We don't have the slots in the state. We don't have the faculty,

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: we don't

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: have slots. So, have to attend an out of state school, but their obligation is to actually practice Vermont

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: and serve in Vasant.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: Yes, so they'll understand that.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: We don't have enough teachers, we don't have enough slots at Vermont programs to actually meet the need of all the nurses we need. So the slots we have in the state at all of our universities are filled to capacity.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: So, that's an issue in itself.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: That is. That's why we have that program around nurse educators.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: On slide eight, you'll see nurse faculty.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: But they come back to Vermont after and some of them come back with families. Hopefully.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: Yeah, thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: There are also many of them are from here. I think you mentioned that the vast majority of your recipients are Vermonters. They just have to go somewhere else to get their education. Correct.

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: Yes, correct.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: I'm sorry. I answered the question for you.

[Rep. Allen "Penny" Demar (Member)]: I appreciate that.

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: But but you did it more eloquently than I would have. So If

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: we could, we would. And I'm sure they'd love to study here. But

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: I know. Some of them probably wanna get out for a few years, then they they're like, what am I missing? And they come back home.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Second round of

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: spring.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Go ahead, and then I have one last question.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Sure. I

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: mean, I'm just thinking about the faculty problem because we heard a lot about that when we took testimony. Do you feel like you're making any dent in that?

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: I think on the Nurse Faculty Loan Forgiveness Program, we are definitely starting to see more interest in that program. I think there is an inherent challenge that we want to continue to work with both the hospitals and the institutions to make a better economic choice longer term for nurses to get into the faculty space.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Salary problem. Salary is still. Yeah. Last

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: question. Do you have an ask of us? Would you?

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: I think the budget proposal that we submitted to the governor, which included increased funding for the nursing program and for mental health. We continue to think our high priorities. What I would love the opportunity to do is perhaps allow the conversation that we have scheduled to have with AHS tomorrow take place and then quickly reach right back out to you to let you know where we believe we stand with regard to rural health transformation and then provide you numbers.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: We would appreciate that. It is our anticipation that we will be, that House Healthcare will have their recommendations done to appropriations by next Wednesday. So, it will be in discussion on Tuesday and Wednesday in this committee. If we could have it as soon as you're able to give it to us after your meetings tomorrow.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Thank you. Absolutely.

[Scott Giles (President & CEO, Vermont Student Assistance Corporation - VSAC)]: And once again, if I can just say thank you for the support that you have provided to us, but more importantly to the Vermont students that we serve and support. And we're proud of these programs. They've made a huge difference for students, but I also believe that they have been a critical part of our efforts to address the workforce needs of the state. So thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Thank you, and we thank you very much for your work. Okay, thanks for joining us. Thank

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: you

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Thank

[Patrick Lueders (Chief Operating Officer, VSAC)]: you. So Bye bye.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: And I'm just,

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: is that Kristen? Yes. Oh, hi Kristen. Are ready for me? Yes. I think I was just looking for the other two around Zoom. Okay. Have a hard time distinguishing on our agenda. Who's on Zoom and who's Because I don't read to the very end of the qualification. That's all right. Hi, Kristen. Thanks for joining us. Thank you

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: for having me. I'm happy to be here. I was here a couple of years ago, probably with a different configuration of members to talk about Team Two, but I'm here I remember. You do remember. I remember. I should

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: have brought my knitting. Yay.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: It's so new.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: I know that Representative Cina knows Team two very well because he's been through the training. But I'm here really to follow-up. This is on Department of Mental Health's list of budget cuts. I know Amy Johnson was here, I think, a couple of days ago talking about the cuts, and I wanted to follow-up about T2, which was on the bottom of the list for the very small amount of DMH's budget. It's $109,000 which

