Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Okay. Good

[Speaker 1]: afternoon once again. Welcome back to the Senate Committee on Government Operations meeting of Tuesday, 02/24/2026. We are joined by Ashton County Senator Ruth Hardy, who has an amendment proposed for S-two 55, which will be on the floor tomorrow. It did not go to Finance Committee as some had expected, myself included. Yeah. They'll be up there. Welcome, Senator Hardy.

[Speaker 2]: And if you would, walk us through your proposal amendment. Alright. Thank you, Senator Collamore and committee. Thank you for having me. As you know, I have concerns with this bill. I've been in to chat with you all in the past, and, you know but I understand you all passed it out, and it will be on the floor tomorrow. So I'm trying to offer an amendment that would it would not address my all of my concerns, but it would maybe help a little bit. As you recall, the two biggest concerns I have with the bill are one, just in general, I think puts the cart forth worse in a couple of instances. One, a couple of years ago in this room, we passed a bill and several of the committee members were cosponsors of that bill to create a county and regional government study committee, which would have looked really more comprehensively at county and regional government and made recommendations for how we might improve the transparency, equity, and accountability of county and regional government, including law enforcement at that level. So that's one thing. Then also, two years ago, we passed or three years ago, we passed act 30, which provided some more oversight of sheriffs, but really it was supposed to be in tandem with a constitutional amendment, which would have opened the door for a way to more expediently remove sheriffs from office if they were not upholding the duties of their their office. Right now, as you all know, the only way for a sheriff to be removed from office is through either resignation or death Yeah. Or impeachment. Mhmm. All of which are difficult, it turns out. And so, as you all know very well, we've had a number of incidences, including recently of sheriffs not performing their duties or or, in fact, engaging in criminal criminal activity while in the execution of their of of their duties. I suppose at this point, it's alleged criminal activity for one of them, but in my district, our sheriff was convicted of criminal activity that he engaged in as a member of as as well he was the sheriff. And this ranges around sexual assault to assault of a somebody in handcuffs to leaving the state to a a number of to financial mal malpieces to just a number of things. So it's concerning overall. So I I think that putting a, you know, expanding the ability to fund and provide sheriff services shouldn't be done until we do more looking at our county government and how we can execute county government and also better accountability for sheriffs. That's just a summary of what I have already said to the committee. So this amendment would unfortunately not do all that, but it is at least a small attempt to strengthen some of the accountability measures that we did enact as part of Act 30. So, a lot of this is just current law that's in here, so it looks longer than it really is. But if you go through the first section is about providing financial reports in the interim between sheriffs, and these are now provided to the auditor. And you see at the top of page two, it would also add the Department of States Attorneys and Sheriffs to getting those reports. And then I'm just gonna

[Speaker 3]: get some easy ask for me.

[Speaker 2]: I think most of these are in this kind of line. The second is the annual audits that the sheriff, the auditor of accounts is supposed to do in the biannual, so they should submit them to the auditor, the department, and the GOV ops committees. Right now, they're only submitted to the judiciary committees, but traditionally, or at least in the last few years, GOV ops committees have actually done more work on sheriff oversight. And then making sure the department had them as well as the auditor. Then again, that's similar on top of page three. And then I added a paragraph, paragraph two in the middle of page three that says after receiving the written report from the auditors, the sheriff shall implement the recommendations of the audit before the following fiscal year or on before thirty days after implementing. And then they have to submit a letter to the auditor detailing the changes they've made to implement the the recommendations of the audit. Send it away.

[Speaker 3]: Thank you, mister chair. So they do have the auditor them so this is where my audits get confusing. So they this is a request when they do their internal audit, but we do get an audit from the auditor. This is the auditor's report. This is the auditor's report. So this so this is not asking the specific sheriffs themselves to do an audit. It's to make sure the report that's done by the auditor is also sent to these folks.

