Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Hello, Ways and Means Committee. Today is the May 15. It is the afternoon, 03:20. We are picking up S-two 78, which we have been sitting with so much longer than we needed to. And I want to apologize to everyone for asking you to maintain the thread over many, multiple, very short meetings. I am very hopeful we can finish it today and move on with our lives to a next week hold with committees of conference. Last we were gathered, we had a couple of questions about the tax portions of the bill. And Kirby Keaton is now here with us inside the computer. Kirby, if you can join us. Hi, thank you. I think people particularly If you don't mind if you're backlit, thank you. I think people were particularly curious about essentially sort of the workarounds to have cannabis businesses treated like businesses in the context of Vermont tax law.

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, so Kirby Keaton, legislative council. Should I walk through that section and then have some

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Yeah, maybe bring it up, yeah, and explain it a little bit, that would be great, thank you.

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, is everyone seeing it?

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Yep, thank you.

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Okay, so we have section 24 of the bill that's in the household income definitions section of law. It is a change to the definition for modified adjusted gross income, which is used as the starting point in calculating household income. What this does is add a new subdivision that clarifies that any federal deductions or credits that are not included in a person's income because they're not allowed under 26 USC section two eighty e would be allowed to be included in adjusted gross income for purposes of this. So my reading on this is that it has these cannabis businesses starting at the same place as other businesses when their federal AGI kinda flows through to the household income calculation.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: So Kirby, I mean, you just said when it flows through to the household incomes, are you talking about corporate and business income taxes or personal income taxes that refers to a pass through income on a k one statement or something similar?

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah, this is going to typically be the pass through income. Could be sole proprietor, but yeah, that's how this will end up on a person's household income when for purposes of a property tax credit. The income will flow through to their personal income tax return, But if without this change, I think the thing that the department has called out is especially the cost of goods sold deduction at the federal level, which means all of the money that's spent on to purchase inventory for the business would be in the business's income taxes and would flow through, but there would be no deductions for all of all that was spent on fund the inventory. Yep. So this that's that's my understanding of what's trying to be trying to be corrected here. From what I can tell, it it would succeed. The the cost of goods sold deduction would decrease the businesses total AGI and therefore decrease the individual's AGI when it flows through or passes through I should say.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Would it require a separate special form then?

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: I would guess that

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: would The tax department

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: is joining us, so you don't have

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah. To The the department might have to amend existing forms.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah,

[Mark Higley (Member)]: Representative Higley. Am I still under understanding that this is strictly a cash business? I

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: think that's a good question for Pepper. Are Cannabis businesses in Vermont are banked. Yes, there are banks in Vermont that operate Or credit unions. Yeah, losing bank loses. With apologies to the banks, I mean, Credit unions, yes.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: But to that question, think you were asking, will they take payment by methods other than cash?

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: And the answer is yes.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: So, credit card processing.

[Mark Higley (Member)]: Again, I'm just looking at this income piece.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: And those are your questions for Pepper, knows more about how the field works. Any other questions for Kirby? Thanks Kirby, I really appreciate you joining us today.

[Kirby Keaton (Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah, well, hang in there, hope you feel better.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Thanks, you too. Hey, Rebecca. Thank you also for joining us from remote locations. Hi. Do you have anything to say about this bill or about early question or anything?

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Yes, for the record, Rebecca Samaroff, Deputy Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Taxes. I'm taking this testimony from Abby, who was much more well prepared than I was, but I know high level that we request, or I remember that we requested all these things and are psyched about them. And despite all of these things, I'm speaking about sections 24, twenty five, twenty six. The to the question of like form management, I actually had I think that this can be handled in the instructions in the form more so than like having to need a new line. And I did just also want to clarify that the cost of goods deduction, a cannabis business owner would be allowed to deduct for the purposes of household income, is already allowed for both corporate and personal income tax. Those get taken out of AGI. So this is just really, you know, it actually appears, I think, to be an oversight of, like, something that we weren't thinking about recommending at least in Act 164, because that's where we allowed the deduction and all these other places. And it really presents like an equity issue, I think, for business owners. Like any other business owner would be able to take these deductions and consider that when, you know, calculating the property tax credit and cannabis business owners can't until hopefully this becomes law.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: So Rebecca, you just said that currently current Vermont Tax Lab does allow cannabis operations to deduct cost of goods sold?

