Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: We are live.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Welcome to Hudson Judiciary Committee. This is Tuesday afternoon, March seventeenth, and we are continuing our work on h seven seventy two landlord tenant bill. And just just wanna do a little bit of an introduction before we get a walkthrough of draft number 3.1 of at this point, my proposed amendment. I hope to convince other folks in here to to join me on the amendment. Seven seventy two. Yeah. Seven seventy two. So given testimony last week, primarily from board administrator, Crozones and judge Zone, it seemed that the bill, as far as court process, still wasn't working. That still presented us with a decision of having other cases fall further behind if we were prioritizing the eviction or ejectment cases or having to put a whole bunch of more resources into the court system. So given that, I worked again with the court administrator and the chief superior judge to see if we can find the places that would make this workable for the court without significantly overburdening that. One of the big issues was the confidentiality provisions that were in here were largely unworkable, would be very difficult to implement. So this bill, as we will see, changes this to a ceiling after the case is resolved. And we'll get into the language of that. And there's some other places that really look to try to be able to lessen the burden of some of the expeditious or expedited paths that this bill creates. That's been the intent, we will hear from Judge Zoning, but we'll first have a walkthrough with Cameron. Thank you for being here, Cameron.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: Can I

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: just say? Yeah, go ahead.

[Unidentified committee member]: How do we go from 4.1 back to three point one?

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Okay. So so 4.1 is the bill as passed the house general. This is a draft number for my amendment. So this is the draft amendment is like a separate document. So this is like an amendment copy? Thank you. Correct. 3.1 is a proposed amendment that we have been working on.

[Unidentified committee member]: Thank you.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Good afternoon. For the record, Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel. I'll share my screen, and then we'll walk through. So as was just mentioned, you have draft 3.1 of an amendment that's currently being proposed by the chair. And it's an amendment to the reports of the Committee on General and Housing. I'm not going to walk through every instance of amendment because the changes are highlighted in yellow on this document from what we were reviewing on draft 2.1 just last week. So I'm going to just hone in on those changes and not the amendments in total. So the first change we're looking at is this is going to start on page five. We're talking about the new ejectment subchapter. Which one are you on? I'm on 3.1.

[Unidentified committee member]: Because I don't have okay. It's okay. It's not yellow, but I got it. Okay. Thank you. Yes, sir.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So we're looking at the and it starts on page five. But just to hone in on the section that we're referring to, this is as we've talked a few times now already, you have the termination of the rental agreement. And then when the landlord needs to bring the ejectment action against the individual to remove them, or if they receive a writ of possession, to be able to remove the individual from the location. Part of the bill that came out of house general is creating a new ejectment subchapter for a subset of termination types. So for the nonpayment of rent, for the breach of the rental agreement terms, for violent activity, etcetera. There's this new subchapter of ejectment to try to have more of a shorter timeline to get to a final disposition of the case. And so the first change is in this new subchapter. There is an answer period. And if you remember, the House Committee was proposing a shorter answer period of fourteen days. This amendment would strike that and be consistent with other civil cases. So the change is really going to be on page six, the subsection C. And so if you recall, what this section said was, as the last version that we reviewed together, it was for a termination that was based on 04/1967 a, which is nonpayment of rent, or 4,467, it said b one, which would be the breach of material terms of a rental agreement or late payment of rent or not allowing access to the dwelling unit. Those are some of the new reasons for cause under that subdivision. The court shall set a final hearing. I believe it was not later than I think it was sixty days after service of the complaint. And so this has altered it to ninety days after service of the answer. So it's given a little bit more time, and it's moved the point of reference from the serving of the complaint to service of the answer, at when that point in time will start to count. And then what you have here under the Subdivision 2 was addressing some issue that was brought up about, well, do we really need an expedited timeline when the plaintiff, the landlord, actually has possession of the property already or has already been issued a writ of possession. So you may ask, what would be remaining then? The landlord could be seeking damages or back rent. There could be other unresolved issues of the complaint that the court still needs to rule on. But this language is saying, if the plaintiff is already in possession of the property, then we don't need to have this very short time frame turnaround on the hearing itself, because the need for the expediency doesn't exist at that point.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: One question, just the so in c2, the timeline in this subsection, the timeline that we referred to is the timeline established in c1? Yes.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So at that point, then, the court would schedule the hearing as they generally do under their normal hours when they schedule it. So it's going to be dependent on what county you're in, etcetera.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: Barbara? I'm sorry, can you

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: 100 say

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: again more detail about 4067

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: A or B, what those conditions were? So the April

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: is when a landlord terminates a rental agreement due to nonpayment of rent. And then 4004 And 67 B is broken up into a Subdivision 1 and a subdivision two. The Subdivision 1 is where they're terminating the rental agreement due to breach of material terms of the agreement or breach of the tenant's obligations under the chapter. And the proposal from the House General Committee is to add within that subdivision examples of what that could be, which could be late payment of rent. And as we discussed, that was late payment three times. So it's not just once, repeated late payment of rent. Or it could be failure to allow the landlord access to the unit, which is required that chapter.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: Which means certain hours, if I recall.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: There are limitations on when the landlord can access the unit. Yes, ma'am. And then the b two. So like I said, you have a b one and a b two. B two is when there are acts of violence, damage, things that threaten the health and safety of other individuals.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: It's like I've called damage is not defined. I

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: do not recall damage being defined in that subchapter, no man. So if I found a picture and made holes in the walls, that's

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: It would have to be

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: damage that threatens the health or safety of other individuals. Okay. And late rent is if it's a day late, that's late? It's defined in the House general proposal as payment ten days after the due date, from the due date of the rent. So under the B1 for a repeated late payment of rent, it would have to be late payment of rent three times.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: It's Over

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: what time period?

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: A twelve month period. And it's defined as late being ten days after it's due. Okay, so that is the C1, just doing a little bit of extension of the period where the court needs to set a final hearing for those terminations, and then adding in that the timeline doesn't apply, as I mentioned, if the plaintiff already has possession of the property. The next change is going to be here at the bottom of that page on the new section four thousand eight and sixty five. So now we're talking about the termination under B2. So we're limiting which types of terminations can be brought under this expedited hearing process. So it has to be a termination due to acts that threaten the health and safety of other individuals. And there's a further condition being placed here on line 21 to say that the plaintiff can file a motion for judgment that the plaintiff is entitled to immediate possession on the grounds that the defendant's continued occupation of the lands or tenements is threats ongoing, then the landlord could file a motion to have this expedited process, which if you recall last time we talked, it mirrors the expedited process for unlawful occupant that currently exists in statute with the change that under the sub B on page seven that a hearing on the motion shall be held not later than twenty one days after the motion is filed. So that is a shorter time frame than under the current statute. But the point here is to you can terminate a rental agreement if somebody has done activity that threatens other people. But the key question is, is it an ongoing threat that is continuing to threaten individuals in the dwelling unit or the landlord, etcetera. If there is an ongoing threat, then you can bring this motion where the hearing needs to be heard within twenty one days. If there is no ongoing threat, you can still terminate the rental agreement and bring the ejectment action. It's just going to be subject to the time frames outlined here above, which is ninety days from the date of the answer. That's really the change that you have in this amendment here. The next change is going to be regarding the confidential versus sealing of records, as the chair mentioned. So I'm going bring you all the way down to the bottom of page nine, where we're looking beginning on lines 13, we're looking at the fourth instance of amendment. On draft 2.1, it had a much more narrow change. But what this proposal would do is strike that entire section from the report from the House General Committee and insert new language. So instead of having confidential records that was proposed by the House General Committee, it would be replaced by what you have here under this version. All the changes are highlighted yellow. So it's ceiling of ejectment records. Definitions are primarily the same. I just added a definition of rental agreement, and that will be referenced later on. Then we get to Section 4,872, which is going to be on page 10. Upon the expiration of the appeal period for an ejectment action, the court shall order the sealing of all ejectment records unless the court issued a writ of possession to the plaintiff, in which case the ejectment records shall not be sealed. You remember under draft 2.1, there was a distinction of what would be confidential depending on what type of termination what type of termination of the agreement was under. We've gotten rid of all of that distinction. This is saying, at the end of the case, if no appeal has been filed, going to seal the records unless we found in favor of the landlord and issued the landlord a writ of possession. And if the landlord is given a writ of possession, we're not going to seal the records. Sub B here is simply stating that if it is appealed, the records will remain open. They will not be sealed until there's a final disposition. And then again, if the landlord's issued the writ of possession, then the records will not be sealed. Otherwise, they will be. Moving on to page 11, what's the effect of sealing? This is a lot of language that was just mirrored what currently exists regarding sealing of certain criminal records. So a lot of the language is the same. It's just been tweaked to fit here in reference to ejectment records as opposed to convictions. So you have the order upon sealing. The order is legally effective immediately. And the person whose record is sealed shall be treated in all respects as if the person had never been ejected. Effect here, the response from the court to an inquiry from a member of the public regarding a sealed record as no record of an ejectment exists. There's language here regarding process for the court. So the court has to bar viewing of the sealed records of any accessible databases. It has to ensure that the case is publicly accessible until the ejectment records have been sealed. And then afterwards, it has to be exempt from public access. So just some standard language regarding what the court must do after the order of sealing the records here. Then you have the prohibition regarding the consumer reporting agencies. So this was language that was in the report that came out of House General, wanting to provide that a consumer reporting agency can't report information on records that have been sealed. So that has been kept. And as the injury there on sub E, same injury that was in the report there. If the consumer reporting agencies are violating that section, there's a provision here where the tenant can take action. And then the language here on the four thousand eight seventy four is just stating that the individual or person or the attorney that possesses the sealed record can still use that information in any other claims that arise out of the same rental agreement. And the entity or person has to, before disclosing the records to anyone else, document that the information is sealed with that information. And again, that mirrors what you all have under the current statutory framework for sealing of conviction records. There is no distinction between what you have here other than we're referencing ejectment records and not convictions. So that's the amendment. Barbara? You explain, I don't fully understand the

