Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: You just We are live.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Senate appropriation April 2. And we have we saw that these are still our last f y 20 '7. We're talking what are we talking about? Now we're talking about that.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yeah. Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Which is part of that. So we have the agency of natural research, the secretary of logistics. I will let you introduce yourself to the record and give us your presentation.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Thank you. I am just working to join the Zoom. And then Oh, there we go.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Probably gonna open 28 times now. I apologize.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: It hasn't gone yet.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Oh, here it goes.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: I'll just be more patient than stop clicking.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. Click it all, basically.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Yeah. Just or the button whenever you wanna cross the road. Yeah.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: So while that connects

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: now it's happening. Absolutely.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: So, for the record, I'm Julie Moore, I'm the Secretary of Natural Resources, and I'm joined today by the agency's Chief Financial Officer, Steve Gomez, and I'm going to hopefully do two things in this presentation. First, I'm going to walk you through some high level agency points and then speak specifically to the budget in the secretary's office. So just a couple of notes that I wanted to flag ahead of time. You submitted complete budget presentations to the committee based on the guidance provided by House and Senate Appropriations in October. What I'm gonna walk you through here is a shortened version of that, that aligns with our allotted time, but all of that information does exist and happy to answer questions about it if you have made any notes in the margins and it's something I didn't touch on. We're gonna talk about the Governor's Recommend, recognizing that the House version differs from the Governor's Recommend. There are seven differences between the Governor's Recommend and the House passed version of the budget, and we'll provide those as we go through our testimony. And then just a quick update on federal funding, which is not much of an update in that most federal funds used by ANR were level funded. We just now have confirmation of that, whereas before it had been an assumption. There were a few small increases, the Urban and Community Forestry Program that is administered by the Department of Forest, Parks and Recreation and our state wildlife grants and FPR, both saw a couple percent increase and also congressionally directed spending is back as a federal '26 budget. And that does have a pretty significant impact on the state revolving loan fund administered by DEC. The dollars coming to Vermont are relatively consistent, but we end up with things that go

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: out as loans or grants, excuse me, instead of loans, which means long term it starts to diminish the capacity of that fund.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: So with that as context 8,000 screens open. There we go. All right. ANR's FY27 budget. So talk a little bit about the budget development cycle and the instructions we received from finance and management and how that lands in terms of the agency. We'll walk you through our FY twenty seven budget and then talk about funding sources. This isn't the right presentation, sweetie. I grabbed the wrong thing. Sorry, That's not

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: what I wanna talk to you about at all. I

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: apologize. Oh, that's fine. I was super.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: So I'm going to talk a little bit about our mission and organizational structure, the prior fiscal year appropriation update, and then get into our budget as well as at the back of this deck, there is a whole set of slides I do not intend to cover in thirty minutes today since there's 44 in total. That includes a lot of the reports we've been asked to produce by Joint Fiscal. So just looking at the agency's budget as a whole, our FY27 budget is just shy of $300,000,000 About two thirds of that is in the Department of Environmental Conservation. And that is large- that body of work is largely comprised of grants, contracts, and loans for municipalities, partners, and businesses. The little dark green wedge at the top, along with the olive wedge next to it, are the two pieces that actually sit within the secretary's office. The pilot payments we make for those talents where we have state owned lands and then the actual work of the secretary's office. I do think it's worth worthwhile to just look briefly at how we deploy those dollars, because a lot of the money the agency budgets ends up going right back out the door. We invest about $40,000,000 a year in contracts. These take various forms, including maintenance at parks and at fishing access areas, construction contracts as we need to bring new buildings online and some of the assets we own, as well as improvements to dams. And over half of that $40,000,000 goes directly to Vermont businesses. We issue about $59,000,000 in grants, the lion's share of which goes to Vermont entities and largely does go to municipalities and non government organizations. And then we make about $65,000,000 worth of loans, primarily out of our state revolving funds for clean water and drinking water. We have just over six eighty full time staff at the agency and then bring additional 400 during the summer months when we are operating the state parks. And as you can see, about half of our budget is going right back out the door and then half is the staff and the operating costs for the agency. I think this chart is really telling. ANR has been, I would say,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: a

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: disproportionate beneficiary of some of the federal funding programs that have existed over the last several years. So the four wedges at the bottom of this graph are sort of what I would consider our base funding on an annualized basis. The general funds, special funds, which is a lot of our permit fees, fishing license sales, park gate receipts, and then federal funds. And then that dark green mountain shaped wedge at the top is the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law. And so you can see it was a pretty dramatic scale up, and we've sort of crested and on our way back down. And that's reflected in the, not just that green wedge, but the agency's total budget that is $341,000,000 for the current fiscal year, and as I said, just shy of $300,000,000 for the next fiscal year. This was entirely anticipated. We hired a significant number of limited service positions to help support the implementation of these dollars. I would offer that I think we've been incredibly successful in their deployment and getting that work out or that money out the door and that work done on the ground. And so we will be working to wind that down over the next two fiscal years.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And those limited service decisions were being eliminated?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Yeah. So it's

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: a little bit of

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: a two step. As you may recall, the agency also received about 300,000,000 worth of ARPA funds. There was a considerable overlap between some of the ARPA funded investments that began in 2021 and then the investments we made under the bipartisan infrastructure law and the water infrastructure space. We ended up hiring sort of fewer ARPA staff, but have extended them into supporting the bipartisan infrastructure law. But yes, anticipate most of those positions will wind down between now and the end of next calendar year. Then there's a small number of positions that will remain on after that, because we have audit obligations and other things.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: How many positions is there?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Anybody want to say, Steve?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I can check, yeah. Okay.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: The ones that will be retained past the May.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: How many will not be retained?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Oh, the 50 ish that we hired across ARPA and bipartisan infrastructure law, I believe by the end of next calendar year, there will be about a half a dozen that remain on staff. So, and people in those positions have generally been moving into permanent classified positions with the agency as they become available, and really our challenge is now that there's a relatively short shelf life on those positions, making them harder to fill, just trying to make sure that we're being smart about who moves where when and that we can finish the successful deployment of these dollars.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: in terms of our FY twenty seven budget, that decrease is really being driven by and large by bipartisan infrastructure law funds. But there are other budget changes that are of note. We're seeing about $6,500,000 across the agency of upward pressure in salaries, wages and benefits. There is an increase in our internal service funds allocation. On one hand, a decrease for insurance specifically, and this is, I think in the park system, saw a substantial decrease in insurance, but we also gave back that general fund. So, was effectively neutral to our budget. We did see a significant increase resulting from the new ADS billing model across the agency. As I noted, our federal funding is relatively flat, although with Forest Legacy had seen significant funding through the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, that's money we use for large land conservation projects, and that is less and less available. The funding that had been budgeted by Congress there has largely been exhausted. We have proposed to decrease our draws on the Petroleum Cleanup Fund to try to maintain solvency in that fund, Just recognizing, I think we're not immune to some of the same forces acting on the agency of transportation's budget. And then we did see small decreases in our air quality division and Commissioner Cinny can talk more about that when she is in front of you later this afternoon.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So, to maintain solvency or just less money going out?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Less money coming in, less money going out. So, I'm going to shift gears and talk specifically about the Secretary's office. So, just for reference, of the six eighty ish positions within the agency, 43 of them are in the Secretary's office. Myself So, and the Deputy, along with our Civil Rights and Environmental Justice Unit. We also have our Policy and Planning Shop that includes both the team that represents the agency in Act two fifty and Section two forty eight proceedings, as well as our Climate Action Office, The Office of General Counsel, which is all of the agency's attorneys, report up through Kathryn Gessing, but are on paper in the Secretary's office. And then we have a Chief Operating Officer who Steve works with as he leads our financial and administrative services division. And as you may know, we also have five regional offices and that's where the management of those facilities sits as well. So in terms of major federal funding sources, one that is being finished outside the secretary's office is the Climate Inclusion Reduction Grant Program. Was part of the Inflation Reduction Act. ANR received- or Vermont received a $3,000,000 noncompetitive planning grant award back in 2023. While there has been some rescission at the federal level of other CPRG funds, these planning grants have been left in place. And so, we have used this funding to update and improve our greenhouse gas inventory to help support development of the Climate Action Plan that was adopted by the Vermont Climate Council this summer. As of the drafting of this presentation a little earlier this winter, we had expended about 1.4 of the $2,500,000 or excuse me, we expended 1.4 and it encumbered $1,100,000 of the $3,000,000 and we have about 500,000 left, but expect to fully encumber those dollars by the end of the current fiscal year, giving us about a year to complete the work. We have had a series of one time appropriations and we're asked to provide three updates on those. The first one is related to climate change. This is the Climate Superfund Act. We received $300,000 for a limited service position. As you may know, the treasurer's office is actively working on the cost assessment, and then our work is to think through how those costs actually become allocated across the different responsible entities. So we've been kind of holding those funds close, waiting for the treasurer to complete their work, so that then we can turn around and we'll hire a physician to actually do that math about how to attribute the different, to attribute those costs to the different sources. I just would flag here, we did indicate that there is need for additional contracted support for us to really do this work and do it well. In particular, a new attorney position with the Office of General Counsel and would just be remiss if I didn't flag that we continue

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: to see

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: substantial workload related to litigation on the Climate Superfund. There was a case argued down in front of earlier this week, but there are a number of other outstanding legal challenges that require our participation. So then just thinking about how that breaks out across the secretary's office, about a little less than half of our budget is in the legal services division. That natural resources fund is sort of a catchall that includes our Act two fifty and Section two forty eight work, as well as the pilot payments, the finance and administration team that Steve leads, our climate action office, and then the smaller appropriations from my team and the secretary's office, our office of policy and planning, our civil rights and environmental justice unit, and then the budget we need to maintain our regional offices. So, this is the same sort of look at the upward pressures that I gave you across the agency. This is the part that's specific to the Secretary's office. So, we did see a net increase in salaries, including the addition of a staff attorney position. There was money made available to us under the inflation, no, under the bipartisan infrastructure law to expand compliance related activities for prior grant recipients for the Land and Water Conservation Fund monies. So, these are parcels of conserved land all around the state and have this additional staff attorney position that can help us review those.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: These are the governor's recommendations, not the House budget. Correct.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: These are governor's recommendations. We

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: are seeing upward pressure in our internal service funds and including ADS. We were able to save about $40,000 in terms of space management, and then we moved a small ongoing grant to drive electric Vermont that had been run out of our air quality division office because it seemed to make the most sense there. Our pilot appropriations increased by about $6,000 from FY '26 to FY '27, and that's really determined based on land acquisitions. We look at the queue of conservation projects we anticipate completing in FY twenty seven and making that estimate. There will be a larger update to how we determine the pilot rates we pay to communities that is also due next year, and if there's interest, Steve can speak about that in more detail. But this number is really just looking at additional acres, not any change in

