Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: And we are live now, Thursday, 04/16/2026, House Transportation. I'm kind of interested and excited to hear about the winter season. Cindy from Vast is back in committee probably first time this session, but I think you were here last session and whatnot. Excited to have her back. I hear lots of great things out there in snowmobile world, and I'm anxious to get an update of how the season went. I also know there's been some safety, there were some troubles, there were some accidents or whatnot this year as well. But then there, you know, we made the news on a couple of things, and then kind of where things are at and what's next. But I'm glad to have you back in committee. Welcome. And thank

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: you very much. The record, Cindy Locke, Executive Director of the Vermont Association of Snow Travelers.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: And we do have a section on the bill as well. Right. I'm sorry, that was true. Yeah. Thank you. There is a section in the bill that references snowmobiles, so we're going get into that as well.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Great. Well, for inviting me to come in. We have had a very good season for, you know, snow wise, boosts our membership numbers. We consistently have around 20,000 members statewide. And what that translates into when we have a good winner is more money spent on grooming. We had two years that we had more, we had about 22,000 members, which was during COVID, which was when everybody was boosting, even home sales were up. But yeah, so basically what happens is when we have a good snow season, our expenses also go up. So even though our income comes in, our expenses go up. So this year we budgeted $1,200,000 to groom our trail system, and we're going to probably end at 1,400,000. And I did send Gabriela a document called About VAST. I'm not going to read it. It's really there for your reference in case you have questions afterwards or during our chat this morning. Chair Walker, would you like me to sort of give an overview of VaST? Would that be helpful or?

