Meetings
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[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Okay. Welcome back, folks, to the last session of the afternoon. We have Joint Fiscal Officer Nolan Langwell here to talk to us about the H-six 60, which is our opioid settlement fund bill. And we have this on your committee webpage, so you can turn to the spreadsheet that's there. Nolan. Hi. Welcome. Thank you.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: For the record, Nolan Langlois, Joint Fiscal Office. I'm going to share my screen. This should be posted. That's not what I want to share. Look, I ignore that. Stop sharing. That's the wrong spreadsheet. I know. That one you'll get later. That's my work in progress.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: You'll be interested in all of the testimony we heard from BCF, okay? Did they share with you the spreadsheet 25, 26, 27, the GA and OEO appropriations?
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: I have not seen it yet.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Okay, I'm going to share that with you because actually it would be helpful if it jives with what we believe.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Chair,
[Eric Maguire (Member)]: is that a document that we
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: all got earlier in the week?
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: You've got it right about five minutes ago.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Okay. Don't know why it's showing up on my screen. Oh, there it is. All right, there we go.
[Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Let me meet again.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: All right, so what have, what you have before you, this is a spreadsheet that I put together for the committee to kind of help reconcile the differences between what OSAC had recommended and what the health department had recommended. So I put them all in one place and I broke it out by, both of them had existing ongoing projects and new funding, and they also had sections about initiatives that were recommended for future funding, but weren't being recommended now because like placeholder for the future. But what I also did was in alignment with what I did last year, which is also what has already been appropriated from the previous bills. So on the far right, you'll see Act 16 from 2025, Act 113 from 2024, which was stuff that was in the budget bill, Act 178, which was the other opioid bill from 2024, and then Act 22 from 2023. I think you can see the historical of what have we already appropriated to those folks. In terms of what has been spent, that's a different spreadsheet that the health department has put up, and I can pull that up to get some questions about that. But in terms of why has money been spent, why hasn't that money spent, I will defer that to the health department.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Okay. Hold So on a second. Just trying to wrap my head around it. Existing ongoing projects, new requests.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Oh,
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: okay, sorry. It's more than one page. I just, I only had on my screen the first page. But where are the other things? It's more than that.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: VDH DPS. I just want to flag that I believe it was in somewhere, you probably know this, there's also an appropriation in the budget that is for recovery residences that is outside, that has been appropriate to the opioid, to the fund in the past, but is actually part of the budget outside of the opioid fund this year. I think that this health department decided it was not they didn't wanna do it as part of the OSAC. They did it as part of their recommendation. I will defer to them as to why they did it outside of OSAC.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: They actually testified for And it was actually a refreshing change. I'm just flagging it. Yeah, they're recognizing They actually made a point to talk about sort of the continuum of supports and recognizing the value and the importance of recovery housing and moved it to the base budget. That's not in the sheet because this is only meant to be the OSAC. So questions. Is actually, thank you very much, because it provides in one place what we can see the history of. And as you can see over there on the right hand side, the difference between the different acts, the budget bill, and then 22, Act and 16 rather from last year where we put it all in its own standalone bill. So that's very helpful.
[Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, go ahead. I actually have started reaching out to, I've got most of them done for a spreadsheet of how they actually use the funds. Only one person has gotten back to me and leave. It's hard to bolt on something when we don't know how they're spending the money and then asking for additional money. And one person got back to me, I'd have to look it up. It was Community Care Network is the only one so far. Yep.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: I mean, the health department, it would be consent. Did you ask the health department about what reporting that they have? You haven't heard back from them either? And also remember, especially for
[Unidentified Committee Member]: the ones where the smaller, like the new, they're small nonprofits. So it might take them a little longer to go through, have their finance department pull that out. So maybe yeah, wait a few more. Yeah, go ahead. So just as these organizations all have agreements with the state. So the health department in their grant agreement will have performance measures and standards and scopes of work. So they would really be the ones responding to a request like that rather than, I just feel like it would be an inefficient use of the providers to because respond to they're already doing it for the department. So I would just in case the department is here and Jessica is here, I think they probably have a lot of good data that that study is looking for.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Of the health departments on their website No, I'm pointing at Jessica. So I just wanted to clarify a couple of things, first off. So responsibility of the legislature as an equal constitutional part of government is to hold the administrative part of government, the oversight and accountability for the administration of the policies that we set. It is their responsibility to be assuring that the things that were funded and that have gone out to community organizations or that they spend internally meet the legislative intent. It's our responsibility to ensure that. So it's not actually our responsibility to be providing what I guess I would call oversight or whatever of community organizations. Our responsibility as a legislature is to provide oversight of the department to assure that they are doing their job in actually doing the oversight of these contractual obligations. I'm not telling anybody they should be or should not be doing anything. I just wanted to be clear about where the oversight and responsibility lies for the individual grants that you see here. It lies with either, as you can see here, Department of Health or with the Department for Children and Families or Department of Public Services. Department or agency is listed for each one of these. So that doesn't mean that we can't have this individual interest, to
[Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Right, anybody can. Exactly. I mean, I could ask doesn't the person on the screen.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Yes, I'm just laying out what our duties as a legislative body are. Yeah, go ahead, Representative Bishop.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: No, I'm trying to determine, we have some of the requests that align, some that don't. There's varying amounts of just over $5,000,000 to $5,860,000. What is the pool of funds that we should be considering when we are making our decisions?
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: That's why I wanted to know what the balance was in the OSAC fund.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Yeah, and I guess any balance plus funds are available this year, because theoretically, in theory, we could come up with an amount that's in excess of the higher of these two.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: That's why I did ask Nolan before we went online what the balance is, because we do have reversions coming in from the health department. I don't know if that language got submitted to Katie yet. Jessica, did that get submitted to Katie today?
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: We got something today, haven't looked
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: at So there's reversions coming back in for money that's not going to be spent. And it was a good little chunk of money, the department testified to the other day. So it looks like Nolan's looking for something in particular. So we'll give him a minute to do that. Or if it's something that you would prefer to get back to us on, Nolan, that's No,
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: I'm just pulling up the health department report because they have
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: have the balance in that report?
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: They have the balance in that report.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: And then theoretically we would add to that the reversions?
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Theoretically, yeah.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Is that report based on, I don't have the report right in front of me, is it based on cash or is it based upon obligations?
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: It's got all of it. It's a totally pulled up.
[Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Thank you.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Madam Chair, would I understand this one correctly, that it is something that is replenished each year from the national settlement? So we get the cash, we spend it down. We get a certain amount of cash, we spend it down. Yeah.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Doesn't come all the way back up to here because it's all dependent upon the terms of the settlements. And there's more than one settlement.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: The year varies by year.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: The year varies. Yes. And thank you, Nolan, for pulling that up.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Sorry, I had it up. I was just trying to
[Unidentified Committee Member]: Up there.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Yeah. But this is While
[Eric Maguire (Member)]: he's looking for that, I would recommend that take a look on within the health departments because there is a notation there that does recognize that fall for these programs require ongoing funding. There's a couple of bullet points. If only these four ongoing funders are currently expected funding, the fund will go into a deficit within a decade, should the legislation continue to appropriate funding at the prior average annual amount of $8,000,000 that the current expected federal funds continue, the fund will go into a deficit within one or two years. So I was
