Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Alright. Morning, everyone. We are pivoting a little bit this morning. We're into pivoting here. So you will see on our committee's webpage H657. So we're going to have a walk through of H-six 57, which is, you have heard me refer to an omnibus DCF bill. So we had a little committee comprised of Ray and Jubilee, Esme, Anne and I. Is anybody? Esme wasn't there, right? No, just Jubilee. Okay. Took a look at all of the things. Sorry, my brain's a little scattered this morning. I've done three topics before 09:00. So rewind a little bit. At the end of last year, we were taking a look at the bills on our wall, and we noted that there were several having to do with DCF and the Family Services Division. And rather than try to not do any of them justice. And since they had some interlocking pieces that built on each other, I had said that we would look at and Jubilee and Anne thought about this over the summer about how we might approach doing an omnibus bill that brought together all of these distinct pieces. And so we've been working on that, and Katie's been working on that, and other attorneys have been working on it because it crosses over jurisdictions in some areas. Dan's had a little piece of it. So there's been different things happening with it. So this is one of those things that is complicated and simple at the same time. The concepts are simple. The law is complicated. Katie, could you join us?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Theresa?

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: Yes? Is there money attached to this?

[Speaker 0]: There is not money attached at point.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: Good morning.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Katie McLean, Office of Legislative Counsel. So there was a little switcheroo this morning. Yes. I've been through this bill. When I'm in Senate Health and Welfare and Senator Lyons asked me to do something complicated, she always says, this is gonna be fun.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. It might be

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: fun. I'm

[Speaker 0]: just with Senator Lyon, so I'll repeat it. This is going to be fun, Katie. I like

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: that, a little bit bumpy, but we'll go for it.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you putting up with the change. No problem. Just felt because this is a pretty complicated bill that I needed people to start to get their heads around it if we're gonna pass it out by crossover.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So we're looking at the bill, H657. Several different attorneys working in this, and I'll sort of alert you to who the point person is on a particular section when we get there. Let's just go for it. So the first section has to do with reach up, and this removes the asset limit in reach up. So right now, there's an asset limit of $9,000, and then we have language about exceptions when an asset limit shouldn't be considered for the for the purpose of calculating the asset limit. So this whole subdivision five would be eliminated. So right now, we have language that says the commissioner shall adopt rules for the determination of eligibility for the reach of program and benefit levels for all participating families that include the following provisions. And then this provision would be removed from the rule. But the asset limit shall be $9,000 for families for the purpose of determining initial and continuing eligibility for the Reach Up program. And the following savings account shall not be considered in the calculation for determining asset limit. And that's a retirement account such as an IRA, defined contribution plan or similar account. And at the top of page five, a qualified child education savings account, such as the VHIP from our Higher Education Investment. That is the first topic. Then are

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: you okay for us to ask questions? I can give it

[Speaker 0]: a go. Yeah. Okay. So I'm I'm wondering if we I I understand the first part, the asset limit. Mhmm. But then if we say if we remove the parts that say she'll not be considered in the calculation because there's no limit. Calculation at all. Yes. It will be calculation at all. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Sorry. I disconnected with the I was thinking about benefit, not Yeah, was just

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: asking when I was pinging it through. Well,

[Speaker 0]: okay. Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So then we're changing from reach up to a new topic, that is youth and foster care. So, yeah.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Sorry, what's with Section D there then? Right above.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: That's existing law.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: And it remains.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And that remains, yeah.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Okay, so.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So it's showing the whole set. So what would what it would look like in the green books if this were to pass is you'd have a five a that would say repealed, and then you'd still have a five b.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I see. Okay. That's why I When you said the entire section, you meant 5A.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes. The whole subdivision 5A. No. 5B would be retained.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: All right. Thank you.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes. Thank you. Okay. Changing social security benefits for youth in foster care. The point person and ledge counsel for this is John Gray. So first, you have a definition section. These are all existing definitions. And there is the addition of several new definitions at the top of page three. So qualified ABLE account means an ABLE account, as that term is defined, elsewhere in statute or an account established pursuant to any qualified state ABLE program created in federal statute. That's something we already have in Vermont. We're just adding it to this statute. In subdivision six, representative payee means the person appointed by the Social Security Administration to manage the Social Security benefits of a child. And

[Speaker 0]: just for people who might not be accustomed to this person in legislative language, does it have to mean a human being? Correct. In the case- Be an entity or corporation. Yeah. Corporation could be a department and state government.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: RSDI benefits means a child's retirement survivors or disability insurance. There's a definition of the Social Security Act, cites federal law. Social Security benefits means the child's RSDI benefits or Social Security Income benefits or both as applicable. Sorry, Supplemental Security Income. Then oh, 10 is SSI benefits, Supplementary Security Income, and it cites to federal law. And then we have the corresponding section that these benefit that these definitions modify. And this says that a department is not to use any portion of a child's Social Security benefits to offset the state's costs for the child's maintenance, except maintaining the child's eligibility for SSI benefits and to avoid a violation of federal asset and resource limits. So it can only use the benefits to the extent it helps maintain SSI. Then in subsection P and its capacity as representative payee for a child, the department may use the child's Social Security benefits for the child's unmet needs beyond the amount that the state is obligated, required or agrees to pay after notifying the child, the child's parent, legal guardian or counsel, the family division of the Superior Court and the Office of the Child Youth and Family Advocate. In its capacity as representative payee for a child and with the assistance of the state treasurer and depart the department shall establish a trust account for the child, which shall be a qualified ABLE account for any child receiving SSI benefits. It shall monitor any federal asset or resource limit for the child's SSI benefits and ensure that the child's best interests are served by using the child's Social Security benefits for the child's unmet needs or conserving the child's Social Security benefits in a way that avoids violating any federal asset or resource limits that would affect the child's ability to receive SSI benefits. And the department shall provide an annual accounting of the use application or conservation of the child's SSI or Social Security benefits to the child, the child's parent, legal guardian or counsel, family division of the Superior Court, or the Office of

[Speaker 0]: the Child Youth and Family Advocate. Katie, do we know, or Dan, you might know this, do we know if that's something that number four is something that's required already? I think represent pays are supposed to do like a annual filing or something.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Yeah, but I think that just including those other individuals just to keep track of it. But I think they do have to keep track of the amount.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Of the amount, yeah. Okay. I'll ask. I'll just buy it.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Okay.

