Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: We're gonna go live.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Gretchen's my next door neighbor. Well, a couple of doors down.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right. Welcome to seventh Economic Development, Housing and General Affairs. It is Friday. I think it's something exciting like the April 17, just slipping away time. And today we're getting a brief update on paid family leave, paid family and medical leave, and the Vermont state program that we established, the voluntary program that we established two years ago. Two years ago, I think. And that we passed it. So I think it was important, and people have asked for an update on it. So we're gonna do an update on this and ask, see where we are. And we welcome to our committee, Gretchen. Elias. Elias. Welcome. It's great to have you. Have you met all of us? Not. Okay. So we'll just quickly go around the table.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: David Weeks, represent Loveland County.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Randy Brock, Franklin County, and

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Roland Grand Isle. Alison Clarkson, Windsor District.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Tom Chittenden, Chittenden, Southeast. And Kesha Ram join us. I hope she'll join us at some point.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: She's also at the same district this time.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Okay. Yeah. She's one of the ones that had any updates.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yes. Well, she can she'll probably look at the date.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Okay. Great. Yeah. So I know I only have about twenty minutes, and so I what I have to say should only take about ten so that there's time for questions. Great. I represent the Vermont A and B Prohibition where a group of more than 80 businesses, organizations, and everyday Vermonters who believe that nobody should have to choose between making a living and caring for themselves or a loved one. And evidence is clear, I know, we've both noticed that universal access to paid family and medical leave benefits everyone. Families who have access to paid leave are healthier, more economically secure, and less likely to require taxpayer funded public resources. And access to paid leave is also good for the economy.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So just put a pin in that because I think all of us are interested as we look at the pressures on our budget to reducing dependence on state dollars to just survive. And I'm just curious what percent you anticipate that being affected. Well, I did, I would have to Because it's one thing to say, but it would be great to, at some point, to be able to quantify that.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Yes, and that is in one of the resources that we can have a cost benefit analysis specifically for bonding me about the total savings that you see when families have access to that. I think it's

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: a look. We'd appreciate seeing that. Yeah. Our website. Okay. I provided it. I'm channeling our vice chair here. Yes. We wanna see the return on that investment. So if that's a reduction in. Here, this should be

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: in your packet that care of them.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: We have your testimony and we will also follow-up. Yeah. Was my testimony. That's big benefit analysis if you have that one. Thank you. That's great. Sorry to derail you. Oh,

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: that's not a derailment.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Pieces like that matter in this committee and in every committee, in particular in this committee.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: So it's also a benefit to the economy too because it increases labor force participation among big parents, people with chronic illnesses, and caregivers for older adults. And for those reasons, 14 states have already passed the universal paid leave program, including nearly every one of Vermont's neighbors. And as you all know, Vermonters want paid leave. Around 80% of Vermonters supports the idea of a universal state administered paid leave programs, and we've come close to making that happen several times. The governor has vetoed it, opting instead for the voluntary coverage approach the state implemented beginning in 2023. As a result of that, state employees now have access to a partial paid leave benefit. And while we have some questions about how this benefit is actually working for state employees, what I want to address today primarily is how this voluntary approach is working for the remainder of MUC workers, the majority of MUC workers. What does this voluntary option mean for them? And in theory, it means that their employers could choose to provide this benefit by contracting directly with a commercial insurance And this option became available to private sector employers in 2024. Likewise, individual providers who don't have a pay fee benefit for their employer, so self employed or ten ninety nine workers, can now choose to buy this benefit again directly from The Hartford. And this option became available in 2025 with a month long enrollment period. That was the only time in 2025 when individuals could actually enroll.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And how well market is it?

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: That's a good question. Don't have I'll get to the numbers, which will suggest maybe not.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Can I just kind of cut right to the chase? If there's a commercial product available for APM and B, you can buy into, what's the testimony for? It sounds like that's a solution.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: The The testimony is about how it's not getting us where we want to go. Yeah. Okay. This was kind of just the set up so that Right. The refinement of how we got to And where we yeah. What the numbers show is that this voluntary approach has had limited impact on Vermonters' access to daily as a whole. In the two years that it's been available, only 79 of Vermont's roughly 17,000 private sector employers have chosen to apply this benefit to their employees. 79 out of 17 Again,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: we have to ask how was that marketed to them too? And, yes. And that's about I

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: just have a little bit updated numbers since yesterday. So, as of yesterday, I only had numbers updated last October, was 63 employers representing 18 countries. So, I'm guessing now that since October, it's been it's increased a level of 79, maybe like 2,000 employees. But again, we'd have hundreds of thousands of people. It's less than a fraction of a percent.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: I'm gonna play devil's out. Yeah. Because I mean, it was an interesting moment. I haven't had a lot of exposure to the conversation. I'm wondering the 79 versus the 17,000 by the sector. Know people have all kinds of options that they can take, which are good for their family. Like for example just regular life insurance. Is this update anywhere similar to that? It's like a lot of Americans don't do life insurance because they have to pay for it. Right? It's not a breeding. It's a you gotta take a portion of your budget dedicated to life insurance. So that's another example. Is that a similar statistic that you're seeing?

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Well, this in the states that have offered a university program, it's just part of the standard benefit package, not as an optional add on to the importance. So in those states, 90% or more of folks have access. It's more likely healthcare.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think it's just something that we, as we dig into to this, maybe not at this moment, is I think what David's asking is how does this compare to other options of other insurance options? People have to pay it was best in

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Right. Not just receive

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: I I don't have stats on life insurance, but I will just, you know, again No. No.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And it could be other insurance options too, but it would be interesting to see how voluntary paid family, and if it's of such value to Vermonters, and it's an interesting devil's advocate question. If it's, as you say, it's of such value to Vermonters, I think when you describe the benefits involved, Vermonters say, yes, that would be a great benefit to have. I think you asked them about paid family leave, they don't as much say yes as a sort of broader umbrella thing. But it would be interesting to compare that choice with the other choices that they have to make in terms of insurance options. Okay. Anyway, let's let you finish, and then we'll have your questions.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: So, you see the same low uptake for individual enrollment during the one month enrollment period 2025, so we see that from the arteries. Again, that's a tiny fraction of the workers that, as far as we know, would be eligible, either because they're self employed or contractual or as the crisis is offered. And these workers won't have another opportunity until May 2026. And that's what happened to Karen Mowry from Hartford, Vermont. She shared her experience recently in a letter to the Valley News, and I'm going to read an excerpt. A trip to the ER this past summer because my husband wasn't feeling well turned into immediate surgery as a result of a cancer diagnosis. Our family soon learned about the gaps in Vermont's paid leave coverage that caused many families to scramble to bash together care and financial resources. I remember when I heard on the news that there was a paid leave program in Vermont, I immediately thought a coworker of mine who had spent the last couple of years balancing work, PTO, and unpaid FMLA while caring for her husband. I thought that would be a great resource for her, never thinking that I'd be at the same boat. I was told that I could sign up as an individual under Vermont's voluntary plan on the Hartford's website, But what I discovered was that if I had wanted this coverage, I had to have signed up in May. It was now August. So guess what? I'm not covered and out of luck until next year. The Hartford rep couldn't even tell me what the premium might be if I did sign up because I wasn't eligible at the time. And so I think this gets a little to this next part gets a little to your point because another key difference between the voluntary approach that we're using in Vermont and the comprehensive program offered by 14 other states is that this is commercial or private business transaction with the employer or the individual with the Hartford. So each employer or individual negotiates something. And so it looks very different from employer to employer. They don't all offer the state. They have a lot of choice in what they offer. And so the choices that employers have, they can require a waiting period of six months or more before the employee becomes eligible. They can require a benefit elimination period, that's like a deductible. It's a period of time after the qualifying event during which the employee has to take unpaid leave before they've had this paid leave. They can choose to offer it as an optional benefit, one that an employee has knocked into or declined. They can choose to offer own bonding leave and not caregiving for sick or dying loved ones. They can choose whether or not the benefit qualifies for job protection under PFLA or FMLA. And they can choose whether it can be combined with other benefits to fully replace the workers' wages they're needing without accepting it. Students at UM's Launder College of Medicine, and that whole research report is also in your packet. That's right here. I'm gonna read some of the responses to that survey. These are folks who have the Hartford benefit, and it's referred to as FMLI. That's the acronym for it. It only covers a percentage of salary. It could not be combined with FMLA backed PTO to bring wages up to 100%, so it was functionally useless for our family when we had a child in early twenty twenty four. I instead merged my entire PTO leave bank and have limited time on I explored this for paternity leave. Was deeply disappointed. It pays you 60% of your income, and you can't combine it with your paid time off. So unless you can survive off of 60% of your income, it's useless. I could have taken paid leave but cannot afford it. It only pays out 60% of my income, so I had to take vacation or sick leave instead. FMLA is inadequate. The process is not included. It does not provide you more than 70% of your pay. This is critically detrimental to folks who cannot afford to leave almost a third of their pay. It was incredibly stressful managing finances in relief to support my maternity leave, even with the FMLA benefit, as it doesn't fully cover the salary weakness. And finally, we had to significantly defer the savings and acquired new credit card debt, fund by me, and my husband's six weeks age. He received three weeks of pay, so three weeks unpaid, but we couldn't afford for him to take more time off. I had a traumatic birth, then my son had a birthing injury. It was challenging for him to have to go back to work so soon. I'm pregnant again and inspecting in February. I anticipate we'll need to take funds out of our retirement and savings accounts to fund the unpaid part of life. So what this data shows is that two years after adopting this voluntary approach, fewer than 2,000 of Vermont's non state workers now have a better access for vaping benefit. And even those who do have this benefit may not have one that they can actually use functionally. And what's more, the low enrollment rates associated with voluntary approaches like these can't generate a large enough pool for the system to be affordable in the long run. So sometimes in these cases, the private company decides to withdraw their arrangement with the state because it's not solvent for them to offer it as a bond. And that's why with paid leave, a universal program, which all employers participate, is more sustainable. It creates more equitable sharing of resources among all the businesses of all sizes, and it ensures that the system is sustainable and available to everyone on long run. And that's why 14 states have taken that path. New Hampshire is the only other state that took a voluntary purchase approach similar to the Vermont's, and they contracted with a different insurance company, MetLife, and they started the program at the same time we did 2023, but we have more data from New Hampshire because they offered it to the private sector individuals all at once along with the state. They didn't phase it in like we did. So starting in 2023, private employers and individuals had the option to purchase this benefit. And their option is even a little bit more flexible than Vermont's because they have a two month open enrollment period for individuals each year instead of one. And still, with three years' worth of data, still only less than 3% of the New Hampshire workforce has access to this benefit through methlight. Roughly half of those are state employees, and only about 8,500 private sector workers have access to it out of a total workforce of 700,000. The New Hampshire data also shows that a voluntary benefit option won't move the needle on equity. Currently, in Vermont, workers most likely to need paid leave are the ones least likely to have it or to buy it on their own. Low income workers, self employed workers, contractual workers, sole proprietorships. After three years of offering a voluntary benefit, what we see in New Hampshire is these folks don't have greater access to leads. The people who are most likely to have paid leave are those in the highest income bracket with postgraduate degrees working for the large employers who offer a self insured plan because they've worked in other states too. So the evidence shows that the safe experiment that the voluntary leave benefit confirms what we already know, that a voluntary approach doesn't and won't meet the needs of our monitors. And that's why 14 states and the District Of Columbia have opted for a universal program. So we know from their success that universal paid leave is a cost effective way to ensure financial stability for workers, improve health outcomes for families, and help small businesses attract and retain employees. The Vermont Paid Leave Coalition will continue to advocate for a comprehensive medical family medical leave program because only a universal publicly administered program will expand access to all Vermonters, especially those who need the benefit votes, put small Vermont businesses on an even playing field with the big companies who can afford to sell for sure that make Vermont attractive for young people starting to have that.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Well, thank you. Thank you. Sadly, I think this issue, given what we're already dealing with this year, is gonna be punted to next sesh tonight's biennium Yes. Which makes some of us very sad. I think this fulfills everything that we thought would happen would happen. Agree. And it would just be I'm interested in the in the data question Okay. David asked because I think it's the kind of thing you're gonna need to sell as we go forward. Okay. Which, you know, I also would really love to know, and this is obviously key, is how is this marketed to people? Right. A one month window is just ridiculous in my opinion. We don't even do that for the exchange. We have two and a half months, I think, on the exchange.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: I think that gets into that gets to the private model where the concerned company doesn't have an incentive to market it because they're concerned about

