Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Okay. You're live.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: This is, I'm Richard Westman, and this is the Senate Transportation Committee, and we're resuming testimony with Secretary Flynn. And we're sorry we're a little late. We had a little technical difficulty. And secretary, if you've got as much time as you'd like. Thank you

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: very much, chair Westman, and for the record, my name is Joe Flynn. I'm secretary of the agency of transportation. With me today in the room, seated near the window, chief engineer Jeremy Reed and DMV commissioner Andrew Collier. And then to my right, Maureen Parker, the deputy director of finance and administration, Todd Law, the Director of Fleet Ernie Patno, the Director of Maintenance and Michelle Boomhauer, the Director of Policy Planning and Intermodal Development. Director Morris is in house of hopes with our CFO today. That's why she's not here. So we're here to talk about what's been accomplished, and I'm gonna run through this, and clearly, any questions that this causes you to have, please let me know. I think the goal is to go through this timely and then allow you all to ask all of us anything that you would like and direct the conversation. This

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: presentation is not posted right now, but will be shortly.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Correct.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: We will be sure of posting it right now.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Okay. Perfect. Great. Great. Is the video the blue link below?

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Yeah. Just click on that link.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: The inbox.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: And just hit allow. Yeah. Fingers crossed. Maybe if you highlight the whole thing. The Get the Oh, it's going on yours. Why is it? Yeah. No, it's not that. You'd

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: probably have to send it to the shared screen. Yeah, it opened in a different window probably. Okay,

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: alright, so we'll just go here, and we're gonna go here.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: And

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: then I don't know.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: On an off ramp.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: It's not it's not going through. Can we shut that volume off or no? No. Because then everybody else won't be able to hear. Wow.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: That's If you shut maybe wait. Was it coming out?

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: It came out of the PowerPoint, but not out of the camera. I well, I shared the file. I

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: shared the screen. What?

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Can you mute Joe's computer?

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: It's it's already muted, but that is also mute. If they turn it on, then both go on. Why don't you just look at the nice at the location. Which is also going in slow motion. Maybe we won't look at the pictures because it's not coming through.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Is that my end? Well, we could we could talk to this. Really, let's just start it again here.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Oh, you don't need to start it again. They've all been You seeing

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: know, I think one of the things about this what the engineers said, and Jeremy can certainly lend more to this, but this wasn't just a bridge project. It was multi components to this. It was on and off ramps. It was the bridge. It was the intersection at Route 2 and Route 7. A lot of individually complex projects rolled into one large project all at the same time handling thousands of vehicles every day. And I can say that because I'm one of them who travels through that and did every single day, so it really was a pretty unique situation. What we're talking about here is the rapid successes that we've seen in rail, in particular with upgrading 29 rail bridges the last calendar year, which is further on in this as well. And I believe this will say, and we'll follow it in a further PowerPoint, that we are up in the 90% of our bridges today on our rail system are at the £236,000 national standard, whereas about ten years ago, it was about 30%. But '29 bridge projects were finished were done. Started and finished last year. The new facility, most of you are aware of this. Excuse me. Up until we built this, it opened up about a year ago. This is our first full winter out of this facility right off the interstate at Exit 1, the second exit in Saint Aldo. Cuts our time to get to the interstate probably by a factor of three, if not more. It's sufficient. It it just it's a beautiful facility, and I'm certainly happy to take you up here to show it to you anytime you guys take field trips. It's it's a net zero, I think, is the correct terminology. Mhmm. It's solar and pellet with solar for EV as well as EV charging as you see right here. Oh, it's the floor. It looks like it's plywood floor. No. I don't know the I didn't catch that, but no. It's not. It's it's probably radiant heat, but Yes. They have mats underneath the

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: plow, so it looks like

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Oh, in there. Yeah. Fine.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: So I'll get you back to the other screen then.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Well, he's a drone videographer, at least, is who

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: we Yeah.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: Well, they have a drone photographer.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yeah.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Can you go under bridges?

