Time at DEF CON 11 rocks, okay Information leakage actually I wanted to name information spewage because it's funny as you go through and start looking at information It's available out there. It kind of surprises you anyway call your plumber because your information is leaking We're gonna talk about today as a background of how the speech was Conceived information about security leakage what the risks are to organizations and then many fun little trips tricks and tips Technical trip tips For technology people and process and also for those that actually have to protect from this kind of stuff Some tricks on how to protect against it Okay, beginning the bed the background was the art of war. I just happened to be reading it lately And one of the things I say is that if you know the enemy and you know yourself You need not fear the results of a hundred battles in other words, you're gonna win if you know yourself, but not your enemy You're gonna suffer defeats and you're gonna succumb to any battle if you neither know neither A lot of times in information security. We tend to see to the know ourselves maybe and not know the enemy or In many cases during assessments. I found they knew neither Here's a chart that I put together that Dealing with all the time on the left hand side. You see the red. That's pretty much what Most of the world sitting in as far as from a security standpoint if you notice you have the unsuccessful attacks discovered those are basically people that attack systems and and Loose basically it don't successfully get in but they're discovered usually picked up by intrusion detection systems or misconfigured systems IDS is whatever And then we have successful attacks and they're discovered what I'm focusing on today is successful attacks that have been undiscovered It's funny. I've again. I've done a lot of assessments and usually a six months after a year after doing an assessment We come in again, and we find out that sometime in between they've made a change There's an echo back there cool Huh, okay, so what we have is a level protection But I think there's a lot of successful attacks that really go and discovered basically the NT guy goes well my machine locked up I'll just reboot it. Unfortunately. It puts it back to where or whatever in a year or two later It's found or discovered So that's the basis of that after conversation with some friends What is information leakage information leakage results either purposefully or accidentally? Information that's released that can put your staff and tell intellectual property systems or networks a risk So that's pretty wide category Risks of it If you understand and have the patience Of looking this information up The success of attack dramatically increases you can find many many many vulnerabilities that have been overlooked by the You know press now vulnerability assessment type stuff also places your Organization a competitive disadvantage if your competitors can look up information that's public About you long as you want. Oh, I don't want to talk that long Okay, good. I can tell stories Okay, I can put you at a major disadvantage Also, there's a lot of legal risks of this information being leaked out and also can do physical harm to staff or faculty. It's funny During from an intellectual property standpoint. This is it's kind of the Well, I've used this to track people back that have Threatened the life of individuals and also in one case threatened to blow up a facility So they were not aware of all the information out there about themselves type of information leakage. There's technology people in process I'm going to very quickly talk about technology. I think Everybody else talks about technology here. I'm going to focus on people in process Which is typically left out in this kind of conversation, but it's as critical Okay, from a technology. We really have the passive listening world Which is sniffers and scanning of frequencies and also the active We're driving we're dialing scanning of networks pretty straightforward Types of things that we can learn about a network layer to we can find out about the MAC addresses We the MAC addresses we can kind of figure out what kind of network card they have and make some assumptions about what platform they're using SSIDs frequencies used Things like wireless Active probes things like nmapx probe ICMP Cato passive which is sniffers Kismet and radio scanners Pretty straightforward. Oh, this is my favorite layer for an above SNMP Systems, I don't know if you guys actually looked at some routers that have SNMP open It's pretty neat a lot of people decide to put SNMP up as firewalls and they leave this This firewall the SNMP open to the internet several assessments that I've done I Scan the network. I find it and I enumerate the SNMP. Well, luckily enough for me I find out what processes are running so I know what protocols are using in house It lifts all the internal networks all the default gateway information. It's really wonderful tells me what? Ports are currently connected during the day. It's pretty neat Systems if SNMP is open you're able to enumerate things like hard drives processes applications that are running makes it real easy to Determine what's vulnerable? application servers like web servers if you guys have gone to netcraft netcraft will tell you what web server somebody's using Without literally going to the website. It'll also give you a history of the website and give you uptime advantage well It's a good idea. You can find out a version of a vulnerability becomes available. You can go here look up what platform they're running and Test it if you choose Also information with chat email usenet mailing lists If you haven't seen it in the header of all these there's lots of good information that can be used The track back to you And then applications is Tom Marken Speaking I know he spoke at black hat. Is he speaking this weekend? I Guess not Thomas Arkin did a presentation of black hat on webmail Where he went through webmail and talked about all the information it's given away when you use webmail and how it's used back to track back information so know you're Not anonymous when you're using webmail Some special cases firewalls. I've had Several companies tell me no you can never figure out what kind of firewall I'm using because It's you know, it's magical. I can't figure out what it is Well, there's two papers out there There's a paper out there and there's a tool out there to determine what kind of firewall they're using I recommend and suggest pulling that up and Also tempest We're getting more and more into looking at radio frequencies and Determining what radio frequencies different things are running on. This is some links to tempest sites Which will give you ideas of what frequencies are being viewed as an example Went over to a friend of mine's house. He has a new baby and everything. We had a baby monitor. He just bought a Panasonic Telephone we're sitting there and we laid it down and okay. We sat and had a beer and As we're sitting there the two of them together. We started listening in on phone conversations from the neighbors Okay, apparently the phone the baby monitor the phone was bleeding enough information that through the baby monitor We can listen to all his neighbors. So he said hey, this is kind of cool So we went a block down the street and we could catch more It's kind of cool Radio emissions are coming out of everything and can be tracked Okay, people the fun part if we're gonna track a company Typically with what we'd want to do is we'd want to go to their website if you want to find out information The speech earlier today they talked about how you can use Google as a proxy to do searches against the website looking for things like email looking for things like Company names things like passwords