Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: We are live.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: James, you're still there, but it's So we're live. Court in the hallway.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: So we'll say Maybe she get us holding court in the hallway.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So it's February 3, the Senate Appropriations Committee. We are going through the Justice Act for appropriate reform. And we have the chair of the house the esteemed chair of the house of appropriations to walk us through the good work that the House did on HW90. I'll let you give any further introduction that you I'm want to give from

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Robin Shide from Middlebury and chair of the House Appropriations Committee. It's so wonderful to see you all again. Here we are. Budget adjustment, which, we had a successful budget adjustment this year and have passed out of our house on a roll call vote of 133 to zero. So it was unanimous vote, which doesn't happen often enough, but it did. So we're very happy to send that over to you. I chatted with Amy from Joint Fiscal who gave me a list of some things that you all were talking about. So rather than go through, like, the whole bill, which we don't need to do, I can just highlight some of the things that she'd identified that you were interested in and have me answer any questions about anything else that I don't touch on. Does that make sense? That makes sense.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: So one of the questions was about the money for non emergency medical transportation funding, These are the rides that the public transit authorities around the state, they're Medicaid rides, so people who are Medicaid eligible can get rides to their doctor's appointments because they don't have a car and they can't afford that. So that's what that is. Pardon me, do have the section? Oh, I can't find that section, please.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And we're looking at the gels introduced. Yes. We don't have the gels. We do have the. And we have okay. Let's see.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Oh, wait. I think I can put this

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: on it. B1100E5Section51. Oh, I opened Dragon's tab. So what's happening is that with the closure of various jobs and offices and other things, people are now having to be driven much further to places, not exclusively, but that one of the things. So what used to maybe be a twenty five minute, twenty minute drive one way is now forty five minutes. And so there's the mileage and then there's the time and more people. So that was the the public transit associations have been in a deficit in '25 fiscal year twenty five of $800,000. That was the federal and state contributions combined. And then a further half of the half of the in our deficit in the 2026. Again, that's it's there's a global commitment involved in this, so it's not just general fund money. So it's an it's an example of a much needed service that's been undesided, and so we were able to use some of the extra time that we were able to find to fund that. So that's what that was. The next one was 167,000 general fund for the Bridges to Health Program. This is all in B1100 right now, the next few of these are. This is their transition from UVM to the free and referral clinic, and it's a cost to doing that

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: and getting equipment and things like that. So they are in the process of moving, and that was that request. Representative Chittenden, sorry, I looking was at things when

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: you were talking. The money for the Medicaid non emergency transport would go to AOTs, and then they would distribute it, or how do you remember how?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: No. It goes to DIVA, and then

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: they have a contract with public transit agencies, and it gets sold out through that public contract. And that public contract, just for the information, is out for bid right here. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: But yeah, so the idea is it goes to the revolt of public transit association. So it isn't going to one specific, but through. So, and I've mentioned bridges, the 167. And then the next one is the 1,100 gs-nine. This is an additional 420,000 to the recovery centers. 228,000 is from the Substance Use Prevention Fund and 192 was General Fund. So what happened here was that last year, the FY twenty six budget, we authorized $800,000 to go to the recovery centers based on what the recovery centers said they needed for each specific recovery center. So some might have needed $10,000 and some might have needed $75 or whatever to do the work that they had to do, but they put it all together and said, here's the 800,000, here's how we like, how we need it. And the department chose to do it a completely different way and just level fund each one for $50,000 And so some ended up with more than they needed and many ended up with less than they needed, and they'd already made their plans based on what they thought they were gonna get. And there was no ability to change the money that had gone astray. So this is the difference, and we, in the budget adjustment, said specifically where they need to go to, which are the recovery centers, and how much?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Senator Norris. Yes, we discussed this earlier. I just need some clarification. I said Amy was very instrumental in this also. I know there's 11 throughout the state, but there's one in St.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Albans that's not part of the program, but they still receive funding.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Correct?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I believe so. So the only ones in here, this is not all the recovery centers, you're correct. These are the only ones who got shortchanged in the way it was done for the 800,000.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: They were the ones that got flat, Like, got the flat.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Right. Everybody got 50,000, and then they got, like, a $1.37 per Medicaid population in whatever. It was a different methodology. So, that's that one. So, the next one, B1100J, they did not add the Reed Vermont program for 700,000. So you'll recall that we had the revenue forecast on January 16, and there was a downgrade of $8,100,000 So the governors, the administration went back and said, we're gonna change some things around from the budget adjustment that we gave you, and we're gonna take some more money from here, but then I would want you to spend it in other ways. So this wasn't actually part of their original budget adjustment, and one of the things they wanted to do that they just gave to us suddenly was 700,000 to the Agency of Education for this READ Vermont program. So there was no opportunity to take testimony. The House Education didn't take testimony. We were just asked to put the money in the budget, and that's not really how we operate. So, we said, that'll be a great program, but we need to hear more and hear from past education. You know, that's so that we did not accept that proposal. Okay.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: That's helpful. Which section was that?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: 1,100 On page

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: 20 of the involuntary And

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: then the next one was a happy news, B1100R6, the reduction of just over 2,000,000 from the Brattleboro retreat. That's a negotiated reconciliation every year, and they went back with more of a fine tooth comb. This also happened while we had the budget adjustment. It was originally gonna be something like 7 point something million, and it's now down to 5 point something million, and it's 2,000,000 and change, a reduction, which brought more money back into the general fund. So we thought that was good. The next one, B1100T, was adding money back to the food bank. We increased, we ended up increasing it by about 500,000. It was They requested 1 and a half million at the public hearing. And we agreed to 500,000, given the way things have been. One of our house members, Representative Larush, went and talked to the head of the food bank and got some information about that and then came back and he made a