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: That's go in. Okay. Me in.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Alright. So the first series of talking points are gonna be regarding the highway division, you know, Jeremy and Aaron. And you can see the staffing. I'm not intending to, but happy to if you'd like, but read everything you see. The picture you're looking at is, Industrial Avenue in Williston, Williston Road. It's it's a it's a busy intersection. It has been forever. It was a intersection that required an awful lot of utilities movement. There was actually goes back into the throes of the pandemic. We had some delays simply because the utility companies couldn't get some of the utilities they needed to move fast enough. But it's a tremendous enhancement. That used to be single in and out if you from the direction you're looking at. You've got Ireland Concrete up there, which is SD or was SD Griswold for years, plus the Avenue A B C D Industrial Parks, tremendous amount of truck traffic. And while it's not in this picture, but at the other end of Industrial Avenue, we have that other project that's similar to this where 2A Paints Industrial Avenue. But you see the different bureaus within the highway division, construction and materials, operations and safety, project delivery, and asset management, and then the various individual offices between each of those. Just highlighting a few of the projects again, you saw Exit 17 in the video, But as I said, you know, it was the bridge, but it was also the Route 2 And 7 interchange. And, there's there's just a lot happening there. There's a convenience store on the corner. The amount of traffic that actually goes off the interstate heading to Milton and heading to Colchester on top of, of course, what heads west to the islands and to New York. This is the major thoroughfare to the Grand Isle Ferry. Tremendous number of commuters every day from New York. They go right by my house in South Hero. It really you know, from a from a building perspective, it's impressive, but I I really have to say the logistics of this project were tremendously successful. And I say that not just sitting here as a secretary, but as somebody who drove that every day throughout the entire length of that project. And frankly, the comments that complement how well it was handled from people I know who live in the county who reached out to me were 10 times the number of the two or three who reached out critical. And that's just people choosing to reach out. So often that's sort of the sentiment that we don't otherwise hear. On my right, the slide of the Reedsboro Bridge, a pretty complicated project as well. Just setting the temporary bridge was a big effort. It's a large span. The structure that's being replaced is a complicated project. It's going to be a long span, three seventy feet, I believe, and it's also going to carry the town water and sewer system under it. So again, this is underway right now, right down near the mass border. Royalton, if you're traveling 89, Senator White, showing your neighborhood coming back and forth from White River. This is underway right now. These are the north and southbound barrels, the bridges, right there when you get off. Complete rehab of both of those. And then the picture to my right is the bridge in Quechis. Again, it's a historic structure. It's a structure that we took a lot of input on from the public, number of meetings, diverse feelings, including not just business and tourism, but personal and emotional because of some of the history related to the bridge. And I I will say because I know one individual, you know, and there was there's a high degree of empathy that went into how this bridge was being ultimately delivered because of some of the history around it as a structure. And frankly, I'm proud of the agency, the the decisions that it made, and the fact that we take some of that into account as well, as we should. You've seen these slides before. These are basically, I can go back and date myself, but results based accountability. These are our bar charts showing rich condition. We are really, while you do see some purple at the bottom of each of those columns, which indicates poor condition, every time I say that, I emphasize that it is not correlated to safety. If we have a bridge that we are at all questioning the safety of, we close it immediately, and then we investigate it further. So deteriorating condition, deteriorated condition is not safety. We are in, frankly, in good shape, if you will, data wise, on our bridges in the state of Vermont at a at a national level and as at a regional level. The devil in those details, and you've heard us testify to that before, is that much of the supplemental grant money we've seen available thus far, and we don't know what, of course, reauthorization will provide, we have not been as successful as we would have liked, and the word we hear is because you've actually done such a good job maintaining your bridges in Vermont, we want to direct that money to other states where the conditions are worse. We don't rest on the laurels here because once you allow a bridge to get away from you, it's extremely expensive to get it back, if you will, but the work here shows, I think, in the data that we present on the bridge condition. We move to pavement. We've all had this conversation. I know you know this chart. We can point to the fact that you see '22, '23 were relatively constant with respect to poor and very poor. There was a decline in what's measured in poor and very poor, which is invertibly good news, if you will, for the calendar of '24. I don't believe we completed all the '25 data. That's why you just don't see that now. I will say the other thing you've heard me say as well, so anyone watching this or or enough to watch this or watch me Yes. Regarding pavement conditions, We don't forget the fact that if you live in Vermont and drive in Vermont in an area that's poor or very poor, that's a 100% of your experience. We understand that. So it's not lost on us when we show these numbers, but we are currently at least showing a drop in those conditions. Of course, we all know the risks we face going forward, none of this is to not address that, which we will, of course, over the rest of the months here. Go ahead.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Yes. We have a question.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. And to that point you're making right now, I've been anecdotally asking constituents what percentage of roads do you think are very poor quality in Vermont? And across the bat, almost everyone starts with 30%, 40%, 70%. I've never gotten anyone in the since our eighteenth meeting who has said as low as what it actually is. So I'm wondering if you have a reflection on that. If that if that is because people are experiencing maybe municipal road quality being lower or why why do you think that perspective is being shared, at least anecdotally?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: No. That's a great question. There might be three things that come to my mind immediately. One might be, I'm not sure that any of us, other than those of us who know about it in this room, including this committee, have awareness necessarily as where the state road or the municipal road starts and stops or the town road. So I think that's part of it. I think that, again, it depends on how far a person drives, and who are you asking, and what is their motoring experience with respect to where do they travel. And like I said a moment ago, if where they travel is more local, our roads in this case happen to be in worse shape, that's probably their experience. And then I think just as people, how many times have all of us heard, in particular in the transportation space, well, it was the worst mud season ever. It was the driest summer ever. It was the dullest foliage season ever. It's the worst road ever, you know? And so and that's not to say that what people are experiencing isn't real to them, but I do think there's a piece of that as well. And, you know, regarding winter so far, and we may talk more about this later, there's a completely different experience between a snowstorm that we plow off and what people see when they drive, or an ice storm like we had a week and a half ago, which the results of which can linger for several days, as you know. I mean, the the wheel tracks can be fine, and it can meet the snow and ice control plan, but when it's 16 degrees or eight degrees, the wind's blowing, and the snow is swirling around like little dirt devils, in order to say this and talk more than I, with more real experience, but it it's much harder there. And you do end up with, you know, ice along the shoulders and sometimes in the center of the road if it's a two lane Vermont state road. And so the perception of that as well could probably influence the answer somebody gives you.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: That's true. I've only been asking in winter.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Very well. Thank

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: you.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Sure. Well, I I would just say, you might go, if I'm on a 40 mile trip and I get one pothole that Right. Colors the whole picture. No. That's a good point as well.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Our crash data, and you probably heard this from the prior testimony, first thing I'd say is it's not complete yet for calorie 25. While the year is done, there are things like toxicology that are still out on some crashes, and I'm sure there are still investigations. I mean, obviously, an unfortunate reality is a fatality is a fatality, but causation is really what is not always quickly determined as far as impairment or anything like that. So the data is not quite complete yet for the month, but what the takeaways are is that while there were fewer fatal crashes in the last year, there were I'm sorry. Yeah. Slightly larger. This is pretty small, Michelle. It's nice. We're slightly higher on both fatal crashes and fatalities. One of the things that's interesting in looking through this, which I did the other day, you'll see alcohol only related fatalities are down quite a lot, which is encouraging news. However, drug related fatalities have flipped the scenario, which is not encouraging news. Then of course, you've got It's the combination of drugs and alcohol. One of the other things that just frustratingly remains consistent is the number of crashes, the number of fatalities where the person who died was not wearing a seat belt. And while it's Vermont, and I don't know what the testimony was prior to me, but we are, I believe, in the low nineties as far as compliance for seat belt use in Vermont. We are among the highest in the country, even without primary stop, which is really good news, and that has crept upward. However, we unfortunately remain kind of static at well over fifty percent of the people who die in Vermont, on Vermont roads, in a vehicle where a seatbelt was available, because we have to make sure we're not counting pedestrians or any bikini or a motorcycle or a bicycle, but let's talk cars and pickup trucks. We are still about the same percentage of people. It's just staggering. Unscientifically, I will tell you that what I see when I get these reports, every single one, and I'm sure that we could substantiate my comment here with real data, but what we're really seeing as well is young males, which you know, when I was a middle aged guy, it wasn't that uncommon to hear older people because maybe it was generational. They lived most of their lives or they drove half their lives. They certainly started their driving experience without seat belts even in cars and might have just said, I'm not doing this. But, you know, you'd think I'm just you know, as a guy, as a dad, as a granddad, you just think that young people today would have heard this so many places, and to see, in young males in particular, we see that a lot, which is, I guess, perhaps one of the things I take away from that is there's opportunity here for more educational moments, I

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: would hope. But I think they're dismantling the belt. Like, I wanna strangle somebody when I hear for, like, thirty seconds. I can't even drive.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yeah. Well, I think what a lot of people do is they buckle the the belt behind.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Oh, yeah.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Just buckle it and then get in the seat. And it could be a bit uncomfortable, but I I guess yeah. Because we would have to assume that in most cases, the vehicle has to have them, of course, in order to have a inspection sticker. Right. And I'm sure there are some instances if you could have been a vehicle that is yet to be inspected because of somebody Or it got a lot of stuff. Right. So that's a that's a troubling statistic