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: how we value those elements.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you know what the total contractor, Grand Isle is a five k increase?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: That is the total grant. It's just the five ks increase in our budget.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Alright, because there's not a 100, because we talked about it on the transportation committee, so.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: That, I guess I don't know if there's additional money provided by the transportation agency. That is the sum total of the money out of the agency, natural resource. And then included in the PowerPoint presentation are a bunch of links to other reports you may wish to avail yourselves of. And I will stop there and happy to answer any questions you might have, either about the agency budget or the officers' office. I

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: don't know if this is in the central office or sector the central office is. In our meeting, it's a question for DC about the admissions repair program. Should I wait until DC is in here?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: I'm I'm happy to speak to that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So the the house reverted it, but in direction of Secretary Clark's letter, it talked about how the money was obligated. So I don't know if you could talk us through that one.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Sure. And Steve will clean up whatever mess I may take here. But there was about $600,000 appropriated. Of that, we had put about $200,000 into contracts with two Vermont based entities that eligible applicants could then access to try to effect a vehicle repair and needed about $35,000 to cover our admin costs associated with with that money. The house unfortunately pulled all $600,000 back where whereas we had indicated there was about $365,000 that could be reappropriated. It's a little bit of a challenging moment for that program. I know that there was some concern expressed that we hadn't seen a lot of uptake in that grant, but DMV had been issuing, and you may be aware of this, had been issuing waivers for a period of years and that waiver language expired at the beginning of this year. So, we anticipate going forward, we will see more interest in this grant repair program than we have in the past. And so, while the past financials may not speak to the need for that program, we are concerned that there will be future interest. And so, really recommended at least leaving that $200,000 that's already in existing contract agreements in place.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And there was a lot of problems with that program that we switched to the tablet system and the person were using that and so they were giving on waivers. Correct. It'd be interesting how many errors and other people we make use of. It was something I know the Transportation Committee felt strongly about that we had that program so people weren't losing their building and drive illegally because of the faulty small repair.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Correct. I believe today we've issued less than 10 grants out of that program, so there just, there hasn't been a lot of interest, but I think it is because people were able to obtain waivers.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: And in house so some of these questions are about the house budget. I saw references to the Volkswagen settlement, is there still money in there?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: There is.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What's happening with them?

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: So we're getting to the end of the period where those funds have to be spent down or they will need to be reverted to the National Trust. The legislature, giving us the spending authority for those funds early on, had asked us to limit them to electric vehicle purchases as opposed to sort of clean diesel technology, even though that's allowed under the VW Trust. Our proposal is to sort of give back that flexibility so that we could support clean diesel projects. We would still continue to prioritize electric vehicle purchases and incentives before we would get into clean diesel, but this would hopefully allow us to avoid needing to revert any of those thoughts back into the National Trust.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: That's why you had the strike electrical system. Any other questions?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Any mistakes I made?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Know if I can use anything. I was just wondering what looks like how much money is in there? Did you use it?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Do you remember, Steve?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I don't know.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: We we can get that and get back to you. It it's not an insignificant sum. So it it's not how many we would like to return, especially because the challenge has been, I think, in for many heavy duty electric vehicles. They're just there aren't a lot of options out there. Whereas, there are some really good clean diesel options, and we would love those that have maybe not as much benefit, but not insignificant benefits, particularly in the public health space in reducing particulate matter. And so we'd love to see those investments made possible.

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

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Joined. Got a couple of us, but no other commissioners. Hoping.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: FBR next. Oh. Yep. Oh, and

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Steve is wears two hats at the agency currently. He is both the Chief Financial Officer and the Acting FPR Business Manager, so I may turn the screen right over to him.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Oh, now I thought you got Liam, the you get a penny per down? So it's just like a reduction of the price doesn't matter, I think, on the

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: funding of funding fund. Right? It's just per down.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Correct. That is my understanding.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: You're ready, Commissioner Pitsko?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yes. Hi. Good to see everybody. Daniel Pitsko, Commissioner Forest Park and Recreation. I apologize for not being there in person today. I'm I'm out of state. I'm also joined by, you know, with Steve Gomez. I don't he's actually not acting anymore, but still playing a heavy role. We just filled our director of finance and administration. Monday, they started Naomi Fury. So we're pretty excited about that. Okay for me to just get right into it?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yes. We do.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Okay. Fantastic. Just trying to move my screen. Okay. So like all the other departments in the secretary's office, we have a lot of slides in our presentation for you, but only a few of them will be highlighted. And this is sort of the overview of all the slides that are in there. We'll touch mainly on what's new and a department budget overview, but there's a lot more detail in our division budgets if you want to see more details. Just for a very quick intro to FPR where I think you all know us pretty well, but we are what our name says. We're forests keeping our Green Mountains green, helping to sustain them, make sure they're sustainably managed, intact and healthy. Also supports all the benefits of forests from climate resilience, biodiversity, clean water and air and air, and also our forest economy, which contributes about 14,000 jobs to Vermont and brings in about 1,200,000,000 in economic activity. We also are Vermont State Parks, bringing in about 1,000,000 visitors a year to the state park system, really offering affordable outdoor recreation and, vacations for both Vermonters and visitors. And we are also outdoor recreation, advancement sector that actually represents 4.8% of Vermont's GDP. So for every dollar of economic activity in Vermont, about 5% of that can be attributed to outdoor recreation. But beyond sort of the economic component of it, it supports local businesses, rural communities, and also our physical, mental health, and quality of life. When I think about FPR, I think what we represent is a lot of Vermont's identity, helping to steward our natural landscape and supporting communities, families, and future generations. This is an overview of the high level of how we're organized. You have myself at the top. You have our principal assistant, Kate Eberly. I just want to call her out because she plays a key role in legislative affairs. So I'm sure you've seen her or have met her in the in the state house. We have three programmatic divisions. We have the division of forest that's led by Oliver Pearson. We have state parks that's led by Nate McKean, and we have Lands Administration and Recreation that's led by Becca Washburn. And then we have our administrative arm with our new director, Naomi Fury. I look at that branch as like the circulatory system of our department. We move a lot in the in FPR, and without them, we couldn't we we couldn't do all we do. We have about a 144 year round staff. And then in the summertime, when we're operating state parks and all of the work we're doing on state lands in general, we bring in about four fifty seasonal employees. So we are in major recruitment right now. So if anybody has family members, friends, grandkids that need a job, we're looking and hiring. This slide just gives you an update on some items that were funded last year. Last year, we did have one time funds of $200,000 that went to serve, learn, earn. I'm sure you're all familiar with this wonderful program that supports workforce development. We also last year did get $500,000 in base dollars that we do have again this year. So that will be going to serve, learn, earn if if if the budget's approved, stays in there. On the house side, for this year, for f y for next year, for f y twenty seven, there is a line item for serve, learn, earn for a onetime fund of $300,000 just to make you aware of that. Also, last year, we really appreciate the support you provided, onetime funding so FPR could get a wildland fire truck, which is a type six fire engine. We actually just closed the RFP on the purchasing the fire truck yesterday. We did get a couple bids in, so we will be moving forward soon with contracting out to get this fire truck built and working on the ground for us. Think I'll stop there because I that's sort of recap from last year, see if anybody has any questions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: When do you expect the truck to be operational?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Well, probably will take about a year to be built. It's quite a long process. It it took us a while to even get the RFP out. It's not like we can go down, like I said, to the, like, local car shop or fire engine shop to purchase it. So we anticipate probably a year from now, we'll have the engine.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Wasn't it in fiscal years ago that we funded it?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: You funded it last year.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It was funded. I remember talking a lot about it. Yeah. I just thought it was the same.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Right.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: It's and then we had a you know, as you probably are really aware with the intense drought that we had last year, we had a pretty active fire season. So it'll be really good to have this resource available for us in the future.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Wasn't there a grassland fire just like last week?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: There was. There was three fires at least I know of last week. Yes. Spring is spring and fall are two sort of higher risk areas at times of the year.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Okay. And do you have any no. What did you say about federal funds that you may not get in the future?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Right now, we don't so far, the federal funding that we've had for previous years has been sustained. Of course, we don't know what the future holds. The present president's supposed to put out his budget this week, and then through the through congress, we'll see. But so far, we've been held out okay, which is great.

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

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: item in the governor's budget is one time funds with Vermont Outdoor Recreation Economic Collaborative for our grants program. These have been really successful grants that we've been able to provide to support really economic development in communities around recreation. They are really in high demand grants, Actually,

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: in f

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: y I think it was in in 2025, we had a grant round that had $6,000,000 available, and we had $13,000,000 that went unfunded in request and $70,000,000 I mean, 70 grants that we could not fund. So there's definitely a demand out there, which tells me there's still a lot of opportunity and communities are ready to really advance the the outdoor recreation economy. I look at these grants as revenue generating because they really do support downtown businesses and bringing in tourism and and downtown activity.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you know if that was included in the house building?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: It was included in the house bill. Yep. As to date, we've we've actually funded 85 projects in all, 14 counties. And if you look at the map that we have up here, you can kinda see, you know, all the areas that have had VORAC investments.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you do that in house, do you have, like, a board or advisory committee of some sort?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah. We we had the board program is housed in FPR, which is a partnership between agency of commerce and community development. And it is a governor initiative, and we do have a steering committee of 20 members that help guide the VORAC grants and selection.

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

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah. Really active, engaged community there. It's it's pretty it's it's working well.

