Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: You're live.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Welcome back to the Center for Economic Development Housing and Federal Affairs. The next subject on our agenda today is S-two 78, an act relating to cannabis, And this particular part of today's meeting is to finish the walkthrough on this bill with the chair of the Cannabis Control Board, James Peppa.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: That's great. Thank you very much. I'm James Pepper, chair of the Cannabis Control Board. Again, just walking through section by section the draft 1.1. Picking up where I left off, we ran out of time the other day. I do have my there's a lot of very technical aspects to advertising. I do have my general counsel with Dave Gilman here. I kind of, operationalizing and implementing the advertising laws. So he I may need to phone a friend from time to time on advertising. Just a few things to mention before I get jump back in. I did submit for posting the comparison chart, which just shows certain key policy areas, how we compare to our New England states. So this post did I sent it to On the the year. Yeah.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: It's on top. I got it right here. I

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: also I know there's a lot of concern when you increase per package limits of THC that they may have an impact on accidental exposures, particularly in kids that might, you know, eat an entire box or an entire package of something. So I do also included the twenty twenty five poisoning people numbers for New England. It shows Vermont specifically, and it shows historical data there. The trends are moving in the right direction, particularly amongst the sensitive populations. I'll just leave that data for you for you all to look through. And then I also just there's a few key sections where I didn't know how best to get you the information, but I just I just have four slides or five slides that I'll reference. So we left off last time I was here on the delivery permit and the event licensing, which is section eight, draft 1.1. It's page eight, line one. On delivery, you can see from my comparison chart that and we're the only New England state that doesn't do delivery. We do, I should say, we do delivery for medical patients currently. It's a different model than what's contemplated here. There's essentially three models that have evolved on delivery. There's the kind of pizza delivery model where it's an employee of a retail establishment that's authorized to just, you know, collect deliveries and go in, and that's what we have right now for medical. There's the ice cream truck model where you could be a wholesaler, you could fill up a truck, and you could just I could snatch it.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: No. It's just the you know, sometimes taking cannabis out

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: of it and thinking about other industries is helpful. So you could be a wholesaler with the warehouse somewhere, and you could take the you could take orders and go deliver them. And then the third option is more like the Uber Eats model, where it's just an independent driver that's licensed by the board that can take deliveries, go to a retail store, and go deliver it. So this model that you have here is more of the ice cream truck model. And it would permit anyone with a cannabis license of cultivators, manufacturers, wholesalers, retailers to apply for this permit and make deliveries between the hours of nine and five 9AM to 5PM. And, you know, there's some restrictions if it has to be to a physical address. And there's a fee, dollars 100, or some authorized the board to create some procedures. I mean, this opens up potentially a huge number of new retail sales.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Sure. Mhmm. In your scan of the other states, is nine to

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: five common? And also, we allow this for alcohol? Nine to five there there are time, place, manner restrictions in every state, but it's not necessarily nine to five. I don't know the answer to that. Do we allow delivery to agree for alcohol? I would defer to your alleged counsel on that. Yeah.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Beer and wine.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Beer and wine.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Not beer.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: In a similar way with the ice cream truck model. I just wanna be able look like a situation. Yeah. If I support this under some standard or

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: It's not an easy comparison because you can buy beer and wine at a grocery store. So, like, are there, like, specialty? We we've had this conversation about direct to consumer sales that come in the mail and having to have someone over 21 sign for that. So we've allowed that for beer and wine, you know, it would probably be inefficient for them to do pizza delivery model. And then this is where I come in with overall trying to do something different in cannabis delivery than what we do in alcohol. Wholesalers and distributors have immense power in the middle distribution of all alcohol. There were only two left in the state, and they control what products are available and the price and delivery for bars and restaurants and warehousing. It's like a whole thing, and that was a vestige of prohibition in a lot of ways. If we do this differently, we won't have a very powerful distribution industry.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: And the net fact of distribution industry may well be significantly higher prices that Vermonters pay than in some other states that don't have such a limited distribution.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Right. And I mean, even the warehousing limits what people have in stock, and we've heard complaints from high end restaurants, for example, that if these two businesses won't carry some wines that that they really want to serve, that's it. Like, they just can't do anything. This

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: model is meaning it's an extension of an existing business that would have owned the truck, go out and have a responsible for for the transaction as opposed to the pizza delivery model or the Uber guy which would be a third party that might also deliver other things. We're not allowing that.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: That's not a consulate. This is just of the I mean, we have about five seventy licensees. All of them could have applied for a permit Sure. And to to do home deliveries. It says deliveries to a physical address. I mean, some of the stuff that we would have to work out in rule, you know, are there limitations on the physical address? On the medical side? We require that we can only deliver us the address that you put in the form that you filled out into medical cards. It's usually paid

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: in small businesses. Madam Sheriff's hand is up.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Oh. Randy. Pepper, do you envision I know there's a fee to the grower for being able to deliver. Do we we would we then also supervise the delivery fee they would charge? Would we set that? Is that something you'd set by rule?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I would not want us to get in the business of that. I mean, is, we don't have a lot of medical dispensaries that are willing to deliver. In fact, there's only one currently because it's a money losing proposition for them, just as you can imagine, somewhat rural state outside our house and the major metropolitan areas, it's not, there's not really efficiencies delivering. Costs more than to deliver.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: That's why I'm asking. I mean, so I assume they would charge a delivery fee.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Right. And then currently, I think

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Well, and so I've tried to follow, like, the evolution in other states, and I think I've gotten confused about what's currently happening or not. But, like, at one time in Massachusetts, you paid for the delivery of, like, a plastic bag for a $100, and that plastic bag happened to come with cannabis for free. So, it it was really it was really squirrely. I think they fixed that. Like, I think some states have figured out how to do this well, and I think we wanna look at those states. Yes.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Drop it to pot as ingratuity because they couldn't sell a pot. They couldn't sell the bag. Yeah.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: They don't wanna do that.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah. And a lot of people stumble on the age verification piece. You know, in Massachusetts, they require people wear body cams and get a shot at the IV. Certainly, probably don't want to do that here.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: And we don't do that for alcohol. People, a delivery person can come and just get a signature.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: We don't know whether or

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: not there's been any abuse or problems in the vet system because I haven't heard some testimony from where and the other. I

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I mean, sometimes I I do think Wendy Knight has come in because we did If you have alcohol at your house

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: The question, Madam Chair, was whether or not in the alcohol system there's been any problem with that system or any testimony if there have been any problems with the system. Are you aware of any?