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: that just seems to be holding true. I would just we we did have safety people in there just before you and Dave were for quite a good, and so they do have the chart Okay. How many people are willing to go out, and and a comparison to the national average for us, we don't have, but we're gonna do that. I'm asking asking those questions because I know the chair that was in this seat for a very long time, Senator Masso would have been asking those questions. Yep. Sure. Appreciates

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: you continuing that. District maintenance and fleet. Again, as far as the orange column, you're looking at our current total staff, the current total appropriation. This is, of course, federal I'm sorry, state fiscal '26. Photographs are of District 8, and then you see along the bottom how district maintenance is broken up in the five regions around Vermont with the pertinent districts within each of those region regions. But a little bit of recollection here on some of the storm issues that we've had. 2025 was literally the third year in a row, same day same day, that we had damage in Vermont. It was much less, of course, than it was in 2023 and in 2024, with '23 being the worst as far as the amount of damage and the number of and then widespread nature of it. But this is up in the Sheffield, Kirby area, just north of Linenville, bigger, like, West Burr. They got hit extremely hard and and, you know, including some of the town roads up in that area as well. This is the event that the appeal of the original denial is related to. So the picture you're seeing here. And part of that, not that it's in our slide, that's the EM shop, but part of that was there was some data that we did not have as a state from some of the towns. And so the the publicity around the denial caused us to ask more questions of the towns because we were hearing things anecdotally. Much more information came in, which was, frankly, grounds for the appeal. Okay. So that said, it's still out, but you'll see it's typical damage to what we see often, and it doesn't necessarily take a horrific event, but with debris in the waterway and fast water, often what'll happen is you'll see a culvert get blocked and the water's gonna find a way around it, or a bridge get blocked and the water will find a way around it. So often when we say a bridge is out, it's not necessarily the bridge structure itself that's compromised, but you can't get to the bridge from either side, so that's what has to be rebuilt. But in the orange, it gives you a sense of, at least on the federal highways, this is not FEMA. These are not FEMA numbers. But when we talk about things like the climate or we talk about things like resiliency, federal support, the necessity of FEMA, but this is not FEMA, but obviously the necessity of the emergency relief, wanting to get from Federal Highway, this really brings that to life. Central Garage.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: When do you know when we're gonna hear back on the appeal? Do. We don't have any

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I I can't. Oh. I mean, I I I can't speak. That's that's the White House.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Oh, okay.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: That comes directly from the White House.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Okay. And they haven't said we'll make a decision by, like, the state or something?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I I am unaware of that. Okay. I'm unaware of that. So Okay. I mean, if they did they did receive the appeal. And it and it really it wasn't just, and again, I want to be careful. I don't speak for Director Foran, but it wasn't just an appeal, it's a denial for the sake of appealing the denial.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: That we go?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: It was the recognition of the denial, but look, actually we have more information. Let me say this, that if the appeal is successful, the math will actually work out more favorable for Vermont than it would have if the original application was approved. It's a strange way to, depending the denial, just telling you what the weird possibilities can be. Getting back to central Garage, of course, you're all aware of the saga that started in 2023, speaking of flooding down here on Route 302 by the wayside, and the work that our crews continue to do, we're now in the third winter since July 2023 where our folks are working in, micro space, if you will, compared to what is necessary, but they're making it they're making it happen. You've seen the data before, the number of pieces of equipment we have, active dump trucks, pickup trucks, graders, and things of that nature. You've heard us talk about the aggregated value of our fleet is about $75,000,000 Central garage also keeps the DMV law enforcement units going. Excuse me. And so, you know, we'll we'll talk much more about that starting here. The high level good news is that we have reached a settlement with FEMA. We've agreed to it, so that has put a pin in that conversation. And FEMA has offered Vermont in the low 20. There's some hazard mitigation money in that that we cannot use on this build of gradually, but we can use it elsewhere. What we're looking at doing is, you know, can we move some money that we have programmed elsewhere somewhere else? But we have more currently from FEMA for this bill than the low bid we just received, and we have sent a letter of intent. It's I I can't name it now because we're literally in the last days of that process, but what I can say is that the low bid to build the building came in under the guaranteed money we have to build this, not counting the hazard mitigation or the carve out for state insurance.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Do we need to still match whatever they're giving us with tenders?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: We do, we do, and Chief Recovery Officer Farnam has a small bucket of money in his shop within AOA for that. So, you know, we're covered, but good question. Thank you. We do have a small batch. So what you're seeing here is the building. This is what will be built. You're seeing one side of it. The opposite side will look the same with small changes. In other words, all the bays that you see are replicated, so this is a facility that you can drive into from either side. And but the brickwork in the center is going to be the backside of a building. Actually, you're looking at this from if you were standing, I guess, over at the mall, looking toward our property, this is what you see. If you're on the paint current bike, you're gonna see, I guess, what we would call the backside of the building. The small things, but some of the thought that was put into this. I don't Todd is in a room here, and he and Brad McEvoy and a few other folks from our wetlands team, along with, of course, the folks at DEC. But in particular with God, this has been his job since August 2023, and we're we're literally within days of signing a contract. So it's been a it's been a long process. And the other encouraging news we're hearing from the contractor is they believe they can get us in this building in twelve months. We'll see, and that's good. Policy Planning and Intermodal Development, Michelle Schaff. This is obviously a list of the various accomplishments during the year. A few things in here I think are important to point out from my perspective. While it isn't raw, cash that we give to municipalities when the legislature has some conversations about how much money do we provide to towns, But the number of towns that we actively engage with to help them do their planning would be money that they would have to spend elsewhere other than perhaps if the RPC was helping them, which we're engaged with as well. You will see later on, of course, under F and A, the amount of training that we do with towns, but some of the roll up here is the number of highway permits that are put out. I mean, you're talking multiples per week, Acting 50 applications. We go through every one. We have comments mostly, especially, of course, if it's got access or egress involvement. So there's a lot of behind the scenes work that occur in this division that is linear in so much as just ongoing work. It's never finished, if you will, like a structure that's built. It's annualized. It just keeps coming, and there's a lot there. You'll have this in your presentation, and you can go through it. We also update town mileage certificates for every town every year, every single month. And by and also on that note too, in case folks aren't aware, if you go to V Transparency and you go to maps, every town map, it's every town is created by us, four towns. So when towns change something, it's the new map. It's it's So again, to do one map for one town, it may not sound like a lot, but when we annualize the efforts that are done in our mapping sections, that is that support that it's not dollar support, but it's work support.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Just a question on the maps. So the GIS group, do you work with them on the maps?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: There are. VCGI is not we we do the maps. VCGI is another entity, but we do the maps. Okay. I mean, they they do maps as well.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Yeah. We have our own GIS resources within the agency Right. Both in our mapping group and elsewhere because so much of our work is dependent on that use of that.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I wonder what just happened here.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: So I guess you worked with the other GIS folks.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: I'm