things like that without directly going into the website Which is with the domain option a couple very cool things the web dev or times there There's a link there called the way back machine Has anybody seen the way back machine always in that great? It has eight years of website development. There's a lot of dumb things people did eight years ago There's several sites out there that I found this is real scary, especially if you're a parent I found kids names and sports that they were in on corporate websites Okay, wife's What activities are involved in they don't do that anymore? Well, some of them don't Also Google has caches so you can go in and do searches and find a lot of information From the last time they made a change. So literally you do search and click There's also a lot of technical record information. It's leaked Seriously, if you have the Aaron record and you know what the domain name is most people leave their phone number their fax number all kind of Good information there that can be used for an attack if literally you don't know where the company is you can go to the Aaron record or the network solutions or The who is done that look it up and find out where the corporate headquarters is typically Kind of interesting and many times. That's a phone number to their help desk Hmm Marketing material I want to show you guys that that's kind of cool If I can find it Cyber alert here you go. This is kind of interesting You can take in put a corporate Information in on this you can say I'm looking for whatever company and This guy will longer 13,000 new sources and email you personal information About that organization when they do press releases and when they're named in any Article throughout the country throughout the world Pretty scary Another one is inbox in box robot And see I think that's Here that's the web dev bar. Yeah, there's the way back by the way Let's see, who do we look up? Network unavailable. Oh well Anyway, it's pretty neat because you can look up lots of information about their internal technical people at one point They used to put up what their network diagram was That's the other thing is a lot of corporations leaked information about how great their security was So literally they'll put up the the IP addresses what technologies they used what firewalls with IDS is they used They were proud of them Trade shows From people standpoint if you go to a trade show, there's a lot of information. They'll give up Trade show people leave all kind of information Around sitting on desks and things like that I've gone to things like Comdex and literally have seen their dial-up and passwords to the corporate network sitting behind the tables VPN keys all kind of things so you know people don't protect those Bars and smoking lounges and organizational parties I was once went to Comdex a little bit earlier and I found out there was a party and considering I like parties Okay, I went to this party. I didn't realize it was a corporate party for this well-known database company well, I stood there and The corporate officers got up and told me about what their plans were for Comdex Told me it was closed and enjoy the party To me and everybody else had a great time. Everybody asked me. Hey, where are you from? I said I'm from Jacksonville. Wow. We didn't know we had an office there. That's pretty cool and they left me alone It was very cool. I did that with HP. It was kind of cool because I did with HP and they said wait a second We don't have an office in Jacksonville and I said wait. Can I get one more drink? I said, okay Smoking lounges if you go to a company's smoking lounge and just ask for a cigarette. It's incredible the kind of information people will tell you about the corporation Or close by Sandwich shop people talk about during lunch during dinner They'll talk about all kind of corporate information and do it publicly Company names technology, especially if you know where the techie techies go Great place and obviously bars Tech tech support The people that are supporting the technologies that we deal with regularly they have their own little challenge They have to deal with the vendor and Even worse they have to deal with the vendor help desk. You guys have never dealt with those. Have you? Yeah, okay. Well What kind of stuff do they ask you for? Hey, give me your configuration file. Can you give me your password? Okay, well in some corporate Agreements you have to provide all that information What I found is that there is a lot of companies that are now outsourcing that and Their expectations of security To the outsourcer are far lower than the original company and many times They never have the authority to even test these outsourcers. Let me tell you a story one of the outsourcers that I know about told me this story that That They didn't have enough computers for everybody on their help desk for a week or two. It's a well-known company that does Tech that does tech support for some devices can't go into the details But literally when customers would call in they would run to a single computer and print out that information the configuration files And then whenever done they'd throw in the trash yeah a Lot of companies during outsourcing agreements will forget that security is important and forget about these kind of issues unfortunately Also another fun place The people leak information is use net news and web pages. Oh, those are so much fun You can find out that the technical support Question that a techie will post full configuration files with for their Cisco pixels With the VPN configurations Okay in clear text, you don't even have to decrypt it. This is great Or what kind of DNS server they just configured or what application languages they're using in-house and what calls they're using Which may be vulnerable decom Here's some places that you can go tile net is Allows you to searches robo fetch is kind of neat robo fetch allows you to put a piece of information out there about a company corporation individual whatever and any time they post to the net it Sends you a copy Anytime they post to use net kind of cool You can also use the advanced search feature. I wasn't going to show it because I don't have a connection unfortunately but in the advanced search feature I Could put domain put the domain section and do a search and come up with a list of all the employees That have posted from that corporation and all the details During some CIs that I've done competitive intelligence gathering. I have found things like What hobbies people have one guy was in the leather. That's a different story We've found all kind of information just by doing simple searches we found a school district where We found an individual that was inappropriately interested in a woman that was inappropriately Interested in the football team see Another challenge what we call the exception to the security rule management Does anybody ever have to deal with that? Yeah We're above security planning. We're above any of that. Hey, come on over. Let me show you The spreadsheets it's okay that we have all the social security numbers for our employees being passed around at Budget time so we can figure out how they're going to get raises During present day during a lot of assessments I go in and I look for this kind of stuff and it's common It's there a lot of educational community. I teach I Get the social security numbers for all my students and now I can do a search and by find everybody's Social security numbers in this one area Apparently it's not important to protect that for many organizations Another place and information is leaked all the time is during disaster recoveries or dr. Drills a Lot of times these people are rushed. They're drive. They're driving boxes of tapes up They're bought. They're basically driving from one place to another. They're