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

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: This is just to give you two examples of some projects that were funded with board grants. There was a $400 grant that the town of Wakefield received, and this was really to provide accessible access to trails and making it accessible to get from the recreation infrastructure to downtown. So they really looked at street crossings and any areas where we could actually build sort of that connection to outdoor recreation. This picture here of this bridge, was put in with these funds and actually accessed additional 60 miles of trails. So it really is meant to be sort of a connection from downtown to the recreation trails and even including sort of a gateway stop where you can learn about the businesses and all the trail networks in the community. So it's really been successful. A lot of partners involved in helping to steward these trails and all the investments going forward. We've also had an investment in Dan Ville just under $100,000 and this was to transform their train station into a recreation hub that sits on the Memorial Valley Rail Trail. It is meant to be sort of that transportation hub again, but really thinking about recreation and their downtown. They added some ADA accessible amenities to the train station and really are trying to drive people from the recreation outset access to their downtowns. A lot of the business are reporting increased sales, due to the trail uses, and they're really entering the village. So again, really, an economic driver in our communities, and it's a $500,000 one time request that is in the house side of on the house in the house budget that was recommended by the governor. Any any questions on Boric? Nope. Okay. Also in the governor's recommend, there is some proposed language. This still sits in the the budget bill that came from the house side. And this is looking at our lands and facilities trust fund. This is a fund that the revenue comes from uses of state lands. So if you think about timber sales or leases and license, commercial use on state lands, And so there's a fund that we use that we have, and we use some of it to help steward state lands. The language that we have proposed really does three things. It aligns to fund management with statute. Where it currently sits in statute is underneath the agency of natural resources, but a lot of the language points to Department of Forest Parks and Recreation. So this is really a technical fix to change it to the agency of natural resources. The second, item that we're trying to do is clarify the eligible uses. Right now, it's mostly about management stewardship, and we'd like to add administrative costs as well. A lot of the funds that we use, on the ground are contracted out work. So we're bringing contractors to the work for us on the ground, and that takes a lot of administrative work. So we'd like to use a small portion to support the administrative costs of moving these dollars and then modernize the distribution rate. Currently, we have we're able to use 5% of the interest rolling I gonna get I'm gonna try, Steve. 5% of the interest over over five years, and we'd like to move that to 8%. The current balance in the Lands and Facilities Trust Fund is about $6,250,000. We feel like the health of the account is at a good place right now, that if even if moving it to eight percent and based on our use of the state land, that fund would still increase. And we anticipate by 2034 that there'd be $7,000,000 in this account. So we we'd like to be able to use more funds to put that on the ground to add a little use a little bit of funds for administrative costs and then do some technical corrections by changing it to from FPR to ANR. I just wanna give you an idea of, like, what this funds funds, but I is there a question?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. So you're projecting an 8% rate of return on that fund?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: No. So how yeah. So the the construct here is basically with the earned revenue from the state lands, the interest collected on the fund, and then there's a small amount of limitations that come to the fund, due to the first stewardship endowments. Based on our recipe, there that would generate about $568,000 of revenue between those different revenue sources. And then bringing us up to that 80%, it's budgeted at 437,000. So we would still have annual surplus of funds that would go towards that principal. So that that longer term, like, we would still continue to grow the fund. It would

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: just be slower. And you because that's 500 and whatever thousand is your annual projections for revenue, or just next year. Is that just request for one year or going forward?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: This is a permanent request, so the projection for the $568,000, that's FY '27, And then in out years, there's a modest, like, we assume a 1% growth on earned revenues, 1% growth on donations, and we assume a 5% interest rate, basically annual return. So that's so the fund the $568,000 would grow each fiscal year out. So

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: What's the interest? Do you know what this what you're earning on the in this

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Yeah. Yeah. The the last three years, according to the treasurer's report, the the three year average has been 10%, you know, so that's that's on the higher end compared you know, going back and looking at was it the ten year average? We were let's see, we were a little bit over 5% over ten years, so

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Where is this request located?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Yep, so this request I is can send you the exact place in the budget bill that was marked the governor's recommend incurred in the house. So if it's but I the actual language section.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I'm not sure. Okay. So it's just in the language section.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: It's in the language section. Yes. And then there's a complimentary piece in FPR budget where they're assuming the increase in revenues. Part of that would go to cover the administrative cost, and then the rest would go to deploying those dollars on

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the ground. So mainly, increased distribution is coming from increased revenue from the use of state life.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: I would say that this, right, when this fund started, you know, we're starting at zero, so now that kind of like a check-in period, and with that large fund balance of $6,500,000 we're generating real interest there now. I would say it's a combination of that piece and

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: then also the earned annual revenue from that. Is there any language that the distributions can't just shrink the corpus?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: There is no language there, but so just as a recognition, you know, the way that FPR manages this fund, you know, they've had the authority to go up to the 5% of the fund. Many years it's budgeted under that because they're trying to continue to grow the fund. Again, is right. Like part of the balance is to the department, you know, if they have the authority to go up to 8% and the interest rate last year was like 1%, right? Like that would have to, we would have to adjust that just like we do with all of our other special funds.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So I might be interested in proposing language that limits going below, not picking any of the corpus. Like if there's enough extra revenue, then go to 8%, but not if the returns in there or some reason that revenue wasn't there, you're not digging into the 6.25.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: So essentially locking the 6.25 as a baseline in?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Senator Watson?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Well, no, when we met and talked about this, I had a lot of questions about the same constructs and I asked some of these same questions. And I would just say I'm interested in something like that, you know, thinking about like if the rate of return isn't what was projected, you know, then maybe that triggers something else, or maybe it can't dig into the The

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Higher Ed Trust Fund has language like that, so it could be based on the language that's to that. Like they can get 5% through the state colleges and UVM but only if it doesn't decrease the court fees. Is that our lines of view also?

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: I do, it's not about this but it may be related but my question is are you responsible for the leases to the ski areas for State Land?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Yes. FPR is responsible. Commissioner Fitzgol, I'll turn that one over to you.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yes. We are responsible for the leases on State Land. It does not go into the Land Facilities Trust Fund. It goes into the park special funds. That helps to operate Vermont State Parks.

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: So and my question is, when's the last time that those lease conditions were updated? I'm concerned about some of the leases that we have in the state where huge expansion has taken place in our ski areas, but I'm not sure the state is benefiting adequately from that expansion.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah. So our our ski leases are are really long term leases. Most of them are forty to like sixty years. The first lease that's gonna become up for renewal is Bromley in 2032. Anytime we have an opportunity, if there's a change in ownership, we try to make some modernization of the lease, but it hasn't changed any of the payment provisions. I will share with you right now that we do have a contractor in place that is looking at how ski leases are look how they're reporting out and pet and paying on their ski lease because the thing that's changed changed since these ski leases were put in place is that used to just be by a pass to one mountain. Now they're multi resort passes, and we just want to get clarity on how those are being calculated. But anytime there is an opportunity, we do look at modernizing where we can. And right now, we're looking at Bromley in 2032 will be the first real overhaul of a of a ski lease.

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: So I I I guess at some point it would be good to have more information about this and understand exactly what clauses are in the lease agreements. I look at the expansion that's taking place both Stowe and Killington and the exceptional revenue that is being pushed out of state. And I have a huge concern about that and with all the work that the state has done. Understood, does bring tourism, it does bring money into the state, at the same time it doesn't fill the general fund or special funds that we have. I've this concern. So it would be helpful to know if there's anything in any of those leases that allows for us to do course correction.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah, I'll be happy to provide you some more background on our leases with ski resorts. We have our director of of Lands Administration and Recreation is very in tune with this. I will say that, when the Killington had their expansion, we did see an increase in the revenue coming to the state based on that, particularly even like the World Cup when that happens. We do see more revenue coming to the state which goes directly to Park Special Fund.

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: Yeah, no, that's good. Thank you for that. I understand that we do benefit. It's the it's the balance of how we benefit versus the private enterprise.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yep.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Thanks.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah. And it's based actual ski lifts are on state lands and what buildings are on state lands. So there's and they all are a little bit different, but be happy to give you a background on that and and help answer any questions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You. Watson.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yes. Thank you. On that same topic, and Kate is here also. I just wanna flag that I'm also interested in the leases with ski resorts. And so I'm I'm interested in some of the the conditions that might be in some of those. So, anyway, would love to we don't it doesn't have to be the same meeting, but would love to connect at some point about that topic.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yep, absolutely. Just because they're on state land, we do have district stewardship teams, which are interdisciplinary teams of within the agency of natural resources that help to help work help to steward those lands. So they have to get approval for work with us, and we have annual meetings with them. So we really do have a close partnership with the ski resorts, making sure that they're maintaining sort of the health and integrity of the lands as well, as well as bringing in the revenue portion of it. But happy to give you happy to set up those times if you want us to come into committee or do a side meeting.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: That'd be great. Thank you so much.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: If I could just add one thing for folks' awareness, it is a percentage of the revenue generated, so it does scale with the scale of the enterprise, at least in terms of the portion of it that's on state lands. But I think the audit that Danny spoke to is really important because it's always been 5% of sales. But now when you have these passes where people are skiing at all different areas, what are we take what are we expecting to receive 5% of?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: The sale could have been in Colorado. Correct.

[Julie Moore, Secretary of Natural Resources (ANR)]: Who might spend twelve skier days at Stowe, right? Do we get a percentage of a sale of a pass that occurred at one of Vail's resorts in Colorado? So, this audit, I think, will be really important and, you know, ensuring that each of the skier is with these multi resort passes is calculating 5% the same way is the goal of the audit too.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Good. Then you have more minutes.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yep. That works on ongoing now. This just gives you an idea of how we use the funds from the lands and facility trust fund on the ground project, sort of core land stewardship, thinking about hazard tree removals, forest health, and then also some workforce. We bring on a state trails crew and supporting some seasonal staff. So that just gives you an idea of how we deploy those funds to steward state lands. Understood. Understand we want a quick update on ARPA. FPR received $3,300,000 in ARPA. We had three targeted areas. One was to support the three acre stormwater management and state parks. We have 19 out of our 55 state parks that triggered the three acre stormwater permit. We also had funds to support urban tree planting and community canopy of tree giveaway and then parks major maintenance projects. Pretty much as of December 31, we had just under $90,000 that remained unspent. That's probably all spent out by now. So we are absolutely on track to spending down all of our ARPA funds.