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: For personal income tax and corporate income tax, yes.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: So it's already in there. What is the other business expenses, whether it's rent or other operating expenses? I'm just trying to understand what we're capturing in this.

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: We just want to mirror what's already allowed for personal income tax and corporate income tax in the household income format, which doesn't, you know, the household income is built up from the ground up, basically, it's not, it's not a derivation of like AGI necessarily. So it would just be mirroring that same, that same, you know, the treatment that allows, like, because we just need to like, do a little proactive work in all of these spaces, personal income tax or corporate income tax or household income because of what is not allowed at the federal level. And so this would be like making that same proactive adjustment in the household income space. I'm not sure that fully answered your question.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: I'm just trying to figure out if this is specific only to what, form 122 and the calculation of total household income?

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: This proposal would be specific to the calculation of household income, correct.

[Carol Ode (Member)]: Okay, all right.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Thank you. For the purposes of calculating the property tax credit? Yeah.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Anyone else? For Deputy Commissioner Sumrall?

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Thank you. Anything else I wanna say? Go ahead. Do folks wanna chat about either of the other two sections, 25 or 26? I'm happy to summarize or answer questions.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: We went through them earlier this week, but if you have anything you wanna say about

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: them, they're okay. We love them. Think they'll make everything easy and straightforward. Thank you. Thank you. Thanks for the opportunity. Ted?

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Yes. Hello.

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: Okay. Debarnett, join fiscal office. Since you've already gotten the walkthrough, I'm gonna jump straight to the fiscal impact section. Bits and bobs kind of all over the place in terms of fiscal impacts. So first of all, just wanted to highlight that the package and transaction limits, in part, a lot of the bill initially was designed to make Vermont's regulated adult use market more attractive to people who may have been participating in the illicit market. So to the extent folks are the fact that they can buy more product in a specific package or make larger transactions at an adult use retail establishment, that may encourage them to participate in our market. And so it's tough to evaluate the fiscal impact of that, but it could increase the size of the market and consequently cannabis excise and sales tax revenues. The very minor part here is by increasing the possession limits, you could have fewer people who are getting cited for possessing cannabis. So would be civil penalties are handled by the judicial bureau, judiciary. And so that revenue would go to the state minus the $12.5 Administrative fee, it flows to the general fund Sorry, the administrative fee flows to the Court Technology Special Fund. It's like JFO doesn't estimate the fiscal impact of changes to fines and penalties. The event permits in section five would generate a maximum of $5,000 annually, of which that revenue would be split between municipalities and the cannabis regulation bonds. And that $5,000 would be generated for two years that the permits are in effect. Section 10A, which is the reduction of fees contingent on that revenue being made up. I'm going to skip to a table that would show if a transfer was made to the regulation fund, the fee decreases that would occur for each tier of cultivator. The fee amounts are cut in half. So for context here, outdoor cultivator tier one would be the smallest size of cultivator and the tier corresponds to a certain amount of canopy coverage. And so each fee in this fee schedule would be cut roughly in half. And so that would add up to just shy of $105,000 And that would be the amount that in the bill, if in order for these fee reductions to come into effect, a transfer of the same amount would have to be made to regulation fund. It's not part of the budget construct, so it seems very unlikely at this point, but commenting on that. And then, yes, you heard quite a bit. So glad experts talked about the definitional pieces and how changing the definition of household income would change the calculation of property tax credits. The Department of Taxes did a lot of legwork on the estimates, so I want to thank them for that. However, we did review it and frank consensus essentially, but this would have a minimal impact, pretty minimal on both the edge cases and offense. And then finally, potentially the most minimal thing I've commented on in my time at JFO, flagging it for you all, is the part of the bill section 27 would allow cultivators to form cooperative corporations and those pay a fee of $20 at incorporation or merger and for $10 for amendments to those filings. It's just when they merge or when they start up. And so you would see $20 here and there from that specific provision.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yep.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Present quickly. If you could explain to me again, when it counts about the $105,000 the general assembly appropriates it from or transfers it from where? Do the cannabis regulation form where?

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: It doesn't specify, but it would be the logical source for that money.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Any other questions for Ted? Anything else you want to talk?

