Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: We are live.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: We're live. Senate appropriations. We're going to fiscal year twenty seven budget request. And today, we have Dale with us. We have the commissioner with us. So you can introduce yourself and anybody else you want to that you have with you and then give us your presentation.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: We I'm just gonna pass it. We printed out a couple pages of your presentation that we thought it would be easier for the committee to have hard copies of this part.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah, I know. I see what they think that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Oh, you want that?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Oh, I'm sorry.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Know exactly what you're gonna You did the other one?

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: I have another one.

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

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: for that interruption.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay, I'm Doctor. Phil Bell, I'm commissioner for the Department of Disabilities Aging and Independent Living, Dale. And with me? Okay. Thank you. So we're gonna start. You're gonna Rebecca, you didn't introduce yourself. Oh. For the record, I have a silver and able proof of assistant appeal. Okay. Thank you. We're going to walk through some key points of the testimony. So you're gonna put it up there, and we're just gonna talk to certain key areas that we would like to highlight. Okay. So page four, number one. So we wanna highlight for you, for those who are not familiar with Dale, and I don't know if there's anybody in the room right now, but we just want to just let you know that Dale's five divisions are the adult services division with a focus on older Vermonters, the Division for the Blind and Visually Impaired, the Developmental Disability Services Division, which includes the Office of the Public Guardian, the Division of Licensing and Protection, which includes survey and certification, and the adult detective services and the division of vocational rehabilitation, which is hireability. Then there is a commissioning office. So the first point we want to highlight in terms of the work that's ongoing is a strong Vermont plan. For those who don't know, it's a comprehensive ten year multi sector plan on aging. We are the second fastest growing demographic in the nation with a third of our population, 60, and it's growing steadily. This is a very thoughtful approach that is one of only a few multistector plans on aging in the country. There are other states that are working to address a growing demographic as we are, but not all of them have such a comprehensive plan, strategy and approach. We have just completed year two. 2025 was year two, and our year two report will be out within the next few days. We really recommend you to take a look and to see what's going on with a strong remark. Page four number two is to highlight the conflict free case management and developmental disability payment reform. That is a plan that was required by the federal rules for from CMS that has been in place for some time, but Vermont was virtually the last state to come into compliance. We did have a settlement agreement, and we went live with conflict free case management and payment reform 10/01/2025. That was many years in the making, but it is a complex approach that takes some time to adjust to. We've been working with our partners to work through those challenges. Next is page five number three to highlight supportive housing for developmental disabilities. Last session at sixty nine did put commission together, a committee at the road to home was the report. It was a multi stakeholder effort. There is a tremendous need for housing for folks with developmental disabilities. The system that's in place now is insufficient to meet all of the needs of those with developmental disabilities. Many who are with families that are aging, here comes the intersection between developmental disabilities and aging demographics. And this just highlights some of the work we have done to date and were able to accomplish last year. And it showed that we have stood up or helped to stand up with our partners. Hainesback, which is a housing project that was born out of the act one eighty six from 2022 housing pilots. All of those have come to fruition from the pilot work. And then we're working with housing trusts and fundraising. Our providers have succeeded in opening several other DS settings that are each have a different model. And the idea is to create enough and to create choice. Most of the residential care for developmental disabilities in this state are in shared with providers, which is about a thirty years old since the initiation of that model. And there's lots of reasons why that model is waning and we need to have alternatives.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Are there any components in section three I'm talking about that address vocational transportation issues? Is it all about housing?

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Like rides to work? So this is this particular section is about housing.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: How strictly housing? Are there anything in any area that addresses that?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: In any area of the work that we do that addresses transportation, it's a first of all, it's getting to work or getting to a doctor's appointment or get depending on where people live and whether this public transportation, whether the public transportation is something they can reach even if it's down the block from them is a problem. So I don't know if you want to say anything more about transportation and the work that we're doing. Sure. We're on developmental disabilities. We could wait till you get is our director of developmental disabilities.

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: Transportation to support people getting to their employment is an allowable part of developmental disability services is built into the rate for the hourly reimbursement for an agency so that is part of it. Certainly as I said, transportation as a whole in Vermont is pretty challenging. We have had some early conversations with our Medicaid policy team about how we might be able to build out the benefits within our home DS home and community based services as we renew our eleven fifteen agreement that also within our system of care plan that the issue of transportation is one of our special initiatives. So as soon as we get a little bit more stability under the major changes that we've made with complex of interest mitigation and our new payment model, we will be starting a work group with our key partners to explore models. Other states have some really interesting Medicaid reimbursed transportation alternatives and we want to explore what they're doing and see if there might be a a world where we can bring those

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: to Vermont.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Now when it comes to because you asked about employment. Right? In the vocational rehabilitation for those with developmental disabilities and other disabilities, there are some opportunities not not sufficient for for all, and it limits where people can get employment if they don't have the means to to travel. So in rural areas, you're gonna see that. When it comes to older Vermonters, now I'm pointing it at you, just getting to, let's say, a senior center where maybe there would be a congregate meal or an opportunity to engage with other people could can be a challenge. There are a few who have some transportation built in, but not most of them. And people tend to drive to get there, so that means not everybody can get there. And just in general, the public infrastructure, obviously, is not there for everybody. There there are some some work in the rural health plan to try to help address some approaches to reaching people or for transportation infrastructure. So that, you you can get a briefing on that. Did you wanna say anymore or that was basically it?