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: I think a few minutes would be great.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Okay.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Especially in relation to how big the economic impact it has for sure. It is actually not members of your network of trail partners, guess, is how it's said. Sure.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Okay. So basically, we've been around since the '60s. We have incredible relationships with state agencies. We work really well with the Agency of Transportation. I see Michelle sitting in the room And also with the Department of Fish and Wildlife, Agency of Natural Resources, and Forest Parks and Recreation. We have cooperative agreements with them all for the management of our trails that are on state lands or with the Green Mountain National Forest for federal lands or the Conti National Refuge in the Northeast Kingdom. We have about 10,000 landowners. The majority of our landowners are not snowmobilers. They just like to have a groomed trail on their property that they can also recreate on, cross country ski, snowshoe, walk their dogs. And we sign all those to let our riders know that they could be encountering the landowner or other uses on the trail. Very few, a very small percentage of our trails are snowmobile only, and that's because the landowner doesn't want other people walking on their trails with dogs and things like that, but that's a very, very small percentage. Because we're a private nonprofit, we were able to establish our own standards, so we have very, very high safety standards. In fact, we've got programs that other states and provinces are duplicating, like our safety ambassador program. We have 40 statewide safety ambassadors, and they help people along the trail. They give people information. They'll assist law enforcement if it's needed. These are not law enforcement, but some of them are retired law enforcement. It's sort of like what you get at a ski area. The program was based on the ambassador programs that ski areas have. I used to a little bit about me. I was a non motorized person before I started this job twelve years ago. I taught skiing in Stowe, and worked for three different chambers of commerce around the state for twenty five years. So the ambassador program was a way to combine it with a safety program. And so these guys, they're all volunteers. They get a trail pass for one snowmobile to do this, and they log their experiences. They wear high vis vests. So they actually look like law enforcement, but they're not. And so that's been a great program for us that's being duplicated, like I said, in other states and provinces. We also have very high standards for signing our trails. Every junction is signed, stop stop ahead, stop signs, bridge warning, bridge ahead. We have very high standards for that. We Going back to Michelle with working with them when I first started, we were doing the build up for the Lemoyle Valley Rail Trail. And over the years, with them after snowmobiling, we put in about $6,000,000 of our own dollars to build that trail. The state of Vermont stepped in to pick up the rest of the build because it is a state entity. The trail is owned by the state of Vermont. And we have a great relationship with all the trail users that use that trail and that we share trails with. Other organizations that we share trails with are Catamount, Kingdom Trails, Crasberry Outdoor Center, other Vimba, the mountain bike trail systems, the Cross Vermont Trail. So, these are all users that are multi use users. As far as safety goes, we did have two accidents this year. We haven't had any fatalities in the last five years until this year. One of the fatalities, which was in Island Pond, was someone had never ridden a snowmobile before. Tragically, her boyfriend took her on a trail ride, and within a quarter of a mile, she crashed her snowmobile and passed away. It's a very, very sad story. So she had no training, no safety instruction. She was old enough that she didn't have to take the mandatory safety course. She was born after 1983. If you're born after 1983, you have to take a mandatory snowmobile safety course. The other accident was also in the Northeast Kingdom. I believe that the last time I spoke with Fish and Wildlife, they think it was a medical event that the gentleman had, and so they're still investigating that, but it was a single accident. We have never had someone get struck by a snowmobile since I've been here. Yeah. I mean, I don't get complaints. If anything, we get thank yous for the grooming of the trails. We have a 100 clubs, over a 100 clubs. We have over a 100 grooming machines statewide, and those cost I think the most expensive now is about $450,000 and some of the ones in our fleet are a little bit older. All of our clubs are their own nonprofit associations. I'll stop in just a second. I'll mention one more thing because I'm sure I'm leaving some things out you might have questions about. We are self insured. We started our own captive risk retention group a few years ago. And so our policies, even though we're mandated to hold a $1,000,000 policy by the state of Vermont, we have a $2,000,000 liability policy. And, of course, people that open their properties up to outdoor recreation are indemnified by the state of Vermont anyway. But this is just a liability policy to make sure that our landowners are covered. And, you know, just because you're indemnified doesn't mean that somebody can't try to take you to court and there's costs involved with that. We've only had one lawsuit since I've been here in twelve years, and that was about six or seven years ago. And after that, that's when we decided to start our own insurance company, and it's called the American Outdoor Risk Retention Group.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Thank you, Cindy. Could you talk a little bit about these partnerships with these, you mentioned Catamount and Kingdom, are there multi use groups, are they? I mean, I'm not familiar with that into a certain How does that work? When you say multi use, you mean there's not just the snowmobilers on there in the winter? Do they mean multi use that they're using them other seasons for other things and only you use them in the winter for snowmobiles?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: No. Nope. We share mountain bike trails with Kingdom Trails, so there's fat bikes on them. All the rail trails are multi use. Catamount, one that pops off in the top of my head is in Stowe, goes over to Sterling. So it's cross country skiers and snowmobilers. There's quite a lot of trails. The Green Mountain National Forest, it's all shared use. All the state lands are shared use. The Groton Rail Bed is shared use. That one, yeah, there's quite a few that are shared use.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: And you have a relationship with all those entities, those organizations that you can either meet with or continue to work with on whatever comes up?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yes, yep, we do. We have management meetings with them. We have partnership meetings with them. We're all part of the Vermont Trails and Greenways Council. I'm on the board of that, and we work hand in hand. And yeah, I mean, I can tell you from my experience of snowmobiling on a trail where there's skiers and things like that, The skiers will hear us coming, and we know that they're going to be there. So we ride slower because we're in an area that's shared use. There's always a slow ride down. Everybody waves to each other high, the skiers wave to us, we wave back. It's a great relationship.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: The accidents that you referred to, I'd say I'm assuming that they've got a little bit of media coverage and I'm assuming they're probably within at least 20,000 members and whatnot. That type of word must spread pretty fast. Noticed you highlighted that the person didn't go through the safety program. Don't know exactly what my comment is. That's pretty striking, I guess. And was there substance at all in that? Or was it just that I