[Speaker 2]: Not an additional It's not an additional audit. It's the audit report that's already required. And this provision would require the sheriff to implement the of the auditor. Right now, there's an audit done, but there's no follow-up to say, hey sheriff, you need to implement these. There's just an audit. So, this says, I see you, Alison. Let me go ahead. Says, implement the recommendations and that willful failure to comply with this section is category B offense. And this is similar to what we have in current law already for some things that the sheriff doesn't follow policy and procedure. And Tim can correct me if I'm wrong or add more information, but a category B offense. Category A are the big ones. Category B are the offenses for if a law enforcement officer does not follow policy or procedures. So, they're more administrative offenses than sort of criminal conduct offenses. So, this and this is consistent with current law that we have in other places. So, this is just trying to underscore some of the accountability measures that we put in in Act 30.

[Speaker 1]: And so are questions?

[Speaker 0]: Correct. Happens when an audit isn't conducted because the CPA was hired because the auditor jobs out the audits. They aren't done by the auditor, they're done by a group they can't CPA contract. What happens when that CPA who's contracted with them refuses to do the audit of a sheriff's office because it is such a mess as what has happened in Windsor County right now. So we have a situation where we don't even have an audit because the auditor who was hired to do the CPA who was hired to do it refused to do it for good reason. Yeah. I I mean, that's part of the challenge that we face here, and I don't think it was done last year either. I'm not sure

[Speaker 2]: if they're done annually. Right? I think they're done bi annually. Are they done bi annually? But, it's, it should be in here. Oh, it's bi annually. Okay. Bi annually. So, I don't know if you have suggestions, Senator, I would love to put in but the auditor's required to do the audit, and the sheriff is required to receive the audit. Yeah. I appreciate all that. And So I don't know what happens if the auditors can't do it when it's such a mess that nobody wants to touch it.

[Speaker 0]: So I would just put that as a flag and maybe a question for our auditor.

[Speaker 2]: If yes. If I can get ahold of them quickly and if they and if there's language I could put in here, I'd be happy to do so.

[Speaker 0]: Maybe he's listening. Maybe he

[Speaker 2]: is listening. So then the next page, top of page four, section two ninety one a, these are about the contracts. As you know, most of the work that sheriffs do, they do through contract. This is, I think, consistent with things in the senator White. I hope that you'll appreciate this. It removes that they can do a contract with an agency of The United States. I see. Yeah. Okay. So that they can't contract with the federal agency for law enforcement. Mean, that's a lot of It's kind of I was surprised that nobody caught that force. Putting it in here. That's why we needed you. Yeah. No. I like attention to detail.

[Speaker 0]: We're shocked. Page top of page five.

[Speaker 2]: So, this is you might recall that we put in act 30, the the requirement that the sheriff keep track of their schedule, because we had sheriffs leaving the state and not coming into work and nobody was sure where they were. So we required them to do that. What what we failed to do is have any consequences or have them report it to anybody. So this would say that they have to submit it their schedule record record monthly to the to the Department of State's Attorneys and Sheriffs and post it publicly on the sheriff's department's website so that there's public accountability for it. And, again, it includes the language that willful failure to comply is a category b offense. The one issue that and just talking briefly when I was going over this language was we have right now actually a sheriff who does not is not a certified law enforcement officer. That's the sheriff in Franklin County. He doesn't have his law enforcement certification. He's decertified. He's been decertified, so for him, a category B offense would mean nothing. He doesn't care about it because he doesn't have a certification. So the question is how do we make non certified law enforcement officers who are still sheriffs because we haven't impeached them and they haven't resigned. How do we make them follow it? I don't know. This was the best I could come up with for the others that do still have their law enforcement certification. Yep. The next about sheriffs being imprisoned. Some of it is just changing the this the pronouns, but the other one is that it is the set I added care paragraph b, that if a pair if a sheriff is confined basically, if a sheriff is in jail, then their salary is suspended while they're in jail. They're not gonna get paid to be a sheriff while they're imprisoned, and that their salary would be reinstated when are released or when they're conditioned, sorry, suspended for the duration of confinement or until the sheriff's duties are restored in accordance with any conditions of replace or court order, whichever occurs later. So, and then, can I just say something?

[Speaker 1]: Set it away.

[Speaker 3]: Specifically on confinement, if they're detained because they are potentially going to go to trial, but have not yet been charged with a crime.

[Speaker 2]: The current statute say confined in prison by legal process. So that would include, let's say,

[Speaker 3]: you had been charged but were waiting for a pending court case, but you were held without bail or you were not able to make bail. Uh-huh. That would be a situation where they

[Speaker 2]: would still I guess according to this language, but that's also under current law that they're not allowed to be the sheriff while they're confined and due to a legal process.