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: writ of possession. I don't know if you can just explain a little bit more about when that happens and why of that changes things.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So as I mentioned before Cross River, when we were first walking through, you have the rental agreement, you have the circumstances that exist for the individuals renting a house or a unit from the landlord. And then either party, but it's primarily going to be the landlord, at least in the statute, it's written that way, wants to terminate that rental agreement. They have to have a reason to do so, because depending on the reason, it gives the tenant certain notice periods. So the landlord proceeds to terminate the agreement, and depending on what the reasons are, they provide the required notice period. Then the individual remains after. So the landlord has to bring the objectment action. And then the language in the statute is that if the landlord is entitled to possession of those properties, the writ of possession is the document under which the court orders that the landlord is entitled to the lawful possession of that property. So when somebody doesn't leave the premises, those are the records on who gets sealed? Pardon? Those are the records that will not be eligible for sealing. The court records for the ejectment. Yes, ma'am. So any documentation so if you remember when the landlord files the complaint, they have to include the reason for termination, the termination notice that was given to the tenants. And the termination notice also has to include the affidavit supporting the facts that led to the termination, all of that information in the complaint, the information in the answer, information in their motions, other documented evidence that the individuals are providing to the court to support those positions, all of that information. The sealed and I can share it. There's a definition of what the records are. So all of that information that's in the court's possession, that's what would be sealed.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: So when you said it's mostly going to be the landlord that's doing this, That made me wonder if this is the parallel process, if it's the tenant that wants to get out of the lease because the landlord is not meeting material terms, they are breaching the material So for example, I've had a lot of constituents who are college students, and I've had people tell me that their stove and oven don't work, but they're afraid to tell the landlord because they're worried they're going to get victed. So how would this amendment affect the renters who are

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So the tenants have certain remedies under the current statute for residential rental agreements. Whether they're willing to take advantage of those remedies. I understand that could be difficult or unique circumstances that may dissuade them from doing so. But currently, under the statute, if the landlord is failing to comply with the landlord's obligations for habitability after notifying the landlord of that, the tenant has these remedies, not withholding payment of rents. They can seek injunctive relief, etcetera. So there are some remedies that the tenant has. And then understanding that a tenant may be afraid to take advantage of those remedies because of retaliation, as you just mentioned, There is a statutory section about retaliatory conduct being prohibited. So a landlord cannot take an adverse action by charging more or threatening to evict them by taking advantage of those remedies. And then there's a presumption that if the landlord under the C here if the landlord serves a termination notice for anything other than nonpayment of rent within ninety days after notice from a municipality or state entity that the premises are not in compliance with the political health and safety regulations. So in the instance you provided, if something is not working and the individual notifies the Division of Fire Safety, for example, and the Division of Fire Safety comes out because of the complaint to do an inspection, the landlord can't retaliate against the individual. And this is saying that if the landlord serves notice within ninety days of that, it's a rebuttable presumption that it is retaliation. So there are certain provisions in the statute already that try to provide those remedies for tenants. Again, how that's operating on the ground could be a different

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: And are there the same tight timelines for the landlord to fix

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I do not believe there is the only time frame in here is for repairing the premises is within a reasonable time. And I don't know if that has been I don't think the courts have given a universal time frame of what is reasonable. It's going to depend on what's the circumstance of what's the violation that needs to

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: be cured. And the new bill never dealt with that?

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: The new bill adds some language as it came out of the House General Committee. It does have some language currently under this section. If there is a violation of the landlord's obligations for habitability, the individual can withhold payment of rent. So that's already here in the statute. The House General Committee did add some language in the termination section. This is in its own section. So they added some new language in the section related to termination to state that it is a defense to an objectment action that if a landlord's not paying rent because of a serious health and safety violation, where there has been a citation issued to the landlord and the landlord hasn't taken I think it uses similar language reasonable steps to cure it before the ejectment is brought, then it's an automatic defense when the ejectment case is brought. So a court could look at that and say, you landlord have this serious violation. You haven't taken reasonable steps to fix it by the time you brought the action. The tenant hasn't been paying rent because of it. That's a defense. Dismiss the case. That's being added. Again, I think one could argue that the statutory defenses of the tenant already exist. But the House General Committee felt it was important to put it in that section to make sure that individuals are aware there in the termination section itself.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Just

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: wanted to know, should we page 12, line 15, the entity or person shall, before disclosing the record to another person for purposes of litigation, should also say or claim provide the following notice to the recipient of the record. Then

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Which line you want?

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Line 13, end of line 13.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Just to be consistent with what's there on line 10?

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah, because I guess I'm thinking about an insurance claim or something like that.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I don't have a legal concern with it to add it there. Can think You have the judge after me. If he has any concerns, can share with that. I wouldn't have any if the committee wanted to. It would at least be consistent with the language above.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: And I'll flag, and I'm not going to ask for any answer on this right now. Definitely want to have witnesses well, they'll comment on whatever they want, obviously, on the ceiling provision. But specifically on page 11, lines four to six, specifically on line six, I don't think that language works. The person had never been ejected because it's possible that there was a previous case where the person was ejected. So it could instead be along the lines of respects as if the case had never been brought or that's something along those lines. Or we just actually strike essentially most of that and just talk about really the effects of when there's an order. Because presumably if a person is asked about the situation, they can explain that they've sued but they won. I'd rather have something along the lines of what the first thing I said, like something along the lines of the case had never been brought.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: As if the ejectment action had never been brought.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Right, right, right. Something along those lines because there may be a previous case that wasn't sealed where the person was ejected. And the whole idea is that if there was an ejectment, then it wouldn't be sealed.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: I think this is probably for alleged counseling. Is it a of possession and an injectment, as we're going through the ejectment process, that is the conclusion? Are there other ways that one of these ejectment processes can resolve that's not a resolution that happens before the end, like an out of court resolution or whatever. Or is the funnel always landing to the writ of possession and objectment?

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: If the landlord prevails. Yes. Thank you. If the landlord prevails.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: As far as my knowledge, the case could involve multiple different questions, possession being one of them, damages, fat rent, etcetera. I mean, there are multiple questions throughout. I would defer to the individuals who actually practice in this area because they're going to be able to answer that question better than I can. I believe the current ejectment statute, it does contemplate if the defendant wins. But I don't think it's similar. The defendant's not going to get a writ of possession in that instance. The defendant's in possession, at least in my mind. But I'll defer that to the other parties.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Okay. I'm just thinking I'm just wondering about we're kind of saying if I were to do the equivalent to the criminal court, it would be like we're saying, well, can seal your criminal record if you resolve before trial.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So even if there's an agreement to relinquish the tenancy, they intend to leave without that a big seal for that particular instance.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah. But maybe I don't understand it quite.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Yeah. We have the witnesses waiting on this. Mean, is not thing that we've shot at this with Yes. Admittedly, not a ton of knowledge, but that's why we have the witnesses here. It goes trying to get us on a different track Yes.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: From one that just wasn't working. And and this seems to be a

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: lot closer. We may end up having to do is strike that whole thing, but I'm taking a shot at the Yeah. Yeah. At least our knowledge of what sealing is and how the court process works. But we know that that's

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I will say just- Reviewable. Just real quick pulling up the statutory section. I mean, the defendant receives judgment, it just says that when a plaintiff's complaint is dismissed, or he or she does not prove his or her right to the possession, the defendant shall have judgment for his or her costs and execution thereof. And then for judgment for the plaintiff, you're going to get a writ of possession. Again, if that's still a question that remains needing to be resolved during the case. I imagine at any point in the case, the defendant may vacate the property, in which case the plaintiff receives possession of it. And then you may still have outstanding issues that need to be resolved. And

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: that would probably those outstanding issues would still be resolved in this judgment process.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I will say it this way and then pose the question potentially to the judge. My apologies, sir.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Hanging on you behind me.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Regarding the sealing of records, it talks about that the records will not be sealed if a writ of possession is issued. If the landlord brings the plaintiff brings a case against the tenant, and then seeking a writ of possession because the tenant remains after the termination period. Maybe the landlord's seeking other questions, damages, back rent, etcetera. And then during the case, the tenant leaves. Does the court still order a writ of possession? Because that issue is no longer needed to be resolved, do they not? Do they still answer the remaining questions? And as I would read this section, even if the judgment at the end of the day awards damages or back rent to the landlord, but because the tenant has vacated the property, there's no need for the writ of possession itself. My question will be, is the writ still issued, in which case they wouldn't be sealed? Or is that some sort of gap in the language that we have? Because technically, if the writ's not issued, then it would be sealed. But the tenant has vacated. The judgment is still issued for the landlord for something like damages. Do you want to address that in the ceiling? That may be an open question. So