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: the Well, it can't be the insurance company because they're not gonna concerned. Wouldn't Right. I mean, because it's not big enough Yeah. In coverage of them. There's not more people. Right. But if it's of such value, as you say, I mean, if if people understand what it is they want and what it is they're willing to pay for, it would be interesting to see and then market it that way. It

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: would be interesting to see from the same

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think the other point marketed,

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: it would be interesting to see this.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: It's also got a lot of social value. I mean, you think things like car insurance and health insurance have a lot of benefits to others, not just the insured. Yeah. So there's a value to society to make sure that everyone's covered with this, as opposed to some some kinds of insurance are really only the value to the person buying it. So it's really a you know, and their immediate family, perhaps, in case of insurance, there's been a very transactional thing. But this is something where folks who are at least able to buy it are the ones who are most likely to need it. And that puts enough cost on all of us as well when they lose their jobs or have more medical costs because they have to go back to work.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Or go to the ER. All of it costs us the time.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: So it's important to think about what kinds

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: of insurance we're comparing you to.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: You, Randy. Do you know whether or not anyone has looked at multi state bottles such as cop pack arrangements?

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: That was brought up in the House committee yesterday,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: and I'm gonna look into that. Well, actually initially, I think we're talking about that, weren't we, Randy, with We New

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: were talking about it, but

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And then somehow that didn't proceed. Okay. Because we were both considering it at the same time. Right, Tina? Yep. We were we were looking at it. I don't know why. I I know our governors were talking about it, I don't know why it didn't proceed as a compact. Anyway, that'd be a good question for the governor's office too. But thank you for this update. I think it's helpful for us to know how this program, which we had put made the decision to go this direction and see how it's actually playing out.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: That's

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. And I think the I think clarifying what the cost is to employers and to our Vermont life is as as important as what it might cause. I mean, it's got huge ramifications when people aren't trying to do it right. That's a

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: lot about the policy here. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Any other questions? You have another question? No?

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: I have a go in.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But I know. I know. Yeah. But I think some of those would be helpful for because we'll be dealing with it next by any. So Yeah. I think those are all key questions. And any other questions we have that would help next year as we look and analyze this would be great to get.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Yeah. That'd helpful.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And I think David has some Yeah. Right. And you do. I mean, I do too. We have to get it. Great. Thank you. I'm gonna be glad to have you. Thank you very much for this update. And we are going to shift gears. We're hosting it weekly. Although and we are going to it's housing Friday, housing every day, but housing in particular on Tuesdays and Fridays. So we're going to move to H 772, the landlord tenant issues. And we are going to begin with Chad Simmons who is

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Who am I?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Who are you? A man who has worn many hats in this building.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Oh, and I love my hats.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And an advocate, we have come to pressure and on many issues. And

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Are you? No. He's here. Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: That he has listed as a witness. You have no no anything to update us with in particular. No.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: I don't get you any questions. Tell me. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think questions. Yes. But And now wearing the hat of the executive director of the Vermont Housing and Homeless

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Housing and Homelessness Alliance. Vermont, I have not sent you my testimony yet. I will This

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: is yeah. This is for Gene. Sorry. It will come. It will come, I am sure, because Chad is one of the well prepared people. One more thing. One more thing.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Good morning, Randy. Thank you for having me. Again, my name is Chad Simmons. I'm the executive director of the Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont. We're a membership organization representing well over 60 organizations, individuals from across the spectrum of housing development, finance, advocacy, youth, and young children, and legal support. So we have a diversity of members, and you'll see that reflected in today's testimony. So I'm here today to talk about and provide some of our member input on H seven seventy two. And as the name of our organization implies, we're both focused on housing and addressing and preventing and supporting folks experiencing homelessness. So I will be touching both of those parts of the that that continue on in today's testimony. I I would like to share a number of our members' perspectives as it relates to seven seven two. And before I do, just a a couple of really important notes as I dive into it. We represent a broad coalition, and as such, perspectives on this bill are diverse and in many instances, diverge. So, HHSB is supporting the nonprofit housing network's request and several investments that are critical to preventing evictions and homelessness. Secondly, HHSB has some significant concerns with the broad application of expedited eviction and rental agreement termination processes. Research is clear that evictions can lead to increased homelessness, increased residential instability, and exacerbates mental health and financial instability. We are concerned that broadly expedite and so we think that these challenges could exacerbate our housing ness challenges across the state. And finally, I can't emphasize enough the importance to integrate and talk about the two bills, h seven seven two and as well as H nine thirty eight, the response to homelessness bill that is currently in Senate Health and Welfare. We We are concerned that the significant changes in how we approach homelessness and respond, coupled with the provisions in seven seventy two, as well as, unfortunately, the inadequate state funding going into those two parts of the continuum into our shelter services, housing development further exacerbate our housing and homelessness concerns. So you'll see me touching on kind of both the areas that we support in the bill as well as some of the concerns that we have in the bill. And so over the next couple of weeks, we urge the committee to work with and collaborate with Senate Health and Welfare, judiciary, and the appropriations committee on how these two bills will work together with one another, and then if it gets to that point, conferees with the House on how to make sure that these bills are talking to one another.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So you're absolutely right. I'm just going to put a pin on this. Because as we've gone through the budget process and been asked to weigh in on budget process, so things even that haven't obviously come out of this committee or our spending measures that we have supported directly in this committee have huge impact on what we're talking about. So, BRAF, all the things, all the money we spend preventing evictions, trying to cure conviction challenges and problem, and renter challenges and renter problems. That is critically important in this particular window to have been advocating for, which we have. So Yes. But there are many other pieces like that. But, you know,

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: we forget because we do so much of our work,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: which is reincorporations, in silos that we have to remember the things that affect all pieces that we're working on. Yes, you all

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: have a tremendously difficult task to kind of weigh how all of these issues interact with one another, so I hope this is just a helpful reminder to kind of

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: answer Yeah, and in this case, this has impact on the person.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yeah. Sorry to interrupt. No, no, no. That's quite alright. In fact, it segues quite well into wanting to thank you all for advocating for some of the investments that you have made and encouraging the Senate Appropriations Committee to continue keeping those investments in the House passed budget and advocating for the ones that we currently need. So one of those and one of the most important pieces that was contemplated in this bill in the House was the $1,000,000 for the Vermont State Housing Authority's Rental Assistance Fund, so the rent on rears. This is a critical tool to prevent evictions from happening, and and a partnership between tenants and landlords to be able to reconcile any challenges that may have happened and to keep people in their homes. That's what I've just Yeah. So yeah. So thank you all for your continued support for for that program. There are a couple of investments that HHS AB members have identified as kind of that are not currently contemplated in the budget and as part of this bill. And you heard from one of our members, Jess Simon, from CBOEO talk about the the community action program's request for $600,000 to

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: the land of liaisons program as well as navigators. Is that the housing sort of mediators and navigators? Those are Or is that education?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Those are slightly different. They're yeah. The housing case management and housing navigators are slightly different than the landlord liaisons. And these investments are particularly focused on developing relationships between tenants and landlords, and ensuring that there's really clear communication and supports. So we support both that $600,000 investment for the CAPS, as well as the $200,000 investment for fair housing education through a statewide network of the CAP agencies. So as it relates to the policy of this bill, there are a couple of provisions that we are asking the committee to support, and as you've heard in testimony prior, and what I believe we'll hear further today, our nonprofit housing members are seeking targeted expedited relief in two key areas. The first is the shortened termination period based on acts of violence, damage, or activity that threatens health and safety to other tenants and residents. And so these expedited processes should be clearly focused on acts that threaten health and safety. Can can you cite, like, where it is? That would help. I believe that is sectional mean.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think Cam can tell.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: It's a

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: big bill. It is

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: a big bill, and it is Let

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: me actually go ahead and pull that up

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: the bill. Let's look at that.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: I can just give me

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: a second here. It's page eight? Yes. Page eight? You're gonna I'm assuming you're gonna ask the same question for the next point, which I will get to. So the second point is the ability to issue a trespass order to a tenant invitee if the tenant consents the invitee violates the terms of the rent agreement or a state or federal law is violated. And so that's the the trespass section, which is, I believe, section five on page 25, if I'm wrong. So those are the provisions that our members have asked to support on, and we encourage the committee to look favorably on those sections, And, again, really focused on the health and safety impacts of

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: So let's just clarify before we go to your question.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: You you're actually in support of section b, determination of breach of rental contract, that section?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: In very specific instances of health and safety, and that would be for the expedited Yeah. The expedited process. Yeah. I'm not trying to which which section was Page eight. Yep. Page eight.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I believe we're on page eight, and it's sub b. It should apply to It it is the termination for breach of agreement, and it is it allows them. It is it is two on line 16. When termination is based on acts of violence, damage to the dwelling unit or premises or other activity, any of which threatens the health or safety of other residents, the landlord or landlord's agent or neighbors, the landlord may terminate the tenancy. That's what I think you're

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: So you're supporting the five day notice? Yeah. Yes.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: It comes from the '14 to five. '14.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yes, Thomas.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: So, Chad, the concern I have with this language is the following. I think there are good tenants and bad tenants. There are good landlords. There are bad landlords. I think this is fine for the good landlords. I think the good landlords are gonna be fine in interpreting this, but I'm worried about the broad scope of this for the bad landlords. Break some glass in the hallway, that's threatening. You just use that to escalate and pick this out. Previous existing law language is criminal activity, illegal drug activity, which I think has is a clear white line where you can show a police report or a citation of sorts, photos, but threatens is is extremely vague. I'm I'm not worried about Champlain Housing Trust not interpreting that. I think they're gonna be interpreting that just fine. But when I think about some of the other tenant landlords in Burlington so I I don't support this language because I see a misappropriate use of this those circumstances. Do you see a way to either more strictly define this to qualify to certain categories of landlords?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: As so furthering my testimony, do bring up these exact same concerns, and I think we would be open to seeing more language and working with nonprofit partners to have that, look at that being narrowly focused.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Okay. Did you have

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: any draft language?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: I do not have any draft language at this point, but I think that is something we continue to work with the committee on finding, again, a much narrower focus.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. And threatens is as hard to live with as actual violence having. Had, have had, we, Randy and I were part of a joint hearing from the Decker Tower situation, which was full of threats, which were incredibly undermining for residents the entire Deckard Towers. And it was some of it was real and some of it was threatened. And I I think we should be able to thread this needle because threats are just as devastating

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: to live It just needs to

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: be an entry based for the claim. And so that you document what that threat consists of, how it was delivered, who else to wear, but It could be a variety of things. I think that's something, you know. I think we can find thread in this deal.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So let's put a pin in this. Thank you.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yes. Thank you. So those were the two those two areas.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Alright. Is it just while we look at that on page

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Section five.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. Let's Page look at page 25, which is the

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: other piece you do support.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I mean, I think you support other pieces of this bill too, these particular ones, page 25, unlawful trespass, section five.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Right? Correct.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And that was very challenging in the Decker Towers situation we heard.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yeah, and I think it's important to just make note that I think these are very specific instances where health and safety are at the core component of it, as well as that landlords are finding, or nonprofit partners are finding limited opportunities or ways forward, and we're hearing that tenants and residents are asking for these. Yeah. For me personally, as running the organization, that is a compelling argument if tenants and residents are asking for

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And will it procure for residents that were caring for residents?