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: Yeah. I think that in the older Vermonter space, it heavily relied on volunteers Yeah. Throughout the state to provide transportation.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. And a a shout out to the volunteers because many of them are actually older Vermonters themselves. Many are retired. Meals on Wheels program completely depends on the volunteer workforce, but other in other sectors too, and rely on volunteer workers.

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

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. Okay. So page six. Mister Norris?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I'm sorry. Before we go to page six, I'm just curious. You said NCSS just opened up Gables House? What what

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Gable House.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What is that? What townships that is?

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: It's yes. It's you're right in Saint Albans, but I think it's at 6 Home Health Circle. So right near the hospital.

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

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: A since we were talking about the intersection between older Vermonters and disabilities, this program was built for people who are older, like 40. 45. Yeah, have to be at least 45 to qualify, because for these folks with developmental disabilities You're not there Are you not there yet? Not quite. Oh, sorry. No. I am.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: No rush. What do

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: we look for? So this is a forever home for them then because they can age there, and that was built intentionally. And so they're set up to be able to address some of the issues that could arise just in the normal aging or in the complexity that we see across the board.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is it allowed in Vermont? I know in other states where residential, because there's only six beds. Could somebody open one of these in their home and have it like three beds?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: So there are, there's a couple of different approaches. The issue I said before with most being like SLPs, which is shared living providers. So the majority of the folks who are in residential in the DS world are in a shared living provider. That means somebody has invited them into their home. They do get compensated for that. And it could be usually, it's one or two people. When you hit three in Vermont, there there is a it doesn't need to talk about licensing. Okay? So the therapeutic CCR community residents is there's some of those out there too, depending on what the type of program it is. And at three, you would need to be licensed. So, there are programs like that. Many of the models, the sort of independent or peer models that are being built now are looking for that kind of community peer connection that hasn't been as available to this population. And so some of the innovative ones that were built to us of Act 186 are like that. But we're not talking about large numbers. That's one of the challenges. The Act 69 will show you that we need space to 600 people. So that's a big leap, a big lift from where we are. But if you have mixture of choice and mixture of, let's say intensity for what the needs might be, that's the vision. Okay? And we're not there now. So when these little these open up and they're small in each one, they're, they're celebrated. It's a I I've been to all of them to take a look at it, to talk to the people who are being served there. You walk in and it feels like a home. It is really special and people are really happy to be there. Okay, so let's move on from there. We're going to the next page for a quick look at the Direct Care Workforce Initiative. Do you want to speak to this since you've been very directly involved?

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: Sure. We're doing a few things in the direct care workforce space, recognizing that's the backbone of our HCBS system and our nursing home system as well. So in 2025, we applied to participate in a national director workforce strategy center collaborative. And through that work, we're partnering with other states on learning and we're getting technical assistance from national experts to really focus on supporting our independent direct care workforce as well. We have thousands of Vermonters who self direct their care and hire their own caregivers just to support them. Those individuals do not we don't have any requirements around training or education. So we're working on creating a core competency model for those workers to be to then be able to work on training for them. We also implemented a marketing campaign in 2025 called Careers and Caring, which was really successful. It was, you know, radio, TV, social media, and drove people to our Career Caring web page, which then directed them to learn more about the opportunities and different agencies, the red where they could find work. So we had over 120,000 visits to the Career and Caring web page during that campaign. We're also working on an RFP for a direct care worker registry. So for folks who are looking for caregivers and for people who are looking to provide care, can go to this website and basically be matched, find a good match and a caregiver to support themselves or their family. So we're hoping to have that developed this year. And then of course, we worked closely with the Vermont Healthcare Association and the nursing homes to implement the grants

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: for

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: the LNA workforce that were appropriated last year for recruitment and retention of LNAs in nursing homes and over 17 nursing homes took advantage of those grants this year to implement projects related to training, scholarships, mentorships, supervision, etcetera. And that's had a real impact in our nursing homes in helping retain LNAs.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: And I was in the room when AHS did their presentation, so you learned you have heard a lot about the rural health transformation plan, but Dale's two we are the lead for two of the initiatives, and one is an LNA workforce initiative that will that is and the NOFO is showing up. I think there was a few ones when you you did a fist bump on that. Yeah. You did a fist bump on that. Yes. You did. You put you gave us the grants that were successful. Next step in the evolution is creating basically a hub to coordinate the trainings and the opportunities across across the state and help folks get to get into those positions and support their success. The other one, just as an FYI, is the complexity of the nursing home, increasing ventilation, and dialysis. So that's those are not in our budget. I'm telling you guys that we are the lead on those and it's part of AHS' efforts around rural health transformation. But it did come from the LNA piece of it was encouraged. We were encouraged by what the results of that was. Okay. So And you