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah. Yeah. That gets right at what I'm

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Right here. That's right here. Yeah. Any other questions, Cameron? I'm not seeing any. I think you're a little late for your 02:30. I apologize for that. But the polls got Okay. I'm going

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: to step out and be back.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Thank you.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: Good afternoon, Tom Zunig, Chief Superior Judge. Thank you for being here. My pleasure, thank you. I will comment. Cameron did a nice job.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Good work. Yes, we are very lucky with all of our legislative cults who will come in front of us here.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: So on page five, on lines eight through 10, there's language that, I apologize, I should have pointed this out before. It mentions that the complaint shall include a copy of the rent ledger. And I just wanna point out that some people might not have rent ledgers, especially electronically. Take a look at that and decide if you really need that in there, because that might impose an obligation on the landlord to start doing something they otherwise do.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: It could even be a ledger if available.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: The timelines that were changed on page six are ones that are much closer to the type of timelines that would not have an imposition on the court after they was talking about move cases that Terry was talking about. And so, I think that we can make these timelines work that were put in here. And I think the addition on page six of subsection C2 recognizes that there's a difference between someone who is still in the property, in which case it is important to get that case taken care of. And if they've left the property or there was a writ of possession issued, for instance, from a rent escrow or under the new threatening behavior process, that if the only issue remaining is monetary damages, that it shouldn't If we can't make the ninety days, that's different, because that's not the depressing need. The depressing need being to have individuals removed from the property. So we think those numbers are ones that we can work with. And again, the ninety days, I know Terry talked about, we talked about how long it takes cases to get resolved and a percentage by six months. That doesn't mean that we're not resolving cases sometimes in thirty days, sixty days, ninety days. So our desire will always be to schedule something as soon as we can and as quickly as we can. But if we have the ninety days, then we certainly have that as the benchmark. The new section 4,865 seems to be a policy response to the concerns about individuals who are actually continuing to occupy property and they're threatening the health or safety of others at the property. And so, that provides much like the unlawful occupant statute that is currently in existence, tightened timelines and the ability to address those cases in a much faster manner than previously done. Yes, it's a new statutory framework in terms of threatening behavior. But it mirrors the one for unlawful occupant, which we already have. So, you're not creating something that is completely different. It's something that is consistent with existing law. The section on ceiling, I would refer back to Terry's comments about confidentiality and the difficulties with that. The ceiling provisions that have now been placed into draft number 3.1 are greatly preferred over the confidentiality. It's a much more direct, simple process. I would still need to mention that there will be obligations on the court, but I think it's safe to say that those obligations are not to the extent of the confidentiality and the hearings and the issues there. So, this works much better than the confidentiality in the prior version, in the court's perspective. And on page 11, under the order, that's the section you were talking about, Chair LaLonde, about legally effective, and it shall be treated in all respects. And what you may wanna do is just say upon entry of a sealing order, the order shall be legally effective immediately, period. And then in subsection B, you talk about what the effect is. That's one way to handle it. Or if you wanna grant additional effects, you can put that in. But you may, instead of that second clause on line five, after the word immediately, where it says, and, that's really the effect. So you might wanna move that down if you wanna have an effect, put effects altogether. Right. And that, those were the concerns. And I know, Representative Goodnow, you had a question, I think it was, Chair LaLonde. The questions were asking about, what about a circumstance where someone leaves the property, but the landlord still wants to get a writ of possession? It's unclear whether you can do that if they leave the property. I would say that there is certainly the potential that one judge may look at it and say, Well, they're gone. You don't need a writ of possession. Another judge may say, Well, you've got a right. We're gonna give you a right of possession. You can have it served. And even if they're already gone, we're just belt and suspenders. So, I think there is that potential.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah. I think what I'm concerned about with the current structure is, and I don't know if this is what it's grading, but I'm trying to understand is, I would be concerned about putting a tenant in a position where they are weighing the benefit of sealing the record to the risk and reward of taking an ejectment to final hearing. So they want to fight it. They think maybe they have a good claim, but they're like, Well, if I lose, then I'm going get this writ of possession. It's going be issued to the plaintiff, and I won't be able to seal this record anymore. So now I'm not going to pursue the final hearing. I'm going to somehow withdraw, get out so that I don't have that risk of sealing. And that's kind of how I was trying to understand, is there a way where these processes move so that you could have that written question resolved, but you're still in the ejectment process, the tenant's still exercising their rights to advocate for themselves, but that whole process is going

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: to get sealed? I think you raised fully a policy question. You're a prosecutor. Individuals sometimes have to determine the balance. Do I go forward with trial or do I accept disagreement or how do I handle it? So I think that's a policy question. And there may be some different type of language that committee and regulator comes up with, but I do see that that's a potential, that someone may have those considerations as they're looking at the case.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Can I ask one more thing?

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: Yeah, yeah. Go ahead.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: And this is a little bit more ridiculous, but I just kinda wanna pick the tires on it. Yeah, on page six, line 21, the new language that we added in. So we're not reinventing the wheel here. We're borrowing language. That's an existing statute. But the way that it's written, so defendant's continued occupation of the lands or tenants, is threatening the health and safety of other residents. So it's not tied to the actions of the tenant. It's just tied to their occupancy.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: I think that the way this would be worked out is that when you have a case, the claims are someone has engaged in behaviors A, B, and C. Yep. So this language stands, as I read it, stands for the proposition that just because they did A, B, and C, doesn't mean they fit under this new expedited hearing. They fit under the expedited hearing if for instance, A, B, and C, and the court concludes that, if you will, they need to leave because they're continued occupation. So, it's not that the facts don't matter, but the key question for the court, think of it like a relief from abuse order. The question for the court is, has there been an act of abuse? And is there a danger of further abuse? And so this would be more in line of the, if you will, the ongoing, the danger of further abuse component.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah. And so that's kind of captured in the further abuse because they are continuing to occupy the town. Yeah, that makes sense to me.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Okay, great, thank you.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: And it wasn't a ridiculous question. Well,

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: here you go. Do you have questions for Judge Zellen? Thank you very much, Judge. We'll go with Brenda Siegel next. Finally, definitely have it cleared for you, Brenda. I apologize again for not being able to fit you with That last better. We feel less rushed about since we're not

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: I felt less rushed, so that was okay. That day was a rough day. Thomas? Okay. Nate is gonna help me with running some slides because I can't seem to be able to do.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: If you just give me one sec.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: I'm not ready for them yet, but I was just letting you guys know. Don't need them here.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: And identify yourself for the record. Yeah.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: For the record, I am Brenda Siegel, the executive director of Mental Illnesses Vermont. So I just want to start by saying that I would urge the committee not to move forward on this. And I need to just say that. I know that's not what you're taking up. But I it has far too serious repercussions for it to be done as proposed. And the bill protects landlords more than it does tenants. It's not a good balance. And the foundation of landlord tenant law has to consider both of the landlord and the tenant. And H-seven 72, including with this amendment, just doesn't do that. But before I go into detail, I want to tell you a little bit about where I come from on this issue because you guys have not had me in this committee while I've been in this role. End Homelessness Vermont is a lived experience led organization that works toward the goal of ending poverty, disability discrimination and homelessness in Vermont. We provide a data driven safety net to the safety net, and it's trauma informed, rooted in compassion, empathy and housing first principles. We work closely with teams across the state, and we work both with people who are experiencing homelessness and people who are experiencing housing insecurity. So if they're in the middle of an eviction, we might be working with them as well. Or if they're living with a disability and need extra support in their housing, we would be working with them as well. We have two departments. We have the Office of Housing Advocate and the Office of Research and Advocacy. And I'm going to talk to you a little bit about our research in a minute so that you understand where we come from. In 2025, we answered more than 3,000 hotline calls and responded to hundreds of referrals. We were in front of the Human Services Board more than two fifty times representing people with disabilities in fair hearings as non attorney advocates. We supported more than two fifty people with ongoing support and assisting them with emergency housing or in their permanent housing and 500 people in ongoing capacity that was a little lighter touch. We worked with providers across the state. In the last twelve months, we housed 80 people with complex needs with only two returning to homelessness. And one has already returned to permanent housing from there and the other has passed away. We have a 97.5% housing retention rate in this program. And with the right tools, many of which will be taken away with H772, we can get more people into housing and keep them housed. Registered more than these are just a sidebar. We registered more than 200 people experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity to vote with our All Voices Vote project. And we completed the draft report of our research is still being looked at from a public health researcher. So I can only give you data parts, not the whole report at this time. I think I want to start by sharing with you some of the data and then some of the recommendations or some of the concerns you have about the bill. Yeah. Okay. So I'm just going to tell you about the methodology of the data. This is a three phase