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: recommendation to talk when they ended up.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Did you do another food thing or this just

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: the That was it. The 400. The 400 was in FY '26 budget. We added 500, so now it's 900. So the 400, we all approved last year.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But you added 500. We added 500. I was gonna say they added one. It was five you added.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Oh, my dad, I've got it. Yes, I'm reading it too fast.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You're right, the end result is 9 100.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yes, yes. And then in Section 53, the 100 one is a fund transfer. You will note that the administration asked us to put in just over a million dollars into the criminal justice, record history, records check funds because revenues have failed to meet expectations. And this is an ongoing issue, This is one of the themes that we picked up on if we're doing the whole budget adjustment. When you have a special source of funding identified and then that funding doesn't live up to expectations, we end up backfilling in the general funds anyway to for the project which is done. So there's a whole larger conversation to be had about special funds and how we

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: use them and whether we should be running funding deficit and all of those things.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: So we said, okay. It's good fiscal policy to not have a special fund deficit by a million dollars. And we wanna know what your plan is to not have this happen again. So that's what the lenders are for. So

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: This was for the background checks, not the fingerprint checks, correct? Through BCIC, the special fund This is

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: This is not my house.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: That's how I remember it was he brought the

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: check. And during the deficit due to the Department of Public Safety Vermont Crime Information Center.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Right, so the next question was, we know they came in here, we know there was a deficit on the criminal records check. However, I think we had a discussion, okay, so now what we're gonna do is start addressing who needs to raise their fees. We're subsidizing these programs, obviously. Charging for them is to be charging appropriately.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah, yeah. We didn't go there with that. We we said, okay, we'll agree to the governor's proposal to backfill the general fund. But if we do that, we also want to see a plan for sustainability because this is making sense. So when we get that plan, then we will see what they come up with.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What section is that? I know you don't, but I don't know.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Transfers, fund transfers d one zero one.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It's just I know. Won't be able to

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Section 53. And it probably is in here.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: And then it looked like there were some just questions about other fund transfers out of DFRs. We just accept whatever the governor did. We have any conversation about that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So it's already directed to criminal the record. So you've added us to report back.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: We report to address sustainability. So there's language in the section about that.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Yes. Is the Vermonters feeding Vermonters grant program the same place we put the money in the fall?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah, no, when we did the money with the e board? Yep. No, that was straight to the food banks to get out to the partners. Vermonters, has to do with contracts directly with Vermont farmers who will grow a specific quantity or a specific price. Yeah, that's what And we need to get that out before the growing season starts. Can't start a contract in July. Maybe for kids. Okay, so back to D101, DFR changes, general fund transfers, those are just recommended by Is that section 73? Section D one zero one. Oh, no, section 53, but it's D one zero one. It's just DFR does their thing, you know, as the year goes on, they're raised or blow over by little bit, so we just accepted what the government recommended. We didn't actually really have much conversations out of. And then D-one 102 in section 54, a reversion adding 700,000 back to the general fund. This was done by the administration as the result of the downgrade of $8,100,000 They had to do some more reversions so that the activities of the budget adjustment could be funded. And then, in section D103, which is section 50 five's D103 reserves, the governor had said, or wanted us to spend $74,900,000 now to buy down property taxes, just to buy down property taxes. So, the budget adjustment is not the appropriate place to make a commitment like that, where we don't have all the budgets in, we don't have a yield bill, etcetera. What we did was we simply carried it forward, but we also didn't want to commit the full 74.9 property taxes because what if we find out something we don't need at 70 4.9? We may, but so we just put in language that was the same kind of carry forward language that we used last year, that it could be used for federal funding, property tax relief, or other things that will help revanchors. So, it's the same language. So, it doesn't mean it can't be used for that, it just means it's not now a budget adjustment because we

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: don't have nothing to make sure. So, it's just kind of keeping it where it was under the language that we passed last time. Right,

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: right, and it'll be addressed in the big bill.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The whole 74.9? Yeah. You

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: didn't take anything out of that. In section 77, which is B312 Public Health, the increase was not just to Vermont Cares, was to three HIVAIDS organizations. We have done this, we've had the same amount we've given to these organizations for at least the last eight years, or maybe ten years, with no increase whatsoever. Two organizations that they used to fund closed, And so the other three left are picking up the extra work and have inflationary costs and things like that. So we put $45,000 and you'll see in the budget itself, it's specific, Vermont Cares gets like, there's fifteen and twenty five and five or something like that. Is that right, Maris? Five, twenty five, 15. That's what that was. And then the next two, sections seventy eight and seventy nine, have to do with section eight housing. This is new for all of us. We proposed using 5,000,000 of the 50,000,000 from e board that we'd set aside for the e board to

