Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: This

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: is Senate Appropriations Committee. It's February 20. We are going through FY '27 budget requests. And today we have the judiciary. Is that what you say? Just the judiciary. It's not an agency. The judiciary thing. So I'll let you introduce yourselves and give us your presentation.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Thank you so much, Senator Chairperson, State Court Administrator, and I'm joined by Greg Moser, who's our Chief of Finance and Administration. And also remotely, have Kelly Carbone, who's the Director of Finance, who knows the role, integrating figures if you need them. Thank you, Kelly. I have handed out copies of the materials that we'll be referring to, including a PowerPoint that Greg will call up. And also the memo just kind of provides the background kind of the detail for the slides. And then also is a document the Sheriff's Association provided that spells out the rationale for their request for an increase in their state contract rate pay. That's referred to in the memo towards the end. But those are the documents that we'll be referring to as we go through, but please feel free to stop us with any questions along the way. Greg is going to start off by going into the budget itself and how it compares with the governor's recommended budget. And then I'm just going to give some background for four specific personnel requests that we're making and the reason for that. And then Greg will end up explaining in more detail the share of contract piece or a pass through for the share of money that they come through the judiciary budget. And they're requesting an increase, which Greg will refer to at that that juncture.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Thank you. For the record, Greg Mose, the Chief of Finance for the money this year. So appropriation is about $78,500,000 in the current year and the governor recommended 4.2% increase which would bring it to $81,000,000. A couple of notes about that is the there's a shortfall in fee for space, 218,000. Our increase went up by about 400,000, and they provided about half of that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Did it happen there? How did so how is that gonna work? You're just not gonna pay BGS? No.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We were gonna ask for the money.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So just the budget adjustment act? If necessary, yes. This is just kinda what the governor said. Like, we need to we need to keep it at 4.2. So we'll just take it.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: What what they have done in the past is they have just not supported any increases in current services or anything new. This time they they supported some IT increases in current services, but then they just shorted us a little bit on on deeper space. And then they changed our budget in

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the vacancy savings. They upped

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: our vacancy savings by 285,000. I only mentioned that because as a separate branch of government, they don't have the authority to do that. You work for Springs, and you decide what our budget would be.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And you don't think I assume you don't think you would have this vacancy savings?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Depends on what is going on every year and vacancy savings. We just have two new Supreme Court test deals. We did have vacancies then for a couple of months in in addition to the churn. So I think I think 285,000 is probably a reasonable number. This is an increase of

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: two eighty. In the in the vacancy savings. So it's

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: essentially a budget cut. Right.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So what what were your vacancy savings before?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We we budgeted just just shy of $1,000,000.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. So it's it's 1.2. So it's like a 20% increase. Okay. Yes. And you think you can budget towards that, like, if I do leave some positions open, or do you think you would need them?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Well, obviously, you manage towards the number. And if if necessary, you need positions open. We're we are not in that position and haven't been for a couple of years.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Okay. And it was definitely our strong preference. I mean, we feel that we're very leanly resource. So our strong preference is to do not to move vacancies, especially when we're making such a strong effort to continue making good progress towards reducing the backlog. And you're not going to use the backlog if you have vacancies.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Can manage to the fee for space shortfall? No. You can't really No.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Get out of space. We can't give up space. That's a formula driven thing. And so it's not determined by us.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: And and even if we don't have space, I don't know that there would be an adjustment in the fee for space.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: They do it retroactively. So it would take a year before it

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: would take it after. Okay. So it's I've never I've seen a lot of increase in vacancy savings, but I haven't seen anybody just short you on your fee for space. Because I don't know, it doesn't mean BGS will be short.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Right, if it's the first time anything that's happened, so it wasn't something you anticipated nor if you have any luck to see if there's any courthouse that has extra space in there.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: No. What mean, our conversations with finance and management, was really about trying to keep the our budget increased within the government's recommended increase. Yeah. So that's what they chose to do. It's not the budget that

