Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We are live. This is Senate Finance. This is the February 11, and this is the Coalition for Disabilities Brightening Day at the legislature. And it's also Recovery Day. So this morning we had a hearing on Recovery Day. And this afternoon we're going to hear from Disability Advocacy Day. Have a former member of the House and patron here to talk to us.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Well, thank you very much. I appreciate the opportunity on Disability Advocacy Day. And want to give you some perspectives. As we ask the buzzword for the day, we're trying to say rights disability rights into every bill. And I'm gonna give I hope some information that applies to this room that'll that'll help you see why we why we take that. The first thing I would like to do is share some thoughts about who we are, and not as an advocacy group, but as a significant part of your constituency. I've attached to this, which I submitted to your statute. It's a description that I put together back in 2009 that's outdated in its precise numbers, but it's accurate, I think, in the overall picture it gives of the people that you represent as you shape state policies. Please look it over when you can, and right now I will point out a few things. Roughly one fifth, although maybe as many as a four of Vermonters, have a disability as defined in the Americans with Disabilities Act. And when we think about those folks, we often think we often don't think about who's functional impairments have come with age or who've acquired limitations on the job. Now on on page five of that thing, there's, some information about Social Security. And one of the things you have to remember about your constituents with serious disabilities, unless they found good, solid, full time gainful employment, they are very likely dependent on Social Security, either SSI or SSDI. And what we tend to forget about, and what I didn't emphasize in that thing that's attached to this, is that when you cross the into the age where you would qualify for regular Social Security, if you've been on SSDI, that gets converted. And so when you look at my numbers from that 2009 thing, it's a greater population of older Vermonters who are dependent on Social Security who also have a disability. So that doesn't show up quite as much in there as perhaps I could. So what it okay. Yeah. I just covered that point. I'm not great at reading these things straight up. So people with disabilities often need support and assistance with their activities of daily living, like basic mobility, bathing, toileting, and eating, and often with what we call instrumental activities of daily living, and that's more like cooking, shopping, managing money, and running a household. And I'm bringing this up to thank you folks because last year in the Senate, it was recognized as challenge that families face when they're providing uncompensated care. And a few folks passed S-fifty one, which went through the process. And I think that there were some things that stayed in the or that were put in the bill that were probably good and beneficial for some profiles of folks with disabilities, but they took out the part about caregivers. And I understand it wasn't a huge as I understand it was a thousand dollars over the course of the year, if you offer twenty hours or more a week. So that's, you know, it doesn't come close to compensating, but I think it was a worthwhile gesture and something that I think is worth thinking about because more and more we rely on our unpaid caregivers. The labor boom is really tight in Vermont, particularly for folks who give the family care and those kind of services. So, but now I want to get back and refer to the Disability Advocacy Day theme of including rights in every bill. And you can see from the information in that pamphlet that follows this, These Democrats, or these demographics, sorry, include many renters, but also many who own their own homes. Circumstance, injury, long term disability, age, etc, place many of your constituents with disabilities at lower income levels than their non disabled peers, often relying on Social Security as their primary means of report, of support. And these folks get hit the hardest by rising, rapidly rising property taxes. As you consider measures to manage the challenge of funding education, you should keep in mind that your folks whose disability either makes gainful employment difficult, or that stands in the way of finding the employment that they need to meet their basic needs, your committee should look at the societal context in which you're shaping tax policy. There's bigger issues that I can address today as you look to modify or completely reinvent the way we fund schools, and especially if you're looking to reduce the overall amount of money that goes into school. And I think there's a lot of basic questions that need to be answered, and some of those are things that I probably shouldn't get into in this. You know, I think making the decision in a centralized way or in very large districts, I think there's a lot of questions there that I can't pretend to answer, but I also haven't heard a lot of answers in the public square about things, like whether school consolidation has actually been shown to save money in what ways and those things work. And I have a lot of questions about foundation formulae from having the experience of having state aid, having been distributed in formulas like that. And I know it's a different thing these days, so I'm I'm gonna not get into that. Also, some of the costs that are really basic in your school, and here I am speaking from a disability perspective, the needs, the mental health needs of our folks in school are much greater than they have been, on the one hand, the students who walk through the door. On the other hand, what we pay to keep decent teachers for health insurance has gone up, and one of the graphs that I put at the very end of this thing is a good illustration. It shows the curve of education spending against the curve of healthcare spending. So those are things, those are really big picture things that I know you folks are gonna have to take a lot of testimony on, and I'm not gonna get too deep into that. But administration, the administration and legislative leaders and now I'm coming close to something near term, which is to say, this year what's going to happen? Administration and legislative leaders have looked at the current prospect of large property tax increases, and have floated the idea of making a one time addition to the education fund, as I understand it, as had been done in the past. From the perspective of middle and low income Vermonters with disabilities, I would urge the committee to look at this in the broadest context of affordability without oversimplifying the effect of tax increases across society. In the last generation, the job of funding services through government has fallen more and more on low and middle income Vermonters as federal tax cuts have largely favored higher income Vermonters. Please direct any injection of funds that you can make, and I know people need it. Mean, we're looking at what 12% was the estimate after having some pretty tough years already. Please direct any injection of funds to those most in need, those most in danger of losing their homes to increasing costs of living, that is to say low income per monitors, which you may not have realized this, but they are disproportionately people with disabilities because of how difficult it is for them to be be earning, whether, well, a homeowner for twenty years and and accident on the job. Next thing you know, they're living at SSDI, and you start to look at what that is. And it's not a full replacement for the fee income that trades in the past. I haven't been in trades and lost my income. I I can I can vouch for that? So what so really the context that I want you to think about this and look at the stuff that I've attached and the charge that I've attached, the tax cuts that have happened, particularly the most recent ones, will make it so that the family who is well healed, I'll I'll say, will be receiving tax cuts that unless they have a huge amount of property, will likely cover their whole property tax bill. And so I think we need to really be thinking about if we have a limited amount to bring down that 12% to something more handwritten, It should go we shouldn't be spending the money on people who, frankly, don't need that, and who's where you're really not increasing the attack burden because there's this balancing factor that comes into play. Think it'll lift those at the situation. And I don't think that anything we can do, I don't remember the figures that have been floated, and I think they've been different from different folks. Those wouldn't come anywhere near to matching the kind of reductions that those of us in my, say, class. I'm in a bracket where I think I'm probably gonna benefit from that in from some of those tax cuts. So the message I leave with you is really twofold, and I'll sum it up by saying more of your constituents than you probably think are people living with disabilities. Many of those disabilities really affect their ability to earn what they were in before. Many more of them than you might think are homeowners, particularly, you know, folks who've gotten their disability later in life. And the context in which we're working has meant that people on the higher end of the income scale have benefited considerably in the last few years. And when you've got a precious resource, I think you should go to the people who absolutely need it the most, And Very folks who really looked at their bills and say, god, I'm not sure if I'm gonna stick around. So I and that's where I would leave it with you. And I've I tried to put oh, just to by way of explanation, the charts that I put in the back, think are well well researched. They're from Public Ancests Institute, which some of you may be familiar with. They'll probably