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: should probably tell the committee that how much you've asked for.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Oh, from the rural HUD information. It's it's somewhere around 800 and something like that. For

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: 11,000 per year for five years.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. But it could be more. Yeah. Yes. Great. Again, this is that's year one, and we have I mean, you you heard the whole like, we have to be able to get it out the door and prove that we've done what we said we would and have outcomes, whatever, to in order to get it to year two. So our we're anticipating really being able to do that for five years and having an infrastructure then

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: that will work. The only reason, partly, is it's been hard for us to figure out what's in that grant and what's not. Okay. In the federal grant.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. That's for that particular initiative? No. For everything.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: No. I'm just you you you just fit Yeah. For everything, it's been a little hard.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. Not everything is all locked down yet either. You've got it all now? Because I don't have all that.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Because this But it hasn't been that easy.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: No. It's not easy at all. And yeah. It isn't easy, but it it it's moving. Yes. Yeah. And there's a lot of information online, but some of it is not locked yet. There's still there's still negotiation going on, which is why the 811

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. It's just yeah.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. The next thing on page seven I wanted to talk with you about is the pathway to partnership grant, which is still ongoing, and that is led by DBVI and it includes coordination across the school system to create stronger transitional plans for students with disabilities. It's basically partnerships between schools and community agencies. Six on here is the higher ability opioid recovery employment pilot. You will see that as essentially our one initiative. While it's not new, it's been in pilot phase and it has been funded by the opioid settlement agreement. It is now coming into phase. It is one of the most effective programs that we have. It's in the three editions started in let's say, it started in Orleans at Chittenden, and it's working to expand to Rutland and Bennington. And since November '25, which is not that long ago, they've generated over five forty two referrals, three seventeen applied for services, ninety four placed in employment. These are people in recovery from opioid use disorder. And this is an effective approach because those who are employed, the employment itself supports their recovery. And those who are in recovery, the recovery supports the employment. So this is a good program and it's working well and you'll see that that's in our budget.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Is there something in your budget about the career advancement project which seems related pending. The The Vermont Career Advancement Project.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: That doesn't sound familiar to you, anybody? That's that's in you're saying that's in our budget? Yeah. What is that?

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: NBI.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Oh, you're talking about hireability. I'm sorry.

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

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yes. So hireability has many programs, but one of them is really focused on careers. So helping people get credentials or diplomas or skills so that they can advance their career. So not just to think about a job, but to think about a career. There testimonials that are, you know, give me chills.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But that's similar to the the the opioid employment pilot that you're talking about, making turning into to to the base, or it's a different population that

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: It's a completely different population. One is the substance use disorder population, that's the opioid recovery, and the other

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: is for folks with disabilities. And

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: and the so you need two different types of counselors and folks working Absolutely. In individual cohorts. Yeah. Yeah. Different so they're different cohorts. Yeah. But ultimately, your your point about the importance of employment and success for people facing any number of challenges is it's underappreciated as, you know, a real great tool for success and for people's well-being of them confident. So let's see. We're up to page nine. Oh, the bottom of eight, I just wanted to call out Mission Care at Bennington. So that has now been in place for a little over a year. And they have met their contractual obligations. They're at 90% capacity. They have brought in folks with complex care needs. There are some other nursing homes or SNFs who do take people to complex care needs, but this is their entire sort of approach is to to bring folks in with complex care needs. And they have admitted more than 60 new residents since they opened and have helped to reduce the boarding at hospital and emergency room. Okay, the next on page nine, number nine is nursing facility stabilization and sustainability. And this is an approach we are taking to address the fragility in the nursing home system and the capacity challenge in our nursing home system. Are, well technically I guess there are still 33 because it's supposed to close in April, but there's no one there. And before, so we have looked Green Mountain Nursing Home, they closed, and the individuals have been transferred to other settings. But we are at risk for others closing. There is just a tremendous amount of fragility at a time when the demographic is increasing. So we have looked forward and said we need to be planning forward. Now we have five different areas of focus that not the least of which is the workforce. But there are others like infrastructure and the ability to bring in complex care cases, etcetera. And we have focus areas and we're on it. We have gone from planning into stakeholder engagement and we have our kickoff engagement meeting tomorrow.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Similar to my question before, can there be like a small home based nursing home? So we

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: have residential care homes and assisted living facilities that can meet an ERC level that can provide nursing home level of care. We also have Money Follows the Person, which is a federal grant that helps people to shift from a nursing home or some other institution like a hospital setting into a different kind of community setting, could be their home, and bring over the services there. So we definitely have

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: alternatives. Some people can do that, make

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: it like a home light setting where they might only have two people there.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: The residential care homes and assisted living facilities have an adult family. Adult family care will be that,

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: what you're talking about. Choices for care,

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: you do. It's all choices for care, but that but usually, an assisted living facility or a residential care home have more. But the the Right.

