Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: You're You're live? Yeah. We're presuming testimony in senate transportation. It's January 9, and we are here with, public transit. And name and serial number.

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: Perfect. Yes. Daniel Currier. I'm with the Vermont Agency Transportation in the public transit section, and I'm a public transit coordinator. I've been helping to meet with the transit agencies, that includes Green Mountain Transit, Tri Valley Transit, and Rural Community Transportation, who are also here today to help talk about the rural transfer that is being currently administered, whatever word you like, for basically taking GMT, the rural services, and passing them over to Tri Valley Transit in Washington County. And RCT, a rural community transportation in Franklin and Grand Isle taking over those services in Green Mountain Transit. Where we stand in the process is really I'll let Caleb and Jim talk more about that detail. From B TRANS' perspective, we're seeing a lot of good faith effort going on here, where everyone's working collectively towards the common goal transferring the rural services for Franklin Grand Isle. That transfer actually occurred on January 1. So on December 31, we were literally in the DMV transferring 22 vehicle titles. And so thank you to those staff. It took two hours and two staff members to get that done. And so that was an epic day for us. And so and operations has commenced in Franklin Glen Isle. For Washington County, we're looking at a January sorry, a June first transfer of those services. And so and I'll let Jim Malton talk more about some of the items that they still have in their punch list for that transfer. The whole you know, the premise behind this transfer really started with the notion that our rural services, you know, we're seeing increased costs. We're seeing decreases in in ridership. And how can we get ahead of this curve? Can we provide better service? Can we transfer, you know, some of the service to lower cost operators? Because for us, it's not the operator. It's all about the routes. Right? How can we provide the route at the best service level at the lowest cost to help support riders on InfraMoms? And so that's really our focus at the agency. And so that's some of the reason why we started Rural Transfer. We have had support. VTrans has hired a consultant, Steven Fauble, to help facilitate the meetings, help generate statistics, come up with some of the preliminary budget values that we went into the rural transfer with to see if there really was gonna be a cost savings as as we shift service. We don't yet have the final numbers for that. That will come out later this calendar year. So Before the transfers or no?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Was sorry. Before the transfers happen?

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: Before the transfers happen, no. We won't know the true savings until after the transfers happen. So we'll get some of the numbers from Franklin Grand Isle in the coming months. And then Washington County, we really won't see those until just about June. Our grant application process that the trans ministers for the public transit program really will help us to evaluate the savings, how much is there, how much we have, what the routes look like.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Does this include microtransit or the individual transit programs?

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: That's correct. All the existing routes in Washington County, including microtransit, will be transferred as is over to Tri Valley Transit, the Goblins. Go ahead.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Thank you, Mr. Chair.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah, that

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: would be my main concern, that we would lose the GOPR service in this So I'm wondering if you could either outline, and it might be for Jim as well, to just outline what that's gonna look like and how you're going to maintain, especially like the medical rides.

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: Sure.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Seem to be a big need. And unhoused children who are using the school service

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: for that.

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: The Gopher service is a subcontractor to Green Mountain Transit, so I can't really speak on how that relationship will be maintained under Green Mountain Transit. I know Prime Valley Transit is working closely with Gopher, and so they, you know, could bring them on as a subcontractor as well. That's something Tri Valley Transit will need to determine. Oh, okay. So besides that, the older adults and persons with disabilities program and the Medicaid program will still operate as it does today with the transfer of trivalid transit, with volunteer drivers providing trips as well as vans being used by paid drivers to pick up anyone that's in a wheelchair or needs that type of lift equipped vehicle. So Gopher could definitely be part of the mix, but it will have to be a transition for them and working with Tri Valley Transit.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: The Gophers in your area? No. It's actually Yeah. I did not. Okay. We happened to go

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Capstone had, like, a special legislative day last year, and I happened to be the only legislature that showed up because it was a terrible snowstorm. And I was already up there, and I got, like, an hour tour of Vopar. And they are a really cool program through Capstone. They have an electric vehicle, and it sounded like after a conversation with Sue Winter that they're serving quite a number of people and that would be a real loss. And I know, I think Jim would probably be the best person to address that, but And it's microtransferring.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: It is, yeah, because that could be a model for the rest of

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: the Yeah.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: We're going to be most interested in as this begins to wrap up and and things about service to people. Mhmm. You know, the we totally appreciate being as efficient as possible, but anybody on the service level left behind is whoever's interested. Any other questions right now?

[Daniel Currier (Public Transit Coordinator, Vermont Agency of Transportation)]: Wonderful. I'll bring her over to the chair. Let's go next.

