Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: It is still Thursday, May 7. This is still the Ways and Means Committee room, and it is 10:20. We are picking up as 02:14. We have St. James with us to tell us about the bill.

[Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Good morning, Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel. Would you like me to share my screen? Yes, please. You have S-two 14 is passed by the Senate because Education Committee made no changes. They concurred with what the Senate passed out. So S-two 14 is an amendment to Section eight twenty nine, which is the pre kindergarten statute. These asterisks represent all of current law. We are not making any changes to that. We are adding a new subsection to be subsection I at the very bottom of the statute, which reads, Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, the any K choice school district may provide pre kindergarten education to eligible pre K students by paying tuition pursuant to this section to one or more pre K programs operated by a public school in New Hampshire that is located in a school district within 25 miles of the Vermont border. The ethics North Supervisory Union shall be responsible for administering enrollment procedures and managing prefilled portion payments pursuant to this section and state board rules. The superintendent may apply for and receive a waiver from the Agency of Education and Agency of Human Services of any rule provision that is impractical for the any K Choice school district or the New Hampshire program by demonstrating that a substantially equivalent provision is offered. This change would take effect on 07/01/2026.

[James Masland (Member)]: Can

[Unidentified Committee Member]: you just say some more words about that last sentence, that substantially equal provision being offered?

[Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Yes. If you will indulge me. I can take no credit for this language. This language came to the Senate and the Senate adopted it from collaboration between the Agency of Education, DCF, and the school district in question. The issue is that most, if not all, of the kiddos in the NEK Choice School District would be getting their K-twelve education in New Hampshire Public School. Our K-twelve tuition system is separate from our pre K tuition system. In order for public funds out of the Ed Fund to go towards pre K, they can only go to a pre qualified provider. It's either public or private. Pre qualification requires you to meet certain things, including having Vermont licensed teachers or following Vermont Early Learning Standards. I'm going to guess that the New Hampshire public schools are not following Vermont Early Learning Standards or teaching with Vermont licensed teachers in all classrooms. So I believe that the last lines 15 through 19 are meant to get at the fact that the statute says money only goes to pre qualified providers. Now we're saying it can go to public schools in New Hampshire. We want to make sure that there's some amount of substantially equal education being provided. So the agencies are going to work with the district to make sure that there's a substantially equivalent provision, for example, a New Hampshire license feature or New Hampshire Early Learning Standards, whatever they call them. But that would be managed at the local level rather than spelled out statute as to what hoops they need to jump through.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: So the district, through the superintendent, will talk to the AOE and the agency human services, say, this is what this school's standards are. The

[Speaker 0]: only way I can figure out which school districts would be likely to be impacted would be to look at where they currently send their elementary kids, and the overwhelming majority of their students are actually in Vermont schools. And of the kids who go out of state, half of them are in independent schools, including two that are no longer eligible except students. So I'm assuming that the majority of them would go to the public schools that are currently certain kids. It's only about 20 kids in that age six age group that are in New Hampshire right now. And so I looked at the public schools they go to. One of them has a virtual pre kindergarten program.

[Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Would this apply to that virtual pre kindergarten program? I don't know that I can answer that question. I don't know anything about whether it's part of a public school or whether it would be substantially equivalent provisions offered in the discretion of AOE and DCF. So it is a public school program. And so then the other public school programs, two of them are just a couple miles from

[Speaker 0]: So my question was, was the decision to go out of state and drive past Canon on the way to the public's pre Ks across the border there, was that because Canon is at capacity and can't accommodate those kids? Rebecca Holcombe is joining us so she can answer questions about the committee's intent, which are She's asked for on the way. Thanks. Any questions for Beth? Yes.

[James Masland (Member)]: Yeah, the line fifteen, sixteen, whatever, may have basically run not be cynical, applied for a waiver for any rule, that seems awfully broad. I mean, maybe that's a policy question for, but I'm just voicing for the committee that seems awfully broad.

[Speaker 0]: Yes. And the House Education Committee passed us as did the Senate Education Committee.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Yes? Only question is on tuition. Is it just limited to regular tuition payments that would be sent out from public school

[James Masland (Member)]: tuition?

[Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel]: 166 funds. So the ten hours. The ten hours. Yes.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Thanks. Any other questions for Beth?

[Speaker 0]: Thanks, Beth.