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: for them

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: is really a drop in the bucket, I think. This is a contract that Vermont Care Partners holds, and then I subcontract with them to put on the training and coordinate it. And I created this training fifteen years ago when I was at the Department of Mental Health as an Assistant Attorney General. I'm very proud of it, obviously. It is a half time, or it's actually a point six five position, and what it does is it brings first responders together in a room to train and run through scenarios and learn each other's limitations and language differences. It's for EMTs, police, mental health clinicians, dispatchers, and occasionally, department personnel come, other people are invited, state's attorneys are invited. Anybody who might be involved in that handoff with friction in crisis, either going to a hospital or from a hospital or just being in the community and not needing a hospital at all. We run through three scenarios during the day. These scenarios change every year. We have a section on the legal updates that I do, along with a police officer, and we talk it's these trainings are conducted regionally around the state for a reason because there are different resources available in different parts of the state. And then, one of the highlights that most people talk about, in their evaluations is the other person with lived experience who comes in and talks about, what worked well for her when police were involved in her own, crisis in her life, You will hear from her, she's on the Zoom later. She's on my steering committee, Team Two has a steering committee, comprised of people from relevant agencies, state police, county sheriff, local police, mental health agencies, Department of Mental Health, NAMI Vermont, etcetera, and they help me shape those scenarios each year, as well as just sort of the direction of where we're going. This is a voluntary training in Vermont. As you might know, we only require police to go through eight hours of mental health training. I teach that at the police academy, along with a clinician and a police officer, I've been doing that for about fifteen years as well. But about six years ago, Vermont State Police made my program, TEAM two, mandatory for all of their troopers, because they recognized the need for officers to have additional mental health training and they asked for it. And so every year, there are six trainings in five regions. Vermont State Police participate so they can satisfy that mandatory requirement. They've committed quite a bit to that, and in fact, they collaborate with the Department of Mental Health to fund Team two. After the first year, I went to the Department of Safety because we called the team to because it was for law enforcement and mental health clinicians to train together. And after that first year, we realized there really needed to be dispatchers at the table, and so we went to the Vermont State Police and asked them, really, Department of Public Safety, and asked if they could help contribute so that dispatchers could attend, and they have every year since. They add to that under a $9,000 budget. But it's a training that has gotten international recognition. I've gone to several conferences to present this model. We're the only state that does this, where we bring first responders together physically in a room to train together. So I was concerned, I learned about the Department of Mental Health wanting to cut this from their budget and take it in house from a committee hearing. There's been no communication, there's been no transition plan, they did not let Vermont Care Partners know about this or the Department of Public Safety, and so we are now of scrambling, like, well, what is this going to look like? And why now? At a point in where we're asking for more training for police around crisis calls and more training for EMTs. EMTs have been begging for training. And I have put all the details about the work that goes into organizing the training in my written submission, and I'm not going get into that here, but it's not a simple thing to just pick up, as TMH has said, in house. This takes a lot of planning, and the whole thing about Team two is it's built on those relationships that are created, that I've created, with all the different agencies in the state. When I first came to Vermont, I was the staff attorney at Department of Public Safety, so I had connections with police. When I was a prosecutor in King County, Washington, I was the main trainer in my office for police, mostly on domestic violence stuff. But there needs to be that relationship building in order for people to, believe in the training and to come to it. Police are hard to get to a training. And one of the things we figured out right away was I gotta provide food. Gotta have free food. And we gotta have those relationships, So, I have a relationship with the, BSP has one point person as a trainer. I have a relationship with the police academy, with the criminal justice council, with all the mental health agencies. I attend all the emergency services directors meetings and make sure that they are aware and that I'm aware of what the current issue is that they're facing as they're doing their work on the ground. And that's why those scenarios change every year, so that we're doing something that's current. So close to two thousand first responders have been trained in Team two in the last twelve since it's been up and running. And I just want to share some quotes with you from participants in closing. What people have said, and this is in their evaluation at the end of the training, that the training has offered resources and ideas about how to help Vermont State Police, dispatch, and mental health collaborate and communicate in a more efficient way. This training offered abundant insight and knowledge of other agencies' operations and procedures. I valued the guest speakers' sharing of lived experiences. This training has helped me learn how to better serve clients. And gaining a better understanding of who others are and how they do their job assists in informing how I respond to and work with them. And finally, now that I have a better understanding of what police can and cannot do, as well as their perception of situations, I can better support them in supporting clients. So to take this training away, without any plan, without any transition, I think it's going to be very detrimental to a lot of people, first responders, but also vulnerable Vermonters.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Question, Daisy.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Thank you for framing thousands of your offers and your twelve years of service to us, really. I was also really surprised when I saw the cut because I have heard so much about Team Q, yes, from Brian and S'well Brothers. I was also shocked because I did ask if it was coordinated with you and was told that it wasn't a coordinated production. That's rough. Do you have ownership rights or trademark to Team two?