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Thank you, Senator Westman and everybody for having me. My name is Jim Bolton. I'm the executive director of Tri Valley Transit. Currently, we officially serve Addison, Orange, and Northern Windsor Counties. And as we're here today, we'll soon be also responsible for Washington County. I'm also the vice chair of the Vermont Public Transit Association, passing the mantle chair to Caleb this past year. And I'm very appreciative of the opportunity to come back to you for this purpose. So I did, provide a handout, for you in terms of where we're at with the transition. RCT is ahead of us in terms of the transition having, started it, or officially made the transfer for Franklin Grand Isle January 1. We are taking longer, I'll say primarily because, we are a union organization and our union contract, just coincidentally happens to be expiring on June 30. So we are at the beginning edge of negotiations on a new contract. GMT, of course, is also a union shop and the, drivers there, will be come part of our union. And so we need to go through that negotiation process and come up with what our new contract will be in order to fully integrate the union staff at GMT and then the rest of the staff as well. But we've already begun that process with the union. Just from historical perspective, I've probably in my career negotiated up to 10 contracts with the union successfully. I expect that that will be the case going forward as well. So it's a lot of work and it will take time, but I don't anticipate that there'll be any issues or concerns in the transition that would create a problem for the service continuity in Washington County. I think that's the point I want to assure the committee and legislature and the communities about. So in this process, we've had a lot of meetings with GMT leadership, Clayton, Monica White, who's the regional director there, other leadership people at GMT, between myself, my management team has been on-site there many times. There's just been a lot of relationship building. I think that's probably the most important element of making sure that the services can also continue smoothly, seamlessly. And I think I'm so getting the signals and Clayton has sent this to me in private, I don't think I'm setting him up for anything. But I think the staff there are just really looking forward to being part of TBT, and I think that will make a huge difference in, again, in continuity of services to the community members and to the riders, which as you articulated earlier, Senator, is the critical element of this whole transition. Again, as part of the process of the transition, we've had a board committee dedicated to looking at this and working on the oversight to make sure that we, the staff and everybody are thinking about things. We have added a GMT board member to that committee so that we're having GMT board representation. Clayton has participated in many of those meetings and Monica has as well. I feel like we've already Examples of the good working relationship I think that we've got going on here is that Clayton very early on has been making sure to communicate with me about issues and concerns that we carry beyond the transition date so that while they're responsible for them now, we would be responsible for them later on and he's been very careful to make sure that he's not making decisions that potentially set Troy Valley transit up for a risk of failure going forward. One example of that is we work together to develop an MOU with Sugarbush for services that GMT currently provides and that TLT will be responsible for going forward and a local match commitment. It was really great for me to participate in those meetings and develop a relationship with the Sugarbush leadership and help them understand the financial challenges that transit faces and the need for businesses like that to invest in the local match commitments. It was a significant increase in revenue that GDMT was asking from Sugarbush, and I appreciate the opportunity to help make them understand why that increase was important and how that really matters given the rising costs of public transportation that Dan alluded to earlier. We've also worked with GMT to leverage, they had an aging grant to hire a volunteer coordinator. We helped work with them to leverage that. They now have a volunteer coordinator, as you will recall. We remain statewide grateful for the investment that this, I would say, this committee really spearheaded in terms of additional funding for volunteer coordinators around the state. So I just want to share my gratitude for that commitment on your part, and let you know that that's something that we've already managed to change in the Washington County area. And I'll actually sidebar for a moment. One of the other efforts that you really worked on putting into the legislative language last year was coordination of services between the medical providers and public transit. And I was participating, we've actually been participating in regular meetings with UVM Health Network, but in one just yesterday afternoon and a major topic of yesterday afternoon's conversation was about volunteer coordinators and volunteer recruitment. Really great in terms of the hospital looking to figure out how they could even take their volunteer base and potentially help them think about becoming community drivers for public transit as well, sort of doubling their volunteer, not just for the hospital, but also in public transportation. So it's a really nice nexus. It was a nexus moment for me of all of the things that we testified in front of this committee last session, and you guys really heard us and really made the commitment. So it's actually kind of fun to be able to report out on the successes in that way. Briefly, we've also been working on the facilities and information technology infrastructure. We've got our Infotech firm gone into GMT in Washington County to determine what their hardware software systems are. Tech is a critically important element of the seamless transition. We've been introducing, I think you've heard this in prior testimony, a new statewide dispatching software system. TBT was the first organization to implement that, it's starting to be implemented around the state as well. It is not yet at GMT, so we're accelerating the process to get that in place over the next few months, so that when July 1 comes, that will be part of that transition. And also making sure the GMT historically has been on different software systems than TBT has used. So again, we wanna make sure that the staff there, we just talked to again yesterday, I was in a meeting with the IT consultant about all the training that would be necessary, making sure that they have the information on-site support from our IT firm to make sure that they are familiar with the systems and they're not going to disrupt services. If you're not familiar with the technology, then you can screw up the transportation and we don't want that to happen. And then lastly, with the facilities, we've been working closely again with GMT to leverage a grant that VTrans gave them this current fiscal year. So again, technically TBT is not responsible for it, but Clayton and his team have been really good about that partnership to make sure that we can fix some critical facility flaws in the current building. And I've been also working with VTrans in terms of the transition for a new lease, working on that language, so that will be in place as well. And then know obviously Kilde's gonna talk about his transition, and I'll just say that we're paying close attention to what's going well for them, what's not going well for them, that I appreciate the fact that we're gonna be in a position of being able to learn from his lead in this process and take advantage of that knowledge. So happy to answer any specific questions beyond that or about any of the topics. Oh, I guess Senator White, I'd like to just quickly address the gopher question. I have worked a long time with Chris Cole and have had several conversations with him along the way. Monica White, again, who's the director in Washington County. And I met very recently with Sue Winter and Amanda Carlson to talk about how we'll keep partnering with them in ways that we could potentially expand what they're doing for all the transportation needs. So very much aware of the Go For program and wanting to keep them as a resource, because again, they're providing a lot of services out there and we don't want to create any larger gaps that may have already exist. I just wanted to make sure I covered that as well. So again, happy to answer any other questions from anybody.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Go ahead. Yeah. Thanks, Kim, for that news about the Gopher program. Feel strongly about that. But also, I can't remember when we talked about this last year how close we're queuing to the county borders. And is GMT still doing the link buses? Yeah. Okay. And then the RCT route that came down Route 14 that goes to Washington County, is RCT still doing that or is that transferred to somebody else?