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: No, I'm not sure. I know that my understanding is that they were staying at a camp on the pond, in Niland Pond, and he put her on a snowmobile and went around the pond a couple of times and then took her on the trail. And like I said, within a quarter of a mile, not even a half a mile. Know, and that's why we have like ride right campaigns. Ride right means, you know, you stay on the right side of the trail and lead right. Ride right, lead right. So if you're leading someone with less experience, don't take off. Right? You need to ride within their ability. But this instance, that campaign for us is for people that go through the safety course too. This person was put on a snowmobile without any experience and tragically. And she was a very loved and well known person in Chester, Vermont. Don't know. Now, are times when there are fatalities or accidents that people are on their own private property. You'll hear about those once in a while. I think there was one last year that he was on his own private property where there is alcohol involved and they're not wearing a helmet, but they're not on our trail system. And we have a zero alcohol tolerance, which means we have signs all over the state that say zero alcohol tolerance. We try to encourage people to enjoy the sport. It's fun enough. Why do you need alcohol to make it more fun? And I think that goes along with any sport. Like even people that are riding bikes on rail trails will stop at a brewery, right? And that's along the trail. So it's not just snowmobilers, but we have pretty high safety standards. And I also think that a lot of the press, unfortunately, this winter came from New Hampshire. They have a lot of accidents in New Hampshire because they don't have the structure. They have rental companies that rent snowmobiles, and there's no training. And so people go and they rent a snowmobile and they have And that happens repeatedly, weekly in New Hampshire. They don't have the laws we have where if you in in order to rent a snowmobile in the state of Vermont, you can only go on a guided tour and you have to go through the safety training. There's a video that they have to watch and then they do on snow training. And so that's also why in other areas, you'll see more accidents than you see in Vermont.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Thanks. And I'll say, I don't tend to ski on fast trails regularly, but when I do, it's always been a good experience. Never been an issue. Are there any trail or trail sections, you know, that you're hoping the state would help with bringing on? Are there a section that, you know, like maybe if we were talking ten years ago, you'd say, hey, the Memorial Valley Whale Trail would be really good to finish. Are there any things that, you know, you're looking to expand on or hope to see in the future that the state has some leverage maybe to help that happen?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah, thank you for the question and thank you for the comment on your experience in the past. So I would say that we're not in the business of building new trails, right? But what we have done in the past few years because of our winters are not we started let me back up. About eight years ago, we started with no ice as safe ice. And so we took all of our trails off of bodies of water. Now that's not to say that snowmobiles aren't crossing them and they're out ice fishing and things like that. But we just figured for a liability purpose, so what we do is we have what we call, spur trails that will lead to someone's house, you know, or a few like some households that'll give them the advantage of those few snowmobiles reaching our trail system. And we have signs at the junction before you get to that trail that says, No ice is safe ice. Continuing on will lead you to homes, but will also lead you to a body of water. Here's the way to go around. So then there's a map on the sign that shows them that rather than going straight and crossing the body of water, they should turn right to continue down this other trail to get to our trails. So with the questionable winters, it's really important for us to keep people off bodies of water. So I think the only trail that we're yeah. I mean, that's those those are the types of things that we're acclimating with with the changes in in winter patterns is to keep people off bodies of water.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Thank you. When you groom, is that primarily at night or day too?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Most of it's at night because our groomer operators are all volunteers, so they have jobs. So they get home from their nine to five and they get in a groomer. And the groomers go eight, nine, 10 miles an hour, they have big lights on them and they groom at night. Some of our clubs do groom during the day. We have signs that say, you notice that this club in this area, you know, may be grooming during the day. There'll be a sign so snowmobilers are aware that there might be a groomer out.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: They are a lot easier to see at night, that's for sure. How do you see this BB Spur playing out in our area?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: I think that it's you just said, it's a spur trail, so it's four miles. I've looked at it, you know, I did comprehensive work on the LVRT, and so I'm used to looking at the specs for rail trails. And I think that some of the information that came out from maybe a meeting or something that happened in Newport and maybe the legislation that was introduced earlier was a little misinformed about the width of the trail and things like that and the safety of it, I think it would be a benefit because it would keep people off of the lake for our purposes, but I think that, it's not a it's not a destination. It's not that people are gonna go, oh, let's just go up this four miles. We have plenty of trails, as far as going out for a daily adventure. It's really just the thought of allowing people that live up at that end to be able to access our trail system. I was just looking at some pictures before we started this morning too as well. There's some great winter pictures of cross country skiers and there's plenty of width. You know, I know that there's a few bridges that are seven feet wide. I've been talking to AOT about the possibility of like maybe we put a stop sign and say, One way bridge, you know, and so a snowmobiler would have to stop. And whoever gets to the bridge first goes across and you can see from one end to the other. So there's all kinds of workarounds and I believe that trail is groomed by a local ski club. And I'm assuming I'm not sure what they use to groom it. I don't know if it's a snowmobile. A lot of, like, cross country ski areas like Catamount and Kingdom Trails use a snowmobile with a drag because snowmobiles actually help pack down the trail. They don't dig it up. So yeah. Think it would be good to have more public discussion. This is a state owned trail, there's certain statutes and laws, federal and state, that protect multi use rail banked railways.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Okay, thank you.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: But I will say, I will add one thing because Michelle's in the room and she can decide to agree with me or not. But before we built the LVRT, there was fear. There was definitely some people along that trail that were like, Oh my gosh, what's coming? Once the trail was open, that completely died off. It really was more fear based than it was the actual experience of what happened after the trail opened.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: I didn't have my question.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: No, I'll just sort of add to that anecdotally, my experience, when the bike path was being built in Burlington, mean, was an uproar of people, you know, it's going bring crime or this and that. Now when somebody sells their house and you're next to the bike path, it's one of the first things they listen. And I'm guessing same with the Memorial Valley Rail Trail, you know, access to the trail. So