[Speaker 3]: Yes. But they wouldn't get paid in your situation in either. I guess my only thought would be and let's you know, hypothetically, if someone didn't get bail Mhmm. And then they didn't get their salary, but then they were found not guilty. Mhmm. That would feel not great to have denied them. You know, like if someone was falsely accused and was being held and couldn't because they're they're

[Speaker 0]: an asset until proven.

[Speaker 3]: Yeah. So I guess in that situation, I just I I mean, I understand that's a a protection for someone in a very Right. It's a different kind of medical scenario, but, you know, it They're not able

[Speaker 2]: to they're not able to perform their function as sheriffs. That's current law. They're not allowed Yeah. They're not allowed to be confined. And so But this

[Speaker 3]: would also deny them any pay they were owed during that time.

[Speaker 2]: Right. Because they wouldn't be sheriff. They wouldn't be allowed to perform their duties as sheriff if they're confined. They're in in prison. So, I mean, the and it just is suspended. It's not, you know, removed. Removed. It's suspended. So I think there could be a process by which they could get that suspended salary back Okay. If they were found not guilty. Yeah. And then the the next section is, you might recall from act 30, we required the Department of Sheriffs and state seats State attorneys. And sheriffs to adopt to create model policies that sheriffs to adopt. We never actually put in a thing saying sheriffs had to adopt those model policies. So, this would just add each sheriff shall adopt the model policies and then Good. If they don't, willful willful failure to comply again with the category B events. So those are the, you know, they're minimal. I would love to have done more. I would love to have done a constitutional amendment as an as an amendment to the bill, but it seemed and I there are other there were other ideas. I just Tim and I did not have time to pursue them. I was hoping to get a few more days, but I thought So the effective dates though, this is something you should The effective dates of all of the things I just went through would take effect on passage. The effective dates for your pilot program would not take effect until after the county and government regional the county and regional governance study committee created finished its work and the legislature had a chance to, you know, pass legislation. This is similar to the contingency that is in Act 73, the major education policy bill that we passed last year that about the foundation formula not taking effect until after the acceptance of a report about the foundation formula. And so I sort of cribbed that language so that we could get the recommendations from that committee and its report to see if they conflicted with this type pilot program. It's a intention of that to take.

[Speaker 1]: Senator White.

[Speaker 3]: Thank you, mister chair. I'm well, first of all, I really appreciate this amendment. I think it gets at some of the concerns we've heard from yourself and think I heard from one other person kind of related to the general construct of sheriffs and public safety. So I think that helps. I kind of expected your amendment to go into the construction of the pilot itself. So this is, I think, kind of a slightly adjacent to the pilot conversation. So it is significantly different. And I think we would wanna hear from maybe some of the stakeholders we had engaged with on the topic originally. But I really love what you did with the first instances of amendment. The second instances of amendment where you change the effective dates to push it out, I wouldn't be able to be supportive of that. But all of the first part, I would be very open to.

[Speaker 1]: So, I had two or three things written down if you want to jump ahead with me. Did you?

[Speaker 0]: Oh, I thought you said John. I I would agree. I think the number of these measures are really good and and reinforce the work that we've done in this arena. And I'm grateful to you for taking the time. Yeah. For helping us add some detail where we might and I know we need some committee discussion of this. But I again, I I know you think it's cart before the horse, but I I think the pilot's a pilot, and the task force is more abundant. It isn't gonna get started again until the fall, probably later summer. I really hope we do the the task force, but I also I'm really interested in the pilot. And I think for because the pilot's five years, I don't think that it can't be affected by the work of the task force, because I would hope that a number of our sheriffs would be actively engaged in the task force and as their stakeholders to that work and county work. So, would hope that they all might be mutually affected and effective together. Mean, thank you for your suggestions. Those are good ones.

[Speaker 2]: Sure. You're welcome. I think that the irony is that literally the last meeting of the task force, the the meeting we ended up canceling after the election last time was actually to talk about regional law enforcement. And then the the task force never met again.

[Speaker 0]: Because of the election. Because both chairs were not. Well, but Alain was still chair until January.