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: I think that is basically it. I'm going through the background and details section, but it provides context for some of the information in the Oh, one additional piece is section 13 converts annual employee licenses of $50 under current law a two year license of $100 It doesn't change the amount of money that the control board would receive, just overall long term, but it does change the timing of those revenues. And so there are about 1,700 employees licensed by the control board.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: That's it. Thanks for your patience while we rescheduled you to five.

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: Next week will probably be crazy, so happy to interview.

[Mark Higley (Member)]: Thanks,

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Ben. Have a good weekend.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: James Masland, Chair of Cannabis Control Board. So just big picture, historically, the cannabis board, there's a miscellaneous cannabis bill every year. It's generally speaking, starts in the house and is just issues that the board has identified as either just oversights from the original legislation or addressing emerging issues. So mostly technical pieces Throughout the process, usually some industry focused or market expansion ideas get tacked onto that bill. That didn't happen this year. This is an s bill started in Senate Economic Development as opposed to House government operations. So their focus is always just a little bit different than the government operations committees. This really is I was kind of pitched as a market expansion bills slash with everything going on federally, we may see interstate commerce of cannabis products sooner than expected, possibly even as soon as this summer. So there was a desire in that committee also to start to harmonize some of the regulations between the various, at least New England states, the ones that touch the share of common border with Vermont, because that would be most likely pathway for interstate commerce. So you see things like raising the amount of THC that can be in a single package. You see the section on raising the amount you can purchase in a single transaction. You see the section on the interstate compacts. So there was a lot more in there. There was delivery licenses that's been whittled down to what you see before you. And I think a lot of the first sections around transaction limits in per package potency allowances are also gonna get cut by an amendment. We'll see. But so

[Carol Ode (Member)]: Yeah, I don't think there is.

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Oh, okay.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Hard to tell what's gonna go and what's not at this point. But essentially, there was only a small number of requests from the CCB in this bill, section 12. There's a local licensing fee. It's a $100 fee that we collect and remit to a local municipality that's hosting a cannabis establishment. We do that quarterly now. It's a bit burdensome to do that quarterly with the amount of licensees that we have. So we requested to make that an annual remittance. There was very little objection to that in any of the committees that worked this way, so any of the stakeholders that may be impacted. And then the only other thing that we asked for, we no longer have integrated licenses. Happy to kind of talk about what those are, but they appear in about six or seven different sections of law. So And we just asked to have the term integrated license struck from all of the statutes, both the Title VII statutes and then the tax statutes that refer to them. So that, I mean, truly just a housekeeping measure. We did talk to representative by wrong about an amendment, but because there was a shift in who was handling the bill and they kinda got jammed up, He requested that I bring it here instead. I don't know if you guys have time for it, but essentially, one thing that we noticed that we didn't have, and now that we're potentially taking on hemp, we realized that the Secretary of Agriculture does have this authority and it makes a lot of sense to have it, is when we have someone who's not paying a administrative penalty that we've assessed, we have no real collection authority over that. You know, we And it'd be nice to have I mean, essentially what could happen, especially if there is interstate commerce, is we could send administrative penalties to a company and they could just not pay it and just reincorporate it to someone else and try and just get out of paying an administrative penalty. So we have a section of law about how an aggrieved party can appeal a decision of the board. It would make sense to maybe stick it in there.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: We don't have any attorneys here right now. I mean, you're an attorney, but you can't draft for us. So I think my preference would be to vote it out, and then maybe we can do a floor amendment for you. Yeah.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I'd send it to Tucker, and then Sophie took over. Yeah. Yeah.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: If you could forward it to me, that would be cool.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah. I will.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Okay. Let's, for a moment, focus on the bill and then we can talk about the amendment. If that's okay? Do it. I was just curious about the recommendation. You're cutting in half the tiered outdoor licenses for you. I wondered why, just not a criticism, just a curiosity, you cut each of them in half, why you didn't do it on a curve or some sort.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: This was not a recommendation from us. I mean, there was a lot of testimony last year about reducing all the fees. And our role in that was really just helping JFO determine how much it would cost to do it. And then we were asked to write a report about it, and we kind of gave some analysis as to why you may want to cut outdoor cultivation fees, just given the relative profitability between an indoor and an outdoor cultivator. And I think there was a desire to not, I mean, just to make it simple. Sure. So, it wasn't all that well. But other than the fact that we wrote an extensive report about it, it was more just a convenience decision,