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: Non licensed adult family care homes can insure up to two people who are Two. Yeah. Did you continue to And

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: they all For the record I

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: it earlier. Okay. Yeah. I can say it again. For the record, Angela McMahon, the adult services division director at her down. So in choices for care, we have many people who are at nursing level care, that's one of the eligibility, clinical eligibility for the program is that unique nursing home level care. So we have many people who are served in different settings. So some of them are adult family care, some might be in their own home or in their family's home. So it's nursing home level care and the community.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. It's it will in our sustainability planning, we need the entire care continuum, long term care continuum. It's not just about nursing home. We need all of it. It's not either or it's both. And this is the and this fragility in the long term care as well. Although they did get rate increases that have stabilized them a little bit. Last year, we added more residential care home beds than we lost, which was a net positive for the first time in a few years. So we're working on that.

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

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. So next slide is number 10. So the APS statute has been, I think, ready for a third reading or it had that?

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: It had a proceeding yesterday in the So you all be hearing a little bit about that soon.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. So this this came about because CMS changed its rules, and one of the areas that needed to be adjusted was caregiver negligence. And there were some challenges in past years in terms of balancing the needs of the individual who's under their care to ensure their safety and supporting the workforce. Because caregiver workforce is very difficult work. And so balancing that, what we did was we came together with a wide array of stakeholders across the board in law and in direct care and like advocates and like everybody. And we had 15 sessions throughout the year facilitated, And we agreed we were gonna work towards a solution that would allow us to be respectful for the caregivers, ensure the safety of the individuals and be in compliance with CMS. And we came to consensus and we're in agreement. And we, you know, this going to, it looks like it's going to make it through. I'm gonna knock on wood now. It's going smoothly. Okay. Let's go to page 17. Here we have a slide. Can you pull it up just a little bit? This goes back to the choices for care settings so that you can see adult family care, which you asked about, center. Enhanced residential care, which is one of the that's the residential care homes that the enhanced rates. The home and community based services moderate needs. This is the whole choice of care continuum. A nursing facility and traditional home and community services. So you can see in blue is 2025 and green is 2024. You can see where there was growth in the community based setting and you can see the nursing facility utilization growing. So you can see that in adult family care and in traditional, the top and the bottom, you pretty much see steady. But for enhanced residential care, the moderate needs and nursing facilities, again, community and the more acute, you're seeing growth. So that's why we need a stabilization sustainability plan. We need to have the capacity, and we need to have the stability. Next is just so you can see the high highest enrollment counts. These are for those who meet the criteria for high high. And you can see home community based versus nursing homes. So we, for sure, each year have more have the next slide

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: after that?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: No, next slide. Yeah. There we go. Okay, so what you can see here is that there are more people in the community based settings receiving the high highest services than in the nursing home setting. But you're still seeing an increase of just wanted you to see that. And then all of it is interesting, I'm just trying to pop for you because, you know, below that is the the adult day program for the brain injury program and the OEA home delivered meals and etcetera. There's a whole continuum that needs support. Okay, so we're going to jump to 26. And this is just now we're in developmental disabilities, home and community based services, so we can see the growth in the pressures here. So we have about 3,400 people being served through the developmental disability services, home community based services population. It's 3,394 people. There's over a thousand served by flexible family funding. There's nearly six fifty in family managed respite, over four sixty in the Bridge program, more than seven fifty in the Office of Public Guardian, Public Guardianship Services, and then a little bit 300 in the Office of Public Guardian's representative payee services, the rep payee. So just so that you can see for the population what's happening longitudinally over time. Okay. Now we can look at slide 34 or page 34, please, just so that you can see what you're looking at here is for the blind and visually impaired work, compared to the nation, the MSD environment is measurable skill gains. And you can see that, look at 25, which is, you know, each one of them are comparing to the nation. But if you look at all the way on the right, that's our most current and we exceed the nation's results. And I'll show you that for hireability too on page 46 because that is also exceeding the nation's in median earnings, in credential rates, to your point about credentialing and career building, and in measurable skill gains, we exceed the national average. Yeah. Yay. So That's great.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: No. No. You're in I'm not sure if this is quite quite the place to ask, but I think this is blinded and visually impaired. Go ahead. You there's an elimination of the Vermont's support services provider in, this area. Is that correct?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: That's, it's not an elimination. It it was never in the base. It's, over the last year or two, I believe, we've been able to fund it through FMAP and other funding. We looked to see whether it was a billable service, and unfortunately, it was not. So now that that and we, you know, stretch that as far as we could go, so we're good for this year. But it's not in our budget. Was never in our base budget. We've always kind of been able, at least the last few years, to cobble together. It's a small number