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: sure. Yeah, we do have interface with BCGI. We post a lot of our data to BCGI, but the actual doing of the GIS work is definitely not interesting.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: We will work with them, but we're independent. Okay. And and this it just won't sound perhaps the way I want it to come across, but we don't rely on them to to do what I'm talking about. We do it. We do it all.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: And that makes sense. I just hope that they have all the data that they need

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: from you because obviously it's

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: great And in fact, we even pulse town offices on a weekly basis for text marks for personal matters. And I believe they do that annually. So every week, every single week, if a town has had real estate transactions, we change personal matters. We have real time information that's often used by multiple entities.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah. Parcel maps are valuable.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Right. So, I mean, it's again, it's just one of these talking points that really shine a little light on the effort that so many different parts of the agency undertake on a daily basis, and in this case, correlated to towns, as well as serving state government and anyone else. Susan, I

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Thank you, mister chair. I'm I'm not sure I've been confused and haven't gotten good information about within the rescission plan who was laid off with the temporary positions, and and I also have heard there was lots of internal movement of staff, at least anecdotally from staff who had said they had been moved. I'm wondering, my understanding was that was in part within the Policy and Planning division, moving folks to It had

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: nothing to do with mapping, though. I mean, are you if you're asking about movement within the agency, yes. There was movement of certain positions that really weren't so much directed by the result of the revenue downgrade in July. It's more of what we were seeing coming in the way of key retirements in the 2026.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Oh, okay. So there were these were folks who were not laid off. They were planning to retire, but retired early?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: The the well, I wanna I'm I'm looking at both Jeremy and Michelle.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Maybe I can Sure. Yeah.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Go ahead.

[Michelle Boomhauer, Director of Policy, Planning & Intermodal Development (AOT)]: So for the record, Michelle Boo, Power Agency and Transportation. So I will be retiring now at the May. It's gonna be the March. And so You said that

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: a lot. Thank you

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: for thank you for your patience by for that.

[Michelle Boomhauer, Director of Policy, Planning & Intermodal Development (AOT)]: So Amy Bell, who has been the bureau director for policy planning and research is also retiring. So, we took the opportunity to look at what kind of a realignment of resources to, you know, sort of better accomplish our job would be appropriate. And so, some of the folks from policy and planning are going to be now reporting to the highway division under Jeremy's shop and working more closely with asset management, which is a great synergy because of sort of planning for asset deployment in the future. It ties in with all of that. Our research folks are going to be working at the Materials Research Bureau, which that is how we used to have it. Like our some of our permitting staff are going to be working more closely with our utilities permitting people. So there's a lot of opportunity there. And then trainee Broussard, who is, my deputy, will be, forward with aviation rail, public transit, and rail trails areas where she's been historically very strongly involved. And then other policy folks will be, like me, working directly with the secretary.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Thank you so much for that explanation. I think due to the lack of information, was filling in the blanks of, like, are we losing this as a focus? And that made me concerned because this area, I think, where we set the vision for a lot of our decisions. Thank you for that information.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Appreciate that. Take this opportunity to say in addition to the key retirements Michelle just spoken of that are coming, Former speaker and commissioner Michael Bahowski retired last week. And I think it's worth publicly acknowledging his lifetime service to Vermont. And in the last ten years, he's worked for the agency. And he's done, again, a lot of, as I said in the note to him, a lot of the Quiet Warrior stuff, like delving into the rules and just cleaning up a lot of things that just take absolute hours and days of time. You know, those of you who know him, those are one of his He's a detailer. Of his forges. So he retired and we were tremendously grateful that he was with us for ten years out of the head for Michael. Yeah.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Can inspire this bridge. I mean, John.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: This town.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Maybe that was why it was built. No. It built a long That was the condition of it. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Environmental policy and sustainability, you might recall a few years ago, we highlighted this. I would

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: just like to back up and say Sure. Part of the not knowing where you go, I think, somewhat relates to the situation that Patrick has been in. Patrick does a great job. Yep. And