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: So

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: the reason why we are supporting these components in our members, from our nonprofit members is, as Senator, as you just pointed out, our nonprofit members provide rental agreements that include strong tenant protections, including rent stabilization, automatically renaming leases. They provide residential services and supports within properties, and most importantly, they provide deeply affordable, accessible housing across the state. So we are supporting these because our nonprofit members are asking for these, and they provide, really importantly, between twenty and twenty, and I know this committee knows a lot of this, but our nonprofit network provided over 2,000 formerly homeless individuals and households with affordable homes. The median rent for folks who are housed in these properties is just under $18,000 per year. 36% of the new leases go to former and foremost households. That's an extremely high percentage. It's huge. And so these the reason why I'm sharing these data points and this information is just to share the acuity of the need and the request to alleviate some of the pressure within our nonprofit house.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And I would just say that we also beat it, which is the program this committee cares a lot about as well, also has a very important re housing the homeless aspect of it and opportunity in it. So it's not as much as we treasure our affordable housing partners, we also have for profit landlords and developers who through VHIP are taking on this same public service. Yes, thank you, Sundar.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: So, I just wanna spend a few minutes, though, on the concerns that we have of, again, Sundar, you've just brought this up with broadly medical agreement terminations and eviction processes. And so, just to share a few key data points, and I'll include these links in the map as a follow-up, is that evictions directly increase homelessness. So studies show that evicted individuals are significantly more likely to use emergency shelters in the period following the eviction, and eviction evicted individuals spend more time in emergency shelter than individuals who are not evicted. I will note that as currently constructed, the legislature is considering a nearly $83,000,000 investment in homelessness. I would rather have those dollars go to building affordable homes. But right now, we are at an emergency situation and continue to be. And so I we are concerned with exacerbating that by by this bill broadly speeding up the eviction process.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I'll throw a pin in that, though, also, which is our federal partners are not at the moment in the throughout of supporting the move of housing the homeless full time. As I understand it, they are now only interested in supporting housing for temporary shelter.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Correct. Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So, you know, this is not just on us.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Correct.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So I'd appreciate you putting this in context.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yes, I'm really glad you brought that up, because I've spent a lot of time in other committees talking about,

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: and I don't spend a lot of

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: time in this committee talking about this, that we are at a point where there are so many things coming at our state and the people providing housing. And I think one of the concerns that is brought up that our members have brought up around this bill is that with all of these changes happening, and my staff, the other part of the work that we do, is do we do work with HUD as a way to as to apply for HUD funding to serve our homeless population, and we're trying to get as creative as possible to utilize

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: I support for housing them in homeless children.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: So, we're getting as creative as possible, but we're concerned with the lack of resources coming into our state, and the tightening of restrictions that our federal government is putting on, and how we can serve folks who are experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness. So you're absolutely correct. Our federal government is making it very difficult for us right now, and I think that's why I'm bringing up the concern that if we too broadly expedite evictions and and create instability in our housing sector, we're only gonna exacerbate the challenges before us. On the other hand, just quite the other side, the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: money that you're talking about, that 83,000,000, it's not only it is also in part to go to our affordable housing partners who are rehousing the homeless and be I mean, and we kept money going to be, which is also doing the same thing. So we are working towards rehousing homeless in lots Yes. Of different

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: are lots of different ways, but by and large, the $83,000,000 investments are going towards our emergency response. Okay. And so we would like to invert that at some point, and I think that's why we're you're seeing me thread this needle.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Yeah. No problem. This is

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: a tough needle for threading.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Did you already ask about how much money it would take to draw down the federal funds that were not intentionally drawing down for section eight?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: I have not That

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: that that that's not what we're

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I mean, it's not just the federal government. Right? The state is, the administration is leaving money on the table to not invest in section eight when that was really important to a lot of us that we look at what will happen in section eight, and we can't blame the the federal administration.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: No. No. I I agree. That's another conversation. That's

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: It's another conversation, and we're grateful for our partners. ASLU has been really elevating these issues up to do whatever we can as a state to maximize how much money we're bringing in to both address homelessness and our housing needs. And that's a critical that's a really important point for This

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: goes back to our budget adjustment, which you'll recall. We fought hard to allocate the money that we needed so that we could actually compete in keeping those section eight vouchers, which were critically important to keep. And I I can't remember how we ended up with that, but that was a We didn't end up getting as much as

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: we wanted because We didn't identify Yes, you're correct, and thank you for that work. It was critically important, which Because

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: basically It bases its allocation of Section eight vouchers on what you spent last year. And as they keep ratcheting it down, you obviously are spending less and less and having fewer vouchers. So it's this bad circular thing where they end up always cutting our section eight vouchers. And what we tried to do was true it up in the budget adjustment and keep it maintain the level of section eight vouchers available for Vermont.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Correct. Yes. I think that was what contingency fund that you all created as part of the BAA is moving forward at this point. And so we partnered with the SHA and the legislature, and legislative council was really helpful in kind of navigating that. And so, ESHA is currently working on standing that program up to be ready as soon as we get word from the PUD. We're still waiting for some critical important information to provide.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah, so I would appreciate at some point somebody talking to us about what Kesha just raised, because that's additional, that's a different, that's a different effort of maintaining section eight.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Does anybody in the room know how much we would need to put on the table to draw down the federal match right now?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Chris, I no. I we don't have a PSHA, Chris, here, but we can let's find out.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: And then listen the They're other in the middle of actually creating that amount right now and identifying specifically what each public housing authority would need to be able to maximize. You

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: might not tell us. Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So, I'm sorry. You derailed you. I didn't

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Oh, that is quite alright. I'm at the very end here. I wanted so I've kind of enumerated the areas that we support, the investments and the two provisions that our partners are asking for. I've enumerated a number of areas of concern that we have in the bill, but I also wanna share just a handful of areas in which we see possible improvements to the bill. So first, explore increasing court capacity and processes and or creating the housing court. I know this has come up in previous testimony. Yeah. And so we strongly encourage efforts to to really look at what at a capacity and using the existing state law and bolstering those processes in future.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think we actually are already working on language about that. How's it going?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: That's great. That's great. So the second thing is to remove the delivered by sheriff service in the definition of actual notice. Leave that from the top of section one of the definition. Number three is to move up. What? We don't necessarily think that needs to be a tool that is used. I mean, we think that could be a harm

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: How does notice get to them if they don't have the address?

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: It's it's in a list of delivery efforts.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Just one by one by one.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: The I think there there could be other delivery methods

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Yeah.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Other than a share of delivery. Yeah. A notes.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: You haven't submitted this stuff. Do you wanna have I have not. No.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Okay. Do you see that as a, like, a way of more kind of question for the housing committee or a judiciary?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: It could be either one.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I'm just wondering sort of what the what the reasoning is behind you know, like, we we can certainly our jurisdiction would be more how a landlord the manner and the timing of a landlord giving a notice to a tenant. But anything outside of that involving legal notice

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Would be under Would be

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It might be. I think it would be great because Nader's looking for witnesses for next week. So I think I think you might be interested in doing that.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Chat to

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But what section because I'm trying to remember what section delivery is. Here it is. Delivered by on page one.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yes. That's a very yep. Under the definition section. And

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: who else is gonna hand deliver it if it's

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: I think we prefer it to just be to strike that that piece as actual notice. So hand delivered, we feel like this is usually the most effective.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: By now?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: How it's currently in statute right now,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: which is plethora landlord. It's canceled. Please go ahead.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: Yeah, the record Family Wood Velvet's Legislative Counsel, this is in section one, page one, as mentioned. This is about how the termination notice of the rental agreement is provided to the tenant so this is before you get to an objection before you get to the court process this is about how a landlord would provide actual notice to the tenant of a termination of a rental agreement or otherwise how the tenant would provide that notice to the landlord. So currently it has to be hand delivered or it can be mailed. The the definition requires receipt. So you have to ensure that the individual actually has it in their hand and receives it.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: How do you do that?

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: That's why you have hand delivered, so if you hand deliver it, you know they received it, and then the current statute says that it can be mailed, and there's a rebuttal presumption of receipt three days after it's mailed. And so what this section is doing is it's adding in delivered by sheriff service, it's adding in the ability to email it, and it's adding in to give the last address is unknown posted on the door, I think the witness is saying that they would prefer to remove hand delivered by the sheriff. These

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: are huge changes to landlord. Okay. Thank you.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: And Sandra, thank you for bringing that. Yeah. That's why we're asking it to be strong and just keeping it as is.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: The three days is concerning just

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It moved to

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: five. Male problems

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: that Right. Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But they it has been moved to five. Why don't you keep going? Because we have a

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: lot of certified mail. Right?

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: I think it's certified at first class. You get the rebuttable presumption if you mail it certified or first class.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It it doesn't say that.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: There is a reputable presumption. First, like all

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: of the The reputable presumption is first glance.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Yeah. It's just a saying.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay. Let's do it.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Yeah. So I just have a couple more points. So the the third is to move the effective date of the bailout. We think it is it it's extremely unrealistic to think in the next six weeks, changes of this magnitude will be able to be done in the next several months. Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It is July 1. That is be it. That's a little more than six weeks. But they're

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: not feel like this this the the change in the in this bill require a significant amount of time for our partners to be able to shift and be able

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: to provide the services and supports for tenants. Appreciate it. Do you have a suggested date, or is that gonna come with your other suggested date?

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Have we don't have a suggested date, but probably no earlier than September. But if you talk to our our number of our other members and partners, again, the there's a significant amount of changes contemplated in this bill. And to think that our junior carrier network, our network of nonprofits will be in, our landlords will be able to Okay. Do all of this. We we think it's unrealistic. So noted. Yes. Perfect. The next thing is to strike that provision allowing landlords to change charge for background checks. There should not be a financial barrier to applying for inaccessity housing. Next is to change the security deposit section to make it clear and explicit that municipalities that stipulate the security deposit cap of less than two months rent are allowed to implement that more stringent cap. The next is to restore the provision allowing tenants to pay partial rent payments in the courts as opposed to what is currently contemplated in the bill of full full rent. And then the the final thing is, and this is more broadly speaking, is just going back to that that point of looking at the bill nine thirty eight, FY 27 appropriations, and how that they interact with this bill, and to ensure that there's, adequate investments, for tenant protections, in this bill, and that we're making investments that this bill and nine thirty eight combined would have in terms of the impact on the law. Right.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: In the full line investments. Correct.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: I will get you this testimony in just a few minutes as I That would be great.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And then also language that you might work on for us to consider. Sure. I- We don't have the bill. I know. But we're getting the bill. And the question is, we may not have a lot of time with the bill, so we need to be as prepared as we can be.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: But those sections may be gone. Who knows? We'll see. But that's why we don't usually change language when we don't have sessions. So

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Let's see your language. I'm not about to we're not about to change that. Let's just see which what your what language you propose. Well, thank you for

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: your There are some pieces that are not our jurisdiction.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Mhmm. Yeah.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: No. And I think I've not touch those sections.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I've already asked that Chad consider being a witness next week. If not, that would be great. Thank you very much. Thank you so much for having me. We appreciate and we look forward to getting your testimony. Peter Tucker, we welcome you. And Jean Reisman, you're on deck. Next one, and you've been very patient. Thank you for being Excuse me. Oh, I'm waiting. Sorry. Up there to steal your feet here. Yep.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Be back. Stop my How would

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: I be there, I got enough. Right.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Peter, welcome. I thought Brenda was a little next month. Yep.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Brenda is gonna go next week. Unless she feels differently. Nope. We're gonna go next week. Sorry.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: So give me just a second to get her down here. Yeah. And most of my comments are to the the bill as passed by the house.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So That's what have in front of us.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yep. That's what I wanna refer to.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And while Peter is Yeah. Getting are you almost there? You've got the link. Think Gary I'm had already sent

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: it coming up. To

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: High speed.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Sometimes the light

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: gets worse a little bit. That is from cheese.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay. And the testimony, just while we're waiting, well, Peter, are you ready? Not quite. While Peter's getting ready, Jean's testimony, if you want a preview of where she speaks, is on your desks.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Hello?