[Speaker 2]: Yeah. But, you know, he wasn't reelected. And December is a tough month.

[Speaker 0]: They did. Yeah. And you didn't know about you, though.

[Speaker 2]: Yeah. Yeah. But without him being at the table, I wasn't gonna meet. And also another member of the committee didn't get reelected. So two members were not reelected, and then, you know, I wasn't put back in the chair. So and then it never met again. So, you know, it's it was a it's it's a really wasted opportunity to not have had at this point, we should have had recommendations and they may have been about law enforcement, but there was so much more in that study. And my concern is that we're creating yet another layer of regional government that the the, like, whole advisory committee thing or whatever you guys called it. It's just another layer. There are, like, 13 plus layers of regional government right now already in Vermont. So to create another layer at this time seems premature without having a larger plan for how to implement How to fit it in. How to fit it in. And, you know, we have these pilot programs that often get expanded because they seem good in a vacuum. And what I think we need to be doing is looking more broadly without layering things on because the layering of things on creates confusion for constituents. It creates inequity of services. It creates a lack of transparency, and it it creates a lot of cost. So we could have much more effective and efficient regional government if we did look at it more holistically. And I'm afraid that doing this kind of thing, you know, it it just it just negates that entire possibility of of really looking at it. And I also was shocked, frankly, that you guys made the amendment that allowed a levy of taxes without the support, without the vote of of the population. Every to levy school taxes, there has to be a a full vote of to levy municipal taxes, there has to be a full vote. County taxes are the only property They are.

[Speaker 0]: Because when we redid our courthouse, we did

[Speaker 2]: not have a vote on Exactly. And that is wrong. That's one of the reasons why we need to look at county government and say, how is this accountable and transparent? If you listen to that that podcast, the brave little state, they came to my county when they voted on the county budget, and there were five people in the room, three of whom worked for county government. That's not transparent. That's not equitable. And you're layering on the ability to levy property taxes at a time when property taxes are top of mind for everyone. And you're doing it in a way that the voters will not have knowledge or the ability to participate in the project. Well, hopefully, they will have knowledge. Hopefully, if this is well run, they will haul. There will have been a whole education campaign on what they're voting for. I would hope that that would not be true.

[Speaker 1]: So here are my questions.

[Speaker 2]: Yes.

[Speaker 0]: What

[Speaker 1]: happens with a category B offense? What is the penalty? What is the punicion?

[Speaker 2]: So that is up to the criminal justice council. And I think and and Tim and I talked about this just recently. I I think there's a layering on of them. And if they get certain number of them Okay. They can have a revocation. Secondary. Or it can go up to a category one, but it is, you know Okay. It's lower than a category

[Speaker 1]: A.

[Speaker 2]: A, which is which are the the the badder Category badder things.

[Speaker 0]: I think category b's add up, your license the checks on your license.

[Speaker 1]: To be fair, I think we ought to hear from the Department of State's Attorneys and Sheriffs Yeah. About the amendment since it involves them.

[Speaker 0]: Mhmm.

[Speaker 1]: Especially the elimination of the contract where some of them I don't know whether any of them are currently engaged in a contract with an agency of The United States. I don't know if they are or they're not.

[Speaker 0]: But

[Speaker 1]: We

[Speaker 0]: didn't allow that in the work we did last year. I don't believe we're allowed local law enforcement to enter into Okay. Contracts with federal agents. They're not allowed to come

[Speaker 2]: to support with them, but there's I don't think we prohibited contracts. No. Not in this way.

[Speaker 3]: And to just be clear no. No. No. We what we did you're thinking about what we did with the dagmatization. We did we changed it so that previously the governor you didn't need the governor's signature in a state of emergency to deputize sheriffs included. Could have been local law enforcement. We changed it so that the governor has to sign up even in the time of emergency. So, technically, local law enforcement can still

[Speaker 0]: Could still

[Speaker 3]: have work with them, but they couldn't be forced deputies by ICE.

[Speaker 1]: Yeah. So my question for the committee is, should we ask to pass over this tomorrow so that we can hear from Department of State's Attorneys and Sheriffs, or shall we just go ahead and have Senator Hardy offer her amendment on second reading and get what reaction we're gonna get. Senator what?