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: report. We

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: conducted a survey with participants of the General Assistance Emergency Housing Program to understand the demographics, experiences and needs of people utilizing emergency housing. We have this is phase two. There will be four or five phases if we deem it necessary. And this phase was done from September 2023 to February 2024. End Homelessness Vermont chose hotels in phase two to ensure a strong sample from a broad geographic spectrum in Vermont. Our next phase will include people who are housed, people who are outside, and a broader spectrum. EHVT also surveyed individuals who volunteered to participate. We had not met most of the people before we did these interviews. And the questionnaires were administered by staff and homelessness Vermont using a standard questionnaire. All interviews were held in a private location in the motels or by phone. And at the time that the data was collected, we think this is important, there was a June cohort in fiscal year twenty twenty four that outlined a vulnerability category and started 06/30/2023. And there were regular GA rules, which is the previous rules before the pandemic. And then there was winter weather, which is relaxed flexibility. Important because of what I will share with you next. The people were in the next slide. They were in five counties in 10 towns. And they ranged in age from 18 to actually, you don't see it here, but to 88. And with the broadest number being between the ages of 30 and 59. It's sort of equal number. So then you get into the cause. We're not going to go through all the slides. I'm just going to go through one relevant to this. But this is from a presentation I gave at UVM in their public health class. So this is the cause of loss of housing. You can see no cause eviction is 41 of Oh, I forgot to say we interviewed 200 people. So that's a broad sample. The no cause eviction is 41 people. But if you go down to the non payment of rent and could not afford rent, you get 20 could not afford rent and 10 non payment of rent. And they answered it different ways. That's why they're different. They're listed differently. And in all of these, it doesn't mean that that is how they left the apartment. It could be that there was a health or safety violation, they withheld money, and then were evicted for non payment of rent. Something that I think is really important is that it's 84 evictions out of the 200 people we interviewed, which again, was a broad spectrum of volunteers who we had never met before, the majority of them. Something that we found really interesting was that in '47 of the people that we interviewed, even if they didn't leave because of a health or safety issue in their housing, there was a health or safety, a major health or safety issue in their housing. So I just think that that's really important when we're talking about when we're going to take some rights away from people. And I'm going to go forward. I'll tell you how my slides, Nate. One, two, three, two, six slides to the health of participants.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: For the Yeah,

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: right there.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Okay. So I just want to show that people experiencing homelessness, 92.5 reported having a mental illness of some kind that we interviewed. And of those, that's one hundred and eighty four of the people. Now, is important to just note when we're talking about that, that some of them, it was situational. They're experiencing homelessness. It's pretty traumatic. If we interviewed them right before a major exit from hotels, that's pretty traumatic. So they may have reported, self reported that for that reason. But the majority, it was ongoing disabilities that they were living with. And in physical health conditions, it was seventy six point four percent of people and one hundred and fifty two. And I want note that these were major health conditions. They were not necessarily the kind that will immediately kill you outside, but they were the kind that are pretty serious. And that's important because before with the eviction piece, when we get the full report, one of the things you're going to see is that a lot of people who were evicted for nonpayment of rent were evicted because they had suddenly lost their job, or they had had a death of a family member, maybe a death of a child or death of a parent, or they had had a major catastrophic illness or lived with a disability. And so when we're talking about not paying rent and treating that the same as a lack of safety in the home in terms of sealing of records, I think that we have to think about how we're shaming poverty. I also want to go to the next slide, which is learning disability history. What I want to talk about is that thirty seven percent of the people, participants reported living with a learning disability, but ninety eight reported living with ADD or ADHD. They were asked both questions, and so some people didn't identify that as a learning disability. And then in terms of reading and writing, and this gets really important for eviction, nine point five percent, an alarming number of the people that we interviewed had either trouble with reading or writing or could not read or write. So when we have timelines for answering, that's really important. And there is no exceptions in the draft amendment that you made for people who have challenges like these or are living with disabilities. So I think that that is the most important thing. That's what I'm gonna share with for data today. All All set of slides. Thank you very much for your help. So first of all, as I mentioned while I was going through the slides, tenants who are marginalized due to disability are not protected in this bill, and they are not protected in your amendment. If you did not answer a complaint, we'll go through several examples of this. But if you did not answer a complaint in time, and you didn't answer it because you couldn't read or write, or you didn't answer it because of you were literally losing your right to cure. If you don't pay in time because you don't have access to a wealthy relative who can help you in that moment after you lost your job, you lose your right to cure. Those are things that are not equitable and not what we should want in our state. We, of course, support ceiling records. However, We don't support moving forward. I don't support moving forward in any part of the bill. But if we're moving forward on narrow If we were to move forward on a narrow aspect of just the safety issues, then we would want there to be ways for people to seal their records. Let's say that they have addressed the issue. There's a period of time that they have or something, some way that they can still steal their record in the end because otherwise they live with that forever and many criminal records can be sealed, but your eviction record will not be able to because of whatever happened in your eviction. That doesn't make sense. And the non payment of rent portion, we strongly recommend that it is allowed to be sealed or at least be petitioned to be sealed, including non payment cases essentially is in most cases continues to make shame about poverty and disability. So often clients of ours lose their jobs, or even worse, have a catastrophic medical event, as we talked about before. Even if that leads to eviction, being exposed means that they can't get the support they need. They are barred from other types of support in terms of housing. It is really problematic. I want to talk about a little bit about that process of when you're in poverty and you're asking for help to get the rent so that when we're talking about sealing or curing, it's really important. I'm gonna give you an example. We have a client in Southern Vermont. We go to Sevka to do what's called a application to get payment of to help support the non payment of rent portion. He lost his job. He was doing really well. He looked at the disability. He was trying to find a new job. You can't get that support from Sevka until you've already got the new job and you have a plan to pay it forward. So in that short time period that you and you have to meet with the caseworker, they have to have time to meet with you. So that might take two to three weeks. And then in that time period, you have to have that plan solidly. And then you have to go through the process and then they have to approve the application. And then they have to send the payment out, which often does not happen in as timely manner as we would like, though they are doing the best they can in really tough circumstances. And what incentivizes the landlord to work with End Homelessness Vermont, or to work with SEVCA, or to work with that tenant, is that partial payment does count. I would not, as a landlord, be incentivized to work with SEVCA on making sure that this is cured if I knew that I could easily just go get an eviction because this person was not going to be able to cure it before the time frame. And then you know that if you work with low income tenants. And I I grew up in an upper middle class family. I entered poverty as an adult. As a young adult, very young, before I had my child, I could have had a problem paying rent, lost my job, had a sudden disability, and my family would have jumped in and helped. I have had the, I guess, privilege of having both experiences. In the middle of my adult life, that would not have happened. And I know the difference between your parents can come save you and your parents will not come save you. And that is really This allows people with that privilege to cure than people without it not to, because the tools that they rely on take more time than this. The same thing, and then Sorry, one more thing about that part about curing. I want to give a few examples of what if you had a heart attack, you're in the hospital. What if you have a sudden disability? We have a client who's finally rehoused after three years of homelessness. He got evicted for damage to the property. The damage to the property is from his wheelchair. The protections that we think are in place are not necessarily in place with private landlords. So that's really important. And finally, we were able to support it, appeal a process through Rutland Housing Authority, get him into Rutland housing. But that took some time. And his disability, or the onset of his disability was fairly sudden. Prior to that, he was a security guard here at the State House. He was a bus driver. He worked his full life and then suddenly had this disability. And all these negative landlord references prevented him from being housed for three years. And there is no protection in this bill for him.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Can I ask a question about Yes? This is on page five of the amendment. Want to I sure I understand this. So the issue that you're, there's a couple issues here maybe, or I'm just trying to identify what the issue is. Is it that there's not enough time to cure because it says you have to cure by the time you have the answer? So that's one part of the concern, I assume.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Yeah, one part of it is that having to cure by the answer is problematic.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So current law, is it allowed that there could be partial payment? Is that a concern as well as far as it mainly you said that timing issue is the crux of the problem?