flying up a lot of times these people will leave Have clipboards of passwords and all kind of other information. That's public That they can be public just by walking up to a car and reading this information. It's it's incredible and It's real interesting because during an early part of a disaster recovery Pretty much. They don't know who's going to be there So anybody walks in is considered an employee for a short period of time. That's kind of strange other information it's leaked Posting of resumes. Oh, this is so much fun I have found out lots of information about the corporate officers just by looking up resumes that are posted especially when they're looking at moving or technical community or staff What their backgrounds are and things like that? financial comment boards if you go to yahoo comments about Corporations you can find out a lot about the internal politics that are going on and even email people. Oh, geez. This is a shame Do you know anything about this and they'll tell you and then that f you'd company? They have leaked internal documentation Which is always interesting and then here are six different Websites the tricks that I use when I'm looking for information about an organization or whatever All these have emailing lists. I can pick a technology and I can pick an area and Then every day I get to see if there's any job openings in that area and then the technologies that they're using Social engineering calls Just make a phone call. It's it's funny how bad it is when you make a phone call and say hey Can I talk to the corporate or whatever? Can I talk to HR and they'll give you names? They'll give you lots of information a lot of leakage there from the people standpoint and also email and delivery I have a CD that I created. It's a golf magazine CD. It has a trojan on it You know, it's really interesting that you can take a golf magazine And a CD and take golf magazine rapid and plastic and how many corporate officers will run it Okay, they're above security. Oh Golf courses, of course That's a pun. Sorry the course part Yeah, no, oh news sources a lot of times The local newspapers will have a lot of news items about the people that are within corporations Besides the corporations themselves So if you do a search for wherever the corporate offices There's a good chance you'll find out that they were they were involved in this community activity or that community activity And we'll give up the name and titles of lots of different people that are involved in this Yes phone numbers Here's four places that literally just by putting in the phone number or looking at names Honestly, not all four of them are that good with certain names or certain databases It changes based on area and whatever but by literally looking up Whoever's name between these four. There's a good chance. You're gonna find people You're gonna find an individual The personnel wreck the personnel the WW us search us search is kind of cool You have to pay for it, but before you pay for it After you type in the information and give you the names it gives you the age of the individual Hey, how can that be handy? Well, if you go to the genealogy website You can look up the family tree and if they've posted that information you can approximate who they are to figure out The mother's maiden name This is information leakage for individuals that you've got to protect yourself from Okay, reverse phone number look ups. Oh the fun part about it is this particular place now has cell phones Yes, you can now look up cell phones here, sir. Yeah horizon comm. This is a roll-up for everybody's email dresses for some weird reason this guy keeps track of email dresses classmates calm if you have a general Age and where they're grew up from their resume What do you think you can find out about them? All kind of things people put their hobbies their names are their animals The names of their kids they put all kind of stuff on classmate calm. It's pretty outrageous. I Didn't say that you did I see Q again. I see Q people put all kind of information up about themselves a Lot more than should go and also here's my favorite public Records place if this is the only thing you stayed for this is the most fun place Where are you? That's the other one. I'm gonna talk about that one a minute. Ah There we go. Oh, maybe not. I miss it again, huh? My Lennox partition died. Sorry I Have to see there we go. This guy is very fun This guy is a index To all the contractors anybody's licensed by states property records For majority of states can be found here Drivers life license information for free can be found here Okay, I just found that they put legal records and they put my son's name on legal record here Okay, not cool Found out that somebody posted My social security number I've taken that off now, but you can get a lot of this information Yeah, I'm not a lawyer and I don't even play one on TV But anyway, we're gonna talk about that towards the end But honestly when I've done competitive intelligence I've been able to find passport numbers for people in Israel by looking up this information if they spend any time in the United States I've been able to get social security numbers what their signatures look like Marriage divorces Pretty much any type of legal records for free Also, again, if they're somebody like an architect a contractor an engineer They have to give a lot of that information up There's also a physician's database with the physician's code that they're supposed to Protect Is on here And if I had internet access unfortunately, I don't You can go to the state of Florida and look up information about counties and then drill down from there To individuals within counties and then look at all the court records for that individual For 12 years The other one is the Search systems Another free database This has hundreds of additional databases one of the things you're probably not aware of Do you do you guys believe that google? Has an index to everything on the net No, it doesn't It's interesting google does not index databases. There is expected from a database size Uh, there's supposedly anywhere between 10 and 100 times more information out there within databases That cannot be reached by google what you have to do is you have to go out and find the front door to those places Well, guess what I'm going to show you where the front doors are Okay, here's the hidden gems See that librarians index to the internet. This is what the librarians used to look up information Uh, the invisible web has a lot of great indexes Here we go So if you're looking for lawyer information, you can drop down there and find out lots of information about the practice Industry industry groups Uh individuals within industry groups All that information is public Let's see Ooh Now those are all the people information any of you guys afraid yet Yeah, yeah, it's pretty cool. Amen It's uh, it's very interesting Uh, I teach a class in a college and first thing I do is I have everybody go out and do a vanity search For themselves They use this list and a few others And they look up information about themselves And usually within an hour or two of doing this I can tell that they're doing their homework because I get an email It says I don't believe it. You should see what I found about me It's pretty outrageous Processes it's incredible How easy dumpster diving is Let me give you this story um We're at another con We went to the bar because we were thirsty And while we were there we went there very early in the morning We looked at the trash can because it was sitting right there. We found this long yellow strip So we picked it up Well, apparently the process within this hotel is at the end of day They run a strip of all the credit cards and all the people's names Okay, this is common And what they do is they only keep the