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: of people served who are both And you talk to the committee about the service because we've had when we had our hearing and we had people speak, it got brought up a few times and we've heard about it.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. I mean, it's it's not that it's not a good program. Right? It has people who are both deaf and blind, and it's a support program for them so that they have somebody who's actually with them, like physically with them, to help them navigate, whether it's community or in some cases it could be a work environment. But for many of them, it gives them more freedom, more ability to be more present in the world. So people feel very strongly about it, but it is not in in the budget, and it's not an elimination. It's the the end

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: of the FMAP. And can you just tell me how much if we put into that?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: We're at let's see. 114,000.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. 115,000

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: is the annual. Well, I think it

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: was 60 for the half year. It's about 120. Is that what you you know? Yeah. That's good. Change. Okay. Let's move on to 28, and we can go into your what you've all handed out. I I do have mine right here. This looks like thank you. Yeah. So to look at the top, can you come down to the I can see well, they have it in front of them, but above that. Okay. Yeah. There we go. So our total proposed budget for fiscal year twenty seven is 829,747,105, broken down by funding source. General fund is 4.7% of that. Global commitment is 88.2%. We are very heavily Medicaid funded.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So do you have in here what that is as a percentage from last year?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: That's a percentage of what's being proposed. You mentioned China.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. No. The 829,000,000 compared to Oh, yeah.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: We're gonna get oh, we're gonna the next page is

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the breakdown. At the bottom?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: No. Next page. Oh, do you what's that? Yeah. You have it on in your little pen.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Is there a percentage?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I don't see a percentage. What was your percentage? Did you mean the governor's 3% for example?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Oh, do you have that?

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: I think it's around three. I can calculate it. Yes. They're around three.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: We're close. We have we have the last year's and we have this year's, so we could you can do math. You could see if I was gonna math. Okay. So the federal fund is 6.5% and special and interdisciplinary departmental fund is less than 1%. So now what we're doing is breaking it down for you by our divisions. So the developmental disabilities, three hundred and sixty seven million eight hundred and twenty eight thousand one hundred and ninety nine, that's 44% of Dale's total budget right there, and 97% of that is global commitment. Next, the adult services division, that's our largest, which it didn't used to be, but with the cost of nursing homes that it does. It's 403,614,407. That's 49% of failed budget, 92% of which is global commitment. For a vocational rehabilitation, which is hireability, it's just under 36,000,000. That's 4% of our total budget. 24% is general fund, which is kind of the match to the federal, because this is very directly funded by the federal government, 76% of it.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: 3.93%.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Three point three nine?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Three point nine three. That's true. Yeah. Good job. And then the blind and visually impaired, it's 5,800,000.0, which is approximately 1% of our budget. General fund is 21%. And they are also, as vocational rehabilitation, heavily funded by the federal government at 74%. Licensing and protection is just under 8,000,000, approximately 1%. 55% general fund and 45% federal. Commissioner's office, 8,500,000.0, approximately 1%, 85% general fund with 14% federal. And that brings me back to the 829,000,000 for the employee's debt. Million. Next

[Rebecca [last name unknown], DAIL Deputy Commissioner/Workforce Lead]: is where we will compare

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: me to last year's. So the total change is 31,346,555. By the way, that's 3.93. Okay. So in 'twenty six for administration, we had 55,517,792. The proposed changes is an increase of 5,800,000.0. You can see the split of general fund, special fund, the IDPT fund and the federal fund. And that's how we get to 2.48 here, but it comes to 5.8. So what's recommended is an increase of 61,000,003 and 83,402 for administration and support. For the adult services division grants in 2026, the base appropriation was 24,009,492. The proposed changes, so we have an underutilization of adult day and therefore hold $1,000,000 back in from that budget. They still have money in their budget to expand. So we this is an efficiency in lieu of any cut that we wouldn't wanna make since they are lower in their in their use than they have been in the past. Not that they're not working to increase their participation. And then

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Yeah. I it just that's one of the areas that we didn't get to cover when we sat down because we had so little time. I will I need to hear from you about where we are with that. I know there was someone in Washington County last year that was interested in opening and during COVID we had at least two maybe three closures and we aren't any we aren't back to where we We're not back.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: We're not back not just with the ones that closed. So I believe one of them have been. Is that correct? Of those three?