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Oh, sharing that turned down? There we go.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It should Coming your way. Yeah. She's just gonna. There we go.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Yes. Did you get it? Did you get it?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yes. Yes. Oh, I'm sorry.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: There

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Sorry. Sorry. Go. There you go. But you step in.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: I got it. I I finally turned my Oh, Mike. There he Okay. Thank you, guys.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Sure. Thanks.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Sorry.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Pretty good. Big enough? Okay, good.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Well, thank you for having me today. It's Peter Tucker, and I'm here representing the Vermont Association of Realtors, And appreciate the work that's been done on H-seven 72, and just wanna kind of express our points of view on the bill itself. So Vermont Association of Realtors, we have about 2,000 members spread across the state. Many of our members are landlords, and more members work for landlords as property managers. We view landlords as housing suppliers, who address a critical need for housing in our state.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: And we have to understand that many landlords are small business owners, mom and pops that own a duplex or a triplex, to build their family's assets while providing housing for their community. Ultimately, increasing housing supply is the solution to our housing challenges, and we appreciate the work of this committee over the years in Act 47, the Home Act, housing exemptions, and Act 181, especially the interim exemptions that have been a proven boost to rental housing, and Act 69 last year, creating community housing infrastructure program. Goal of, age seven seventy two is to reduce timing to resolve landlord tenant issues. However, because of the lack of confidence in our postal service, the first thing the bill does is add two days to the bill, to five days. Page three, this is what I wanted to have this

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: What is talk big big picture before we dive into the specifics of the bill, or do you want

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Okay. What picture I mean, I've specifics. You want to. Yeah. Okay. That's draw up.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: So you support Section one, the change

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: in Section one to five days?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Sure, and I think generally we support this bill. Okay. So I mean, just from that Yeah. Residential, yeah, page three, line four, sub chapter two, regarding residential rental agreements, allows landlords to charge for background and credit checks. One thing that we learned in House General is that if the tenant pulls their credit report, it's a soft pull on their credit, and if the landlord pulls their credit report, it's a hard pull.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: What does that mean?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: It means that Hard pull is a hard pull. So and I worked with the the bankers association to confirm this. You know, initially, probably doesn't matter a whole lot if it's a one time thing, but if if but if anyone has continued, you know, questions, you know, credit pulls on their credit, you know, it eventually does start to, you know, reduce their credit scores.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I'm not sure. So, forgive Go ahead. But a pull is what?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Somebody going to the credit reporting agencies and asking for a credit report on an individual.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Your credit report is docked by the number of times somebody comes and checks

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: If somebody else does.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: For instance Oh, not yourself.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Not yourself. And that's my point is that, you know, this bill does have some language that that, you know, allows the, you know, the tenant to provide the credit report. But what we're thinking is that, on page four, line seven, I gotta go down on page Yeah, it's

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: whole section three.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah. Know, suggesting Oh, I'm sorry. Let's see. Hang on. Yeah. I'm on the wrong line now. Sorry. You know? But just basically suggesting that that, you know, after the applicant which is page is, line five, actually check with the applicant, to change the next sentence to the tenant or applicant may provide a current credit report, you know, just reinforcing the their ability to do that. Thomas.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: So I'm somewhat familiar with this, and I'm always referring to two types of credit checks, the soft inquiry or the hard inquiry. Right. So I don't know if those are legally defined. The soft inquiry shouldn't affect the individual's credit So you'd be comfortable though allowing landlords to do soft inquiries?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: They can't. They can't. Their inquiry would be a hard inquiry. And if it's one time, it probably doesn't impact the credit score of the applicant at all. But if it, you know, for instance, if you had to go to multiple different landlords before you found a property to rent, it potentially would start to diminish your credit score. Not I don't think it's dramatic, but I just wanna point out that, you know, making sure that tenants understand if they hold the credit report, you know, that they're not gonna be paying for that. So that's my only point here, I guess. And I think that would be a, you know, a good, you know, change in terms of, you know, the language.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So you checked with the bankers?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yes.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: That I mean, because this is an area where it causes a lot of anxiety for people. Like, they sometimes pay for systems that are fraudulent or that take a monthly fee that they don't realize. So

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah. I think we

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: You're just gonna have to be really careful and understand the credit system to

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Right. And that's why I pointed out, because there was some confusion in House General. I had had a a separate conversation about this, and I thought I understood it, so I actually grabbed Correct. Chris Delia from

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: the backers to come in and and clarify that or the House General. Right. Some some landlords might not accept a credit score that someone pulled themselves. It it's you know, credit scores aren't necessarily a best practice. You know? That's why we I think the bill two years ago let landlords do other assessments Yes, to

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: we did. We included some other assessments. Right, right.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: So on page seven, under termination

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: of That's the next one is?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah, under termination of tenancy. One, let's see. Reducing the notice for, yeah, page seven, it's line 14. If you have these recommendations in an email, can send them. I do. When I send it to you, you will see how I think. So that may or may not be as good as things. But

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Oh, page seven.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah. So so at any rate, right here, you know, reducing from fourteen to ten days, the the the notice for termination, know, for nonpayment, you know, that that This is line 17. Yes. It is. Line 17. You know, is is a a good step in the right direction, but keep in mind, you know, we're increasing the mail requirement, the rebuttal presumption in mail for three to five days. So 10 plus five is 15. The current law is three days in the mail, fourteen days notice is 17, so we're picking up two days. Not a lot, but that was the whole goal of the bill, to try and tighten these things up.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Well, goal of the bill actually was to balance impertience on both sides, not

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: just to tighten them. Yeah, yep. So just so happened yesterday, I was on a call with the National Association of Realtors, government affairs directors from across the country, and the title of the call was NAR Rent Control Roundtable. Interesting. I was so excited to to be on this roundtable, and we broke into, like, eight different regions, and we were able to kinda present, you know, what we're doing in our state, you know, listening to my my counterparts in other parts of the country, or said, you know, jeez, we have this issue with rent control and how it impacts property rights and, you know, property rights of landlords. It's it's really universal, and it's in a bunch of different places. And, you know, I was able to go on and say, We don't have rent control in the bill that we have here that we're proposing. And my enthusiasm and optimism was dashed by suppressioning by counterparts, you know, going through the reasons for ending a tenancy, and they came back and said, Look, that's just cause. And I know that that's a term that the chair of the house has said, Look, we really don't want to use that term. But I thought about it, and I said, Wow, I mean, you're right. That's exactly what Well, this it's a difference for cause versus just cause. Just cause has other implications. Well, yeah. Well, it's yeah, it's, at any rate, you know, it is, so me, you know, I actually asked the question, I didn't really get any help on this, but what are we missing in doing this? You know, it's pretty simple. You know, the the most the most terminations of tenancy are for non payment rent of, you know, I'd say 90 plus percent. You know, the the the three reasons here, failure of the tenant lie within material terms, not paying enough rent more than three times in a twelve month period, tenant refused to allow landlord access to the unit. Those are all, you know, really, I think, you know, critical issues and cover the great majority of of things going on. You know, we are super supportive of of tightening the the the the the termination when there is, you know, damage to the dwelling unit, acts of violence, and other things like that. And I heard Senator Chittenden's concerns about how do you define that, and I don't have a great answer there. But I do wanna point out that by deleting criminal activity and illegal drug activity, this is a major change to the way these laws have been written, and I just wanna make sure that is really the intent here. Know, I always am concerned about two things. You know, one is how do you you know, unless somebody is convicted of a crime, whether they're criminal or not. You know, that's always That's not true.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Convicted. Think what Thomas was talking about citations and being called. Right. There's

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: evidence that's

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: That is enough. I mean, would the court deem that to be enough? I don't know. You know? But then the other thing is is is having the landlords have to make this determination. Now, you know, I've had conversations with the apartment owners association, and they say, look, we can't do this on a somewhat regular basis. So I don't think it's it's been a huge burden on landlords. And they do require if they're going to claim this, you know, that they happen to have an affidavit stating the terms and the reasons why they're claiming, you know, damage to the unit or, you know, other activities that threaten health or safety.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: That that affidavit is done by the landlord themselves? That's correct. Okay. They don't even get it from, like, witnesses or third parties or Right. Neighbors. Okay. No. It is. It is.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: It is done by the landlord.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So it's a self attestation.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: They know. Yes. As someone know that the landlord would have to have a base score, the assertions that they make in the affidavit, and that is witnesses, other neighbors, tenants, and blight. And he had just attested to the fact that he's evicting that tenant because of these criminal activities, and this is how he knows that the criminal activities are taking place. Is that fair to say? Is.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah. I I mean, I think that that they could do it without that information, at least, you know, at least initially, you know, if

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: they had a challenge then. Well, that that would be the independent challenges of the allegations that are made in that affidavit. That's another story.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: So that's current law. Right? My concern with the contemplated change is it's vague. I mean, threatens that landlord can say he looked at me funny, you know, or Went like this. Well, I it's not a them.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: Yeah. Yeah. But it's also residents. It's people who

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: are living with with some of those threats. So I think we definitely need to figure out how to tighten or or or clearly define that. I think that that's something can can you give us any background on how people in the house, did they look at defining threatened? Is the judicial matter.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: It's it's for the termination of the rental. Right. So, is before you get to court. Is this is justification or this is circumstances that would allow the landlord to terminate a rental agreement. Now, if a person remains in the dwelling unit, the landlord ultimately has to bring an ejectment action and so if they're terminating the rental agreement under this B two, they're going to have to, you know, prove in court, unless the the tenant leaves, you know, before an ejectment occurs, you have the ejectment action, the landlord's going to have to prove that there was criminal activity, illegal drug activity, or acts of violence that, you know, that's the justification as to why they're terminating the rental agreement under this section.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Can you Cameron, does so this this also applies to to our habitation law, that if you have lived somewhere for longer than a month, you also have rights.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: I would wanna I'm looking to some research on that.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: I don't wanna I

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: don't wanna make a statement off the cuff here in that regard.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: So none okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay, so we'll find this out. Peter, keep going, because we have a morning full testimony.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Sure, great. So, you know, and here is really where the reduction of time rates kicks in. If there is this health and safety threat to the folks that are living there, reducing from fourteen days to five days, and then getting this in front of a judge between ten and twenty one days, is and that's on the ejectment side of things. And this is kind of a two part bill. Right? Like, the first part is about the landlord tenant relationship. And if if the landlord wants to terminate that for one of these reasons and the tenant leaves, then there is no eviction or ejectment process. Right? Like, you know, the the tenant has accepted those terms and conditions. The second part is the legal you know, the court process of actually evicting somebody.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Have you passed to testify in Senate Judiciary?

