Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Blessed be good. Good morning. It's Tuesday, March 10. We are Shine Agriculture back in action after a week off. They're between town meeting or after town meeting. We just got a little bit of We're going to spend some time talking a few minutes about where we are with our miscellaneous bill S-three 23. We're going to pivot to talking to some farmers who've been harmed with current use stuff. Don't want to steal their thunder, but in discussions with Vice Chair. First of all, want to go around the room, let's cut Mary, and introduce who we are.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Yeah, Brian Collamore, represent the Rutland District. And I'm Robert Plunkett, Bennington District. Steven Heffernan, Addison County District.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: Joe Major, Windsor District. Senator Russ Ingalls, Northeast Kingdom.

[Linda (Committee Assistant)]: I'm in the lenient committee assistant.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Okay, so just as you guys, as the committee knows, we have a very expansive miscellaneous bill. I think we're actually in pretty good shape, but the pressure is nonetheless there. We're still getting a lot of advocacy throughout the whole bill. I think that we have to be real as far as what we think we can get done. The crown jewel of that bill is to protect farmers against municipal zoning. I think we're in a really good spot with that. For those folks that haven't followed us all along, Supreme Court made a decision that brought municipal zoning back into regulating farming. It was a longstanding tradition or thought that that just wasn't the case. Supreme Court and what I think was their wisdom basically said, Hey, listen, if you think that you're exempt from municipal zoning, then you need to say that. I think that we've got to that point. I want to also call out, we've lost the Legion Towns. We've worked closely with that along with the Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets and I think that we're all in agreement. I also want to bring in that the advocacy groups are over Vermont, the NOVAs, a of the other, all the farm bureau, think that they worked really well and all brought very important issues into this bill. I think we're going be in a pretty good place. We got some got some help. Anybody want to anybody? How does anybody feel about that? Everybody feel we're in a pretty good place with one through three? I think the next bill is going to be we're working to bring more farmers into hemp growing with some protections. A lot of people that are in the hemp business, the federal government's kind of starting to step away from regulating hemp. We have a lot of people that are in the hemp business with products that are demanding, which is very rare, demanding that we get regulation for them. The reason why they're doing that isn't because they're self abusers, but the fact is that they are being asked for by national markets to say, Hey, where are you guys? Where are you at? We need to make sure that if we partner with you that we're all kept safe. Again, we've got a lot of input from a lot of different people. I think we're going to get a pretty good bill out that is going to still allow for conversations after. This committee has been very clear about where we stand with hemp or even marijuana. That is that we want to make it so that if our farmers want to grow that, they want to put their hands in the soil and they want to grow those products, that there's no difference why that's growing in the field, that they're to grow carrots, that we want them to be able to grow it, deduct all expenses, all of that. We do realize that once that product crops the road, then it gets into a different entity and they're going to be under different, which basically is going be the Cannabis Control Board. But again, we've worked really closely with the Cannabis Control Board. We're not being adversarial in any way and again there's still a lot of opinions coming in about a lot of different stuff but what we pack will not stop the conversations from going forward and again we've been very clear about we do not have a problem as far as just being with the farmers and letting the cannabis control board do with what they do, but that if we ever feel that farmers are being disadvantaged in any way, we have the ability to write bills and to make sure that these farmers are protected and everywhere they need to be. We have a solar siting that we're going to take some more, maybe possibly some more testimony tomorrow, we're certainly on to see where we are, where we're going to be headed with the solar siting. We're getting a lot of pushback, feedback. Really, if I was to bet anyone anything about where we're going to be with that bill, I still do not know and I don't know if the committee knows but we'll figure that out in this coming week about where we're going to be. For the people that haven't been watching what we're doing, we're very concerned about the solar companies citing solar products in prime ag land. We've had a lot of testimony on that. We are not anything against green energy at all. In fact, support it 100%. Everything has a place. In action of Act two fifty we've lost 56% of our farmland and there is models out there now that shows that if we continue down the same path of where we're at that we are looking at twenty years of losing most of our farmland. We don't think that that is true. All we have to do is look to our South and our East and our West and look at some of our neighboring states and to see the pressures that have been put on. We are not, again, trying to dictate what farmers do with their land but if we want to be a food hub resiliency for the Northeast, all of the Northeast, we have to maintain for all the rest of our years of our lives and then our kids lives and their kids lives that there is soil to grow food with We are very committed to that. Very delicate. I don't know what we can get done with this bill. The worst case is that we've raised awareness of what is important to, I think, most Vermonters. People come to Vermont to see wide open fields growing all kinds of product whether it's to feed cows or humans or whatever or to manufacture other products. I can tell you this, I can promise you this, they do not come to see solar fields. That is our thought as far as on that. I think that is in a, to be addressed, obviously, other parts of the bill that I think that we are looking good with, but I've tasked Senator Major, Vice Chair Senator Major, to keep us on track with this and where we want to get a vote out on Thursday on this bill, and if not, we have Friday left over, but it's imperative that we get done what we can get done and get this bill out to meet crossover. Everybody good? Yep. Okay, next, again, as I said at the start of the committee, we have a very important topic that's going on. We have a group of farmers in here that have been kind of left behind a little bit when they're putting up new farm structures and there's more to it. I don't want to steal the thunder of it, but the gist of it is that some of these farmers have gotten big bills because of properties, new constructions that have been left off their current use roles. It used to be that towns had more involvement in listers coming around and reminding these farmers that hey, you gotta make sure that that structure is under current use and there's more to that than just what I'm saying. I'm going to just quit talking and bring the next panel of people forward. Who would like to start off?