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: No. No. Still remain with RCT.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: And like other ski buses like the Stowe buses, that's BMT still or is it you guys doing that?

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: So Stowe will be transferred over to Caleb and RCT. We'll be doing Sugarbush. So in current winter system, GMT is continuing that work. But those will I it's funny to me that GMT does both of them now, but one's going to CVT and one's going to RCT. But so that's what will be going on with that.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Okay. Just one very just

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Yeah. No. It's there's a tremendous amount of information out there, a lot of details, and, you know, you can't be expected to remember all of them. So I'm always happy to answer any of those questions.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Okay. Thank you. Go ahead.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: So I have a follow-up question that is I was thinking I should know this. In the transfer, are you doing fixed route as well as demand?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Correct.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Okay. Yeah, is great news. Thank you very much for what you're doing and it's really good to hear, especially the hospital conversations and now transit is elevated to something that people are thinking about and being more creative about. That's just wonderful. Just a question about the IT, is that the dispatch for the Medicaid?

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Well, yes, it's primarily for Medicaid, although it's the same software is used also for the O and D program as well.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Okay, okay. Needs to be all of the users need to all of those providers need to use that software, right?

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Correct. Correct. And we are using it, for all of TBT. We had it installed in our, Addison County region first, then in our Orange, Northern Windsor County region, and now we are partnering again with GMT to get it moving into the Washington County arena so that our plan and pushing the software company hard is to have that in place and functioning staff trained by June 30, that July 1, they will be familiar with the system and be able to do the rides without any issues.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Yeah, that's terrific and then just a heads up in case you all don't know, but you probably do, there's a study that we're looking at on permitting and it includes permitting of the ski resorts and how they support transit and can support transit. So that's something that we're going to be talking about in a couple of weeks here, but on our system it's, it says, it's ACT 181 Transportation Support Study. So if you're able to look at that and be part of that conversation, that would be really helpful because some there are Act two fifty permits that either ask for or include funding obligations, but it's more than funding, it's how the roots work and that's just so, so important. It'd be great to have you all be part of that conversation.

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Thank you. Happy to.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Thank you.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Thank you, Julie.

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Thank you. I'll stay on for any other questions that might come up.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: So thank you very much

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: for having me today to share an update on the GMT world transition, and obviously happy to answer any questions on related or unrelated topics. I will warn you, I feel a little bit like the the weathered man standing in the hurricane telling you all it's raining, but we are in the thick of the transition. January 1 was the official transition for Franklin Grand Grand Aisle with a transition of the Chittenden County 0 And D in July 1, as well as the Stowe Mountain Road operation on July 1. So we're we're a portion of the full transition, but certainly the bulk of the transition is happening at Franklin Grand Isle. So a couple of exciting updates, 20 out of the 20 employees we made offers to all accepted. I know that was a concern of this committee, and I'm happy to have them on board. It's a exceptional crew. I think the harshest criticism I've received in the first couple weeks is that the, the roads were a bit icy, which, hopefully, the sun dried out today.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Your joke. You know, I

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: I tried to blame it on GMT's stewardship of the of the sky,

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: but

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: it was hard to transfer over. And other than that, it's a huge amount of engagement with the community. I think I attended four different Franklin County care organization community meetings. For those of you unfamiliar with Franklin County, it has an incredibly engaged and caring community when it comes to human health services, getting an enthusiastic response. I think there's really a great amount of optimism given RCT's success and Rides for Recovery as well as job access programs that historically have not been as active in Franklin County and being able to bring that as a new opportunity for some of those care partners and then really focusing on expanding as much as we can within Medicaid, O and D, and related programs. So so far so good. We begin negotiations with union. So the drivers in Franklin County have elected to be represented by the Teamsters, and we have enthusiastically accepted and will be entering into negotiations for a new contract in the coming week. So everything seems to be in place. There's obviously some challenges with transitions in technology like time sheets and vehicle inspections, things like that, just learning new habits. But for the most part, everything has been quite smooth.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Good to hear.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: As far as the STOW transition, we do have an RCT employee embedded in the operation this year, and is doing a little bit of everything, shadowing the supervisors, driving. And I've been spending quite a bit of time with that individual as well as the operations heads at Stowe to make sure that it's seamless transition. In that sense, we have new buses on order, which our manufacturer promised me will be here by November, which would really help This past November. And well, the the initial projection was April 2028. So we were able to find a manufacturer that was able to meet our deadlines and was met a number of times with the town of Stowe and are really optimistic about that relationship as well. They've been willing to extend the lease in the Moscow facility, and a great partner through and through as far as the Stowe community, the town of Stowe, well as Stowe Mountain. So all that seems to be in good order. And then working really closely with SSTA to transition the O and D administration for Chittenden County starting July 1.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Did you change the composition of your board or add folks representing the new area?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So in anticipation for the transition, we've been holding board seats. So we didn't have to fully restructure the board. We ran a little lean for a while, but we now have a municipal seat for Franklin County because Grand Isle is largely covered by a subcontractor and cider. We've extended a nonmunicipal seat to them, And then Catherine Dietrich, who is currently on the GMC board, is gonna be joining as a representative from the Regional Planning Commission. So really good interest, and and I think just structurally it made a lot of sense for us to hold those seats rather than rewrite bylaws and all that sort of things.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: And this, I think I could ask any of the providers. We're seeing that the agency of transportation is likely to be significantly cutting their budget for this upcoming year. And we've, I saw, I was on an email exchange earlier in the year where I don't remember who asked the question, but it was essentially saying that we're, as a public transit provider, going to have to make cuts if we don't see certain budgetary increases or at least a little bit of growth with inflation. I believe the response from the agency was, well, we can't answer that question now. It's unlikely that there will be any kind of increase for public transit. I'm just wondering if you can speak broadly about do you does the do you as providers have anxiety about this upcoming budget? Are there things that we should be looking at as you especially during this critical time for your transition. I would hate to see us drop funding for this upcoming year, right, as you've made such a big move.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: So I