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: Not yet,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: but I would do it soon. I will, yeah. Like today.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yep. And I have been following Senate Judiciary, so But I think that that second half of the bill is, really, I'm not a lawyer, better addressed, but Judge Sone and Thurry Curriculum's court administrator have done extensive work on I that part of the think that I would defer to them in many parts of that.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right, but it would be great to have people weigh in, because I'm not just looking for risks. Page 10.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: So can I just verify back on page eight?

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Yep.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Line 16, do you support, does your organization support the removal of criminal activity, you think, drug activity? I'm very uncomfortable with that.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah, very uncomfortable with removing it. With removing it. I think that it's a big change to this building. Okay. Removing what? The criminal activity and illegal drug activity.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But it does replace it with other aspects.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: You're not comfortable with removing it.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: That's correct. Yeah. I agree. Yeah. Yep. And, yeah, mean, it does it does replace it, but, you know, to the bigness and to other concerns about, you know, trying to divine all the other reasons, you know, is is a bit of a concern.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: I I

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Well Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: This is not judiciary bill. This is the piece that is addressing landlord tenant.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: That's correct. Yeah. We're still in that half of the bill.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Mhmm. All our bills are laws. All our bills are statutes. So I mean, to to but this is not. Anyway, let's keep going. And we certainly got a pin in this section.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: So page 10, line 16, you know, discusses when a when a tenant, you know, vacates the building. And our feeling is landlords are required to provide notice when they're going to have a tenancy. If the tenant has a lease, they need to honor the terms of the lease, the lease. If they're month to month, we feel that they should provide some kind of notice to landlord. Something like thirty days would be

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: a hardcore suggestion. Yes. So can you kind of quantify that on this page 10? Like, there's a bunch of language removed. There's a little language added. Yeah. Are you supporting you know, which

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: I would I would add, you know, it kinda provides notice I'll go back here. Sorry.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: What do we have there, Pam, for a notice? Now have

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: a The current issue is based on the intent to vacate provides.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: So,

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: very quickly, there is a separate section that's not in the bill. There's a section that's statute that says that a tenant has to provide essentially one month's illness to terminate a to terminate

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: the I think I walked through

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: that Yeah.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: You a did. Little while ago. But Okay. There is a separate section that does that does require the tenant to provide

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It's referenced here, I think, but not explicit here. Yeah. Is that

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: I don't know. It's just not in the bill. It's in the statutory system.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It's already law.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: It's already yes.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Yeah. Okay.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Got it.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: That. Okay.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: It's already

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Moving on.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It's already law that tenants are

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: good buyers for them. Awesome. So,

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: our real concern starts here on page 11, and this is the reasons, termination of a rental agreement when the property gets sold or repurposed. And so I have several members in our government affairs committee who are landlords, one who has built a ton of rental property up in Mooresville, sells some of those off, and continues to manage them. So he is very much in the build and turn over the property to another investor business. And his concern is that currently thirty days is the actual the actual notice required, you know, if you're selling the building, and and you have a purchase a signed purchase and sale agreement. You know, we've been talking about this over the past several weeks, and our concern is that moving to ninety days really doesn't work in the sale of a building. You know, when you have a contract, you have a a a time frame to deliver, and if you're getting financing from a bank, you know, banks won't block a rate for more than thirty days. So by pushing this out to ninety day notice, you may very well defeat some transactions, just they can't meet the financing requirements.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: They may not, but if you're doing something big with a building, you generally have a notion three months in advance that you may be needing to. I mean, this is, know, again, this is a balancing act, this bill. Sure. This is one of the pluses for tenants, is that it gives the landlord it it really requires the landlord to be clear about their intentions for what they're gonna be doing with the building and sharing that with the tenant and not advising them only particularly in this very constrained housing market. Mhmm. Giving tenants longer. And I would argue that ninety days in this housing market is almost not even enough time. Mhmm. Thomas.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Have we I I was generally asking this. Can an advocacy organizations come out full support of that pushing this to ninety days? That, like, something that people are asking for?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Something I believe they support. Yeah. Chris and Jean in the room. Right. So

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I just genuinely haven't heard anybody say that that's really a craving

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: ninety days, but they know they I

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: think can crave it when they are given

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: But you

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: see my point I have

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: to understand. They got a testimony to confirm the financial implications of that to landlords. By putting the deadline in or a period of time in like this, are you constraining the ability of the landlord who is attempting to sell the property from being able to finance that sale? Yes. And if that is a situation in which the landlord cannot commit to retain or the banks will not allow the landlord to commit that period of time, then it becomes a very difficult thing to try to enforce it. Need to know that.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Right.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: And that is the testimony that I'm providing here. Right.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: So it kinda cut to the chase. Do you have a recommendation on what would be an appropriate period of time? Thirty days. That's what's currently in the office.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: So there are four reasons that the landlord can end tenancy in a building, right? The sale of the building, family occupying, withdrawal from the rental market, significant renovations. And so the two that I'm kind of focused on is the sale of the building. Obviously, we feel like you don't want to impede those transactions. Understand that many times, the purchaser of that building wants it occupied, wants those tenants in place. I mean, he's buying the cash flow for me or she. You know? So it may not at all, you know, restrict the tenant's ability to continue in their in their residence. Right.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But too often, sadly, we see people actually post COVID, in my neck of the woods, we have seen too many buildings we have counted on for housing with people being evicted and rents get them getting rehabbed and then rent going doubling. So I think, you know, my living grid

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: not a property is something that I think is important to our rental stock, maybe having the oldest housing So

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think there's a compromise here. We've got a pin in it as

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: a discussion point.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: So so the other other states, if there's a standard health regulation in terms of thirty days, ninety days, or something different. We know

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: whether there's such a standard or

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: I don't know what the states are doing.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah. I I don't know the answer

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: to that. Let's let's find out.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Okay.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay. Pin in it? Let's keep going.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: I'll be responsible to put that beyond that. So so the other thing is on significant renovation, and I asked one of our landlords, a different landlord from Ferry, actually. If you were going to repaint the building, it's $3.78, it's got lead paint, could folks be there while you're doing that?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Sorry, what line is significant?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Oh, I'm sorry. So it's right here, line 17. Yeah, Yep. Okay, got So just a concern that for stuff like that, the landlord is gonna have to vacate the building. And the other section here that is a little concerning for us is ninety days before the expiration of a stated rental term agreement. So think about a four or five unit building where you have five different leases all starting at different points in time, and the notice needs to be ninety days prior to termination for every single leaseholder in the building, you know, the potential to have this thing drag out for quite a long time, over a year maybe, before you could provide all the notices to the tenants correctly based on One of things

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: that would happen all at the same time.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: I mean, people occupy at different points in the year. Yeah, I mean, you know, so that is, this language is challenging as well.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: But I don't believe it requires them to rehouse them while the work is done.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: No, not at this point.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So there are, which, I mean, example, Belish was, there are places where when where people do rehousal people while renovations are being done if they're expected to go back into those canvas.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: There's some of them that based on the geography of Vermont, effectively impossible.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yep. Anyway, I'm just pointing out that that's not in here. There's no requirement. I know it was discussed of of requiring, like, if they're gonna do to simply renovate the the home to rehousse people while it's rent being rented.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: That that is not part of the Yeah. Front. Yeah.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Can I say something? No. I I know I know you keep talking about this as, like, very careful work to balance both sides. I've been on the committees of jurisdiction over a long time. I've been doing landlord tenant law for about twenty years in this building. And if you touch too many things, it's not a careful balance. It's like a Rube Goldberg that

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: Right.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Tries to spell too many things out that usually work better on a case by case basis, where landlords have gotten pretty good at writing agreements that work for their rental market above and beyond these things, and tenants are pretty good at knowing when they're they have housing organizations that are pretty good at detecting when their rights are not being met. Touching all of these things puts everyone in a precarious position. And I I I have to imagine judge Soumy, if he if he had the opportunity, would have said something like that. If we up end landlord tenant law too much, we throw into chaos rather than try and create the infrastructure to manage what people know about their rights at this point. We simply instead throw into chaos what has become pretty settled precedent between landlords and tenant. Thanks. Okay. That is why most of this is a judiciary matter. And Yeah. I'm worried about going into the details of things that which other areas of law, I I I don't think I don't I think we're setting Cameron up for an impossible task because this bill

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: impossible bills. Okay. So, Pete,

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: do have two places? Yeah. Thank you. This is just a comment on a commercial condominium. This is page where am I? 12, line 17. So I actually reviewed the statute on conversion to condominiums, and tenants have really good protections in there. Mean, you can check it, but our feeling is that the tenants are well protected if the property is going to be converted to a condominium. And just a couple more things. Yeah. On page 14, the affirmative defense section of this bill 14, line of 13, We're very concerned, as this was written, that it would be subject to the tenant's kind of claim that there is a elder safety violation. The addition of this language-

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: There's no new language on line 13.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: I'm sorry? On page 13. Page 14.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Page 14, line 13, There we go. Permit of defense. So the addition of this information, if there's a serious health and safety code violation, in other words, Department of Fire Safety, their health and safety department shows up and issues a citation, and that hasn't been addressed, gives us great sense that this provides a reasonable approach to really serious health and safety issues. And then I wanted to get to Senator Chittenden's concern on, let's see, on 18 by 15, oh, I think it goes, judge.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Page 18. The judge being able to 18,

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: yeah, here I go. Right, fully partial payment. This

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: is actually all the section you need to testify in judiciary on. Yep. This is all in the ejectment.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Okay, can I just, I mean,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: couple points? Nope, nope. I would really encourage you to ask Nader to testify and speak to him about objection. I mean, you're happy to

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: get brought through, but, I mean,

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think they're looking at this section for any changes you might recommend. Tom?

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Tell me in the hallway. I feel

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Oh, okay. Peter, tell us quickly Okay.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: But you know, that's all got. Trespass piece too, believe that's

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah, yep, actually. Okay.

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: Yeah, I mean, trespass piece, don't remember that. I mean, that is judiciary in my mind, and I think that it kinda makes a lot of sense when you But tell us how to pay taxes, what pay you Okay, just really quickly. So, most motions for ejectment are because of nonpayment of rent. To allow 90%, you said. Yeah, and allow a tenant, I think it won't be plus, but to allow a tenant to only pay partial rent if the reason that they're there is for nonpayment, this doesn't seem sensible. Your concern was Section G, top of page 19, to file a motion and a cost to them. My understanding is that that is a sell, but this is current, and that's sellable abuse. And more importantly, I think, this section here, I, allowing the parties to come to an agreement. And in practice, that's really what happens. There is a lot of back and forth before showing up in front of the judge to see if you can't work something out, and I think that this language definitely applies to that. Oh, and then, if I may, on the positive rental payment program, I'm here to support Senator Brock in his opinion that if it's positive rental payment, that's great. Let's make sure that the credit associations understand that. If about folks section, that's near the end of the bill. It's, yeah, page 26.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: And so

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: section C on page 27, potentially to say that if people leave the program, I gotta get down there, sorry. People leave the program, that that would be reported to the credit agencies. Would be, I think, a simple way to add that and phone it in, and seems only fair. As a landlord, you wanna know if somebody has failed to meet their obligations. And that's it for me.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: Right. Thank you for your patience.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Thank you. So would you be kind enough to send us the recommendations?