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I hope everything goes well. And thank you for that regarding Patrick's efforts. Hope everything goes well. Yeah, and we will pass that on to him. Environmental policy and sustainability, much of this is Patrick's wheelhouse, which he is still overseeing. There's a few things in here. Let me start, frankly, with the last bullet. It's quite a bit of a recap on a lot of the programs that you had agreed to fund with respect to vehicle replacements and enticements and incentives to purchase EVs or to update older vehicles. And you'll see in talking points in here, 7,000 different incentives across Vermont. And, you know, 79% of the funding went to lower income Limonters based on the metrics that were set forth in the language, which is noteworthy. Those programs have cashed out, if you will. And so and they were certainly successful programs. And and then working back up to the top bullet, this is the NIVY conversation. You certainly recall some of the headlines about that funding being paused and funding was released. The pause was lifted as we believed that it what we were told it would be, it was. And the team did a tremendous job. Houston had to do a tremendous job obligating the full $21,000,000 to add 19 locations across Vermont. And a location could have multiple plugs. So I believe the math worked out somewhere in the 60s, actually, as far as the number of individual vehicles that could be plugged in, and these are superchargers that may not be the right terminology, but these are these are level three chargers on steroids, like the one in Bradford that's been running now for a year and a half or so. Allocated, as you see in the, well, obviously the mileage based user fee that as well as Patrick's lead on that again this year and come together. And I realize, of course, that it's of great interest to this committee. And I saw good interest to your testimony from a person from Hawaii. Very interesting. I thought she did a great job. So again, covers pretty much that area of location. Public transit, you know, we've said for years that Vermont is really one of the leaders in the country, regardless of what sometimes I think a Vermonter might experience, or rightfully, how can we improve what we have? But it's still the case that many states envy what Vermont has any whether it's fixed routes or rides on demand. And you will see that on a fixed route basis, the graph at the bottom, it's recovering from the pandemic. I mean, the pandemic shut so many things down, and there were many reasons. It wasn't just social distancing. It was staying home, going for the work, working in person, working remotely, and then many, many, not even counting to state, but many employers changed their posture regarding work. So there's a whole myriad of reasons why public transit saw some really volatile numbers. But the good news in this is if you look at where it's come in the last five years, it's come back like what you can wear was pre pandemic, but there aren't there aren't a whole lot of data points across many things you measure that might be better than what they might have been pre pandemic, but they're working hard to get things back. There have been changes and fluctuations, as you know, and you've got testimony and will have more testimony from the transit providers. And Ross McDonald, who runs the shop, will begin. And so it's coming along. The rail program, again, I referenced the 29 Bridge projects that you saw Paul Libby talking about in the video. And again, it's quite a thing when you look at, so let's check my recollection. When I said there were 13 of one hundred and seventy four fifteen years ago, and now there are 161 of 174 now that are up to the national standard. One might say, well, yeah, but it's been fifteen years, but what everybody has to remember is these are these are grants only. There's no formula money in rail, and there's no formula money in aviation. So this required just constant focus on grant opportunity, tremendous horsepower by the federal delegation over the last two decades, excuse me, seeing that Vermont was heard when it sat at the grant table, if you will. And as far as numbers coming back, that point to the Amtrak bullet, we're seeing increases over prior Amtrak operation, frankly, that exceeded our modeling. So at this point, Amtrak is really, really successful, and it has increased our modeling, increased over what we had modeled for passenger ridership recovery. We continue to work with Canada, New York, Amtrak. Hopefully, in a week or so, we can report on at least some more effort regarding central station and pre clearance. So maybe in a couple of weeks, we can maybe share some more news. I'm not saying it's gonna be done, but anyhow. And, you know, again, rail is too often the victim of damage as well when it comes to storms. Rail is FEMA eligible because it's owned by the state. Wouldn't qualify that statement. The NECR line out here in Montpelier, in Berlin, junction, pointing down to the White River is not. That's owned by Genesee in Wyoming. But this line near Cattown and everything else that the state of Roman owns is eligible for FEMA. They are not necessarily more complex projects than road projects. They seem to take more time to close out than road projects do, because the good news with road projects is we work with Federal Highway. Rail projects with FEMA just seem to be more unique for them. They, to their credit though, in '23, they brought a particular team in that was more used to working with applicants on rail projects than, let's say, local roads even. They I mean, they brought in the local road folks and the rail trail folks, but they brought in a group that had the most experience just to talk to us about the rail damage we had. So but, you know, I I say it's more complicated because it was May 2024 when we closed out the last FEMA, PA from Tropical Storm Irene, and it was in your district, Senator White. It was twelve years to close the last project from Irene, and it was a rail project.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Alright. And we love our new platform.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yes. It's come out nicely. I believe that's the next slide here. Yeah. There's something. Here we go. This is the terminal in the picture. This is the Northeast Kingdom International Airport in Coventry. This terminal is, you heard about this last year, this was built over the fall. It's up and running. It's fully occupied by the FBO, and it's complete. And this terminal is the terminal design that we'll move forward with at other airports when we build new terminals. So, you know, in the future, we're currently looking at Middlebury, we're currently looking at Springfield, and anywhere else that we do build a new terminal or a terminal, if you will, because Middlebury, I'm not sure I would call that a terminal today. But nonetheless, well, neither was Northeast Kingdom, frankly, but very much in my mind, the state police did close to twenty years ago, I believe Tasha Wallace was the commissioner of BGS then when they came up with the design of the barracks that you saw built in St. Albans, in New Haven, in Westminster, not the remodeled one here in Middlesex, or the Berlin Barrack, but this model of a building makes sense because you've got the plans. You don't have to spend money engineering and designing. You just spend, you know, the planning part is specific to the site, and it's able to be added onto. It was built with that in mind. So from a structural perspective, especially in this location, I think all of us want to see the day when there's enough international travel by air and the cooperation of Customs and Border Protection when they can put some sort of a pre clearance there or at least receive planes that now have to go to Burlington to be cleared and then back to where they're going. Senator Perchlik. Where is the NEJ International? Cupboard. Cupboard. Here's a new cupboard. Okay. And then any update on the Lindenville Airport? No. Not since I was in a couple of weeks ago. It's still between the applicant and FAA. Okay,

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: you're waiting. Between the A or B and the applicants, Well, you're have to

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: applicant has to be the one that disagrees to the options the FAA provided to So we submitted this purchase and sale agreement that was signed for FAA review, and FAA denied it in its original form, but came back and said, Here are four suggestions we would make to get to yes, So if you when I say deny, I wanna be thoughtful in how that comes across. They didn't agree with it as it was submitted, but they said, Consider these options instead. And the latest I've heard is that And that is options public, or that's still That's still in negotiation between FAA and the applicant. We don't know what they are. See the public. That's correct. Right. That's kinda like if somebody was selling a business, the purchase sale agreement is present We've until it's reviewed it with the applicant, know, AOT, I think, thinks that there's possibly a way forward here. But at the end of the day, the applicant has to be the one that agrees to that.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: And there's no timeline?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: No. I don't believe Well, the timeline really is the one sent by the EU, which was 2027. I think that at least the permission to sell the airport, and then we'd have to read that plan too. We certainly would expect that would happen. It's you know, Craft LLC is the applicant. I think we talked about that. Yeah. And if you follow the news, I think you've seen a lot of news about those individuals having a lot of integration and a lot of opportunity with FPA at this point, and I just hope that, frankly, this topic benefits from that. Yeah, it works. Administration division, again, this is Maureen and Dana. Left side in orange is the size of the division and the budget. The blocks in the center of the different offices, it is, I think you've heard from all of these. Will point out as we go a little further, learning development, remote local roads, Because as I said when I was talking earlier about planning, the services that the group and the F and A provide to municipalities, in many ways, is actually measurable dollar wise, but it's real, and that's something that we ought to talk more about, I think. Facilities is one of them, and what you're looking at here, the two on the left are on Lord Newton Street in St. Albans. That's the old District 8 site. District 8 moved to the new building, and we had nine or so acres down there. So these are just the two pictures on the left. And I had not made a decision yet on what to do with the property. There's been several outreaches, but we haven't decided as an enterprise of government what to do with it yet. There's an armory right next door. So in total, there's more state land right there than just us. And, you know, it it it requires, you know, thoughtful planning on where to go in the in the future. And, you know, the district has gotten most of the stuff out of the cold storage sheds, but, you know, they probably still have a few more things because there was no emergency. However, DMV, early last fall, I think it was, the commissioner lost the lease that it had for its facility in St. August by the hospital. It was through no fault of DMV. The landlord was making some changes. So we started looking for where could we operate to serve the public, and the first thing we did is we looked at existing state buildings. There's some office buildings downtown. We were just told there just wasn't any space that could accommodate that. So we decided what we would do is we would, with a gentle touch, we would renovate the office building of the district gate site, if nothing else, as a location which is very adequate until such time other decisions may or may not be made on that property, doesn't necessarily preclude leaving that as it is as well. So that's where it's located. And on the left, this is our, I believe it's the West Danville garage. This is maybe a few miles past Joe's Pond, sort of halfway in between Joe's Pond and Danville Village, Marty's. And before you get to the hardware store, you know where that is. And so this is a small building we're putting up just to house some of the equipment that we have that helps to maintain the Lamoille Valley Trail. So I talked about the work we do with municipalities. These are these are folks, our folks, and these are employees of towns, many of whom we represent. Especially the column on the left, on the right, rather than my right. 117 total training sessions. We estimate this cost, and these aren't just wags. Mean, we pay trainers. We have contracts with trainers. So we have real backups when we say this is what this cost us, and this is what we give for free to the towns. And then, including in the case of the flagging in the center, 64 VLR flag, that's a certification, and CDL training. We have a really interesting program working now with Department of Motor Vehicles where, and I'm looking to the commissioner, so if I start to misspeak, he can do the third base coach signal, where they will train a B TRANS employee to be a practical examiner, which means that the employee who's taken the CDL training we provide could be tested by us, and it all could be in house. Now, we don't necessarily profess to suggest that any amount of capacity we were able to do that with. But it's a big step. It's a huge step. Because probably five years ago, the federal government tightened down on the credentialing for this long before current conversations about CDLs. And really, with an interest in making the training and the education better so that it had safer outcomes on the highway. So for federal motor carrier safety, to allow DMV to train a state employee, excuse me, apologize, is a big thing for us, especially coming from the clamp down five years ago. And I'd like to think it somewhat has to do with quality of effort that you see out of our training center, and our B TRANS employees who are our CDL trainers. So there's a difference between being a CDL trainer and a certified tester, if that's the right terminology. And this is only for AOT employees? Well, it is to this point, but I don't believe we are closing the door. It's a capacity thing. That's all. Department of Motor Vehicles, perfect segue. This is broken up into the divisions there, so there's more than 171 employees across the department. But a couple of the I think you had some testimony already yesterday from DMV, or you will have it soon, and I don't wanna I'll let the commissioner and his team go into more of the detail, but there's an awful lot that's been accomplished at DMV in the last several years, and especially in the last year. One of the interesting things that I think has gotten lost in all of the compensation today regarding all things motor vehicles are the kiosks that you see the gentleman on the left hand picture. Basically, it's a self-service touchscreen kiosk, and one could envision the day where those could possibly be put anywhere. It's a matter of the equipment being safe, not smashed, depending on where you put it. So if you're thinking, which we have looked at, we have literally looked at freestanding ATM type machines. But every time you think of that, do you have to spend more money to buy some piece of hardware that's robust, hopefully heavy enough that it can't be carried off, or strong enough that it can't be beaten. Everything comes with cost factors, but there are a lot of these now popping up, at least at Burlington I know, so that a citizen can opt in, I'm gonna walk over here and try that before, especially if you're all walking and you didn't maybe have the reservation. The other thing, when you see that person standing at the counter, we all remember getting our driver's license and then having to go around the corner with somebody and have your picture taken. Many of our stations, not all of them yet, but many of our stations can take the picture right there so you don't have to move. And that just saves time. So the efficiencies that are being accomplished, and Of course, you've heard the commissioner and others and me talk about the core system, which I hope is the next slide, and I think it is.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Can I just, a quick suggestion, you can put those in town halls there's there? But then another is the goal for the DMV offices to have them open more than two days a week because