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We're familiar with.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: You're familiar with. You know, whatever things you think about them left, right, and, you know, they're left. But at the same time, they have been pretty careful to work with honest numbers over the years. And so, you know, I wouldn't put those on the table if I didn't trust them. And like I said before, the other thing about trusting numbers, the thing that I gave that's my description of people with disabilities is from 2009. So I will admit right off. Those are old numbers, but the picture that they give overall of your constituent constituency, I think, is is really accurate. So I'm happy to answer any questions that I'm qualified.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Okay. Committee, any questions? We are practically trying to serve evolved people who are rich, are the same, and getting the same tax benefit. I guess it's the old debater in me. That's a logical fallacy to say some are, therefore all are. But we are we have been taking testimony and we are working on that. Also, I think understanding, I'm sure many of people with many of the people with disabilities are also facing a healthcare crisis.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Absolutely.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Health insurance crisis. I know that many of you are in the single, individual insurance pool, which is the most expensive. It's fine. Said you are in that one. It's good to hear the balance that taxpayers are seeing their health insurance go off. Their incomes are not many of them fall across the board with and without disabilities. And have limited ability to raise.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: So Yeah.

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: That's senator Hardy, and that's senator Keith. Thank you, madam chair. Hi, Ed. Thanks for your testimony. It's nice

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: to see you, and thanks for your shout out to us for s 51. I was bummed. I was sad and frustrated that the the part about the unpaid caregiver came out, but there is a new bill on the wall out there that several members, including me, sponsored that is a sort of rewrite of that bill. So we're I am blanking on which number it is, but it's up behind you on the wall,

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: and hopefully, we can get something like that path to self build this year. Great. Yeah. Thank you. I just wanted to say thank you for your testimony and for the data that you included. It's really nice to have it all in one place. So thank you. I also wanted to ask you, I think I heard you say, but I want to make sure I understood correctly that if