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: federal funding kind of

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: losses that would be pretty serious to Vermontrix. That's where we used the snap money. We had a special e board meeting last year to when we had the government shut down and we did 6,500,000.0 for funding, equivalent of SNAP for fifteen days, plus the money with WuFei. So they were still fifty minuteus 6.8 or whatever left of them in that money. We almost had a second e board meeting to cover section eight housing, and then as we dug into it a little bit more, realized that from a timing standpoint, we didn't have to meet December, but we could meet when the general assembly was back in session, so we didn't need a need for a meeting. This is also something, the vouchers for Section eight housing, is subsidized housing for very low income people who still have to pay 30% of their income to rent, and then the rest of it is paid by the federal government directly to the landlord. So we're not used to seeing this because it doesn't come from the state. So all of a sudden we had to have our joint fiscal office and legislative council get up to speed on what all of this meant, and it's a pretty complicated program, and to learn more about the public housing authorities. The proposal is to use 5,000,000 to support public housing authorities who would apply for grant funding, like we've done with provider stabilization grants. They would apply and then be approved. We in our budget adjustments had the agency of administration overseeing that because there has been a relationship with the AOA and the public housing authorities in the past, apparently. And so that seemed like the appropriate place to put it. I know that the letter that's come May have a different proposal. But anyway, that was where we put it to start with. The point was to have it here. And then we also put in guidelines to ensure that the money would be used in such a way that it wouldn't hurt future vouchers and renters or the public housing authorities, because there are very strict guidelines on how any money can and can't be used from the public housing authority. So we can't directly pay rent, for example, that would would hurt any future vouchers.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Who would you recommend we have in if you wanted to learn more about that?

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: James. Probably James and James Duffy from Jamerid Jamerid Wood. To talk about

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: the Yeah, Jamerid did the language and James has become our local expert. And what we also wanted to be sure was that there were no bad unintended consequences and that by doing this we're actually maintaining future vouchers at a level that's current vouchers, because if we don't, they give you, the feds give you money based on the number of vouchers you did the past year, and if they go down, you end up in a downward spiral every year. We don't wanna have that amount. So, we're trying to prevent homelessness by doing this. That's kind of

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the thought line.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Then Section 81 B. Three twenty five, the governor's proposal in the budget adjustment was to add $2,000,000 for more shelters. And at the same time, it was reducing the funds available for community partners related to HOP grants, the Housing Opportunity Grant, which again helps prevent homelessness or children's homelessness. So on the recommendation of our Human Services Committee, we reduced the two, we kept the 2,000,000, it's in the same area so you don't see a lot, but what we did was kept 678,000 for additional shelter expansion, and then we applied the remaining 1.3 to restore financial assistance to the, for the HOT to prevent people from falling into unsheltered homelessness or, and help them move into permanent housing. So that's just a shift of some newer

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: funding there on how much time it exists.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Did get an analysis or printout of the housing assistance funding generally and where it's coming from? I see here it's from our action resolves from 2025. I see the $5,000,000 there in that section. And then this money, it's all staying within OVO. That's why it doesn't look like it's It's just rearranged the money that's in OVO. Got it. Okay, thank you. And then the last one we had on the sheet that I got from Amy was some language that we put in regarding payment reform. This is your bail and payment reform for the designated and specialized agencies. Issue is, and everybody agrees that there should be payment reform, and the DAs are all for it. It's the process that's happening right now is creating serious financial problems for the DAs if it continues the way it is, and they wouldn't actually get paid for seventeen months, and not too many nonprofit organizations could go seventeen months without getting rid of the work that they do. So this is, the conflict free case management is the other side of it. That started October 1, and that's in process, and that's going. And then this is the other piece of it, and it just, we actually convened a meeting with all the players from the DAs and Dale and listened to them have a conversation, and we had some other experts in the room. And it was very clear that we couldn't come up with a solution and fix this in two days, when we had to get the budget adjusted about it. So what we said was we're gonna put this in as language, and if you need to have a progress report back to all of us by April 15, how we can handle this. So there's not a money thing, but it's a serious issue that needs to be addressed. So those are the things on this slide.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Your committee take a lot of testimony on using the pilot funds for the reappraisal programs?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: We did take some testimony. We had Chris Roop come in. There's actually a lovely spreadsheet that he put together. The governor is proposing the exact same thing for FY27, to use the 3,410,000 of pilot money for the payments to municipalities for their parcel payments, appraisals and listings, so using pilot funds for that. The governor's proposing that to start in FY twenty seven. We said, great idea. Let's start it in FY twenty six. We can use 3,000,000 of that for the pension issue that we have to address because the ADA came in at a different amount. And then we used a little

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: bit of the extra for some of

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: these other things that you saw in here. So it's already sort of been created by the governor. We're just starting it a year early. And the spreadsheet that Chris presented to us shows that even at the 2027, after this has happened for two years and 100% of the pilot is paid out the way it's supposed to be paid out, there's over $11,000,000 still left in the balance of the pilot funds. So, it's got plenty of money.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And we had them scheduled to come in, I think we talked about having Chris come in yesterday. Yeah,

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: found it Yeah. Extremely yeah, and it was reassuring, let me put it that way, see that information.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. I think you did touch on the things that I knew about her. Any other questions for the House of Preparation Chair? Just the praises or accolades? So yeah, think, I don't know if your committee should, Senator Lyons wants to take up that, doesn't he? We'll be looking at that. Think that'll

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: be I already started looking at it. Yeah, there's definitely been a bunch of people that have only been involved in that. He was part of the meeting before we had the initial meeting when we realized it can't be fixed in budget adjustments. So hopefully the sides are all meeting now. No, if it is, it has to happen with the full policy discussion. Right, well that's why we said April 15, we'll come back and tell us how you're going to fix this thing. So there'll be plenty of time for you to get involved with that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I was glad to see they did the money for the elderly and disabled rides. That's something that we had a joint committee, transportation, and it's a critical issue. We could use more money, but that's Yeah. That's Well, that's I don't have anything else. Great.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Thank you all. Good luck.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Alright. Thank you.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I'd make it easy for you.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You did. We'll be in touch.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah. Thank you.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Okay. Just.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: It never.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: We're having that bill as passed printed out, there's some little changes from the as introduced we had here. It should be right, we have a spreadsheet that's called the Emily spreadsheet. I don't know if you want us to pass that out. Yeah. You should. And

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: I can probably share it on the website.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: This is this one page. Right?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah. Right there.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Should be a lot here. Oh, yeah. There's a lot. I'm just Just one page. Just one page.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I hate one. It's no minis. His face.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: We want one.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: We're not. We're you know, like, no one shows up. He wants one. Says no one wants one. That's the whole thing. Senator Baruth, can you send that to that one? Anybody else wants one of I should do that. Oh, you can just Yeah. You're doing the checkboxes. So do know those boxes we've checked, and they'll be looking on that straight through?