[Speaker 0]: That was topic number two, pregnant lift shield. Now we're

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: going to topic number three.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So at the top of page three, we have, Eating unaccompanied homeless youth who obtain certain services without parental consent. This has a number of sections falling within this topic. But because they're they kind of jump all over the green books, we have some relating to motor vehicles and we have different titles. So I've tried to put little headings in that start off with unaccompanied homeless youth. So like before vital records or getting a driver's permit. So you can sort of know that they're all relating back to this section. So first we have a definition of what an unaccompanied homeless youth is. It means an individual who is 16 years of age or older and who is not in the physical custody of a parent or guardian, including a youth who has run away from home, who has been forced to leave home or whose parents have left the area and left the youth behind. And then there is language about obtaining a certification that the individual is an unaccompanied homeless youth. So an unaccompanied homeless youth may become certified if the youth is found by a school district's liaison for homeless children and youths or other appropriate staff person to be an unaccompanied homeless youth eligible for services pursuant to the federal McKinney Vento Homeless Assistance Act. If the youth is believed to qualify as an unaccompanied homeless youth, as that term is defined by the federal McKinney Vento Homelessness Assistance Act, by the director of an emergency shelter program funded through Hopper or designee, the director of a runaway or homeless youth program funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services or designee, or by a continuum of care lead agency or designee. So both of those things have

[Speaker 0]: to be true. I would probably remove a reference to HOT. Okay. You can say funded by the Yeah. State of

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: What page is that?

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: We've tried.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: It's at bottom of the page. Here we go. Funded by.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Proof of certification. The department's Division of Family Services shall develop a standardized form that shall be used by entities specified in the subdivision below to certify qualifying unaccompanied homeless youth. The front of the form is to include the circumstances that qualify the youth and the date that the youth was certified, the name, title and signature of the certifying individual. And the section shall be reproduced in its entirety on the back of the form. So that if anyone has a question about what this form means, the statute would appear on the back. A certified unaccompanied homeless youth may use the completed Form two. Apply at no charge and without parental consent for a non driver identification card, a learner's permit or an operator's license or operator's privilege card. They could apply to obtain a vital event certificate without parental consent and at no charge. Top of page seven, they could use the certification to consent to care by health care professionals licensed or certified in Vermont, including medical care, dental care, mental health services, including psychological counseling and treatment, psychiatric care and substance use prevention and treatment services and surgical diagnosis and treatment, including medical diagnosis and treatment, such as preventative care and care provided in a health care facility for either themselves or for the youth's child if the certified accompanied homeless youth is unmarried, is the parent of the child, and has actual custody of the child. The certificate would allow the youth to enter into an agreement for housing or obtain admission to a shelter, Would enable them to obtain employment pursuant to any limitations in Title 21. It would allow them to purchase an automobile and obtain an automobile liability policy. It would allow them to obtain a student loan, obtain admission to a high school or postsecondary school, would allow them to open an account in a state or federally chartered bank or credit union, It would allow them to receive services for victims of domestic or sexual violence as appropriate.

[Speaker 0]: Before we move on, I'm trying to understand back C, little I, two I. Allowing them to receive medical treatment for themselves or their child if the certified unaccompanied homeless youth is unmarried? I don't understand why that's there.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I can't remember off the top of it. I'm just trying

[Speaker 0]: to figure out, does it mean that I think they can if they are married. If they're married? Okay.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I guess it's it's that maybe then consent by two parents would be required. So they're simply saying it's intended to say that if unmarried

[Speaker 0]: I don't think the sentence is marked by two parents.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: No, it's not.

[Speaker 0]: Okay, so we just need a little

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: more information about that. I will look into that.

[Speaker 0]: So what I'm just reading it is it makes it sound like if the youth is married, then they don't have the right to seek treatment for their child. Which I didn't understand why they would be giving that up.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah, I hear the concern.

[Speaker 0]: I'm not going to look into it. I don't remember. Okay.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: All right, great. Thank you. Vaguely remember it being something to do with they already have a lot of these rights if they are married or something, the way our statute is, but now it's been a while.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It could be that

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: we could just be silent on it. They're

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: the parent of the child and have actual custody of the child.

[Speaker 0]: Thanks. Yeah, go ahead. Go ahead.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Just quickly, does allowing minors to take on liabilities expose the state or provide us any legal risks?

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Well, a lot of that would be I think we'd have to go through each of these items one by one to sort of think through what that would be. The fact that the state is authorizing this takes off a little bit of the liability. They're not, for example, a health care provider ordinarily, unless it's allowed by statute, wouldn't be able to provide certain services to a minor. But it is allowed by statute, we have some services where we, by statute, already authorize a minor to consent to certain health care services. So I think having the statutory language allowing certain activities provides some shield for liability. But again, I think it's worth going through each of those items one by one to

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: think about.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: I'm looking at it more from a liability in regards to, for instance, it's written on up there that a minor could go and get a car loan. And if they don't pay the car loan, will the state be liable for payment of that account? Yeah, I hear you. That's what I'm talking about in regards to legal risk.

[Speaker 0]: Think it's a good question. I I think that the it plays it actually places the liability on the individual. And so then you have a youth potentially taking on debt that they maybe can't afford. And so, I think it's valid point to consider.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, but it's a reverse. The liability, right, the liability protection is for the one giving the service, not for the one receiving it.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: But

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I think that needs

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: to get clarified in

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, some and

[Speaker 0]: I also think that we need to think long and hard about whether enabling there's certain things in here that seem obvious to me. If they wanna be able to work and they want to be able to have a mission and get a non driver's ID and things like that. Taking on debt when you might not have the capacity to take on debt, or really maybe even to understand that you're taking on debt might be a different thing. So, yeah, it's a good question.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: I would note that this child's same parents could go and take out a loan in their name. So if we're going to say things like that, then we should make it so that 16 year olds can't have a loan taken out in

[Speaker 0]: their name across the board. So parents can take it out in the child's name? Oh, it

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: happens all the time.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah, don't know.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: It's the coercive debt bill. We see it a lot in youth populations. They turn 18 and find out that they now have thousands of dollars of debt that they had no idea about.

[Speaker 0]: They just know that. Okay. Thank you.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Well, I think just to follow-up quickly, is there any type is anything under Vermont law that currently is in statute that limits minors from going into any type of contracts?

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: I would have to look.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I wonder, practically speaking, how much debt could they take out without the marketplace would dictate how much someone would say no. We would we would hope.

[Speaker 0]: Hope, though.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Unless you would hope.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: Right. Yeah.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. One day. Yeah. But

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: if in most instances, that's kinda what I'm getting at.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. But then that would be

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Then did they have the assets to say yes? Would there also be a problem?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Well, if they're protected from liability, they might be more than willing to make the loan, but that might be gross negligence.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Katie. Yeah, so Section D Governs the use of the form that a health care professional may accept the completed form as proof of the youth status as a certified unaccompanied homeless youth and may keep a copy of the form or card in the youth's medical file. Then consent of a parent or guardian.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Is there any reason why we would limit that to the health professional's ability to

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I think you could probably expand it to other if the school would like to have

[Speaker 0]: a copy of the form or if a

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: lender was basing their decision on this statute, keeping a copy of their form on record. I'm not sure. Yeah. Potentially. Okay. Subsection E. Excuse me. An unaccompanied homeless youth's parent or guardian shall consent to the youth living independently or obtaining benefits or service pursuant to subsection C, but consent can be implied by the act of forcing the youth out of the home, refusing to provide financial support to the youth, or abuse and neglect. So those conditions would constitute consent for the unaccompanied homeless youth to act independently.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Curious about the just reading this for the first time, but the shall language, an unaccompanied homeless youth parents regarding shall consent to the youth living independently or obtaining benefit. So any 16 year old who states intention that the parent must acquiesce to that?