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: there

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: is a buy down of property taxes, that it should be allotted in a way that benefit or would help lower income and middle income folks in Vermont. And so it wouldn't just be like a blanket.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: That's what I would recommend, because I think there's plenty of folks for whom it's less of an impact.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Right.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: I mean, I'm a lucky person. I'm in a position where if my property tax goes up some, so be it. I'm not in a position where I'm gonna be looking at you know, this is gonna, frankly, particularly change my standard of living. I think the simplest way to address this would possibly be to look at the thresholds of the income sensitivity that was built into the system, and move some of those thresholds that haven't been changed since I think some of them haven't changed since Act 60 was paid. And so that might be the simplest way to say, okay, we're not we're not going, okay, this bracket can't do this and that, but we're moving where those thresholds are so that the person of low income and middle income if low income is could be more likely to to benefit because low income has moved up when, you know, people who could live on 30 or $40,000 a few years ago are having a hard time living on 50.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I've looked at that.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Beg your pardon?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We've looked at that, but I think it was just last year that I realized that the money when we limit the amount of money you can pay in property taxes because of your income, that money is raised from everybody else or from the pool, which raises the property tax rate and that there are significant number of people that would be better off if they didn't would pay actually less tax because if we didn't fund income sensitivity because it would lower their tax rate. So we've got this catch 22 in there where the new proposal well, it is the new law in Act 73 is that depending on your income, a portion of your housing value would be exempt. So there wouldn't you would pay no tax on the first 24.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Understood. Yeah.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: And that cost would the bill envisions being covered by a tax on second homes, which will take a couple of years for your town clerk to get everything in place. But I was told today that it is coming to us, the house that was the division. You just have to adjust the little number in there about the proportion. So that's what the new bill is in.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Now that fits oops, excuse me. Okay. Go. But that's in the context of the implementation. That doesn't address what happens this year No. For tax breaks. No. And I'm I'm looking more at this near term.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: This year.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: If we're investing a substantial amount of money, I would like to see it go to people who are in danger of losing their homes.

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: And, James, my follow-up, and maybe it's to the committee, but is has that ever been done to not disperse a property tax buy down in a way, just like in a blanket way? Is there a precedent for that?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: And Yeah. We can two or something. Yeah. Okay.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Increase that.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: The question usually is does it go to Yeah. Or non homeless debt tax? And Okay.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: I think we increased the credit by, like, 12%. That means it's something that average increase bill.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Increased our debt. Two years ago, we bought we had to adjust because your tax credit is based on last year and the year when we had 18%.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: That's how we

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We had to put money in because you were gonna get billed for the 18% increase this year, but your rebate would be based on the 5% last year. So

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We did put significant amount of money. We Good. But

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: The year after was the problem because then it snapped. Right?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: It snapped back on a very small group

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: of people.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: And there is no extra money. I am beat by the appropriations people. We're back to the alligator withdrawal where our spent our our income is coming in pretty flat, and our expenses continue to go up. So Well, my That's gonna be a challenge.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Yeah. I I don't have the command of the details that you folks do, and I am a bit removed. I retired a few years ago from from disability rights, I'm not as as, you know, as close to some of these issues. And I have to say I rarely really looked too closely at tax policy, but I must say, you know, the older I get, the more I realize that many, many people, and it's disproportionately people with disabilities, are in that low income. Yeah. And so the constituency that I'm speaking for today could use the help. And so if there is help to be given, if there is a logical way to distribute it, I think that would be something truly appreciated by a lot of people.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: And I appreciate that you are a voice for those people because we've been looking at schools and school funding and the superintendents that their beads, the superintendents, the principals, the NEA, all the folks that work in the schools or around them have organizations that represent them. The taxpayers don't. And so to find somebody who can talk to us on the other side about decisions they're having to make about their health insurance coverage and paying their mortgage and we're trying to find if there's been an increase in delinquencies. We've raised the level at which the towns can go to tax sale, the amount due. Mhmm. But we're we're trying to find out if there is an increase in delinquencies out there to just get a sense as to what is happening. So, yeah, the only time we actually hear from the people is our town meeting day. Don't be wrong. But that's yeah. But that's a little late in the session. You know? And Yeah. It's it's good to be reminded that's your people.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Did you know?

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Vice Chair)]: No. I was just wondering what you were gonna say about.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I don't know what's going on, but I'm just the chair of this committee. So thank you.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: You're welcome. And I really do appreciate the chance to come in here. And I, you know, I think it's great that I thought that the coalition for disability rights had a good idea when they asked almost all the committees for a little bit of time to speak with them. And I have to say I was really pleased at the number of committees that welcomes folks in. They're speaking all over the state house today on any number of different issues and probably don't ordinarily see the nexus between tax policy and disability, but it's real. Oh, it's real. It's disproportionate. Yeah. When you get

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: on property taxes, very definitely.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: So thank you all very much.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Thank you. Thank Okay.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: So Randy, if you take your seats, can we vote on something? How about two twenty?