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: wonder if

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: you can speak to that generally with the AOT budget reductions.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: Yeah, and I appreciate that. I think, you know, there's a couple aspects to that. One is each year the providers put in their grant application and then kind of see what's awarded after that. And each year there is a pretty significant gap between, you know, what individual providers feel would be an optimized optimized service portfolio and what we're able to function with. One thing I've shared with this committee is that transportation is infinitely scalable. Right? But one of the scary parts is that as you shrink those costs, you lose the the the scale the efficiencies of scale. So, that is one of my primary concerns is that as we, you know, look at consolidating services, as we ration, so the o and d program is really kind of a strategic rationing program. So how how do you make the most impact for the dollars available? And looking at a forecast where we may be cutting, it's making those remaining services significantly more expensive. Yeah. So we're not necessarily addressing budgetary gaps by cutting services. We're just making fewer services that cost more. So really trying to figure out how we can make investments as communities or as the legislature to regain those efficiencies of scale, but it is a very real challenge. Our VPTA did a kind of a an outreach to all its members, and across all the members without change in coverage, our insurance went up by a million dollars this year. That's umbrella coverage for liability. That's vehicle insurance. That's workers' comp. So without any type of kind of mismanagement by us or by changes in policy. That's just the direction the market's going. So you have these kind of external cost drivers, which continue to push the cost up, which reduces services, which then continue to put the price up for a remaining one. So I think some key things to look at are, you know, what are the what's the gap between what the providers are looking for in a grant application so that optimized service and the actual award? Because once the award's there, we scale services to fit the funds available. It's a little bit more difficult with fixed route, but as much of the state has been transitioning to on demand, less money means less rides. And so scaling again down to that point. OND specifically is one of those indicators. The other challenging area is in Medicaid where, you know, we're on the tail end of a number of extensions currently awaiting the award of the current R and D, but as any of you know, at the really tail end of the contract, that original proposal tends to not cover some of those. So we are facing an $800,000 loss in previous year and a projected $500,000 loss in this year. And so the way the Medicaid is structured is without an intervention in the Budget Adjustment Act, those losses then get carried by whatever minimal cash reserves the organizations had stored up during COVID. And I think in the coming years, what really concerns me is any reserves are gone. We don't really own the buses. So the only place to really cut services or generate revenue is either going back to the municipalities and saying, hey, give us more money for the same amount of service or cutting services and again, losing those economies of scale.

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: And if I could follow-up just to talk about GMT Urban and the future outlook. And so one of the things that you're going to hear from us in a little bit is that our fiscal year twenty seven is looking better.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: You should state your name.