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: You're breaking up, madam chair. We can't hear you.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Can you hear me now?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes. And we've lost you again in front of the audio.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Sorry. Can you hear me now?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: We heard a little bit, but not your entire

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Okay.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Bill, I I we you have age verification when alcohol is delivered. You have to show that you're oh, you have to show your ID.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: And

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: and I think the commissioner like, I love talking about how what we already do for alcohol and how similar this could be. So if we want commissioner Knight in, you know, they I don't think they have seen any problems. I think we asked them to come back for a couple years and tell us that, and now I think they can do four to five wines that you could purchase and specialty beers which are higher. If we get like, addiction complaints or public safety complaints, they would come through mental health or local or state law enforcement, and they haven't remember, look, we asked them about to go cocktails and they were like, yeah, no, we're not seeing people with Dramatic ties looking at any more accidents.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Probably, I would say a couple of years. I don't remember hearing anything last year, but one way or the other, so I'm just curious as to whether or not they're having What any problems at

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: we probably have is a report on the incidents that

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: I suspect it's minor. The same thing would be true with cannabis. Pepper, why don't you go ahead.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yeah, so the one thing that I do want to just mention on delivery is this, we have this kind of bedrock principle in the Vermont cannabis laws that you're only allowed to have one of each license type, even vertically integrated, but you can only have one and you can only operate at one location. This potentially chafes against that in the retail setting. I mean, what you could see is a retailer who's got their brick and mortar store in Chittenden County, Burlington, setting up a wholesale license down in Brattleboro and having essentially just operating purely on deliveries down there, having kind of more regional coverage of the state, and then maybe adding a cultivation license in, you know, Franklin County and doing deliveries that way, and manufacturing for themselves around the state. So you could see someone just, I think you should be very clear in here how this proposal interplays with the one licensed

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: branch to Google. So this, I think, is another interesting area where we've thought long and hard about this with alcohol. And you can also say the opposite. Like, we have Tide House laws, so you can't be a producer that sells your stuff more with your other license than other people. Right? Like, that's been a huge headache for a lot of spirits folks, but also even, like, that's an old beer law. Like, people wanted to change forever, but which is exactly why we have a bill this year on allowing a wine retailer to subsume that license for a night to have a catering license that night and have an event where they do not sell their product. So, like, this is this is as old as time, the question of who can build a monopoly and how do we move away from that. And we can look to alcohol for lots of examples. It's not perfect, but it's you know, you can say the the other thing too. Can retailers set up a a really tight market and hurt producers and vice versa? That's always an ongoing conversation in alcohol as well.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I just want to flag it because you leave a lot to rule making in this or to adopt procedures, but that's one where you just have to make a policy decision whether

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: you want the- The question is, is that the right policy decision whether or not you have any comment or not? I think Madam Chair has comment at this point on this subject.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. Thank you, Randy. I, question, Pepper, if you have language that you would like to propose to us on this so that we avoid the situation you've been describing and the patient's been underscoring. I think if you were willing to work with Tucker on language to improve that and tighten it up so that we don't leave it to rulemaking. I think we'd appreciate that.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: That would be well.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Business, I mean, like, we do leave a lot to rulemaking. I agree we should set some parameters, but this is a very sophisticated area of policy that I think only the commissioner of liquor and lottery has kind of mastered to the extent possible. So we could bring in Commissioner Knight, but that's exactly what they do is to make sure that nobody has-

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, we might suggest that you consult with Commissioner Knight and see if she has any input that might be relevant to the Yes. You're coming back to us with your thoughts. Yeah.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Great idea.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I can absolutely do that, and then I'll also work out with her, because if they, again, don't like to recreate the wheel, how does the opt in opt out nature, you know, you can only have a retail sale. I assume the sale would be kind of deemed to occur where the physical address person is, so with respect to has that town opted into retail sales, and then the local option tax issue, and then just one other piece is that currently under current law, this is a technical fix that can happen relatively quickly but I don't see it in here currently that retailers are the only entities that are allowed to to the excise taxes, just a technical fix needs to

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: happen, type of

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: things can do. That Right. Well,

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: guess the only caution that I just, in terms of seeing where you are right now, is the more new things that you do and the more complexity you add to the system that you have, the more difficult it is to stabilize where you are and move to the next step. And I realize you don't want to get behind on the market given what's happened in the way other states are competing with us. Right. And there's a delicate balance there.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: And if you look at the number of full time employees at the Canvas board compared to the number of licensees we have, we compare that regionally. It's not your comparison chart, but I do have numbers here. We are we run a very lean operation, and this does open up the potential of adding five seventy new points of sale. So it's just

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Would they

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: be able would they be able to deliver to towns that had opted out of cannabis, I mean, that had chosen not to do cannabis sales?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: That issue you just raised has an issue that has to be.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Really depends on whether you think the sale is occurring at the cannabis establishment's fiscal address, or is it occurring where the delivery is happening? So yeah, there's a few issues that even just on the face of this need to be addressed, and I can certainly work with Tucker to at least point them out for you and give you some options.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Why don't you go ahead and walk through your bills, make sure

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: we're Event happy to get through licensing is next. That is one point one. Sorry. That's on page five. I I flip flops delivery and event permitting. So this is page five draft 1.1. This is a scaled down version from what was in the as introduced. You know, it's it's it allows any cannabis establishment. I know last year when we were talking about farmers markets, everything had to run through a retail license. This this expands that every licensee. So anyone can apply for a permit to host independent. Also, unlike the farmer's market last year, this does a lot of consumption at those events. And,

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: you

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: know, what's what it's what it is, someone's gonna, a cannabis establishment's gonna reach out to the board with a plan or an event. You're gonna have to have written approval from the local cannabis control commission for that, very similar to that local liquor control. So they'll get approval for the kind of day out plan. The town will have the ability to condition that permit with things like, you know, I know Burlington oftentimes requires there be an EMT on call or on-site. If they need help with traffic control or anything like that, that can be part of the local decision making. So when they're applying to the board, they need to have a security plan that we feel is satisfactory to make sure that underage sales won't be happening, that the product will be secure because this is high value products. They're gonna present to us product sale plan describing types of products that they can sell, the amounts they intend to bring, how they're going to monitor those sales. They need to have insurance to cover the cost, and we can add in additional health and safety requirements as needed, just so it can be flexible based upon the actual kind of nature of the event.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So, it might be good to look at alcohol catering license law only because I don't think they have to They're not relying on like an alcohol establishment necessarily, they're relying on a bartender license and the venue takes a lot of the responsibility on because they already have a big insurance policy. So I just want to make sure we're not reinventing the wheel. We should probably try and make this similar to alcohol, right? I just think this is probably a little bit too prescriptive. And probably, like, does that work?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: So this is based upon the alcohol special event licensing. Know what

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: But that's Canada's establishment, so do we say in that an alcohol establishment, they have to