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: I will.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I really appreciate. And I would encourage you please to be in touch

[Peter Tucker (Vermont Association of Realtors)]: with another

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: way in.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Yep.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: That would be great. Thank you so much. Really

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: appreciate Nice to see you.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Great to have you. Thank you for following this. And, Jean, we're gonna turn to you. June Grisman, we welcome you.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Hello?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Hello. Can we please make your full screen? Gene, one sec. We're just get full screen and then we're gonna introduce ourselves. Were you here earlier, Jean, when we introduced ourselves? I

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: had trouble hearing the names, so you can repeat them.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay. Great. Now we're gonna ask you to introduce yourself to all of us. So, why don't you start?

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Good morning. David Weeks, representing Rutland County. Randy

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: Brock, representing Franklin County and Northern Grand Isle County. Allison Clarkson, representing Windsor County.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Hey, Chittenden, it's Del Chittenden

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Jean, welcome. Welcome. Introduce yourself if you would for us and thank you for sending us your testimony.

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: My name is Jean Risman. I live in Brattleboro and I'm here as a tenant of Wyndham Windsor Housing.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: And

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: thank you very much for having me. When I thought about testifying here this morning, something I've never done before, so this has been interesting. I'm being educated. It occurred to me that what I'm offering is a victim's impact statement, a description description of what it's like to live beside two active drug dealers. I'm just one person, but there were 12 other tenants living on the property, including two young children in nine separate apartments experiencing the same thing that I was experiencing. So I'm speaking for all of them, for all of us. As you consider this bill, I hope you can take my experience, which I believe mirrors the experience of the other tenants on the property into consideration. So when I moved into my apartment at 19 Homestead Place in Brattleboro about ten years ago, it was a quiet and seemingly safe neighborhood. A building and the building next door at 25 Homestead Place are both owned and managed by Wyndham Windsor Housing Trust. The two buildings have five apartments each and they share common spaces, a parking lot, a laundry room, a storage shed, and a small amount of open space. The property was well cared for and the tenants who lived there got along well. There may have been the occasional problem, but nothing out of the ordinary, nothing that could not be handled. Then the drug dealers moved in. First, a young woman and later on her boyfriend who already had, as far as I've been able to find out, a long criminal and drug related history. When they began dealing drugs from their apartment, everything changed. It's hard if you've not lived through it to appreciate how awful and how all encompassing the atmosphere became. It may sound to you is like an exaggeration, but what came to my mind while it was happening was the Alfred Hitchcock movie, The Birds. Drug addicts came in in an almost constant stream by foot on bicycles and in cars and trucks. It was a small invasion of drug addicts onto the property and the streets surrounding it. I have compassion for those suffering from addiction. I wish that every single one of them could get the help they need to overcome their addiction, but their overwhelming presence in the neighborhood created an almost dystopian atmosphere. If the drug dealers had not been living where they lived, the neighborhood and the property would not have been overrun by addicts and the people helping the dealers with their illegal enterprise. A once quiet and pleasant neighborhood was being destroyed. I also have compassion for the drug dealers. They have made a horrible life choice. I wish that they too could get the help they need in order to change their addictions and the way they have chosen to live. But my compassion also extends in great measure to those of us who became the almost invisible victims of their drug dealing. There needs to be consequences for dangerous criminal behavior. Tenants who are living quiet lives, paying their rent, being mindful of their neighbors and their shared responsibilities to maintain a safe, clean and quiet environment in which to live, need to have their rights addressed, the right to be to a quiet, safe, habitable home. So in order to give you a clearer picture of what it was like living in my apartment when the drug dealers lived next door and shared the public spaces I utilized, I'll highlight three areas: safety, quiet, and habitability of shared common space. Although I'm singling them out separately, they are of course interrelated. First, safety. People high on drugs are not known for exhibiting rational behavior. Not every drug addict presents a safety risk, but the presence of so many drug addicts within a small area ups the possibility of harm coming both to them and to the residents residing there. On a number of occasions, my drug dealing neighbors and gay neighbor would engage in loud shouting matches with people outside his apartment. It was scary to witness. His temper was obvious. He clearly posed a danger to anyone who might cross him, other attics, residents of the buildings, the maintenance people who service the buildings. On the day he was finally arrested, I watched the Brattleboro police remove him from his apartment at 06:30 a. M. In an obviously well planned raid. After that, I watched the police take nine guns from his apartment and place them in the back of a police SUV. My drug dealing neighbor possessed nine weapons, along with a temper which he displayed on many occasions. There was also the danger of discarded needles left on the property. A single mother with two young children lived in one of the apartments at 25 Homestead. She could not allow her children to play outside and had to advise them to never pick up anything from off the ground. Also, directly opposite the dealer's apartment was the apartment of a frail elderly woman. I worried about her safety, given the people who were coming in and out of her building day and night. Finally, there was the safety risk posed by all the cars. Homestuck Place is a small one Way Street. Children play outside on the street. In normal times, there was not much traffic. The drug dealing created frequent traffic in cars and trucks driven by people either high on drugs or looking for their next fix. I worried for the children's safety. Next, the noise. I learned that people using drugs definitely don't prioritize fixing their cars. Almost every car that entered the property was noisy, and there were cars entering and exiting the property at all hours of the day and night. The driveway goes right by my bedroom window, and almost every night I would be awakened by cars or trucks coming on the property, and then a few minutes later leaving the property. When this happens day after day for approximately two years, it's hard to remain unaffected. My sleep was interrupted almost nightly. I was not the only one so affected. Also activities related to the drug dealer and his friend would occur at any time of the day and night. He and his friends would be outside doing any number of things, fixing his car, bringing into the parking lot probably stolen property, a property battered for drugs and leaving it there, either out in the open or in the shed designated for communion use, not the storage of ill gotten gains. In a word, there was almost constant noise, which was especially difficult to handle when it happened late at night when most of us were trying to sleep. And finally, the habitability of the public spaces. The public spaces were commandeered for use by the drug dealers. The parking lot often contained cars of the people buying drugs. Sometimes they would sit in their cars for long periods of time. I thought I should probably buy Narcan just in case someone OD'd on the property. On several occasions, the male drug dealer brought unregistered cars onto the property, junkers usually, And he would just leave them there for weeks at a time until the tenants complained enough and they would be towed away. Once after a warning, such a car was removed by the dealer himself and then returned the next day. As I mentioned before, the shed meant for the storage of trash cans and recycling bins was filled with what I presumed to be stolen goods or goods bought for drugs. These would be accompanied by signs warning people off from touching or removing anything. It was a filing cabinet, a headboard, even a small motorcycle for a while, just all sorts of miscellaneous stuff, leaving no room for the shed to function in the way intended. This stuff spilled out onto the outside space. A very large trailer was parked for a long time on the small small grassy area area behind the shed. It was the size that would need a large pickup truck to pull it rather than a car or an SUV. The small paved sitting area with a bench installed was also littered with their stuff. It could no longer be used by others to sit. It became simply part of the territory they claimed as theirs. They also installed numerous cameras to monitor outside activity and invasion of our privacy. A few times, threatening messages were left posted on the laundry room door by the woman dealer. I can't now remember exactly what they said or why they were posted, but they always threatened some repercussion. I do not know what the solution is to the opioid crisis, not to the problems of homelessness. My view is more narrow. What I know is that when drug dealers move into a property, everyone who lives on that property is affected. The simple desire to have a safe, quiet place to live becomes unattainable. The tenants living on Homestead Place in Brattleboro were all victimized by the two drug dealers who set up business on the property, along with all the people they attracted by their drug dealing. Landlords need to have some way to provide their tenants with a safe, secure place to live, to mitigate, if not eliminate all the damage done by having drug dealers engaging in their illegal business on the properties, transforming those properties from homes to continuously active, disruptive crime scenes. And that is it. Thank you for listening.

[Cameron Wood (Legislative Counsel)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Jean, thank you. And has some safety and reduction of noise and peace been restored in your community, in your apartment community since then? Back to the way

[Sen. Randy Brock (Vice Chair)]: it

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: was. These two drug dealers were arrested twice. Once in March 2023, they were arrested and released the same day and back in business the next day. In September 2023, there was a major police raid. The police battered down their door, took them off in their pajamas and bare feet, removed the guns, and both were in jail on bail. When the woman got out of jail, somehow having paid her bail, she came back to the apartment with her drug addict friends and stayed there for several more weeks until she was eventually evicted. After she was evicted, people broke into the apartment, probably looking for drugs, broke down the windows, entered the laundry room, stole the cash machines on machines, seemed to be fetching drugs out of the woods behind where they must have been hidden. So it took a while. But eventually, and it took a while for things to return to some kind

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: of

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: normality. But even after they were gone, it took an even longer amount of time to feel safe again, because it's, you know, it's I considered it like a mild form of PTSD. I was forever vigilant. By now, two years later, it's okay, it's good, no horribly difficult tenants, you know, just the usual kind of tenant kind of stuff. And I know that Wyndham Windsor was aware of the problem. I know even that they were working on the problem, although they're not they weren't allowed to give us details on what that meant that they were working on the problem. But it shouldn't have gone on for two years.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Right.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you so much for I know it's it's a tough thing to come and put all that on paper and and and come forward publicly. And we really appreciate because it's it's very helpful to have a face on this problem. We had this two years ago when we had a public hearing in the senate on a on a similarly challenging situation in Burlington with Decker Towers, and that was very impactful on all of us at that point. Any questions for Jean? No.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I mean, I'm I'm very sorry for what you went through, miss Rizman. You know, having neighbors who are not cognizant or or thoughtful of of their fellow tenants. It's it's really, really challenging. Is the legal counsel for Wyndham Windsor present? I I just I I I wouldn't wanna ask ask you any questions about why that situation might have gone on Right. So But we you know, we the judiciary committee will probably wanna look at how well the existing remedies are working for when you have, you know, criminal activity being investigated and happening, you know, in your building or in a single family home next to you. But I think those are questions for for Wind and Windsor about what they attempted to do.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: We had Elizabeth of Bridgewater in, and she addressed that.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: I just don't know if they have a legal counsel on staff.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Well, she was the executive director who spoke for how difficult it was for them to go through this. I we can certainly ask her to to To

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: bring her legal. To bring her legal. That would help us, especially when we have judge zoning in. If we if we do or if it all Yeah. Gets dealt with in judiciary. You know? What I what I think is important to to say, miss Rizman, and and, you know, I think we've all been through really scary situations that hit close to home and it's never acceptable. Some of the things you described could be considered illegal activity prematurely. Right? So if we took out the idea of drug dealing, being loud in the hallway, having 12 people, you know, live in an apartment is not necessarily a great situation. It's not a good habitability dynamic. But those could end up being things that get people ejected from apartments even if there was no gun possession, illegal gun possession, I

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: should say,

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: or drug related activity. I know a lot of what you're saying has to do with people in some ways being under the influence, so not being thoughtful about other folks. But we there really does have to be a criminal investigation before before, you know Right. So people can take witness statements like yours and put the pieces together that it is a pattern of of drug dealing and and criminal activity and gun trafficking in and out of a an apartment.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So I think your point will will to ask Elizabeth, then we'll get the the lawyer that represented to understand really why it took two years and to understand the barriers to objecting people. But I would just listening to your testimony, Jean, I would also say that if this wasn't a single family home in my town, this would have been dealt with right away because the neighbors would have had a hairy canary, and this would have been dealt with. Think there are ordinances against a lot of this, noise, against a lot of things. And I think when we have these things happen in our communities, in single family homes or, you know, in in neighborhoods that aren't necessarily apartment housing complexes that that they get dealt with in ordinance and in other ways that we try and and manage some of this. So it's it's very interesting to hear all this, but let's let's get a little lawyer from the Windsor Windsor Housing Trust. Any other questions for Gene before we go forward? No, I just wanna

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: thank Ms. Rutland for her testimony. It's very compelling.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Thank you very much, Jean. Really, really good.