[Speaker 3]: Well, would just say I like, as I described, part of Senator Hardy's amendment, and I would like to see that in the bill either way. I would not be comfortable with the push out of the date of the pilot existing. So I'm wondering if there are pieces that we could take as an amendment that we look at as a committee. And then if there were you know, and then you, of of course, can bring up the parts that we don't do. This the amendment.

[Speaker 0]: Is But you can divide it, Becca.

[Speaker 3]: Well, yeah. If that's the case, then I'm happy to divide the amendment on the floor.

[Speaker 2]: But You may get other suggestions from the department, additional things. Yeah. And this was my literally just going to the statute then. And this is my amendment and I would like it I would like to offer it as the whole amendment. Good. The committee, you guys can take Because Michelle has them respond. And I wanted to do it on second reading. Yeah, I'd like to do it on second reading. So if you want to have the department in, if you can ask to pass over the bill, that would be helpful.

[Speaker 1]: I think that's only fair. Yeah. And Those are my questions. Well, I

[Speaker 3]: just I just think you have a less likely chance of getting your amendment on the floor than you do getting parts of it in this bill as it is. So if I'm understanding correctly, if we hear back from the organ we should hear from the state's attorney, and we probably should hear from the sheriff.

[Speaker 1]: Well, it's one department.

[Speaker 3]: Okay. And they disagree with everything, you're gonna lose. She could lose the whole thing. You know what I'm saying? I guess I'm

[Speaker 2]: just trying to figure out.

[Speaker 3]: I do want some of those changes in there.

[Speaker 2]: I I I think that the Department of Sheriffs and State's Attorney will be supportive of

[Speaker 0]: the Department Justice. Okay.

[Speaker 3]: Oh, then I'm misunderstanding the dynamics here.

[Speaker 2]: No. I think In fact, they may have more things that they would like to add

[Speaker 3]: to. Oh, okay.

[Speaker 1]: Well, I'm not necessarily hoping that that's in

[Speaker 0]: a week. Well, we probably This has been a long on bills.

[Speaker 1]: Yeah. Somewhat torturing process here.

[Speaker 0]: Oh. We've taken a lot of testimony.

[Speaker 2]: So

[Speaker 0]: I would suggest you hear as soon as

[Speaker 2]: possible from the state of

[Speaker 0]: your enemies and sheriffs and that we pass over S two fifty five. Okay.

[Speaker 1]: Does anyone not think that's the right way to go? Okay. Then I will go up when we adjourn here for a brief.

[Speaker 2]: So I will wait to submit this to the calendar until I hear from you guys.

[Speaker 1]: Or you could submit it and that way they can look at it.

[Speaker 2]: Yeah. Well, if you got any more good ideas, you might want to add? Okay. I will wait to hear from you all about what happens with the testimony from the department. Okay. And then take it from there.

[Speaker 1]: Can we make a note to see if we can get the Department of State's Attorneys and Jerusalem tomorrow? Tim Wooters. Just as quickly as we can.

[Speaker 2]: And one question I would ask them, because I couldn't figure out how to do handle it, is for for a sheriff that has already lost their law enforcement license. How do we how are what are their ways to better hold them accountable besides, obviously, impeachment? Because the category B offense wouldn't hold them accountable because they wouldn't they've already lost it, so it doesn't really matter to them. So if they have ideas, that would be helpful.

[Speaker 1]: So let me suggest, Linda, that we have them come in at 01:30, And since all the testimony on the next bill, that 192 is Tucker, David Weeks, Christy Morris, and the BL-fifteen team, we could push them down in So we could have one 30 Department of State's Attorneys and Sheriffs, and then two S-one 192. You can look at the agenda and see if I

[Speaker 0]: can The next day might be in that too. Okay.

[Speaker 1]: Okay.

[Speaker 2]: All right, thank you all. I really appreciate your consideration.

[Speaker 0]: So, committee- Thank you for your thoughtfulness.

[Speaker 2]: Yeah. My pleasure.

[Speaker 1]: Let's take a ten minute break, because I know that won't be ten minutes.

[Speaker 0]: Oh, good.

[Speaker 1]: And we'll come back on at 03:30 with the next bill, is

[Speaker 0]: 02:28. 2 twenty eight.