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Take care of the scholarly part

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: of it. Take care of that.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We have What do you think, doctor? I don't know, but maybe I in my I thought I'd read my emails this morning. I was hoping they canceled the eight a. M. Meeting, but they didn't.

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Vice Chair)]: I was just looking over at his testimony. It one number that just stuck right out to me that in 2008, our population in

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: the state of Vermont was

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: 621,000. Yeah. What is it now?

[Sen. Thomas Chittenden (Vice Chair)]: And eighteen years later, we're at six forty, six fifty.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: It's like a 4%

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: When I spoke to you fifty years ago, we thought we were gonna get a second federal rep. We were that close.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Yeah.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: And we haven't gotten there. Yeah. We are not growing except older. And that is getting to be an issue.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Nobody wants to ask why.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I know. There's a reason. You Rebecca's going to be joining us. Rebecca's gonna do Zoom. Okay. We're in about two minutes. Oh, it's press conference on 208 and two 09. We did one

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Nobody invited me. I'm going for it.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Me too.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: I was hoping to get invited.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Many that wants five o. Yeah.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Okay.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Okay.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: We have long memories. Not inclusive at all. No? No. Okay.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: So Rebecca should be checking in momentarily. And we are going to go to this is the refundable machinery and equipment tax increment. You have here she is. Okay. That's right. Yeah. Where is it? Telling them that it's not helpful. She has joined us. Feel left out.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Inclusivity.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Okay. I doubt that you'll not be the nasty person again. I just said it's not helpful during committee time. I'm sorry.

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: Rebecca should be here if you will.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Rebecca should be here. Okay. So we will continue. And after this, we'll load up to 20. All right. There's Rebecca. Okay, welcome Rebecca. We Thank are continuing committee discussion on the fundable machinery and equipment investment tax credit. I assume you've seen that and you know the background on Yes. Just, I know that corporate taxes are complex. They get paid, carried sometimes, and we can end up owing huge refunds and We try and plan for those so we don't take a major hit and I just want to give the tax department time to weigh in on this one, see what your thoughts, any concerns that you might have.

[Rebecca Sameroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Excellent, well, you so much. For the record, Samaroff, Deputy Commissioner of the Department of Taxes, so sorry I'm not there in person today. I have one of two twins home sick, so, you know, just the joys of toddlers.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: This will be a regular occurrence.

[Rebecca Sameroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: Yes, yeah.

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: So, so

[Rebecca Sameroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: thanks for the opportunity here. Yeah, I'm a little bit familiar with this non refundable credit that's been part of our code for a bit and have, you know, heard the walkthrough of the proposal to make some changes there. You know, I think my comments are pretty short, which is that, you know, converting this credit structure into a refundable credit would be kind of like an unconventional credit mechanism for current corporate income tax. We don't have any refundable credits today. And given the history of this one and just the of eligible, the very targeted eligibility, it seems designed very much around a particular industry or even company's circumstances, which isn't where I sit in the organization isn't my dream for a piece of tax policy like the first refundable credit in corporate income tax code would ideally be something that would be more broadly available to folks, I think. Certainly, you framed this well, Chair Cummings, there's been a lot of change in corporate income tax lately, and I think all of those changes have been really excellent for Vermont based companies. But it does mean that many Vermont based companies that are investing in a footprint here, investing in capital here in state, investing in employees and growing workforce here in state, they don't actually don't have in state tax impact from those changes because of the recent move to a single sales factor apportionment formula. So you really only like amass corporate tax liability in Vermont if you're making a bunch of sales in Vermont. So You definitely acknowledge that that makes some non refundable credits challenging for a local corporation to take advantage of if they don't have much tax liability here. Kind of two sides of that coin. And if there is, you know, legislative interest in, you know, doing more targeted support for, you know, an industry that meets the parameters of this credit, it just seems, you know, from my seat in the tax world, that that would be a great opportunity for, like, a direct payment design rather than, you know, using a credit structure in the tax code to target funding, so specifically.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I think this bill was targeted bill when it went through and there were good reasons to protect a major employer in a section of the state that needs all the major employers it can get and the tax changes we made have resulted in they're not being able to use the refundable tax credit or the tax credit that the bill gave them because they are doing you know, they they don't owe the tax they would have if we hadn't made those changes. So it would be precedent setting. Alright? And that money, if it's a refundable credit and they don't owe the taxes, then where would that money come from? I mean, if it's if you is it a refundable credit? Is essentially a grant, right? I mean, if we do a refundable tax credit, it's a we're gonna the state of Vermont is gonna pay you low income family 200 or $2,000 because it's a refundable tax credit. Right,