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

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: I'll pass it to you, Steve, for the next ones.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Yeah. So this is a really high level overview of the department's overall budget. So if you're look at kind of the top part of the graph, the major object that identifies expenditures for the department. So a few things I'll flag. One is you'll notice that the the overall, there is a decrease from FY '26 to FY '27. The main reason for that has to do with land acquisition. We do have a budget there. So those budgets fluctuate greatly from year to year. So if we were to exclude land acquisitions from the budget, how it would look as you see about a $3,000,000 year over year increase, it'd be about six and a half percent. So I wanted to just provide that context because it does look a little bit odd. Also some of the major changes, happening, across those major objects. One has to do with the land and water conservation fund. So that's on a every other year cycle where one year the dollars stay focused on state lands and then the other year they go out with grants. So in FY '27, what you're seeing here is a large increase in personal services which represents an increase in contracts for work on state lands. You're seeing a large decrease in grants because there's fewer grants going out under that program and then the large change in operating expenses is due to the land acquisition budget. And then overall for the department, about a quarter of the budget's general fund, a third's park special fund, and then a third federal funds and those are the main revenue sources for the department.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: What's the increase in the Clean Water Fund?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Not a of dollars.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Not a lot of dollars. Commissioner Fitzgow, was that was that the water quality road access?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Additional funds. We have 600 miles of roads on state lands, and we are implementing work to put in best management practices to protect water quality.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: You just added more money to the budget to deal with those? Does that work?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Yeah. It's part of the clean water board and budget process. So, yep, through that process, it was a recommendation for an increase.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Yeah. Okay. And some of it was a shift from funds that we've used to be in capital that are now in this in the in this side of ledger.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: So taking a look at it kind of by each division in the department, this is how the budget breaks down. So, you can see that on the left hand side there, State Parks is the largest share at 37%. That is mainly focused on, you know, the cost of managing those those places and then the permanent and temporary staff. The Land Administration and Recreation Division, their focus is on everything FPR and state ANR owned lands and then also programs like BOREC. That's 29% of the overall budget for the department. The forestry division, you can think about, you know, UVA, urban and community forestry, those sorts of programs. That's 27% of the overall budget. They also have the largest full time position count in the department, and then the 6% there is for the administration division, so that's the commissioner's office and business office functions. And then the very bottom right hand corner, there's no label there, but there's point 4%, $229,000 for, again, forest access roads. And then looking at the key budget changes for the department, so there's the normal increase in internal service funds, so this is for things like human resources, vision which can save the accounting system, those sorts of things, there's a $131,000 increase. There's the large decrease that secretary secretary Moore mentioned, so this is mainly for state parks. There was a large increase post the July twenty twenty three floods with insurance claims since this is kind of, again, this cyclic nature depends on kind of being the claim rates. So now that there were fewer claims in a out year, there's a large decrease, but also the general fund dollars, went with that. So there was no net benefit to FPR even though there was a decrease in that cost. And then for FPR, their share of the increase of the ADS billable services was $424,000 Looking at federal program investments, we already touched on the clean water budget piece. IRA Growing Forest Resilience grant, that's a $1,100,000 increase that's within the forestry division. And then there's $160,000 increase for annual ash borer mitigation, which is basically tree removal. And Commissioner Fisco, that's in the state parks budget.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Correct?

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: That's right.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: That's focused on state parks, and then at the bottom of it, the other main changes, again, you'll see in the middle there, that's the land acquisition, so again, that's decreasing the budget for land acquisitions overall. There was a million dollar decrease for completed projects, so this is money that flowed into the department, was spent, and now that project is closing out, And then last is the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Again, this is the cycle where one year the money stays focused on FDR, state owned lands, and then the other year it goes out to in the grant cycle. So for FY '27, we're in an in house cycle, so you'll see that shift between contracts and grants overall.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Nick, any questions for Steve on this slide, Laura, for me?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: No, there's one thing.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Okay, I think that's really it for us. So these are just a link to all the reports. Happy to answer any questions. Certainly we'll follow-up on ski leases. Appreciate your time.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: I have one quick question. What is the IRA? I'm

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: happy to do that one. Steve, this was a $5,000,000 competitive grant that FPR received in our private lands program. It is funding that will support working with private forest landowners, foresters, loggers. It's going to be developing resilience strategies for the state, thinking about the health and future of our forest that's going be working with UVM. There'll be funding for development of resilient forest resilience plans for landowners and also implementation dollars that would support resilient strategies that would go to loggers so that in addition to harvesting timber, they could be doing, invasive introduced invasive plant removal and other practices. It's gonna have a certification program for both loggers and foresters that are resilient certified. So it's really, a comprehensive grant that's gonna be looking at how do we manage our forest for for timber products, but also be thinking about resiliency strategies going forward. So this is the $1,000,000 is what we anticipate spending in FY twenty seven. There'll be more years ahead to, continue to implement this grant.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Great. Thank you. Any other questions for forest and parks?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Thank you for your work.

[Danielle Fitzko, Commissioner, Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR)]: Thank you all. Sorry I'm not there. I hope to see you in the hallway soon.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Yeah. Thank

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: you. And

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: there was nothing in in I was gonna ask questions. There wasn't anything that the house could be refunded.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: There was one item they added, a one time appropriation for the Serve on the Nerve program for $300,000 so that's in

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the House passed, Virginia. That goes through?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: That's administered by FTR, yeah, so they have a base appropriation in FY20s per plan for FY27 and half a million. So this would be plus ing up that base appropriation.

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

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Great. Yep. Thank

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: you. Thank you. Got Tracy on then. Hi Tracy.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Hi

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Tracy. Yeah? I have to close my shades real quick. Alright. For the record, Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner for the Department of Environmental Conservation. Nice to meet you all. Thank you for having us. Joined today by Deputy Commissioner Keenan our Financial Director with administration innovation division, which is Tracy Lyons, who is going to also be manning the PowerPoint for us today. So, in alignment with the budget testimony instructions, our goal today is to provide you a clear understanding of our priorities, given the depth of our department. The 51 slides that was in our original slide deck, we pared down for best to get through. 51 slides are available if there's questions today or in the future, we welcome them, whether it be in writing or at house.com and to answer those questions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Well, I appreciate you reading the budget instructions.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Our struggle was to interpret how much all of it

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: to give you, you got it all, but yeah. The instructions are the same for the House and the Senate. The House needs more time to go through it.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Thank you. Feel free to, and we're gonna focus today on our main budget drivers, and really a lot of that includes the tapering of our federal infrastructure funds that you'll see when we go through. But structured the presentation to highlight those shifts and then to,

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: you know, bump in any questions.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: That's over here. We'll start with kind of the main slides. First slide is just kind of the overview of what we're going to talk about today. Mission, carbon structure, budget overview, kind of what's new, those key budget changes, appropriation budgets, prior history or appropriation update, and then the OBS Live that has those reports and other information. We'll get through as much as we can today, but please feel free at

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: any time to jump in and ask questions.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: We'll move down.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So our department mission, it's always good to remind ourselves that we're here to preserve, enhance, restore, conserve Vermont's natural resources, and protect human health for the benefit of this and future generations. Going down to the next slide. So how we do this, we have nine different divisions and within those nine different divisions, you will see that we've included our total authorized positions, which is 351 on that. So in order to meet our mission and to do that, we have our intentions. The colors are broken out by the appropriations, And we'll walk through each

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: one of those divisions and the budget for that

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: in the next couple slides. We can go on to the next one. So here's kind of just our budget overview. Get that. Okay. Budget overview. No. Breakdown of salary and benefits, operating expenses, contracts, grants, loans by division. So the management support services appropriations are the people. And then our media programs are on

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: the bottom.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So some some big numbers, especially in our water and investment division,

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: which is the track. At the

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: bottom of the table, you'll see that the bulk of that is managing the federal and state funds. So thinking infrastructure and jobs act or IIJA, and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law Bill. So, American Rescue Plan Act, ARPA, so they really do that issuance of that money goes through and out the door to our communities, and you'll see that that is mainly passed through, it makes that 92 of their budget, a big part of that. And those funds are winding down, as well as the drinking water and groundwater protecting division also see some of those funds move through theirs. I'm gonna stop for a second and ask if there are any questions on this slide for any of our questions.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: The Water Investment Division, you said a different name.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Sorry, the Water Investment Division?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It's always called Water Investment Division.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: That was created, it's Neil Cowns on the Road Commissioner Commissioner. That was created in 2019, a coincidence with the passage of the Act 76, which was sort of the second iteration of the Vermont Clean Water Act, puts together all sort of water quality and water infrastructure funding and financing into one shop that's kind of designed their programs around moving those dollars to Vermont.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: When we started taking some of the transfer tax money towards it, that's what it was.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Exactly. Yep, so that's inside the Clean Water Fund and a lot of those dollars are in the district.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: You'll see if we go down to the next slide, you'll see that

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: you can see

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: the breakdown of the budget, I'm showing the previous slide and the magnitude of, we just said, the water investment division compared to the other divisions and the amount funds that move through that program. Their dollars are critical and move in the last three or four years with all of those federal funds that have moved through continue to be really a big part of the budget, but we'll see that start to go down starting next year,

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: because of several

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: So, is a pain in the knee. But

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: they're mighty, all mighty. That is very true.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Yeah. We enjoyed working with him a couple of years ago on the what was that called? Planet survey? Never mind.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: They are fantastic.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yeah.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Alright, we'll keep it going so that we know that there's no questions on that. Then we're gonna look at the budget overview. So again, within ANR, DC is the largest budget. We did see an overall decrease from $245,000,000 budgeted in, say, fiscal year twenty six to about $2.00 2,000,000 in fiscal year twenty seven. And that's the tapering of those federal funds, the infrastructure investment in jobs act, bipartisan infrastructure law, bonds passing through. We will, I would say, in the context of looking back to fiscal year twenty three, which is where we will probably get to after these federal funds move through, just to give you perspective that our GDC, you know, that was 117,000,000 at that point. And so you've seen the growth probably hit its peak last year at the $2.45 and now start to taper back down. So a lot of money moving through, a lot of great work that is getting done in our Vermont employees. So, really this budget represents kind of a continuation of the current service for DEC with a few minor reductions. Again, primary reduction in two particular programs are those federal funds and a big portion also of the decrease that you see in these slides is in contracts related to VIL and IIJA money. So it's the money moving through to the communities, but also the contracting that has been done with the money that has tapered off. Makes sense. Any questions before we Alright. We're gonna go down to ARPA and turn to the deputy to talk more about ARPA.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Sure, there's a substantial amount of interest, especially in the House Appropriations Committee side around the American Rescue Plan Act dollars. Tempo of their expenditures, and we're pleased to report that we continue to do a good job moving those dollars out. That's all fine and good, but what's really important is the communities themselves are just held to the ground getting those projects built. So those dollars take two forms. There's the American Rescue Plan Act federal funds, state and local fiscal recovery. There's ARPA dollars that are now considered Cure General Fund. So we're tracking those projects separately. We consider them separate debt IDs and so forth, but we are tracking them both. Our initiatives, Commissioner Fitzgibbon mentioned a couple of her initiatives and three initiatives, they're inside of the list we see on the screen here. I just want to kind of draw a circle around a couple other major ones. We'll have invested $30,000,000 into remediating combined sewer overflows. So cities like Perchens and Burlington and Rutland and St. Johnsbury are, you know, we are putting pipes in the ground to disconnect the stormwater that gets to the wastewater treatment plant. Three acre storm water, I think everybody in the building has a sensitivity to that and put a lot of money into three acre storm water to help individual homes and businesses. Really proud of the work in the Village Water Waste Water program where we are building new wastewater capacity for towns like Walcott, Londonderry, Montgomery, I can go on and on on that. But the one I really want to draw a circle around and is scaling down now is Healthy Homes Initiative, and that is one where we've been helping manufactured housing community residents to upgrade their infrastructure. Also, literally individual Vermonters that have incredibly inadequate septic systems. This program underscored kind of a bit of an underbelly that we didn't quite realize existed and have had major strides in addressing it. We all the way there know, but we've made a lot of progress. We made $40,000,000 in cash, so it's really important work. Next slide, please. Out of the 190,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: how much is