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Come on up.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: So I wanna start by a big set of variables, the rest of the committee for inviting me here today to testify. My name's Rutland Chapman. Me and my brother, Mike, own Chapman Family Farms. It's a farm up in North Detroit, Vermont. Been there for over thirty years now, and we've been farming together for forty seven years now. So I'd say we milk 1,500 cows three times a day. We've got 30 employees and we own 5,000 acres. So what I did, we had an incident with current use that left us a little stunned. And so what I've done is I made a timeline of how that all played out. I made copies for everyone. Agree. Asking.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: And Linda, we have right door door to room, right? Yes. Okay. Good.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Thank you. So what started was we we built a new barn. I understand all of those facilities there we had built from scratch. It's nothing that we had to earn when we first moved there. And so we built a new facility starting June '4. Now, this facility was attached to our gardens. And anything that we've attached in the past, it wasn't as large as this, or anything we've attached in the past, we've made adjustments to our application, but we've never had to file a whole brand new application. They were pretty much kind of rolled in. And so we kind of assumed that this new barn would do the same thing because the cows in the new barn do go to the older barns to get milked every time today, so it is part of the farms. But it

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: wasn't a freestanding barn at all, that just was built off into the hinterlands and was part of the existing structure.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Yeah. And then the other thing is we also have all of our property in Vermont Land Trust. I think actually we're the largest private farm in Vermont Land Trust. And so by their statutes, we can't build anything but farm buildings on our property. So it can be a commercial operation. It to be identified as farm. So anyways, in June '4, we started building the barn. And then the next timeline I'll jump to is December 5, the farmland barn is completed and moving the imp cows into the operation. Unbeknownst to us, if we would have wanted to be part of the current use program, we would have had to file the application before 09/01/2024, when the environment was only one third completed. Now I don't know how you do that, file an application for something that's not completed yet. And then also the towns don't always accept a application if it hasn't been completed at that point. So you're already under the gun there. And then on 05/20/2025, the first attachment that I gave you was I received notification from the town of Troy that there was a five percent increase in our assessment of $358,000 and it didn't set up any alarm bells or anything because it was 5% increase, so I figured it's inflationary. So I didn't get, and it didn't indicate in any way that the barn had somehow been thrown into that, and I believe the tax, because we also get rid of our listers, which was a big mistake, and we got outside assessors now, so they're not town connected in that way. So anyways, when they did that assessment, I'm not sure when that took place. And so nothing popped up in May 20 that alerted me that we've got a tax issue here. And then September 1 rolled around, again, we missed our second deadline, unannounced to us. Then on September 5 is when we got our tax bill, and again, when we used to have listers in the county, we used to get those tax bills in July, so we would have been notified before the second time the second deadline went by if we still would have had our listers. But with these new assessors, it now takes longer for them to get things to the town if they can get them to us. So when I got it now, if you look at the next attachments I have, the tax bill went from 10/9724 to forty two thousand and twenty five. So a $31,000 increase. And obviously, now I know we've got an issue. Thought it was a clerical mistake or something. And so I reached out to them and then that's when they explained to me that the bill, the part had been assessed and it was now on the rolls. So I asked to talk to Matt, and I won't try to butcher his last name, Krutland District, who is now the assessor, and he did reach out to me, and we had a sit down talk, and I explained, you know, why when you came to appraise the barn, why didn't you say anything to me? And he goes, Well, we know by law we don't have to. It's up to you to remember all these things about current use. And I'm like, I can't remember all of them. And I have to admit, that's one thing about current use is I feel like the way the program is set up, and I'm not in any way blaming the people who run it, they're even the things that they're even gonna work with, is the way the program has been set up, it's like there's a ton of trip wires out there waiting for you to trip over them, and this is one of those. Somehow we were supposed to know that because the barn was, I guess, they were bigger, we had to do a whole new old application. We thought it would just be part of the old application, kind of rolled into it. So anyways, I said, I agree with you, Matt, by law, you probably didn't have to let me know that. But it would have been nice for, as a navel y gesture, stop by the front of the office as you're leaving after assessing the barn and say, Hey, by the way, you've to get that thing, fill an application out for it, or mention it to the town clerk. And she would have sent it to me because I know her very well. And I said, Just something like that. And he goes, Well, you know what, Rutland, I agree with you. I should have done that. We should have done that. But I guess we kind of slipped up on that one. I said, Well, your slip up cost us $31,000 If you had, it would have been some way we've got some notification that because it's a new barn, a bigger barn, you need to redo an application, we would have done it. But, you know, we didn't have that opportunity. And, so

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: really because of clerical error,