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: That's a great question, because when it first started, there was a different commissioner at the Department of Mental Health, and I do not have, I have not trademarked into and what what that commissioner told me is that I had proprietary rights but I just I never did anything legally about it But I have all the content. I'm in the dark as far as how the Department of Mental Health thinks they're going to put this on

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: I'm asking just because you mentioned the importance of a transition, because it seems that the plan is not to stop this training, but rather to transfer it to DMH internally.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: That's what it would continue to

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: be delivered and they claim to have capacity to do that.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: That's what they've said. And my concern is that if they think they can just give it to a person who already has a job there, this is a lot of work. While it's twenty six hours a week is what my contract is, it takes a lot of coordination year round to do it, and I don't think they understand the depth and the breadth of this training.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Have Brian, but I have Leslie first.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Thank you. Thank you for that work. I come from the Putney area, and we know about Scott Garvey, who was killed in a mental health crisis. And as a result of that, it was a great tragedy, there is a bill, age six thirteen, to increase training for troopers, I think even the social worker who was involved in that area resigned over the result of the trooper's actions. And I guess you're kind of asking for me the same kind of question, and I'd like to hear from DMH about this at some point, how they would expect, and not today clearly, to make that transition. With law, eight thirteen, I think he said, is going to come through the legislature and increase the demand on training, as it should be, because Scott Gartney should never have died. And that's what I'm interested in hearing more about. And I'm hearing, and we didn't hear anything about it other than cut, no presentation of what their plan is, how they expect to continue the training, how there's going to be no more deaths by state trooper. To me, it's a big deal. I really want to appreciate your work, but I really want to understand the plan from DMH about how not to have these kinds of deaths.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: And and I think you should probably hear from the Department of Public Safety because they also did not inform them. And that this is a collaborative effort for a reason. So I know that they are not happy with this idea at all, and we all none of us know who are involved with this know what the what the if there is a plan or what the plan is.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Just to be fair to the department, they did prepare a document responding to some of my concerns about the budget, and they did speak to some of this. Okay,

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: I'm good. Is that something that we've seen? I just had

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: a meeting with them a couple hours ago.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: That's great. So maybe we'll get to that information. Brian,

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: and then Scott. So just speaking to the issue of the department wanting to take on the work internally, You mentioned the hours involved, but I'm wondering if you could say a little bit more about the aspects of the work that you're that are not related to time, but rather to the relationships? Because you've worked with, for example, how many professional relationships have you developed that you leverage to do this course that they don't have yet? I don't understand how they can possibly replicate that.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: I don't even And that's

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: what I put in my written comments and I didn't kind of didn't

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: It's okay, we can read it But,

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: I mean, if they want to take it in house and they have the capacity to do that, that's fine, but I think there needs to be a transition, and so why not we're at the end of a grant cycle as of August 1, we have another RFP that will go out, and it's initially a two year grant, it has been traditionally for the last twelve years, with an optional one year addition. So, why not let it go on and then have a plan to have somebody shadow me or come in and start building those relationships? Because you're absolutely right, those relationships are absolutely critical. You're going to hear from an instructor. I have a team of 35, anywhere from 35 to 40 instructors, and each region has different amounts of instructors. Those people come and go. They retire, they move on, and you have to be able to build, keep that instructor team robust. And not just anybody can be an instructor. And so, I handpick all those people. I'd like to think they're there because of me, but they're there because of those relationships that have been built. And they also really believe in this model, this particular model, the way that we do it. It's very intentional. Every aspect of that curriculum is very, very intentional. And a lot of time went into creating it back fifteen years ago.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: So, I want to be mindful there's other witnesses, but I wanted to just point out something and then ask one more question. People are pointing to the recent death, but something that has emerged that we aren't going to get into here is that there were many rules broken. The training of Team Tube is not followed in that incident, so that's not the fault of the training. Something else went wrong, many things went wrong in that situation where the officers And we'll let the courts handle that. But I just want to point it out because some people are pointing to that as an example of a failure. That one incident was an anomaly. I would like to highlight that there's been probably hundreds or thousands of interactions that have gone better because of this partnership that's fostered between different disciplines and the training. But I do think there's room for improvement, and so I guess my question would be, if the program were going to continue, where do you see things going? What do you think the current need is for this training? Because it's evolving, so if anyone would have a sense of that, it'd be you and the trainers. What is the current need? I don't know if the MH gets it, not to be rude.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: There's still a need. Where I see it evolving is having more and more EMTs actually at the table, because they're the ones who actually get no training. They've asked for training. I've had a couple of separate contracts with UBM to train them, but I see that whole relationship getting bigger and better. I have some relationships with some of the district coordinators for EMTs, but that's a place, working with the Department of Health, that needs to be flushed out, I would say. But thank you for saying it, because you can, you're right, you can train people for hours and hours and hours, and still something bad is going to happen. Very fast question. Oh, sorry.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Sorry, missed this. How many years have you received funding? Twelve. Oh wow. Leslie?