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Sure, next slide. This one right So we've got two points in time, September and then December of the prior year, and then I've got up to date information as of the February. So we have on the state and local fiscal recovery funds expended 72,000,000 of the 111, and we have a lot of projects at bid right now. So bids are out to build the Walcott facility, the Londonderry facility. So these are ones that are gonna drop a lot of money very quickly as they go and finalize their construction. And there's a short leash on these. The other Cure General Fund, the pace is a little bit slower, and the reason it's a little bit slower is we identified which of those major investments had higher levels of risk that could upend their ability to fully expend the ARPA dollars, and we made sure and we used CURED funding for those projects, maximize their efficiency. So while that's a large number under the incumbent obligated and as of yet expended, I can report to you that that as of December 3 December 15, that 13.9, as of the February, is up to 18. So, and this is wintertime. We're not seeing a lot of expenditures on infrastructure construction. So, doing pretty well with this, and it's, when I say we, again, I have to go back to the municipalities and the engineers and the committees that have made this work happen. It's happening out in the field, and we're just trying to help. So I will be in house appropriations to provide a deep dive whenever they might be. So I'm happy to say

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: 40,000,000 that hasn't been expended in the the funds that have to be expended by the end of this year, December 26, you feel confident?

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I do. Yeah. And I'm keeping I'm I'm not only keeping very tight track of which projects I feel are developing risk, I'm also keeping Doug Farm, Chief Recovery Officer, kind of up to date on that. So, yeah, we meet regularly to discuss these matters. You know, we really want the, what we want is just that money gets spent on those projects, and everybody's happy. I

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: guess I do have a question. It was, it's just interesting from your last slide that you were, that it sounded like you all have made some discoveries, like, oh, there's a real need here. And, anyway, especially with the this is something we can talk about in another time, but, it would be interesting once this is done to as just a a part of the, you know, conversation or reflection, like, what what came up, you know, when we had a lot of money, what was one of the some of the greatest needs? And so, you know, identifying like, that's there was an unmet need there, and how how do we work to address that in the future? Like, would be that would be I would love to have that conversation. Sure.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yeah. Sometimes. There's different learning in each of the different appropriations. Sure. We've learned different things, you know, where the bottlenecks are, where the challenges are, when sort of unmet needs.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Love to chat

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: more about that.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Well Sure. Move on to the to the next slide. So these are really, for us, the the key budget changes this year. So, like we said, the bipartisan infrastructure law lying down, it says it right there that you're going to see the decrease from twenty sixth to twenty seventh. And really, we see that for state fiscal year twenty seventh, it will be the final state fiscal year in which we expect to receive new IHHA and GIDL.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So, the

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: goal being that we can continue to get that money out the door, get those projects built in the future, even though it's the last year that we received funding, it will be multiple years of getting the dollars out the door and making sure that the projects actually get built.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you know when you're finished, how much more lead service line replacements would be needed? Are we getting them all replaced with federal money or is this getting us halfway there?

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: We are. In fact, what we've learned is that the availability of federal funds exceeds the need that the state of Vermont has, we will be declining some of the federal dollars that we just can't spend. It can

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: only be used for funding.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Right, and others need it. And EPA has made some changes to eligibilities to open the eligibilities a little bit. There's details around that. I won't get into technical details around what kind of metal is in the pipe, or is it lead or not, or was it ever lead or not. So yeah, we feel good about that. We've just moved a couple of lead service line loans that are pretty big ones. Yes. Right, so these lead dollars are up they're 50% money to the community, so they, you know, they borrow 10,000,000, they pay back 5. So good value. Yeah.

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

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: And then as we said before, the contractual costs, you know, decreasing in the contracting out, because the dollars are in fact receiving less or maybe less out the door. So you're gonna see about $16,000,000 in reduced contracts in the budget as well. Again, ongoing operational costs, salary benefits increase of 2,800,000.0 across all face funding sources, 353,000 increase in ADS service level agreement, the core enterprise service costs That being expected, but there we are. 600,000 reduction in underground storage tank loans funded by the Petroleum Cleanup Fund and the 18,000 reduction in air monitoring pass through, as well as Mercury monitoring contract and CAMNET grant. So those are kind of the key budget takeaways for this year. Are there questions on any of those?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So is this is the 600,000 reduction going out or 600,000 reduction coming in

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: for the underground storage, underground? Going out 600,000 less in loans that we'll be able to issue.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you only do loans? That should be great.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: It is, I'm a little over my skis,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: but I'll do

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: my It best to

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: is cost recovery dollars where we can put money out to help with a monitor right away that needs it, needs help, and we just put it out there. Then if we're able to cost recover the dollars from the responsible party, whether it's that owner or the prior owner Okay. Or of the business, then we will do that. We also are able to make loans through the underground storage tank loan program. Those are, we do need those.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So these are some, we can walk through many of these, but these are prior fiscal year updates. We can just looking at the time and noticing the time.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: One question I had about past work is on PCBs and stools that ran through LTC, right?

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yes. All funds have been, are committed.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Right. Isn't that projects still happening there? Are you still overseeing some projects? Yes. Still seeing projects happening. And testing has

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Slow. Slow. We do not have funds right now to continue to do testing. Are

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: there schools contacting you, or are the best kind of test that once you have more capacity, they would come up. Are you lining up schools? I got a waiting list.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: It's a live conversation in the building as to how the program moves forward, so I wouldn't want to get firstly in front of that, and second, the technical pieces of it, and sort of the tempo and staging, would have to get our director of the Waste Management Division to talk about that, which we can. We have a long list of unmet need underwriting for schools that have tested. All the dollars that the department has through last year's one times are staged out of. Right. They're going for mediation traffic.

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

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Any questions on previous years prior prior fiscal year updates?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: I don't if you have to take

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Walk through them or come back and talk to them. I can do the high level just quickly. So or we could

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: move through the special on

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: that rating statement also. I will make a replay just for the prior year fiscal updates because I think it's important to just touch on some of these some of these one time appropriation. So, Act 27, one time appropriation for CAPO. I do wanna say that the CAPO process has, from last summer to now, we've gone through the stakeholder process, and we're working forward with any of the programs, making sure those dollars are spent. And I know that there, we continue the conversation around the report that is required from our stakeholder process, that there may be some things that come out of that conversation that we will be having in the near future.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Where are the your KFO regulation funds coming from?

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: The the one time appropriation that we had, the

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: That was to set it up because of the transfer. So we're ongoing.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: We got you you appropriated base funds for staffing for the program, which we've gotten all set up and so We

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: take it from Ag and give it to you again? Well, I can't remember what we did.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I I I not sure.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I think you had you had 300,000 base of base funds for the cable program for added staff. Right. So, on top of the 851

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: 850,001 time.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But there isn't a revenue source.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: You know? I can look at that later. Mean, there'll be Well, there'll be fees.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: By by,

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: you know, applicants to the KFO program. So folks that are involved in the program would be paying operating fees. That's, you know, out in the future once they're under

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: in the Are Are they also paying the I'd say, the business money going to the clean water fund? No. Well,

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: so if I can jump in here. So just on one point. I seem to recall we had the CAFO bill last year that there was no concurrent reduction in ag that matched the increase in funding for DEC to, to take on this work. Remember if there was- Yeah. Which was like notable- Yeah. At that moment. But then, in, I have, one of the questions that I have about this is specific, if it's supposed to be, there is a bill right now that we stripped out a portion from the miscellaneous ag bill that was filed.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Right, the things that the governor recommended.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Right, so.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: It had no fees per capita.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yes, right, the governor's recommended.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Reduced their fees from here.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Right. And I think it was just for medium and large That would be huge.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: The large term, but not Right.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: It's for everybody. But, nonetheless, it sort of but with a corresponding increase from, I think, DEC, and I think it must have been for base. Yeah. At least that's what Priscilla indicated, was that there was an increase to General fund in agriculture. It was for the agriculture. Yeah, it wasn't. But was there any It was not for Yeah. CBD. Mhmm. And it was against the dairy farm. But we're interested. Okay.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: In

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: which case, like, if it's made up, if the revenue source is CAFO fees, we're, I I'm wondering if you all can survive on the fees that are not from the large or the medium CAFOs, too. A small CAFO? No, I'm not sure if there's, there's not, okay.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Bill and MFO fees would go to the agency of agriculture. Once a farm comes into the KFO program, they'd be paying fees into the department, but that's not, you know, we're not there yet.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Okay. So those fees are

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So Ag fees. Those were Ag fees.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yeah. Not not Oh, okay. Yep.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: But were you expecting them to move over?

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: We did not advocate for that one more year in London. We have base phone.

[Sen. Virginia 'Ginny' Lyons (Member)]: But just wondering how they've been used in the past. So I know the CAFO fees have come in previously, and then AG has used them for

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: what? And then We're gonna have AG answer. We're gonna have to. There's some confusion around that. Okay. So

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: So I will come in, but, yeah, it would be you weren't you weren't expecting any of those funds to continually fund the position that you find it. I think the money is going

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: to clean water from that ag. Right. The agency of agriculture, they can speak to their appropriations for sure, but there's clean water fund support for them. There's fee support from their farms into the ag water quality programs.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: That's all I can say. That's what they're proposing to zero out the fees to backfill the general fund. So they'll still be doing the clean water work on the farm that are needs a general fund.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: For us, it's supported by base funding from you all now, from the positions that are in

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: there. If

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I may, I think there was a question you had on emissions repair. Did you want to ask that? I asked the secretary. Ah, okay. She

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: gave the general walk through that there was some money available. They took all of it, but there was 200,000 available

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: for those repairs. And

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: if there's ever any new data on an uptick of the program, transportation committee would also be interested in that as it comes to the future.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: So I just wanted to make sure you had what you had asked.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yeah. There's another question right on one twenty one. Was there

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: a question on one twenty one positions at all?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: One Or 21. Remember. Oh, Yes. That's

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Safety conditions. Oh,

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: yeah. Is that where we the food safety?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yeah. Yeah. Correct. Well, they they had authority, but some had expired, and so this was

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Do you do you have any to say about?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Position for the folks there.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: They're in the they're in the house version. There's a couple positions in the house version that was all from the app saying that he's in the house. I

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: think that's why we wanted to ask you is like, so the House put these in, the Governor didn't recommend them. I know that you have to follow the Governor's recommendation, but you haven't even said like, could you operate that? Is there anything that you could say without getting in trouble?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Sure, no, no, understood. It's certainly

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: not a matter of getting in trouble at all. There's a bit of a history to it, so we provided testimony in the House and multiple committees, but basically flood safety act major piece of policy after the floods of twenty twenty three, DEC is on record requesting 18 positions to do the full body of work. We received authorization for 15 base funding for 11. So we were able to go forward and fill the first tranche of 11 positions. We then came back during adjustment and requested the base funding true up to get the additional four and we're not successful with that. So in our deliberations with House Environment and the other committees on the other side, we basically, we were asked, well, why is there a slowdown in getting this work done? Because we had some date adjustments on the table with a bill that appears now to be tabled. You know, essentially, we're honest then as we are now, which is it takes a lot of time and a lot of communication with Vermonters to put new regulations on the ground that support that would affect 45,000 parcels around thousands of miles of river. We wanna do it right. From the passage of the act, we didn't quite have the resources that had been requested, and so we're doing the best we can with the resources we have. I think the House's response is to put those two requested base positions into their proposal. To speed up the work. If that survives the budget process, they will be used well, but it's not in

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: the government's budget. Thank you. Any other questions? Any last comments?