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: Sorry. So my name is Clayton Clark. I'm the general manager for Green Mountain Transit. And in response to Senator White's question about future budget impacts, one of the things that you'll hear is that our fiscal year twenty seven budget is in the red by about $800,000 That's actually much less than we thought. So that is something that we're happy that we do not need to immediately go into another round of service reductions like we originally planned to. The thing that I want to make sure that this committee understands is that the real problem for GMT financially is going to be fiscal year twenty eight. We know that our gap there is going to be close to $3,000,000 And we also know that the carbon reduction funds that VTrans has been very helpful with providing us in the past will no longer be available in fiscal year twenty eight. And so one of the things that I'm gonna need to come out of this session is an understanding of the direction of where things may be going in fiscal year twenty eight. Because if we are told to live within our means, then we are going to have to probably do another 20% reduction in GMT's urban service that would need to be implemented by this time or it would need to start being implemented by this time next year. And so the immediate need is a little less than we thought, but the long term need is still, very critical for us.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: So you mentioned cutting services as a budget saving measure. Correct. When you say cutting services, do you mean lowering the amount of grants for for O and D that towns are receiving or keeping the grants the same and eliminating the services they provide?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So that's a two part answer. One, so each year the transit agencies submit as part of the grant application a request for OND funds. Typically, we shoot for the moon, and if we land in the stars, we're we accept it. We're probably closer to skyscraper level at this point. But once we receive the award, then it's really a matter of forecasting. So with our allotted O and D funds, municipal match and local funds, looking at the cost of on demand transportation at that point, how many rides can we give to this amount of money? And that's where it becomes scalable. RCT going into this year forecasted, This is the amount of O and D funds we have available. We go to individual partners. We say, this is your portion of the O and D funds. Let's work together to see how we can make that last until July. Worst case scenario is you get to March, then you're out of funds, and all of a sudden, those critical care trips fall away. So it's working with partners. Then so you you submit to the, VTrans how much OND funds you think you need. You then receive the amount that is allocated. You assign that to either municipalities, adult days, whatever various OND partners you have, and then you work together to forecast how many trips you can give for that amount of money. When I I think about cutting services, it's it's far less kind of dramatic than a fixed route where it's we're just stopping this today, but it may be a reduction just on ledger, how many trips you can possibly give for the amount of money allocated. So if that money goes down, that gets compounded. But if the money remains the same and costs increase, then you're still gonna see less total rides, but you can gain efficiencies and get more rides. There's a number of levers that try to achieve that. Does that answer your question?

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Well, sort of. It's not the way I understood it, but I'm I'm really kind of green. I'm getting into the SOMD program gradually here and, or quickly I should say, but, so by partners, you're talking about the local room of folks. So let's take Colchester and their partners around the table.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: It's federal

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: money that passes through you to them. Correct? Tell me when I'm wrong here because I

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So currently passes through GMT. Yeah. For that. Yeah. In the future. Yeah. But for for this hypothetical, yes, it passes through the regional agency. Each agency managed it a little bit differently. So I I can I use an existing line

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: of territory? Yeah.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So in RCT's territory, so let's say we apply for $2,000,000 in o and d funds. We're awarded 18, you know, 1,800,000.0. Mhmm. These are all crazy high numbers. I think the total budget's about 6,000,000, but hypothetical, I can be generous with myself. And then we look at our nine partners within the Northeast Kingdom. There's adult days. There's municipalities, but the bulk of it goes to the Council on Aging. So we say, based off of historic trends, Council on Aging, you have $500,000 Based off of our current on demand, we can give 5,000 trips. It's actually probably closer to 15,000 trips. How we try to work that within the demand, it's very nuanced. Because let's say you have a small community, Northeast Kingdom, you have one individual who has kidney complications, and now they're in dialysis. That is five trips a week multiplied by the year. So about 17% of all of our trips go to dialysis, and that starts to shrink the portion of trips you can provide to other individuals. So, you know, not to kind of get overly complicated because at the end of the day, you walk into July 1 with a set amount of funds, and you know roughly what your on demand rate is, and you know how many trips you can give. So this is the population of older adults and persons with disabilities. And so in the Northeast Kingdom, we went to NECA Council on Aging, and we say this is your budgetary allotment at the beginning of the year. And we said, based off of these projections, I think we can only get to about five trips per person per month. They came back and they said, you know, that's four medical trips and one nutritional access trip.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: That's a whole.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: And one nutritional so okay. We're gonna land on six, and we as partners are gonna try to address those losses, but it's really an exercise of forecasting based off of trips possible under the allotted amount of budget.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: And that decision is made by the provider and the recipient of the grant, which would be the talent.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: The management of it can vary by provider. I only know from our own experience how we approach that, but all the parameters that are set are really a conversation because we're the content experts. Right? We know how many trips we can get for any allowed amount of So being able to work with those providers to kind of forecast and make sure we don't have shortfalls and put people in difficult positions. But to speak frankly, it is choosing which of your fingers you're gonna cut off because that kind of strategic rationing, there are no winners. Because when you get down to the cost we have and the budget we have, it's alright. Am I telling this senior they're not getting to the grocery store this week, or am I telling this senior that, you know, this preventative care trip can't happen this month? And it it is an impossible decision. The other thing I'll share, and this is I'll silver box here for a moment, but the most cost efficient way to approach care for our seniors is investing heavily in preventative care. So if we can expand the O and D program, invest in social engagement trips, get them to church on Sunday, get them to see their their friends for coffee, get them to work, all that is a much more cost efficient. And so that is my kind of pitch to invest heavily in the O and D program. But I hope that helps explain

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Well, does. I'm trying to think those when you were going through the list, getting get them to work, get them a coffee with their friends. What are you leaving out there? What didn't happen when you would you provide this?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So those are those are the quality of life things, which when you're when you're choosing how to ration are typically the first things cut. Because if I have to choose between getting a senior to dialysis Yeah. And getting them, you know, to quality of life thing, then it becomes a much different discussion. With the budget we have allowed and the need of our population, we found that four medical trips and two nutritional access trips, we wouldn't go below that because then you're really impacting the livability. But it is difficult that we can't do those additional trips on top of that with the money la la la. Okay. And just one