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: None of them have been? No. There's there is a a project plan for Washington County. Yeah. I believe that they secured a location. Yep. But we're still talking about several years to build and open is the intergenerational facility. And we've had some interest in the Rockland area, but very, very beginning stages

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: The of

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: people in the Barrie area, at least three of them have been taking their elderly parents to Morristown. So it's really kind of, so I will be interested, but we didn't get a chance to

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: have But this is utilization. Anyway, would you like Yeah.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: I can share with the committee some historical utilization just to give perspective on so

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: base budget for this was 3,300,000.0, and in 'twenty three the actual expenses were $1,000,000 in 'twenty four dollars 1,500,000.0, and then 'twenty $5 1,800,000.0. So take the million away, we got $2,300,000 There's still room for growth and utilization.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. So what's the biggest barrier? Is it just people, volunteers, transportation? So, yeah, mean, I think that, you know, in talking with in going to the sites and talking to people, and you could see that there's fewer people, not that there's nobody there. There there are people using it, and they need it, has been just people not coming back after the pandemic. Yeah. And either because they're not feeling comfortable or safe coming. There's still a lot of people who just did not return to this kind of social engagement and support. Transportation is an issue. And like I said, in some of the centers, they actually do have transportation. Most of the people who come are driving or they're going with each other. And the programs remain excellent. And for many, it is and many families, it's the difference between being able to remain employed. And it's but the the reality of the moment is that they're not using the amount of money that's budgeted. I I didn't Devin? Alright.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: You're good? But I will have to have a discussion about that. One of the complaints that has been by the providers is you'll have that the way the payment structure works, you have to show up every day to get reimbursement. And the rolling average, what happens is somebody gets sick for a few days, they're not there, the adult day doesn't get paid, and it racks their budget to be able to put it together on a basis. So we didn't get a chance to cover it, but that's one of the areas I'll want to get some comfort level if

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: It's kind of a way of talking about no shows. They could because they have capacity, they certainly can have more people come in if they

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: can bring them in. If they call in the morning and say mom or dad is really sick and they can't be there and they have to show to pay for that and they don't show up, it it you know? Yeah.

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: Yeah. It it is a fee for service model, so bill for the time that the individual is there. I don't know how much we want to talk about the great study that was done several years ago.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Right. I will will be not here, but, you know, it there just is all of those issues around in that piece. And That is a big concern. I totally get why you're taking the million out, but underneath all of this, you know, I would say, and I know we've been working with someone to do, but when there's not a single adult day here in Washington County, it's difficult. Yeah. So we do need a provider to to step forward and say they wanna put together a plan. And we did have some money in the years past to help with the opening of adult phase because we did lose the three and I'm not really sure given this if there is still what there is out there for people to help people start. For startup? Yeah for startup.

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: So those funds have been utilized by the proposed and the one that's in Washington County so they did get a grant and we have

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Yeah and I have no idea what's left if there's more and what there is because yeah. Right.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: So Yeah. Is that something we can get? Do we know the answer to that? The answer is they're all of the funds have been distributed. Yep. Yeah. Okay. I know there is an answer. Yeah. Okay. Great. So, you know, fee for service is the is the model that is the most common model when it comes to Medicaid, etcetera. But, you know, even if you go to your primary care, it's gonna be food service and, you know, just and what you're

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: not gonna get. Are there 13 left in the state that don't face?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: 11. 11. 11. Thank you. Thank you for the interest in it. They are an important part of the continuum.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: They certainly are for families that are working and yes. Agreed. So okay. But that's why we took it from there

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: as opposed to somewhere else. The Sorry. I'm just gonna keep going or Yeah. Keep going. Okay. So the federal revenue reconciliation at zero is something you wanna claim that. Just move from where Yeah. The other.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: Yeah. If if you have the ups and downs in front of you, if you don't, that's fine too. There was a transition between getting some general fund from central office, and they utilized some of our federal in a different place in the agency, net neutral.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. Mhmm. And budget to actual adjustment at $3,350,000 which takes under the adult services division grants, takes us to total changes of netting $2,350,782 So the fiscal year '27 recommend for this, for the adult services division is 27,260,274. Then we can go into blind and visually impaired, the grants. In 2026, it was 3,407,604. There were no proposed changes, so it remains at that rate. Vocational Rehabilitation Division, which is higher ability, last year was at 10,179,845. The budget to actual is into departmental transfers funds. Do you wanna explain one and two?