white copy so they throw away the yellow copy Okay, this is real common This is the kind of stuff that you have to from a process standpoint you have to put in place and say look Yes, I know that there's little x's on my credit card piece that you're giving me And yes, I know that there's x's on the credit card piece that you're keeping in a lot of cases by the way They're not but check. Oh my favorite by the way, if anybody sells things It's the merchant id the merchant id and the phone number of the credit card machine Well, that's an index into their bank account I tell people in that and they go you're nuts man. You're nuts. Nobody would ever do this well Yeah, that's why a secret service announcers nine million people that have lost their identity in the last 12 months Okay backup tapes cds dvds floppy disks people are throwing these things away without deleting them destroying them whatever They'll throw them in the trash can they'll give they'll take them home Yeah, that's fun Then we'll throw them in the trash there hard drives We had a school district that decided that they didn't need those old hard drives for all their corporate machines So they gave those they donated to them to us To another organization as linux boxes. That was so special Well, they had I brought to their attention. They had credit card information and uh information about the kids in the school district Not good hard drives pda's pda's for a lot of people that's their whole life the pda can be snatched that's everything cell phones a lot of cell phones have numbers you can't Grab hold of also the cleaning staff um a lot of assessments that i've done and a lot of people that i've talked to Uh, they never checked their cleaning staff and things disappear and they never Take the cleaning staff to task and ever confirm that these cleaning staff is bonded, but uh This one well-known lawyer that I know kept on finding information moved and fall cabinets open at night when they got in in the morning So, um the cleaning staff is definitely a process issue to check Okay, another process information. Well now that we've given all this information away to Um about ourselves and our financial information everything else the government likes to post it too wasn't that special um If it's a corporation edgar will have the information hoover Secure systems or uh search systems dot net info today Uh done in brad street gives you a lot of information even for free Uh the a icpa.org gives you lots of information for free. Here's one of my favorites american express That's their b2b information They put far too much information on there about corporations If they take american express Um take a look at that and also you can do uh google searches on uh targets You want to find out what vendors sell their product Or use their service Link colon and the target domain will give you links to hundreds thousands or 10 thousands of different places About that organization Okay, how to protect yourself People limit the information Um and haven't removed most public records they'll have a form and a Practice to remove your information which can take six weeks Um we're literally they'll have your social security number erased from that image online, or they'll have the particular um Information removed unfortunately once you know it's there You can then go back and it's still in public records physically down at whatever courthouse and they can still obtain it So be aware you want to request that information to be blocked on yourself um educate your staff Especially corporate officers a lot of corporate officers don't realize They've put a lot of information out there about themselves. It's very easy to find out All the information about all the houses that they've owned and where all the places they they currently own And who signed for them um It's incredible even to the point of social security number and um credit card numbers especially uh about five years ago That was the vogue within the real estate business is to on the closing papers to put that information at the bottom Uh processes have someone do a competitive either you do a competitive intelligence on your organization or yourself Go out there and do these searches and no you can't just press a button a lot of the stuff isn't automated Stuff appears and disappears all the time Um in the presentation. I had eight links that disappeared and they found three more So the stuff appears and disappears is hard to automate that kind of stuff But go out and spend a couple hours looking up information about yourself. I think you'll be surprised go out there and request it to be removed Um if there's information on google google has a remove link They'll remove information From their database But some um search engines it takes a lot more work. It's not just uh fill in the uh blank and go process let's see process Basically define what's considered extreme damage to either uh your corporation your individuals um as an example if i'm shipping um Fertilizer in rail cars maybe Maybe I don't want to tell people where that facility is Um technology consider removing the banners From all your email servers your web servers All kind of fun things like that what you're going to find is uh, you know, seriously, that's what you're looking for Ooh, this has a banner of microsoft Is three cool. We're there Consider removing the banners pop mail servers imap all those others Also consider using crypto and a lot of that Um also generally for organizations Classify the information This is a difficult process most people have a real difficult time doing this to say, okay This should be treated You know this could could do the be the end of our company or our organization Or put people in jail So we're going to keep this really secret and we're going to make sure that this information doesn't get leaked And then this information should stay here, but it could be shared and this information could be sent out to everybody else It's not real common for organizations to do that and because of that A lot of information is leaked Also another trick In databases Consider inserting some misinformation Hmm, what do you mean? Well, um Agent smith I usually in databases. I'll put a bogus agent smith in or bogus Information that way if that information is ever leaked I'll know that it came from inside Spreadsheets things like that Okay, also another thing considering posted on the usnet some piece of information about misinformation about technology or two Can't hurt And also perform all your best practices and security. Well, that's all the technology stuff we talk about anyway And that's about it. Oh, by the way, one of the interesting parts I didn't mention during the news A lot of companies during these outsourcing processes The outsources get really excited that they're outsourcing and give away lots of information like wow This outsource is going to outsource the whole security department For a company Okay, well there's a transition period, right Enough said Okay, especially when you see layoffs occurring too um There we go any questions sir I'm providing them back to the defcon folks. They'll have it up on their website Plus you if you want to come up if you have a USB drive, I'll drop it onto it if you have it here Or if you want to email me feel free. I'll email you a copy No, it's not on the cd. I made modifications to it. I added more cool stuff Any other questions sir Yes I found from a public record standpoint. I found 40 references to myself And I had in The database company that they outsourced to interestingly enough I literally have to fill in a piece of paper And have it certified for every single record that I found that I have to remove or modify So it's a very arduous process Did a question A lot of them will have a removal of information Uh for public records