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Just a question for DMH. I'd like to know if they have an idea of what it's going to cost them to replace this program internally.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Ask them that. Thank

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: you, Chris. Did Christie want Or Christie and Crystal here in support of you.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: No. No. They both have different perspectives. Oh, they do. Because Crystal's an instructor, and Christie is on the steering committee. Okay. And I know that they know they have five minutes.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Okay. That's fine. We we actually didn't have anything at three, so we're okay. They need more time. Yeah. They need more time. Hi, Christine. Do you wanna do you wanna go ahead?

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: Yeah. That would be great. Thank you. I'm on the steering committee for team two, but I'm that's aside from that. I did want to mention just from that standpoint that I was really surprised to hear the decision to cut this program, given its strong history, its proven impact, and the relationships that I've seen being built across the state. And I think it's concerning, and I think it's also disrespectful that not just you all, but it seems like other key partners were not informed. And so that lack of communication is troubling just as someone from my perspective. But really, I'm here to explain to you that I've stood in front of team two trainees and shared something very personal, my lived experience with mental illness. I'm not a clinician. I'm not law enforcement. I'm the person that's being trained to be encountered. I'm the person that just passed away recently that you've mentioned. Since I was a little girl, I used to dream about floating away with dandelion seeds because I didn't want to exist. I wanted my life to end before it had really began. And so I lived for most of my life without hope and without purpose. I found through sharing my story, my lived experience. In team two, I found purpose. I found hope. It connected me to a community, and it gave me a meaning to my own pain, a pain that I once felt was meaningless. Many people assume that training programs only benefit the participants sitting in the chairs. But team two is really unique. It also helps those of us who struggle with mental illness, just as much as it's helping the people who are trained to respond to us when we are in crisis. Training manuals and lectures cannot explain symptoms and diagnoses. Hearing lived experience can help trainees understand what crisis actually feels like from the inside. And it has helped me to feel safe to receive it. It's helped people understand how small words or even actions from responders can deeply help. They can also accidentally deeply cause harm. And so these real stories help workers move from a clinical understanding to a human understanding, which, again, is so unique to Team two. I can describe what actually helps, like listening without trying to immediately fix something by staying calm, by respecting someone's autonomy, recognizing them as a human being. I can talk to them about what can be harmful, like being dismissive or minimizing someone's pain. That kind of feedback is really hard to get from a textbook alone. I don't know how something in house as wonderful as DMH is, and I recognize as being someone served by them. I just, I don't see that happening from something like that. Because before this program, I I'd had lots of police interaction during my mental health crises. I look like someone who may not have, if you speak to me and you hear more about me, I think you'd be pretty surprised. But there are a lot of people like me. So when we're in crisis, fear can escalate quickly, misunderstandings can escalate, and Team two addresses that. The program teaches law enforcement and crisis workers how to collaborate. We mentioned EMT workers about having that kind of training. It prepares dispatchers. It creates a shared language, and really, it humanizes people, the people being served by you. And so when I stand in front of trainees, I'm here to show them what that feels like, that you can't learn it from a PowerPoint. But the program itself has saved my life, my life personally right here in front of you. And I wish I had known this again so I could be here in front of you so maybe you could feel it. But this program hasn't fixed me, but it's been given me a way to transform my pain into prevention. And it does something bigger than just me. It prevents unnecessary use of force. It helps reduce repeated crisis calls, and it builds a collaboration instead of just a siloed response. So when officers understand mental illness, outcomes will change. When dispatchers understand mental illness, a tone can change. When crisis teams and law enforcement train together, the response will change. It's not theoretical, it's public safety. And this right here that we've just referred to about the current passing is a great example as to why this particular training and what it offers is detrimental to the future, to the future of myself and my conrad in arms who struggle with mental health. So I'm not just speaking for myself, I'm speaking for people I've lost, for people who are still struggling, and who may not get the chance. I've survived two suicide attempts, and I don't take being alive lightly. I believe part of the reason that I'm still here is because of Kristen, because of this training, and because of the people that I don't get to stand in front of and say thank you to. I don't get to They don't get to sit here and stand in front of you and say, Please keep this training going because these people saved my life. And when they're trained better, I can live longer. So when we feel seen, heard, and especially believed, because you can't see mental illness, it changes everything. It makes people more willing to reach out, makes people more willing to accept help, and it can help someone to stay alive long enough, like me, to find hope again, to find a purpose. And so I would ask, that you find some way to think outside of the box or work with us in any way to help this program to continue. Because I believe that ripple effect is far beyond what we could even imagine. So thank you.