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: No. I mean, if you want to create a totally different license type that just says like a catering list, then that was a alternative proposed. This was just something that would allow us to get moving a little bit more quickly.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Uh-huh.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Because all of our campus establishments are already vetted, they've already been through background checks.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Right, I'm just trying to make sure that if we're saying it's not just retailers, we're, like let's say it's a farm and the insurance liability would be carried by the wedding venue. Does this allow for that?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Yes, yes. I mean, think that what you're gonna find is that the only people that are willing to insure these types of events are surplus line insurers that aren't gonna be traditional insurers. So all of our cannabis setups currently have surplus line insurance policies. So it would just be kind of an umbrella policy to that that covers the scope of the

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: event. Well, assume that you take a look at how this is done in other jurisdictions and try to model

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: best practices from that? Yes. I mean, there aren't a ton of states that do this with consumption.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: How many states in all of the types of sites?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: California does this, and they do it quite successfully. And New York has this just for sales, not consumption. Although they do have very liberal consumption laws, so, you know, you can't consume anywhere you can consume, like, backup products.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: That point in your table, which I love, says that Massachusetts, Maine, and New York allow these events. Question is you'd go when you're going to get that scan of the terrible states. Are there scales adjusted fees? Because a thousand dollars across the board. I just I think I raised this previously. You know, they have a smaller scale based on maximum possible attendance versus a larger scale because I'm guessing there is going to be the scope and related workload or the review of these applications depending on the size of the event that's planned.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I don't know if they're if they're scaled based upon the size. So I can I can certainly look into that?

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I just wanna wanna cut out the little guy that just wants to have a small gathering of the Northeast Kingdom somewhere expected to more than 200 people versus a ski a ski resort that's gonna be a trial of thousands and thousands of people that has the parking capacity. I just feel like your review of the plan for the larger scale event will take more time that it seems to make sense of that charge a little different. But it's a little bit

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I mean, this this is set up somewhat as a pilot. It's no more than 10 events annually and I think that this reflects for the fact that these are almost certainly happen on nights and weekends when we don't traditionally have staff in the fields. You know, it really kinda I mean, we can shift a lot of the compliance burden to the actual event of permanency. You know, we can do walk throughs of events, make sure that there's sufficient transportation plans, but we can just say you need to have private security. I mean, in California, they hold about two fifty events. Their compliance team, while they're involved in the setup on the front ends, they only actually go to about the border and really focus on people that don't have a small compliance system on this type of event.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: One thing here on this, we're going through a walkthrough of the remainder of the bill. How many we're now on, I think, one page, where we're, just about to section eight. And have you got to go through all of the other sections to section 30 on this to bring us up to date?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I do, but, you know, there's always next week. Well, unless you can do it in three

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: minutes. Looking at the schedule that we have right now. Senator Clarkson?

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. Palmer, there's a lot still to go through. I wanna hear your response. We we've asked for JFO's feedback on this bill, but we and a fiscal note, but what are we doing? What are we oh, I just the when you talk about it as sort of a pilot, the event permit, we don't have a date at which we would wanna review how it's working. Do you wanna build in a date to review it and and look at it as a pilot? Or do you wanna just let it go? Because I don't I I I'm reminded that looking through this, we don't have an end date for it or a review date.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: I have a report. Okay.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: We have a report.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Yep. I might recommend that we that our next testimony include experts or policymakers or stakeholders from states like New York and California and Massachusetts and Maine even. Because I I don't want us to, like, reinvent the wheel or get nervous about something or, you know, go around the bush on something that is pretty settled in other states. I was reminded of something that I I think could be even a compromise, for example, on delivery, which is California, as some may know, has a lot of really rural places as well, huge rural swaths where there are no cannabis retailers. And so they've allowed delivery in towns where there is no retailer. So we might look at something like that for a square mileage amount or a county potentially, because we're not trying to increase geographic density, we're trying to serve places that are underserved.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, I think that's important on the one hand. On other hand, I'm more concerned about crossover dates and where we are on this bill. And the fact that at this point, gotten through the entire bill with an explanation of what's in it now without having

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Well, Tucker did that for

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: us. Tucker got an issue in

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: the works of doing that today.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Right. But I so think the thing is, Tucker, where I wrote the bill, right, and it's been there's been some changes that I I don't know if I agree with because what I asked Tucker to do was look at other states where this is really settled and it's working. And I just that's why I would raise concerns about messing with it too much or, you know, of course, should get their concerns addressed, but it might be good to talk to other states who went through all of this.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: It might be. And again, the issue is time, and as we talk about what we're going to do for time, I think that probably may not get done until Tuesday based on where

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: folks are.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right. I would boldly propose that

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Oh, you're freezing up in your chair.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Going over at one Sorry. Sorry. I I

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Please try again.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Should be fine. I have three more. Can you hear me now?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: We will, if Tucker, if Tucker, if Pepper and Kesha can identify a state, one or two states that could quickly weigh in on those key issues where we don't want to reinvent the wheel. We want to hear how it's working, how long it's been working, and what revenue is generated or not depending on what the issue is. That would be great. I think if we could hear from two states next week, that

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: would be

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: terrific. And we have been working. We have a draft agenda that we'll have at the end of the day and we need more time for everything. So we're starting as you know at 08:30 every Wednesday, Thursday, Friday for the next weeks of our meeting, time is our challenge. So if we got two states to weigh in, that would be great.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Perhaps at

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: the end of the day, or sometimes today, we could just clarify the days that will be devoted to each of the subject areas that we have to get done before crossover.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: That's what we're trying to work out. We need more time on cannabis because cannabis is a big bill. We also have housing issues that, you know, we're trying to balance it all out and we have 190. So we have six bills that we're going to be trying to get out. We have the last labor bill. We have housing. We have economic development. We have cannabis. We have the. So we've

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: have

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: work with on that subject. That's usually been an outline of what we might do and begin to seek out what witnesses we might need before seeing here on the date, which we need the witnesses.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Okay. That

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: could be a challenge.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right. It it will be up to it.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Gonna get it through

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: the halls. Remember that the

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: halls schedule another day for you sooner rather than later, which we will do as part of this process so that we can work go through the things that are on your agenda as far as the walk through.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: That's that's That's great, yep. And if you don't mind, I may have to send in my trustee general counsel. I'm out next week, unfortunately.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: He'll be available. We'll attribute those remarks. That being said, we're running right now three minutes late, which we never, ever, ever would like to do, and so we're gonna have to move ahead to the next agenda item that's scheduled, and that is S207, an act relating to prohibiting surveillance pricing. We have with us today Martha Phat, Chief of Weights and Measures at the Bakken Institute of Agriculture, is that correct? Yes. And Scott Dolan, Agriculture and Weights and Market Specialists. You want her to come up together? Sure.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Ahead on the We'll go ahead and put on the table.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: I want you to identify yourself for the record.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yes, my name is Mark Popkett with the Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets, Chief of the Weights and Measures program.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Scott, one Weights and Measures specialist, Weights