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: Alright. Good morning, everyone. I'm Ezra Holden, joint fiscal office. Would you like me to share my screen? Alright. So s two fourteen, as you all just heard from Beth, this bill would allow the NK Choice School District to pay tuition to a public school in New Hampshire for eligible pre k students. So, Joint Fiscal Office is estimating that this bill would increase education fund expenditures beginning in fiscal year twenty twenty eight. The reason being that most districts, including any K choice, have already passed their budget for fiscal year twenty twenty seven. So if there were new expenditures in fiscal year twenty twenty seven, they would need to use their already approved budget to shoulder those expenditures, and then their fiscal year twenty twenty eight budget could be increased to account for any additional expenditures. We're estimating that up to 14 students would gain access to UPK through this bill, and that is from the field. And I believe that's seven students who are ages four and seven students who are ages three. So that's from the field. And based on the Act 166 tuition rate, that would be about $60,000 in additional expenditures to the education fund, which we consider de minimis in light of the $2,000,000,000 or so plus in the education fund.

[Speaker 0]: Isn't it also possible that that district would keep their budget the same and change something else to a payment as possible?

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: Sure. That would be a district level decision there. So it's a range of zero to 60,000, I would say, because zero to 14 kids could choose to participate and go to New Hampshire.

[Speaker 0]: So I'm curious know, about fourteen and zero to 14, and is that estimate the total number of three and four year olds? And so is it inclusive of the kids who are already enrolled in Kingdom East and Kingman, or is it in addition to those kids who are currently

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: enrolled? Sure, so that's a good question. I spoke with some individuals from the NNK Choice School District, as well as some folks from DCF, and they provided this estimate of up to 14 students who do not have access to pre K now would gain pre K access if they could go to New Hampshire. Like I said, I believe that's seven four year olds and seven three year olds. However, to your point, it could be as low as zero because if the parent or guardian does not wish to enroll their student or they can't find a slot in New Hampshire, then those kids may not actually go to New Hampshire, but these are considered up to 14 new students who do not currently attend Pre K, it's my understanding.

[Speaker 0]: Did you take testimony also in the front, or did you talk to the superintendents in Essex North and Kingdom, which currently enrolled pre K students from Kingdom Choice, to understand the potential impact of this on their pre Ks that they're currently operating?

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: No, I did not speak with any superintendents.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Any other questions, Professor?

[Speaker 0]: Please. Thanks, Israel. Hi, Beth. Represents Bimby. Excuse me. Welcome to Toys and Means. Would you like

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: to come join us in the church? No, if you did.

[Speaker 0]: You already did all that. We already did all that.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: We're all over. I know. We

[Unidentified Committee Member]: We're fasting.

[Speaker 0]: Things felt like good.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: I almost came earlier, I'm like, bam.

[Speaker 0]: Things were going slow this morning, and then they were going fast. We got really busy in water system, and then we just came back out again.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: So I think, thank you for joining us. I know the vote out of your committee was ten-one, but happy to hear any backgrounds.