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: So anytime you see budget tax adjustment for a particular fund, and I'll just mention federal specifically, because there's so much interest at the federal level, Whether that reconciliation is up or down it doesn't mean that we got more federal or less federal funds. It's a utilization adjustment and to the spending authority needed in that appropriations.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. And then the opioid recovery employment program, which I had to talk with you about before, gets us to the recommend the change is 840,539 and that gets us to 11,000,000 and change for hireability. The next page, we're at developmental services grants appropriation. In 2026, it was just under 350,000,000. The proposed changes is caseload. So it's an additional $6,604,679 And then Public Safety Act two forty eight caseload is 3,344,342. Those are both caseload utilization pressures.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What is the Public Safety Act two forty eight?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: So there's two separate things. Act two forty eight is for folks who have intellectual disabilities and are charged with a crime and are found not fit to proceed. There are particular crimes that tend to be included in them. And then they are determined to be committed to the commissioner's custody. And we have about 30 in the state. And they have they are it's basically a community commitment. So there's monitoring and oversight and living situations that are provided and whole array of supports and services to help them to get to a place where they can function independently. That sometimes takes some time, sometimes it happens more quickly. Most of the folks there, this is successful, but there's a few for whom that's a particularly challenging program. The designated and specialized services agencies provide the support and the monitoring, the supervision and the monitoring.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And the increase, the 3,300,000 increase for that just

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: increased participation. Well, it's that plus public safety. So public safety is for folks who have not been found to be not fit to proceed and not committed to. But they're on our roles and they present as a public safety risk. And so that requires a different type of approach often for those individuals. And, yes, there's more votes than there used to be.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: I I could give a little bit. So the the caseload is calculated by a three year average. Okay. And it's generally split between additional needs for current customers and new consumers in the program, if that helps answer your question. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So are we dealing with competency issues? Or at

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: two forty eight, we're dealing But with

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: not insanity issues, just policy issues. No, I'm not.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah, because they are essentially released or committed to the custody commissioner. So they are not still having their case adjudicated or being determined whether they're not guilty by reason of insanity. This is all just about competency. And then they're not in the system at that point. They're not in the criminal justice system at that point. They're in a

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: They're near.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. And it's an issue that we have worked we worked on last

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: session. Long time now.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: I'm seeing. It's not it's complicated.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It's great.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: And it does have costs associated with it, as you can see. Internal service fund, that's the the commercial

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It's under $10,000. You know what mean?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. Great. So the ARRIS payroll benefit withholding exempt reduction is money that was at the financial intermediary for benefits. And over time, it had built up enough that we were able to pull back. Okay. And budget to actuals on we're not under 10,000, but we're under 20,000. It's just Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Things like that are okay.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: And then the federal fund budget to actual adjustment, that was was explained, in this case, it was left. The Arch program ended and the funds were returned to Dale. This is age that's net neutral with the MH. Integrating family services ended and the funds were returned to Dale. That's the increase in that funding. And integrating family services ended, funds returned to DCF. And then on deposit with Dale, so that's 200,000. So for the total changes for the developmental services grant appropriation, it's an increase of almost 8,200,000. You can see the fund splits and that brings our state fiscal year 2027 recommended for developmental services grant to just over $358,000,000. The brain injury program has no changes from say this year '26, it's still at 7,500,000. And

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: it's just level funded, are you seeing less need for that with all the work we've done on trying to do TBI prevention paying off or is it just something else like?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Do you want to take that?

[Angela McMahon, Adult Services Division Director, DAIL]: I don't think that we have data to make that correlation. I think that caseload pressure is something that we've got throughout the year. We now have case management organizations that cover statewide. So with having those case management agencies, we may actually see higher utilization of services because we're connecting more people to services. This is also part

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: of topic for case management. The brain injury program needed to come in for compliance also.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: So the reason that there isn't an increase in '27 currently we have funding for 91 or two consumers and that's at 76 so there's room to increase utilization there. Okay.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. Thank you, Bill. Choices for care. Okay. So in 2026, the base appropriation was 346,858,094. The statutory nursing home inflation increase was 5,471,782. The nursing home Medicaid bed day pressures is 9,625,625. And you can see it's day is at approximately $3.62 per day.

[Bill [last name unknown], DAIL Finance/Budget Director]: And I could add that that particular line item you saw in BA, so it related to five nursing homes from having a billing error and being paid this year and meeting that BAA request, is putting that in the base budget because we didn't have the funding if that hadn't been paid in the proper year.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It was a billing error, but it was because they were using more beds.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: No. Yeah. But what happened there in terms it wasn't really a billing error. I think it was a coding issue when they came in. But the bed pressure is real. The bed pressure is real.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And are you thinking that's gonna change? Is this, it's gonna increase we're not gonna see less bed days next year?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: No. I don't think so, no. So Maybe we'll see the same, but it wouldn't surprise us if it went up.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Given the aging population, we would expect this to increase similar, I would think, every year?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: It might. Over the next five years? Over the next ten years. I think it's gonna be keep going. We only