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: Yeah. We got real fancy. Yeah. Doing this box this year. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Introduce yourself to the record and then give us the overview. Sure. It's been several months since we've looked at one of these spreadsheets.

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: Yes. So for the record, Emily Burns, the new fiscal office here to talk about the FY 2026 Budget Adjustment Act. I'm going share the spreadsheet that you

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: have in front of you on the screen.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Those are at home. So, this spreadsheet yeah. It should look familiar, but also it's been a while since we've gone through this, and this is the budget adjustment as opposed

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: to the budget, so it'll look different

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: a little bit different in the budget. But the the main gist of this spreadsheet is has at the top, so this sort of gray chunks, this is the budget as passed. So there's nothing to change on this side of things, and this is the appropriations as passed. So line two is where you got baseline appropriations and right, the adjustment is changing where you ended last year. You've got the Pay Act and other bills, one time appropriations, the transfers, I'll just flag everybody says, what was the 190,000,000? And that's 70 plus million to debt service and $77,000,000 for the education fund and then all of the other little transfers that happened, but the majority of that are those two big ones. The contingent appropriations and transfers, so that is primarily the $50,000,000 that was appropriated to the emergency board for the back bill of federal funds that needed another $8,000,000 to the digital services, and then $61,000,000 the amount that was transferred to the reserves. Of that $61,000,000 60,000,000 of that are the $230,000,000 reserves that were done at year end for federal fund uncertainty and other needs as identified in the future. So, then structurally, and the next in the sort of blue and orange box, you've got gov rep updated because there was an update to the twenty sixth budget after the emergency board adopted the revenue downgrade in January. So, the governor presented a balanced budget adjustment to the House Corporations Committee in December, and then had to change it slightly. So, this is updated to reflect those changes. The The next column, that's the house. Most of those, the house accepted most of the changes that the governor proposed. And then in a difference from the governor, he places where they were different. Then the Senate column, can see is blank. You guys haven't made any choices officially on whether or you agree with what the governor has

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: put forward or what the House put forward.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: As you go through and make decisions to fill that in from there. I don't know if you want me to go through individual lines specifically at this point, or I wanna keep oriented to this bridge.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yes. Sure. Was on the other page.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: So there are a lot of changes in this budget adjustment, and these are actually also qualified. These are just the general fund changes. So that big spreadsheet that commissioner Gresham gave you at the outset, that has changes for the general fund, the transportation fund, global commitment funds, special funds. So in terms of reviewing the Budget Adjustment Act, going through that spreadsheet to make sure you also agree with or disagree with any of those global commitment changes or other things will be important. We get down to line 85. This is where Or line 84 is the total of all of the changes to the base budget. And starting on line 85 is where we get to the one time appropriation changes. There's a little bit more going on in one times as there usually are budget adjustments. We have some new sections.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is there a reason sometimes parenthetical numbers are read and sometimes they're not. There's no reason behind that. It's

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: like if you Formatting. Accounting or number. Formatting Okay.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I didn't know if there was some other reason for them not to be read.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: No. We can go I should go back through and double check those.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But the end story is the house is $110,000 less than the coverage.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yes, on the

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: On line +1 02. Or, 3349 on high and 84.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yes. Yeah.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Right. In terms of changes. Yeah. Right. So and then so you got the one time appropriations, then you have the the few transfer changes. The very small changes related to the criminal history records check fund that representative Chey mentioned. So, transferring some money there to deal with the deficit and then, there was this transfer to the pilot special fund from the general fund and the transportation fund. I wasn't funded, so that transfer is not happening in the House version. That gets you down to a total of $2,800,000,000 of general funds appropriated in the budget adjustment by the House. The governor also had 2.811 in his recommend recommendation. The green box at the bottom, this is the revenue picture. So from line 111 through one fifteen, this is the as passed revenue. So none of this will change. This is what you assumed to pass the budget. And then below that are the things that have changed since the

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Can I ask you, Emily, on on 01/2008, 01/2009, why is the difference? Say it's 180,000, but it looks like it's

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: It's the

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: $2.07.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: 111 or the yeah. 110,000 from line 01/2002 plus the 70,000 out of 01/2006,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: it's 180. So you don't do the math from the governor's column to the process column for the change?

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yeah. The change column, I need to look at what that formula is, but the

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is it not normally how it works? Like, you're you're just taking the house subtracted from the senate. I think that's not point.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: I think it's missing if I were to guess, I think it's missing a row somewhere. I'll check it. Let me put a better one.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It means. I can shoot you a note on it.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: But the so then you go to the bottom, line one seventeen. That's the updated revenue forecast adopted by the emergency board. And it's important, this is a little tricky because there's, there was an emerge, there was one adopted in July, and then there was one adopted in January. The difference between January to January is what you need to look at, and that difference was $80,000,000. The

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: $80,000,000. Which revenue?