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I think we have one more slide on, we had a special funds operating slide. I just want to, like, touch on that. So, if there are, we can always come back and answer questions or provide answers in writing. So, those are our special funds operating statement. I can talk more in detail understanding what

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: the time is right now. We'll contact you if we get through

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: this and have any other.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Yeah. We welcome that. Great. Well, you for your support

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: of the work that our programs do on behalf of everybody. Very much. Thank

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: you. Any any kind of good guide. Your chair. Allowed to move your your your flexible guide. Mean,

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Yep. That's it. We love permission and welcome. Thank you much.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: It's okay. Yes. Okay.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yes.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: We'll let you in.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Chair)]: Good afternoon, mister chair. Good to be here. Jason Batchelber, and I'm commissioner. The last time I was here, I was in Misty's shoes, so it's it's great to be back. You for hosting us.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I'm joined by Melissa Strattenden. She's our director of our admin services division and our and our business manager, and Steve Gomez from the secretary's office. So I'm gonna try to angle myself so I can see the slides. I'm just gonna run along with me here. You're also welcome to sit up at the table if you want to. It's up to

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: It's you're you're you're okay. Yeah. As long as I can glance over. Yeah. We've got

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: a few slides muted, which you can you can see, but we'll likely skip over in the interest of time. We have a couple of efforts that are underway that I wanna linger on. One of them being our our area license and then a couple of financial restructuring efforts that the department is undergoing that I think will be of special interest to you both in the moment and and in future considerations. So to get right into it, this is the the 2027 governor's recommend. This is a skin of our teeth budget, I don't mind saying. With projections proving challenging over the next few budget cycles, as I'm sure the secretary alluded to, I'll likely go over some of these quickly, like I mentioned, so we can have some time to get into some details on some others. So I'm gonna jump to slide three. So our mission, as many of you may know, is the conservation of fish, wildlife, and plants and their habitats for the people of Vermont. We dedicate a great deal of time providing quality fish and wildlife based recreation, reaching Vermonters with the best possible information about these resources. And I I I think I'm very lucky to be with this staff again. I you may know I was I was a warden for twenty years and and didn't get to see the department through the lens that I do now, so a huge benefit and feedback. But we do a tremendous amount beyond what the public generally says. Go on to slide four. So many people are surprised as to what we can serve. So natural communities, fish, wildlife, the habitats that support them, plants to invertebrates. We like to say that we we are bugs to bobcats and and muskies to maples and all the natural streams that they need to thrive. Over over the recent years, it's become more evident to me and to many others that we're we're more of a lands and habitat conservation organization than we are an organization that supports traditions, even though that's very present in our lives. We fully understand what allows these traditions to thrive sound habitat and connectivity. We serve all Vermonters, hunters and anglers, and from down people who simply just like to look at wildlife from a distance. We work closely with towns and communities as well as providing direct assistance to landowners who are looking to improve habitat in their properties. We take a lot of commitment to future generations in order to ensure that the healthy and thriving wildlife and wild places that we enjoy will be here for children and grandchildren. I realize I'm going pretty quickly here, but happy to linger over anything that's like We'll stop and then bring out any questions. Sure. I'm on slide six. So this is our organizational structure here. Elizabeth being a head of our administration division, we have wildlife, fisheries, awarding service, outreach. We have approximately 144 positions, 38 of those being seasonal and temp. I don't need no warden. How many warden, what I have warden's? The warden service itself has 45 employees, 44 employees, depending on the day, but there are about 41 wardens, including management, which is at six right now, so field wardens there at about 35. You think about days off, military leave, and family leave, it can be lean at times. We are going to slide nine. So here's our budget overview by program. We have Fish Division, which is our, by numbers, our most expensive, and the Warden Service, wildlife outreach and education administration, and we've broken out land acquisition, which falls under a couple divisions. We broke it out for clarity just simply to show how much money we spend annually on acquiring habitat, wetlands, critical habitats, communities. But we do we do a a great deal of work there responding to and acquiring open parcels of land for all of the reasons that you understand. Are you gonna talk about Slide eight at all? Sure could. So you can see we have, in years past, supported the LCI VERY 2025, and current fiscal year that we are in, you can see one time appropriations down the line from non dedicated special funds or Sorry, this slide.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Oh, Sorry.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Sorry, if there are those who can't see it, I think that the version that we have being presented doesn't present the muted slides. Okay. Apologies for that. I see. Do wanna use mine? Well, wondered if there's last year we had that 185,000 for the help with the financial restructuring. It was just like how's the financial restructuring going? Maybe you're gonna talk about that later. I do have a slide on that one coming up, absolutely. And I assume there's no, maybe I'm getting mixed up with public safety, but there's no ongoing need for radio equipment. There is an ongoing need for radio equipment. We've asked for that in the CDS space. Not sure where it's going to land. We did not build that into

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: our budget this year as part of the

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: hydro scoping. And you don't have the fund that you're putting money inside, the paper radios when they're needed, correct, maybe not. You know, warden's are there. I'm sure you use other radios, but mainly for the wardens? It's mainly for the wardens. It it and it is that their their radios are a public safety tool that is essentially what they are used for. We talked to their public safety about trying to set up, I can't remember what we were calling it, but Capital. Yeah, a capital fund and a capital program so that we don't have to come up with It's not a surprise, but 80,000 per year, but there's a bigger number. Same with the firearms. Know every seven years you're going be replacing, you're going to set aside money every year for it. I have a depreciation fund for you. So you don't have anything like that. Not to my knowledge, no. I appreciate you considering it. It's more and more frequent as technology advances, but it's an adaptive shift for us to to think more rapidly about this kind of big ticket item. But I'm I'm I'm excited that you're thinking about it, I appreciate it. How are the walleyes doing? I know there's people out here that are caring about that. Walleyes are doing well. We we captured a bunch of broodstock yesterday in the Pulte River, and they're off to on to their next stop at at at culture stations to be think my eve had a slide on them today. Right. Maybe I don't, but they're they're in the first round of of capturing Brutusaki as we speak. They're captured and being stripped, as they say. Right. Yeah. Okay. It's happening as we speak. Doesn't sound good.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Maybe

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: some walleye that agree, but the the overall big picture, it's it's a huge benefit to the state. Walleye brings in a tremendous amount of income. I I couldn't recapture the number for you, but they're they're bordering on a mystical fish that that bring in technical anglers. They're also very, very good table fare. People love to eat them. I love to eat them. Like, I don't get to fish for them as much as I'd like. And they're only native to a few places in Vermont, so we we distribute them in a few areas, and there's some natural reproduction that's taken hold. But when there's an established population like Lake Carmi, the the fishing pressure that we see there is extraordinary for these fish, and they are self sustaining. Lake Carmi, Chittenden Reservoir, Lake Salem, Lovis Salem, five on

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Senator Running, since we're on that topic, would you consider the investment that we put into that and the Lake Chittenden, the LCI Derby, how would you consider the return on investment for all 100%? Well, for for the whole fishing Yeah. Program, the fish culture program. Sure.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: As we as we stand here today, we're evaluating this entire system through the through the Macmillan Associates consulting firm that is looking into our our hatchery system. They have come back to us with early reports that we are among the the top fish culture systems in the country from first glance through to this moment. The the return on investment is difficult for for me to capture not being an economist. But the the fish that we produce, the fish that are are reared on behalf of our of our MRCF. Request for poultry fish are based on angler satisfaction. And so it's a it's a direct correspondence, to what people say they want in landscape. People are very happy with a fish. Our fish are beautiful. Fish bring in an incredible amount of anglers on an annual basis. Speaking walleye centric for me, I I think the program is I I know the program is among the best in the country, and I think that that program pays for itself in spades. I couldn't imagine living without it. Do I I I do think McMillan is going to expose some pressures that that we put upon ourselves to put out fish that I'm not sure we can that we can cash. There are say, we put out a million fish a year. I'm not sure the actual number. I'm not sure if we are if we are demanding that much from ourselves. So I think that's gonna be exposed, but I I think as far as our infrastructure goes, as far as our staff goes, as far as fish we put out, it's it's 100% worth what we're spending. And if you look at the budget, I'll show you a slide with the fish culture budget on it, you'll see that we've been living I don't know if I actually exposed this. We've been living within our means, in a similar budget for almost twenty years now, over twenty years. And it's and it's only personnel costs and benefits that have been going down. They've been they've been retrofitting their buildings with with solar. They've been going to you know, like, everyone has LEDs. They've been cheaper fish, less for a lower phosphorus fish or fish food. Excuse me. Cheaper fish food, lower phosphorus fish food, cheaper ways to produce the same amount of fish, and they've been living within this budget, simply because we are, we are looking at a decline in Vermont's demographic. It's not producing the anglers that we used to have, but we need to keep up. And personnel costs are what drives most of this. And so yes, the answer is yes. I think that the juice is worth the squeeze when it comes to our patriots. One of your predecessors proposed a close one after this, I mean, department has backed off of that, the president's not to mention that it's a study. So the governor's recommendation does not include a closure, so for some of the benefit of the committee that may not know, there has been a closure on the table for twenty five years. Bald Hill has been looked at closure since Eric Palmer, the current fisheries director, since day one of his tenure. It hasn't happened, right, because we we don't we don't eventually get there as a as a staff. He he said this is gonna be a reasonable place for closure. There are many points in society and within the department that disagree with that, and we don't we don't get there. They have been able to to financially and in a responsible way manage these fish for for that amount of time, and so we haven't seen the need. As you know, the closure in Salisbury was not entirely financially related, but that has been put to bed. Salisbury, that's that's it's been it's been taken off the paving for closure. We have we are experiencing a a staff shortage there and and at Ball Hill as well that We're not sure what McMillan is going to explain as far as he goes there. But, yes, there was a hatchery slated for closure. Every one of the last twenty five years just wasn't in the in the limelight. Sure. You're