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Right. And I think currently you can, in my experience, currently you can go and you can cure throughout the entire process. And I think that's also what we heard either dead zone A or I'm not sure. But the say is that you can cure at any point throughout the process. And I think that that's important.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Well, you may not notice, but I should ask the landlord folks that, is the problem that this one is addressing? I'll ask that to other people.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Mean, in my opinion, problem in my opinion, there is some of this bill to me, and I guess I'm just going to say this really bluntly, is not addressing a major problem. Some of this bill is addressing a landlord's desire to get to have a faster eviction process, period. And when you look at the reasons that people can't pay rent, it's not most often that it's malicious on the part of the tenant. And so that part of the bill just doesn't really make sense. Doesn't it is I understand that for some there's people who have I know that there's nonprofits who have a lot of back rent that's owed and that this has had challenges. But that, in terms of this rushed process and not being able to cure so quickly, that is not there. And I just don't know that we just haven't. I keep saying this isn't ready for prime time, but that's what it feels like is it's not ready for prime time.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So maybe this is also a little bit more for landlords that since this does expedite the process, not as much as the landlords want, more than what I think tenants would want. This changes to ninety days after the answer instead of fifty days after the complaint. That time has been shortened as far as when you can cure. Right, right. So I guess I'm just, it seems like it could be one or the other. Yeah, right. It needs to be but I want to hear from landlords as well on that particular issue.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: And then I think the other piece is partial payment, which we'll get to in a minute. But I wanna talk about the failure to appear really quickly. I realize I'm bouncing around a little and I apologize. This is page it's not page 20. It's page 20 in the other bill, in the whole big bill. So I apologize, I can't find it. But if the defendant fails to appear

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: It's in the bottom of page seven.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Thank you. Or file an affidavit signed or written, that whole section. Again, this poet is a huge problem for people living with disabilities. I can't say this enough times, there is not anything in this bill that protects people living with disabilities if that is the reason that any of this happened, including, let's say, they have an episode of violence, like an episodic violence that feels threatening to everybody else. And I'm gonna give you an example. This was in a hotel, but I'm gonna give you an example. We had a client who is doing well again in his house now, but he and I feel like that's a big preface to what I'm about to say. He lives with severe autism. He was 19 at the time. He went into the 4th Floor Rutland Hospital, which is the psychiatric unit. He was prescribed a medication that did not work well for him. That medication created a period of pretty severe violence. I was at the hotel at the time with him. He was wielding a knife. He didn't seem to understand the consequence of that at all. And the police were called. By the time the police got there, we were able to had talked him out of holding the knife. And then I incorrectly went running at the police to tell them that there was no I was asked, please don't run at the police when we have loaded guns. Thank you. But in in but I will say that he did not have the knife anymore, and I was very worried that this 19 year old was going you know? So But This prevailed for a period of time. There was several violent episodes. It wasn't always a knife. It might be punching a window. It might other things like that. It was dangerous. He did get exited from different hotels. We did work with him until we could find something that didn't trigger the episode that he was having, and also to get him into getting some support from the Bratibor Retreat. Once he got the support from the Bratibor Retreat, he never had another single episode like that. So let's say that was the last of these violent episodes, and then he had gotten help. Now there is no opportunity for him to actually do better or for his I shouldn't even say it that way for his disability to not flare up in a way that caused violence. And really support him. So I understand and feel sympathy for the part where everybody else feels fear and has danger. But part of rapid rehousing, part of housing first principles are to work with that person to get the help they need. In the instances where it is not someone's disability, I completely understand. But in the instances where it is, there's got to be some way for those people to get the support they need and not end up outside, which I don't think makes any of us safer anyways. I don't know if you have any questions about that.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Any questions on that particular issue? They'll try to catch up on. No. Go ahead. So maybe this is a question for, I'm not sure who this is a question but in that situation where somebody doesn't show up, and by the way, kind of current law, but with respect to unlawful occupancy, we're using this instead in this other scenario. The individual, if subsequently they kind of understand what has happened that before the writ is executed, they could file a Rule 59 or Rule 60 motion to try to overturn what that order was. And maybe that's where the litigators need

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: to Yeah.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: To make sure they need to make that order.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: I'm certainly not an attorney. But I will say that as someone who feels like every time I sit down at a table for the first time, I have to inform everybody that I'm losing my eyesight, it is not actually a pleasant experience to have to constantly fight in order to overturn things or in order to be able to put your bag down in the state house or in order to be able to whatever it is you have to do to alert people to your disability. And I understand to some extent that happens in court. But if the harm has already been done, if you've already had to leave your apartment, what can be done to solve that except to address If the judge orders an immediate writ of possession, what can be done to resolve that for that tenant?

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Well, I think Martin's point was that the question is more, can you try to vacate the default one: for the radius But executed? Then you would already well, before it's executed, perhaps. But it still has a

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: penalty Well, not. Yeah. Okay. I can understand it to an extent. And then I peter off.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Hear your point too.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Yeah.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Another piece is partial payment. So right now, multiple parts of this bill and this amendment really rely on either the landlord can make a motion or there can be an agreement. But there's almost nowhere where the there's one place that I saw where the tenant can be the one to initiate the motion and ask for some so the defendant can ask for anything. They have to get agreement from the landlord. And unfortunately, that assumes by default that the landlords are usually probably at fault. And also, it assumes by default that all landlords are reasonable. And in my both experience professionally and as someone in poverty, I would argue that not all landlords are reasonable. And I'm going to give you a very brief situation on my own. My son six, and I was renting in Brattleboro. I had a terrible landlord, known to be a terrible landlord, who There was black mold in my house. There was water leaking from my bathtub or the hole in the ceiling into the kitchen. And there was no lock on the door, and the landlord would just walk in whenever he wanted to, including and that's all illegal. But I was in abject poverty, and I did not really feel that I I I didn't have anywhere else to go. I didn't really feel that I could fight him on it. Eventually, I started withholding rent, and I also had a section eight voucher at the time, a housing choice voucher. When I withheld that rent and had the Housing Choice Voucher, after a couple of months, the landlord did not wanna fix it. He told he filed an eviction and told me that he was gonna go make sure my voucher got taken away and proceeded to go tell my case manager lies that were about me participating in criminal activity. And fortunately, I am not the person you see here today. I wasn't that person then. However, I was savvy enough, had grown up with, again, with privilege and had the education to say, this does not seem right to me. I called Legal Services Vermont. They helped me write to try some replies, but that took a long period of time. And eventually, I did not have to return the money and the landlord did have to give me $500 and I did prevail. But I wouldn't have prevailed in a short period of time. And while it seems like there's protections for tenants in those situations, when you're in poverty, there really aren't. And when you have a disability, that's even further. And the other example that I want to give about that is that in the fall of this past year, I, for a period of months, my income did not come in. Everything fell behind. I was not able to catch up all of it at once. And if the people who I owed money to wouldn't take part of it, I would have been in very big trouble. That's the first time I've fallen into poverty in many, many years. But because I was able to do that, because I had built up this goodwill and I knew the law, I was able to remain stable during

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: that time.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: So I do think that using myself as an example, which I don't often do anymore these days, I really feel like it's a critical thing to understand that sometimes you don't really understand the whole situation. But a partial payment, an order for a judge to say, hey, this person's just been in the hospital. I think right now they can't pay, so I'm going give them a little extra time and we're going to start this in a month and it's going to be a partial payment. I think that's really important. We already set the bridge here. We already talked about that. I guess one thing that failure to file the answer, it's gonna be the same thing. People with disabilities just are not able to do that in the same timeframe. And I'm worried that when the notices don't really take into account that but I appreciate that it now says that you can petition the court, that you didn't actually get the notice because that was not there before. I almost gone through all of it. The immediate disposal of property is a huge concern of mine. Similar reasons. What if you're in a What retailer? I unfortunately looked at the wrong draft, so you cannot rely on my page numbers. Or the bill has passed. Well, I think I thought it was in the amendment also. We changed it to immediate. Yeah.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: But it's not in the claim that we've had because it wasn't changed again.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: Page nine, the landlord may disclose of any personal property? Yeah. Oh, you got it. Page nine,

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: thank you. Thank you for the team effort. So in the similar what if you're someone in a wheelchair or you're someone with a different kind of disability or you are someone who can't rent a U Haul, now you have absolutely no time after that. And maybe it's an immediate writ of possession if there was violence or alleged violence. And you have no time then to make sure that your belongings are secure, then we're starting people at zero when they experience homelessness. People who start at zero when they experience homelessness have a much longer road to where they get back into housing, especially if we're talking about an eviction.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So I don't think this has changed, unless I'm missing something.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Well, if it's not in your amendment, maybe it could be. So we could

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: I think I can work.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: I was just going through the differences from the house committee's version in our amendment, and I thought I did see that it was. So I thought I did see it.

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: I will find it. I see a meeting.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: The other couple of things are on late payment of rent. Wow, ten days late. It's really not that late for payment of rent, even if it happens three times. And I just wanted to That really is Again, somebody who has resources, who has family with resources, is gonna be able to fix that much more quickly than someone who doesn't. Someone who's able to access things because they don't have a disability, live with a disability is going to be able to fix that much more quickly. You aren't going to be able to if you suddenly lose your job think about times when the job market is not full. Does it might be three months in a row. And now you're subject to an expedited hearing. That doesn't make a lot of sense to me either. It's not addressing the health or safety issue that we're talking about for the scary situations. Also

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Karen, next question.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Okay, sorry. No, sorry. I don't. I found the piece of it, but maybe you're right that it is from