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Think this is saying

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: No, I'm just trying

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: to figure it out. That the consent of a parent or guardian is still required for the person to be obtaining these services by themselves. But things that you wouldn't ordinarily think of as consent, actions of consent, would count as consent in this case. Abuse and neglect would be constituted as consent to do things independently.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: And find their consent for them to do all of those other things. Even if it would be

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: of the youth being out of

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: the home.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I get that part of the language, and I like that. But just the first clause in that sentence is

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It could

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: reword. Regarding shall consent to youth living independently or obtain a certificate pursuant.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. I think it could be a wording issue where we couldn't Yeah. Yeah.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: Ahead.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Ahead. Follow-up just quickly in regard to sorry, let me just get my title. Is the implied consent standard legally sufficient without a judicial ruling?

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I'm trying to remember. It's been a while since I worked on this bill, but there were others. I think this was based on other state statutes from other states. And that's where I pulled it from.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: And I'll send you the list of states. There's 30 that use this around medical, and 18 around, I think, so around shelter and housing and other services. And then there's some that and a lot of those are the same states. It's designed it works for federal even federal standards. There's programs that exist that provide shelter and services. We have them here in Vermont. For youth 18, the requirement is they have parental consent. And this implied consent, this is why a lot of states developed it, is it allows them, it meets the federal kind of bar for providing it without any kind of judicial process.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Well, the only reason I'm bringing up some of these questions that I'm bringing on up is I'm not as informed and I'm just seeing a lot of liability that could be potentially placed upon the state to take care of fallen obligations? Or are we doing things that need to be ordered by a judge? That's my question. Right.

[Speaker 0]: I don't see the state liability. You're seeing potentially the state liability. But I think that the notion about can satisfy for certain programs and access to certain services, I think is certainly we can have judge Zonay weigh in on his thoughts about it. And I'm just certain that he probably is familiar or will make himself familiar with what the other states are doing. So we'll add judge Zon May to the witness.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: And, Julie, if you could send me that over

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: to

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Yeah.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: I'm gonna send it out to everyone.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, Boyd. There are

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: two items that we've asked judiciary to do a flyover on, and this is one of them. I think the whole intent is there is a judicial process for being emancipated, which covers everything under the sun, you're an adult. And the idea is that's a burdensome process and there are certain things that if it gets homeless, we want to exempt from that process for these purposes. So it's sort of an intent to not have to go through a court process for these specific things. And other things beyond that, you have to

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: do the whole court emancipation. Yeah. No, in regards to like some of the other things in regards to certification, what happens if it comes to fruition that the certification may have been invalid? Is there any type of guardrails in there in regards to those certifications that were then recognized as like, Oh, it was invalid, or we miscertified, or is there a recertification process?

[Speaker 0]: Like if there was false information provided or something like that.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Something like the provider was acting on good faith that the certificate was valid, that they can't be held. Yeah. Okay. I'll keep thinking that

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: though. Continuing

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: on, consent can also be demonstrated via letter from a homeless service provider or school district, homeless liaison or other appropriate staff member For any service or benefit authorized under subsection C of this section, if a parent or guardian's consent is required to obtain the service or benefit, the division shall stand en loco parentis and provide the necessary consent in place of the unaccompanied homeless youth's parent or guardian. So it allows the youth to do this. And if it is something by statute that requires a parent to obtain, then the department would act as the parent. For the purposes of implementing C2A have to remind myself what C2A was or C21.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Let me see.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: C two I. Open

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: the next one.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Right. 19 on page seven. Two I. Opening the bank account or credit. Okay. You can find it.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Oh, right here. C2i. Okay. So specific to C2i opening the bank account, the division shall consult with the commissioner of financial regulation to ensure that minimum youth certification requirements are met for the purpose of making it legally permissible for a bank credit union or insurance company to contract with an unaccompanied homeless youth without the assistance of a parent or guardian and with the understanding that the unaccompanied homeless youth may not have a permanent physical address?

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: Don't Go ahead. Other question. A bank can't do that, can they? I used to work at a bank.

[Speaker 0]: Insane is that it can't

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: This is probably That's okay. Creating a pathway by which the bank could have that relationship with a client who's an unaccompanied homeless youth.

[Speaker 0]: We have

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: immunity from liability language. Any entity, provider, or health care professional who contracts the unaccompanied homeless youth pursuant to this section shall be immune from liability for the determination to contract with the minor unless the entity, provider, or health care professional active with gross negligence. So then that kind of gives us the framework of what we're going to be looking at. And then we look at several sections that are conforming sections with what has just been permitted in the section four that we've just reviewed. So first we have language about vital event certificates. In subsection B, the registrar shall waive the fee for certified copies of vital event certificates issued to an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certification pursuant to Section 4,908. Non driver identification cards. This adds to the list an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certificate. What was the lead in language? This talks about the department standing in loco apprentice. The commissioner shall require a $29 fee at the time of the application for the identification card, except that an initial non driver identification card shall be issued at no charge to. And that is C is adding unaccompanied homeless youth to the list. Next is the license and privilege cards. Scrolling down. An unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certification pursuant to 4,908 shall be provided with an operator's license or operator privilege cards at no charge. No additional fee shall be due for a motorcycle endorsement or an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certification pursuant to forty nine zero eight.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: So who would pay these fees? Because, like, the coffee and beer bursting, if it gets local,

[Speaker 0]: that would come out of, like, Milton, their taxpayers. So who would pay these fees? The so that there there are already provisions in statute for certain people under certain circumstances to not pay fees. That already exists in statute. And what we're saying is for youth who's I don't like using these terms, but who lacks the active assistance of family members because the family members are no longer in their lives. They're on their own. We're just saying youth who are on your own, you've already got enough problems. If you need to get access to a learner's permit or a license of some sort, we're not going to charge you a fee for that. But who pays it? Look, I wouldn't want

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: it coming out of the taxpayers of Milton if somebody came and wanted a copy of the birth certificate. Who would pay it?

[Speaker 0]: I don't that would probably cost you money.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: It's not the Milton Clerk. It's the state agency of transportation. I know. Tech raises different

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: I expect a lot of money involved here.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Okay.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: That's struggling with people already.

