Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: Good afternoon, and welcome again to the Assigned Committee on Government Operations Committee meeting of Wednesday, 02/11/2026. We're joined by, I believe, three folks, maybe it's two, from the Disability Advocacy Day group. And I want to welcome in, are you going to start things off, sir? Okay. Very quickly, Senator Morley is not with us. Senator Clarkson from the Windsor District, Brian Collamore from Rutland. And Jack Hovsky. Committee of Senator.

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: Tanya Vyhovsky, and then Senator

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: White, also from the Windsor District. She'll be back in this moment, too. So welcome. Thank you. Oh my gosh.

[Sarah Launderville (Executive Director, Vermont Center for Independent Living)]: Thank you so much. That was you guys just had a marathon. It's okay. Good. It's your way you used Well, good afternoon. Nice to you. Laura, there is just two of us today. I'm just leaving after me. So name is Sarah Launderville, and I'm the Executive Director of the Vermont Center for Independent Living. BCGAR is a statewide disability justice organization and will be our people with disabilities working together for dignity, independence, civil rights. And we're also a proud member of the Vermont Coalition for Disability Rights, in which I serve as a pessimist. BC DERR is a coalition of organizations throughout Vermont focused on protecting and advancing the rights of individuals with disabilities, and I'm also a person who has disabilities. The theme for this year's Disability Advocacy Day is write disability rights into every bill. And so I want to thank your community for being curious and about inviting us to come and talk to you a little bit about that today. BCDR has five principles, including Disability is a natural part of the human condition Putting community supports before institutional supports Supporting self determination and independent living Support community based living and peer support and dignity and respect for people with disabilities, and that includes through education, food security, housing, work, and full inclusion. Nowhere in our theme is it more fitting than here, where you shape the rules of governments, elections, transparency, emergency response, and local governance that we talk about writing this into every bill. Unlike some of the committees we're speaking in front of today that might not see a direct connection to our theme, we know that in the past we have written into language ways people with disabilities can engage. What I've experienced over the years and after these bills leave the Stakehouse, the intent of inclusion is sometimes and often meant with defensiveness and bias that is difficult for people with disabilities to go and navigate. We should continue to work on ways for people with disabilities to be able to circle back to you. Disabled Vermonters are one of the largest constituents affected about how government operates. Whether people can vote privately and independently, whether public meetings are accessible, whether emergency alerts and shelters serve everyone, whether administrative processes and charter changes include disability access, and whether state systems consider people living in poverty using assistive technology and navigating complex benefits. My colleague Lori is going to spend a good amount of time talking about the community's experience with voting in local elections, and I won't spend a lot of time on that, with one exception. It's essential that people with lived experience of disability, especially those currently facing barriers to voting, are genuinely heard and taken seriously. Too often reports from leadership and testimony from professionals give the appearance of including disability perspective. Real inclusion requires a different starting point. Asking who faces the greatest barriers and what would it take to ensure that they can participate fully, Build policy from that hardest case scenario rather than defaulting to either we've done it this way forever or it's tradition because that always includes people with disabilities. One example that comes up from time to time is the requirement to have signatures on a petition to get on the ballot. There's a large difference between able-bodied individuals being able to walk from house to house compared to someone who uses a wheelchair and can't access individuals front doors because there's a set of stairs in front of them. We need to consider, quote, tradition and make processes accessible to our select boards, school boards, legislature, and have more people participating with lived experience of disability. Before moving towards new and exciting voting options, it would be important to acknowledge disabled voters already left out of systems, and VCIL is in full support of statutory changes that would require that all municipal votes be taken by Australian ballot rather than floor