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: The satellites? Well, I mean

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: I mean, it's they're really, really helpful. They're actually a good public service and Right. The people were always wonderful. Right. And when my kids went to get their licenses, it was it was a really nice experience as compared to other states. I mean, that is somewhere where we are so much better than other states.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Oh, that's wonderful.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah, when people move here and they go through that, it just validates their

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: decision. Well, you very much, Senator. It's good to hear that personal experience. You know, I think, is it a goal? Yes, but I think like every goal and every aspiration, we have to balance, and you know this committee more than anybody, as well your counterparts in the house, the affordability piece. In other words, we do have to weigh the throughput in the satellites and the cost of us to be there, being the team, because we send people by vehicle you know, down there. We carry the lease cost of all of those sites with the exception of Doberson, which is really sort of an internal thing because it's our building anyway. But in, well, White River, Right?

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah. Duberson is the one I Well, one I had here about.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Now ours as well. I was thinking the other former one in White River. So that one is ours as well. Right. You still have to send the team there.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: No. I I understand. And and so you have your cost, but then the public has their costs.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: They do.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: And so their costs are are pretty significant to them. That's one thing I hear a lot is, you know, when they have to go to Bennington.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Well, and that really reinforces the why we did what we did in the Saint Albans slides that I was showing you when, we lost the lease there. We knew that, you know, because really a lot of people from Franklin County plan their DMV visit days based on the days that those were open. Yeah. So, or, you know, maybe they're broken.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: And the kiosks are good. That's what happens. The fire is out of town

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: clerk is a great one. States like New Hampshire, you have to go to a town clerk to register your vehicle.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah. And you know the registration fees they pay in any

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Very much more. Right.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: We should talk about that.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Senator Windham.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Thank you, chair Westman. So I did just wanna ask because I was very surprised by the Vermont State employees. The union had done their annual satisfaction survey.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Mhmm.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: And my understanding in the past is Agency of Transportation has performed very well in that survey with folks responding that they're satisfied with their workplace. And it was surprising to me because we learned in Senate, I was in operations, that DMV was now ranking in the top, but in the bottom third, so the most least satisfied of departments in that survey for the first time. And I just wanted to ask you a little bit about that because one of the questions that was such a deviation between the other state employees and DMV was the question of where DMV scored particularly low was employee answering the question, I'm encouraged to share ideas on improving either service delivery or business proficiency, business process efficiency. And the statewide average was around 66% and DMV was around 50%. So just about half of the employees at DMV who were surveyed didn't feel that they're encouraged to share ideas around innovation or business efficiency. And that surprised me. So I just wanted to put it out there that when you think about this conversation, I think about half based on the survey,

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: about

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: half of your employees aren't feeling included in the conversation in this department.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: About those who responded.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah. And they they have, you know, over a 800 folks responded, and they do have, like, a they they have a whole they statistically analyze it to make sure it's within a band

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: of Human Resources survey, not the Union survey.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: The one I'm looking at is the Union survey. This is what they shared.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Actually, I'm not sure I've seen the Union survey, but I'm gonna go to the commissioner, but the one comment he made though about I I just wanna understand, you said over a thousand eight. You must be referring to that's the entirety of the union survey because that's three times the number of employees we have at the DMV.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah, exactly.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Right, okay.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah, you're right. It is actually the Department of Human Services table. My apologies. It's not a survey that's

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: done by,

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: yeah. And so table four is what I was looking at. It looks like, yeah, 72% of the they had an overall response rate of 20.5 employees. And I could tell you the number of people who responded, but it might take me a minute.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: No, that's fine, and your point's well taken, and I'm gonna look at the commissioner for perhaps a more detailed response. Absolutely. Andrew Collier, Commissioner DMV for the record.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: I would just, I would just say, Senator, DMV saw a 41.6% employee response rate in 2024. We saw a 50, or sorry, percentage rate, 52% this prior year. So the to your specific, specific area that you mentioned, and this is not the downsides that we can't, we're not working to improve that metric, but from year prior at 33%, we're at 42.7 for 2025, so I think that trajectory, I think we're