[Speaker 0]: There's not that many unaccompanied youth. I mean, there's enough of them, more than we'd like to think.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: More than doubled in the

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: past five years. But this goes to 24 years old as an adult. That's okay. Let's not argue. It doesn't make common sense to

[Speaker 0]: me. Thank I think there

[Rep. Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: is a full picture consideration here as well, talked about employment. If you don't have proper identification, it is really hard to get a job. So it's a ripple effect on several other aspects of our economy too. So we're very, very small input. We want to

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: keep them off reach up, which would cost the state a whole lot more money than the tiny amount for getting its driver's permit and getting thereby being able to get a job.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: What what was that? Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay. Let's keep going with it. Next section is learner's permit. The commissioner shall require payment of a fee of $24 by the time the application is made, except that no fee shall be charged for an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certificate and then the existing law or for an individual under 23 years of age who is in the care and custody of the Commissioner for Children and Families in Vermont after attaining 14 years of age. In subdivision two, we have similar language that the fee for the examination shall be $11 except that no fee shall be charged for an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certification under Section 94,908 or an individual under 23 years of age who was in the custody and commissioner of B. C. E. Vermont after attaining 14 years of age. That's existing law. Subdivision three is the motorcycle learner's permit.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: So another concern, if they don't have any money, how would they have a motorcycle to get a permit? I guess this is really concerning.

[Speaker 0]: They may or they may not. Brenda? What this is doing is trying to make all of the language that exists in certain fee areas consistent. It doesn't mean that they're going to have a motorcycle. It's trying to make everything consistent so that it appears in all sections of applicable law. Thank

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: you. Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay. So we have a similar language in subdivision three, an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained a certificate pursuant to section 90 eight-four 908. And then existing law, somebody 23 years of age is in the carrying custody of the Commissioner for DCF in Vermont, after attaining 14 years of age, shall not be charged a fee for the renewal of a motorcycle learner's permit. Subdivision D, the application, the existing law, the applicant is to pay $24 to the commissioner for each learner's permit or duplicate of renewal thereof. And then in subdivision two, an unaccompanied homeless youth who has obtained the certificate shall not be charged the fee for the learner's permit or duplicate or renewal thereof. So that's the last of those conforming sections that go with the sort of They were part of the original bill on unaccompanied homeless youth. So we're changing to a new topic if that is okay with the committee. Yes. Okay. So next we have a section on the mechanical restraints and transportation of children. We're first amending existing language, existing law that the Commissioner for Children and Families shall ensure that all reasonable and appropriate measures consistent with public safety are made to transport or escort a child subject to this chapter in a manner that prevents, instead of reasonably avoids, physical and psychological trauma, that change tracks what's similar language change in Title 18?

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. Sorry. That's okay. Just was like, you know, reasonably avoid them. Insufficient. Insufficient. Right. Might

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: as well jump at this and the next piece. When the statute first passed, the language was identical for children in the custody of DCF and people with a mental illness in the custody of DMH, not using shackles and so forth. Over time, there were changes made to the DCF one and there were changes made for the DMH one, but they weren't pulled together into one. And that's what this is doing.

[Speaker 0]: So, it's really updating it for children So, and then the other one so they

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I will skip ahead to sub, I think it's maybe important to just go over the existing law. So subsection B, the commissioner for DCF shall have the authority to select the person or persons who may transport a child under the commissioner's care and custody. And C, also existing law, The commissioner shall ensure supervisory review of every decision to transport a child using mechanical restraints when transportation with restraints for a particular child is approved. The reasons for the approval shall be documented in writing. This section in particular is cross referenced later, which is why I wanted to slow down and look at it. I wonder if they actually do that.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: They do have that policy, which has been in law for I

[Speaker 0]: know it's been a year. Supervisory review, I'm just Well, the degree of it. Since they couldn't tell us how many people

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: forever. You'll see that later in this So

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: indeed, we have existing language. That's the policy of Vermont that mechanical restraints are not routinely used on children subject to this chapter unless circumstances dictate that such methods are necessary. A new language is that a law enforcement vehicle or private agency under contract with the Department shall have soft restraints available for use as a first option, and mechanical restraints shall not be used as a substitute for soft restraints if the soft restraints are otherwise deemed adequate for safety. In subsection E, annually on or before January 15, DCF is to submit a written report to the various policy committees addressing the number of secure transports of children during the previous year, including the age, gender and racial background of the children transported, top of page 16, whether the transport was conducted by law enforcement or a private agency, the number of children transported using mechanical restraints, when applicable, the type of mechanical restraint, the type of custody children were in when transport occurred, and the purpose of the transport. Then we have some definitions. Mechanical restraint means a type of restraint using a mechanical device, material or equipment that restricts freedom of movement or mobilizes or reduces the ability of a child to move the child's arms, legs, body or head freely. Physical restraint means a type of restraint using a manual or physical hold that restricts freedom of movement or mobilizes or reduces the ability of the child to move the child's arms, legs, body or head freely. A physical restraint shall not include a light touch to encourage a response or to provide direction or guidance, provided the child is able to move away freely. And restraint generally means any manual hold physical restraint or mechanical restraint that restricts freedom of movement and immobilizes or reduces the ability of the child to move the child's arms, legs, body or head freely. Secure transport means any transport in which restraint is used or in which a child is restricted from leaving a vehicle by means other than a standard car seat, seat belt, or car locks. I'll just note that I did a little more background on what language other states use and so forth and haven't I have an updated draft definition for that that clarifies it. I have a question,

[Speaker 0]: not so much on what we've just been, but I'm just wondering about chemical restraint. And it's not identified. I would hope that it's not being used, but I think we should be clear that it's like all of these things.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, no, I think that's good point. Because despite how we define restraint, under CMS restraint, the definition of restraint includes chemical restraint.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: So if

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: we're saying restraint and we're only saying you can't do mechanicals restraint, that's a good point.

[Speaker 0]: So we'll need a definition for chemical and include chemical.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I have one lower down in the bill.

[Speaker 0]: Think we'll join the bill later. Use a lot for

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: chemical, doing that?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Maybe in the it may be

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: in

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: the restraint seclusion in in residential. In residential. It may be there, and so you've COVID time. So what

[Speaker 0]: does need to insert chemical restraint paragraph in here. Page 23. Yeah. Very good.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Okay. So I can make those changes. Then we have a report on mechanical restraint and transportation of children. By September 1, DCF shall submit a written report to the policy committees addressing how the department is effectuating the policies set forth in 5123D. That's the language that we were looking at previously. It's this language. So if the policy of the state of Vermont, the mechanical restraints are not routinely used on children subject to this chapter. So do we want that to be only mechanical restraints that are reported on? Oh, the title? Yeah.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: No. Because it's supposed to be the whole policy, is least restrictive and safety and all that.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So I'll just say restraint And also policy that was set out in the 2017 budget that I'd have to pull up for you. In the context of contracting with law enforcement or private agencies for the transportation of children, departmental oversight of the secure transport of children, including transport provided by law enforcement officers,

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: and supervision.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: The mechanism used by the Department to collect and review data on the application of mechanical restraints during the transport of children in compliance with 5123 and written policies used to effectuate the law. And then we have the same definition of mechanical restraint, which maybe you just want restraint instead of mechanical, you just want the definition of restraint.