[Speaker 0]: And I think Representative Holcombe at least has a question

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: or two. Okay, so yeah, the bill came over from the Senate, and we just concurred with that. I don't know if there's things for me to say that have not already been answered by the people you've spoken to, but there are some Essex County has the lowest percentage in this state of eligible pre K students accessing pre K. And Vermont's at the forefront of pre K education nationally, but not in Essex County. There is a couple of Head Start programs. I think one's in Island Pond and one in Gilman, if I remember correctly. So families in Essex County, in the NEK Choice District that live close to Canaan, that has a public school pre K, or close to Island Palm that has the head start, or close to Gilman that have a head start, they have a place they can access. But it's a pretty vast geographic region with no public schools of any kind. And so there are families who live really closer to the New Hampshire border, perhaps in Guildhall, who it's the most convenient option for them and has been for them to send their children to Lancaster, for example, because it's ten minutes away, they might work in the area, they're already taking their older children to Lancaster. So having the option now for their three or four year old to be in the car with them and go to Lancaster as well is going to allow them to have access they just haven't had. And also, with the poverty level, these are people who don't have or they can't drive to Island Pond and drop off their three year old and then drive an hour the other way, so they just don't send them. And there are people who aren't working because they have to be home, because they cannot conveniently have their younger child somewhere. The superintendent from Essex I'm gonna say it wrong. That's the school district name. Anyway, she said, It's five kids. I don't know where the number 14 is coming from. I'm thinking it's more like five kids. Again, hard to know because there's so many who have not been taking advantage of it.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: And either way, the impact to the Ed Fund is somewhere between zero and de minimis.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: Yes, either way. And so how many will take advantage of this? Not sure. I think it's the families who, like I said, mostly who are already sending their older children to that school anyway, that it would make sense for their three or four year old to go there and then continue through that system.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: So Beth, I'm thinking of some of this fiscal impact, which is our point here, might be offset if some of these three year olds are triple E. Maybe not, I mean, that's not our decision, but I think triple E is more clear.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: I'm not sure how that's going to work because it does have a tuitioning model as opposed to how we fund free K in Vermont, which is a little different. And I think they fiscal we can talk more about Senate Finance, why it worked that way. But having to make it a tuition model as opposed to how we fund here, I'm not sure, but I think the offset would be there because they're getting tuition, but you're not getting the payment the other way. So it kind of balances, it doesn't exactly balance out equally, but it's de minimis when that happens. And I did ask the biggest question I had is why, if in Vermont, you access either a pre qualified IVET provider or a public school, why did we not do that for this option as well? It just really overcomplicates things. In Act 73, there's no more out of state tuition allowed to non public schools. So we can only make tuition payments to public schools in New Hampshire now. We can't make tuition payments to an independent approved independent school. So not adding that extra layer. And also the testimony they had is that they have capacity. The public schools in New Hampshire have the capacity that's needed to take in three and four year olds.

[Speaker 0]: I was looking, so I

[James Masland (Member)]: looked at the

[Speaker 0]: public schools out of state because the only kids from DiMath Model Academy and they're not going to be taking tuition. So I looked at public school and you're looking at Coalbrook, Summerlin, Stratford and White Mountains. White Mountain regional because we don't have capacity. Coalbrook is two to four miles from Canaan, which I believe has a public. Canaan does have a public. So we don't really need Colbrook. And then Northumberland, Stratford, it's a virtual program. Is that a substantively equal program when kids are doing a virtual?

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: I don't know if it's simply equal program. I don't know if I know the answer to that. And that's the other thing was the third provision is to apply for the waiver. And in section one, there are basically three parts. And the third part is that they could apply for a waiver if it's substantially equal. We said, what would that what are you talking about? And the biggest issue there is, you know, in Vermont, you're required to have a Vermont licensed early educator, early special educator on staff. You must follow the Vermont early education quality standards. Well, if you're in New Hampshire, those two things don't make sense because you're not Vermont. So, would have to be a licensed New Hampshire teacher or a New Hampshire early education standards. So it have to be substantially equal, but it wouldn't be the exact requirement because you're not in Vermont.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: I think I remember hearing that in the Northeast Kingdom, there were a number of private providers as well that were kind of supplementing, but in this particular area, there are

[Speaker 0]: more than

[James Masland (Member)]: 5%.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: Or the distance to them is so much further in the exact opposite direction that you're traveling with your other children or you're traveling to work, that it's your parents are not taking advantage.

[James Masland (Member)]: Right. Right.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: And

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: again, number 14 seems very high to me from what I've heard.

[James Masland (Member)]: Let's hope we

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: get that many kids.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: Tom, we heard a lot, some testimony.

[Speaker 0]: The jury fiscal did their research before that.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: And we've heard now that the numbers are increasing. I mean, Gil Hall closed their school, I think it was because they had eight kids, and now there's twice as many kids living in Gil Hall. And East Haven closed their school, and now there's twice as many kids living in East Haven because they now have school choice. So families have moved into those areas that were not there ten years ago. School's closed.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Well, thank you so much for joining us. Really appreciate Oh, yeah, representative.

[James Masland (Member)]: Quick question. Lines 16 through 19.

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: Oh, I didn't bring it with Well, do have it in my bag over there.

[James Masland (Member)]: It's easy peasy. The superintendent may apply for and receive a waiver from the agency or anything like that. Any rule

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: for visions? So the biggest two that were referenced was the requirement to be a Vermont licensed teacher.

[Ezra Holden, Joint Fiscal Office]: Well,

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: if you're in New Hampshire, they may not hold a Vermont license, they may hold a New Hampshire license. Yep. And the Vermont early education quality standards, it must be followed. Again, you're in New Hampshire, so you're not going to Vermont ones. Is there a substantially equal one that New Hampshire has?