[Rebecca Sameroff (Deputy Commissioner, Vermont Department of Taxes)]: yeah. In terms of fiscal exposure, this would be, you know, as drafted, I would say, you know, a minimum of $500,000 a year outlay from the general fund would be available for folks that meet the eligibility requirements for this credit. I say up to or starting at $500,000 a year because that's the refundable portion, I think that carry forward could be used for against any tax liability should should a company be eligible for this and also have some tax liability. So it could be a mix of nonrefundable and refundable credit, but definitely at a minimum a half million dollars from the general fund.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Okay. Just show up as the state corporate income tax.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Would be 500,000 less revenue. Up to. Yes. Okay. And that is not accounted for in this year's revenue forecast.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: It and that's why I need it back to next year. Yeah. Alright. So I

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: think maybe we ought talk to appropriations because from what I've heard in the days when there was an extra 500,000 is over. So we take a further look at that, but it would it would be a reduction in state revenue would become out of taxes paid by others, I assume, or just it would be yeah. You took the money would be paid out. It would come out of the general fund. Alright? Okay. Questions for Rebecca. We do have our next. We do have our next witness. They are waiting to come in. Rebecca, thank you so much. Thank you. Okay, we're gonna go we have Carol Martine is there. And let's see if we can get Carol in. Here's Carol. Oh, we've got all kinds of people. So,

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: This guy in the bottom left corner used to be a baseball player in the student line.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Ah. Well, welcome to Senate Finance. Why don't you all introduce yourself and then the floor is yours.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: Okay. Well, thank you. Thanks. Good afternoon, senators. Thanks for taking our testimony on this proposed bill and its impact on Vermont and our community. In the essence of time, since we don't have a lot of time, I thought I would introduce myself and my colleagues and get started on that. My name is Carol Martin. I'm the head of corporate accounting for the Weidmann Group. I've been with the company thirty two years now, and I reside in the town of Barton. Sandra Hollenstein, she is our VP of finance. For the Americas region, she's been with Weidman for eight years, and she lives in East Charleston. We have Bill Stimpson. Bill is our general manager of the site here in Saint Jay. He's been with us over fifteen years, an Air Force veteran, and he resides in Wheelock. And then Bradley Greens. Brad is our laboratory services manager. He's coming up on fifteen years already with Weidman and he currently resides in Saint Jay. So that's the team is kind of here to back me up. I will walk through the presentation and then we can assuming this is okay with your formatting. We'll go, you know, be available to answer any questions you have. Okay, then let me see if I can share my screen here.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: K.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: Please let me know if you can see my screen, and I put it in presentation mode.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Yes. We're good.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Okay.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: So let's jump into the Weidmann Group. Who are we? So we are a family owned privately held company headquartered in Rappersville, Switzerland, coming up on our one hundred and fiftieth anniversary next year in 2027. This is a map that gives you an overview of where we are in the globe. You could see we have kind of a big footprint for a really small company. We have less than 3,700 employees globally. The darker blue locations are our electrical production or our sales site. And then we have some partners that are shown in the lighter blue with our headquarters shown there in in Rappersville, Switzerland. Looking at our region, just to give you a picture of that as well. We have four sites in the Americas region with our Saint Johnsbury facility highlighted here. We are we have the produce the board for the entire Americas region, and we're known as the center of excellence for the large power transformer insulation market.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: That

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: sounds in St.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: I'm sorry?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I said that's not St. John'sberry.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: That is not St. John'sberry, but what we wanted to show here is how is Weidman connected to the electrical grid?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: So