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Right. So you talk a lot about the revenue forecast. The downgrade that happened in January was compared to July, but you didn't build the budget compared to July, you built the budget compared to January. So from a budget building perspective, you take into account full changes to the revenue forecast for a net change of the $80,000,000 There are also some additional reversions. I've represented Cheyenne refer to those. Those are the DFR changes mostly. And then the increased direct application Oh no, the increased direct applications are the DFR changes. The additional reversions are reversions identified by finance and management and adopted through their authority to revert unexpected appropriations from prior years. So, and after all of that, those net appropriation changes less than that changes in the revenue leaves $74,910,000 on the bottom line as the governor proposed, as representative Chittenden alluded to. The budget adjustment indicates that that $74,000,000 shall remain on the bottom line and be carried forward into FY 2027 to be used for property tax reliefs, federal funding needs, or other items identified by the general.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: My cell phone. And if a comment, okay. And then the notes column, if it's red, it's something the house did.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: It's the house. Yep.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And it'll be green.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: I approve of the color code.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Thank you. It was hard to play motion?

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: No. Think it should stay. House red. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I think the the irony is

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: The trick is the green sometimes. Not dark enough, and it's hard to breathe. Mhmm.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Of course,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You can mark down this.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah. The the cookie.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is there anything else I know you think we should you want?

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: I don't think there's anything else in particular on this spreadsheet to highlight. We've represented Chai walk through a lot of the the details, You know, the differences from GovRec. I think when you're ready to do markup in terms of going through each of these lines and figuring out whether or not they're things you agree with or disagree with or if there are easy ones you wanna look at and explain. Oh, one actually, I'll apply two lines just to put on the record and be clear on them. I realized I closed this.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. My bad. Yeah. It would be good to well, compare it to the worksheet. This is the spreadsheet. Yeah. This one. I do have a question about that. Yeah. Yes.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: I agree. So, Emily, you remember Senator Sears and Justice Reinvestment II? Mhmm. I'm trying to remember I remember that Justice Reinvestment two, reinvestable savings, and I thought it was if how many events we stopped needing out of state, and then we could count that as savings in the general fund? But I'm wondering if I'm looking here at the increase of 30 beds. What line is that? It is two seventy nine.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: 39. Yeah.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: It just got me thinking about that. I don't know what you would call it. It was an initiative that senator Sears spearheaded to try to, number one, bring people back into state, number two, to save money, and number three, to put a fence around that money so that it was used to invest in programs for justice and all of these other people. So I was wondering, obviously, I can't remember the details. I'm wondering if you want to just look into that and let us know, obviously, when he died, a lot of the things that he had been keeping in the air dropped. And I would just like to know where we stand with that initiative.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yep. We can look into that. I also don't remember the details.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. Yeah. Can't remember if it was just his work, or we have put it in statute that it had to be I don't think it was in his Well,

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: do you remember, Rich?

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: No, I think.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The way way Sears talked about it, it seemed like it was

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: It was like

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You couldn't touch it except for

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Well, the he had worked out this whole process with the CSG. The Grand Council of State Government, and I'm pretty clear it was written down someplace, I can't remember where. But it was, there was a report that came back from CSG to whom he built us.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: So in joint justice oversight, we've had CSG a few times, I don't know if we've recently talked about that program.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: But it was It's not going remember. Yeah. It it was kinda meshed with this initiative to decrease the number of out of state

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Definitely. Prisoners. That's right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: With protocol.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: Anyway, so we're unfortunately moving in

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: another direction. Eventually, goes back through the judiciary committee meetings. Yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: We'll find out. Yeah. Okay.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Find out. Okay.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: So two two lines just like looking closely at this that may not raise questions, but they may. So on line 28, there's a line called All AHS, with the net impact of the ADS SLA transfers from the departments. So, recall on the AHS budget in the '26 base budget, put a whole bunch of money into the secretary's office to cover the agency of digital services, service level agreements. Once they get to budget adjustment, they have a better idea of which departments are actually going to incur those costs, and then they make a net neutral transaction to move the costs into the appropriate departments. Rather than carry that whole net neutral thing, this is just a line that says it's a zero impact, we've double checked the math, zero impact on the agency, but this is just to reflect, like, what that is. So, it says it's zero on here even though because it's so the budget is zero.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But it's moving around.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: But it's moving around in all of AHS, but it we need to add an extra seven lines to show that ten zero effect. That's just what that is. But

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: if we wanted to see all the transcript, we could

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Part of the SLA change.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yep. You do that. And then the last one I would point out is on the back, the one time section related to the section eight housing. So in the language, it shows up in B11001, Part B, Subpart two. That $50,000,000 appropriation was contingent. And rather than change that appropriation and then reappropriate the money for Section eight housing, it just redirects an appropriation that already exists and says to the administration, You have this pot of money, use $5,000,000 of that pot of money to do this. The spreadsheet itself shows this as zero because it's not changing the net appropriations at all, it's utilizing existing appropriation, but this is just how we characterized it to make sure you make the decision on it accordingly. So

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: is that in the language part of it? Okay. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So going back to 5054, was that, no. Probably all along the list. Was that the portion where ADS was back loading where we decided to front load some of money so that we wouldn't have to deal with all that. The Budget Adjustment Act. The The AHS.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: The all AHS. Yeah, I think, are you thinking of the $15,000,000 that we put into the AES Yeah, budget last that was just a straight general fund transfer to their special fund to try to deal with the structural deficit.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But we also tried to change the timing of their Yeah. Way, we like to front load it in, so there would be less.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yes, there are some transactions, yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I that I don't