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: more moment on that. Keep going to because we're gonna get into specifics on your case. Right.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Yeah. So the ultimate decision when the money passes through to a committee or a board, what I'm not sure what you call it, that would that would distribute this money. You distribute it to them, correct? Or they have it available to make those my question would be, who makes the decision on which fingers get cut off when that money is ready to be dispensed.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: Yeah. So that's that's agency specific, so I can't speak to any other agencies other than RCT. So let's talk about your view. So in in our case, we begin the conversation in in in July 1. Right? And so we now have been awarded our grant application. We know how the general distribution of those funds are gonna go to partners. We send them a contract that includes the amount, and then we begin that conversation with them because they are in the best position to understand the needs of their community. We are in the best position to understand what cost per trip looks like and and forecast over the twelve months for the allocated budget. And then it's really that dynamic of understanding what the best utilization of the funds, but there's no reason they would know how many trips they could get away with, and there's no reason for me to know what the priorities of that. So you collaborate. RCT, that is how we approach it. Correct. And and, you know, the agencies retain the ability to, know sign off on waivers and all that sort of thing for circumstances that are beyond our understanding. But again it's that constant supervision of the budget and making sure that we have enough fuel in the tank to get to the next budget cycle.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Just a clarifying thing. You don't send actual money to the other agency. You just allocate a certain budget for them and you keep the money to provide this service. Correct. Right?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: Yeah. So it's managed within our software. So you assign trips to various and you track those funds based off via a lot of budget.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Do you want to go further with this right now? Not right now. Okay, then because I'd like to know how the decision was in your case.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Well, my case, I think

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: I'm talking to the wrong guy. Yeah. I know you are.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Do you wanna move into that?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: Whenever you get there. Okay.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Well, we'll wait until we get there. Okay.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: I think we have some hands on the screen.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Well, Jim's got his hand up.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Okay. Thanks.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: I

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: just wanted to add on to Kael's testimony. He referred earlier to the very large gap in Medicaid funding. And I don't want to let it go miss that, if we're losing in Medicaid, which is an entitlement program, we do not have the same ability in that program to make decisions about which fingers to cut off. We're not allowed to cut any fingers off, we have to continue to provide the service. So we don't even have the opportunity to try to manage our costs on a service level within that program. And I wanna make sure that we're also clear, a loss in the Medicaid program dramatically affects our ability to continue to provide service in the general public and O and D programs. We cannot get around, a loss is a loss and we are not like many traditional healthcare providers where we can cost shift. We have cost allocation programs. They come down from the FDA, get approved by VTrans. They're very specific about making sure that costs are allocated fairly. So I just wanna make sure, and there'll probably be more testimony on this as the session goes forward, but the gap in Medicaid funding is enormous and untenable and will dramatically negatively impact our ability to make services available in the general public and O and D arenas. And know that Caleb will be able to articulate a lot of that issue as well. They're the largest provider of Medicaid services in the state, but we're all affected by that. And I just don't want that to go unmissed. Thanks.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: It will be the last one we talk about. Clayton.

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: Just quickly, I would just wanted to clarify that for Chittenden County, GMT does not provide the OND service that's contracted with SSTA. So that's just a different in urban than in the rural communities.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Do you wanna?

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Yeah, can you get into that a little more? Explain that a little, I didn't quite, know what, said you don't provide the grant, it goes to SSTA, did you say?

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: No, we contract with SSTA to provide the service. And so when Caleb was describing how RCT implemented OND, that they would provide the service as well. And so, but for GMT Urban, the funds come to us, but we do not keep the funds because we don't provide the service. We pass them through to SSTA to pay for service. In fact, GMT doesn't receive any funding. We used to receive $50,000 a year to for the administration of the program, but we have chosen to give that into the program so that to maximize the amount of trips. So GMT retains no funds for Chitney County 0 And D. And GMT, in fact, is planning on using its reserve funds, which normally would be focused on fixed route transit or other similar things. We're gonna use our reserve funds to help augment the Chittenden County 0 And D this year.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Keep going, you're gonna because if you don't, I'm gonna ask the question. I welcome

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: that too. So in the situation of Colchester, is a heavy user of OND, and again, I'm just getting up to snuff on the numbers and stuff with the town, Who should I be talking to, you or SSTA about the cuts that are coming in?

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: So you should talk to me because SSTA is the provider. I can tell you, and I don't mean to be flip, but with the town of Colchester threatening legal action on this matter, I'm going to be very cautious about any answers about town of Colchester service specifically.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: Well, I can tell you that they probably, I can't speak for the Town, but I, from what I've heard with the extension that they've received about two to three weeks of service, am I correct in that?

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: So yes, restrictions will not, no restrictions will go in place until February 1. There will be a Chittenden County OND meeting where we talk about the best approach and that that will happen before then. I can tell you that what was reported in WCAX that provided a list of, like, here are going to be the definite reductions, you know, that is not the case. It's still going to be a work in progress. The town of Colchester will be at the Chittenden County OND meeting to be able to advocate for their position.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Okay. All right. And I

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: know they've pulled back from their threat of lawsuit for now, but I understand what you're saying.