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah. That that's a great point. They actually just built a whole housing unit called the Rail Trail in in the Morrisville area. There's lots of businesses that use it as a recruiting tool for employment, work here and go out for a walk on the rail trail in the summertime. The majority of people that use these rail trails use them in the summertime, but there's also, especially down in village or town centers, cross country skiers, people walking their dogs in the wintertime, but it definitely has been a large economic boom for the state.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Before we get to the Section 17, would you comment on the safety ambassador, Pete, if you have issues in a particular area or whatnot? I mean, are they all over the state? Are they more aware of maybe landlord concerns in some areas than others? And do these safety ambassadors or the ambassador program, is that statewide? Sure.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah, it's a great program. It is statewide. It wasn't built because there was a need for it as much as we just wanted to offer this. And they go out and they identify if there's a sign down. They can fix it or let the club know. And they are trained in some CPR and things like that, but it is statewide. In fact, just in Newport and Derby itself, we have at least three safety ambassadors in that area, but they are statewide. And they also log all of their rides. And so if they're wearing their vest, they're logging their rides, and I get that information. I get about 500 logged rides, a year from them with reports on what they've seen and what they've done. The other part too is law enforcement. So we hire all the law enforcement to, patrol our trails and do our safety inspections. We we pay fish and wildlife wardens, state police, a variety of sheriff's departments, and police departments. And so the safety ambassadors will also work with them. They'll help when law enforcement's going to go out and do safety checks, which is where they will stop snowmobiles and they'll do a safety check and check, you know, to make sure that the snowmobile is in compliance, that they have their trail pass, their registration. If they're born after 1983, they've got their safety card. And safety ambassadors will help law enforcement with that process too.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: That law enforcement piece, if you were aware of particular areas, you have the, because you pay them, you help direct them to certain areas that, I guess what I'm saying is that you got more out of state rental, Airbnb's advertised to it, you mentioned advertising to the trail, you got people that maybe come and are going in and out of a particular area on the Moyne Valley or something. Are you able to if you felt like you had an area of concern, are you able to help influence where that law enforcement activity happens?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Absolutely. They coordinate themselves as well. They're also all part of our governor's council, appointed by the governor, and, we meet monthly. And so we do talk about areas of coverage. They also have to produce reports. We don't pay an invoice until we get a report on where they've been and what they've been doing, how many tickets, if they've come across any accidents, how many warnings. And so it's a very coordinated effort. We have an orientation with law enforcement in the fall. We also have an orientation with our safety ambassadors in the fall.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Thank you very much. Representative Pouech?

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: When you hire fish and wildlife, do you pay the state of Vermont, or do you did you pay them? Like, as a you know, this is, like, overtime for them, let's say.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah. Some of them, it's overtime. It depends. So some of them, we we we pay the organization that they work for. Okay. So so we're paying we're not paying an individual fish and wildlife warden. They are being directed by their sergeant. The same with state police. They have a sergeant in charge of snowmobile and boating safety. And so they supply me with all their reports and then we pay them for the hours that they have patrolled.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: Okay, thank you.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: In the miscellaneous motor vehicle bill that we're looking at, S-three 26, there's a section 17 that I understand that you may have asked for or been aware of. That sound familiar? The penalty increase.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: It's very