[Speaker 0]: It can resolve, but yeah.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: So again, just a reminder, we had this discussion about restraint of transportation, and there used to be a requirement for an annual report. We stopped doing it because back at that time, ten years ago, whatever, the department said, well, you can ask for it any time instead of us having to write a report. And then last year, we asked for it, and it turned out they didn't have it, and it took them a year to get information back us. So maybe we need a report again.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Well, I guess that's sort

[Speaker 0]: of coming back to my question before about if they are signing off on it, then they should be able to have that information readily available.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: It shouldn't have been that part.

[Speaker 0]: And I know from my joint justice oversight and listening to the sheriff's department that they do keep data on use of restraints, not just for children, for anybody. But that's not everyone who provides transportation. There are private transportation providers for this group that we're spending a lot of money.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: We just added a million.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: We just added a million. Exactly.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Do we need to be more directive earlier? The reference is to commissioner shall ensure supervisory review of every decision to transport. Does that necessarily it may imply a written record, but I'm not sure that it requires that.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: It should go to number two, I think, to add that language to make clear we're asking not just for oversight, but the and that language that you just read.

[Speaker 0]: In both places, is that what you're saying?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Right, in the reporting part number two, departmental oversight, I'm sorry, on page 17, page two, where it's the report on how they are effectuating the policies, it would be saying department oversight and supervisory review of decisions to transport, which goes back to page 15 c, existing statute that we want, which is cross referenced through saying the policies of the statute, but it makes sense to be very specific about Only one tells you the number of

[Speaker 0]: percentage that failed to get the supervisory review. Yes. That's right. So As an add to that report. Then the I don't know how it would be phrased, but the degree to which supervisory and I think it's important, what you said, Doug, about making sure that it says written. Yes. That it should be in that youth's record. Page 15, you

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: want to say. So that

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: the reasons are documented in writing. Let's see.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Yes. When transportation with restraints for a particular child is approved, the reasons for the approval shall be documented in writing. Is that sufficient or do

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: you want additional language? It's sort of all of C because it's ensuring supervisory review of each decision and then

[Speaker 0]: approval. Oh, Right. It sort of says it in writing already. Yes.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Unless we wanna know the number of instances that supervisory review is sought and rejected. But I'm not sure if that's

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I I I think, Katie,

[Speaker 0]: it probably would be good just to say, shall ensure document written documentation of each supervisory review in the first sentence as well. Because the second one is just saying you only write down the reasons for approval.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: The second sentence, right? We

[Speaker 0]: If do both you didn't approve it, then we wouldn't know that you didn't approve it.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And then can we go back to the report? So, in two, I have departmental oversight and supervisory review of the secure transport of children. It sounded like maybe you wanted a new subdivision that was the degree to which supervisory review occurs no. Not along that line. Occurs or supervisory review

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Of the reasons.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Like, still results in use of the restraints. Are you looking for something broad or you-

[Speaker 0]: For an error rate. Okay. That's what I'm looking for. I mean, the concept of, so the requirement is a 100% is reviewed. And do you achieve a 100% every time? That's that's you know? So or or are there situations where things slip through the cracks and you only are reviewing it after the fact. It's a percentage of supervisory reviews that occur prior to trans birth. Yeah. Right.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Just wondering whether we will, in reality, get to that number because in a sense, it's trying to seek a negative. Will it be brought up? And someone says, oh, sorry, boss. Earlier today, I transported someone in restraints. I failed to check with you.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Then they're not assuring that it happens by their training of staff. So

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I'm trying to envision the instances in which we will discover Oh. A failure to abide by that supervisory review.

[Speaker 0]: Well, we'll have an opportunity to ask the deputy commissioner about how that would be documented.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Shall I keep moving? Yes. Thank you, Katie. Okay. Page 18, we're changing topics, solitary confinement of children. This was originally drafted by the judiciary team, so you may want to hear from them more specifically on this language. Subsection A, solitary or room confinement shall not be used on any child for discipline, punishment, retaliation, or any other reason other than as a temporary response to behavior of a child who poses a serious and immediate risk of physical harm to the child or another person. A staff member of a facility shall attempt to use less restrictive techniques before placing the child in solitary or room confinement. The technique shall include attempting to deescalate the situation by talking with the child and permitting a qualified mental health professional to talk with the child. Subsection C, after attempting to use less restrictive techniques as required in A staff member of a facility may place a child in a temporary room confinement if the staff member determines that the child's behavior poses a serious and immediate risk of physical harm to the child or another, explains to the child the reasons for the confinement, informs the child that release from room confinement will occur immediately when the child regains self control such that the child's behavior no longer poses that serious and immediate risk of harm to themselves or others, or not later than the time period specified in the next section. If a child is placed in temporary room confinement pursuant to C, the child shall be released immediately when the child regains self control and no longer poses immediate risk of harm to self or others. And if the child does not regain self control not more than three hours after being placed in room confinement if the child's behavior poses a serious risk of physical harm to others or not more than thirty minutes after being placed in room confinement if the child's behavior poses a serious risk of harm to the child. Yeah, go ahead.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: So just seeing a pattern of the word or phrase least restrictive is popping on up. How are we going to be able to assess and document that uniformly? I believe we need to provide a definition of what least restrictive is within the definition categories to provide some clarity and really implementation too. Because least restrictive is a very, very broad term. I know there are agencies, SAMHSA defines it and so forth. So my suggestion is, and I'll lean upon much counsel for this, is that we define and clarify that within statute.

[Speaker 0]: Think it's the most, think that what's said here is a little loose with regard to how it's referencing least restrictive because it has it has different meanings in different contexts. And so just for us to be clear. And I'll have to say, I think three hours is way too long for the child in Seclusion. Seclusion. Yeah, he keeps calling it solitary confinement. Is there a real reason not

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: to call it seclusion? Yeah, that's one of the things I just mentioned to the When I look side by side, you'll see the next section on restraint and seclusion in residential facilities. There's a lot of overlaps, but where we use different terms, and Representative Rachelson introduced this bill. I'm going to get together with her in the next twenty four hours for us to align language. And one example is room confinement, which appears to be intended and defined the same way we define seclusion under restraint seclusion for residential. So we need to do some work on that.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. Yeah.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: And it's the same thing in terms of the issue of least restrictive. It's used in both.

[Speaker 0]: It means something very specific in education terms. Right. It means something very specific in developmental disability and human services terms and in mental health terms. So I think it's a good call for us to be very specific about what it means. Although it's considered

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: a term of art, the term of art changed its face. It

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: is termed differently in regards of maybe juvenile detention centers or schools. There is different levels of restrictive. Right. It's vitally important as we define that.