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: it costs you 30.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: I'm a third player on the hard part.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Right. Right. And but if you if you if you had done that, then the you would not have had to pay the 30. Correct.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: It we would have I think what would have okay. So Alan Thompson sits behind She me runs our current use program, and and we're in agreement that probably what would have happened is if we would have known that we were had to file application for this this structure, would have filed it with the town. They probably would have like put it on the wall and just left it there until the bar was completed. Then they would have filled it through, and so likely we would not have paid, had to pay the 31,000 But what really sustains us right now, because we missed that second deadline, we're on the hook for another $31,000 this coming year, because we missed it by, well, September 5 is when I got the bill, so it was five days that we missed it by, because we were notified five days after that. So we're in, we're on the hook for that as well. I did file an appeal with current use program and it was rejected. So we ended up paying the $31,000 Why did they reject you? They just said that, Hey, you didn't file all the insurance. It's not an excuse to file. Basically, yes. Know, it was up to you to know that. On the dairy farm, because we haul our own milk, so I said, this dairy farm, could probably count 15 to 17 agencies I have to deal with. The DOT and USDA and on and on and on and on, and I do not know every single bit. I mean, I'm the only person that does all the administrative work on this farm. I cannot know all this stuff. And so one reason we hired Alan to take over something. But anyways, that's, yeah, that was the reason for doing that. So I'm not only here, I guess I feel Well, go ahead.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Go ahead. No, you go ahead. No, you make

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: a I

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: just feel that they're happy because I also, we deal very closely with Shane St. Cyr of Adirondack Farms in New York, And I called him on this just the other day, and I said, I have to know, what is it? How does it work in New York? I mean, and I explained to him what went on, he was confused. He goes, I understand what you're talking about, right? He goes, If we build a barn, it's automatically grown. We don't have to file an application. We don't have to do anything. It automatically goes into our tax rules. All of this that you're talking about, and I explained the forms that have to get sent in, that get sent out every year. On our farm, because of the properties we have, I think I get 14 or 16 different releases that we have to sign. And worse, they're sent to different addresses based on who owns it, like it's privately owned or the firm owns. So we have all of these out there. Luckily, every year we've caught those. Explained that to him. He's like, wow, you have one confusing system out there in Vermont.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Well, lawyers are running it. So this, what I was gonna ask is the simple fix to this is to just as you start construction on a barn, whether you have to get a permit or whatever, that would trigger at that point in time your enrollment into the current use to keep you compliant. That would take care

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: of it right there. I mean, at the very minimum, you know, the first year as you're building should be forgiven. I mean, because you're in the middle of construction. Once it's completed, then that makes, okay, now I've to file an application, but, you know, even if we had done that, we would have missed that first deadline, so we ended up paying the $31,000 so, but your suggestion would, you know, once, if it's a farm building, it's a farm building. You know, you shouldn't, like D. A. R, you shouldn't have to put up a whole new application. Because like this year we're actually building onto one of the other barns that's we're going to double the size of it. In the past, we've done that in the past, and it's never triggered anything. But we're not taking any risk this year, we're going to file it before September 1, even though we feel like it's never been a problem in the past, but so

[Unidentified Committee Member]: You think of 31,000 reasons why you're filing it now? Yes. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Soren, did you have to do anything with Act two fifty? No.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Okay. That's an important question.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Because that would have probably at least triggered something for you to say, Uh-oh, maybe something else might be happening here.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: I agree.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: There was nothing there. Much like if you put a new bedroom on your house or you put a, you know, you expanded the attic or whatever, you expect that the value of that property will increase by some number, if it's appraised. I mean, that's the way things go, and then your tax bill would be similarly affected. Is any of the 31 penalty stuff, or

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: is it just that's the new tax on it? That's the new tax on it. Wow.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: These numbers. Yeah. If you would have got it under, just for our education, Reg, if you would've got it under the way it's supposed to work, what do you think your tax would've been?

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: So we, right now, we pay, this raised our tax bill from, I want say, right around $87,000 to $114,000 I'll do the math, it's $31,000 more, but I think it's about $114,000

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: If you would have got it under the right way, what would

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Around 87. 87, okay. Yeah, okay.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Okay. Just again, education for us. We had said that, okay, well, if you start construction, then you would automatically be rolled into the program automatically. Is there another trigger in there as well, in case you missed the first one? Is there another trigger that would be valuable to have?

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: I'm gonna let Alice speak to those, because I think he's better versed than I would be.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: So Reg, on land trust, how often do they, are they in contact with you, or is it you have to contact them?

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: You have to contact them. And how many people up in

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: your area work for the land trust?

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Nobody in our area. Nobody in Montpelier that we deal with, yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: It's from Montpelier? Correct. Okay, so they don't have somebody for your county that kind of keeps an eye on what's going on in that? No. Because it's like, that's a big barn. Right. You know, there should be, I almost think it's on land trust as well to check-in with their members once, especially big, big farms. Right.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: What's going on? What are you

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: What's going on? What's happening here? Yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: It's surprising that nobody knew about this barn being built till it was built.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Yeah. What really shocked me was the assessment going up $358,000 Keep in mind that this was a $4,000,000 market.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: So you got a deal

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: So it was, I think in our updated balance sheet, we got a $2,000,000 paid it was half price, what we got. So I don't know what the town assessed it for, but I'm sure it wasn't $358,000 But if this assessment, May 20 that I received had gone up a million dollars or something like that, then I'll be like, okay, now this is not an inflationary result or a result Do of

[Unidentified Committee Member]: you think that, you mentioned that the local assessor doesn't have anything to do with it anymore, we brought some outside people in. I have to think that that's part of the reason A big part. For your dilemma. Yeah.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Yeah. It definitely is. The Town Of Newport Center, which have our lands in, and the Town of North Troy or Troy both did that. It was the same here. They brought in the the same assessor. And again, nothing against that, but it definitely broke down the whole relationship that we had before beforehand. Yeah.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Prince, is there anything else at this moment that you'd like to ask or know?