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: gonna get to that. Thank you for bringing that up. So what this sheet does, if you have and this should also be on your website if not, health department has submitted it before. This is in that report that they see in their report. So you have the total appropriation for each program, how much has been obligated to date, total unobligated to date, total spend, and then the remaining balance. So that's how they And if you scroll down to the bottom, see there's 16 bottom million right, that's the total that has the remaining balance. Now to represent Maguire's point, we have about 4,000,000 or so coming in each year and we're spending 6 to 8,000,000 or whatever each year. So right now we have the excess and to their point, spending more each year than it's coming in each year. So that's why they're projecting a deficit. Now, that's just a modeling with basically an assumption. And they have a whole sheet on that in the report too, which I honestly, no offense if that was laid out not very clearly, because it took me a little while to kind of understand what they were trying to do, but that might be just the way my brain works. But I felt this sheet was actually very good. I will also just remind folks that this does not include one more settlement. I think it's the Purdue And that's supposed to be, I think, over around 20,000,000 is what we're hearing. And from what I also heard that will likely be like a one time. So it'll come in a giant fund. This report is based on what do we have in the bank because that's known. When that Purdue comes in, it still remains to be seen. I don't know if there is a timeline, they don't know yet. So there will be some money coming in, but the point remains the same, in that the funding will run out. It is finite. So I think their point is just be mindful of that, which I believe this committee always is. But that's the point.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: And I just would wanna caution people that that 16,500,000.0 in the lower right hand corner is not available to spend because some of those that as of the date on that report, there's some things like, look at Dale higher ability, they will expend that entire amount by the time that, fiscal year is complete, most likely. So things that have been funded other than the things that the department told us that they were reverting back into the fund, that spreadsheet doesn't talk about that. So I just want to caution that don't look at the bottom right as that's what's available to fund, because that is not what's available to fund. That's the part that I'm you had something at the end of last year. Jessica, do you have something I to
[Jessica Spana (Vermont Department of Health)]: have Jessica Spana, Department of Public Fund, page three of our report. We note that the fund has a total balance of approximately $8,600,000 right now. And that is based on the current balance of the fund as of fall twenty twenty five, plus the 1.44 reversions. Reversions? Yes. Okay. So 8.6 is what we had discussed with the committee and internally as what would be available for this upcoming fiscal year.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Okay. And just because I don't have the report right in front of me, 8.6, does that leave a balance in the fund? Will that provide a balance? Or maybe your recommendations are less than that?
[Jessica Spana (Vermont Department of Health)]: Recommendations at the granola spreadsheet were in the 5 to 6,000,000,
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Yeah, like, yeah.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Okay, so at least a balance, okay.
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: Is that assuming what you are recommending?
[Unidentified Committee Member]: I think, yes.
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: So one, I would encourage you to pull up that report. Laurie, is on our webpage or should they go to reports?
[Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Oh, I
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: can put wherever you want. Okay. Okay. Okay. That's all right. Would encourage, just so people know are aware of the schedule. So my plan is to finish age six sixty and vote it out by the end of next week because appropriations onset sooner rather than later. And I'm going to say out loud to our people who are representing those folks who were recommended by the Opioid Settlement Advisory Committee, but were not recommended by the department. We do not have time to take verbal testimony, but you are welcome to submit a statement in writing as to why this funding is critical. We don't want a repeat of your whole proposal, just please be brief about that. Because we have to consider both. I want our committee to consider We have recommendations from two different entities coming to us. And so we have to decide which recommendations we're gonna accept and which one we're not going to accept. And people should have an opportunity to hear from those folks who are not represented by the department's recommendation. But I just need to
[Eric Maguire (Member)]: be honest that we don't have sufficient time to take it verbally. Okay? Point of clarification. So we're going to be tasked with choosing one or the other?
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Nope, we can choose it non- We can ala carte it. Okay, that's fine.
[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Just want to get clarification
[Nolan Langlois (Joint Fiscal Office)]: on it. Just how the recommendations are the same? Or some of them are the same organizations with slightly different appropriations?
[Unidentified Committee Member]: Yes. I have a question. Are those assumed to all be just one time requests? Or would we see anything where they
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Everything's one time. Everything Except that Yeah,
[Unidentified Committee Member]: up to the top. Okay. But I think that
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: is going be incumbent upon us to understand whether or not this is actually a one time request or it is going to require ongoing funding.
[Unidentified Committee Member]: Well, and given the four priorities, and I think it'll be good for us to review the four priorities that we laid out last year and determine, evaluate which of these projects can that I'm guessing CHNOSAK did that, but I think it would
[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: be good for us to review that and ensure that I'll have Katie pull up actually the original bill and the amendments that we've made to it so that we can be clear. I don't want to recreate the evaluation process that the committee and the department spent months going through. But sometimes we have a difference of interpretation about whether something meets the intention of this originating statute. So I'll I'll work with Laurie to schedule Katie for that. But just I just wanted you to have in your brains that we're gonna be voting that out next week. Okay? Okay. That'll be it for now. Thank you, Laurie, and we'll see y'all tomorrow.