[Speaker 0]: And so can I ask this whole section, would this be for any, this section is about for any child in GCF custody? Is that right? I think where this one is placed, it is not. I think I looked at that.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Hold on. Let me stop sharing and go back. I think

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: this might be in the let me just look.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Oh, Terry, I have little seems like that section's talking about DOC? Well, that's what

[Speaker 0]: we just said too. Yeah. I think

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: this was approached I think the intent of the representative was addressing juvenile detention or corrections placements as And opposed to that's why we didn't quite align language.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Because that's why Section 12 seems to get at what this committee is used to dealing with.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Right. That's exactly what exactly

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Right. Right. Solidarity requirement as a penitentiary slash corruption. Which

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: is why that went to judiciary originally, and section 12 was this Yeah,

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: down at the bottom of that section H, it says solitary confinement or room confined means a form of I'm sorry if you just read this a moment ago. Physical separation in which the incarcerated child is placed in a locked room or cell for approximately twenty hours.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. And so this is

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: This is in the general chapter. So this would apply to

[Speaker 0]: all children under DCF custody. Not just those who are incarcerated.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Well, but then you have the way that definition reads. That the placement of this statute makes me think that it should be broadly applicable. But then incarcerated child, that's pretty specific.

[Speaker 0]: I wouldn't Well, I guess what I'm gonna Anne's gonna work with representative Rachelson. And I'm just wondering if there's a way to make this one section that deals with I would like to try that's exactly what we just In general. Exchange details about it. Okay. Yeah. Alright. Thank you. Okay.

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: Thank you very much.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Let's see. I was on E. Staff at the facility is to check on the child at least once every fifteen minutes while the child is in room confinement. The child's behavior continues to pose a serious and immediate risk of harm to self or others. After expiration of the time specified in D2, the child shall be transferred to another facility or location where services other than room confinement can be provided to the child. Nothing in this section shall be construed to limit the use of single person rooms or cells for the housing of children in detention facilities and does not apply to regular sleeping hours. Further, this section is not intended to apply to such situations where one child is housed where only one child is housed in a detention facility. Conflict with any law providing greater or additional protections to others. So I think there has to be a policy decision here about who you want this to apply to. Is this a general policy that DCF should have for any child in its custody? Or is this specific to children who have some type of criminal justice involvement?

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: I was just going to ask quickly. We don't have any detention facilities in the state.

[Speaker 0]: Not any more, but Red actually Clover is. Actually, right.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Oh, Red Clover is considered a

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Well, for, I think, for purposes of this, but there are also youth who are adopting adult facilities. There

[Speaker 0]: are youth in correctional facilities. They have to be separated by sight and sound, but they are allowed in correctional facilities. And so I think the policy decision that you're talking about, and I think that Anne can work with Representative Rachelson, and we can figure out if we need different wording, if a youth is in a correctional facility versus a youth that's in a residential facility or foster care, frankly.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: I think that this is in some ways less restrictive on what the department can do for children in locked facilities with things that we wouldn't permit at all in a residential facility, such as defining it as when the child is placed in a room for twenty hours or more out of twenty four hours, whereas with residential facilities, it's defined as at any time you can't leave the room, these different triggers take place. So there are definitely some, and those are policy decisions. But I think this is accommodating a little bit more the fact that these are children under detention custody rather than in a residential unlocked group home.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: If if I did the s your work with representative Rachel Simpson, prove ultimately that we need to have two separate I think we're heading in that direction. Seems like the settings are sufficiently different than setting it out in two different sections.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Right. Maybe be it subsection of an overall one that says, in the case of the child who's in detention. But either way, yes, I agree. We just need some of the language like solitary confinement definitions and so forth to align better. The definition of least restrictive and things

[Speaker 0]: So like in summary, we know these two sections need work the capable hands of Representative Donahue. Okay.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: So next is the restraint and seclusion. This generally applies to all children in the custody of DCF, that the department shall not use or authorize the use of prone restraints, mechanical restraints, chemical restraints, or strip searches on children. Seclusion and physical restraint shall only be used to prevent the imminent risk of serious bodily harm to a child, staff member or others and shall be discontinued at the earliest possible time based on an individualized assessment and re evaluation of the child. Whenever feasible, a child shall be offered an opportunity to cooperate before and during the use of seclusion and physical restraint. Prior to initiating seclusion or physical restraint, other interventions shall be attempted and found unsuccessful or shall be considered and determined to be ineffective unless the child is attempting to cause serious bodily harm to the child or others and immediate action is necessary. Only a staff member trained in accordance with rule required pursuant to this section may initiate seclusion and restraint in accordance with this section. The program or staff member using seclusion and physical restraint shall document its use, provide a copy of each recorded use to the Commissioner. The documentation shall include a description of the child's specific behaviors justifying the use of the procedures. And D, the Department is to collect the following data on the use of seclusion and physical restraint with a T by placement type, program name, and the age, gender and racial background of the child. The nature of the seclusion and physical restraint used and the length of time the child was secluded or physically restrained as applicable. Annually, and or before January 15, the Department is to submit a written report to the policy committees containing aggregated data collected pursuant to this section.

[Speaker 0]: Would that be to us or to the Office of Child Youth and Family Advocate? Both, probably.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Us and the office.

[Speaker 0]: They're more likely to look at it, that's all I'm saying.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: I agree, they absolutely agree.

[Speaker 0]: I think we should add the office fatality from family as, yeah.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And then here's our rulemaking that the Department is to develop adopt rules in collaboration with the Office of the Child Youth and Family Advocate and in consultation with stakeholders, prohibiting the use of seclusion and restraint on children in the Department's custody for disciplinary reasons. The rule shall only authorize the use of seclusion and restraint on children to prevent the imminent risk of serious bodily harm to the child or others when seclusion or restraint is conducted in the least restrictive means necessary to ensure the safety of the child or others, respects the child's privacy and avoids physical and psychological trauma. The rules shall specify that the use of seclusion and restraint on a child shall minimally conform with CMS standards for seclusion and restraint in psychiatric care settings, and each use of seclusion and restraint shall be followed by debriefing for both the child and person administering the seclusion and restraint. The rule shall require that after the use of seclusion or restraint on a child in the Department's custody, that notice be given to the Department, the Office of the Child Youth and Family Advocate, the child's parent or guardian, the child's guardian ad litem, and attorney, if applicable, within forty eight hours.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: So just to note that they have rules existing now. They are not, because of the new parts of law, they would need to retract, so this one's makes it clear. They're somewhat loose.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: And we have some definitions. Chemical restraint is any medication used to manage behavior or restrict freedom of movement that is not a standard treatment or dosage for the individual's condition. Child or children means somebody in DCF's custody or receiving care and services in a program regulated by DCF.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: Yeah, that's important.

[Speaker 0]: Madam Chair. Yeah.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I go back to the question for you, Rutland, you the the current rulemaking in this, we talk about notice within forty eight hours. Is there anything currently on a with with respect to a timeline for reporting?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: I believe that I can double check. I believe that that's the current requirement. It's not being followed. So the youth and family advocate has indicated that a lot of these are not being received, but I can double check if there's an existing time limit.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: While you're looking for that, you have cross references to the definitions of mechanical restraint and physical restraint that you've already seen. Phone restraint means a physical intervention technique when an individual is held face down on the individual's stomach. And then we have the same cross reference to restraint definition that you've already seen. Shall keep moving? Yeah. Okay. Judicial review of placements of children previously under the custody of DCF.