Uh, you just have to look forward or ask the ask the question. How do I have this information removed? It Has information it could leave to identity theft. Oh ask me later. We'll talk to the company. This could be fun We didn't say that you did Okay, what company? Honestly these databases, um, it's interesting how many, um, companies Will belong to associations and they'll give up lots of corporate officer information in that Which is pretty scary golf courses post scores An information about executives real handy Anybody else? Okay, what he's asking is how is charity is for things like this? Um, I have done some searches through charities. I've made phone calls and asked and yeah, they'll give up some information Oh, you know what I didn't uh, I didn't include one called they rule net It provides information about the board of directors and then you can search underneath that and find out where they donate Again, I'm not a lawyer Okay, what he asked is uh, if they say no, what can we do? Um, honestly public embarrassment is probably the best way for a lot of those corporations to sit up and uh Become aware of the other thing is there's uh Legal issues if it has if it's HIPAA based it's health care based Um, and they're not doing it. That's something can be reported if it's gremlin from bliley financially based There's there's places you can go there. There's privacy act information Yeah, the survey in oxalic act where if your identity is stolen the corporate officers might be held accountable for that Lack of due diligence on their standpoint. So there's there's some hammers that you can use against them Sir The regulator Six Oh, no problem. Actually I want to add to that if you did you spend time and read the law I totally forgot about this. It's really cool because everybody from the administrator that managed this system Through their manager all the way up to the owners of the company can be held liable for that action Okay, and it's it's not only um professional, but also personally And guess what best of all there's no limitation of liability So if enough records are stolen they could be charged for a billion dollars by the way, um Feinstein I guess that's her name from california. She's just proposed this for the nation It's in congress right now floating around So we may see this every place She has set a limitation. I'm not sure what it was. I think it's A hundred million dollars or something like that. So you can still hurt especially if you're administrator and your systems get cracked I don't have that kind of cash Any other questions sir The question. Yes, there are they all free? Um, the majority of them are free. There's one or two that are pay It's interesting that with this there are some links that you may want to check out There's a link that check gives you information as an example about licenses Each state has their own information Give an example Please repeat questions. Thank you So, thank you Um as an example driver's license the information In some states you can go in for ten dollars walk in with no identity check or anything else and look up people's driver's licenses Yeah Exactly Yeah, I had that on here, but they also give up information like the age of people which is actually very handy Sir The legal, um information is specific to data. Let me Repeat that. Um, are there similar are there legal restrictions? Am I repeating that? Thank you. Yeah, he's waving at me in the back Um, are there restrictions to the use of this information? Um, yes, it depends on where this database comes from some databases There's really no restriction some databases. There's there's minimal restrictions Of usage it did, you know your mileage may vary on these databases. Just read it Any other questions? If I had internet access we could look people up now, which was what I was looking for. This is fun The questions, thanks


take up 716 and that bill is up on our documents. Is that right? Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. Thank you for coming. I know how difficult that is. I was your next door neighbor for six years in the committee room next door, and I was there that day that Jim referenced, I recall. But thank you very much for your consideration and your support. It's good to see you. So I'm trying to remember who I, I think I was going to start with Paula Lefebvre. Are you here? I'm trying to see who's here. I am, Madam Chair. You are. Good. Okay. So committee, this is another bill that we got. So we got this from House Natural Resources Fish and Wildlife, and we got it on March 12th. And so I don't believe we've looked at it before. I don't think so. So I'm going to start, I think, with you, Paul, if it's okay. I know you're the reporter of the bill. I think you're also the sponsor of it. So if you could, I'm hesitating a bit here, because I can't remember who else I had lined up. Lewis Porter and he's here and Dan Dickerson is here. Okay. So Paul, why don't you go ahead and tell us about the bill. Okay. Fine. I am the presenter, but I'm not a sponsor. Well, I did amend the bill and it was passed. Anyway, the bill strives to grant free hunting and fishing licenses to all members of the four recognized Abonafki tribes in Vermont. And the bill also requires that the Fish and Wildlife Department in 2022 gives us a report on how many licenses were actually handed out under this prevent. There is some concern as to really how many licenses it's amount to, because we don't know how many, how many people are in the four tribes all. An estimate is difficult to come by, because each tribe has its own rules and regulations who can become a member. For instance, if an Abonafki marries a male outside the tribe, and which tribe she's a member of, they can either be a member or not. It's not so there was a little discussion there. There was also the exception that if you living out of the state were a member of one of the four tribes, also be entitled to free hunting and fishing license. So that's the basic bolts of the bill. We had 13 witnesses and we're on support from the Lieutenant Governor and the Attorney General. The Commission of Wildlife expressed some concern over the financial impact it would have on his department. But went ahead with the bill, thinking it was a long time in coming. These rights had been guaranteed in a late 17th century treaty known as King Philip Treaty with the white settlers, basically in New Hampshire and Massachusetts. And we thought we were basically regressing on oversight and putting this bill together. And we did get strong, strong support from members of all four tribes, with the exception of one of the chiefs, a woman who took exception to the fact that no one person could speak for all four tribes. And I think she felt that she had not or her tribe had not been really well represented. And she expressed concern about whether or not the impact would have on the Fish and Wildlife Department as far as programs go, it's camps, and it's hunting courses and things like that. They came out of committee 10-1. OK, let me see if there's questions anyone has. Sam. Hi, Paul. So I saw a letter from one of the tribes saying that they didn't support the bill. And so we have four state recognized tribes. I was wondering what the breakdown is of how many support it and how many don't. Well, I don't believe there was any kind of vote taken among all members of all four tribes. The woman that I remember who spoke to us and sent us some testimony was one of the chiefs of the Cossack tribe, Shirley Hook. And she seemed to take someone, take umbrage over the fact that the chief of the Malhegan tribe, a man by the name of Donna Steeves, was getting recognition as someone was speaking for all the other people. And so she voiced her opinion that he did not. And in her letter she sent to us, she said she was concerned as to how it would affect the Fish and Wildlife Department's conservation camps and fishing derbies and basically had questions about its overall impact on an apartment. So I have a, this is doing this by Zoom, this is where it's challenged. I have a letter that says that Chief Shirley Hook and Chief Wood have already sent letters of support. This is a letter from Carol McCranahan who is sending a letter of support. I don't know where those letters are. And so I'm not basing that on seeing the letter, I'm just telling you that the information I have is that there is a letter.  