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: and Measures program. You're going to tell us everything we need to know about survival in price here.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yes, absolutely. Well, we're here to answer some questions and make comments. What we tend to briefly explain a little bit what we do from the Consumer Protection Weights and Measures Program in regard to accuracy and pricing in consumer protection. We follow national standards that are located in the Scan Books 130, and we're going to retail stores and conduct inspections on the accuracy of pricing to make sure that the price that is on the shelf is the price that customers pay when they go through the cash register. We we issue significant fines and penalties, warning letters, make corrections, and we are we are passionate about consumer protection and making sure that that pricing is accurate and correct. We have in the works now a house bill that is updating our unit pricing laws and regulations, which is very, much, in line and related to what we're discussing today. And unit pricing is a little different than price accuracy or verification. It's pricing disclosure with consumers when they go into a store and want to make price value comparisons. But we have we have called to rename the regulation you know, pricing regulation as opposed to simply unit pricing regulation as we have found that that's gonna be the most beneficial for this. So I'm going to just, as far as surveillance pricing, happy to answer some questions in regard to things that you might have to the capability that we can answer. We don't get too involved at this point as far as AI or surveillance pricing. However, it is a concern because, again, we want accuracy, transparency, and we're concerned with the possible manipulation of pricing based on algorithm sport pro programming, or AI and all of that. So we have Scott and I both looked at the the proposed that we are not in opposition. We would be supportive of that. I don't know if I fully understand, and Scott and I were discussing it earlier, if we fully understand all aspects of it, and we probably don't have the authors of this present.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, madam chair, I know Yeah. On screen, and I think she has a comment. Thanks.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right. It was my understanding. Thank you both for coming in. I apologize for not being there. The it was my understanding that you two are quite interested in the surveillance pricing and that, in fact, the agency of that one or both of you would be willing to take on actually reviewing where we are with surveillance pricings with the state and and how we might how you might come back to us next year with a recommendation. We, that was my understanding is that you were doing some work on this. We don't have time actually to take up this bill at this moment, but we would love to give it to, We were led to believe that maybe you would be willing to take this on as an issue to be working on and reviewing and investigating, exploring and come back to the legislature actually with a recommendation next year on how we proceed.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: And so I'll follow-up a little bit again with the pricing update to the unit pricing law that we're doing. We are addressing some of the concerns in regard to electronic pricing, electronic shelf tags. And so Scott has done a lot of work on that, and he's with us here today. And for example, in what is going to be reviewed with the house ag, Hopefully very soon we have, something that does address the use of electronic shelf labels, which restricts, frequent price changes on those. It restricts the changing on a standard price, which is referenced in 02/2007, the standard price that would restrict that from being changed during the day and only being changed once that store is posted, it's an increase in price. And so that part is being addressed in that. As far as and I'm gonna let Scott speak in just a minute. As far as the AI, more of the AI natural surveillance parts of this, as he is more of an IT person than I am. But we are addressing part part of that in our trap. And we hope that that is going to have some limits on, for example, electronic shelf tags and the capability of retailers to build those algorithms and change the pricing in a way that benefits them?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Is this in a bill or is this

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: in a This is in housekeeping. This is in housekeeping for the agency of Pat Bill.

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: It's in the miscellaneous ag bill in the House. Yes.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: So in the house, and that was a comment from the legislature counsel? She's identifying herself as

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: a resident? Michael O'Grady, legislative counsel.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Thank you. And so you're saying that this is something that is ready or introduced or going to be initiated? Yes. What is it? What's the bill number?

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yes. Scott, do you have a specific It's bill a

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: bill committee bill.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: It's a committee bill and Senator House Act. It's in House Act. Act. And the bill will do tell us what will the bill will do this year? It will Assuming, you know, once it's finished and as you anticipated.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: It will it will limit and put some guidelines, guardrails on on electronic shelf pad labels and the amount of time that those prices can be changed.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Okay.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: And and and for example, on dynamic pricing. We're concerned with dynamic pricing. I'm gonna let Scott speak in just a moment. He's a wealth of knowledge. Dynamic pricing, for example, you folks probably already know what that meter is. But for example, if they have algorithms and studies on sales of certain items, for example, if they spot, it's a Friday afternoon. So if if they spot that between 04:30 and 06:30 on Friday afternoons, that the spike, that sales of a certain type of beer spike during that two hour period of time, that they're not allowed to just go and increase the price of that one item for two hours from from 04:30 to 06:30, and then 06:30 comes, and then they can reduce the price. And we are had concerns about that. We wanna limit their capability to do things like that. I was writing down, coming down to work this morning, as a matter of fact, listening to a talk show that I listened to, a national talk show, and they were talking about surveillance pricing this morning. And they were talking about all the information that they're gathering on consumers, and they're mentioning that people will have their cell phones on them when they go in shopping into the stores, that can be reported.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Which is 99% of the

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Yeah. Almost everyone. Right? Yeah.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: But they they doubt, you know, this specific

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: base What is that called? Like, geo fencing, or is there like a fancier

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: There are different, again, depending on what it is, there's different terms for it and how it's going

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: look like, but

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: yeah. In what we've introduced this year, we've one, put in a definition of what a real time dynamic price would be, because all prices are technically dynamic, right? They change day

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: to day, week to week.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: So, dynamic pricing doesn't really mean anything but prices. The change for real time dynamic pricing, is changing as the market changes. And that's what we're trying to go after on limiting, right? Because again, prices are going to change, like stores right now with paper tags are changing prices two, three times a week, sometimes not for a month. So what we want to limit, again, is that real time dynamic pricing of prices being increased the day, especially when a consumer can pick a product up, in between that time, like, oh, they pick

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: a product up, they go get

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: a cup of coffee, then they check out forty five minutes later, that price has been changed on it, right?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, this is a great opportunity to use a spy versus spy and use your AI, Joe, that prices are what you want them to be and the store on the other hand then would change it adversely to them.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yeah, and we've tried to kind of step back from the, basically we're looking at the effect versus the cause, right, Mhmm. Because as Mark said, like, it doesn't take an AI to figure out that people buy beer from 04:30 to 06:30 on Friday afternoon. I as a monkey and a human being can just be like, yep.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: I'm gonna program this in. That would be what

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: our devices do. AI has nothing

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: to do. Oh, like a surge price.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yeah, right. It doesn't matter when Do people's

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: we allow gas stations to do that since they have electronic

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Not many have electronic tags yet. There are a few that are starting to adopt it on the gas And that's one of those things that that's why we'll that's one of reasons why we've introduced this language this year Yeah. Is to just put those guardrails on, basically. You can't increase the price. If you wanna have a discount

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So, like, you know, a lot of them have the big sign has the electronic the digital now? Do we let them change that in the same day?