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: wanna speak out of it, correct? There are some charges, or it's so it wasn't the SLA charges, but sort of their core enterprise service, if you will, so things like Microsoft licenses, that sort of things, used to be billed in arrears. It's no longer billed in arrears, it's billed real time in the actual year that they had growth costs. The FLA is still a look back charge to departments. And that's partly why AHS appropriates a lump sum to the secretary's office, and then once they get those actual bills, they know which departments to charge it back to. Would buy your. Yeah. Hopefully, these all look familiar. Yeah.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Everything. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. Any other questions for Emily? Okay. You're free to jump.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Boy, one Michael, I'm sorry to hang on.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Great. I think I'm understanding this, I just wanna make sure. Lines fifty three and fifty six, the tenant funding realignment, it's just that they're moving from one place to another, from one part of DCF.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yes, yeah, yeah. That tenant funding realignment. Yeah, they were moving.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: That's right. Okay. Thank you.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Back to the one line.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah, it

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: shows up on line 56 and line 53. Yeah. Net record.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Thank you. We will cherish the spring.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: So I bring you a new one. Right?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. So I'm changing.

[Emily Byrne, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: So you change it. I

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: want it approved.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Thank you, Green Nixon, JFO. So, yeah, the as passed version of the budget adjustment hasn't been posted online yet. So this may have, one or two, you know, edits from granting operations, but this is the bill that's who was passed by the house. And I think most most of what I'll go through is just a repeat of what chair Shai went through with the committee earlier in the hour. I'll start on page 27. So this is section 51 of the budget adjustment making changes to section the 1,100 of act 27. On page 27, you'll see in that sub four, this is where the house added 3,000,000 general fund to reconcile the ADEC. So that's where that money is being added. Then on page 29, you'll see in sub five, this is the general fund and federal funds component of the non emergency medical transit. So you'll see an appropriation later on where the global commitment appropriation is being made. This is the appropriation to AHS, and then later on that global commitment appropriation is made to TIFF. Not on this, and Emily, it's did they take out that payment that transformation had to make back to the panel? Does it show up on here? Or or for some reason, it doesn't show up, so I think it's

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: It doesn't. The general fund piece is out of here. There's a little small general fund component, like $67,000 and then there was the AOP piece. The AOP, the transportation fund piece, doesn't show up on here? Doesn't or does? It does not. The general fund share does. And it's

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: It's just that $16,000 is not going to the pilot fund.

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: Exactly. 60,000 of general fund is not going to the pilot fund, and the 290 something, I think.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: E

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: E fund money isn't going to the pilot fund. It's one of those like because it in the governor to recommend there was language that said transfer transportation money to the pilot fund but because that's not happening, there's a language about it now. So, it's.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Is it a and only one of those funds? Just the general fund line. Where is it?

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: Line line one zero six.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: I think

[Committee staff/technician (unidentified)]: it had the note about the.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah. 02/1992.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: And then you referenced the other. Yeah. Also on page 29, you'll see the bridges to health appropriation and then 228,000 substance misuse prevention special fund and 192,000 general fund for distribution to recovery centers. And then you'll see how that appropriation is split up amongst those recovery centers. On page 32, this is in sub seven where you'll see that DEVA Global Commitment Appropriation. So again, the general fund and federal fund go to AHS and then your global commitment bid for non emergency transit goes to DITA. You're highlighting only changes that the house made. Correct. Also on page 32, you'll see that change the house made on the last few lines of that page, just bumping the, appropriation for a grant to Vermont Food Bank for Vermonters to feed in Vermonters from 500,000 to 900,000. And then skipping ahead to page 35, this is

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: That's not

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: is that the that's not the crop? That's not the one with the This is not crop cash or crop cash plus. This is yeah. Vermonters feeding Vermonters. So this is directing funds to Vermont farmers and the farmers should get it to the food bank and it's distributed like all the other. Right. Page 35, this is the fund transfer section, so this is section 53 making changes to Act 27, Section D 101. You'll see the language that the House added beginning on line seven, this is intent language surrounding that transfer to the criminal history records check fund. So government had that money there to stabilize the fund due to deficit mitigation resulting from salary and benefit costs. This intent language just establishes that report back that chair Chittenden mentioned earlier. That's where the blanket on page 37, the very last line of page 37, this is the reversion section, section 54 and then in section 102, back 27, you'll see the last line is where the house took the governor recommend AOE license data management reversion of 700,000, just highlighting that Mhmm. Because it came in that revised BAA. So this was not in the original BAA, and the house accepted the recommended reversion but did not make a $700,000 appropriation that was also in that updated BAA. On page 38, you'll see in that sub d language pertaining to the reserve and unreserved of that 74,000,000 74,900,000.0 fiscal year end balance. So this language and number came over in the gov rec house added language to it, specifying that the funds could also be used for addressing federal fund shortfalls or any other uses determined to be in the best interest of the public in the subsequent fiscal year. On page 41 And who has authority on the decision making progress or process? The General Assembly. The General in their absence, is the This money is moving essentially keeping it so it can move from f y twenty six to f y twenty seven, but that $7,074,900,000.0 dollars would be addressed in the FY27 budget itself. Okay, thank you. Or not? I guess even if it wasn't addressed, would just fall at the bottom. Whatever would happen to it would still be addressed either by not addressing or addressing it in the FY27 budget. On page 41, this language relates to, it begins on page 40. This is the child care contribution reserve language that is proposed to be added to statute. This was largely consensus language that was in the governor recommend. The house made a small tweak to it. I believe the committee will be hearing more about this later on in the week, so I won't get into the weeds on it. The house just added one small line to that in sub c on page 41, clarifying that after those funds are reserved, they must then also be transferred to child care contribution fund. And the the mechanism here is essentially protecting an estimate, estimated amount of fourth quarter receipts so that the general fund can be closed and then those fourth quarter receipts can be transferred from the general fund to the child care contribution fund once receipts are actually done. So we'll have tax in the time about this? I believe tax and joint fiscal are going to have a final presentation later on in week. I heard it was going to be a public show. Yes, I think, Chariot Palm is actually flying it. So that's Oh no, no way. Oh, thought you did.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Nope. Nope. It's just cited there. That's exciting.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: And then we can skip all the way to page 52. This is section 77. So there are some interim pages here that Chair Chittenden mentioned. You'll see as you flip through the bill a lot of language that was added by the House relating to the repeal of the Office of Legislative Operations, so there's about 11 pages in the bill that are just statutory being on clarifying that the duties of the Office of Legislative Operations are now being split between joint fiscal office and legislative council. And so any statutory reference to the office of legislative operations was removed from statute. Section 77 on page 52, this is where you'll see the addition of $45,000 that the House made, to provide grants from the general fund for HIV and harm reduction services, and then you'll see that split amount, and just flagging that this is the only section that is different in the as passed version from the as introduced. They only changed the meeting? This was the only amendment on the floor. That's law on the front of this. So the as introduced language, it had that entire sum of 45,000 going to Vermont Cares, and it was found out after Bill was introduced that that money should be split up between the three organizations. So rather than 185,000, it's 165,000 for my cares, 115,000 to the AIDS Project of Southern Vermont, and 60,000 to the HIV HCV resource center. And maybe I should maybe been listing more of one center. Should I say this will apply the need for the change in the VA? Do you remember? Yeah. I would have to get back to you on that. Mhmm. You know