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: we submitted. Yeah. Okay.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Thank you. And then the our judicial request is actually a 5.6% increase to $82,900,000. The difference between what we are requesting and the governor's recommend is only 1,100,000.0. So it's not that big of a difference, but there is a small difference. Just a quick review of what our existing budget looks like. 72% of our expenses go to salaries and benefits. And then we have the fee for space, which is just under 10% our total budget. Security contracts, which are the sheriffs. The IT budget, which we manage independent from ADS now. And that leaves everything else in the judiciary budget is just 7% or about $5.5300000.0 dollars. And not everything else is things like interpreters and mediators, guardian ad litems, and, of course, you know, supplies and office furniture and postage and travel and training and all the normal things that come along with that. So we don't have a lot of flexibility in our budget. I'll pause for moment during the call.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Your security contract are still with sheriffs? Yes. It's a it's a combination. Actually, fair for the the vast majority of it, but the sheriffs are able to basically provide the security levels that are in your normal court house. So it's supplemented in part by some state employee, court security that came about a few, as some of you recall, we had the 17 report in 2023 when we did receive positions that are court staff that are trained for courthouse and courtroom security. So that's a part of it. And then we also have a small number attend the secure test for armed private security. Our goal is always to have at least one armed officer, typically at the door screening to prevent weapons from the warehouse and to have secure tests to supplement where we don't have the resources for that. Otherwise, it's our preference would be law enforcement sheriffs, which had been the case for centuries. But in recent decades, we've had to supplement to make up where we didn't have the number. So it's a combination. There's about there's 70 altogether, 40 butcher shares, 10 of which are our security officers, and then the balance of our court security officers. And those people that you have on your own staff that are security, I am imagining that that is cheaper than paying for either private security or or the sheriff's.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Yeah. The sheriff's obviously are the most expensive because they aren't law enforcement. The private security guard is about the same cost as a court security employee because of state benefits for the employee. So once you factor that in, it's it's pretty similar.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The guards

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: on

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: The The security guards are on The employees are not. Okay. The

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The can I Pardon? Does private security are they armed also? They're certified then?

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: They're not.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. And this is just the the sheriff having similar other law enforcement having a hard time hiring deputies like they have they could see if they can still they used to have.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Yes. Secured to us, those 10 positions are in six different court courthouses in about four different counties. And we brought them on when the sheriffs have announced that they weren't able to support the courts anymore. We currently have contractors of 11 of the 14 sheriffs.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And it's just that they can fire the deputy if it's not because they don't want to or something. There's not another factor that's is it just that I can't find the people to hire or is there other factors?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: No. It's usually when somebody leaves their employment or retires, they then tell us they can't replace them. It's a recruitment issue that they they're having.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yes. I don't know. Yeah. On the sheriff's paper that you gave us here, it says most Vermont state agencies also recognize $75 as the appropriate market based rate. What does that mean exactly?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: It means that the executive branch contracts with sheriffs at that $75 an hour rate. That's why they're at the table at the negotiation table with us asking for the same amount.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But when they say it's already an established They have an existing contract with executive branch. For $57 a month? For $75 a month. But you just share only pay 57? Yes. Just share only pays 57. There is a difference. Okay. That's the difference. Thank you.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: We thought that we would provide detail in terms of the request that we're seeking, the physician request that we're seeking. And this amounts to about $600,000 which is not part of the government's recommend. There are four categories of decisions. One is an additional help desk analyst. And this is connected with our tech resources. They're the first line of triage, if you will, whether it's a judge, a court staff member, a litigant, anybody accessing the website, anybody that has a tech question, they call the help desk. Our office goal is to have a live person there, especially when you have a courthouse where you have tech issues and you have somebody breaking down, we wanna have an immediate ability to help in that regard. And certainly looking at the numbers, we have 12,000 help desk requests that come in here, and the industry standard is one person per 2,000 requests roughly. And so that would equate to one additional position. Another way to look at it is the number of users for the help desk and or way beyond the standard behind terms of how many users considering 400 or so in addition to literally thousands from the public from litigants, whomever. So both of those initial would indicate the need for additional health care analysts. And it's just been our experience as well, given the increasing technological footprint that we've had as a result of electronic filing or electronic case management and then the remote hearings. That was a whole new avenue that came about after COVID. That now is part of our reality and is a very helpful and convenient aspect of it, but it has increased the need for technology support.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: How many test analysts do you