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: was already Immediate in there. Anyway, so go ahead. You're on a different part.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: Well, no, I was talking about the late payment of rent part. And then I don't know if anyone has any questions about that. But overall, so when you're talking about the writ of possession distance might disincentivize a tenant to actually fight for their rights at all if the only way you can steal the record is if it doesn't end in the landlords with the landlord prevailing. And I think that that's extremely the whole bill overall, and even in the amendment, disincentivizes the landlord to actually try to come up to a conclusion with the tenant. And it disincentivizes the tenant who already is marginalized to fight for their rights because they can end up with more harm because they did that. And so I really worry that this is not a bill that's I understand that some people are saying, some landlords are saying and some nonprofits are saying that some units will come offline, but a lot more homelessness is going to occur. And I wish that we were spending time finding a way to actually address the immediate and urgent need and not doing something that would increase the problem just as we reduce the amount of shelter that we're willing to give people. It's just the two things are happening at once. And it's very from the perspective of at End Homelessness Vermont and our partners, not all of our partners, but some of our partners, is that this is really going to increase the load. It's going to increase the harm. And it doesn't really fully address the problem that people say is the worst part of the problem. If we were talking about just that narrow piece, but I would, in terms of disincentivizing, there has to be some way for people to seal their record after, even if the landlord prevails. There has to be some way for someone to petition to have their record sealed for whatever reason. Like, yes, I didn't pay rent, but I was sick. Yes, I didn't pay rent, but So I think that petition at least has to be allowed so that the judge can decide if it's still warrants being sealed in the act.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Additional questions for Brenda? I'm sorry. Did you get through it? I'm assuming since Seating was the last part of this deck, that was the last

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: I believe that that's the last part of it. I I went through this.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: The one question. The ten days for that rent, that was something that came out of housing. That's not something that Yeah. That's not been part of the court process. So I've mentioned this before. What we're really trying to do, one of our main, trying to stay in our lane, even if I'm in the other lane, I may or may not like what this overall But bill is, mine is to make this court process work. And I think by doing it, it is definitely taken away from the expedition that people want and trying to focus it on the safety and health parts. Because if we do all of this that has been sent over to us from the House General, it just overwhelms the court and we either are gonna fall behind in other stuff. That's kind of been our focus. And I understand the other concerns that are being raised. That's

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: But am I wrong that the ten day, if you fall behind three times that you're Maybe I heard this incorrectly, but that you're subject to the expedited process. Isn't that what I heard? Bell? Yes.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So no, I think that is a fair question for us to think a little bit about. So the House General, because this is their area of landlord tenant law, how that works is theirs. And they've come up with why, the different reasons why a tenant should be evicted or not. And they have come up with other reasons for the rights of the tenants as well. I'm not trying to shove off responsibility. It's just one of the things I try to do is make sure that we're staying with our jurisdiction. Because I don't know all the testimony they've received over weeks working on this bill. But I do know as far as the court processes, this is very much in our area to try to address. I'll have to think a little bit more about some of the discussion, that getting out of our jurisdiction, if we're starting to talk about whether that ten days are right versus thirty days. It probably is out of our realm of our jurisdiction.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: And I think the other thing is that it seems like there has I know I said this, I just want to end with saying that there has to be some protection for people with disabilities through every one of these processes. I understand there is supposedly with the ADA, but it's not real 100%. It's supposed to be, but it's not how our state operates. It's not how all of our systems operate. And so every single bill that we pass, I'm going to say this about this one and any other one that you see, if you see that there is no support or if disability and inclusion aren't considered in the bill, then it's not addressing the disability need.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So, and we've received written testimony from ACLU, from legal aid, we'll hear from Jean in a minute as well. Now we've heard from you. And given that input, I'm going to suggest that I look a little further on the partial payment. I think that the way that we can make partial payment available that addresses what the landlord's concerns are, that in fact there has to be a showing from the defendant that there would be an undue burden if they have to pay the full amount or they're holding money back for a cure. So I'm working on something on that. And we'll look at the cure language a little bit as well. I mean, it sounds like we're getting both an expedited time and even pushing the cure even earlier. Why can't we allow that cure to go through that expedited time that we have? So we'll look a little further at that as well. And hopefully that'll help a couple of your concerns at least. Know there's not all of them and we'll think about what we can do

[Rep. Barbara Rachelson, Member]: Okay, thank you so much.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: I really appreciate your testimony. So we'll go to Jean next, just to kind of follow-up on what we've just been hearing.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Thank you for coming back. Thank you for having me. Really appreciate scrutiny the your committee is giving this bill. Think trying to figure out how to change it is a really good idea. But I have to say that this bill didn't get here in the way that other things do, especially with a bill that's technical for practitioners. Jean, I say my name?

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: When

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: the pandemic happened, now six years ago, Angela and I and Nadine sat down and said, okay, if the issue is a moratorium, how is that going to work? If the issue is changing things around to protect people during this time, how is that going to work? And we, as practitioners, we talked it through. We met a lot of times with the legislative council, and we figured out how to make it work and when it was going to end and what the processes were going to be. And that kind of process worked smoothly. That kind of process has not happened in this bill at all. It's been incredibly rushed, and stakeholders have not been given an opportunity to work together. And one of the things I keep thinking is this the landlord tenant bill as it is, along with the title 12 court processes, have been in existence and being used for thirty years. I failed to see what suddenly went wrong that requires all of these changes. These changes, drafted the way they are, are going to create chaos. And I'm talking about that as a person who is I think of myself as a trial lawyer more than a litigator, but there's a little bit of litigation in there. There's a little bit of strategy. People are going to see the holes in this and exploit that. So I made notes for myself just on your amendment 3.1, and I have 18 things to say. Talking about why this doesn't work, which I did in House Judiciary and I did earlier here in your committee, I've tried to pick out the salient, oh no, don't do that sort of things. There's a letter now in your committee documents that points out three salient things. But there are 18 things that can be exploited in a way that aren't really not going work in the way that landlords, mean for them to work, certainly going to harm tenants. One of the things that people keep saying is, hey, we already have a process for unlawful occupant, and this also mirrors the process for rent into court hearings, as if those things are fair and provide constitutional due process. I don't believe the unlock full occupant statute does provide constitutional due process, and let me tell you how. It allows, on a motion, a landlord to say, so and so isn't on the lease, and they should go. And what the so and so gets served with is by mail, a notice of emotion, and a hearing date. We don't even know under the process, in the current unlawful occupant process, if that person had ever been personally served by a sheriff with a complaint. The way you read it, you don't necessarily have to serve that person by sheriff with a complaint. You simply have to have an open case about that address, and then you can serve a motion. So right there, that's denial of due process. But I'm telling you, as a practitioner, right now, the law requires landlords to file leases, if any, when they file a complaint. It is incredibly common for a landlord to file an expired lease. I don't know if people know this, but there is no uniform requirement of what goes on a lease. Each lease can be absolutely different. I think I testified that to this committee last year. And so a lease that has expired, let's say that lease said Jack and Jill can live here, but that lease expired three years ago. And now John is living there with Jill. Well, anyway, and so you can do unlawful occupant against John saying, We had a lease that didn't allow John to be there. So I'm saying the fact that it resembles, the language in the amendment now resembles what's in the unlawful occupant statute, doesn't mean that it delivers due process or that it's constitutional.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Can I ask a question about that? So on page seven, line eight, or 79, it's talking about the ten days. It specifically says notice for the parties. So I'm not sure where the service issue is that you just mentioned. Well, if the party

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: if the landlord believes the parties are the people on the lease and serve those parties, the landlord doesn't believe the person not on the lease is a party and never had to serve a party. I'm not saying this happens all the time. I'm saying the law would allow it to happen.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: I guess it's notice to whoever is causing the threats the continuing occupation. Anyway, that's fine. Go ahead.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Okay. Where was I? Maybe move back a bit. One thing I want to bring up that I don't think anybody's thought of, and sometimes I think I'm a little crazy for thinking this, but it's in the letter that I, wrote to this committee, the idea of bifurcation, that right now there is one process. And this bill suggests that there should be two processes. One for nonpayment and breach of lease or violation of some time. That goes in this one process, brand new process. And terminations for essentially no cause go with stay in the same process. But landlord tenant law allows landlords to send multiple notices. And as a practice matter, landlords frequently send both a nonpayment and a no cause notice or a breach of lease and a no cause because they want the no cause to come back in and be So what does that mean if you have two different processes? And if the thing that brings you into court is a successful termination of a tenancy and you've done it twice, and one goes in one court and one goes in another court, same port, different case under a different docket number. So now the tenant this allows for the tenant to have to defend against two cases at once. Now I could be I would like the opportunity to sit down with other practitioners and say, Oh, the tort wouldn't interpret it that way. Gene, the court would interpret it this way, and have that conversation. But me, looking at this by myself, if you set up something with two different processes, that means you could file two different lawsuits. So that's that's a huge thing that is not addressed anywhere in this bill.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: We'll look a little further at it. I'll reach out to judge Zoning and also the legislative counsel to weigh in on that. Yes. Thank you.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Let's I wanna talk a little bit about rent into court process because you just had a big discussion about partial payment. Right now, in the rent into court process, the judge can order payment of the full amount of rent that's due each month, and then there's this formula where it's backdated and blah blah blah to the beginning of the case, they can order full or partial. And this draft, as well as the draft from House General, took out partial. So what that does is it removes discretion from the court. The court is hearing a rent into court hearing and says, how much should I make