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: what mean? They distribute it to three But why did the governor change what he had

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: the 45,000? So that's did that council add in the 45,000? This was this was not held out. Just the. Do we know why? On page 53 in section 78, So this is what Emily was discussing where on your big sheet, this shows up as a neutral change to b 11 o one, that you'll see an amendment to the 11 o one sub b sub two fifty million for addressing federal fund shortfalls. In line seven through 10, language was added clarifying that the general assembly may also designate those funds for purposes related to federal funding changes, and then carry forward and reverting language, just clarifying that, whatever remains of that $50,000,000 appropriation shall carry forward in future years unless the general assembly reverts those funds. But does that does that happen? You're saying the house added that last sentence to to? Yes. So Norris. So they're just I'm talking about the $50,000,000. The e board didn't spend all that. You're just talking about bringing it back up to $50,000,000? Oh, no. So the e board the e board action was roughly $6.36400000.0 dollars. And then you'll see in section 79 language that directs our further 5,000,000 of those funds for section eight. This language here is just making what happens vis a vis that 5,000,000 for section eight an allowable use of that 50,000,000. So it's not changing the total amount there at all. It's just allowing for $55,000,000 to be used for these purposes. So it's roughly over $11,000,000 gone from the original 50,000,000. So my question is, is that something that is automatically gets reimbursed? You do that or bring it back up to that 50,000,000? No. There's no reimbursement mechanism for it. It's a essentially, that appropriation was a pot of money for dealing with various shortfalls, and E board used a little over six of it. And then in section 79, it would be using a further five. So on that, the 39,000,000 that's left is left for the governor's recommend, or it's just left to do it with whatever. Right, it just continues to exist as an appropriation, unchanged, and then that language specifies in lines nine and ten, that the funds carry forward from each fiscal year. So other otherwise, those funds may be reverted, but this explicitly states that the funds stay in that appropriation for that purpose unless the general assembly reverse them. For the e not Pardon? For the e board if we're not in in the the The basic supposedly states that the funds carry forward unless the General Assembly reversed them, so the General Assembly would have to revert. But always the g the e board. I mean, I guess the legislature can do anything they want, but it's it's worth the legislative assembly on session. You need the e board to appropriate them. Right. So the original language gave appropriation or gave an appropriation to the agency of administration for e board transfer. Lines seven and eight state that the general assembly may also designate those funds. And then lines nine and ten say carry forward unless reverted by the general assembly. Because before, if they hadn't added that, they would have had to call the Board of the American Exchange. Exactly. So section 79 on pages fifty three and fifty four, again, that's where that 5,000,000 for section eight is being appropriated or utilized. Section 80, this is not withstanding language for the pilot fund. So Rep Shah mentioned that, Grand List Litigation Assistance that that in the twenty seventh gov rec was recommended to be a pilot. This is language relating to that change, stating that that appropriation shall be made from the pilot fund beginning FY '26. Section 81, so this is the HOT money that Rep Chai was discussing. So you'll see of the general fund appropriation in section b three twenty five of this act, 1,300,000.0 shall be used by DCF OEO for distributions between partners providing services to prevent and address homelessness. And then on page 56, you'll see the 13 community partners that are outlined and funds that are being directed to them. Section 83 on page 57, this is that DA and SSA placeholder language that rep Chittenden was discussing. So this we're gonna see that April 15 report back from the department. So we're gonna we're gonna wanna have to be CF, and then we'll be able make a question on this. Think we don't have any tests that are great.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: I apologize for missing representative Shai's description of this. I have heard it called place order language. Maybe senator Lyons can also can let me know about this. I'm just wondering, this call for court after consultation. And I understand it's place with her, but was thinking from the house that we would need other language besides this.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: So you're talking about section 83?

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Are you in section 80 Yes. Oh, I always go back in the other one. Yes. But, yeah, no, this will this will our committee will be working to have a language change here. This is temporary because there needs to be some kind of funding that will take our DA's over that seventeen month period and how to do it is the difference of opinion. Yeah. So

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: in other words, the house isn't looking to advance this language. They're Yeah.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I think they're looking at us to make

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Yeah. They seem to be

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: open to further work on. Yeah. Okay.