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Can talk about the need and why and whatnot?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Sure, thank you. Yep. We actually asked for this increase because right now we feel like it's a safety issue that people will come to the state of Vermont and just take a chance to not buy a trail pass or be registered because the fines are about the same cost as our trail passes. It's not safe for other riders if something happens and there's an accident or something that these people are riding without, maybe without insurance or with an unregistered snowmobile or without a trail pass. So what we're trying to do is just add incentive to being legal. This is something that we've also worked with law enforcement on, and they felt it was a critical need because they would hear from people like, Oh, I just came up for the day. I didn't think you were going to stop me. I mean, they're good riders. They're just not legal to ride in Vermont. So it's not that they're bad as far as unsafe, but it's the idea of just like in Vermont, you have to have insurance on your car. It's more of a safety factor all around. So we're asking for that increase. Didn't want to go in and say, We need to increase all fines. You know, we just really wanted to, incentivize people being legal, by looking at, well, would you rather pay $235 or would you rather pay $400 for the fine? So really, that's why we're asking for the increase. And when law enforcement does write a ticket, that money comes back to help support our law enforcement program as well. We get funds for fines, and it's not a lot. Believe me. We're not doing it for the money. It's not a lot. I'm talking, like, $8,000 a year. But yeah, it goes into the law enforcement fund, guess. In statute, there's a certain amount of money from registrations that goes into law enforcement. That's how we're able to pay law enforcement.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: So that's about $8,000 You mentioned you like 1,400,000 in grooming this year. Just how big is the vast total budget? The $8,000 small, I mean, it is a small piece. What is the approximate vast total budget number?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: 4,000,000.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Thank you.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Because that includes trail maintenance grants to club. Most of our money goes back to the clubs for trail maintenance, grooming equipment, we pay for their fuel, we pay them by the mile to groom. So most of that goes back to the clubs. We run a pretty lean organization for a nonprofit, which is in that vast document. It gives you the percentages of in the budget section.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: A lot going on there. Representative White?

[Candice White (Member)]: Yeah, thank you for this, Cindy. So just, okay, so this section of the bill is suggesting an increased penalty of $450 first time you're pulled over without a trail pass. And can you remind me what the previous fee has been? And then also, if you can just confirm, I'm assuming that when a snowmobiler buys their vast pass, that part of that, so they need to be registered, they need to have insurance, they need to have their safety license if they're born after 1983. Can you just review what you all are checking when someone purchases a valid license or a pass?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you for the question. Sure. So when someone buys a pass from us, it's all online and they have to upload a copy of their registration. They need to click a box that verifies that they have liability insurance, collision, whatever on their snowmobile, that their snowmobile is insured, and that they will carry it with them. It is in statute that they can just show a picture of it on their phone to law enforcement if they don't have the insurance card on them. But we ask them to verify that they do have insurance. And like I said, they have to upload a copy of their registration. We do charge more for people that are registered have registered their snowmobile in another state because that means it's a loss of revenue for us because we get registration money. And so it's a little bit more expensive. The price difference basically, our most expensive season pass is $235 and right now the fine is about $2.40.

[Candice White (Member)]: Thank you.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Representative Burke.

[Mollie S. Burke (Member)]: Yeah, hi Cindy, Mollie Burke.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Hi, Mollie.

[Mollie S. Burke (Member)]: I was wondering, we talked, I don't know, when you were here one time, some years ago maybe, about the use of electric snowmobiles, and I wondered if that is becoming increasingly popular or challenging with charging and just want to know what the update is on that.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you. I knew you were going to be asking me something about electric snowmobiles today. How did I guess? Yeah, there are still a lot of people that are very interested in it. There are companies that are developing it. I think that the company that we brought to Vermont and probably the last time I was in there, it was called Tyga and they actually folded. But I know that some of the traditional Ski Doo, BRP, Polaris are all working on technology for electric snowmobiles. I actually drove the Tiger snowmobile. It was a lot of fun and very quiet, but a lot of fun. So I think that there is room for it, but you're right about the infrastructure on charging. That's really the biggest issue because right now the grants that the state of Vermont gets, federal grants for things like infrastructure charging, have to do with cars, vehicles, and they, I believe, I don't remember how many miles, but there's some federal funding that in order for them to get that money, it has to be within a certain mileage from an interstate. So that sort of limits, you know, without the state of Vermont really, or the feds coming up with more rural grants for communities because mostly what we do is in rural areas. But I do think it would be embraced once it becomes a real reality. I mean, other, you know, the battery charging, which is the same argument or concern that people have as far as long distance traveling goes. Right now, it's very, very normal for a snowmobiler to ride 80 miles a day. You go, you ride 40 miles in the morning, you stop, you have lunch, and you ride 40 miles in the afternoon. And a lot of batteries right now for simmobiles only go to like 50 or 60 miles. So until they can figure out how to get that battery to last longer and we get charging stations in more rural areas, I think that will be more of a reality, but it's also just waiting for the technology too.