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: have one last nursing home too.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: You know, I absolutely thought about that because we are at a slightly higher we're like, we usually are between 8090% capacity of late, right? And we we hit 90, but I think that's exactly why is because people were moved from Green Mountain to other facilities where there were beds available. So that we can't afford to lose any more nursing homes or any beds. Right? We need to add them. Like I said, it was really great that the residential care homes because it's a whole continuum that can provide care. Any of the settings that can provide care for people who need nursing home level of care needs to be nurtured. Yeah.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: That brings up a whole other question. How would we add nursing homes?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yeah. How would we add nursing homes? Okay.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Would we add I because our you know, we've only lost. When was the last time a nursing home was open?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Well, Mission Care opened. I don't need to. Would probably not the the place to have that Well, of course, because we're doing the the stabilization sustainability, we are absolutely looking at that. So, yeah, of course, you could build, you know, not an easy thing to do. You'd have to find an appropriate facility. One of the reasons Green Mountain needed to close is because the the the structure of the place was an old military hospital, I believe, and it was bomb resistant, which means you could do nothing with the wolf. And they it was also set up with little corners everywhere, so you need twice as much staff to oversee a place like that. So we need facilities that can either we build or we refurbish or we expand where we already have nursing homes. We expand unit. We expand wings. We expand which is something that we've been looking closely at. And we utilize all of our available beds without but you need to make sure that you always have room for churn and room for short term rehab. Sorry, Anne. No, no, no. But that's the right, those are the right questions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Don't really look to long term budgeting or not really No. That we should be thinking about this increase.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Yep. I I think by next year, we will have some more concrete plans in our to to talk with you about since we are, you know, just starting engagement now. We have a very clear project plan for the engagement, who we're engaging, how we're engaging, and by when we will engage it. But once we're done there, we're gonna be getting into the next phase, which is the actual planning of steps that would need to be done to increase the capacity in the system. Okay, so we were down to home community based caseload pressure. That's number three under the choices of care, a little over 1,000,000. It's the same ARRIS payroll issue, it's just under the choices of care. And so it's an increase of 14,100,000 at $300 just under $251,000,000 So that is our, plan. I do want to take you, can you go to page 53? I do wanna share this with you because I think it could be useful either when you're still have questions or you're budgeting or, you know, it's good reading on the

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: beach when we get there.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: This is the data that's been submitted. This is, it tells you for each program who is served, tells you something about the program. It tells you, gives you some performance measures about who is served and any outcomes that we have there. In this first one is a survey, and then it tells you what is proposed in this budget specifically for the program. So you will see program by program here what the proposed budget is in the DAIL budget. So it takes it that next level down and it explains what those programs are. So the next several pages taking you from 53 all the way to sort of 69, 70 is that's our program.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: That's helpful, yeah, haven't seen that. Really?

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: The appendix is just details on the LNA recruitment and retention grant for your, if you want specific information of the different, that might be, Senator Westman and Senator Lyons, you might be interested to see exactly what kind of yeah. Very good.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. Okay. Well, thank you.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: I'm not sure if I did.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: I will come back around. There will be some questions about Nielsen.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Okay. Happy to answer. Yeah. Alright. So we'll look forward to that. Is there any other questions or we will ahead.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: Do it

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: and by asking questions there. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I don't think we have any questions. So thank you for the presentation. You.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: I like that. I like to move some of these too. Okay.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: We'll look to the opening of Westman. I'll be back in touch. Thank you.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So committee, we're not gonna do 2019. We lost Senator Watson. And I saw the question on the amendment that we had in our election council wasn't available right now. So we're gonna try to do two nineteen and the childcare bill tomorrow. She sent another amendment. I just

[Sen. Richard Westman (Member)]: read that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But that, yeah, the amendment that she sent was all, there was two questions that I had. One, there's two appropriations. The second appropriation of the $10,000 the

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: Thank you. To the group

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: in Addison County. Her amendment doesn't deal with that. Then she said something about if in fact they hire the the monies. Right. So there's section one a, the department has to hire or put add onto their consultant, hire consultant to do the work. And then there was the $10,000 for the Addison County climate, whatever it is. So we we did our amendment doesn't. Ellen drafted did talk about the $10,000 right? So we would still go through. And there's two problems. One, we can't keep money directly to it now. Probably just some group, right? We don't do it. I mean, I guess we could do it. So we would find who the manager So we'd run it through the department of public service because they're supposed to talk to the department, but I wanted to take that appropriation out too. So I missed that when I read it last night, when I said it was fine. Did I write it last night, and I see she's going on another one today? Yeah. Adjusted a little the wording a little bit. So the the the first part, like, the two other parts that you had talked about yesterday, I thought those were good changing those. And then she's her her amendment says that their duty to hire a consultant to do the energy navigator report is contingent upon the appropriations. But we should also say that about B. Should also say that it would be the department that would give them the money. Mhmm. They're only required to give them the money if we give them the money. Right. That makes sense. So

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: So you're thinking about a further amendment?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: To the amendment.

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: To the amendment?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yes. As I said Dylan wasn't available. I did send her an email. Said I think we need another another one then. Okay. So we'll do

[Dr. Phil Bell, Commissioner, Department of Disabilities, Aging and Independent Living (DAIL)]: it. Great. Sounds good.