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: Thank you for having me, and thank you for saying what you just said because that's gone through my head, But I had no evidence that that was true. I just wondered if you live in a single family home, would it have taken so long?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I don't think so.

[Jean Risman (Tenant witness, Brattleboro)]: So I appreciate you saying that.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: No, it's an interesting- Depends on the town. It does depend on the town. Actually, depends on the ordinances in that town.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: In Woodstock, it might be

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: different than Newport. Might be Well, it would interesting to look at, but I think that that's what the towns do make those ordinances for a lot of those reasons. Thank you, Jean. We're gonna shift to Angela Zekowski. Angela, welcome. Angela, as people will remember, is the director of the Vermont's Landlord Association. Welcome, Angela. It's good to have you.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Great. Thank you. Good morning. Thank you for having me. Can folks hear me all right? Yep. Okay. Fantastic. Always hope that the headset's working and never fully know until we're here. For the record, my name is Angela Zaikowski. I am the director of the Vermont Landlords Association. We are a statewide trade organization for housing providers. I'm also a practicing attorney. I represent housing providers around the state, primarily in eviction matters, so I'm very familiar with that process, how it works, and sort of what the challenges are that housing providers and tenants. I am going to include tenants in that group. I think as you have just heard some very compelling testimony from someone of what it's like to live in a building when there are challenging tenants living there, and I think you've also heard the length of time it takes to deal with those challenging tenants. I understand that folks in the committee may be reacted to hearing, the two year time frame. That did not surprise me. I also understand you're going to hear from Attorney Siebeck. My guess is she's going to tell you the same thing, that that is not at a surprising time frame for a case such as that. And I think one of the reasons why H-seven 72 went through the House, was introduced and passed out of the House is because we have a system that's not working. It's not working for housing providers. It's not working for tenants such as Ms. Rizman. They're being significantly impacted with the amount of time it takes for cases to go through the system, and it's incredibly unfair to them, particularly. So this bill seven seventy two has is a balancing act. There's gives and takes in there, there's things that benefit housing providers, there's things that benefit tenants, there's things that benefit both parties, and it there the house spent a lot of time, they took testimony, there were meetings before the legislative session, to get input from a lot of various stakeholders. And as a whole, this bill has done a very good job of balancing those needs. Is it perfect? No. Are there sections in there that my organization is less enamored with? Absolutely. But taken as a whole, we can support this bill as it passed out of the house because it is it is balanced, and it has taken the consideration and the needs of sort of all of the parties coming to the table. And one of the things that this bill does is it does shorten the time frames for evictions. So the eviction process in Vermont is a two step process. First, you have to give a tenant a notice. You have to tell them what the reason is that you're asking them to leave. There are certain time frames attached to those notices. And then if a tenant doesn't pay the rent, if it's a non payment notice, or vacate the property for all of the other types of notices, the landlord enforces that notice with a court process, which is the eviction process. And what we have found is that Vermont is sort of an outlier in in this region and even amongst states that are, regularly looked to by tenant advocates California, Seattle, Washington State in the amount of time it takes from start to finish for an adjutment case. Not getting too much into the court process, but the statistical or the closure timeframe for a case that judiciary tries to hit in the state of Vermont is one hundred and eighty days. So six months, that's their goal for how they handle the timing for handling eviction cases. Many, some take longer, some take shorter. What we have seen is in all of the neighboring states around that process for the most part is sixty days or less from start to finish. And so what we've seen with seven seventy two is an attempt to streamline that process to make it more predictable, to make it less burdensome on tenants who have to live in these households, while also balancing the needs of the judiciary. So the house, you know, heard testimony from the judiciary about the time frames they need and actually extended some of the timings in, section two of the bill, which I know you folks are not looking at and are deferring to, to the judiciary committee in the Senate, but it's all part of the package, right? It's all part of the balance of this bill and in, you know, the sections that you folks are looking at section one, maybe section three though, are you maybe deferring that to judiciary? There's some that give and take, right? So there's some changes to how we do notices, the time frames of notices. There's language in there about restricting security deposits to two months worth of rent. There's language in there about the affirmative defense for condition of the building, right? So there's there has been sort of this back and forth and looking at trying to balance all of the needs And when I say balance all the needs, a lot of times the needs of landlords and tenants are not actually oppositional, right? This is a relationship that for the most part works well and is not, oppositional. So it becomes adversarial at times when when it has broken down, and the parties aren't communicating or there's some sort of issue. But this is a relationship that for the most part, is amicable and should be amicable. And many of the things in this bill are sort of addressing the situations where the relationship has broken down. And I think as you've heard in testimony, one of the biggest impacts is felt by other residents in the building. So to some extent, this is providing tenant protections. It's providing tenant protections to those tenants that are following the rules, that are trying to live in these buildings, that are trying to live their lives and having to live next to drug dealers, having to live next to violence, having to live next to people who are making noise day and night, live next to people who are smoking in their units. So it's that's what we're attempting to fix here. And I is the bill perfect? No, no bill is perfect. If anybody comes in here and says this bill is perfect, I have a few questions. But I think it's a good start and I think we need to do something because we have housing issues and what has been identified over and over and over again is that the amount of time it takes to get rid of tenants that are causing problems is one is is creating impediments to housing for other residents, and is negatively impacting other residents in the building. So that's my 30,000 foot overview of the bill. I mean, I'm happy to walk through specifics, but I think overall, what I would urge is, you know, the Senate pass a version of the bill that the House has already looked at. You know, this is a satisfactory bill, for all of the reasons that I have stated.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So questions for Angela. Anybody have a question?

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I agree with you. It's not a perfect bill. I just do worry that it hasn't reached a balance. So I see that your testimony sees it as a balance from my vantage point and what I'm getting in my inbox and the other testimonies, don't think it's achieved it.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So Angela, maybe it would be helpful for you to share some of the areas you compromised on and what what are areas you think we could continue to work on to improve it?

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Sure, absolutely. Sorry, I've got I have the very long marked up bill here that I printed out, so bear with me while I pull up the one. I think you folks are working.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: We're working on as passed by the House unofficial, because the official one has all the red lines and

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Right, and that's the one the one that I

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Unofficial, it's official, it just doesn't have the red line.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: I mean, I think starting on page one of that bill, we're talking about some definitions related to actual notice. So these are, this

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: is

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: a change that I think strikes a balance. So both landlords and tenants have sections throughout the bill where they need to deliver what's called actual notice to the other party if they're notifying them of some rights. This is clarifying and creating some new avenues for how people communicate with each other. So it's adding an email component, it's adding clarifying some mail delivery components, clarifying sheriff's service component. So really, to some extent, expanding the definition, but creating more avenues for acknowledging how people are communicating with each other, and this section would apply to both landlords and tenants. So this expands the definitions for both. Moving down to page three, we have an addition which would benefit tenants, which is that a landlord cannot increase the rent more once, more than once in a twelve month period. This was a section, that was added, for tenant benefit. We have some clarification on page four about application fees. I know there's been testimony about landlords charging their actual cost for conducting a background check or credit check. And what was added in as on the tenant side of this is that if a tenant brings a copy of that report, then the landlord can't charge them for that and has to accept that as part of the application. There again, there's a situation where there was a give and take and a way to find a compromise that both parties are adequately protected in that regard. We move down to page five, where we are limiting the amount of security deposit a landlord can collect to two months worth of rent. So this is an addition to benefit the tenants. And when it was pointed out that it could create some challenges, if people have pets, if landlords can't ask for pet deposits, They found that in the city of Burlington when they were restricting the amount of deposits that could be charged. They added a section that allows for additional deposits for pets. So I think, you know, again, that's a clause that benefits both the landlord and the tenant. So if we're talking about balance, we're there again. We have a clause in here that says if a landlord is terminating under section D or E, so those are the sale of building or for no cause, the landlord has to return one half of the deposit to the tenant. So that's a tenant positive section. So, what this stat, what this is saying is if your landlord's terminating your tenancy for something that you, not because of anything you did, right? So, those two sections deal with sale of building, repurposing the building, repairs to the building, end of the lease agreement, that you are entitled to part of your money to come back before you move out of the property. So that's a tenant positive section in this bill. The bill has expanded some of the categories for retaliatory conduct. That's on page seven of this bill. So they've added some additional sections of what is going to be considered retaliation by the landlord. So again, tenant positive, section to the bill. And then we get into, the termination notice timeframe. So this this section, starting on page seven and then going into page eight and nine, sort of restructures some of our termination notice timeframes that we have. And is it reducing the time frames for cause? Yes, it is. But I think again, that's about this balance and it's about reducing the time frames for landlords, but also for those tenants that are having to live in some of these situations. It makes that process go more quickly. So, we've seen and again, it's sort of that tightening and shortening of the overall process, which starts with a termination notice. Also added in this section on page nine is a prohibition of terminating based on people seeking medical assistance for drug overdoses. Again, so that's a tenant protection, right? So, you know, as we're going through this, you can see there's been a give and take here. There's things that benefit the landlords, there's things that benefit the tenants, there's some of these that actually benefit both parties and our protections or clarifications that would go to both sides of the ledger if we're if we're keeping keeping a ledger here. It makes it clear that you can't terminate a tenant who's a victim of domestic abuse, sexual assault, or stalking, right? Again, tenant protection.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Those are like human protections. Right.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Human. But if but we're talking about the bill in terms of, you know, landlord or tenant. So we're we're making it clear that that is a protection that is afforded to tenants in this relationship.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: In many ways, it's because we're criminalizing other behaviors that might be adjacent

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: to those

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: challenging situations. Right? So the reality is if you eject people for alleged behavior and they aren't afforded that opportunity to have a day in court before three or ten days or whatever it is to say, this is why that was happening and these are the remedies I need, then you're actually criminalizing a lot of that behavior and then trying at the end to say, but not if it's a lot of these situations that we commonly see when there is a challenging, you know, dynamic.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Right. Correct. But let me be clear, nothing in this bill creates a situation where tenants are going to lose their housing without court process. Tenants always have the right to have the landlord enforce their notices in court, which means an adjutment action. There is no process here for a landlord to reclaim their property if somebody's living in it without going through a court process, which means a court is making a decision about the accuracy of the information in the termination notice and determining that the landlord has followed all the proper procedures and has the correct evidence to support their allegations.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So, let me just stop us here for a second because we have two choices here. One is Nadine is, I know, waiting to testify. This is very productive and if the committee thinks this is productive, we could continue with Nadine going through the bill. We I mean, Angela going through the bill. We get also invite Angela to come back once we have possession of the bill to go through the sections and or so we have the choice of continuing with Angela, which is which is an option or pivoting to Nadine, who's a lawyer who who, like Angela, has dealt with a lot of these evictions in court and the time frame. So what is the committee's pleasure? Angela, would you be able to come back and continue going through this

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: at this point?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yes. Yes. Think it's very productive. We could continue doing this and ask Nadine to come back. So I guess one question is, A, do you have the time to finish now? And then Nadine, do you have the time to come back next week?

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: To answer your first question, I am perfectly happy to come back.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: And, absolutely. Yes.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: That's right. And then the other question is to Nadine, who's on the line waiting patiently. Would you be able to come next back next Friday or would you prefer to go now?