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Okay.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: Well, I think I mean, know, to be I don't wanna come out and say this callous. I'm actually I am as a new management team in there, I actually would have thought we were to saw closer in line numbers a year prior. I'd like to say the team the management team there is doing a phenomenal job trying to bring these percentages up, bring these numbers up, employee morale. As I mentioned, my first day in there is of the utmost importance to me, You know, I would come from state government my entire career. So that's not to minimize what the score is. There are we are always aspirationally moving up, but I think that trajectory, the whole thing, we're moving in a Yeah. I'll layer that with last year was the team did a phenomenal job. They also had a lot on their plate with two simultaneous IT projects going, and the team was very stretched. So that's not lost on me with that team. They did a phenomenal job with the resources that we had.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Well, really appreciate that. I think DMV is one of the few departments where almost every Vermonter is going to interact with And the experience that you have with the employee at the other end can greatly impact your interpretation of how the government works.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: Yeah, you're right.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: But, yeah, I would I would definitely check out table four because AOT overall scored very high, but DMV, oddly enough, was one of the lower.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: So

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Well, thank you for that. And to your point, though, you're right. And we're we're gonna see that Vermonter before any other agency in state government most likely. I mean, we get a Vermonter before the tax departments. They get them at 15, really? If they're an anxious kid, they want their permit.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: And their parents.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: And their parents want the permit.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Most kids want it. Two for one.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: This slide really I wanna talk about this because this is a success, but I also wanna talk about, before I do talk about the core project, I wanna talk about the Vermont Paul Pass. I didn't see it on here, if I did, if it was on the previous one, missed it. Well, E, well, it's not E Services. Before the Core Project, we undertook modifying or modernizing the e permitting for overweight, over length, over height. And that is a significant amount of business. We could quantify how much that is as far as the number of permits that are issued on an annual basis, but it speaks directly to the economy and to commerce because it's often moving heavy pieces of equipment from A to B to build something. And serving that part of industry is crucial for us to be competitive and user friendly. And that's just rolled out as well, but I think it's perhaps often overshadowed even by us when we talk about the slide you see before you, and that is the core modernization project. This was the 50 year old legacy software system that went back to the COBOL process. Unbelievable, the job before DMV this has been completed. And again, for those that have been around a while, whether in or out of government, you might recall EDS, Ross Perchlik's company, maybe twenty years ago, Senator? VNB Modernization launched. EDS sold in the midst of that effort to Hewlett Packard, I believe. Hewlett Packard, it took us years to get the Hewlett money Packard, when they bought the company, they didn't agree to buy the contract or the demand, if you will, the obligation between the state of Vermont and EDS, Electronic Data Systems, to no fault of DMV. But yet the headlines were yet again, and this isn't the aim at the Vermont press. This is just like the movie to the TV show team. It's easy to pick on. But, you know, a government IT project. Well, on that, the state of Vermont recovered every penny, but that part didn't get in the head.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: But it took a year.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: It did. Oh, it took forever. You're right. This project, we're not running around here like a banded rooster with a bucked out chest, but coyly, there's a lot of credit that is due The FAST team, who's the contractors who worked for the State of Vermont before, they did this with the tax department, as well as the employees of the Department of Motor Vehicles, and the prior commissioner and deputy under which this launched. So I want to acknowledge all of that. Most importantly, the trust of the legislature to approve $50,000,000 for an IT project for government. At a DMV, which historically, government IT projects have anxious challenges, and you trusted that this project would come together. It couldn't have come together without the money and the support of the legislature. It was delivered on time and on budget. And that's another thing that has to be said, because it's not often the case. And it may not be the case in the next time we try something and then we can get There's so many factors that impact on time and on budget, much of which are sometimes out of the control of anyone. We were fortunate, but it was a tremendous amount of work. The contractor moved a couple of dozen families to Vermont for the last four, three years. They bought homes, they had children, they have kids in school. We moved 30 to 40 at the peak, people from across the street to Barrie City Place. All they did was work it fast on the court system. Going back to your prior question about employee satisfaction and the comments the commissioner made, we had people across the street and elsewhere that were carrying extra load so colleagues could focus on this system that nobody else saw happening until it was delivered in November '5, on time and on budget. Thank you for hearing that. I can

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: add one more thing, I'm sorry.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: Also, special thanks to ADF.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yes. Thanks for That's correct.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: We were complete partners in this. They have people embedded with our team, they were

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Great feeling you caught that. Going back to Secretary Quinn and and obviously Secretary Riley Hughes. We couldn't have done it without ADX as well because this stuff is not what we do.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: I just have one quick comment, is great, and it's a good model for all of the other updates that we need

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: to It is.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Exactly. And we're looking at it that way. Yeah.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: You know what, I believe, I don't know this to be a fact, but I believe labor is looking at, if not the same contractor.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: There's so many.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yeah. But I don't.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: There's so many updates that are necessary, but it's great to have an example of one that was done well.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: It is, and quite frankly, we got onto this because of the success attacks. And I remember the meeting when we heard about that, we were with ADS, and it was Tom Bonomo with ADS, who's our liaison for the agency, and he talked about this, because I believe he worked with the FAST folks for FAST. And I can remember, we said, Well, maybe we ought to talk to these people first or as well, right? And so here we are. We went out to bed and it's done a tremendous amount of work. And the accomplishments for the user is really, not just, I mean, the citizens, yes, but even our employees.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: I remember

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: going to Newport and watching an employee get excited because she could create a new title right then and there, including the water bars and all the security, and hand it to the buyer. Whereas if you were a satellite like that, and Newport's one of our bigger facilities like Bennington or South Burlington, where they would have to mail it to Montpelier after they took the paperwork and the money, US Post Office, and then Montpelier would mail it to the buyer, and they could hand it to the district. And she was really tickled about that.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah, because your employees care.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Yeah, they do care, you're absolutely The enforcement of safety division overseen by Director Cochran, who I think was in the room earlier. I think you know what the DMV enforcement team does, safety enforcement, not just the trucks, which are huge, literally the upper is huge, but all of our inspection stations, all of the car dealers, they testify in cases that have to do with car conditions. Pardon me. But the uniform and non uniform, but sworn officers also get involved in traditional law enforcement, and I may have to rely on somebody to read the last page or two of yours. I apologize. We work with the state police. We work with task forces. We, you know, we've got three K-9s now. Two of them are traditional, if you will. One of them is trained now, spun up to train for gunpowder residue. We've assisted in a homicide in Burlington. That's where it's a rare talent. I may need to excuse myself a moment. I see. You got

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: a great slide set. Yeah.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Just we do.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Excuse me. Maybe I'll turn it over to the commissioner. Sure.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: Yeah, just to finish on that, so that canine's been assisting with on a few cases, and it's been very successful than we've had that dog. And the team is just we're we're just rolling out. We we assisted with with with safe lease. We weren't kinda in the news as much, and I I'm okay with that. With Brompton, the effort that we had, our team focused primarily on traffic enforcement, our detectives spent a day trying to do some of the warrants that were outstanding, working with Burlington PD.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: K.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Guess we have What's

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: early morning snow patrol?