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I think. Did reduced fees work

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: for you? Oh, I mean, it furthers the gap between what our fees bring in and what our operating expenses are, which is always a sensitive subject in the appropriations committee. But it was also I mean, as you can tell from our report, our fees, no matter how high they are, are not gonna cover our operating expenses. And that's true of every single other cannabis regulatory authority. And it's just it costs more to regulate the industry than you can charge in fees. So usually every other state but ours backfills that gap with cannabis excise tax revenue. We use general fund revenue, but in some ways, it's kind of one pocket or the other pocket, doesn't really matter. But it will just kind of further highlight that, it will further exacerbate that difference between what the fees bring in and what our budget is. But, again, just the policies. And we think it'll be about $100,000 if you do this. This doesn't touch the mixed cultivators, which are primarily outdoor cultivators that have a little bit of indoor space. So that way, if you were to include them in this halving, so if you just have the outdoor portion of their mixed tier, it would be $170,000

[Carol Ode (Member)]: What's that? They wouldn't have to pay.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: If you just the the the mixed year is just a mashing up of these outdoor fees that you see plus a thousand square feet of indoor camping. So you just take these fees and add the two fees together, and it would be an additional roughly $70,000 if you wanted to include the mixed tiers.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Do you ever compare, I mean, like small cultivator fees in Vermont as to what other states are charging? Yes. How do these fees compare?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: It is in the report, which I will send to

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: you, and

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: it has a comparison of, I think, 10 other states. It's got charts and it's

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: No,

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I wouldn't expect you to, it's pretty dry.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: We know dry. I think it was requested.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah, we're a little bit higher on per square foot basis.

[Carol Ode (Member)]: Even

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: at our smallest tier? Our smallest tier is the most equal to our others, but it just varies. I mean, people have different priorities, and they set their speeds. Every state does it a little bit differently. You did sign

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: the report,

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: so I don't know.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: You already sent it. Thank you.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I sent it a while ago. Was directed to this committee, so I sent it to you guys back.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Someone else had a question for you about how something worked, and

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: I don't remember what the question was.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: We require everyone to have a deposit account, every licensee have one. And most debit cards work at the retail level, but everyone has at least a checking account, so they pay. I don't think the tax department accepts cash from cannabis businesses, so I think most people are paying checks.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Was your question about inventory versus deposits or no? That's my question. I have a question, love. Do you do any sort of auditing of Or does the tax department, are you aware Tax of

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: department does a lot of auditing, yes, and then they send us referrals for enforcement actions. And

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I know how expensive being forced to be a cash ish business is for these businesses. I don't think it's a preference. Did you have another sentence in order to?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Just the permit fees, that's squarely in this committee's jurisdiction. It's currently set at $500 with a fiftyfifty split between the town that's hosting the event and the mechanics of pool board.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: And did you have an opinion about that you were about

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: to speak? It certainly is gonna cost us more than $250 to regulate them. But again, we're gonna require that these events be insured. That insurance policy is likely gonna cost $5,000 I can tell at a minimum. So if you actually want any of these things to happen, whether you want to or not, you can't make them so expensive that no one's gonna do it. So I think for the sake of a pilot, I think it's certainly fine with us. And when we have to write a report about it, we can write a report about what it actually cost us to regulate this, to license it,

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: to oversee

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: it, and then you can decide what the future should be. Yeah, I think, James, you answered the question, but I heard Sarah say or imply that auditing cash for business is typical or expensive, something like that. No, what I was saying was

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: that running a cash business can actually be quite difficult and expensive.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Auditing would also be pretty difficult then, I guess, that reason. Thank you. Yes, either way. Anyone

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: else have any questions for Pepper?

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: But I just want to point out your report is proposal for fees and appropriations for fiscal year 2027 is on the legislative website. It's quite extensive, so thank you. 23 pages in case anybody's bored.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Thank you very much, Pepper. I really appreciate it.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah, thank you. And I'll just send you that email with the possible amendment.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Thank you. Appreciate it. Does anyone need anything else for testimony on this? No. Okay, cool. In that case, I would appreciate a motion to sign two seventy eight favorable.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Sure, I would move that we find draft 2.1, amendment 2.1 to S-two 78 favorable.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Thank you. It's not L Rep. It's It's

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Sounds good, Version? The Version 2.1,

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: doesn't it? Think it was the bill as we received it. Yes. Okay. Representative Kimbell moves that we find S-two 78 favorable. Is there any discussion? Yes. Representative Hublard.