[James Masland (Member)]: So basically, the committee reviewed this stuff and was contended, Eric, okay, are we both not?

[Unidentified Representative from House Education Committee (Essex County/NEK)]: We were in this, you know, this has been, I was told, like five years of advocacy from this area to have this happen. There's just so few students in Essex County that qualify, that three and four year olds that are not accessing pre K. That could be. It's the smallest percentage in So, the this change that would allow, or potentially allow these three and four year olds to access pre K to set them up for success, and to set up their families to be able to be in the workforce for more hours, I think for a de minimis impact, I think it's definitely worth holding for.

[James Masland (Member)]: Helpful answers. Thank you very much.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Thank you. Folks, lots of big questions about pre K in Vermont that we are going to continue wrestling with over the next couple of years. But in the meantime, we have this bill before us passed House Education unanimously and with a very de minimis fiscal impact. And so I would love if someone could leave a vote on it unless one needs to hear some more testimony. Yes, Representative Masland.

[James Masland (Member)]: I move that we vote out S-two 14 favorably as we receive.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Representative Masland moves that we find S-two 14 favorable. Is there any discussion? Yes. When they did close the school there, the next year the population doubled. And that's because when you close your school, pick up the cost of the kids whose parents are overpaying their tuition. And so you are going to get that effect. My concern is that the state of Vermont of constitutional commitment is to making sure every child has a school, unless we provide another way to do that. And I understand people think this is the other way to do that. We appear to, pre K isn't even required in New Hampshire, kindergarten isn't even required in New Hampshire. We don't know what the standards are in the virtual program, which is the one close to these children, and maybe the one they pick up. I worry that we, I know it's a very small number of kids, I understand that it's a de minimis impact on the ED fund, but I'm always worried when we approve a lower standard for some kids. And I just am very worried that this is a very ambiguous piece of legislation and it's not okay. And I know on the other side of the state, I called the superintendent in Granville High School and asked who was going to Granville, 41% of kids that Vermont tuitions to Granville High School are at IEPs. So we are pushing the kids who need the best education out of the state, and we are not taking care of them. And we make the biggest difference for those kids when we provide access to good, high quality pre kindergarten education. So I feel like this region and this bill is a metaphor for what we're gonna look like between the southern tier of the other state. If we just think of education as tuition, we don't take responsibility for making sure we're providing good access to education for every kid, especially the ones who mostly need our help. So I just have really, I'm disappointed with this. I think we have low expectations for some kids.

[James Masland (Member)]: So, Representative Holcombe, you have any idea how Granville handles the IETs?

[Speaker 0]: Well, IEPs are handled consistent with federal law, to the extent that we lose federal support for special ed. No one, the local districts can't even tell him how many kids, I've made Susan a month, but I still don't know how many kids from the Vermont districts are economically disadvantaged or have IEPs. We're just not tracking this. We're not paying attention to these kids. And that bothers me, because these are the kids who we invest early and well, people make the biggest difference for them. And by the way, this kingdom choice is a little bit lower economic disadvantage than the state on average, and much lower than Canaan and Kingdom East, which are its surrounding districts. So this is a slightly more privilege. I know there are disadvantaged kids there, but it is more privilege than the two districts that surround it that operate public programs.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: You want to explain this?

[Speaker 0]: Sure. And just to be clear, we declined, we have declined for multiple years to talk about contracting as an option. Even Milton Friedman, who was the granddaddy of vouchers, said you can't have competition create quality and access in rural areas because there just are no kids. And if we keep eroding scale and keep sending our money out of state, we're seeing this on the Southern children too, there just won't be options for the kids who depend on public schools to provide access. So I'm just mindful that that's something we're not paying attention to.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: And I also want to see us pay better attention to all that, but I look at we are serving those children now today and how we will be serving them after we pass this bill. And it's an improvement. So why would we not do that? We want them to be better off. A lot of the decision still belongs to the parents. So maybe the parent can't drive them or something still might be the problem. But for our world, how we can make it better, it seems like this is the best option. Is it or am I not seeing something?