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: I think that's about it for right now, but I'm just hoping- Probably enough. That's an update. I'm hoping that there's some way also that we can address- The September 1. Yeah, the upcoming September 1. I'm not saying to do this, so I'm glad it's done. Okay. Thank you. You.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Welcome, Kiwala. Thanks.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: My name is Allison from Waterbury, Vermont. Primarily, I serve as a consulting forester, but other hats, certified wildlife biologist and board president of Vermont Wild Woodlands Association of Wildland Zandler advocacy group. But as a private consulting forester, we're often taking the role of managing current use enrollments. I manage chat with farms enrollment for 100 other farm enrollments dealing with mapping, building enrollments, forest planning, etcetera. We're in a unique position and probably one of the only positions to be preparing some of those documents. We've just found consulting force, which a family niche, to be doing that. So we deal a lot as intermediaries between the tax department and. So we see a lot of issues that come up, a lot of even buildings that come up or building enrollments or farmland enrollment issues that the tax department asks or has more often to folks that answer some of the more detailed questions. I'm here to one corroborate Reg's story and also suggest that it's not unique to Reg, that new buildings are built all the time, and that they're a lax but clear procedure from the tax department and how to do that. There's really good procedure about how to enroll land. You can't enroll it until you own it. When does a new building become owned? By

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: the fund.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: When the first stick arrives, when the last stick gets hammered in, there's no real good procedure for that. So I'd like to reinforce the idea that a new procedure or a procedure would would be beneficial to avoid this this type of taxation. I think we followed any any and all rules that we knew and were aware of. And had we been very proactive, we would have been taking advantage of the goodwill, even so with black Cedar taking advantage of goodwill at both the town and the town's apartment, assuming goodwill existed.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Alan Yeah? Did you start for them after this or during? Were you

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: I've got probably a fifteen year tenure with the fund. Okay. Great. Okay. Thanks. And and I would've suggested that there wouldn't have been a need to enroll a new building until it shows up on the assessment in the same way that that applies to any acreage on. You can't enroll something unless it's a taxed entity. It's not the current use's role to define what's owned or what is being taxed. Current use is just if you own it and if it's taxed, we want it to be we wanna enroll it, have it be taxed with the use of it. There's just a procedure mishmash there that that doesn't exist. The senate bill has written proposed solution, enrolled old new buildings presuming they're under the agriculture abuse. That does sidestep a current procedure that's required for landowners. One, landowners need to elect that they want the building to be enrolled. Two, that that maps show all enrolled buildings. So there would be it have to be a a procedural amendment as to how buildings are enrolled right now in order for for this bill to move forward. I I have a couple other alternatives to the bill as written. The first alternative, using an example of how landowners are notified when they acquire new land. If I buy a piece of property that's enrolled in current use, that triggers notifications from the town to the state to the landowner that says, you've acquired land that's enrolled in current use. Would you like to maintain enrollment? Have thirty days to file all the required paperwork. That letter recognizes the current procedure. You check all your appropriate boxes. Everybody's happy. No procedure exists for new buildings because there is no process by which the town notifies the state notifies. However, it would seem like a procedure like that would happen if the state were notified that you have an enrolled farmer who's building an agricultural building. It's changed their assessment. Would you like to enroll this? Please file paperwork. Could've done that easily. And it doesn't apply to it. It it would apply to the current tax year, not some upcoming next tax year. Yeah. That's true for the land, and it could just be true for the land. So that alternative is just simple. Create a mechanism for towns and notify the state to notify the landowners. So I can also reinforce the idea that's just a weird tripwire that just makes it look complicated just to be informed. The alternative too is to recognize the complication of the system and symptomize it. Current use says that agricultural buildings can be enrolled if they're used for agriculture. Right now, landowners have to elect to enroll them. They have to identify them on the map and identify them by name on the application. That they're doing so following a listers, town listers' card that would list all the buildings that they own. For example, the Chappell family barn home owns 30 buildings on the listers' card. The barns, sheds, halofs, milking parlors, free stalls, etcetera. Reg, where do these buildings exist? Well, I don't know. There's a few barns. There's definitely barns here, but in that barn is that's where the we have halof and the milking parlor, and he's got three barns that are together, but that one bar. That's what the you know, there's there's not a lot of good communication between all the parties responsible for maintaining the current municipal town, state, landowner, at 100.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Never mind they're in different towns as well. Correct? They've got,