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: have now? We have two. And they're getting only 12,000 calls. Tickets like this. And then the next request is this is something that was born out of when we had the fiscal year twenty four kind of evaluation. What's an adequate level of staffing for courthouse? If we found this part of disparity, when you look at the number the number of full time employees per that courthouse to even it out, we had requested and received an additional 10 judicial assistance. We've had in the judiciary, and I think it's common in the workplace today, much more turnover than we have experienced in the past. It used to be you've come work for the courts and you've worked for twenty years, thirty years. Now, especially with younger persons, and and we're thrilled with the younger persons, they're very tech savvy, they're very dedicated, like the public service aspect of working in the courts, but they don't really, we found that they might stay for two or three years and then take advantage of the opportunity. So as a result, we've had more turnover, that's been a lot more pressure on training. It's typically what we do if somebody joins the courthouse here is we have an experienced person at the courthouse who takes over training them. And we have to provide very rigorous training. It's not a simple process called the information that a judicial system has to take into consideration, especially when you're in courtroom, the criminal courtroom, and you you can sure the conditions of police are accurate, you you can move quickly. Your statutes, there's rules, there's all kinds of information that they're responsible for. So we have somebody in the courthouse treating them, but when they're treating them, that takes away from their normal work responsibilities. And we're just with the increased screening, it's just a 30% turnover in the last two years. It's just taken away from the ability to do that job. So one solution is to get from our staff as well, would be to have a dedicated training judicial assistance, one for the criminal division, one for the family division, one for combination civil probate, when you look at the numbers that's kind of a counter phase out, and one for the juvenile and the mental health dockets, because those are very docets that have very specialized training required. But the idea would be to have one statewide dedicated trainer and now with our remote learning capabilities, it's entirely feasible to either be in person depending on how many new people, for example, the criminal division are coming on at any one time statewide to assist them either in person or at the same time remotely. That would ensure that they're getting the right training, best practices, latest with somebody who's very expert in that docket. So we have better standardization than we have now. And also very up to date training and also being able to establish kind of a network for criminal courtroom operators, for example, statewide, if we're getting the training, it's a resource that they can reach out to as well. So that's the approach in in the thought would be, well, what if you don't count, you know, a criminal a new person coming on that working criminal? We have manuals in each of the divisions that are supposed to reflect what's the latest? What do you refer to, what's your resource, if you have a question for a process in your pocket. And they need to be continually updated. And now they're updated with somebody has the time, you know, everybody stretched, it's we're concerned about them not staying up to date. This would be another responsibility of the dedicated statewide trainer in that division. And then the last part is to fill in, we kind of have when everybody's when nobody's sick, nobody's on vacation, you know, we're fine. But if you have somebody on leave, you have a gap there. And this person can also leave the win, especially now with the ability to fill in remotely. Even if you're recording, you can do that remotely. So we feel that the the person's the attorney's terms would be well well spent. That's just what we feel would make sense to address this specific need that's arisen because of the higher turnover rate in our real desire to continue the momentum that we have addressing the backlog. We've been working so hard and we're making good progress, and it's hard to do that if we have people out or if they're treating somebody else.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is your workplace engagement survey the same one that the state does, or you just have to do your own? Or you do you go through HRs?

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: I mean, we do our own through the National Center for State Courts, and that would reflect the need for, well I say reflect the need, we didn't look at it particularly with the trainer positions but certainly consulting the National Center for State Courts they acknowledge the wisdom of that approach

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: to address Do you not use HR for other services

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: because they're separate? We do use HR for many services especially payroll but as a separate branch of government we do our own employee serve.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Right and you do your own hiring or do they help you with hiring or you do all that?

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Well, we post on their website.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We post on our on our website. But we need

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But you don't need to go through them to

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Hire. Yeah. Through the hiring process. They issue the position numbers. Yeah. But after that, we do our own job description for those of the position and we have a in addition to the state website, we also have a separate website where we post on the.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Because I'm wondering if that is if that's helped you to figure out why you're having a higher turnover than you did three or four years ago.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Well, the main reason because we do exit surveys.

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

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: And there's a different rate of pay. I think I guess you could say some of the sheriffs. The the majority of our people who have left the positions in particular because they can get higher pay in DCF, OCS, sheriff's office or not the sheriff's office, state's attorney's office, public defender's office.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So they have to stay within the state system and sometimes even within the judiciary kind of world, but they just get higher place. I

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: think that's that's the reason. We were able to what was it? Address that because that that's been consistently the reason people say we love the job, but we can get however much more proactive DCF, you know, similar knowledge. They've been working from there from the treatment organization.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And so you wouldn't do you wouldn't use HR to do a reclassification to try to increase the pay?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We wouldn't involve them in that process.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You could do but you could do that.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: In the contract negotiations. So

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

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So you're looking into that,