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: can I you actually go you're gonna get there because I cheated and looked ahead? And I see the you did rip a position Mhmm. In at the end the week. You did. And I see that crossed out in here. Correct.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: So it's bad. It's bad. Yep. We were fortunate to get our our our DJ funds, so our our essentially, federal aid money comes in every year. It came in at a much higher number this year than we've than we've ever seen with our record. And the secretary was able to to testify to go to finish regression, amend the the governor's recommend, and we'll pull this back. Thankfully, this this was not something that we wanted to go through when the governor included. It was just our our last option. At the zero hour Christmas Eve, I think it was, where we were hitting these ADS costs. We could not we level set free that that was the third time we hit the level set. And so, that was our our last ditch reaction. And and we had done as you as you know, commissioner Harrigan done many many cuts to programs, which we couldn't sustain that any longer. We had to go for the for the the personnel, but this this DJ money, this federal aid money, was a boom. It was it was a it's fortuitous. It's a thing. It was nothing to do with me or or or anything. It's just simply Is that a one time fee? I know you talked about this, but if this is a year over year one

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: time item, is that right?

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yes. It's the annual apportionment, and so we'll have we have to spend those funds for two years.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: So we're gonna have to revisit this in two years? But it's federal, it's all federal? It's federal. And we can, we have to reapply, is that it?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: It's an ongoing application process. States based on based on angular numbers get an apportionment. We are at the max apportionment of what's received every year, and it changes every year on on certain criteria. This year just happened to be the record amount of money we've ever gotten. Yeah.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: How about Bald Hill and I mean, Salisbury, I can see that the vacant position hasn't been filled since forever or as long as I could have benefits appropriations even in the house. But now that it's hopefully, it's gonna remain open, apparently, and we're putting money into repairs of

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: the building. Did I see that somewhere? Maybe the capital bill? The capital bill. Yes. So so Bald Hill is is experiencing a vacancy at the moment. Right? We have we're we're using Bald Hill as as vacancy savings. There's a a manager position that was filled, and the the staff position was left vacant. So there was a three a three man show. It's not a two man show.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Can you that was gonna be a question, Mike. Can you succeed with two men in a in a hatchery like that?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: They they are making it work. I don't I don't think it's as as comfortable of a place as it was when we had three people there. They're they're making it work. They're two extraordinary staff, and they're they're making it work. And it it is wide rearing season, so I know that it's getting difficult to manage. They have the ability to hire a CFO year over year, and that seasonal, I believe, is the process of being hired. That'll take some of the pressure off.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Currently, yes, it's manageable. It's not as. What what that vacant position, what shall I otherwise put what does that cost to fill in a position? Do you know?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I don't know off the top of my head. We could probably give you an educated guess. $1.27. $1.27? $1.27. Yes. The $1.27. With with with with benefits.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: Yeah. And insurance. Yeah.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: About Salisbury, that's a management position. Right? It is a management position. It's gonna be more but, again, that one hasn't been And how many how many people are operating that? There are

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: three at at Salisbury.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: I'm not sure.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Actually, we were there last week. There were three people there. Right. Could And have been someone on

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: a day out, but we

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: can certainly find that out for you. And I should know it. I just haven't been

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: to solve No. I'm sorry. I just will give you an idea. Sure.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Okay. I'll shut up for a while. No. Any question? So I I I know we're pressed for time. I'd love to jump to slide 11 and just to to give you some background on our area license because I know this is going to to come around to you folks in a couple different ways. So this this area license is is an effort that has been in the ether at Fish and Wildlife for, untold thirty years. And it and it's essentially and it's in a in a in a very condensed version, this is a license that we have been granted permission by the administration to go after that applies to an extraordinary extraordinarily narrow subset of individuals. It would it's fishing access areas and patterns. So Fishing access areas and what? And and patterns. So the the I'm giving you yeah. I'm just giving you the area, and I'm giving you the people. So currently, fishing access areas are are are largely ruled I mean, it's all it's all it's all ruled on on on a federal system. We have rules that react to these to these federal regulations, and and I say this to tell you that there are very few things that can happen in a fishing access area. You can you can launch a a vessel or an ATV in the winter, you go fishing or hunting, and you can park to do those activities, and that's and that's pretty much it. We allow paddlers even though there's no system for paddlers to pay in. They can buy a habitat stamp currently. But other than that, paddlers are are essentially using these access areas, and and we want them there, believe believe me. They're they're using these access areas and and not paying into the system. So this area license is is fishing access area. It does not apply to hiking trails or other fish and wildlife lands or other state lands. It's simply a a license to access our fishing access areas to help pay for the infrastructure costs that are incurred by by use. This this money that we would like to recoup by selling this license would not necessarily go directly to those areas, those access areas. They would go into the budget, but they would most certainly be used like we use money now to mow and plow and build kiosks and to fund our budget. So as you may know, h nine thirty three stands to repeal the authority for us to set this license. And So just the nine thirty three, it's not in the budget. That's the miscellaneous tax code. It's the miscellaneous tax code. We we have there is a slide where we are anticipating revenue in over the course of the next four years starting at at a at a at a income level of $50,000, upwards of $290,000, upwards of of four to five years from now. But this this is an opportunity for us to build a significant portion of our budget in now, and we certainly love to take questions on this. I I think when when the press hit on this, was on vacation, and I wasn't able to add to to react to the press as as I would have liked to, but it came out as sort of a state lands use fee. Right?

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: And Right.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: And that didn't land well with people, and I completely understand that and take responsibility for it. But this is this is simply our desire to charge a very small group of individuals a license fee to use something that anglers and hunters, have been paying into since before I was born. And that wildlife watching are is the part that I get more questions about. Yeah. So that's why I think people think it means anywhere. Sure, sure. So is that only if you're watching wildlife from a boat?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: I'm kidding.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: No, so if were to launch a paddlecraft from that access area, to do whatever you wanted from that access area, wouldn't matter. Because you're using the boat ramp, or they're using the access area, down the parking space. Right, so that means if you're watching Sure. Right. And and if you bring up a wonderful point, though. So currently, if if someone was launching a kayak going fishing, there's no there's no nothing. You got your fishing license. Fishing licenses would currently be exempted. Hunting license would be exempted. A motorboat registration would exempt you from this because they pay a significant portion of of the fees that go to these ice facilities. And so it's it's simply folks who who who would who would be otherwise seizing the ramp. And and the fun part about it is you could go two doors down to your buddy's camp and launch in the spring. So you wouldn't have to use this because it it's been it's been reported that this is an imposition on folks. Well, I I I have to pay to speak, but you don't. You you can just go to a place that does doesn't say fish and wildlife on it, and then launch from there for pretty And so there for an enforcement award, you might be there and just keep asking people for their license, don't have a boat. All all passive. That's right. We've we've we've committed already to license on. They've got the numbers. They're good to go, which a warden would check. Right? A warden would check the numbers on the side of the boat. Warden would check light jackets. And if a person wasn't fishing or if they were were coming in, you know, they they would ask, you know, do you have an area license? And if they don't, we we are committed to a a very soft rollout of this to say, look. There's a a QR code there. We you'd love me to buy one of these. And what would the fee be? Do you know? $20. I've I've been saying between 15 and 18, but I'm I'm just gonna say because there's Yeah. We don't we don't the rule, but you haven't gone through We have not gone through. We'll make Okay. Yep. So you're planning on?

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Yeah. Okay. So, mister, so this is provoked because I see a lot of kayakers who pull them with a bang. They've got, like, 12 kayaks on a trail here. So this is per kayak, what you're talking about. There's only one person using the space, but there's 12 kayakers going into

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: the OR here. That's correct. So in in that in that particular scenario, it would be 12 people scanning a QR code and having that well, you imagine it's being electronic on a on a device. You scan a QR code, have it in your pocket. It's got a just like a traditional license would have. And to the contrary, though, if this was a party barge, there would only be one registration required, everybody in that party barge would be covered. But if you were paddling your own craft, there just wouldn't be any way around it otherwise. But

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: scenario hasn't been brought to

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: us yet, so that's a

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: good one. Yeah, thanks.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: So I got another question. Gonna yield to my should I stand up to my lab because I don't want you to, I wanna finish your presentation, because I'll answer a question for you. It's probably an hour and a half. Okay.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Well, and also recognizing that we're sort of running out of time, we can have more conversations about this.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: And I'm gonna stay up.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Okay, because this, so much of what we're talking about here also sort of overlaps with what we have been talking about down the hall in 02/24, which is not moving forward, but, you know, it makes me think about, the pressure on the parking lot and it's you're saying that it's per it would be per boat or per craft, but not per parking space. Anyway, just based on the conversation that we had down the hall, the pressure on the parking spaces is substantial. Thinking about the other interests that exist in terms of using the the those parking areas in terms of decontamination or boat washing stations. And, you know, so could could someone theoretically buy one of these licenses and then just use their parking space to set up a decontamination like, to set up a a decontamination station or or to set up a a washing station or you know, because if if the it's the license that gets you the use of the parking space, then there's other there's other things there. Plus, would just add, I think there's because it's it's interesting that we're, you know, we're talking about, like, paddle craft. But if I'm not mistaken, paddle boards are not included

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: right now. They actually are.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: They are. Okay. Because that that had been a point that we had discussed as someone who had been cited as being on paddle boards because they were fishing. And so, anyway, it seems like there's more that could be worked out There's it it feels like a bigger it feels like a big topic.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: I'll just say that.