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: probably twice as many buildings in Troy. And I'm sure that the other gentleman behind you have similar complicated ownerships ownership structures as well. So the alternative is that it's similar to what's already written, but it simplifies you to prefer. It just says all buildings are the role if they're used for agriculture. We have a system in place that towns identify those buildings. There's a list. It's pretty darn easy to determine which buildings are used for agriculture, which buildings aren't. There's probably, some financial implications, some tax implications to doing to make them that simplification because as the complicated system is handled, of many of the farms that I work with, their understanding, and I think that their enrollment is inadequate, at worst, inaccurate, because the systems in play don't provide for clear understanding of of what they own and what they're allowed to enroll. And so the the proposal is lacking any good procedure about how to understand what they own, what you can enroll, and how to keep track of it all from accounts for a second and how to speak that language. All buildings are unwell if they're under something huge. Just go to a simple, simple task. That solution the the first problem I've identified is the new building issue, but this does really apply to all buildings, not Senators, I'll let his girlfriend off what he's referencing. So This problem, I think, is bigger than just new buildings, old buildings. The way that farms have been operating, there's farm consolidation. It puts huge burdens on towns to keep track of this stuff, huge burdens on the property value which you keep track of this stuff. Every town has a different mechanism to keep track of it, different lanes, different structures. And when I'm asked to provide current use services, I have zero guidance to do that as it relates to the not zero. That's that's unfair. It's very difficult. This procedure is unclear for me to follow. At minimum, I would encourage the committee to request improved procedures around building blocks. As written, I think the solution satisfies the Chappaquin Farms.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Anyway. So you're saying that to simplify it just, if it's used for ag, just to fall under agricultural use, Is that what I'm gathering to Correct.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: To my knowledge They

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: don't have to, they're breaking it down in categories right now where we could just put an umbrella out. The farmer's using it as an agricultural building. That's all it's called.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: Yeah. The child family farm has under their nomenclature, they've got a barn. Under the town's nomenclature, they've got a barn, a free stuff called an office, a a restaurant, let's say, and all have, like, different different valuations. Even though it's

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: all just being used for agriculture?

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: It's one giant roof, all used for agriculture. And because of the the way that the things get added onto and then if you go to the county and say, well, where is that free stall? They don't know. They that that determination was made twenty, thirty years ago. They don't they have no visual reference for where that structure exists. And then you get into some circular issues because then they'll pull out the map that I made. I'm gonna wear some freestyle on your map.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: It's a wall. Right here, son. Oh, right.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: I think probably right there. You know, I don't know what a freestyle is. It's not really what the sugar maple is.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: And I and I think to many the part that I'm swirling around within my brain is is that for people, lack

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: of

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: labeling, or whatever, should you have a non farm structure building on there, they seem to be aware of it as we're finding out over and over and over again. To have a farm structure building that they claim ignorance about is kind of disturbing a little bit, that they don't know anything about it, but let it be something that they want to play music in when they're not storing hay in it and they seem to know all about it. That's kind of where I'm at a little bit with some of that. Certainly, as Alan has said, at the very least, changing some language to being that if it's on the premise, it is a farm structure, and let them come in as they have, that we're battling with that part of it as well, tell us that it's not a farm structure.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: If I may provide more context to enroll in farm buildings, not everybody can enroll a farm building. In order to enroll a farm builder, you have to be call a qualified farmer. That's a determination made by the tax department based on your income. If ignore 50% of your income off the sale of farm products, you're a qualified farmer. If you're a qualified farmer, you can enroll your farm buildings. I'm not a

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: qualified farmer. Sorry. FaceTime hasn't asked before. I

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: can't. Serial light shift. So the presumption that farm buildings can be enrolled doesn't apply fact, it applies to the farmers. Farmers won't. You enroll a building, your taxes on that building are zero. It's exempt from taxation regardless of the balance. So it's not a kind of it is it going much is it going up or down? It's a pure tax structure. Of all of the farmers, qualified farmers that I work with, I cannot think of one example of a structure on their property that is not a farm building. Universally true. They don't have bolognese. They don't have creamy standards. They don't have whatever else. And they might play guitar, but that's only the last week of the

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: year when they're at it.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Anything else, sir? In road trip time. Actually, thank Thank you, Al. Appreciate it.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Who'd like to read that, Glenn? Mark Wood. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, you, Mr. Committee for taking the time to be visible to us. It's appreciated. My name is Mark Ingalls. I farm with two of my brothers, three of my boys, they're 17, 21.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: I get to walk alongside

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: of them, set both days there, two or three steps ahead of me, but that's the fun part. We've got 1,500 cows at our farm. It's a farm where my grandfather emigrated from Canada, and my father used to remember the days when they milked six cows by hand. It was never in a blueprint plan to milk that many cows that we are, but as neighboring farms went out of business, we acquired all their buildings and but made it part of one unit instead of one of 11 kids, instead of all of us going out on our own and working, we three brothers decided to work together. So that's how we amassed the One Melking center. We now are investing in putting in 10 robots on our farm, with new technology and the next generation coming, we are trying to position the farm to keep producing the dairy on our farm. So I'm here today because a little bit different than Reg. I am the executor along with my brother of our parents' estate, and what we found, which we did not know about, is the name change going from some of the parcels that they own their names to my brother's Terry, and in the process of the lawyer changing those names, he never got anything from the tax department or the state of Vermont saying, because the name changed, you were gonna be thrown out of current use. Now, the tax department is stating that in July they sent us a certified letter saying that when I tried getting ahold of them to say, all right, who signed for it and what day was it sent, we had no idea. And I thought that was a whole idea of sending a certified letter, but they are saying at the current use administration, they do not track that. The other big red flag for us, I got an email and my lawyer, her lawyer got an email about this situation as well, and it was an encrypted email. I saw it, I thought it was spam, so I threw it away. My lawyer tried opening it up and it took about two months, he said, to get it, and that was in February that he opened it up. But why is the tax department sending an encrypted email that was, it had a seven day timeframe on that we had to respond. Wanted, at one point the town clerk in Fairfield worked very hard on our behalf to help solve this problem. She was texting me, calling me nearly every day, saying, Hey, you gotta do this, you gotta do that, and one of the issues was they wanted a tax, income tax form with state or mom, gets those every year, but we send them in the day they ask for it and we get a response amongst later saying they were too ill. So in talking to our town coordinators, asked, all right, we missed a deadline, right, put it all on us, so how do we grieve this? And she said, There is no formal grievance form from the current Houston administration to grieve any of their decisions. And far be it for me, was kind of appalled that I didn't I mean, in such Vermont is not a big state, I never thought we were that far from the people that govern us. Why can't we talk to someone and say, All right, we made a mistake. Need to fix this.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Who do we work with?