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: Yep, you know, there's consequences to a threat of legal action and frankly that means that we're gonna be focused less on finding the solution to the problem and more on making sure that we approach this in in a way that's, legally justified.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: I can understand that.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: I'll let you Well, I I don't understand the details of all this really clearly. I've read stuff from the town that feels like they were surprised that nearly 90 people were used to losing O and D services within the community of Colchester, and they feel like it was dumped on them that this is happening. I think we will we don't wanna get in the middle of a lawsuit in this committee, but I think this committee is going to wanna hear what the process was and how they got to this place where both sides feel like, you know

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: I do feel comfortable answering some of those questions. I can tell you the minutes of the Chitney County OND committee show clearly that in July, we advised all of our partners to reduce their trip guidelines based on the reduction in funding that we initially received. None of the providers chose to do that. I also can tell you that notifications went out on November 24 indicating that there would likely be trip reductions. And at that time, there was the potential that it would be to critical care only. Fortunately, VTrans provided additional funds so that it can be more than just critical care. I'm not really sure why no action was taken by the partners to prep their people using the service once that notice was set November 24, but that didn't happen. And so I'll leave

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: it at that. I would only say to you at some point, we're gonna want to better understand from all sides about this, because the emails that I've seen that have gone back and forth said that they were told in December that there would be a significant reduction in service. And what I've seen for the indications, that's the only indication they felt like they had got. And as I understand it, within Colchester, there's nearly 90 people that are gonna lose service. So it's a concern to us, and I think we'll wanna better understand exactly what happened and what the process is, if we are in there. It will not be the last time that this committee talks about Medicaid services in in all in this. We're gonna We know we're gonna have to go into that. Andy was next. So

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: I just wanna make sure I understand how it works. What Jim said, that it doesn't have the option, once you're in the Medicaid system, you have to provide the rights. That's what I understood you to say. But then there's this example we were just talking about where services are being cut. What happens when you run out of money from Medicaid? Do you have to do the right anyway or can you tell the person, sorry, we don't have any more money? You have to figure out another way to get to the hospital.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: And just to draw a very clear distinction, So under the Medicaid program, you we are contractually obligated to give qualifying trips at any expense. And so that's why we have a loss in last year based on a thousand dollars projected just based off of usage.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Right.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: What the other program we're talking about is O and D. Okay. And Is there O and D in the It is. Yeah. And and I it's a it's an important thought experiment, and I'm I'm happy to hear that this will not be the last time we have to talk about it because as OND funding remains level and the population that qualifies for OND grows, we will increasingly be set with these determinations and, not to speak with other providers, but no matter who makes the decision, somebody is gonna have to choose which finger. Because the reality is that between critical care and baseline medical and nutritional access, there is going to be very little room for programs like food or for quality of life trips or work access. Medicaid is only for medical transport. Right. So the Medicaid transport, the individual has to be Medicaid eligible as well as the trip. And so if it clears those hurdles, it is non optional.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: The trip is only for medical, but you can't do the food Correct. Trip to

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: the grocery store with the Medicaid. Correct. So, one of the benefits of the braided services model is that the same individual is working with the same agency to go to the grocery store or the food chain

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: They might not know.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: And do the Medicaid. That is the benefit is they get a call and say, Hey, need a trip, and we work through the funding source.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: For the dialysis, it's Medicaid.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So an individual who is not Medicaid eligible but still needs dialysis would fall under the o and d critical care. And and as I mentioned, that is significant. Seventeen percent of our trips, typically a lot of our Northeast Kingdom trips are going to St. Albans or Lancaster, New Hampshire for their dialysis. Charge for o and d trips?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: The ride comes out of

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: the We do not charge the riders. I I I If it's on Medicaid, but if they have enough money, they need a ride.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Could they could they pay for an O and D trip?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: That is currently not the state model. I would defer to them as the OED program manager.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Are you not allowed to or are you just because you're assuming if they had another way to do it, they would figure it out. They wouldn't use the OID.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So we do offer RCT personal pay. So if a person is not Medicaid eligible, has utilized their trips under OID, and has that

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: That's how you would get

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: Yeah, in that case we actually do allow the individual to pay for additional tariffs.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: If they It's a voluntary.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: And I would also say that the agency partners, so some of our OMB partners will seek external grants to increase the allotment, and so we can both municipalities in increasing the funding for OMB.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: They could do their own fundraising, but the voluntary part, like after they use their four trips that week, is the fifth one, is that voluntary with the pay or you would say, hey you've already used four, you have to pay for this fifth trip.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: We give them the cost estimate and it's up

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: to their discretion. Is it discretion?

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: So you said we're going to give you the ride either way you can pay zero or pay the this is what we think the cost is. If that's the voluntary free?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: So typically what we'll do is we'll go to the agency and say hey are there extenuating circumstances that would prompt a waiver on the restrictions that you've put

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: in place? But it's never like, you don't get a rider, you pay us $50. You never do that. I would never do that. No.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Are like ten minutes from the end. We're going to we are going to want to come back and the whole framework and better understand how all of this works and what the parameters around are this. I know that Medicaid pays for the portion, and you have the growing portion, that is private care, and is private, and there is the option to ask one would ask the question, could any of this be billed off to private insurers, and do they ever is that a possibility? But just how the whole system works. We are gonna wanna go back into the initiatives that this committee took last year and say, where are we? What So we're gonna spend time on all of this going forward in the piece. I'm gonna continue this for about another until twenty five after, and then we've gotta get ready for the floor bed, but this is not the last time we're coming back to this. And we are gonna be interested in the process by which communities get notified on what's happening because, you know, springing this on communities is not a good thing. And I see two hands up there and I've got hands here.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: I'll give my hands. I think the first person

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: I'm going

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: to be I'm not cutting

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: your fingers.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: And then

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: we'll go from there because he's had the least amount of time to speak.