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: It's a big topic. Yep.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I can simplify it by saying that we're not anticipating changing any of the access area rules. So something that's currently not approved Mhmm. Would not be approved even if you had an area license. Mhmm. You would still have to be doing something that we approve of. Me, not being the the person who approves. Right? The the the rules would have to approve of your activity. Climb words not allowed. Climb words are are allowed. They have stand up on words are allowed. But picnicking, like, you picnicking has come up. Representative Dean used to make a big deal about picnicking, and I I see him once, but I'll have to talk to him about that. But, no, you you could and and you could also picnic if you were fishing. Right? But picnicking itself is not an approved use. And I believe that it made these rules, and and I know some of them are contentious. But buying an an area license to park a a decontamination station would not be approved, but we would give a decontamination station a permit 99 times out of a 100 if if it met the needs of the of the access area. And and we do. But these these area licenses would not give someone a pass to to walk their dog Mhmm. Or to give another contentious example in 2026. But but if you wanted to launch a launch a craft to go do something animal league, whatever you want, it doesn't have to be efficient. Doesn't have to be Should it be swim I think that's the swimmers used to boat access. Yes. It's not an approved use, unfortunately. We we we draw a free car fund on on swimmers. We do a lot of press on swimmers in

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: the summertime for for liability issues. That's a lot of Yeah. Safety issue. I don't want them around boat launch. It's

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: another there's another odd one in there that was, like, sail Sailboarding. Sailboarding. And that was, like I think that one's still illegal, strangely. Not The it's illegal. Well, I think that was sort of what what prompted the the the paddle boarding situation.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Yeah. Sure.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Which I am hearing you that it's allowed Don't

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: put a sail on your paddle board.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Anyway, to die. Sure.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: And if you wanna go swimming, just get on a paddleboard. Go out. Then I have I need to wear a uniform. That was one of the recommendations. Yeah. Jump in a kayak. So I'll ask. Go swim. Everybody's doing good. Probably running for ten hours.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: You figured me. It's a disunfit. Unlike me being looking at them and asking the question. I'm dating myself here. Back in the day when the analyst permit system first came out, there were multiple members on it, whatever else. You actually had to put your hunting license number on the application back in they were talking early sixties or whatever else. They let me put it for an ounce per minute. You don't have to attach your hunting license number. And my question is, looking at the financial issues that Fish and Wildlife is going through, why not? Because I've been told, and I'm not gonna verify anything, that some people put in for analyst permits just for different reasons. Doesn't stop them from putting it to their permit and doing what they want with that permit, but at least it has to attach their hunting license number on that so they'd have to purchase a hunting license at the very least and do what they want with an analyst permit after that. Why does that not take place? Well, then money issues.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I do not know, senator, but you bring up an amazing point, especially in a time where you're going to be experiencing the the fall that we're gonna experience. Sure. I'm implying we're gonna be harvesting analogous deer with a powered rifle. Some people may be buying these tags for other reasons. Right? It's it's a great point. You have to buy that type of stuff within your hunting license.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: You can apply it

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: to your tag Yep. And get it.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: And if you don't get it, you don't have to buy

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: a hunting license. But if you had to

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: attach your hunting license, you would have to buy your hunting license. And so everyone's gonna get

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: a tag for the most part.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Although this year, with the way the system is set up, who knows? But there's Sure. Generally, in the wellness, there was a time when there wasn't abundance of panelists. Right. You can get more than one. I don't know if it's gonna work with the November season now. Maybe those can be very scarce also. But you got an issue?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: How many analysts permits? In my zone, it's gonna be 400. I don't I don't pay attention

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: to We're about to 500 in our.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: So It it'll it'll be it'll be lower than that this year. Yeah. Certainly lower. So would that be the same issue for the moose movements? Moose movements are are completely settled, mister chair. But is it the same issue where you don't have to attach your hunting license? You you may apply for I I believe you may apply for a moose tag without a license. I think what and and it's occurred to me that financially, probably not the best way to go. But if someone wants to if someone's from out of state, they wanna wait till they they win an analyst permit before they spend the big money to buy their license. That's probably why we do it that way, To give an allowance to someone who lives in Kentucky, they apply for a moose permit, they don't have to buy the that 100 and plus dollar license first. They buy the $25 and see if they get it. And then if they do, we do require a a license purchase after that. And I yeah. And I I understand,

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: and I appreciate that.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: But as a license holder for many, many years, who now is money free,

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I could be denied be denied that analyst's comment

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Mhmm. And somebody who doesn't even have a look at this.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I haven't seen that process. And I'm not hunting analyst there this year. We should talk about that. It's not her fault. I'm just Senator Norris. She's the one I would talk to about. Senator Norris, do you feel the same length with a moose, or is it different? Senator Westman's showing a picture of a very large

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: I think it's I think it's all or nothing.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: In Essex County this year.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Because I'm holding a license.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I don't get one,

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: and I know someone who doesn't hold a license. They get one. Am I supposed to get this? Not good.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Not good. But isn't the department making I that's a fairness issue more than a financial issue. Not gonna because you're getting money when they apply the $25. I would say it's also a biological issue. Not not to expose a a a weakness, but I will. We we want people that are hunting to buy these tags, and he's he's we are implying together that some people who may not hunt or oppose hunting are buying these tags. From a biological standpoint, this would matter also to us. It certainly has to have been studied at this point, but I can

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: go to your biologist and

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: the moose biologist, same person, and talk about this with our business office just to see if it would be a policy change. I know some of this is policy and some of it is is statute, but certainly, I like this kind of conversation. And just for your information, and I

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: are working closely on seven twenty three. So We're talking a little. Yeah.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I'm also at your service in case you ever wanna talk about bank Super close.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Senator Brennan, just one question of my own and one for senator Lyons. You answered the you answered the high level registration piece. Could you talk about the Hill Johnson, Pittman, Robertson funds as it relates to those areas?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Absolutely. So the funds that we receive for the benefit of the committee, the funds that we receive from the federal government come with strings attached, and they want to make sure that those funds are used in a way they intend and that the department intends, so they require us to set the rules and set the rules to manage these access areas. And anything that strays outside of those, as you know, deemed as loss control. When they see loss of control in our audits, if we have unapproved use that the state is allowing, that is deemed a misuse of the funds that are coming from the feds, it puts our ability to recapture that money in jeopardy.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: And that relates to unauthorized use

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: of That's the access right. We have requests all the time for unapproved uses, we can permit some of them, some of them we can't. Some of them we certainly do.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Okay. What projects are important to you that might be in the path of the bill? Senator Lyons would like to know. Think it's, she said nine fifty one, is that the number of the bill?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: It's bill. That's our bill. Nine fifty one is the budget bill. We already know it's important in September, so

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: in the capital budget, I I

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: would have to get Andrea on the horns to answer that question for you. Right now, we've had two testimonies on capital. They both were generally seamless for us, but I didn't get the report out as to our priorities on them. I'd have to get back to you.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: And I wanna thank you on

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I I believe I don't know who

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: to thank, but I'll thank you because you're here. The we didn't have to go searching for Walleye Association money this year in in the ag committee.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: You did not need to be. She sent me the form signed. That's he gets tired

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: of it. We got the LCI one. And the LCI money's in there too. We, you know, we used to, that was a battle every year,

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: and it's everybody's They're got to do both in the They're in the House. Pretty governor directed, right? The LCI money is not the governor to recommend. But But it's you something may I don't. Well, wait a minute.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Did I see that? I just saw it somewhere. I hope

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: you did. It wasn't it wasn't my doing. House Was it in the house building?

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: I did not see it in h nine fifty one. I did not see it

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: in the house version. No.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Okay. Not the walleye money.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: I take it back. I'll give you Half of credit. Walleye's in the LCI is not LCI is 25. LCI was 30. 30. Walleye's 25. The last one.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Year over year, the 30 is the the the LCI line that we as as I led when we are too skinny this year to be able to move on into today's sponsor. I'm happy to chat with you about it. And I was gonna send some of Morgan Horse Farm so you could take that money.

[Misty Cinskalli, Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: 99¢. Week, 1¢. Yeah.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: That's not good. And I and I know you gotta go, but I did wanna mention our we had two financial modernization slash restructuring efforts underway. One is under Bisculture, and one is under our essentially, our departmental it's a departmental overview. One of them is with Wildlife Management Institute, and one is with McMillan that I that I alluded to earlier. Those are gonna wrap up here shortly. One in June, and one we had to add we wanted to add we added a state, and so we're we're hoping to be wrapped up by now, but that'll that'll take us a little bit longer. So you're expecting that, like, the FY 2018 budget without changes from the restructure? I think that's accurate. We we have we we need to dive into these results, and and we have we have some reactivity built into our our special fund, and we wanna be able to do this right, and so we were very lucky that we were provided this money to do these studies. We wanna take them seriously, and we wanna react in an appropriate manner. I just remember another question somebody brought up with me about, state park. It's not a road fishing wildlife, parks, I guess, a great question. You can help out. And then that is that other states charge in state, out of state for state parties, but we do not. But I'll ask Vince that question. Yeah. I have considered that. I can certainly ask Danny about that. For sure. Okay. It won't be today. I know she's exposed. Yeah. Yeah. We heard she was on earlier. Okay. I missed my chance. Maybe it's a way for other revenue for this. Sure. For AR in general that we moved around.

[Steve Gomez, Chief Financial Officer, ANR (and Acting FPR Business Manager)]: Fish wildlife does. If it's

[Neil Kamman, Deputy Commissioner, Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC)]: a nonresident fishing license, I must just leave kinda you should get more. In charge more.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Significantly more. And so do you have data on those that the center nurse may have received this permanent or bag, but never never reported? I mean, it could be of many reasons why they don't report because they didn't find the animal that they wanted to take. But is there data on, like, tags that were received, no, they never reported a game, and they never report to report? I I don't have that in my fingertips, but I've seen you're nodding. I assume that's the data that you would have.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: Yeah. So I think you see after follow-up with a purchase of a license, is that what you're looking for as opposed to harvesting an animal?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: Yeah. Well, who got the tag and never harvested? I Or guess you could also say who got the tag and bit by a lice. First one is, we call that BAH, which means bad at hunting. Yeah, Or it could be that. The second one is capturable. Because yeah. You're right. We we we could buy I'm bad at Honey Nut. You could capture that. But you could also capture some of them if not follow-up with the license purchase afterwards. That's correct. Yeah.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: Because the ag is $10, and the license is, what, 30 now? Or what is it?

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: I don't know. 28.

[Sen. Anne Watson (Member)]: 28.

[Sen. Robert Norris (Member)]: 28. So that's the revenue they're losing is just that. Right.

[Jason Batchelder, Commissioner of Fish & Wildlife]: But it'd be interesting to know how many how that is. Is that 10 people or is it 200 people? Yeah. Certainly. I would I will look into that. I would love to know myself so I can send you the phone. Yeah. That'd be great. That's the one. Yeah. I I'll it to. Oh, sure. Any other last words? No. Just thank you for your support. Thank you for the time. We love being here. Thanks for all the great questions.