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: How do we solve this? So I called, after knowing there's no grievance form, I called a number that our forester, who does all of our work with, fills out all the forms just as Reg works with his forester, and Addison, who called down to the State Department many times, could not get ahold of anyone to return the calls, I couldn't be there. As matter of fact, just as proof, I called three times, and the third time I took a screenshot of my phone, and it's on hold for two hours and ten minutes with no one that will answer it, and no way to leave a voicemail for somebody to call you back. So that's why I really ask you, how do you solve problems like this once you know you have a problem when you can't even get anyone to call you back? And that's where I really question, do we really have that big of a government that taxpayer has an issue that we can't solve this? So I think the key word here, what French use is, they're out to trick you, but yet they don't want to solve the problem. And in our case, because we missed the deadline, I didn't even know we missed it on behalf because know, when you hire a lawyer, you think the lawyer's gonna take care of it for you? Well, it cost us 45,000 because they took all of the buildings out of current use. We're back in now, and I was working on this issue over a year with the tax department, and so now the town this November was looking for their money, And I said, Well, we're still trying to solve this problem because I have to

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: look back for them.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: He said, Well, if you don't, you're gonna be delinquent on that $45,000 life span. So you either pay it or, I gotta tell you, when it's an office $15 a $100, it's kind of hard to come up with that kind of money. So I don't think I might disagree a little bit with what Reg said, I don't think our employees are working that hard on our behalf. Because you certainly can answer your phone or return a phone call. Not once did they ever. And our county forester did talk to this gentleman that I was trying to get ahold of, and his simple answer to her was, I didn't think it was a big deal. I didn't call him. And that is a statement, Floyd, that answered Alison that way. So, in essence, I'm not here, I know you as a committee cannot write rules to solve every issue on the books, but I will say this much, I believe our tax department and I believe the current use administration, certainly ought to be able to answer the phone if constituents have questions for me and how to solve a problem, and why don't they have a grievance program or a formal form that you could follow. As you could hear, I'm not the only one that has run into issues with their governance.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: Had a friend that had

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: the same thing. Parents died, built a house, didn't realize it was security abuse, it was a real pain to finally get a church straightened out and very poor contact with people. Well, I'm not

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: a lawyer. I mean, I'm a primer first. I don't wake up in the morning and sit down in front of my computer and answer emails, I go to work. And farm arts are a lot of things. Environmentalists, they're cow people, they're they're they're a lot of things. Computer tech guy, I remember. Leave that up for your sensors. Oh, they tell me. So I'll answer any questions, but in a nutshell, that was One big question I have is why do they try and kick you out of the program randomly? Once you're in it, you should be in it. The buildings, the farm is enrolled. Why are they always questioning you know, on an annual basis? How

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: hard is that on an annual basis? Is it just, I wanna stay in current use, or

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: is it Correct. Yep, correct. But there's a deadline, and it's a way I know farmers that have missed it.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Well, Mark, I thought it was a ten year plan. Isn't a ten year plan current use?

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Not that I know.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Yes. Mark

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: is referring to the annual agricultural certification that all farmers or those with agriculture plan Ten year plan. The forestry plan. Is your forestry plan in order to maintain your enrolled forestry.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: So those

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: are rather synonymous

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Yeah. Okay.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: Eligibility requirements. Thank you for that.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: So how many years have you been checking off with them that you've in language? Oh, since being a veteran. Oh, is how many years? Since a long Yeah,

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: twenty years before I was at least. And don't get me wrong, we need a profession like current use, because the name says it all, that you're disputing tax the way you are currently using. Right. Fair and equitable. But I don't feel people on the tax department are working hard enough for us,

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: quite frankly. Are you whole now with everything? Are you whole? I mean, you're back where you wanted to be as far as

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Well, didn't wanna write check for $45,000 because we missed a deadline.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: I get

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: that. Why are they sending an encrypted email? Just send an email. When you ask somebody why did they send that, there's no answer. Did the encrypted email have any sensitive information on it? Not that I know of, no. That's the only reason I would suspect, though. But it came from the tax department to us. I mean, it's nothing that, I mean, they're emailing me this information, so why would they make it hard to see?

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Or he sent an email first saying, We want to send you sensitive information. When did you get that information? The only reason I asked is I worked for the state, was on the state system, it was automatically correcting my emails, was sending out anti changes at some point.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Can look in, I can

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: In recent, not that experience.