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: we're the worldwide leader in the manufacturer and fabrication of the high quality transformer board insulation projects. And what we think is a pretty kind of interesting fact is that more than 90% of the transformers in The US contain Weidman insulation. So that means anytime you turn on your lights, you charge your cell phone, it is highly likely that the power that you're receiving has passed through a transformer that contains Weidmann insulation. So a lot of that kind of produced right here in St. John's. We kind of a cool fact that not a lot of people know. So we like to share that or highlight that a little bit. And one of the other points on here is just since 2010, we've put over 100,000,000 of investment in our St. John's reproduction facility. It's actually going up significantly from there as we'll show you in some of the two phases of the project that we have going on right now at our site. So our local story, I guess, started with these two gentlemen, Bob Fuhrer on the left and Gordon Mills on the right. I had the pleasure of working with both of these gentlemen before their retirement. Bob knew the name of every single employee, their spouses names, their children's names. And both of these gentlemen were the guys that would jump in on a Friday night when the product had to get out to the door to the customer. So I think that is a family owned culture is kind of what made a good fit with Weidman. Then in 1971, that's when the companies joined or when we joined Weidman and became the hub for electrical technology business area for the fabrication of transformer born and insulation packages here at the St. Johnsbury site. Jumping forward to today, this is a picture of our main building here in St. Johns Bury. We have two main production facilities on campus. The main building is where we produce our board and this front building here is where our board machine two is located, which is undergoing some upgrades now, which has just been finished. We'll show you that in a future slide. Then we have our component fabrication, which is done mainly in our North Building. I will also show you some pictures of that. We also produce high temperature Nomex board and components that were developed and manufactured here that we make, which is licensed in partnership with DuPont, as well as being the America Center for Engineering Services, which is that Brad is part of. Now I'd like to jump into our strategy and expansion, which is kind of like what we do, why we're important and why we need to grow. So Weidmann St. Johnsby is the only US based transformer board manufacturer and our key customers are the large power transformer manufacturers. We were considered an essential employer during COVID nineteen pandemic due to the critical infrastructure that our product supports. You can see this chart to the left shows what's happening in our industry right now, where we are looking at a 10% compounded annual growth rate through 2030. You know, why is that happening? I mean, I think that everybody's heard all the different things on the news. I mean, there's increasing energy demand. We've got the data center growth. We need grid stability and flexibility. You know, we have an aging infrastructure of our electrical grid, and we also need to be concerned about the the national security related to that transmission of that electricity. So if we're not able to meet our customers demand, that's a significant risk for us. Need to just meet their demand, not to grow, but to maintain our market share. We have to grow with our customers. So that we have been focused on that. And that's what we're doing right now with the expansion of our Saint Jay facility. But as the demand is growing, we are already also seeing foreign competition taking an interest in our market. We need to continue to grow and meet our customer demand so that we can keep that foreign competition out of our US market. We're known for our quality. Our customers benefit from that US manufactured material within the energy grid. So based on all of this exponential demand, we embarked on what we call our Project Bigfoot, which is a two phase expansion project of our St. Johnsbury facility. This first phase that I think is substantially complete now is where we are putting in a 40% capacity increase on our high density board machine. We've installed a third former. If you can see down at the diagram down at the bottom you can see there where there's a new third former has been installed. We have a new three bay storage rack, a new boiler, and we also have erected a new finished good storage facility or warehouse which is just to the left of this our main building here. The second phase of this project Bigfoot is for our increase in our components capacity. We use our board, we take that and we turn it into components that are used in the large power transformer market. We've added on an expansion to the south of our North Building. So this building at the top you see here is the North Building on campus and where those vehicles are parked. It's an older picture. That is where the new expansion has already been erected and is very close to being completed. In that we are putting in separation of dust, producing processes to eliminate contamination. We're installing new lift devices and cradles so that we have safer movement of our larger packages and we're also optimizing the material flow. We've put in here so you can see some pictures of what our upgrades look like over the last few months. This is our board machine upgrade with pictures underneath of our pulper, or storage racks and also the very large boiler being put in through the side of the wall of our building and installed. This is our the second phase which is this fabrication expansion is well underway. What we would do is invite you all to come to our ribbon cutting ceremony on May 27. You're all welcome to join us and you'll actually be able to see the expansion complete at that time and have a tour and more information on all of what has taken place here on this site over the last, I don't know, year and a half or so. So now, you know, I'd like to kind of focus on why Weidman is important to Vermont in the Northeast Kingdom. These two graphs that give you an overview of the return that Weidman has put into Vermont and our local community over the past ten years. You can see here we've paid wages of $169,000,000 Vermont, just Vermont wages that have gone into our local St. Johnsbury community with 6,500,000.0 of Vermont withholding tax paid over to the state of Vermont in that ten year period. 1,000,000 of it just last year in 2025. You can see some significant increase in our wages here over the past you know, three or so years with our number of employees growing, but also our wages growing at a higher level than the number of people that we've added. And right now, we're over at the end of the year, actually, we were at 374 full time employees. This expansion project that we've just shown you that will hire approximately 67 positions. Some of those are already included in that three seventy four FTE because we were able to hire some people for this project earlier than we had originally planned. It does really positive thing for us. Jump into our local community impact here. So I I think everybody knows the Northeast Kingdom is economically distressed region of the state, most isolated, sparsely populated. And, you know, we've been a a critical employer here in Saint Johnsbury since 1969. Already talked about the wages contributed and the withholding contributed. Our expansion project contributes to the economic development goals that are outlined in NVDA's regional plan for the Northeast Kingdom. And we're really actively involved in the community, not just the donations that we give. We've given over $250,000 in the last few years, but also in our employees and being active in, you know, volunteering their time as well as being involved in, like, fundraising events, like Relay for Life, Alzheimer's, those other types of community fundraising events where our people are are actively involved. One of the other things that we've done very recently is committed to support Northeast Kingdom Development Corporation. They are a development group in the Northeast Kingdom that helps to bring more development into the region. And we've get paid them a 150,000 to date, and we have another 100,000 committed to them over the next two years. We also have partners ships with some local nonprofits, Astronomy Foundation, the Museum, the local schools. In the picture that you see up in the top right hand corner of this slide is our Director of Sales, Rob Began. Every year he does a tour with students from St. Johnsbury promoting STEM and also increasing their awareness of careers in manufacturing and how STEM ties into that. Last year alone we put $16,000,000 of payments in with our Vermont suppliers and vendors so it's a pretty staggering number of payments within the one year period. Just this Bigfoot project alone has approximately $7,000,000 of payments to Vermont vendors over that construction period. We actively try to first source locally. If we can't get it direct locally, Vermont, New England, US, we try to prioritize supporting our local vendors and economy first whenever possible. Lastly, I guess I'd like to focus on why it's important to Weidman and to Vermont to pass this legislation this bill s three twelve. I had the benefit of being part of the Weidman team that testified to the Senate Finance Committee when the initial bill was passed, I think somewhere around 2010 or a little before that, which was sponsored by Kitty Toll. We're incredibly grateful for that and, you know, being awarded that $3,260,000 of the nonrefundable tax credits, which was based on our $32,000,000 investment for projects that we were working on at that time. That was our initial board machine up b