[Rep. Leslie Goldman (Member)]: Thank you, Chris.

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: I'm more than happy to answer any questions too.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Any questions? Okay, I think we'll

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Thank you and stay with us.

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: I will, for sure. We

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: have Detective Crystal Rin. Hi, Crystal. Hi. Thanks for joining us.

[Detective Corporal Crystal Rin (Burlington Police Department), Team Two Instructor]: Thank you. Okay. Is it good if I start? Yeah. Go ahead. Good afternoon. Thank you so much for allowing me to be here. My name is detective corporal Crystal Rin. I've been a certified law enforcement officer for over seventeen years with the Burlington Police Department. And prior to my career in law enforcement, I actually earned my degree in psychology from Saint Michael's College, and I was actually a mental health worker before I made the switch over to law enforcement. I became a trainer for team two in 2013, and I can say as both someone who had a career both in mental health and in law enforcement that this was one of the most impactful trainings in my career. I was really shocked to hear that in a time where we're emphasizing more training for law enforcement, especially with mental health, that this program would be on the chopping block. Team two is a very unique training, and I've been to plenty of trainings over my seventeen years. It because it originally started with just law enforcement and mental health providers in the same room starting the conversations together to not only learn, from one another prior to actually being dispatched to calls so that we weren't trying to figure things out in the field. We already knew how we both were gonna work beforehand. Over the over the twelve years, that has expanded, and Kristen, you know, talked about that, but it went from not only adding just law enforcement, but that included patrol, included supervisors, we've included crisis negotiation units, dispatchers, EMT, firefighters, state attorneys, community service liaisons, community service officers, firefighters. It's just been incredible to see how many people along with mental health in the room together. And the only reason we all are in that room together is because of the hard work that Kristen has put into it. We all believe and all of us that do attend and all of us that are trainers for it. We believe that we can collaborate beforehand so we know that when we're responding, we're responding together on the same level. And to give a good idea around, like, how many people we have, there are approximately 35 to 38 instructors around the state. And in my region, the Northwest Region, have approximately eight instructors. The success of this is that our instructor group is balanced of not only first responders, but also mental health providers because we not only want to reflect the group that we are bringing in the room, but how we're gonna actually be responding, as well. And those also include the mental health providers when we put an emphasis because they're the ones that are either gonna take the first call or it's a case manager that's receiving an update. They're the dispatcher that's receiving the 911 call or the patrol officer, EMT, or firefighter that's responding to that call for the first initial contact or the crisis negotiation unit that's gonna be dispatched to the call or the state attorney's office that's gonna be be to the to the cases. To me and all the other trainers, this isn't just a small get together. It's truly a multidisciplinary team of individuals all over the state who have the same goal in mind, which is to keep people safe and to help those who, are looking for assistance and are looking for help. All of our instructors, we make sure that not only are we trained in it, we receive refresher training, implicit bias training, and the training itself goes through scenarios. There's video. There's body camera, even some role playing, so you're getting a whole spectrum while you're in attendance. I cannot emphasize enough how much work Kristen does into it Instructors like myself can come in and be able to instruct seamlessly. The list of line items that Kristen does alone to ensure that we do that is just endless. She touched on it, but I really want to emphasize how much work for all over the state that she has secure locations. She has to arrange instructors all over the state for multiple trainings. Of course, lunch. As a law enforcement officer, I can attest to that as well. It does help. But compiling the materials, she has to, you know, obviously ensure that speakers are there, which the feedback for that has been phenomenal. She has to update scenarios every single year, the Vermont law. There's resources that are different throughout the entire state. And on top of all that, she teaches at the police academy six times a year and coordinates with the instructors down there. So it's important that we also have that basis for, law enforcement officers right as they're starting off in their careers. And for the law enforcement perspective, it's also like really important, that when we're training that team two brings us all together so we can have open and honest conversations about responding to those in crisis and also be able to talk about the safety, clinical, and legal concerns that we all face on these calls. I personally, as a law enforcement officer, have created phenomenal relationships with my mental health counterparts, and it's all because of Team two, and it's because of all the work that Kristen put in to emphasize those relationships for all of us. Team two just needs to be consistent. I will just say from a law enforcement perspective, we all know that the trainings come out, twice a year, at least for up here, so we're already expecting it. We already know the officers that we want to send to it. If it gets up on a chopping block, it will really threaten, those strong ties that we already have with multiple agencies throughout the state. Team two really has received some of the most phenomenal feedback I've ever seen in a lot of trainings, and time and time again, our participants always talk about that their response to a crisis is better, especially for vulnerable Vermonters. So I won't keep you for long, but I just wanna say it's it's a phenomenal training. I know some people in there said that if they have gone, thank you so much. It really has just set a tone not only throughout the state, all over the country, but also internationally. I think that speaks to how great Vermont is that we create programs like this.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Thanks. Thank you