[Unidentified Committee Member]: Not that I'm I'm excusing any of this.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: No. It would have been it would have been Thank you. In the vault.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Oh, Then that was a lot about. Yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Any more questions for Mark? No, thank you very much. Mark,

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: are the last man standing? Are right now. Thank you for the privilege of coming down and sitting in a nice chair. Superintendent's good. I'm Richard Nelson. I'm a dairy farmer today. I apologize. I did not bring a box of Dunkin' Munchkins. And I when I got into the building, I said, oh, boy.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: So They don't get to look like this either at all, so I could tell you that. They said

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: they will be forthcoming. Current use. Senator Major, you said to me beginning the session, you're a real concern for our dates our state's dairy farmers. Yes. And I am too. We're a $15 milk. Our fertilizer just enjoyed at 40% rate hike. Right when we're getting ready to get busy, our diesel fuel just went up over a buck a gallon.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: We're in a we're in

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: a bad spot, real bad spot. And, you know, in the state of Maine, they get $2 a hundredweight added onto their milk check. Maine milk check, $2 a 100. New York, they get a 25%. Now it's a 25% investment credit. That baronet reg built for $4,000,000, he would have got back a million dollars from the state of New York if he built it over there. He could have used that to go buy cows or heifers, springing heifers, are going for $4,000 a piece because the state of New York will give him 25% back. It really costs him free.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: That's Can I add thank you for for this because I I absolutely? Because you've sparked, questions. On that money that is given back to both Maine and New York, are stipulations that you

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: have to invest back into the business,

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: or is it can you use okay. Alright.

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: Well, the Maine milk check, I I don't believe so. But the the investment credit that they get in New York and in Connecticut at 20%, Massachusetts gets $4 a 100 addition to their milk check. Alright? In Vermont, we get three pats in the back and an attaboy. Thank you for making our state beautiful. The best thing that we could do without costing us money in Montpelier is to get out of the way, farmers. Streamline this current use process. So when we enroll it in current use, it's in current use. Don't have to check the boxes every year. They've gone back and forth both ways on it. I think if you ask over there, the tax department, how would you not like to have to go through all those papers every year to see if the farmers checked all the boxes? Probably could save a couple employees or repurpose them somewhere else. Take that burden away from us. Did you have to do that right there in the height of when you're busy? Take that burden away from a farmer. Don't make them go and check those boxes. We got tripped up sort of like Mark did when we bought the farm from my father. My father had been farming since 1963, and he'd been in the current use program ever since it started. And we bought the farms from dad, And two of our parcels two of the farms we bought we farm in nine different towns, I think. I'm trying to count them up. We had buildings in seven different towns. Well, we missed two of the towns to make sure the buildings were still on hold. That cost us $19,000. Take just streamline it when you enroll it in current use. It stays in current use. It's in current use. And if you're worried about somebody taking it out of current use and not notifying people, of course, if you sell it, there's a subdivision. The town gets notified that there there's there's tools to find out when it it's transferred. But if you're worried about that, instead of having a 10% withdrawal fee, I won't call it a penalty. We'll call it a fee because you could take it out of current use today, and you can wait twenty years paying regular taxes on it. And then when you develop it, then your tax at the assessed value of the day you take it out. You know? Hopefully, it goes up in value. So but what the fee at if you don't notify, then make the penal the penalty if you don't notify a 100% of the fee or 200% of the fee. Make it 20% or 30%. I mean, we want people to do what they're supposed to do, but just make it less burdensome so that the farmers can go out and do what they do best, and that's fine. That's fine. That's made food, grilled food. If y'all have any questions for me, I'll field them at this time.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Right, so I understand, and anyone of your farmers can answer this, or even Alan. So when, if they took away that you don't have to report anymore, What's the trigger for when a farm sells? And that person that buys it, will it happen in the transaction of the land sale that it gets automatically pulled out of land use, or will it stay in there until they're notified? I'm

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: pretty sure notified me in

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: thirty days being a transfer. Yeah.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: The the the property transfer tax that gets filed with the state is is what triggers the notifications in your example.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Okay. So it doesn't matter if you sold off 10 acres of this property. It would if it was

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: in land use, it trigger? It triggers a letter. So, The notification is automatic. And it really is automatic. They're actually

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: very important. There's a question

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: why they wanted to hear that because it doesn't make any sense to, if, when you go to sell the land, now what about in a debt? Because your parents died, there was no notification to the tax department at that point, or was there because you ended up paying, obviously they knew about it, but you

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: didn't, right? Right, so, well, had a name change, so, so

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: So there you go, so that's, like you said, that's a no brainer.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: So it's the same thing. Any example of a name change, any beneficiaries take control, all that's pretty much the same thing. It's a it triggers a transfer tax return, which triggers the notification, which triggers the question that a representative is suggesting is there's already mechanisms at play to retain your use of the that current use wants you to do.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: And how many how many years do you you you said your dad when he

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: Oh, you remember when he first started? Whenever current use first started. And then when Governor Douglas was Governor, they changed it so that all agricultural buildings were zero. And Oh, I you know, it's it's it's a it's one of the old one of the it's the best program we have. I mean, there's other things I'd like to see done for water quality down the road that we've got worked into the work at, you know, the cable build from last year that we're gonna be coming with next year. But this is a this this is a big one. This trips up farmers. And, you know, if we get this done, then we could work on the homestead decoration thing so that May doesn't have to tell everybody that she lives in the house she's lived in for sixty years is still her primary residence. Right. That's kind of a thing too. But and that trips up people all the time. It's it's why why are we what's the real purpose of having these booby traps out there? Is it to catch somebody sleeping so they can get a little extra money, or is it something that people were worried and I'm sure that's not the reason. I'm sure the reason before is they were worried about people taking their land out of current use and not notifying. Well, we can fix that with a robust penalty if you take it out of current use and you don't overify anyone. Well, you're you're you're gonna you're gonna pay then, but, you know, there are so many avenues for notification with the property transfer and whatnot, change change a name and whatnot. So just let's just just take without costing us money, just make life a little easier for our our farmers out there. And that doesn't and that and that doesn't matter if you own if you milk cows or if you have a 25 acre farm, farmstead, or a five acre robust vegetables, because boy, they they can do well with five acres knowing what they're doing. Yeah.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: Yes. For current use, they notify when you sell, but they don't notify the person that bought the property? Yes, they do.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: They do. They only notify the new owner.