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: I'm not aware that there's any prohibitions, but it has not been an issue.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: We don't let them change it.

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: No. There's

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: no prohibition.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: If I I

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: will say this second

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: and plus manager, Peter Jackson.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Gas gasoline prices change by the hour. So I think thank you, Mark and Scott. I I appreciate that some of this are concerned about surveillance pricing as in the house ag bill. I think with surveillance pricing, the insidious aspect of it is that it's individually targeted. So they AI has your personal profile and they could charge more as you Alison Clarkson or as you Kesha Ram Hinsdale or as you Randy Brock approach the cashier, the price could be adjusted per customer. That we have not seen. We have seen dynamic pricing. We have seen prices change within the hour with gas stations. But what I think what we're looking for is how to move the surveillance piece forward. And when that bill comes to the Senate, maybe that would be the appropriate place for us to work with House, with Senate Ag on some additional language that would charge you with maybe coming back with a recommendation to the legislature next year. Would you be open to that?

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yeah. I think we would be open to that. I mean, but what let me so let me just try to speak to that. Your one concern there. So another thing that this new language does, it actually forces everyone at retail level, right? When you're physically in a retail store, and that's what we're trying to cover with this, is it requires everybody to post a price. Which is gonna be the biggest thing, right? So that way everybody knows like, guys, if you guys call this standard price, our language, we've just total selling price is the definition we've chosen. In either way, that would have to be posted to the consumer regardless no matter how big, like, for every retailer everywhere physically in the state of Vermont. Right. So that way the consumer would know what they're, again, supposed to be paying, what price was assigned And that

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: would be allowed to be changed only once a day in in your concept?

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: It would be allowed to change when that store is not open to the public, if they wanna raise the price.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: If they wanna offer discounts,

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: that would be allowed whenever they would like.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: That's

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: it. And I'll just speak. We're updating this. We had original unit pricing and regulations. They were developed in the mid nineteen seventies. They've been just slightly tweaked. It it has not been updated. When this was done, the Internet didn't even exist for the public. And not to mention electronic shelf tags and heavy all those other issues. So this has been a long time and time for us to address this and update our unit pricing regulations and to increase other these other issues such as just pricing in general. And and Scott mentioned that our, proposal would require a tag and a price for all products anytime it's offered for sale of retail and the current regulation on unit pricing allows some exemptions where if you have a small store, for example, with 7,000 square feet or less, and it's a sole proprietorship, there's no longer regulation that requires them to have any price at all. That's very problematic in what we're doing would correct that.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Senator Chittenden.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: So I'm glad you're gonna study this because I do think there's a lot in here that we need to understand and I don't think any of us wants to prevent individual discounting. I mean that happens all the time. And if we go down this path, I made this point previously, what you're gonna get is what we have with vehicles and manufacturers suggested retail price which is much higher that barely anybody ever pays and they're just always gonna discount it. So if we start preventing people from charging more on an individual basis, the natural market reaction is they're gonna set it because they could set this cup right here, $200. Alright? So they're just gonna set it high and then have a bunch of ways to discount Yep.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Wasn't really $200.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: $200. I'm telling you right now, $200. But I will give you a $100 discount today.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I I thought you

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: were saying it.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I don't think there's an easy answer to this and I don't necessarily support maybe everybody out there wanting to sell something in the market to have to have a price displayed because I just I think that carries with it a great deal of burden that doesn't really reflect the natural nature of markets.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I could

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Go ahead.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I so we allow this for gas prices right now, which people are incredibly sensitive to, and there are probably some people who know if I go shopping, if I get my gas at 11AM, it's gonna be cheaper than at 04:30. I didn't know that. That's really good to know. The static pricing, like, I think digital displays are just gonna be helpful moving forward. I mean, they could put other languages on there like at Lowe's, you know, because like, this is, I mean, this is a tool that we shouldn't prohibit stores from having. And I don't know I mean, like, I'm open to having a conversation about them changing the price for everyone at the same time at any time of the day. I think I don't know exactly where you're at, senator Chittenden. I I would not I don't think most Vermonters wanna watch that display change because their phone got near it and they are, you know, like, behind someone in line who just paid a different price for an item.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: If it changes down, they're gonna be I mean, that's what I do all the time. I identify who I am with the rewards programs. I'll get discounts or carryover benefits or otherwise.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So Okay. But are we gonna start having, like, leave your phone in the car or, like, bring your phone that shows you're a thrifty like, bring your kids' phone too. Like, I'm

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: studying, diving deep into it. I'm just not ready to pass this bill.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Whole issue of doing the study is also to think forward because as we react to the change in technology, the other people are gonna react to the change in technology and they're gonna develop ways to tell, A, how you can force these other things to change the price or how you could be alerted with price change as the case may be. That's the next piece of technology that's on the way.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: We are supportive of electronic shelf pads. We think they have great promise to help the accuracy of pricing.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: So

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: the issue then of going to the next step of having you come back with the notion of a study or what have you to say, how do you address this and add that as part of how's Ag built? Makes sense?

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: We're happy to, over the next year, to Yep. Study and and, yeah, start We can do something. Do something. Yeah.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yeah. Senator Clarkson? Sorry.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: You're not coming through on sound.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Can't hear me?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: No. At least not in sentences.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Oh, sorry. Can you hear me now?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes.

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay, great. So it sounds like with this issue, I would propose that we wait for this bill to get to Senate AG and that we ask Mike O'Grady to work with Clark and Scott to develop language around charging them with doing an additional, some additional work and investigation into how we might address surveillance pricing in addition to the things they're addressing that currently. But that we that we be prepared for when it comes to Senate Ag with a proposal on how we move this forward so that we can address it and take action next year.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Do you have any other thoughts about additional, do either of you gentlemen have any other thoughts as to what other things we should study or how we should work, what it is we're studying, what it is that we might be asking you to do.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Well, guess we've, we probably have questions. Yeah, we read two zero seven and a few parts of that were not that clear to us. Okay.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: You know?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Perhaps the easiest way to do it is to read them and then have consultation with Michael Grady. And then either at that point articulate what those questions are or come back since I think you have a pretty good idea for this discussion today, what it is that we're looking for you to do, and with Mr. O'Grady, articulate that in language that is legislative language reach and our brains. You've

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: been to Forest before from Weights and Measures, have you answered the creamy question, what defines a large population? There's a huge variation of the way states

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: I'll were text my wife. Excuse. I'll let you know real quick. Like more research. It's more research.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Can I just ask one general Sure?