[Clayton Clark (General Manager, Green Mountain Transit)]: Yep. And I'm going to be very short. I just wanted to bring the committee's attention to the memo that the GMT Board of Commissioners issued on the rural transfer. This has been a great process. Really have enjoyed working with Jim, Caleb, and VTrans on this. And so I just want to make sure that it's noted for the record that GMT is very happy with how things have gone with this.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Okay. Jim, and then I've got committee members with hands up.

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: Just very quickly on the point that Senator Brennan brought up about, people pay for the trip? The OND program, while there can be broad restrictions set on them, means testing is not one of them. So even if so if you have somebody who's not eligible for Medicaid, which is a means tested program, then they have to get their service through the OND program, and it doesn't matter what their resources are. We cannot means test, we can only, the FDA doesn't allow that as a criteria. So it does, that's what emphasizes the voluntary nature of we can say we can only provide you with four rides. If you want a fifth, you can pay for it. We provide that option just as well as Caleb and RCT do, but it is completely voluntary. We we cannot restrict people from access to the program based on our perception that they have enough money to pay for it themselves. So I just wanted to clarify that point.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: So as soon as they learn they can get the right free, they could get the right free. They might pay, it's just an obligation or they might think they have to pay with it, they don't have

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: to pay for the fifth round. Correct.

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: I will say, TVT, I can't speak for the other providers, but we try very hard to function, I would say, a traditional nonprofit in fundraising as part of our local match program. And we do get a lot of riders who will donate, they'll write checks out of their personal bank accounts to do that, but it functions in a very voluntary way no matter what you look at it.

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: And along that category, we also have philanthropic funds that cover trips that may not have listed.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: This is really important. Jim, I thought you said you would pay or or I'm sorry. You would provide the, allocated amount, four trips a week, but if they wanted a fifth trip, they would need your pay. In in circles No.

[Sen. Patrick "Pat" Brennan (Member)]: It it it's a little

[Jim Bolton (Executive Director, Tri-Valley Transit)]: bit like Caleb described. We would be saying you've used your four trips. Like Caleb, we would talk to the partners and talk to individuals if there's a reason, a valid reason why this rider needs the additional trip. We might waive that particular restriction and provide the trip for free under the program anyway. So we're always looking just as Caleb has articulated, we're always looking to how can we provide the ride. We're not trying to make restrictions, but in this really seriously budget constrained arena, we do have to sometimes ask people, are you in a position to be able to pay for it? And then sometimes there are people and then we do the private pay. Sometimes there aren't, sometimes as Khale just articulated again, there's philanthropic opportunities to fund those trips. So it makes it a lot harder and a lot more complicated. The primary point I wanted to make though is unlike Medicaid, which is a means tested program, the O and D program is not. So we cannot restrict based on our perception that somebody has the ability to pay out of their own pocket, which is it's not allowable.

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Right, and that's for the first trips, but we can talk about this more when we talk about it again, but if you can just send us some really clear information. I know it's a super complicated system, but if you could send us some flow charts maybe and some directions that you give I would rather see

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: when he comes back and when we get people back, we're gonna ask for, we're gonna start with the overview and then we're gonna-

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: Oh, okay. That's fine.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: Yep. Go ahead.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Thank you, Mr. Chair. I have heard a lot of mixed information about the rural health care money that we're getting. The tune of 190,000,000 is my understanding. More. Great. Do you know because it sounds like there's some strange parameters on it. It seems like from my understanding, you would be a certainly eligible entity to apply for those funds as a provider or as a now? Okay. I don't know if you've thought about that or if that's come up. Was trying to

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: think it. Unless it was already in the plan, because they've already, states submitted a plan and said this is how we're going to use the money. The grant from the feds is like you will suspend it. Unless

[Sen. Wendy Harrison (Clerk)]: they're Oh, already thought included transportation.

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: Well, maybe it did. I'm just saying, like, if it didn't before, there's not an opportunity to apply.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Oh, so but doesn't but we as a state could potentially allocate the funds?

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: I think I think when

[Sen. Andrew Perchlik (Member)]: we applied to the Fed, you said this is we're gonna spend it on these 10 things. We can't add an eleventh thing now. So if it was not one of the 10 things, there's not an opportunity to change the Fed thing.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: And and

[Caleb Bushey (Executive Director, Rural Community Transportation, Inc.)]: I I will make it a point note. I, you know, have been invited to conversations. They haven't happened yet. But I think this is an important thing for this committee to monitor as I believe those funds do support specialization and and some regionalization efforts, which will come at a great deal of cost to the transportation agency. So if it's not included in that, there are gonna be serious implications, for the work we do and the work all of you do.

[Sen. Rebecca "Becca" White (Vice Chair)]: Well, thank you. Almost thought we had.

[Sen. Richard Westman (Chair)]: And I think at this point, well, I'm gonna pull the plug on this because we've got four minutes to get up to the floor. One minute. And but it it will