[Atty. Nadine Scibek (invited witness)]: Good morning. I am open to, let me just look at my calendar for next Friday. Can you hear me okay?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yep, we can What hear would the committee prefer to do? Well, Nadine told me to get her. I'm

[Atty. Nadine Scibek (invited witness)]: clear next Friday morning.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Yeah. So

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I I think, Angela, I think Thomas' point I I mean, that issue is certainly good.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: But if

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: you don't have anything else to do

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Nadine, if if you were able to come back, I think this is helpful to keep going through this at the moment just to see where where as we as we think about this bill, how it was from the landlord's view of balance. And so I appreciate this. So Nadine, if you're available next Friday morning, we might invite you back to testify then. Would that be okay? That would be fine. No problem at all. Angela's on a roll. Okay, great. That's what I sort of thought. So let's keep Angela going. There you are, hi. Well, it's good to see you.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Great.

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: That is, since judiciary's gonna be looking at this after we had

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: No, no, they have it now, So they're looking at it

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: before they will come back to us with any changes that they made. Correct. So therefore, it still would be useful to have you come back perhaps Yeah. After those pages are made because they may be material to what you'll be testifying on today. Right.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: And both I'm hoping maybe he'll testify as well next week, but Angela's gonna be testifying in the judiciary as well. So if it's okay with you, let's let Angela keep keep going on her role. And, Nadine, we'll see you next Friday. Thank you so much. Have a great weekend. And Angela, why don't we just keep going? Because I think that I thought this was helpful.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Okay. No, I'm happy. I just have to remember where I was. You were on page nine with the

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: prohibiting the termination for medical reasons and for domestic violence reasons.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Correct. Right. So again, that's a balancing of the needs and tenant protection piece in here. And then we have some language that got added on page 10 about terminating for tenant or governmental notices to vacate. So, what this is, is making it clear that if a tenant provides an actual notice, so again, that statute does remember those language, the definition changes that were on page one. So this is an instance where a tenant would be providing actual notice, to a landlord saying, hey, I'm moving out, and then they don't actually move out. This would make it clear that a landlord could use that tenant's notice to, start an ejectment action or eviction action against that tenant for not moving out under the tenant's own notice. Or if the landlord has received a notice of some sort of court order or governmental agency that requires the unit to be vacant, the landlord can use that to ask the tenant to vacate the unit. We do see this occasionally if there's work that needs to be done. Sometimes it's after, some sort of incident, many times like a frozen pipe that's burst and there's, work that needs to be done in a unit. And it's surprisingly challenging at times to get tenants to leave a rental unit when it's even when it's in a condition when it's very clearly needs to have work done to it. So this provides an avenue to deal with that. So to some extent, is that piece is both a landlord piece, but also I think would fall into the category of other tenants protection. So if you have a building where there's been say a significant flood or flood water event, it's imperative that those repairs and that situation get dealt with as quickly as possible because it can actually impact other units if it's not handled quickly. That's again sort of that falls into both categories of protection for landlords and tenants in sort of an odd way. They're continuing on page 11, there's sort of a list of termination for the rental agreement when property sold or repurposed. I do want to be clear that as the law is currently written right now, the section that relates to sale of building only applies if there's no written rental agreement. So current law is no written rental agreement, you can send a thirty day notice if you're selling the building. This retains that, but makes it a ninety day notice. So I mean, I would say that's actually a tenant protection piece here, that if your building's getting sold, you're getting more notice than you possibly would be entitled to now in that situation. And it also adds, think on the landlord side, that you can terminate for landlord needing to occupy the building. I'm on page 11 for those that are following along, or the units coming off the rental market. So it adds a few more categories that would apply under that type of notice. So those are new, those would fall in sort of the landlord category. Just

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: that, we heard realtors for Peter Tucker that this was a constraint on landlords who might be wanting to sell the building and that there was a constraint on the sale. Do you, how do you view that piece, this ninety day?

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: I think, so I don't disagree with that because I think the sales sometimes move more quickly and you can't send this notice until you have a signed purchase and sale, but it's going to impact a sort of very small number of properties, right? It's the ones that don't have or units that don't have a written lease. And that's actually law currently, is that that section only applies to those units that don't have a written lease. So, but again, this is part of that balance, right? I think, are there pieces in here that aren't perfect? Yes, but when you're looking at it as a whole, are we trying to, as best we can, balance the needs of both sides here? And I think, you know, that's ultimately a question for you folks to make, whether the balance is there or not.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Appreciate it. Okay, let's keep going because we only have about ten more minutes.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Okay, I think we're almost done with this section one, realistically. So what this bill also does is so currently in law, when we're talking about our what we call referred to as a no cause notice, so that is we don't have, we don't give you a reason tenant, we're telling you know, it's basically a lease non renewal. We're telling you the relationship's over, it's time for you to move on. And right now under current law, we have differing time frames, depending on whether you have a written lease or no written lease and how long have you lived at the property. And so there's this whole matrix of time frames. And so one of the things that this bill does is it says, we're just going to do away with all of that. And we're going to have one time frame, which is again ninety days. And if you're and you can, regardless of whether you have a written lease or not, how long you've lived there, if a landlord just wants to end the relationship, which is what we're talking about here.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: At the end,

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: at the end. At the end, we have to give you ninety days of notice. So, to some extent, this think this falls in the category of protecting both because it has streamlined this process and just said, we're not going to have these multiple categories that's based on written lease, no written lease, how long you've lived there, we're going to have one time frame. If you're ending the lease at the end of the lease term, it's a ninety day notice across the board. So I think, you know, again in balancing act that's, creating simplicity and creating sort of ease, it's uncomplicating a system that I think is relatively complicated at times, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

[Chad Simmons (Executive Director, Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont)]: Right.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Alright. It's In case you've had somebody run-in.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: Well, so I just what's hard about saying is this good for landlords or tenants is sometimes these things could be good for either one, and discretion can be helpful in those contexts. So for example, and I dealt with this even as a student in a very tight housing market like Burlington, landlords actually want a lot of notice. They they're the ones who wanna say, are you coming back next year because I'm gonna start showing your apartment to other people? And the the tenant might say, hey. I need to renew my contract as a traveling nurse or whatever the case may be. The discretion actually helps them in a tight housing market. Both decide when they need to know, you know, what's happening so potentially other tenants can move in and have some certainty there. But we're just we're not gonna be able to get this right for both tenants and landlords. And I just wanna make sure we're acknowledging that a lot of these things exist and may have some flexibility for both parties because this is not a perfect the tenant gets this, the landlord gets this. And we put you in that bind by asking you what's for tenants and what this just goes back to, like, this isn't just a perfect balancing act of any kind. No. I think

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: what we've asked Angela to do is to go through and identify the areas where there were balance balances and choices made that that and and and

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: But doesn't exist in this stuff.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I I think that's categorical and not true. And I think Angela is saying that doesn't that's not true. There are some balances that would create it, and this don't that's aren't they're not thrilled with, and that's clearly a genius to throw it. But we have tried to work forward, and I would urge you all to read the Rutland Herald op ed piece today that's in the Rutland Peril in the Times Argus.

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: It's on an editorial or as a piece from an individual?

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: It's an op ed from our housing part from our affordable housing partners.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I'm of a similar mindset as senator Ram Hinsdale, I'll just say I'm not seeing a a plus of this side for the landlords to negate what I think is something that's just wrong to do to attendance. So I'm I'm not seeing those equalize out. That's why I've got a lot of issue different aspects of the bill, but I'm just one vote, and this is getting the balance from other people's perspectives I get there.

[Gretchen Elias (Vermonters for Paid Leave coalition)]: But I

[Unidentified committee member/participant]: was Yeah.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I was hoping that was what Angela was was going through was I I articulated that they gave.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: I don't see a scale

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So we will putting it

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: there there.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: I think what you're saying is it might be helpful to have a one pager that has some pluses and the my and it's a a the pluses and the the balances that were struck on both sides.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Member)]: Giving something to landlords in this aspect isn't gonna make me feel good about doing this over here. And that's that's just not seeing that that

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: It's not even an equal relationship to start, so.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Angela, any thoughts on that, those concerns?

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: Well, I, so I think I'll go back to, what I had said earlier, which is this is sort of needs to be and for the most part is a symbiotic relationship. Realize that there's been a lot of talk and over the years people talk about the power imbalance in this process and in this relationship. As somebody who's been a practitioner for over twenty years at this point in housing, don't fully see that, because I think you have imbalances or can run into imbalances on on both sides. We have landlords who are sophisticated, who run this as a business, and we have landlords who are not and I see those or not landlords in many circumstances and situations being taken advantage of by their renters in sort of many different categories and avenues. And so it's when we are looking at this, think many times we can say this benefits landlords and tenants, we or this benefits landlords or this only benefits tenants. But sometimes with the benefit to tenants, it is something that landlords can say, well, yeah, that makes sense. And a landlord saying, yes, this clause makes sense, doesn't make it less of a benefit to a tenant. And I think that's the piece that concerns me is that if I, as somebody who represents housing providers, is coming in here and saying, hey, I think this benefits both and I'm getting pushed back that like, oh no, well, how can that be? You know, that's concerning to me because what we're trying to establish here or what this bill is trying to do is create some fairness and fairness for both sides and balance for both sides. You know, renters need housing providers and housing providers need renters. Like they don't exist without each other. And what we are seeing is with the current system that we have, housing providers are leaving. We're seeing a consolidation in the number of housing providers out there. We see rents increasing and we see it being harder and harder for renters to find housing go into as it is. And so, you know, I view this bill as a step in the direction of starting to try to fix that.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: So, Angela, I just like to ask you to follow-up on one of those points, which is one of the concerns, and I'm not sure we have data on this, but one of the concerns I've heard is that we are losing more, I know we call them mom and pop, but smaller landlords who own, let's say, under 10 units, five units or less, whatever you consider a landlord of smaller properties. Yes. And that many of them are because of some of these challenges we're trying to address in the bill are leaving. We are losing and they're turning them into short term rentals or the other things that are not productive for our long term rental market needs. Do you have data on that? Because that would be very helpful for us.

[Angela Zaikowski (Director, Vermont Landlords Association)]: I know, and I think one of the downsides for all of us as we navigate this is the lack of data. I have anecdotal data. I have you know, the number of small landlords who I've represented in legal proceedings over the years who and more recently, I would say I hear this more frequently in the last three or four years since we've come out of the COVID restrictions that I had in my prior time practicing which is you get to the end of the eviction and the landlord says, that's it. I'm done. I'm selling. I'm never going to be a landlord again or I'm just taking this unit off line because I can't deal with this again. It's too expensive. It was too stressful. I can't go through that again. And, you know, I see those folks selling. I see them selling to sometimes outside investors, sometimes larger landlords within the state and I and I think it is impacting our current system is impacting our rental market.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Yeah. I think that may be the note that we leave it on. It would be great if we could get any of that data because I certainly we do hear that anecdotally, but it would be great to have any data on that. And Kesha has one last Well, because I think we have to I I care a lot about those dynamic and and how

[Sen. Kesha Ram Hinsdale (Member)]: We all do. Where we push the market in terms of units of housing. And the data that that most national organizations do have that I can seek it out is that the outside investment market is looking for very landlord friendly loss. So we have to be careful that, you know, if we become like every other state, we also risk having the same rate of outside investment, which right when we did our two housing bills last biennium, had one of the lowest rates of outside investment of any state in the nation. And that was very important to Vermonters. So it's certainly a balancing act there, but there are I think VHFA might have some read on the impact of outside investment, and they look for places where they don't have to go to court and they don't have to deal with kind of issues.

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: Okay. Thank you. I think on that point, Angela, we'll see you again. Nadine, we'll see you next week. Thank you.

[Sen. David Weeks (Clerk)]: Thank

[Sen. Alison Clarkson (Chair)]: you. We'll see all of us now on floor. Thanks. Thank you. Thank you.