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: So is this bill about just pricing in stores, or is this about pricing in general, ecommerce and retail? Like, what do do we know what the scope of the original stock price?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: A good question. Or do

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: you wanna define it just as algorithmic pricing?

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: So I think that gets again, think we wanna know what the focus is, right? Because again, we were like in our language, we were very careful to be in physical retail stores because if we get bigger to e commerce, then things change a lot because the capacities are much, much different on online.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: The kind of capacity staffing expertise to to enforce some of that AI surveillance pricing. Currently, the Weights and Measures program would struggle with that. Scott, do you agree?

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Yeah. I mean, the the thing about moving stuff to ecommerce is then it takes a whole different skill set than what we currently have. Whereas retail, we have a pretty good handle on enforcement.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, what we could do is perhaps crack something that addresses both at least the purpose of the question, and recognize that there's some things that you may be able to do now based on retail pricing. There are other things that are concepts that we ought to think about and determine whether or not we should address it and when.

[Michael O’Grady (Legislative Counsel)]: And there are ways that other states have addressed the expertise and the staffing issue while still providing consumer information. And New York is probably the best example of that. If your price is set by an algorithm in New York, the retailer in store online has to have a disclaimer that says this price was set by an algorithm. And it's it's withstood a first amendment claim first stage trial. But I think that would be a consumer protection. That's something that the attorney general would would enforce, not necessarily the agency and and it's it's pricing regulation. But you have you have options. And and frankly, over the next year, you're gonna see a lot of states doing multiple multiple different things with this issue.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Understood. Else that any member of the committee would like to add at this point or suggest or raise before either of you gentlemen? Senator Clarkson?

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah, Mike, if you'd be willing to take on, I think you're pretty clear on what we're interested in. If you could work with Mark and Scott on this language. And then I I think that we are interested in e commerce. There's no question because surveillance pricing is at its most insidious online. But I I think we I think we're interested in both and we would want to ask you probably to engage with AG and with our ADS, with our IT people to figure out how we could address both retail online and in stores for the future. Because I think this is gonna be a huge issue in the next, it's just gonna explode if we don't sort of get our handle on it soon.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, think it might be useful to ask those ears to outline what you think this piece to add to the House bill should look like. I think you've got a general idea of what our concerns are. And then back to the draft or a set of ideas that we can discuss and then move to the next set. Exactly,

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: and then can work with the Senate AG on. That would be great.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Great. Hey, thanks to you very, very much for coming. Thank you very much. You learned a lot. Thank you.

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Watch it on the standard cremesis.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Right. Right.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: I'm still mad about the maple syrup with rage.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Coming up.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: On the big rage? That was a long time. Yeah.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Well, I'm old enough to be a big year for that.

[Mark Popkett (Chief, Weights & Measures, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Take care for time. Just need that.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Okay. You can pick that. Will eat. That's

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: your life is good. That's your problem. You all been to the State House before?

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: Oh, yeah. Good.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Good. And we got exactly the right amount of chairs.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: I And this is good. Planning. Thought about that. I'm gonna well, we'll we'll

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: do. Has anybody else So today, we have a distinguished president before the House, or the Senate Committee on Economic Development, Housing and General Affairs, and so that's us. And since you've probably not been to this committee before, let's perhaps go around the room and just tell you who we are, and then we're gonna perhaps ask who you are. So the first person is on the screen right there, and that is the chair of our committee. And Alison, would you like to introduce yourself?

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: If you could hear me, I'm Alison Clarkson. It's wonderful to have you. I represent one of the three people that represents Windsor District. And we're so proud of you. You're really shining examples of how our workforce development work is in action and so it's really it's lovely to have you here today. Awesome.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Okay. And then Senator Weeks.

[Senator David Weeks (Clerk)]: Good morning. Dave Weeks for attorney Gruelman

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: I'm

[Senator Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Tom Chittenden. So, I represent the Southeast Quadrant of the Chittenden County with Senator Ram Hinsdale. Anybody from Chittenden County? Okay. So, South End Of Burlington, South Burlington, Shelburne, Chillat, Hinesburg, Williston, St. George, Hunter Hill, Jericho, Bolton, and Williston. Do you live in those communities? Me and Senator Ram Hinsdale represent you.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes. And I'm Senator Randy Brock, and I represent Franklin County and the Northern Part of Grand Isle County. And so welcome to our committee today. And I understand you're going to be talking with us and giving us comments about accelerated degree pathways. We can't wait. Who's going to start with the introduction of who everybody is and who the group is and support.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Great, I'm Rebecca Kopans with the McClure Foundation. We're here today to talk about accelerated degree pathways through early college and a free degree promise, which is a debt free associate's degree at CCB. I just wanted to start today by talking about We talk a lot with students and young people about how they want people to talk with them about career pathways and what comes next after high school. I realized I should've I meant to grab a bunch, but I'm gonna leave this with you. It really is a collection of how students really want people to show up in these conversations, and given that we're talking about career pathways with young people,

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: it's a great If you could just make a copy of this.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: I actually have more of I apologize.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: That way as you talk or other stuff, we could follow along with some And of high points of your

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: I want you to introduce Judy. Thank you. And apologize

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: for my voice. I will try to take it like a certain while. But really, I want to thank you for the invitation to come and talk today about flexible pathway bill and really in particular, the early college program. And Senator Clarkson, you so much for the opportunity spend some time together. This

[Senator Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: is I wish Joyce, was there to see you. So and Rebecca. Sorry to be I'm on my way to my nephew's wedding in Chicago. So Amazing. For the young people real people too and, you know, let do things for their lives other And than the