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: m two

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: upgrade. But due to a series of unfortunate and also some fortunate events, we are not able to utilize any of the credits that we earned. Shortly after we were awarded the initial credits, there was a downturn in the economy. The the investment in the grid was not, you know, the not happening as quickly or in the way we would have hoped. And so we had several years of net operating losses. After we recovered from that, we had the COVID nineteen pandemic where we had just a short term negative impact on our material and our supply chain costs that took a period of time to fully recover. So these economic factors contributed to why we didn't use it originally. And then now coupled with the adoption of the single sales apportionment formula and the repeal of the throwback rules in 2023, that's effectively eliminated wideband's ability to benefit from those credits that were awarded. The product that we produce here in St. Johnsbury is sold exclusively out of state. We have 59% approximately last year that was sold to other states within the country and 41% internationally. We just don't have any customers which our customers are mainly the large power transformer manufacturers. None of those are located in the state of Vermont. So while we're really appreciative of the change in the apportionment formula, I mean, that's a permanent benefit to Weidmann. With that, we won't be able to utilize the credits that we have even with the extension of the credits without the refundable nature involved. I guess I'd focus here. We've been profitable now for a number of years. We're investing in our site, as we've shown you, and we're protecting our local domestic infrastructure from our foreign competition.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Okay. But as I'm understanding the problem, you can't when we did these credits we were on the old income tax, the old corporate tax system, and you were going to owe taxes. We were giving you a credit. We've changed the system and so now you don't owe those taxes to Vermont. Effectively, if we turn them into a refundable tax credit rather than just forgiving the tax you owe us, that becomes pretty much an appropriation to you out of the general fund. And that given our financial ability this year, that might be a little more difficult to do.

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: But

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I think we all understand the investment you made, which is one of the reasons we changed the tax code is because we wanted to not penalize the companies that actually do invest and provide jobs and all the rest of it here. And it's good to hear that that worked. But it does put us in a different position. It really isn't a tax credit anymore because you don't owe the tax. It would then be more of an appropriation more than and so that I think we may need to get some testimony from the folks in appropriation on what they're looking at this year and see what we could do. Sandra Gulick, do you have questions? I did not. Oh, I thought she did.

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: It does for me. She did yeah. Ask me put my name

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I have to go to another couple of minutes.

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: Thank you for your testimony, and it sounds like you're doing a great job with this company that I didn't even know about. I bet I know where Senator Beck is going

[Sen. Martine Larocque Gulick (Member)]: to be on May 28.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Twenty seventh.

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: Twenty seventh, I'm not ribbon cutting. But it's really impressive what you're doing, but I share the Chair's concerns about giving basically what would be an appropriation or a grant to your company. We've made the changes to our tax code a few years ago that basically means you don't pay corporate income tax in the state of Vermont. And so, that was a huge benefit to companies like yours and we did that expressly to benefit companies like yours that are located in Vermont, employ Vermonters, but make their sales outside of Vermont. So you're already benefiting from the work that we've done in this committee. So, the really, really challenging financial outlook we have right now where people can't afford their healthcare, we can't afford to pay for our schools, You know, we can't people are going hungry. It's just a really tough outlook out there. It's really hard to justify a grant to a company that we gave a big tax break to a couple years ago across the board to your type of company. It's not to say you're not doing great work. It's just that we already did tax changes that helped you.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: But that doesn't mean we're at a closed door at this point. Just that it's not just as you had years where you were not operating in the Florida shades of scrubbed.