[Mollie S. Burke (Member)]: Yeah, that's sort of just following basically what's happened with vehicles. Vehicles earlier, electric vehicles got fewer miles and they're getting now The charging infrastructure is starting to get built out better. It's interesting.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yes. Yeah. It's just taking time, which, you know, all good things do.

[Candice White (Member)]: Great. Thank you very much.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Representative Webb?

[Kate Webb (Member)]: Yeah, just a further comment on representative Burke's, what she was bringing up about electric snowmobiles. Seems to me there might be an economic development opportunity there if snowmobiles I'm not a snowmobiler, so I'm just kind of listening to the conversation. But if they're going out 40 miles, stopping for lunch somewhere, That lunch place could have a level three charger, and while they're having lunch, they could get their charge. Thinking about the economic opportunities that have come along the Lemoyle Valley Rail Trail. Seems like there are probably some opportunities out there for electric snowmobiles on the Bass Trail like that.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you. Yeah, we actually it's been a couple of years, but we had meetings with AOT and the folks over at Economic Community Development, ACCD, about that very thing, about how important it is to get them in rural areas, not even for just us, but for people that want to have an electric or hybrid vehicle that live in rural communities. And we did talk about the possibility of economic development grants, federal grants. I think right now, it's just waiting for the technology. But we haveand actually, I think Patrick from AOT was part of those, and I know you have Patrick quite often. But it's been a few years that we've had that meeting. But yes, that was the direction we were taking, too, was, Well, maybe we should be talking with ACCD about, you know, because of the economic impact, and I believe it was when I want to call him Tom Brady. What's his first name? Can't think of it. Anyway, he used to be the head of ACCD. Ted Brady, thank you.

[Mollie S. Burke (Member)]: Eric will

[Candice White (Member)]: get it out. Cindy,

[Unidentified Committee Member]: just going back to the actual language bill of increasing penalties, I always like that justification in my mind, because I think the justification would be for me is like the fine would be too low because people just are ignoring it. It's just like it's that, it's worth a gamble. Do you have over the last three or four years of tickets that have been issued for people that haven't met the criteria laid out in this section? Has it gone up steady or, you know, what are we looking at?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: I do have those numbers and I can send them over to you. I would also, it's been fairly steady. We have not increased our trail pass rates substantially at all over the last many years. And so, where we're getting the information from is from law enforcement. And we are asking them law enforcement, just like when they pull somebody over, they have the right to make the decision on what they're going to do, right? And so they've really been asking us, and in fact, I know you're from Bennington County. Police Paul, chief, yeah, Paul Dussett runs the Southern Vermont Wilderness Task Force, and they go out and patrol our trails, and he's very vocal about this increase being important, as he does a lot of snow checks and sees people that just sneak over the border and try to go for a ride for a day in Woodford. I don't disagree with that.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I just like to see the numbers of our, we have X amount of soft loss four years ago, and here we are now, it's like doubled or what are we talking about?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah, I don't think that there's any massive increase. It's just it has been an ongoing problem, and we've actually been talking about it, vast for a few years now at the Governor's Council, and finally this year we decided, you know what, let's just go ahead and

[Mollie S. Burke (Member)]: ask for it. Okay.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: But I can send Gabriela over those numbers.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Cindy, I didn't write it down. How much is the annual registration fee and how much is the annual trail fee?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: The registration fee is around $35 $38 And the, trail pass is anywhere from you can get a three day pass for $90 or you can, the cheapest full season pass is $1.55 and the most expensive is $2.35. And $235 is the folks that are registered out of state and don't buy an early bird pass, so those are traditionally the people that are last minute riders that would take a chance.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Anybody else have any questions? Cindy, I'm glad to

[James "Jim" Casey (Member)]: hear you. Representative Keyser, I will say that I think that amount is fair. When I go out and ride on the trails, I ran into people that are not registered and not going have their T. I don't see where their TMA is, not that I sit there or out looking, but they yeah I'd like to see them get caught. Get a little irritated. I paid all that money and so did other people and so bringing it up and making it hurt a little bit I think it's a good idea. So

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: thank you.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you. And I think the other thing to tell you too is we work, I mean even though we have a $4,000,000 budget, that money goes right out the door. We are supporting thousands of landowners or thousands of volunteers, 10,000 landowners. And it's really like we're not flush. Let me put it that way. We're basically it takes a lot to run this industry, but

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: it

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: also takes a lot to support the volunteers that are out there doing the boots on the ground work. And it's unfair to them because they're out there putting the signs up in the fall, taking them down in the spring, grooming the trails, brush cutting, that ditching, putting in culverts, and that money is all to support them.