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: So they became the new owners from their parents through death and didn't realize that it they had to read up for how bad happened then.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: I think that's where the line of communication fell through. Okay.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: My guess is that when the deed was changed, a transfer tax return was followed, some address was listed on the transfer tax return, that address was used to send a certified mail, and and it just didn't get to where it was gonna go, where it needed to go. And and and what's what's interesting about the the notification that gets sent is inaction results and you get kicked out of the program. So you get your letter, you do nothing, you're out, and and it'll they'll give you a timeline of thirty days of of the date of the letter. They're pretty they're they're very lenient on that timeline.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Okay.

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: I've never seen that thirty day window really being published, but it says do something or you're in. And if you don't do anything, you're out. And

[Unidentified Committee Member (Collamore/Plunkett/Heffernan unclear)]: they didn't do anything by the timeline. And they did not know who signed for the registered mail? Yep.

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: It's and there and it would and it would be nice if there was a way to grieve these things anywhere else. And and and then

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: not speak.

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: The shop up family farms case, no. They didn't have to go through act two fifty to build their barn, but they went through a rigorous process with the agency of agriculture to build their barn. And not only are they in current use, they showed their development rates on their farm. How could that be not called agriculture if they sold their development rights? Holy cow. They they you know, they they have a very prescriptive place where they can build on their farm, because they've sold their development. And they had to think of that ahead of time where they wanted to grow their farm. Those young men, we were all kids. We were all farming. And they were milky cows on what? Eight barns? Yeah. Like it was. There were milky cows all over Orleans County. They didn't weigh 125 pounds apiece because they were working so damn hard. And I said, Reg, I said, Geez, if you guys can get together and conglomerate, think

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: of what you can do.

[Richard Nelson (Farmer)]: And look what they've done. They've gone from milking three, four hundred cows. They got 1,500 head now. And and and believe me, it hasn't been easy because it hasn't been easy for any of us, and it hasn't been easy for them fellas. And they worked and worked and worked and put their life into that. Also, can't make a profit this year. I guarantee you that, but they have worked some hard. And then to have them get blown up, 31, $36,000, whatever it is, because they built the vine and put cows in it. Anyway, that's my rant. I'm sorry. No. All good.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: I think if we wanted to go handpick testimony on this, we couldn't have done a better job. So however that happened, appreciate it very much. All you had very important things to offer. It wasn't the same story over and over and over again. It was very covered as far as where it is. This is a big topic. I'd love to say that we could make 45,000 a hole, 31,000 a hole, and 90,000 a hole, but that isn't a true story. But I can promise you this, we are hitting crossover. There's probably nothing that we're going to be able to hit before crossover, but we do have another miscellaneous bill that's going to come back our way. That's all the subjects that we have are germane. We will be working on this for the rest of the year. And I know you guys would be more than willing to come back and talk with us again. Should we need to get some clarification? We got a lot of work to do. We have tax people. We have HCA people, we have A and R people, we have land use people, we have land trust people, we have a lot of people to get in here and figure out how we can solve this, but I think just by looking around the room at the committee and where we're at, we're interested in taking this off. I think we'll be moving forward with this and stay tuned. I wish I could give you more hope. I am very interested in this September 1 thing to keep you from another 31,000. That thought isn't going away. We appreciate everything you guys are doing, too.

[Reg Chapman (Chapman Family Farms)]: We appreciate that there are people here that actually care what's going on with the farmers.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: We do care of that. I'm going tell you, we fight for farmers in the state of Vermont, and we do, and I think we're very effective. It's nice to hear that, Reg. We've heard it everywhere we go for all corners of the state that we've done. One the first discussion that we had in this committee, we all agreed to it, we've all stuck with it, is that we have allowed no politics in this room. We had said right from the beginning that we are going to do what's right for the Vermont farmer. My God, this committee has worked really hard and I'd be proud every day. We hear from all parts of the state that that's where it is. We're not much BS. We figure there's plenty of that left in this building for others to take on, but we do stick by our farmers. As I said, let us go through our process and we'll see where we end up. Sweetens up. Anyone else, everybody else have? I'm one of those that you spoke about earlier, one of

[Alan Thompson (Consulting Forester)]: those hemp farmers that's here to

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: ask for your help. Yep, well, we're not done, so we'll read this section, and I don't have you on the agenda, but you're here so we might as well hear what you got to say. Thank you guys.

[Mark Ingalls (Farmer)]: Thanks.

[Senator Russ Ingalls (Chair)]: Of course. My name is Dan Query. Dan, why don't we take, why don't we take a square root me? Lou Senator Major. Why don't we just take a five minute break? Sure. We'll come right back.