votes to ensure greater accessibility and greater participation in our local democracy. One issue that we hear about at BCIL from different systems is the process for providing reasonable accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act. The Senate Government Operations Committee is uniquely positioned to improve how reasonable accommodations under the ADA function across state government and Vermont municipalities. Many ADA related problems such as inconsistent accommodation procedures, unclear timelines, inequitable access to public meetings, discrimination, or uneven training among managers, municipal officials often stem from gaps in statewide policy rather than the Americans with Disabilities Act itself. While some of this is in place, the committee could strengthen compliance by reviewing and establishing uniform statewide accommodation procedures for agencies and municipalities, requiring ADA and accessible training for state and local officials, improving the visibility and authority of ADA coordinators, and standardizing accessibility expectations for public meetings, documents, and digital communications. As the body responsible for public records of the meetings, elections, and local governance, the committee can also ensure that civic participation, including voting, remote meeting access, and public information is fully accessible to Deaf and disabled providers. So many of our systems rely heavily on volunteers and Vermaat, and while it is really good, and we all promote that, what often goes unaddressed is the harm that it can cause to different populations, including people with disabilities. When we bring up the issues, we are most of the time met with defensiveness or individual bias around disabilities. We hear comments like, Well, we didn't have time to get an American Sign Language interpreter, or We're all in this together, and we're just trying to do the best we can. We further see public entities presenting awards to groups of people that have given so much of their volunteer efforts, but have often created hardships for individuals with disabilities in their efforts. It's a very hard conversation that we have, But it needs to happen in preparation before the next emergency, the next flood, the next whatever. We're not saying that people shouldn't give their time and effort, but we are saying that we need to be intentional in how to support that volunteer base and to have policies in place to protect individuals with disabilities if they have complaints. Relying heavily on volunteers and emergency management systems can unintentionally put people with disabilities at greater risk because volunteers often lack training, consistency, preparedness needed to meet disability related needs during a crisis. Emergency response requires knowledge of accessible evacuation procedures, safe handling of mobility devices, communication with people who are deaf, hard of hearing, or have intellectual or developmental disabilities, and understanding of medical, sensory, or other needs. And volunteers who may be well intentioned, but untrained can easily overlook these requirements, leading to unsafe evacuations, the separation of individuals from essential equipment and caregivers, or the inability to communicate critical instructions in accessible formats. And unlike professional responders, volunteers may not understand or be held to the same standards regarding confidentiality, ADA obligations, technology needs, service animal protections, or how to maintain disability related supports in chaotic conditions. Additionally, volunteer based systems often suffer from inconsistency, turnover, and availability. During large scale floods, storms, or mass evacuation events, disabled Vermonters may depend on predictable systems like transportation assistance, shelter accessibility, power for medical equipment, and access to medication or personal care support. The issues can arise in gaps of service, miscommunication, and delayed or denied assistance. In rural areas where Vermont relies especially heavily on volunteer emergency personnel, these gaps can even be larger. Emergency management becomes unreliable when the backbone of the system is composed of people who can only help when they're available, who may not have ongoing competency training, or who cannot provide sustaining support through the duration of the emergency. And for people with disabilities, as you imagine, those unreliable systems can mean life threatening consequences. We really appreciate the opportunity to share some of these experiences with you today, and I look forward to connecting with you, individuals who have lived experience as it comes up. I know right before this meeting, Caitlin Rose sent you or I think sent to your committee of a new RevUp coalition that's starting in the state of Vermont to really hone in and draw attention to lack of voting access for individuals with disabilities. I'm done for now. Don't know you have a chance for me. Sarah,