[James "Jim" Casey (Member)]: I think everybody does a wonderful job. It's all well marked out there. Don't get lost, plus you have a I can get on my phone, you have a website kind of deal there.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Oh, the trail app.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: I'm not

[James "Jim" Casey (Member)]: really a computer genius. But I can get and around on that and I can tell where I am and I think that's really helpful actually. Yeah, think you guys said it was a good year and I think the program was good. We're the envy of other states for sure. I've written in other states and the program here is definitely a cut above.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Thank you, Representative Casey.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Representative White?

[Candice White (Member)]: Yeah, I just have one more question, Cindy. So on the outdoor recreation front, do you sell day passes or week passes or is it just an annual pass that someone can purchase?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: We have a three day pass. Okay. And then we also have we call it ride for twenty five. We used to do a free weekend, but now we do a ride for 25 because we wanna capture people's information to make sure that they're, you know, clicking up. We have, like, a a rider, you know, acknowledging that they've have everything legal to ride in Vermont. So we charge $25. So a lot of people, when we go to trade shows, we promote like, oh, you haven't been here before? You should come up for the ride for $25 and then stay an extra three days at a hotel or a B and B or whatever, and you're basically getting a six day pass for the $90 of a three day pass plus the 25

[Candice White (Member)]: yeah. Thank you.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: I have one more thing just to bring up that I forgot to tell you about law enforcement. So because we're all online and we have a database, every single trail pass we sign is assigned a QR code, And law enforcement has the ability to look that up on their phone. They can scan that QR code, and they can pull up in real time the information of that rider. Who owns that sled? What type of sled? Snowmobile. Who owns that snowmobile? Is it registered? Who's the owner? So they can verify exactly the person's information. So if they pull someone over and they're like, oh, I bought it this morning or the other day, and it just hasn't come in the mail yet. No, it's real time. It's automatic. You get it in an email and it shows up on our system exactly what time you bought it at. And so law enforcement out in the field has the ability to look those up too.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Representative Pouech?

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: Yeah. Curious over the years how many Canadians bypasses? Are there connections that they can, you know, go through to come in? And then has that gone down in the last year or so, if it was of any numbers?

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: Yeah, so that's a great question. There are a couple of places that you can go through the border. I think Canaan, that area, Derby, up on Derby Line, maybe over in Richmond, I'm not sure, but the majority of our Canadian visitors are people that could be registered in the state of Vermont as well. So we don't always capture we'll capture it in our database, but it won't come out in the registration data that you would get from DMV because unless it's registered in Quebec or Ontario. We have a very small group that comes here, but that's because the snowmobiling is outstanding

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: in Canada.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: They're more guaranteed to have snow, and it's a different type of snowmobiling experience up there. So there's a lot of Vermonters that go to Canada, and there are Canadians that come down here. But I don't think we've really seen a decrease because of the political things that have been going on nationally. It's just never been a huge thing. In fact, we get more people from Ontario than Quebec that come here to snowmobile.

[Phil Pouech (Ranking Member)]: Okay. Thank you. Mhmm. Makes sense. Interesting. They just

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: don't Cindy, thank you very much. It's always very thorough, and we appreciate that. Much like your network, guess. Anything else at the last moment, I'd say thank you very much for joining us. Thank you. We appreciate it. Thank you

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: all very, very much. Anytime reach out and I appreciate what you do and the commitment that you have for the state of Vermont. So thanks.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: Thank you, Cindy. Have a good day.

[Cindy Locke (Executive Director, Vermont Association of Snow Travelers)]: You too.

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: For the committee, I understand you said yes, they did vote the bill out? No, no, no, they didn't vote. Yeah, they're still working on it. No, they're still working

[Unidentified Committee Member]: on it. But

[Matt Walker (Chair)]: yeah, they're getting closer. Okay. We are adjourned until tomorrow. And tomorrow will be based on the floor. We will have Damien if it's reasonable time frame to get off the floor, we will work with Damien on the potential markup of at least knocking off the section we agree on and a thumbs up. And that