[Speaker 0]: Just before you do, I said that too I think it's important for us to really understand what the definition of child and children means, particularly says, or in a program regulated by the department. That is very broad we want it to be. I'm just that means childcare facilities. That means whatever I do. I even remember all the other ones, but that's the one that popped into my head. So I'm just putting that little bug in people's ears to be thinking and touching out if we are intending it to be that broad. Personally, I don't want kids being restrained and secluded.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: In top tier facilities, Anywhere. We couldn't

[Speaker 0]: get the schools and education to go along with it. So I just wanted to sort of highlight that because we've all been talking about kids in custody, and that one statement is much broader than kids in custody.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: So I'll say in the original concept of this, my intent was any of the group homes for children that we've been looking at and discussing, I agree it's a very valuable policy decision to think that we may want to include it to all, but we need to know what those all are, like childcare facilities. So that's something we'll, I'm sure, we'll hear from the Department of, from DCF about that language.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Going. Okay. Judicial review of aftercare placements. Top of page 24. If DCF proposes an aftercare placement or program for a child exiting the department's custody, the Department shall submit a petition containing the proposal to the Family Division of the Superior Court in the county in which the child currently resides. The Department is to provide notice of the petition to the child's parent or guardian, guardian ad litem, and attorney if applicable. The child's parent or guardian, guardian ad litem, or attorney oh, did I just read that? No. No. No. No. This is their note their chance to respond. I'm sorry. The child's parent or guardian, guardian ad litem, or attorney as applicable shall have fourteen days from receipt of notice to respond, and the court shall approve the department's proposed aftercare placement or program if it determines that the placement or program is in the best interest of the child. And my understanding is this judicial process is necessary under federal law to receive certain funding. Do I have that correct?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: That's exactly right. When representative McGill and I met with DCF this fall. They identified this as, if you recall in our budget this year, a large amount of money for services for this group of kids was removed because we couldn't get the federal match for it. And she identified this is the key reason because the federal rules require that there be a court review of some type in order for these kind of programs to be funded. So that's the purpose of this. And we have reached out to Judge Zonay about it, and he and the deputy commissioner are gonna discuss it and judiciary will fly by it as well.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: What is an aftercare program?

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: It's after you are not in the department's custody. But I mean, the example we were given is

[Rep. Brenda Steady (Member)]: It

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: just ensures stability and that transition. So you see them often even in unaccompanied homeless youth programs. And really, it's the Yeah, I mean Is that the to look I guess, at

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Bob, it's a positive thing for the youth.

[Speaker 0]: Yes. Yeah. It's supportive.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: It's supportive. It's

[Speaker 0]: It's supportive. Yeah.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: It's supportive. It's a transition. Yeah. Is that is this group that provides the support after they age out or exit custody of the state? Y. D. P. Y. D. P. Thank you. Wrong letters in

[Speaker 0]: that part.

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: I can the sentence of their explanation in the budget book. This was meant to provide services to youth for at least six months after they exit a residential placement and is one of several requirements that is preventing DCF from drawing down that revenue.

[Speaker 0]: So they would be able to draw down additional federal revenue to support the kids after exiting custody, sort of as a transition instead of just like, oh, yep, it's done. One of the things and what really piqued Anne

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: and I's interest was, and also is represented on a number of the bills, was it would give them the ability to offer six months of stipends to youth as they're exiting, which is really like a financial I mean, that's one of the biggest barriers. And that's in the UHY part. It's that ability. You need resources. And when you've kind of been separated from your family for whatever reason, you often don't have that. So this just opens up.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: That all sounds good. I just didn't know the care program if that was sort of

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. Yeah.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: No. Language for something that really isn't care.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. Yeah. No. I I

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: I think we know most 18 year olds with their families aren't turned out to the street and saying, go for it. Get a job. Good luck when they Right, turn

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: you know, it's not even just monetary. And that's the things we're able to address. But think about, when you were a late teens, early 20s, if something happened, you'd call your mom and dad to help you navigate it. And they don't have that. And so I think a big part of a lot of these sections of the bill is how we as a state can provide that or some semblance of that. We're never going to be able to repair that kind of fracture. But I think we can do a

[Speaker 0]: lot better than we have been doing. And we can get federal money too. And we can, yes.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I have section four also related to aftercare placements. By September 1, DCF is to submit a written report in consultation with the judicial branch to the policy committees containing a proposal to implement an aftercare placement or program for children exiting the department's custody in a manner that meets federal requirements to draw down federal funds and then ensure sustainable use of judicial resources. The report shall include any recommendations for legislative action. And this last section is a section that Michelle worked on, the Pregnancy Surveillance Working Group. First, in section A, it creates the working group to examine DCF's current practice of using the pregnancy calendar to monitor and track certain pregnant individuals in Vermont and provide recommendations on alternatives to a pregnancy calendar and ways to support pregnant individuals in need of services. The membership includes the Deputy Commissioner of the Family Services Division, the Vermont Child Youth and Family Advocate or designee, the Executive Director of the Vermont Family Network or designee, Executive Director of Legal Aid or designee, President of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England or designee, an individual with lived experience appointed by the Speaker, an individual with lived experience appointed by the Senate Committee and Committees.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: And this, just want to map, we just needed to get something on paper. And so there are other groups. Not all of these have been consulted with. It was really just a starting point to get into that spell.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: We decided on the pregnancy surveillance plan.

[Speaker 0]: No, it wasn't, it was to payers. That's a DCF

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: comment. No, I'm not saying it was a fund or anything. Just never to sound so

[Speaker 0]: Yeah, dollars 50,000 is too much money When you're I

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: think they just took the amount that was in the what was allotted in the education. Yes. We figured it would be cut back when

[Speaker 0]: we get

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: to markup. High You and then get to markup. Tackle down.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: I got stuck at certain pregnant individuals.

[Speaker 0]: A vote? They don't monitor all pregnant individuals.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: And they're not, yeah, we don't know who or how or why they choose the ones. This is the selection criteria.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Is this It's hit

[Speaker 0]: the news last year. Right.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: And then and that highlighted a serious problem from my perspective. Is there a positive use of a pregnancy surveillance calendar? And this it seems almost sanction it in a way and try to find it more useful. There are

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: some nuances within, and now I'm forgetting the federal term. And we also didn't want to we thought about making our own recommendations, but there is a lawsuit playing out. And we didn't want to then potentially get in a spot where we have different the legislature says something different than a judge says. So we created the working group. And yeah, that's one of the things. And we kept the charge. We just knew this was going

[Speaker 0]: to get chopped in. Kept it broad enough so that

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: Yeah, and figured out community committee can kind of do the work. The working

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: group, right. Yeah. So just to give an example that The amendable. The example that DCF used at the time this was uncovered was like, well, this is highly limited, and they addressed a lot more. But if a pregnant person has had all of their previous children removed for abuse by DCF and they're addicted to drugs that they want to monitor when the baby's going to be born so that they can intervene right away. That was one example. And There may be some valid uses of that, but not to expand it to anyone who's had DCF involvement or something like that. That's what really needs to be Even when they were a child. Yeah, right, that's right. So there may be that's there may be some reasons for some monitoring of a pregnant individual, but they would seem to be extremely narrow if so.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: And just want to go to the membership. The network was one that we meant to add and was in our back and forth, and we realized after it was not on there.