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: but that's like And I I would add just one other factor that that impacts our turnover rate and that's the use of limited service positions. If you remember back a few years, received 56 positions that was COVID funded. That has now expired. Those positions are empty. And so 56 people left the judiciary as that money was going down. And we now have 26 other limited service. The more you rely on limited service, the more return on.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: When they see the end date of their tenure.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Right, and then there's another job within stakeholder that none of them would be.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Yeah. Combination of all those factors. The next position, actually, so your lines would have familiar with this. I'm very familiar with this. Have a mental health and the police commission. And that we were able to secure grant funding from a federal grant of skip grant that funded in part and then we'll have them as director who's been very helpful in the this we're down on our third year. We did part of that involved. So there's a statewide summit every summer, and then we get regional sequential reset model workshops in the five regions to organize, basically to try to bring together all the resources involved in mental health court users. It's been, I think, very successful. And actually, to Senator Lyons, we were able to accomplish a lot of advances in legislation, particularly regarding competency evaluations that came out of the commission work that was sponsored and really very much reduced the amount of time that's needed for the competency evaluations and addressed other issues with it. That's an example of some of the commissions accomplished. The skip plan is one of those federal grants that normally there's a solicitation on calendar that they're behind. And we haven't been told that they're not going to continue. In fact, we've been told that it's anticipated, But the funding runs out the September for the mental health and the courts director. It's a contract position, it's $88,000 And we anticipate and hope that there will be the skip grant, but there's no guarantee that we'll get one, it hasn't come out yet anyway, to be able to fund that position once it ends in September. So we requested it as part of the budget. I don't honestly know how it works finance wise, because if the skip plan is a solicitation, we will apply, and our hope and expectations we would get in which case it would cover that cost. But this is to have it because we don't know, and when we ask, we check, you know, constantly, but there's no guarantee solicitation date. So that's why we have this request here for our contract position. We're happy to attach a contingency that if the grant is valid, we get companies that we're happy to turn it down, and it works that way, but that's the reasoning for

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The 80,000 is just I assume that's just part of the cost. That's Part of it. That's nine months. Yeah.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Oh, thought it was every year That until

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: because it ends in September. Oh, I see. So September to June.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Gotcha. Right.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: And then the fourth category in fiscal year twenty four, we were given 26 positions And at the very end of the session, of them being the usual permanent positions, they were termed extended limited service positions. And we were in but it yet it came out of the general It's been part of our base fund since then. These positions have all been hired and we're very happy with the people who have had the positions. There are 10 judicial assistants and 11 security officers and then a combination of data positions, IT positions. So we were gonna suggest that we could extend it, use a four year period. Usually for running the service, you might have a two year period. But a four year period, which the recommendation that we're come back before that period of time ended, to ask for a conversion of those extended limited service positions, if you will, the permanent positions. Last year, the state's attorneys and sheriffs who received nine of these extended limited service positions the same time we did, they came back last year and requested and received the permission to convert to permanent. So we're coming back this year. When the people were all hired, it was with the 2028 date. So it's 2026. And, you know, they're kind of approaching that where they say we can't risk, you know, something that won't be employment, they're getting nervous. So that's what we're asking for the commission to

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So they're all failed positions,

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: all 21. Yes.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Yeah. And especially the 11 court security officer positions, even all the more critical because we've had that reduction in share of personnel since then. So they're being utilized, you know, in courts throughout the state. And if we don't have court security, we can't run hearings. So again, it has our whole desire to, you know, make good progress on the backlog, which the most progress comes when you have something scheduled for hearing either either settle or dispose of that way. So we really rely on being able to have hearing days in order to continue moving the cases. And then Greg was gonna talk about the the sheriff request.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: So as we talked about, the sheriffs provide most of the security for all of our courthouse. We have 23 courthouses with 40 deputies across the state in addition with the guards and the employees. And every year, we've con we negotiate a contract with them. The last two years, we did not get funding in our base budget. So we've come back in the BAA and asked for that. So we're actually a little bit behind by about 588,000. I I know you we're talking about the BAA. So it's it's in there to basically cover the last two years, and then they come into this this year's negotiation as for $75 equivalent to what the executive branch is paying them.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What is the if the current is using for? I'm

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: not the person to ask about exactly what they do for the executive branch, but I do know that there are a fair amount of transports. It's not just to courts, very typical medical appointments and other appointments. They cover events.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: They also have a presence at the state office buildings. We were actually yesterday testifying in our joint house corrections and institutions and house general housing. And they talked about having a presence at the state office buildings for security purposes. That was part of what we do as well. Yeah. So,

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: you know, I tried to get them to move off to 75 because they're at we're at 57 right now, so that's like a 30% increase. It's not in the government's recommend because it doesn't fit. And so here we are. We went to them last year. They got I think it was a 7% increase, went to $57 an hour and we still lost deputies in that process. So we started July 1 with 40 deputies. Currently, we're at 35. And they have a turnover or retirement, and they just say, I can't fill it. We have one courthouse that's closed at the moment, the Orleans County civil courthouse of the Newport. We don't have security to cover the front doors, so it's closed. It's locked. We're using the building right next door, so the public still has access. We open it only when we need the courtrooms and when we can send an employee out there to do this too.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do other states rely on sheriffs or other It's a mix. Police or do they have their own