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: so much. I have Brian and then Daisy.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: Yeah. I I I don't have a question. I just wanna thank you for sharing your testimony as people with direct experience as a as a law enforcement officer and a person who has received services. And and I could say as a person who's done the training that the the greatest thing I took away with it was that the relationship it builds between the different perspectives. So, like, there's nothing like sitting in a room with a police officer and and talking through something instead of being thrown into it with them like we are most of the time. And have and then sometimes you work with those officers again, and so then you get to know each other. And the day I was there, the person with lived experience couldn't make it, so I missed that component. But I can say just that having peers integrated into the crisis response system has been essential in changing the quality of the services. And so that's an aspect that Team two was doing before the system did it. So they're having the perspective of people with lived experience. So I just think this would be a great loss if if we couldn't preserve the program. And I just wanted to say that to you all because I if you hadn't been given notice, I think it's important that you hear that you're appreciated.

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: I hope that you get the chance to come to a training so that I can meet you because I'm the one that would share.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: Well, if it continues, I'd even consider being an instructor someday if Kristen hired me. Awesome. I need to.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: I've been here. I've been here. It's right.

[Rep. Brian Cina (Member)]: No conflict of interest. I'm just saying it's it's this is the future is getting us together to work as teams and not to silo things.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Crazy. It's an active win. If the Department of Mental Health brought Team two training inside and they were the trainers, would you still be interested in offering the training to your teams or would you still recommend it to folks?

[Detective Corporal Crystal Rin (Burlington Police Department), Team Two Instructor]: Sorry. Is that to to me or Christie? Sorry.

[Rep. Daisy Berbeco (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. No. That was to you, Crystal. Sorry.

[Detective Corporal Crystal Rin (Burlington Police Department), Team Two Instructor]: Oh, I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. Yes. So it's interesting. I think for all of us, it's, I think we all know that sometimes I'll speak very candidly, is sometimes relationships with law enforcement, rightfully so, some things have happened in the past that have really broken down relationships. And sometimes when law enforcement officers come in as instructors, right from the get go, a lot of negativity happens, which is not what team two does because team two really points to the direction. So I can't actually speak about how that relationship would be, and I don't know if they would actually keep the same model. So I'd be really curious. I have a lot of questions because I don't know what those answers are. If it would be the same model, if they would reflect the same thing that Kristen does around the updates with the legal updates, which is the most important thing because Vermont law, does change. We wanna ensure that our law enforcement officers are following following the law to the tee. So it's like hard to I I don't know. I don't know if and I would also be concerned if they would change a model and not have law enforcement at the table. And so that's also a big concern too because we are the first responders on the scene there, and so, I wanna ensure that we're at the table being able to discuss that. So I don't even know what the direction is that they're gonna take, but I think it's important that no matter what that we are at the table be able to give that

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: voice as well. Thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Thank you. It dawned on me in the middle of this that we had Kristen, Crystal, and Christy. Very far too easy as well. Daisy asked me a question. I can see there was confusion. Thank you all so much. Thanks for joining us.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Thanks for having us.

[Christine (“Christy”), Team Two Steering Committee member (lived experience)]: Thank you for the opportunity.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: Appreciate you sharing with us.

[Kristen, Team Two Program Coordinator (Vermont Care Partners)]: Thank you.

[Rep. Alyssa Black (Chair)]: We can go off of July, and we're done for the day. So we'll see you tomorrow morning.