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: Well, can I ask you to add? I mean, you're a multinational corporation also. I mean, you're a massive multinational corporation. I'm wondering if you might be willing to share your tax returns with us because it seems to me that

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: you have

[Sen. Ruth Hardy (Member)]: lots of ability across your multinational corporation.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: We a U. S. Corporation. Weidman Electrical Technology Inc. Is a separate U. S. Corporation headquartered in St. Johnsbury, Vermont. We are part of a global group but I think what I'd like to also focus on is probably the last paragraph here is that there is a global group. It's not a huge group. We only have 3,700 employees

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: But

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: having this support from the state of Vermont on things like these credits, whether we're refundable or not refundable, helps us to justify why we can continue to expand here in St. Johnsbury and not in China or Turkey or some other lower cost country and so every dollar you can see the investments we put back in every dollar that we get that we can reinvest in this community is jobs in this community and that's how we're able to continue to pay like how we paid the $169,000,000 of wages over the last ten years. We don't get significant financial support from our global corporation. We need to provide for ourselves. We need to show that we're a profitable company and we need to keep reinvesting to keep the foreign competitors out so that we can continue having this site here in Saint Jay and it doesn't go somewhere else. I mean, I guess I'd like to say that that's our really big argument is that we can continue to grow here so that doesn't go somewhere else and we lose what we have. We

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: certainly have had situations in the past in which we have had companies that are similarly situated. In other words, are companies that are owned by a non US owner who have facilities scattered throughout the world, We have structured tax benefits for companies in that kind of situation that are beneficial for Vermont, but also beneficial to them, but based on their continued presence and continued growth. And so one of the questions is whether or not we could think about structuring something that would tie the availability of these credits and perhaps other programs that we have had and have used elsewhere to help you in the event that you do additional growth at the St. Johnsbury facility and that we can tie the two together in some way that makes sense.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: This was one of those programs that was set up for exactly those reasons.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: And we have other programs that we have since used that might be applicable here or that we may be able to structure to make applicable here. The question that I would have for Wyden is, is that something that you think would be worth exploring?

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Yes, why not? Think So, can think about this.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: We also think about who state government could and be how something like that could be structured so that we do in fact have incentives that are, to widen, are clearly the possibility of being made available from the state standpoint to see what kind of structure would make sense.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: We can hear you talk about that.

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Yeah, we have a long history of growing and acquiring, it's a growing market. We definitely want that market to

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: grow here. Yes, I think so. Okay. So I think we have decided to think on this one and see if we could figure out something that would not be a direction hit on

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: Maybe maybe Tim Terry from the agency of Congress and Community Development. He's our international recruiter. Maybe he

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: could Give us some good ideas. Yeah.

[Sen. Randy Brock (Member)]: Mhmm. Yeah. And in the event, though, that we could structure something that we could at least begin to put in black and white so that everybody would have comfort that we are aggressively moving and that we would both benefit from it, the quicker we can try to structure something that makes sense on paper, I think would be very helpful. So perhaps if we try to test with that, we look to get some feedback as to what possibilities are there while we're still in session and still have the ability to add.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: So I'll back, I will leave that to you to see if we're putting thinking caps together, you could find a way to structure this. It wasn't a direct hit on state revenue.

[Sen. Scott Beck (Member)]: I'm sure there's a model they have to

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: this. You would be surprised. I think, Carol, thank you.

[Sen. Scott Beck (Member)]: Thank you, Carol.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: You've been helpful.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: Thank you all. We appreciate your time.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: You know, we're gonna continue to try and do something. I think if this goes through as a 50% of those reduction in

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: This

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: goes through as a reduction in state revenue. It'll be harder to sell if we can find a way to be structured a little differently that will benefit everyone. That will also, I think, be helpful. So, I know Senator Beck will be in touch and we'll see what we can come up with.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: Thank you very much. We appreciate it.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Thank you.

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: Have a great afternoon.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: Cheers. Too. Thanks

[Carol Martin (Head of Corporate Accounting, Weidmann Group)]: a lot for

[Ed Paquin (Former State Representative; Disability Rights advocate)]: your time. Alright. Thank you, everyone. Thank you. Bye.

[Sen. Ann Cummings (Chair)]: I'm gonna give you a five minute break.