Representative Ansel, I have not seen anything. I have other correspondence on this. So Sam, I don't have a straightforward answer, but I was going on the assumption that all four tribes did support this, but based on the information I've gotten, and I don't know if that's accurate or not, certainly three do from what I've seen. Scott and Pat. Paul, I guess I suppose this might be different for each of the four tribes, but how high is the bar to become a certified citizen? Well, basically it's, you have to be a member of a tribe in which is recognized, in which the state recognized. And I believe it's up, as I say, the rules and regulations among the tribes are not uniform. So there's, we didn't really get, or I don't recall receiving any bull by bull point by point discussion as to how someone became a member of any given tribe among the four that are recognized in the state. Could I become a member of a tribe? I, you know, that would be up to the tribe in which you wish to, I'll just step in. You have to be either, in your case, I think it would be a question of whether or not you married one of the women up from the tribe. Well, I mean, I just wanted to be part of a tribe. I can't do that because of some sort of- I don't think that would work very well. Well, I think they're looking for people who can show their abinacchi roots either through genealogy or any documentation they may have. I don't know what all goes into that documentation but I don't think they would take, I think they take membership in the tribe very seriously and just would not hand it out as a favor. Okay, I mean, I don't know what, you know, once you become a member of the tribe, what that entails, but I just would, well, I mean, this is a significant benefit. I wouldn't want to put ourselves in a situation where we have, you know, people becoming members of tribes for so they can get a free hunting and fishing license. That concern of fear was really never spoken to but while those chiefs who came in to speak to our committee, they took great pride in the fact that the state had recognized them as an average people, as Native Americans. And I don't think that's something they would just give away, you know, I can't tell you exactly how much goes into becoming a member but I believe it's not something that they take easily. But it sounds like what you're saying is there's a racial threshold. Well, yes, there probably is. Okay, thank you. Pat. Thanks, Madam Chair. My question is back to revenues and what kind of a hit that the agency may be taking. Do you have any numbers on that or did you discuss that at all? Yes, we did discuss it before Paul answers. Dan Dickerson is here with the fiscal note as well. So if you want to wait for Dan to present that or just have Paul answer. No, I think Dan might have some hard numbers for us. I'll wait. Yeah, he does. Okay. Let me see if there's other questions on the part of the committee. Scott, the question you asked is, I suspect that if the natural resources committee didn't go over that, the general committee probably has information on it because they do a lot of work on Native American issues. But if you want me to try to reach out and get information, I can. I'll reach out to them. I can do that in the same time. But I think that's where the information tends to be. Let me see if anyone else on the committee has anything. I think what I'm going to do is I'm going to shift the order of things a little bit and have Dan present the fiscal note and then we'll go to Lewis Porter and Steve Gomez. So Dan, are you prepared to do that? Yes, I am. Can you hear me okay? Yeah, good. Okay. So in the fiscal note, under fiscal summary, basically there are two areas where revenues would be impacted. The first being that sales of annual and five-year licenses would go down, which would have an impact on fish and wildlife operations. And then the sales of lifetime licenses that go into a trust fund for future use by the department, I think mainly towards land purchases would also be affected although to a much smaller extent because sales of lifetime licenses are smaller. So I based my fiscal note on a population of 6,000 members and this was taken from a seven day, was either seven days or a BT degree, seven days article. So I didn't confirm that number with the four tribes, but what I did do is I looked at five-year census data and based on that, between people that claim, well, let me make sure I get this right, people that claim American Indian or Alaska Native Heritage or a combination of American Indian, Alaska Native and white. It's about 7,500 people. There are probably some others that may be a combination of other ethnicities. So I wouldn't presume that the 7,500 would be just the four tribes. They're probably other folks that have heritage. So I think the 6,000 number is probably pretty close. I don't know if that makes sense to everyone. And then from there, I looked at data that I'd gotten last year from the Fish and Wildlife Department when they, I think when, actually when the House Fish and Wildlife Committee had gone over the fee changes, the Department had provided data on license sales. And so I took the percentage of the Vermont population that buys licenses and I heard Vermont population within the certain ages that buy licenses. And I applied that to the 6,000 members of the tribe. So it's imperfect. I don't know if the 6,000 members of the tribe tend to buy hunting and fishing licenses more or less than the Vermont population. I didn't want to assume one way or the other. So I thought the cleanest way to do it is just apply the percentage of the entire Vermont population that buys licenses. So based on that, under the annual and five year licenses category, I assumed, or I estimated that there would be a $30,000 to $35,000 impact annually to the Fish and Wildlife Operating Budget. Most of that is what I would presume to be Vermont residents, but there's some portion that would potentially be non-residents in that somebody living in New Hampshire could apply for tribal membership or tribal citizenship and then be eligible to receive the free license or the free lifetime combination license. So I built some cushion in for non-residents, but that's very difficult. That part is difficult to estimate. So there's about 5,000 cushion in there for that. And then going to lifetime licenses, I assumed, based on, once again, on the percentage of Vermonters that buy lifetime licenses that there are probably another 10 to 20 individuals that may, going forward, may have been inclined to purchase lifetime license, now won't because they're eligible for the free combination license. And that would be a loss annually of $5,000 to $10,000 because that goes into a trust funds, that money wouldn't earn on the investments. And so the impact would increase from there, but it's not a huge amount of money. And then at the end, I just made a general statement on how COVID-19 might impact license sales going forward. The bottom line is short-term, it sounds like it's been good, but long-term, there are a lot of unknowns. So it's hard to make a prediction, but that is the fiscal note. Right, let me see if there are questions. Pat, did you have questions about the fiscal note?  