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: this order for? Those are the escrow hearings.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Rent to escrow hearings. Rent to page two. Yeah. And it says, what they have in front of them is the landlord's affidavit of how much rent is owed. And if the tenant didn't make an opposition that describes a need to present evidence, then the court doesn't have to take any evidence from the tenant. So what mistakes? On the other hand, the tenant is there explaining their side of the story if they can and removing the court's discretion to make a partial order of partial payment of rent means that they could make a mistake about the amount, the timing of the payments, whether or not all parties responsible for payment are actually in court at the rent into court hearing. And so why that's important is because different people receive their income at different times of the month, and they may not be able to if you have a rent and report hearing on the tenth and the person has already taken their monthly social security income and met all their obligations, they don't have money on that day, on the tenth. They won't have it until either the first or the third of the next month. So the judges needed the ability to have discretion to make a partial payment based on the people's ability to pay. Also, because when you walk into your rent into court hearing on the tenth, you need to be able to pay all the rent that is accrued since the case was commenced, either by filing or service, which ends up usually being more than one month's rent. And sometimes people can't come up with more than one month's rent right then. So judges frequently say, okay, but you had this obligation to do it. So I will give you till the end of the month, you can make three payments. You need to pay this now. Pay this in two weeks when you get your next paycheck. Pay this in two weeks after that when you get your paycheck after that, and then by the beginning of the next month, you need to pay on time.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So do you think that getting rid of the partial payment, that option, that ability could potentially undermine the court escrow, the rent escrow hearings, because we've seen that flexibility. No,

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: what it means is more people will be evicted faster, Because rent into court is a strategy that landlords use. Hence, they don't get a strategy motion. It's a strategy landlords use because they're hoping the tenants will trip and fail, then and they can get an immediate writ of possession. And so by removing the judge's discretion to tailor an order to make it possible for both parties to well, for the tenants to pay, that means that more evictions will happen, more evictions without trial, because the writ of possession will be issued and there hasn't been a final hearing on the merits of the plaintiff's claim yet. And so leaving that discretion with judges is pretty important in the practice of eviction law. And taking away G, 12 BSA forty eight fifty three A G, which allows the tenants to come back and say, Judge, you need to modify this order. That's I guess one specific circumstance that happens all the time is tenants with subsidies. They may have to pay $400 a month, and then the subsidizing place pays $600 a month. But landlords often represent the amount of rent that's owed as the full market rent. And so if they come and the tenant is stunned into silence and doesn't say anything, it is possible that an order for paying full market rent comes is made, and the tenant can't possibly pay it because their portion is only $400 a month. So that kind of amount of the order, I've explained timing of the order, whether or not other parties are also responsible for paying the order. If those things aren't correct in the first place, taking away G makes it so that nobody can come back and correct those things. Adding language that says, Hey, parties can get together and agree and go to the court and say, Please, court change the order. Parties can always get together and agree. We don't have to write that down in the law. Parties can always get together and agree. So it doesn't give the tenant any particular right. The likelihood that a landlord would agree to change a rent in the court order is almost nil.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: For the personal payment in D, as a practitioner, in your experience, does a court order ordering a tenant to pay their portion of their rent that they are responsible for where another entity is subsidizing it, is that a partial payment in the eyes of the court because it's not the payment of the full market rent?

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: No. That's an interesting question. No. That's not what it's meant to be.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: I understand the purpose of the partial rent with the calculation. I get that. But what I'd like to know is, is this another way that we might be undermining it, that the court would order a partial payment because

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: they see that the tenant actually only pays $400 of the month because SEFCA covers $600 And so they say, the landlord's arguing, Well, your honor is $1,000 and it's just $400. To be honest, I guess if a if a tenant can make clear to the court that the landlord is asking for a thousand dollars and their responsibility is only $400 I have seen judges make out very specific orders, like, Plaintiff will receive the other $600 directly from wherever. Making it clear and making it so that the tenant understands. Do I think the word partial allows that or striking the word doesn't allow that? It could be, I guess. I thought. So that's the other thing that goes back to this, that not having had time to sit down with practitioners and work through how this is. Every time I look at this, I see new possibilities, new possible fact patterns that could change the way that people look at this. Can I move on to

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah? Thank you.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: I'm not sure where it is in your document, but I'm looking at the changes to 12 BSA forty eight fifty four a.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: This is starting on page three at line 12.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Thank you. That says that changing the disposition of the tenant's belongings to right now, it's at fifteen days, and that is assuming a service of a fourteen day writ. Because in all eviction cases at final judgment, it says 4eight 54, not little a, says, At the time of issuance of a judgment, the court shall also issue a writ which is returnable in fourteen days. So they're all fourteen days, except when they're not fourteen days, which would be a writ of possession under rent into court.

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: So

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: it's possible that a person misses their payment for rent into court. The plaintiff moves for a writ of protection immediately, and these folks only get seven days to collect their belongings, and then the landlord could throw them out. So that's the difference between fourteen days and immediately, or whatever the words say now, upon being restored to possession. So that's really not fair. Talk about the time to cure. Now I'm talking about new 12 BSA forty eight sixty three. It adds it says that the tenant's right to cure a nonpayment will end at the answer date. So I spent a little time trying to calculate what this was. One of the problems with this statute is it totally ignores the existence of another statute that has been in existence since earlier than 1940. That statute, 12 VSA forty seven seventy three, expresses a policy, a long standing policy in Vermont.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Say that again. It's a sign again. Sorry.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: 12 VSA 4,773. I've done a little bit of history on that. It is a really old statute. And it says, it embodies a policy of the state of Vermont that favors payment and retention of tenancy. In other words, if you pay, you can keep your tenancy. And over the years, the deadline for when you have to effect this cure has changed. Most recently, it changed to any time before the execution of a writ of possession. It might be worthwhile to take a little bit of time about writ of possession language. Writ of possessions are issued by a court. That means they literally put together a piece of paper and sign it. Then they are served by the sheriff or whoever. That's what we're talking about. Maybe it's not always sheriff, but whatever. So far, it's been sheriff. And then the sheriff comes back to execute it. So if it's fourteen day writ of possession and the sheriff gives it to you, usually what sheriffs are telling people is, I will be back by this day, and that's the day I'm going to change the locks and put you out. And that's fourteen days, but it actually kind of goes a little bit with the sheriff's schedule. It can't be sooner than fourteen days, but the sheriff could say, I'm gone fishing that day. I'll be there the next day. So that's usually the way it happens. So there's issuance, service and execution. So 4773 says the tenants can cure all the way up to execution. And so we've actually done this. We've helped people file the paperwork pursuant to 4,773 and called to the court's attention, Look, you can't execute the writ because we have now paid everything, which is paid all the rent owed, paid the plaintiff's court's boss, which include filing fees and sheriff's fees, and paid interest. And they paid all of that in. So now the court looks at it, gives the plaintiff an opportunity to say whether or not, Hey, that is actually the amount or no, they're incorrect about the amount, and then ends the case, the nonpayment case. That could give the tenant anywhere from thirty to sixty days to raise the money to cure and keep their home. This changes that cure to about well, there's a fourteen day termination notice, and then there's a twenty one day answer to the complaint. So that's about thirty six days. So it shortens the period of time. And if they answer I think it says answer deadline? What if they answer early? Does that mean they cut off their time to cure? So I don't know. It just seems incredibly unfair and not comporting with the hugely long standing policy in Vermont that favors payment and stability of tenancy. And again, somebody added some language about agreeing. There's nothing in the current language that prevents people from agreeing at any time. People can agree at any time and make a stipulation and ask the court to approve it and make it an order. And the court almost always will do that. So your new amendment C1 says it requires the court to set final hearing ninety days after service of the answer. This is better than what came out of House General, and it's better than your earlier amendment. And what I want to say about that is it still has the judiciary's one hundred and eighty day aspirational guideline. One of the things I notice about those guidelines, there's all sorts of cases that the civil division looks at. And eviction has always been the shortest anyway. One hundred and eighty days is the shortest. If you have a contract case or a tort case, you get five forty days. That's the judiciary's guideline to reserve those moneyed cases. But when it comes to losing one's home, the judiciary is already hoping to do that in one hundred and eighty days. So ninety days is better than it was, but it isn't even the judiciary's current aspirational guideline, which they meet 70% of the time. And I must say, Oh, they can only do it 70% of the time. Do see that a lot of the times, and talking to people about this bill and practicing law, a lot of the times the delay has to do with the plaintiff asking for an extra hearing, doing a motion here or there, or not serving. They will file, and the rule says you need to serve within sixty days of filing, and they will ask for extension on filing several times. And so the case is commenced by filing, but it may not even get started for one hundred and twenty days. Do have to say about that?

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Niana, go ahead. I want to go back to the

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: 12 BSA 4773, but we can wait until Okay.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: So there is an exception, c two, under the new four thousand eight and sixty three that says, hey, if a writ is already issued, there's no reason to meet a ninety day timeline. Okay. So if a writ already got issued, maybe in an expedited hearing or maybe for failing to pay rent escrow order in time, What happens if the tenant had dropped a counterclaim? You know, his due money because of something that the landlord didn't do. What if the So putting off a landlord's claim to a money judgment or putting off a tenant's counterclaim often to now that has no deadline. Well, first of all, a tenant is going to be at an incredible disadvantage defending a landlord's claim for money damages because they no longer have access to the property. They have had to move precipitously. They might have lost some of their stuff. The rest of their stuff is certainly in a box somewhere, and they are losing the advantage to be able to defend themselves against landlords' rent claims, landlords' property damage claims. And the longer those go on, the likelihood that they're going to

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: be able to successfully defend themselves gets smaller and smaller. Should we strike that section and keep that whole case as to be resolved within the nine days, including the coma claims?