[Speaker 0]: So network against domestic and sexual violence.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: But then we have an even, so yeah, we'll have to do some And

[Speaker 0]: I didn't know with lived experience, if that meant the lived experience of being pregnant, or lived experience of being pregnant and having been monitored.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: Yeah, We meant with monitored,

[Speaker 0]: someone who has experienced

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: previous monitoring.

[Speaker 0]: I think we should actually be specific Okay. About that,

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I like it going. Yeah.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I'll just ask question regarding the membership, and I'm not going to remember the name in the moment, but the organization that Larry Chris serves as the executive director. Yep. They have probably been tied in with this population impacted by the schedule. I don't know if that's something someone for an organization for consideration.

[Speaker 0]: Yep. And I'm trying to remember that

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: I know.

[Speaker 0]: The organization.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: Go ahead and check your order.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Find it. And to the chair's question or reference to the $50,000, that seems like it's tied into perhaps the hiring of someone to assist this group.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. I'm not sure we need somebody to assist that. I was gonna respond.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: I'm not a sure idea. I know.

[Rep. Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: An independent facilitator.

[Speaker 0]: Parent representation center. Add that? Yeah. Yeah, I did. I'd never recall saying that.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. I'm thinking now that when I see a dollar in the sentence, if we want that to apply, that's not likely to apply.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: Subsection C is the duties of this group. It's responsible to study the current practice of using the pregnancy calendar and ways to support pregnant individuals in need of services. Assistance, DCF is to contract with one or more independent consultants or facilitators to provide technical and legal assistance for the working group and for the work part under this section for the purpose of scheduling meetings and providing admin assistance. So work groups will have the assistance of DCF. By November 15, the group is to submit a written report to the policy committees and judiciary, it's policy committee, with its finding in any recommendations for legislative action, meetings. My computer is about to die. Let's see how long I have here. The Vermont Child Youth and Family Advocate or Designee shall call the first meeting of the working group to occur on or before August 1. The group shall select a chair from among its members at its first meeting. The majority constitutes a quorum, and the group ceases to exist February 1. Members of the group who are not otherwise compensated for attendance at meetings shall be entitled to a per diem compensation and expenses as permitted in statute. Wow.

[Rep. Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Is amazing.

[Speaker 0]: Laurie is always listening.

[Rep. Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Oh my goodness. Thank you, Laurie.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: I can't do a suspense. I wanted to come see if she can make it or not.

[Katie McLean (Office of Legislative Counsel)]: It started dimming, so okay. And then we have our oh, it's not more than five meetings for that compensation reimbursement. And then 15,000 is appropriated to DCF from the general fund for fiscal year '27 for the purposes of the per diem and reimbursement of expenses and to hire one or more facilitation consultants pursuant to this subsection. You have an effective date of July 1 year. And then this is renamed to be an act relating to miscellaneous programming and requirements within DCF, which I'm not crazy about. So I don't mind other suggestions. We'll see where

[Speaker 0]: this lands and maybe come up with a better title. Yeah. I would probably substitute various as opposed to miscellaneous. Miscellaneous sounds pretty certain. Miscellaneous makes it sound minor, it's not really minor.

[Rep. Daniel Noyes (Clerk)]: Just have one question.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: The the scope of this bill is the expansion has gone far beyond its original intent and

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: On purpose. Yeah. Know. Combining other bills into one.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. Yeah.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: It's but I do have a concern with the amount of are there are there any sections within this bill right now that likely gonna be require significant delay for implementation? Does some timelines need to change due to rule making and as well as others? I mean, we're talking about some major system changes here, and as well as rule making, it's July 1.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah, there are different sections that will need different effective dates. Yeah, I agree. I don't know exactly what they are right at this moment. As we go through markup and as we take witness testimony, I'm sure that we'll get feedback from the department, from the judiciary, from, you know, child youth and family advocate. So right now we're talking about having, judge Zonay, Deputy Commissioner Radke, Child Youth and Family Advocate, Voices for Vermont Children, the Public Defender's Office, and the treasurer's office because they they have they will have some involvement in the SSI financial section. So that's that's sort of the witness lineup for Rey.

[Rep. Jubilee McGill (Member)]: I would also have favor Ellis from Elevate Youth Services. She's the executive director there. Okay. And they are the statewide administrator for all of our runaway and homeless youth funding And that comes they're the statewide administrator for the YDP. I was just

[Speaker 0]: going say, I was just going ask if that

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: was the YDP. All right. Yeah, just the question about that forty eight hour reporting. Mhmm. I I just got a note from an outside party pointing out that the the current rules actually say twenty four hours.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: So I

[Rep. Anne B. Donahue (Ranking Member)]: think we'll wanna say twenty four hours more time, but they are they already have that in their roles. In otherwise fully adequate, maybe, roles, but they do have twenty four hours. Okay. So, Katie, if you've got that, what are we? 48 for reporting to the department, etcetera, there's restraints that you can use, that should be twenty four.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. There's So, obviously a lot of work to do on this bill. And page 23. I got it. I got it. Oh, you got it. Yeah. All right. So, and we will, we're gonna try to put in some of these witnesses. Like, Deputy Commissioner Rutland knew about the bill coming. So, you know, she's, I'm sure that she has been preparing and all of that kind of stuff. So hopefully we can get her this week. I would like to have at least a couple, three of the witnesses this week in our areas that we have some TBD so that we can tell what kind significant markup that we'll need when we return from break. We have one week after we get back from break for crossover.

[Rep. Todd Nielson (Member)]: It's kind

[Speaker 0]: of priced. Right. Okay. So that's that on that bill. Thank you so much, Katie. I sincerely apologize for making that shift on you, but I felt like people needed to sort of start to get their head around all of the various concepts that are laid out here and have time to think about them before we have the witnesses logged in. But we are gonna do what is on the agenda for the afternoon. Okay. So in the we're going to take a little break before our 11:00, which is picking up on some of the background from our meeting yesterday on pre K. We have lots of subjects that we do in this committee. It's never boring. So we're going to have Beth St. James in here to talk about what is the current statute. So we keep talking about UPK and all of that kind of stuff, but what does the statue actually say for that? And I think we're going to look at kindergarten as well. So it's amazing what the statutes say and then also what they read out. So we're going to do that