I think you're still muted. Okay, so I do have a question based on some of the information we just heard. And I'm wondering, I get the fiscal impact, to the agency, to the department, but I'm wondering, you kind of hit me with something I hadn't heard before, and that's non-residents being a member or possibly applying to be a member of one of these four tribes would then be eligible. And that to me, that's a non-resident hunting license and somebody from out of state is gonna walk into Vermont, apply to be a member of a tribe or maybe already a member of the tribe, but living out of state and are gonna be eligible for a free lifetime hunting license, that kind of blows my mind. And I think that the revenue impact be much larger than what we're estimating here. Especially given the circumstances, it's already a given that more people are going out buying hunting and fishing licenses now given the times, passes the time, and maybe they will find out that they enjoy the outdoors more than they thought they might and be hooked on hunting and fishing. So I'm really concerned that we are hitting an already underfunded department I think we can all agree that fish and wildlife is woefully underfunded and has been for years and then hitting them with what we're saying to be 30 or $40,000, but what I'm thinking might be closer to 80 to 100 if things really catch on. And that concerns me. And it also from another viewpoint concerns me that I'm a native Vermonter, been here 67 years and I waited 67 years to get my free permanence and now we're handing them out to other native Vermonters in my opinion. It just doesn't sit that well with me and I'm concerned about the revenue loss in particular. That's more of a statement than a question I get that, but I do think the estimates are low. Thanks. Jim. Two things I can address. One is there are out of state members of the tribes. In many cases they are members of the same family, most cases of the people under consideration who live in one town or another. They're not people who wandered in for him to hear there or the other. And they, as Paul said, different tribes have slightly different membership rules and regulations and whatnot, but they're all established. They're all either able to establish Native American genealogy, McMack, Abnackie or whatnot or are married to one. So I don't see the out of state problem that's really being an issue at all. And yeah, some hunt, some don't. It turns out that I'm Native American, Abnackie and McMack, but not a member of one of these four recognized tribes. So I'm not entitled to my free license yet. But thank you. Before I go to other questions, Sosha, did you have a chance to post that letter? So I made reference to a letter of support earlier, but I didn't have it. It's on the website now if you refresh your browser. Okay, and can you just post it, do a screen shot of it so that people can see it? Great. So this is a letter that, oops, I'm trying to move it. If you don't mind showing the signers, I'd appreciate that. This is a letter from Chief Ravenwood and Chief Shirley Hook, which were the two that I had not seen letters from, but I understood that they exist, that support H716 as it is. So I just wanted to close that loop so that everybody had the same information. So I have a question from Robin and from Sam. Sam, is it about the letter or the support?  I was just gonna say, I was confused because I had one from a week earlier that said the opposite. Yes, and that's why these letters were written is to clarify and so on. So my apologies for not having it available earlier, but it's here. It just occurred to me, it's a very weird thing to pass a bill that somebody doesn't want or there's a big disagreement about. I just wanted to get that clarified. Yes, we had this on the schedule last week and that's why it went off the schedule. So, exactly. Robin. Thanks, I wonder if I might ask the representative from Natural Resources if your committee discussed this out of state notion, people getting free licenses who don't live in the state of Vermont and what that conversation was like and why you decided that was okay. Certainly, the conversation revolved around people who lived on the other side of the river, Connecticut River, it may be in Maine. We didn't think it extended much further than the general vicinity of the three states. We don't believe that anyone from Oregon was gonna come over and claim a membership in that particular tribe. It seemed to us the numbers we were considering who might be out of state and wanting to take advantage of that of the bill were miniscule. Same, and then I'm gonna go to Lewis Porter. Yeah, Paul, that just kind of brings up another thought to me which is what about the Northern border? I mean, this was, I don't know where the Vermont tribes extend to necessarily, but it was always my impression that there was a lot of going back and forth to Vermont from Southern Quebec and up to the St. Lawrence traditionally. I just, I don't know where that is now. Yes, that came up, but I guess, again, we didn't assume it would be any great problem or any great numbers. I'm sure there are some Avanaki folks who live in Quebec and maybe are members of one of these four tribes, but I don't think we're talking a lot of numbers here at all. Let me go to Lewis, River has, I think he's still here. Yes, I am. Good, how are you? As well as can be expected. Exactly, yep. Madam chair. Sorry, go ahead. You have callous internet, right? Yeah, exactly.  So go ahead and give it a try.  He's also on. Can you hear me okay? Yes. Thanks, Lewis. Sorry. No, no, thank you. I have with me, Steve Gomez, our business and licensing manager. And Madam chair, would you like me to have Steve join me as I go along? Or would you like me to join you? Would you like Steve join me as I go along? Or would you like me to go and have him take notes and then follow up? You can do any way you like. We don't even have to put two chairs at the end of the table. So sounds, sounds good. We'll, we'll attempt the two chairs remotely here. First, I would like to say that I, I think that this bill recognizes a, a very long standing and very significant injustice. And it makes a gesture towards. Towards recognizing that I won't say undoing because obviously the, the land rights and, and other rights that were contemplated. In those treaties and which were, and which were not followed through on our much broader than, than a fishing and hunting license, but, but I do just want to say that it does. Recognize a long standing injustice. And it does, it does. That's a long standing injustice. Having said that, I also am in the, in the position of, of making this bill, if it passed into law, operational both financially and from a, from a management standpoint. And so I just want to go through a couple of points and then happy to take questions or comments on them. I agree with representative Brennan. I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point. I think that's a good point. As good as could be done with, with existing information. Probably does underestimate the, the impact of the, of the license. And in part, I think that's due to the fact that. People are much more likely to utilize a service that's free than one they pay for a price. Price point does matter and price does matter, including in hunting and fishing licenses. There's sort of two ways to look at that. Well, it doesn't, those are folks, if those folks wouldn't hunt with the cost of a hunting license or a fishing license, then it doesn't matter because you're not actually losing any revenue. They wouldn't have been providing revenue into the system in any case. The other way to look at it is that we provide services, biological and law enforcement services. For everybody who hunts and fishes in the state. And here's a group of, of people who would