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: So that is state police. That's we work with state police. State police used to have it as part of us helping out just because of manpower. We'll have heat to sign on at four or 05:00 in the morning when there's no snow event or ice storm like we had last week, and they will be out in force on the interstates. In anticipation of crashing? Yep. Crashes, slide offs, make sure just because historically, you're not always on a lot of traffic. So if you're sliding off,

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: you're crushing cold weather Right.

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: That we have equal air. Get there quickly and assist.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Everybody in the hallway thought the Senate Transportation Committee was beating me up. I'm not exactly sure what we talked about. Canines, the patrolling that the commissioner was talking about. Fraudulent activity across the spectrum, as it says, it's a constant event with us, and we pursue that in a criminal nature according to the level of fraud that's being perpetrated. We've also been part of, which is along here, think, We've been part of the effort in Burlington. Our colleagues with state police have been really high profile with their boots on the ground effort around the marketplace. It's been a partnership between the city of Burlington and the state police and the DMV and liquor lottery, primarily because, you know, wardens, of course, this began in the fall, so it was just a really bad time of year for them. They were really busy with the hunting season. So state sworn services combining with city of Burlington. DMV was working the traditional motor vehicle work. The city will tell you that they really weren't doing a lot of that in the last three years or so. You know, it's it's a different environment, of course, than the interstate, but you've got the BeltLine in Burlington. So DMV I mean, DMV worked Christmas Eve. They worked Christmas Eve day, Christmas Eve night, Christmas day, well as others. But the point is this was an overtime effort. This was voluntary by our officers, but it was directed that we would be there. Unfortunately, we had more than enough people to do it. So we were a force multiplier, really good cooperation with the city of Burlington. Then we also concentrated in concentric rings further away from the core of the city so that for really a couple of reasons, one, the people that were creating the problems that you've all read about in the core of the city, a lot of this sometimes naturally will get pushed out further. And we didn't want to fail to know that. And we wanted them to know we know that. So, you know, our visibility was not so much in the core of the city, although a lot of activity with blue lights on Main Street and Pearl Street, as, you know, one stop can send a message to 100 cars in the five or ten minutes that the stop is occurring. Things like DOI arrests and things that just weren't able to be gotten to, including lifesaving things. I mean, we interacted with a motorist that was having a life altering medical event and rendered lifesaving support until EMS could get there. And not anybody would do, but the effort, I think it was well received by our employees. It was well received. Commissioner Morrison shared an email this morning in meeting we were in from Chief Berger in Burlington, And so they've really stepped up to do a lot, and and I'll leave it there. If there's any questions. And I think That's why we're pretty close to the end too. Okay, well, am I going the wrong way? Yeah, you've done that one. Sorry about that.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: It's a big project.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: There we go. Compliance and audit enhancements, we have a lot of that going on with all the dealerships all the cash they put in sustaining through IFTA and IRP procurement. We talked about the St. Albans branch. Social media, a lot of interest on a lot of the different things that we put out random. Mean, it's not random. It's all related to transportation or vehicles, but we put out things on, like recalls, for example. Just anything to do with a motor vehicle that a citizen might miss someplace else. Just on our social media pages. And I believe that is it. Not going any further, so I think that's the last page. Nope. Great job. So that ends the PowerPoint. And if there's time left on your part, we're happy to answer any questions or at least take any questions you have.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: How is VT BISS going?

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I guess I would probably look at Loraine to

[Lorraine Parker, AOT Procurement/Finance]: Sure, I'm Lorraine Parker, patient division. BT Buys is going well. AOT has a lot of second tier solicitations, so we do a lot of primary retainer contracts, and then we do orders off of those. And so those are not in BT Buys yet. So because those are not in VT buys yet, had to cut too many per care for the overfill, but we had done a few, and so Doctor. That's

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: good to hear. Because I don't hear that press

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: the board.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Or they caught it before, so maybe you have a better original rollout. Yeah.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: I I think that's probably the right thing. I think we saw a lot of emails. I think it's gotten better.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Good start to the year.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Wow. I think I'm Well Happy to talk about Yeah. Anything you'd like except the budget.

[Senator Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah. Know. Exactly. It's like

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: We can't that we'll get to.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: So I'm I'm sure. Yeah. Are

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: there any questions? Have question

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: about project planning. What you think of the year, Jerry? On the prioritization.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: I think it was last year where I ran with the whole system that we

[Andrew Collier, Commissioner of the Vermont Department of Motor Vehicles]: have for

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: project prioritization. Can see the acronym, I think.

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: You only use that for projects when there's extra funding. Or a true active tax program or project, really we could use it throughout and we sort of do, but it's so heavy weighted towards asset condition, that's where the RPCs don't have the luxury given our current situation and propose alternative projects. We have prepared some product to help describe how we on an annual basis describe what moves forward to construction. It's a set process. What gets programmed, which is really the EPSP-two, and then just given the duration and time it takes to progress and develop a project, then there is, okay, we're developing a budget for FY '27, let's say, what's in, what's out, and we've got some materials prepared that I'd be happy to we've taken a lot

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: of time. I mean,

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: we talked more about that, about how they make that prioritization process. Because the other project was very structured. It was clear how things were scored and programmed. However you're going to describe the prioritization project, don't you think? Yep. We've got that prepared, so I'll be happy to come back and testify to that.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: It's on our list. Okay.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah. And to follow-up on that, I think the or what I've heard is that the rule of the towns or not the towns rather, but the tax and the regional commissions, that their role is different than it was and it might be different again soon. But let's just talk about that in that conversation because that's all about Sure,

[Senator Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: and that's where there's really that three step process. What gets programmed versus what actually gets funded in any given fiscal year.

[Senator Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Yeah. But that's really important to the towns.

[Unidentified AOT staff (technical/GIS support)]: Those priorities, obviously. And they should be.

[Joe Flynn, Secretary of the Vermont Agency of Transportation]: Thanks.

[Senator Richard Westman (Chair)]: I think at this point, we're gonna say thank you. Thank you. And if you could take us offline, Maggie.