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: thank you very much. Laura, you're on.

[Laura Cushman (Attorney, Disability Rights Vermont)]: Great. Thank you. And thank you, Sarah. Honorable chair, Vice Chair and Senators, good afternoon. I'm Laura Cushman. I am an attorney at Disability Rights Vermont. Thank you for this opportunity to speak today on Disability Advocacy Day. If you're not familiar with Disability Rights Vermont, we are the Protection and Advocacy Agency for the State of Vermont or the P and A. Protection and Advocacy System is a nationwide network of federally mandated nonprofit legal organizations advocating for the rights of people with disabilities. The United States Congress established the P and A System in the 1970s after news media exposed horrific and negligent treatment of people with disabilities at a New York state facility called Willowbrook. PNAs receive federal grants to investigate and remedy abuse, neglect, serious rights violations that impact individuals with disabilities, whether they're perpetrated by state actors, private facilities, caregivers, employers, or others. And given our role as the P and A, Disability Rights Vermont is also the designated mental health care ombudsman for Vermont. So over twenty five percent of Vermonters live with disabilities. Every one of us is only one accident or trauma away from being a person with disabilities. Ableism is a social prejudice against people with disabilities based in a belief that people with typical abilities are superior. But people with disabilities are not broken, they are not less than, and they do not require fixing. If our policymakers ignore the reality that negative stereotypes and misconceptions about disability have other the disabled members of our community as inferior, then the policies they create will fail to meet Vermont's constitution's promise in Chapter one, Article eight that our state government is instituted for the common benefit, protection, and security of all the people, families, and communities of Vermont. Disability Rights Vermont has been focusing efforts and working in coalition with other civil rights and disability rights organizations, including the Human Rights Commission, American Civil Liberties Union of Vermont, the Vermont Center for Independent Living, the League of Women Voters, and others to make recommendations that will remedy institutional inequality in our voting systems. Vermont has failed to ensure that all Vermonters can access every opportunity to vote. It's true that 71% of registered voters in Vermont cast a ballot in the presidential general election in 2024, which puts us in the top 10% in the nation for general elections. However, according to the MIT Election and Data Science Lab, Vermont is ranked forty ninth in The United States in disability access performance, as Vermonters with disabilities are deterred from voting. This is a shameful statistic. One contributing factor that deters Vermonters Vermont voters with disabilities is that town meeting is wholly inaccessible to many disabled Vermonters because 68% of towns still use floor votes for town meeting day, as well as four votes for public offices, select boards, budgets, and municipal policies. Any person who is confined to their home due to disability is automatically excluded from voting in these elections. And that is a violation of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Vermont Public Accommodations Act. Although many Vermonters are very attached to this tradition of floor votes, We have also learned that when we know better, we must do better. And to do better, we must make participation in town meetings and open meetings, engagement in the vote, as well as one's ability to run for public office universally accessible. The legislature must set clear and appropriate standards for access to local meetings and local elections. We clearly advocate for disability access, but accessibility is about more than compliance with the law. Everyone should be able to fully participate in the democratic process and to answer their duty to civically engage. If we are committed to that, then we must develop solutions to meet the needs of all users with disabilities or without. Universal design provides a path for us to broaden accessibility not only to people with disabilities, but also to non English speaking Vermonters, Vermonters caring for small children or elders, rural Vermonters who lack transportation, and those Vermonters who must work on town meeting day. DRVT and our coalition of civil and disability rights organizations support enacting a Vermont Voting Rights Act as proposed in S two ninety eight, but insist that for our electoral process to be truly inclusive and to effectively protect the rights of Vermonters, it must incorporate the following. Local non advisory public bodies, like state non advisory public bodies, should hold all regular and special meetings in a hybrid fashion. This could be accomplished by eliminating the distinction between state and local non advisory public bodies in one VSA section three twelve. Title 17, Chapter 55 should be reviewed for consistency with the ADA and the VPAA, including local government's affirmative obligation to review the accessibility of their local policies and procedures to ensure that all residents are able to exercise their fundamental right to participate, to vote, and participate in electoral politics, and expand access by offering hybrid participation and by implementing Australian ballots in all elections. S299.7, which proposes to authorize municipalities to adopt an electronic ballot return for local elections that use Australian ballot, is only truly effective if all municipalities are using Australian ballot. Again, Australian ballots are essential for voter accessibility. By making all participation in public meetings and voting more accessible, we reduce the overall need for reasonable accommodation requests. And where accommodation is still needed by people with disabilities, they should have a standardized process to follow, which does not require them to publicly disclose their personal health information as they do now in some localities. It is imperative that we ensure the future reasonable accommodation requests should be made confidentially to a designated person with appropriate training. You have an enormous amount of important work and proposals to consider before you. For these bills that I've mentioned related to voting and for the 38 other bills currently before the Senate Committee on Government Operations, I ask that you consider each of them from a disability perspective and with a clear understanding how your decisions might impact Vermonters with disabilities directly or indirectly. I appreciate your time and attention and for allowing me to advocate on Disability Advocacy Day, and I'm happy to, answer any questions that I'm available to provide additional information. Thank you.

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: I have two what I think are fairly quick questions. Is any of your federal funding in danger or has it been reduced?

[Laura Cushman (Attorney, Disability Rights Vermont)]: We some of our federal funding right now, you know, is shut down. But thus far, we are level funded.

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: Okay. Okay. And with that, what percentage of the complaints or concerns that come in are you actually able to take up and do something with? Because I I appreciate everything you're saying, but our rights are really only as good as the paper they're written on if we can't enforce them.

[Laura Cushman (Attorney, Disability Rights Vermont)]: I would have to I couldn't give you a number. We get so many calls every day and the ones that actually end up getting assigned. I mean, we assist everyone at least with referrals to appropriate organizations that can more appropriately assist or address the issue at hand. But yeah, I can look into that and get you numbers about the percentages that we, are actually able to take on as clients.

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: Yeah. I really appreciate that.

[Sarah Launderville (Executive Director, Vermont Center for Independent Living)]: I want

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: to be clear it's not a in any way a reflection on the work you're doing, but I'm fairly certain you, like many of the organizations like you, horrifically underfunded.

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: Well,

[Laura Cushman (Attorney, Disability Rights Vermont)]: I can't disagree on that.

[Sarah Launderville (Executive Director, Vermont Center for Independent Living)]: On that

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: point. Thank you very much, Laura and Sarah. Thank you. For taking your time with us today, and Have a good rest of the day. Thanks. Thanks

[Laura Cushman (Attorney, Disability Rights Vermont)]: so much.

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: Again, I'd ask the committee to remain in your seats. We have another Okay.

[Senator Tanya Vyhovsky (Vice Chair)]: All right.

[Senator Brian Collamore (Chair)]: The danger, I run here. Pulling another senator out of the Senate Finance Act in order to design the tax on the next bill, and I hold her 230ish, so I don't wanna