Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Alright. Good morning. We are

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: extended here. It's February 27. We have a new draft of s one seventy nine, and we have ledge counsel here to tell us what those new changes are. Yes.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Thank you. Thank you, senator Hashim. Eric, it's Patrick with the office of legislative council here to talk with the committee about a strike all amendment, proposed strike all amendment to s one seventy nine, which is an act relating to the uniform disclaimer of the property interest act. And the changes are quite minimal. As the chair indicated, there are actually two changes between this proposed strike call amendment and the bill as introduced. The first one is you'll see if you look on page four, lines seven through nine. So the way the language reads now, it says to the extent there's no material conflict of interest, a parent can disclaim and then can just basically on behalf of the parent's minor, the parent can disclaim, assuming the minor doesn't have a guardian because that would make sense to think about it. The minor has a guardian, and that person would be the one who would have the right to do the disclaiming. But there's language that was in the draft that's introduced here that said, the way it read back then was, can disclaim on behalf of the parents minor, that part is the same. And that's it for incapacitated child. So the parents could have disclaimed not only just on the basis of the fact that the child is a minor, but also if the child is incapacitated regardless of age. And so I think the study committee had come to the conclusion that that language was not clear enough and wasn't exactly getting at their ken, whatever that may have been. But they had all agreed that those few words or incapacitated child should be struck. So they're not in the language that you see now. Great. So that's change number one. The other one is also a case of language not being there that was there in the bill that was introduced, and that's the very end of the bill. That would be page 15. And you'll see that on page 15, you have a couple of boilerplate pieces of language that are in pretty much all uniform acts. You have on section forty one seventeen, relationship of the electronic signatures in Global and National Commerce Act that pretty much always appears in uniform acts as does the uniformity of application and construction section. There had been another boilerplate that is in virtually all the uniform acts that was a severability clause, and that's where that was. But you don't need that in Vermont because in title one in the Vermont statutes, you have specific language that addresses severability and says that to the extent that some languages ever challenge, it is always severable. So it's applies to all bills whether or not you have the language in there specifically or not. So therefore, it's struck because it's superfluous really. And those are the only two changes. As I mentioned, I drafted it as a strike off. Yep. That way, so it would all appear in the calendar whenever it is that that happens after town meeting. And then I should mention too just in terms of summaries of the vote, and I was speaking with Bob in the on behalf of the Vermont Baruth Association earlier this morning. Ordinarily, when we put together a summary that could be helpful for a floor report, the National Congress of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws on their website has, you know, helpful documents that can be used for and I hadn't checked yet, but according to Bob, evidently, those documents aren't there for this particular bill for whatever reason. Good. I know that's helpful. So Bob has reached out, if I understand correctly. I sent an email to Mark Lincoln, the attorney who was here yesterday to talk with the committee about the bill and asked him to if he might be able to provide a summary maybe based on some of the testimony he gave yesterday that could be used the floor report. So that's kind of in process, but we're still thinking about

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: how that might come together. On the plus side, our our brave reporter has over a week. Yes. Yes. Plenty of time.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Not not much better. Alright. Okay. Next

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: Any questions or comments for Eric? Okay. I see we have Bob and

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: Chris in here. Do either of you folks have any testimony? Good? Thank you.

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: Alright. I would entertain a motion to vote this version of s one seventy nine out.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: So moved.

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: Any further discussion? If you could please call the roll.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Senator Norris? Yes. Senator Baruth? Senator Mattos? Yes.

[Senator Christopher Mattos (Clerk)]: Senator Vyhovsky? Yes. Senator Hashim?

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: Yes.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Senator Baruth? Four zero one. And, mister chair, are you happy to report this one

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: out? Thank you.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: Happy to report. When does Michelle get back?

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: They're leaving today left today, actually. I don't know. I think I've gone for a week, I assume. I don't know exactly the day.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: One eight three supposed to be on the floor Tuesday.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, she'll be back for next week.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: Pass over till Wednesday. They give me some time

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: to review her preparations on the report. Alright. Yep. I believe nope. In time for that, certainly, but I don't know exactly the day. It was fun. Yeah. Which one is that? Remind me.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: 183.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Oh, $1.80 contractor bill. Yeah. Gotcha.

[Senator Robert Norris (Vice Chair)]: So So that that's lane the one. Improvement.

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: We have one ninety three up next. That is on the agenda for ten. So we can stick with ten.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: I don't think we're gonna take

[Senator Nader Hashim (Chair)]: a full hour and a half, but we will have a new version that we're gonna walk through with some of the changes that we made yesterday and have a committee discussion, see if there's any other. So we'll be back at ten.

[Eric FitzPatrick, Office of Legislative Counsel]: Ten.