[Mark Higley (Member)]: Chair Hublard, I'll probably find this surprising, I kind of used up my one cannabis vote last year. Matter of fact, now on H3 21, I think I presented the ways of being. There's a number of issues that I don't support.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: It one for biennium? I'm sorry? Is it one for biennium?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Oh, an

[Mark Higley (Member)]: acunal, it all depends on what

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: it is, I guess. Oh, okay.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I like that name for things. Else have anything to say? Any more discussion? Great. Oh, yep.

[Carol Ode (Member)]: I'm concerned about it going to doubling for the purposes of the content of this committee. You'll vote? I will vote yes on this committee, but I'm concerned about the increase.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: And the dosage you're talking about?

[Carol Ode (Member)]: Yes, I do not favor that, but that's for the floor. Okay. I think people can

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: just buy two packages. Pardon? Yeah, yeah, we can agree or disagree on that, Representative Ode. Any further discussion? Seeing none, the clerk please call the roll. Sure. Thanks.

[Bridget Burkhardt (Clerk)]: Representative Branagan? Yes. I'll vote yes. Is Representative Burkhardt? Representative Higley?

[Mark Higley (Member)]: No. Representative Holcombe? Yes. Representative Kimbell? Yes.

[Charles Kimbell (Ranking Member)]: Representative Masland? Yep. Representative Ode? Yes. Representative Page is not here.

[Bridget Burkhardt (Clerk)]: Representative Waszazak? Yes. Representative Canfield?

[William Canfield (Vice Chair)]: Yes.

[Bridget Burkhardt (Clerk)]: I represent Kornheiser? Yes. We have voted the favorable nine eleven.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Nine-one-one. Thank you, everyone. Represent Waszazak, you work? One more minute, please. Yep. Thank And then, floor amendment. I already forgot what you said. It was for Pepper. Can we join us again?

[Rebecca Samaroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Sorry.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: Will you tell us what you want me to know?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I had it up on my laptop. It's a one line that just authorizes the board to seek a civil order to collect a fee. It's exact same authority or sorry, an administrative penalty. It's the exact same authority that the Secretary of Agriculture has currently for a lot of their administrative penalties. And it just you've actually already granted us this. Well, not yet. It's in the miscellaneous agriculture bill because you're moving a lot of title six over to title seven around hemp. It's already included for hemp administrative penalties. But we just don't have it for cannabis. I think this would fall into the category of one of the original oversights in 2020 because this is a kind of well established authority for agriculture. You know, we haven't It's starting to become more relevant, especially when we may have out of state products and out of state companies moving things to state. But I know it's very late in the session.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I know that this marketplace is one where regulation needs to happen really carefully, given sort of the still longstanding desire to bring people in from the illicit market and folks who've previously been in the illicit market have different experiences of enforcement. And so I'm curious how you think the field will perceive this

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: extension of authority. Yes. I mean, what we've seen a few times is we've seen an area where someone's done something pretty egregious. We've imposed a penalty on them. And instead of paying the penalty, they've relinquished their license and just reverted back to or something along those lines. So it'd be nice to have this authority just so that people aren't tempted to do something bad until they get caught and then just disappear. But, again, I recognize the legislative calendar.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I'm happy to put forward that amendment. I'd love to put it would be a floor amendment, I think. Because we would put We're gonna submit this and then do that. Who would like to sign on to it? Sure. There Should we discuss it first? Or questions for Pepper? Anyone? Is it just a committee amendment? I don't don't think we can do a committee amendment. It would just be all the committee members on the amendment.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Sure. Alright.

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: I know it's weird. It's okay.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Okay. Are

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: you interested in amending it for penalties, which would have a standup hole check? Okay. Okay. So everyone in favor of putting forward that amendment? Yes. Okay. Great. Thank you all. Thank you, Pepper. You'll send me the thing and I'll get adopted.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: The Ledges, I can just send it to you.

[Ted Barnett (Fiscal Analyst, Joint Fiscal Office)]: Just send it to

[Emilie Kornheiser (Chair)]: me and I'll figure it out. Thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you everyone for staying till floor. Really appreciate