[Speaker 0]: My point is, I don't know. I mean, I went back to all the testimony that was provided in the Senate and the House on this bill. We actually got very little testimony. We just got a school board member who came in and the agency and DCF have to trust they're paying attention. If the kid's eligible for triple E, the district might even provide transportation. It's possible that kids enrolled in Canaan and King's DeVis are children who are on IEPs, who are eligible for those early services and are being transported by the district and being paid for. My fear is so often, we can't be the easiest solution, and then we think we're one and done, and we don't make sure that we're actually taking care of kids. And just too systematically, I see who is hurt when we don't pay attention. And I don't want us to, I mean, I still feel that we are not different from the rest of the country. And there's so much research now on who tuition benefits and who doesn't benefit. And you have to build your system with the tensions of the people who, as Rutland said, have parents who can't drive them. And if our solution is to give those kids virtual pre K, I actually don't think, I don't think, first of all, that meets our constitutional task. And I also don't think we're doing the right thing by those kids. So if we pass this and we say, we're awesome, take a voucher and I hope you can drive there, we fail those kids because we haven't addressed the core challenge of access. Anything further, committee rolls?

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Representative Higley?

[James Masland (Member)]: Yeah. Sorry. Go ahead. So, Holcombe, I guess what's your alternative? Does I mean

[Unidentified Committee Member]: It's the same thing I've

[Speaker 0]: been saying for three years. We need to look at contracting. If you say to this district, you can create a program and you can issue contracts. One of the reasons in my area, some of the private providers struggle is because the enrollments are so irregular. So if three kids one year, five kids another. But if a district could say, hey, we're going to work with you and our kids are going to come to you, then that provider could take a risk. They could expand their program. They could hire the teacher. It's the same thing. I know there was a lot of conversations with Head Start and the reasons These people are trying, but the economics just aren't there. But if that head start knew that it was going to consistently have 10 kids, then they could hire and have a stable program. But as a business operator or as a head start program, if you can't guarantee that you're going have some stability, you can't take that business risk.

[James Masland (Member)]: That still doesn't solve the distance issue.

[Speaker 0]: Well, there are options. That's why you know, it's funny in some places. The reason I brought up Granville is we provide busing to the New York schools. We just don't provide busing to the Vermont schools, which are all independent schools. So, we make choices all the time. And the accumulation of our choices is often very unfair. And so what you start with is those kids who don't have access and you say, okay, what is keeping this kid from getting access? And you don't just trust that the market is going to find it because we know who markets underserved, it's the same kids. You know, these kids get to talk to them. And those are the kids, and I'm not saying it's public or private, because you got to make sure that you are committed. You have publicly funded pre kindergartens, how do we design a system that makes sure they get it? And just saying to a parent, it's up to you. I mean, I've talked to super principals who gave parents money to get their car fixed because they broke down the car and they couldn't get to school. But there are families like that who are really struggling. If you aren't providing transportation, you're deciding who can live in your community, truly, if they have kids and want access education. And those choices that we are making as a state and the accumulative effect of them is to harm the same kids and the same families over and over again. Doctor. Masland, did

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: you still want add something?

[James Masland (Member)]: No, I appreciate the comments very much, but I also think, for the moment, I have to agree with representative Branagan that's I can't remember what your words were, representative Branagan, but we need to look at how the kids are being taken care of right now. Are they getting pre k at all, basically, to summarize what you're saying? Thank you. Can

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: you please pull the roll? Yes.

[Speaker 0]: I will vote yes as representative Burkhardt. Representative Higley? Yes. Representative Holcombe?

[Rebecca Holcombe (Member)]: I'm gonna

[Rebecca Holcombe (Member)]: vote no so I have

[Speaker 0]: the option on the floor, but I think I'll vote yes in the end. I'm just really upset because I see It is sweet. You do this.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Right. And over again. Okay.

[Speaker 0]: Representative Kimbell?

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Yes.

[Speaker 0]: Representative Masland?

[James Masland (Member)]: Yep.

[Speaker 0]: Representative Ode is not here. Representative Page?

[Woodman Page (Member)]: Yes.

[Beth St. James, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Representative Waszazak?

[Edward "Teddy" Waszazak (Member)]: Yes.

[Speaker 0]: Representative Canfield? Yes. And Representative Kornheiser? Yes. You have voted the bill favorable, nine-one. Thank you everyone. We are done for the day. Confusingly enough. See you tomorrow.