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: Great. Thank you.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Full payment on the full statement, fairs and how much it should be done. Very comfortable. Underachievement, those standards.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: On page 58, sections eighty four and eighty five deal with rural community hospital, non critical access hospitals that are participating in the rural community hospital demonstration being exempt from the provisions of statute limiting prescription drug prices. So section 84 asks that to statute and section 85 outlines, that such hospitals may submit claims to a health insurer for reimbursement of prescription drugs that exceed the limits set forth in that section of statute. So why do you need to both examine them and put a language saying that they could increase, they could go over the limit? Like, by exempting, is there an, like I said, I can charge you over the vaccine. I wouldn't speak to this specifically, but it might be good to have Jen Carden to explain the mechanics of the language.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: One is directly related to a specific hospital and others like. Yeah, so that would be an interesting policy to discuss.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: Right, well this is something else your committee can look at and advise us.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: We never

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: do. This one, even Bill pays Bill at all.

[Grady Nixon, Joint Fiscal Office (JFO)]: And then the fee allows the care board to make further changes. Correct? Yes. And that is it for house language changes. There might be a a comma change here, but those are the significant changes. So section 86. Section 86 is standard annual carry forward language. It's the same language every year that we add to the I mean, what if I wouldn't if if we add it every year, why don't we just put it into the budget? Yeah. Or you can't do it. This is for the budget itself. So I think my changes in budget adjustment. So the the budget has the the language is here for, you know, general closeout. Well, couldn't you put this language in the budget? Like, it doesn't have any specific numbers. The only thing different would be the date. You could put the date in that budget. That's very valid. Don't know why and I have to like why we would give approval to the Secretary of Administration to chair of the court. If we want everything to be reverted, this kind of says they don't have to I'll ask Gresham. Would be a good question for Commissioner Gresham. You okay? Any effect obtained? That was obtained. Makes sense.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. Questions for Griffin? You probably have to keep it on the bottom screen. On the top of the screen, you can't

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Oh, right in here. There it is.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The different view.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Different view.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Changing it up. Yeah. I like it.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: I've never seen that one before.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I like it. It's the non official. Don't tell IT that we're using.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Especially

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: if you're sitting around there. Okay. Thank you, Grady. Thanks, Cindy. So that is what we're doing with JFO. We now have seven ninety. Think the Pro Tem has potential addition I do. Really quickly. The the goal is that, hopefully, by Friday, I might or sort of talking to people about maybe another addition. We will talk about this. Then so by Friday, hopefully, we have fill, basically, then we know what we're gonna look at if we can. Depends also on some of this advice for getting from health and welfare. We might have to push it off the next week. But if we could vote it out, like a straw vote on Friday as we vote it out on Tuesday, that would be good, but I know Central and the Security have a lot of stuff going on fixing our whole healthcare system.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: Yeah, we won't be able to look at the BAA as quickly as I thought we might. Everyone's busy, joint fiscal includes, but we'll try to have something by Friday. We'll be looking at it Friday and making some decisions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay, well we can check-in in the week and see if we can make the Tuesday date go or not. Okay. So senator Briggs, what do

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: got there? So this is a proposed addition to we just went over page 53 of h seven ninety, and this is added to that paragraph. It's the 50,000,000. And you'll see highlighted there. So the 50,000,000 needs to be transferred by the emergency board when we're not in session in the event of a reduction in federal funds. This adds another eventuality. Or in the event the state or its municipalities incur public safety costs necessitated by the deployment of federal agents within the state. Now this originated with discussions with Burlington and Winooski, places where we might reasonably expect federal agents to show up, given what we've seen around the country. In the event that that turns out to be the case and you have counter protests of a certain scale, we would need, as we've seen in Portland and Minnesota and other places, we would need a greatly increased police presence to make sure that nothing spirals out of control. This allows of the 50,000,000, it allows the emergency board, if we're not in session, to make a considered decision whether or not municipalities have incurred reimbursable costs for protecting public safety in this specific eventuality. And again, if we are in session, the presumption is that we would be able to do something more direct, but this is to protect us in the event that we are not here. And over the summer, we see increased presence of federal agents and the, you know, now predictable response to that from citizens. So happy to answer questions about it, but say it that money must be spent and it doesn't appropriate it. It leaves it to the emergency board to make that decision.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Any sense? Any questions? Or no? You I gotta You could yeah. You can prepare to take this and think about Yeah. I I

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: put it on the table now with the idea that we'll have several sessions to fix these first.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: This may be, so the question, but the vision there is that it might be on a, like, reimbursement basis?

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: Yes. And they would have to show those costs. I'll let you say. Well,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: there's 39,000,000 or more or less left in that fund. Right. But there's no cap on how much they could ask for. And and it does so in

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: the event of the state or its municipalities. So this could be used theoretically by the administration that to say DBS has incurred $2,000,000 of shipping costs and we want to look at that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yep. And could be public safety. Could be Right. Exactly.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: We wanna spend 39,000,000 here. Well,

[Sen. Philip Baruth (Member), President Pro Tempore]: it's I I mean, very much the emergency board spend you know, we've we've spent very sparingly from this so far. I imagine it would still be the case. I also imagine that there wouldn't be more than a couple of municipalities who would incur these policies. Right.

[Rep. Robin Scheu, Chair, House Appropriations Committee]: That should be a threshold. Sure. What's happening in my town?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. Well, yeah, we can think about if there's any other wording or I I should be relevant. Okay. Anything else? And while we succeeded in doing our work, decision