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: so, I would be happy to come back and talk in-depth about Russell Cappraisberger because I think today we're really trying to we invited students to come and many of them haven't been to this task before. And also this is a chance for them to share their voice, to talk to you about something they're really passionate about. So, I'm only going to give a brief sort of level set about the flexible pad refill in Act 77, and then we're gonna really turn it over to the students and let them share their stories. Don't know about you, but I always look at Gary for students. That's what makes makes my work. There you go. So, just to sort of level set, the Flexible Pathways bill is passed 2013, and it's really Act 77. And really, the whole goal of it was designed to help more young people finish high school and be ready for college and their belief, whatever order that happened in. Also the emphasis on helping people realize that no matter what, after high school they have to figure out how to continue their learning well beyond physical and whatever pathway that seeks. And I think that, you know, I'm not telling you anything that you brought to family is better than all of us because you have this regularly. Every employer in the state of Vermont feels like they have jobs and they don't have enough people fill in the sport. They are having people applied. They're not the right skill match. So we are really working really closely with those players. And I see the flexible pathway bill is one of the best economic development strategies Vermont has in terms of that pipeline of young people being prepared for whatever their next steps are. And I think that if you look at Vermont, those who enroll in the K-twelve system, the majority of them are going to stay in Vermont. So I feel like for all of us, how do we help make sure that they are operating at their full potential? I think as we at students who are in high school and then they're entering their senior year, for some of them, the traditional high school path works really well. And then there are people from whom they may have their options to become engaged, to become filling their passion, and even more importantly, staying enrolled and completing the ice. So, we have CTEs, which are really popular. We have work based learning. We have dual enrollment. We have early college. There are lots of pathways and I think that is a credit for Vermont, the Vermont legislature, when you passed 77 recognizing that. And I think today it's even more important than it ever has been because Vermont actually has the lowest high school graduation and college going rate of any state. And that's pretty shocking. And so if we weren't, what were we seeing, if we didn't have Act 77, how much lower could we than it currently is? And we need to, okay, how can we defeat it more because we're losing, we're not gaining ground. And so I think that, you know, as we're, you know, today you're going have the opportunity to hear from students who have opted for the early college program. Know, for five to 6% of the students in Vermont, we are seeing that's that's the number that are rolling for the past few years at Early College. CCDC about between 230, 250 students every year enrolled in the Early College. And what warms my heart and what I think, as I look around, you've heard me say this many times, the reason why I stayed at the Community College of Vermont is because we are really focused on, you know, we serve, we serve just a huge diversity of students. We serve a high number of low income, serve a high number of first generation, serve a high number of veterans, serve a high number of students who are incarcerated and in poor families. We also see the F continuum. People who are doing incredibly well, but feel like this is the right route for them. They can do the first two years at CCD and transfer to wherever they want to go. And so I think that as we look at early college, what we're seeing is a high number of low income first generation students opting to go into early college. And that is a group that as we all, about helping all Vermonters operate to their full potential, that's a group that we can really help and support. And that's why I feel so strongly about this program. And as we think about Early College, the one thing that I missed, this is the floor day of this, so I really miss in not really giving a huge shout out to the Free to Free Promise program, which is then funded and supported by the Foundation. And just quickly what that does, students who do early college at CCD, the McClure Foundation helps those underwrites their second year at CCD at non positive families. So, they are going to graduate from CCD with an associate degree at no cost to themselves or their families. Then they can either enter the workforce or they could transfer to UVM. We have 26 pathways with UVM. We have more than that in Vermont senior nursing. We have that many motion to complain. We have a number with seat bikes. These are the courses you take CCD. When you transfer to UVM, you enter as a junior and you start right with the junior level versus just if you would if you started at CCD. I mean, at UVM. And so if you think about that, for students, let's say, going from CCD doing that at CCD and then going to UVM, they have saved their families more than $30,000 That's the money. And that makes a college education so much more doable for families. So I'm going to stop here, but I just want to say thank you for the support that you've given. I do think that we are this committee is really focused on economic development. And whether we're in this committee or an education, I would be saying this is the best educational economic development strategy or one of the best program. So, I'm going to turn it back to Rebecca and she's going to invite students, different students, come up and share their story. And I would be happy to come back. Alison, I would be happy to come back and talk more in-depth. You. I will. Eva, you wanna join us? Sure. Come on.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: You too.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: You wanna give your name and your town for the record?

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: My name's Aiden Hall, and

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: I'm from Park to Vermont.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Can you tell us why you chose Early College and what you're doing now?

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: So I'd say one of

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: my biggest motivations to join

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: the Early College Program is it gave me a lot more opportunities. As I remember, doctor is very, very, very small. Don't have, I didn't have much opportunities to go into my, the field that I wished to go into, information technology and cybersecurity in general. Most we had was a little bit like a intro scratch classroom like that. Doing early college allowed me to expand my interest in actually being able to take classes in what I wanted to learn, and eventually develop that into a full fledged information technology degree. From there, though, my other big motivation was just funny. Getting the early degree, early college program and the Breeden you brought in to last week allowed me to kind of get my toes wet in the college program in the area. I wasn't too stressed about, oh, I have to make it, I have to succeed in this because I'm already paying $40,000 a year or something to college. It allowed me to take my first year much more relaxed, I would say, and be able to investigate what I'm going to do. As more than I'm doing now, I decided to stay local, and I went I transferred from CCP up to Champlain because the transfer passed away they had. And so far, I mean, I haven't had a chance to get a internship yet, but I'm planning on doing some internships at the local center, or lady center. That was just recently developed and finished developing, so. And where, what do you hope

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: to do with, when you graduate from Champaign?

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: What do you, obviously? Probably stay here. One of my biggest opportunities I've been finding on trying for is Kesha Ram being at Rutland. I know I was speaking with a few of my professors at Champlain. They said that they're working with them already about doing some internships and all that, And having that opportunity to stay, not even just in Vermont, being here with Procter, just because it's like literally ten minutes away, it allows me to get my foot in the door, I wanna say kind of. I'm able to stay able to stay with my parents for a couple years as I try to get an initial job either consolidate or to a country like that and just stay there.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: That's good. Because I love Vermont.

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: I love being to stay with her. Thank you.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Thank you

[Aiden Hall (Student, Proctor, VT)]: very much for your story. Absolutely.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Alright. Hanukkah. Will you introduce yourself and tell us what town you live in? Yes. My

[Audrey Naffy (Student, Manchester, VT)]: name is Audrey Naffy, and I mentioned. Can you tell us a little

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: bit about why you chose Early College, which is quite different than Ada. What's fascinating is all of these students have very different stories of why they chose Early College. And tell us what you're doing now.