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Yeah. I think the whole case should happen at once. There is kind of a common practice where if writ of possession are given after a rent to escrow order, that the court automatically set another hearing for the rest of the case. Really hard for tenants to understand that. Also, sometimes there's a final judgment. The whole issue of whether or not the tenancy was properly terminated gets her to trial, and then the plaintiff asks for another hearing later for damages. I don't think the court should be doing this, but they do do this all the time. I think it works in incredible unfairness to tenants.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Did

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: you want to talk about Code seven seventy three?

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Yeah, I just wanted to Okay, so it's a really interesting issue. Just

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: a time check, we have about ten minutes involved, and we definitely want you to hit on the ceiling. We're definitely gonna have you in tomorrow. I emailed you to see if you're gonna be available tomorrow morning, Chris. But just time check. Go ahead. No.

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: Go ahead. So my my only question is, so 12 BSA 4773 is payment of back rent as it applies to execution of a writ of possession. And

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: the hearing that's in 4863

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: is as it relates to the action that's filed or the complaint that's filed pursuant to 9BSA 4476A, in that you can't cure as a defense to the complaint.

[Hon. Thomas A. Zonay, Chief Superior Judge, Vermont Judiciary]: So I

[Rep. Ian Goodnow, Member]: understand that the complaint can result in the writ. And then this provision under 12 BSA, you could presumably pay everything and not allow for the writ to be executed. But if the landlord could get other remedies from the action beyond just the writ of possession, then aren't those They're separate things, right? Right.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Four Well, thousand 773 applies where the case is solely brought on nonpayment. You cannot get a cure case if there's other grounds than nonpayment. So it's for nonpayment cases only. And so I assume that this cure in this bill wouldn't work. It doesn't make the case go away if there are other grounds for eviction than nonpayment. Does that help? Yeah. It's nonpayment only. You can't cure a breach of lease with cure. You can't pay to cure a breach of lease. So I listened to Judge Zonay. I'm moving on to 04/1965. I listened to Judge Zonay, and there's something about me that says, Oh, I can't disagree with the judge. I do disagree with the judge. Changing the words to have a requirement of occupation is much broader than even what the H772's four sixty seven(two) requires, which requires action on the part of the person, not just occupancy. This, from a litigation point of view, is an exploitable discrepancy. You could do a motion for an expedited hearing based on a person's occupation of a dwelling, where the person's presence could pose a risk. Now, just saying that, your presence poses a risk to the health and safety of others, the wholeness of others. This is a huge risk of discrimination based on what people think might pose a risk to their health or safety. So, for example, the one that's posing a risk of health or safety to you could have a contagious ailment. And you don't want them in the building because you think you're going to catch whatever they have. It could be their immigration status. If you have someone in the building whose immigration status is questionable, then is it possible that your health or safety is threatened because there may be ICE raids on your building? That's awful. That's disgusting. But it's an open door. But what if you're a victim of domestic violence, and you are receiving violence because a violent person keeps coming and breaking down your door and being violent to you? Obviously, that circumstance poses a risk of health or safety to others. And so you're not the one that's doing it, but your occupancy threatens the health or safety, and heaven forbid that your abuser brings a gun. So I don't like anything about the H772's 4467B2B. I think it is not very well thought out. I think that alone is too broad. I think that people could sit down and, Judge Del Nay said, like an abuse prevention process. Abuse prevention process and two other protective processes I can think of is based on injunctive relief. There is a petition. A judge gets to review the petition and sees whether it rises to the level of the standard in the statute. The judge says, Okay, let's have a hearing on this and see whether or not that protection is warranted. That happens in abuse prevention. That happens in orders against sexual assault and stalking. That hope happens in vulnerable adult. And what people want here, the people who are saying, We need a faster process because of out of control drug use, drug dealing, violent acts, things like that. We need that. We need that here. There could be a process based on injunctive relief. This doesn't get there. There is no review by the court of whether or not the petition arises to that level of something that the the other tenants, need to be protected from. So I really appreciate that this committee is suggesting that it be moved not from a show cause hearing, is terrible, because it would make somebody accused of a problem to prove a negative. So this is a hearing process. But in terms of due process necessary for an expedited process, it's not here yet. One of the things I wanted to point out is, because this allows a motion at any time So, okay, so then there's filing. We know that there is sixty days that service has to happen, but you could have a motion and I'm sorry, could file a complaint and have a motion before it ever gets served in person, in hand. And in that way, this doesn't work. Again, I think basic due process is if you are being brought to court, you need to be served personally. They call that in law school personal service. You need to be paper saying you have a court action against you. You need to be put in your hand. And this expedited hearing process, as well as the unlawful occupant process, that step could be skipped. And I think that's incredibly important.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Do want to go ahead to talk at all? Are we even close to target with the ceiling component? Because we only have a few other to go to other means.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: Okay, ceiling. Folks from legal aid worked with the judiciary last year to talk about confidentiality and sealing.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Worked with the courts or with the committee? Worked with the court.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: The ideal idea would be to have an ejectment case sealed from the beginning. I listened to what Terry Corzones and Judge Donae said about, This is very complicated. We can't really do that. So I asked my compatriots who spent a lot of work on this, is this thing that they're suggesting now, this ceiling after the whole ejectment thing has happened, is this better than nothing? It is better than nothing. It is the idea of wanting to keep ejectment records confidential, to remove a barrier to people having found. Right? And so here's the problem, and I think you've already discussed it. If the trigger is it will be sealed if there's no writ, or it won't be sealed, it'll stay open if a writ issues. Well, that will discourage settlement because settlements, from a practitioner's point of view, the landlord isn't going to settle on a promise to move out. They want a certainty that it's going to move out. They need a writ to issue, and it depends on your move out date. If your writs are only good for sixty days, So if the settlement is move out within sixty days, the landlord would push for the writ to issue now, even if it was settled, even if they ended up coming to terms about what the disputes in the household were, the disputes between the landlord and tenant. So turning on the issuance of a writ is going to make public eviction records that are at the no fault of a tenant, will discourage settlement. I was pointed out that the National Low Income Housing Coalition would ask for eviction records sealed at the point of filing. I checked the website for the National Council on State Courts. They are advocating different methods to seal records at the point of filing. This doesn't seal records at the point of filing. It's better than nothing, but it is not really going to be an effective way of removing this barrier.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: Mainly for that settlement purpose. I mean, I understand wanting to be confidential or sealed the whole time, but I think that's a nonstarter at this point. But I understand. So maybe there's a way to write in that if the writ of possession is issued pursuant to a settlement, that it could still be sealed. If someone on those lines are petitioned, there may be.

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: A Well, a writ of possession could still be issued even if the eviction was brought for no cause. In other words, no fault of the tenant other than the tenant standing on their rights to have court process. And I hate to think of that as a tenant's fault. They want the thing to go through court process. But if it gets to a hearing, then the court has to issue a writ, because that's what it says in 12 BSA forty eight fifty four. So that would still make an unsealed eviction record for somebody who is being evicted for no fault of their own. Okay. What's the provision for no fault? What's the citation? Well, the reasons for termination of tenancy currently are in nine BSA forty four sixty seven or but under H772, it's just about the same. They are still no fault eviction is still in nine BSA, 4,467 C or E. There's this whole other section in there that says repurpose, but I don't know why any landlord would ever bring a complaint based on their need to repurpose if they still have no cause eviction under C and E. Why make it harder for themselves to prove that the tenancy is properly terminated? Just do the no cause. So

[Cameron Wood, Office of Legislative Counsel]: as I

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: say, when Brenda was saying this is not ready for prime time, these eventualities have not been thought through about how these things could be used and exploited, which, of course, lawyers have to do, because you have to be zealous advocates for your clients. And so you're trying to find the holes, and how can I make this happen faster? And this bill has lots and lots of holes. How much more time? You people are very patient. It's after 04:00. So I'm not sure. I have more to say. The chair make the decision. Yeah.

[Brenda Siegel, Executive Director, End Homelessness Vermont]: It sounds like we're taking it

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: up tomorrow morning as well. Yeah. I might have to be by video in the morning. I am So is it possible if you had any additional written testimony, if there's any things that you didn't quite get to? Or is it already in the written testimony that you provided?

[Jean Murray, Attorney, Vermont Legal Aid]: No, written testimony that I submitted is only three issues. And as I said, just looking at your amendment 3.1, I had 18. And I have things that I haven't talked about. I skipped over to talk about the ceiling part. But I could I'm not sure when exactly, but I could put it in writing what the issues are. It's so hard to explain to people. It takes more words to explain, and then I give you this whole long thing, and it's too long to get in the read because it's hard to explain. Whatever I can also be here by video tomorrow morning. Okay. Alright.

[Rep. Martin LaLonde, Chair]: So we'll figure that part out. Alright. So we're adjourned until tomorrow. Actually, we're gonna start at 09:30 because that's when Cameron is available. Both Cameron and I are gonna be talking, I think, to the appropriations about where we are with this farmland. So we're adjourned until 09:30,