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: It's it's a mix. So I know that Connecticut and Maine, for example, have their own judiciary marshal service. We have not established that here. We do have employees who do security, but a marshal service would be law enforcement armed, and we're at that level with our employees.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Have you thought of that?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Two years ago, we did a comprehensive review in what was what we call the s 17 report and we looked at a staff model for that. We thought that it was we didn't suggest or recommend a marshal service because given the the labor force right now, we would just be another want that we're using competing for the same number of certified officers. And so we thought that that might create more problems than it would solve.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: K. Yes. Yeah. Quick question. What are you what are you paying your your private security firms per hour? Think counts

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: $46 an hour.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The unarmed or armed? That's armed. And the unarmed is

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We don't have unarmed. They're having different rates for unarmed, but we don't want

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: have employees, so that's not Yeah. The advantage to have a private guard is the fact that

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: they can carry a gun.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: We're use for example in the private room for the screening position because we wanna have an orange person at the front door.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Check out a new room. Here in in Washington County, we don't have a contact with the Washington County Sheriffs. We did we had one officer just down the street, Civil Building, they retired and that's the end of the contract. In Barry, criminal courthouse, which is one of the busiest courthouses, we have two Lamoille deputies, two Windsor deputies, and two securitized guards to make six security and affordability. Three different entities coordinated. It's not illegal. Right. Yeah. So yeah. So this would be basically the same number of deputies, just a higher rate. So it's basically an increase in current service. Could it allow the sheriffs

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: to pay the deputies more, and then they can maybe recruit more or just not? The recruit more into the payors, I think. I don't understand. Guarantee there. Right. And that as we heard from other law enforcement, it's not really a penny issue. It's there's other issues about when you study on the law enforcement. Okay. And so you're supportive of this new contract of 57,000?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: We we always start the conversation with the sheriffs. What will keep the the security level the same. Number of deputies, quality of the service. So that's what we're trying to get to is what's gonna keep them in the courthouse. And this is this is where we're at at the moment.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. And that those are your changes. I assume on your other ups and downs kind of thing, there's not anything out of the ordinary?

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: No. We don't use the up ups and downs anymore. I guess it's the attachment attachment b. Yeah. No. That these are the the biggest issues. Obviously, there's the payout that that we're part of. Even the government recommended an increase in our IT service, increase in current service. Think it was about 400,000.

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Kind of the annual adjustments in terms of the license agreements, etcetera, just the cost of the built in to maintain that.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Since we're separate from EDS now, the increase will kind of remain annual very similar to what EDS

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And is that how did I gotten that separation from any of them taking it on yourself?

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: No. I feel like it's certainly, I know a big issue was cybersecurity and protection, and I really feel much more confident having the independent smaller network. But otherwise, in terms of our corporate operations, we have not had the the work stoppages that we had before with the interest breakdown. So that's gone really well in that respect. And just having the control. One big thing in our IP this year, for the remote hearings, we had used a platform called WebEx. But at the time of the COVID, that that was the state of the art, they then started backing away from that coverage and so increased. So now about 70% of the state closed nationwide use the Zoom. If you remember back when it started, we had the Zoom bombs and it kinda doesn't mean it. But now they're they're building up there. So we're transitioning from Webex to Zoom, so that's taken a lot of our IT people to go and do all the wiring and the hardware necessary for that. And we're in the process of doing it now, and so far it's going very smoothly. It's nice having the kind of the control and workforce that's geared to judiciary operations.

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: Our network was built with better redundancy. So we have one cable goes down. We can usually fix that by using some other wire or pathway. Our Wi Fi has improved in our courthouses for the public. And yeah. It's we and we also use newer wiring. We use CAT six wiring. So in in the courthouses that we share, you know, BGS or the electricians go in, they can identify which network is which because ADS is a CAT three or four, you know, CAT six. And so we're very pleased and it's performing very well. Okay. Great.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And everything else was put in the 3% just other than just because of the pay act and salaries. That's all just fine. And you did mention the cyber because you have a 190 per cybersecurity software edition. And those are also above the governor's recommend? Yes. They're both

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: in the governor's recommend emails.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The pieces that weren't in

[Greg Moser (Chief of Finance and Administration, Vermont Judiciary)]: the in government's recommended right here on the screen. It's a 611,000 for positions and then the sheriff's.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. Any other questions for what you're just sharing? Thank

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: you so much for your time.

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

[State Court Administrator, Vermont Judiciary (name not stated)]: Okay. Don't hesitate if there's any questions. We're right next door.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. Alright. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. Alright. Unless anybody has any other announcements of retirements or anything.