[Audrey Naffy (Student, Manchester, VT)]: Yeah. So I first heard about early college when I was a junior, when we were doing the mandatory, like, counselor meetings that you had to do to learn about. What what comes after college? What comes after high school? Excuse me. I was always really nervous about going into college because it's like, well, this is something that my parents did. This is something that my siblings did. This is something that my extended family did I need to go to college? Well, I was really scared to jump from high school to college because, unfortunately, I had always dreamed that there maybe would be some sort of stepping stone in between high school and college because it's a big jump. It's a big jump that really affects students drastically, and especially, like Aiden said, when you're paying that much money, you have this expectation that you have to stay there and you have to do really well. And unfortunately, that actually happened to one of my friends recently, and I am so forever thankful for the early college experience. So, when I heard about early college, I realized that there actually was this stepping stone between high school and college. I'm not jumping from these lower level high school classes to upper level college where I don't necessarily have the full support system like I had in high school. And then, the big part was money. So, my family, both sides of my family, my mom and my dad both grew up in homes, very supportive, but didn't have the money to do these things. And they both started jobs when they were 14, 15, and they always worked worked for their families. So, I got my first job at 14. I have worked every day since, or I've worked a lot since then, multiple jobs doing all these kinds of things because I developed this sort of independence where I wanted to be the kid who could support my family. And early college really solidified that for me, so it was an opportunity for me to go to school and to not have to give that financial burden to my parents, which was huge to me. Early college actually allowed me to go through school for two years with no financial burden, you actually ended up getting a couple of stipends, which was huge. So, money that I could put towards going and buying my books and things like that, and travel and things, everything in between. Then the opportunities that were available. So, early college, sorry, the master program has been huge. It's been absolutely monumental. I've been able to go to so many places, do so many things that I wouldn't have thought. And that really led me into where I am now. So I actually just got my real estate license in December. I have developed immense speaking skills and personal personal skills and things like that, where I can barely connect with people, and I don't think that that's something that I would have developed without early college, because I was taking all of these speaking classes, I was taking ethics classes, and I was actually, I wasn't just taking high school class, college class, there was this opportunity to do so many different things, has been huge for me, has been monumental. I'm now at St. Mike's and I'm studying business administration and environmental studies, and I've made it an important thing for me to continue with this master program because here I'm able to talk to people like you and to allow these other students to go through the same kind of experience that I did. And I really don't think that this would have been possible without the Early College and the Free Degree Promise Program, so keeping it is something really important, I think it's really valuable to students like myself who have that sense of independence and feel that need to really want to support their families the way that they can.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: This is very helpful. It would be useful just to give us a thirty second view of how the program works. In other words, at what point from high school do you go and where do you go next? Does the timing work? For all of them?

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: In their junior year, students decide they can apply for early college. These folks are all through CDB. You can also, there's Vermont State University and Norwich are the other two entities that have early college programs. With the free degree promise, if you go through CTB, through early college at CTB, can take your next five semesters are paid for through the McLaur foundation. It includes advanced advising. One of the key facets of the program is an advising program that really helps students with career planning, and really just mapping out, like, how are you doing today? Having having advisors check-in. I think most of the students here, when I when I look around, I'm like, I could see their advisors behind them because they're so incredibly supportive of helping them figure out what their next steps are. Also, really key to that is the transfer pathways. So, Aiden or Annika or Madison, Ruby's still in degree right now, they are able to help them figure out where their transfer pathway is going so they don't miss any steps. When they get to St. Mike's or Champlain, they can just step right into their junior year. Another key part of the program is a stipend for books and transportation and whatever students need. It's a small stipend through the Milkor Foundation. These are the three key, besides the tuition, the free tuition.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: This is the first key Doesn't it occur prior

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: to graduation from high school?

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Yes. And much earlier. Was curious, you were just Well, there's two programs we're talking about. Early College is a brand it's part of Act 77 and so what a student does if they enroll in the Early College program they do all of their academic work at CCB. So they can play sports at their high school, they participate in all the extracurricular at their high school, but they do all their academic work at CCB. So they're getting their high school diploma and they're getting their first year of college. So we have a lot of students graduate from CCV who have who you know first week in June they get their CCE degree because they've gone through the free degree promise but they also are getting their high school diploma. So students do early college their senior year. That is with state support. Then the McClure Foundation has been incredibly generous. They gave us a five year grant and they've extended it by two years. We've been working with different legislators and with the governor's office to figure out how do we continue this program after two more years. Because right now, so it will have been seven years of funding for the McClure Foundation to support the free degree programs. So the early college program is part of Act 77 and that's really to help students complete high school. It's one of the multiple pathways that students can access and then if they complete that program at CCV they're eligible to apply for the free degree promise that is currently funded with the Mount Florida Foundation. Is that helpful?

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yeah, is. Thank you very

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: much. It's the master.

[Scott Dolan (Weights & Measures Specialist, VT Agency of Agriculture, Food & Markets)]: Follow the details. How

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: much time do you have? Do we have a minute to

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: We introduce have about five minutes.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Okay. Can we just go around the room and just mention your name, what town you're from, and what your degree track is? Do want to

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: start, Madison? Yeah, I'm Madison. I'm from Shelburne, and I'm doing health science at CCB, and I'd like to transfer to UBM and get my masters in biochemistry.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: My name is Ruby. I'm from Burlington, and I am set to get my associates in STEM studies this spring.

[Brennan (Student, Middlesex, VT)]: Alright. I am Brennan.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: I am from Middlesex, and, I'm currently set to get an associate's in business upon which I plan on transferring to another university. Not sure which year.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: Hello. My name is Jade. I am in Derby and I'm also studying for STEM. Hi, I'm Prana, and I'm from Barrie, and right now I'm doing my health and sciences degree at CCB, but next year I will be attending Vermont State University Randolph to do my accelerated nursing degree. I'm Maryam, I'm Doctor. Rutland, and I'm gonna be graduating this spring with an associate's in liberal studies.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, we've got great pathways lined up, it sounds like a wonderful program that seems to be very, very successful. So we congratulate you, and welcome to the State House. Come back to the State House, run for office, do something. You've used the time that you've got here for something productive. Again, I think it's wonderful. Remember everything they heard about it. It's very impressive and wish you the very best of success. And once you achieve that, come back tell us what you've done so it'll help others.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Can I make one last closing So Representative Mark Lott in House of Commerce has introduced the bill, along with most of the Commerce Committee, that would create a sustainable funding source for this program? The Higher Ed Trust Fund is intended to support non loan student aid. The McLaren Foundation has worked with Representative Markup to create a structure that would be a split four ways approach to the Higher Adjust Fund. Currently, it's three. It's UVM, VSAC, and Vermont State Colleges. In our proposal, it would be four. So, CCV and the Vermont State University would would both be equally named in the Higher Education Fund to support these accelerated degree pathways like the Freedom of

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Your Promise. And and these represent Marcotte has a bill?

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: He he introduced the bill. It went to house education. And if you have a if you have a moving vehicle of anywhere that you might slide something like that Right.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Real question now is whether or not it's gonna it gets crossover to come over to the senate in time, and the time is getting relatively short. It is. We'll we'll follow-up. But keep time. Follow-up with with representative Archives just to get a sense of where things are.

[Rebecca Kopans (McClure Foundation)]: Appreciate it. Thank you for your attention. Great.

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you for coming.

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: I believe that. Do

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: remember the name. I 100% remember the name.

[James Pepper (Chair, Vermont Cannabis Control Board)]: It's all my wife's special love.

[Senator Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Alright. Thank you. I miss

[Senator Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: that

[Joyce Judy (President, Community College of Vermont)]: so much. Nice meeting you.