be participating for the first time or participating when they wouldn't have been otherwise. But we will still be providing those services of various kinds. So I won't make a judgment call about that, except to say that I think that that does underestimate to some extent the amount of participation that will change based on, on these free licenses. To the, to the praise by a couple of representatives. The other statutory. Permanent licenses that we have are restricted to residents of Vermont. Those include those over the years of ages of 66 is representative Brennan noted the legally blind. Those who, those who are paraplegic, 60% disabled veterans. And the special Olympics fishing tournament. We also recognize the point made by representative Maslin and Lefebvre. That these Vermont. Bands tribes were not restricted by the borders of Vermont and that they have. Members who's live outside the borders and family members who live outside the borders. And, and, and that they are also members of those, of those groups. So, we do have a little bit of insight into the use by non-residents through our lifetime licenses as the committee knows we, we sell lifetime licenses to Vermont to kids in Vermont, primarily those under one. They go and move around the country as, as many of us have done before coming back or, or for, for our lifetimes. And so, I think that's a great thing. I think that's a great thing. And I think that's, Vermont kids come back from the far flung corners of, of the world they go to, to participate in hunting and fishing. That's a great thing in my opinion. And I think the same would be true here. Also a good thing here, but I do think you would see. Members of those groups return to, to participate as, as the. Owners of the holders of, of lifetime licenses do. I think that's a huge difference from a, from a fiscal standpoint, but I think should be noted is we are talking about these, these licenses as, as a loss in annual revenue, but there really are structured more like our permanent or lifetime licenses. And the way that the, that the lifetime licenses in particular work is we, we gather that money from, from people primarily parents of kids who are under one. And we then, and we then put that in a trust fund to fund those services when they reach the age that they would have to buy licenses and a normal, if they didn't have lifetime licenses. So this is, this is giving a lifetime licenses, but not adding to that trust fund, which I think has the risk of exacerbating our already existing problem in the trust fund of, of getting the revenues upfront and, and providing the services later. The department has done a lot under Steve Gomez's leadership to undo historic uses of that trust fund, dipping into that trust fund and to try to restore that trust fund to a healthy state. And that's one of our, one of our maybe quieter accomplishments, but an accomplishment we're proud of is restoring the fiscal balance to that trust fund so that we, we've undone to some extent past mistakes by the department when we use that money for operating expenses rather than leaving at the trust fund. I'm not sure this has a similar question to the, to the, to our additional users actually increasing the costs or they merely not providing revenue. They went to provide it in any case, but I do think it's worth, worth noting the, the, another note that I think it is worthwhile is the bill contemplates that parents would, would certify that their minor children are, are the citizens of the state recognized tribes. I think that creates a pretty big loophole unless we were to require that the parent or guardian is also a member of the, of the tribe. In other words, I could certify that my child was, even if she wasn't. And, and I think it should be, should be restricted to the parents or guardians who are also members, if that makes sense. I'd also like to suggest that we, there's a report back in 2020, 2022, I'm sorry. That would only include one year of license, revenue of licensed sales. So it would just be the 21 license year. And what we know from our, from our requirements on that people check in if they're going to use permanent or lifetime licenses is, it takes at least three or four years before people catch up on what's going through, what's changed in terms of licensing operations. So even with our best efforts at outreach and publication, word of mouth still counts for a lot. And it can take several years to catch up. So I would suggest that report be moved out to a couple of years later. So we get an accurate report out on, on what's happening in terms of these new proposed, permanent or lifetime licenses. I'm also unclear on whether we would need language in this bill or not to require that people go through hunter safety before they could hunt under one of these, under one of these licenses. I suspect that the requirements of hunter safety would still apply to these and that this is, is more or less a change in fee. But I would want to make sure that our, that hunter education is required and that there's a mechanism for, for enforcing fish and wildlife laws and revoking such a license. As we do with, as we do with another license or suspending such a license as, as we do with other licenses. And then last, I would just note that. The effective date of the, the effective date of the, the effective date of the, the effective date should be January one of 2021. I would suggest to match up with other types of, with all of our other licenses, which go on a calendar year basis. I will just end by noting that, that the, in the house natural resources committee, I suggested that the fish and wildlife department cover half of the cost of this bill is if it goes into law. And the attorney general's office cover the other half as the attorney general is a supporter of this measure. I'm not sure the attorney general appreciated my suggestion very much, but, but, and in any case, house, house natural did not, did not go forward with that proposal. With that, if I could, I would turn it over to Steve to fill in any gaps or correct, correct anything that I said and, and then we're happy to take questions. Well, as before we lose you. I want to be sure I know what the recommendations are that you made. You wanted to remove the report date out to, to what date? I would say give three years of active license. So move the report date out two years to 2024. 2024. And the, I understand. The parent, your recommendation that the parent should also be a citizen should also be a citizen. I think that's a good question about hunter safety. And then the effective date was January. I'm sorry, what date we use recommending that effective. I would, I would say effective January one of 21 to match up with our other licenses. Okay. And did I know the recommendations that you made over those, the other than sharing it, having the AG. No, those are, those are them. I would just, I would say that the, I would say that the legislative council, if hunter safety and violations would be handled as they are for other licenses. That availed camp field and Robin and George all have questions. Nothing was mentioned. You haven't said much about the conservation camp.   I'm already working on a new. Budget that contemplates at least an 8% reduction in general fund per the governor's directive. And while we have seen an increase in fishing license sales this spring, it's unclear if those are. I mean, I don't know if it's a year or a true increase in revenue. And I won't even go into the, the Byzantine effects that are going on in the federal aid system right now to spare the committee. But long story short. Reps into camfield. I have, I have a lot of budget pressures and I have one. Lionite in the, or one area that makes up most of my budget, which is personnel. And so I would have to figure whatever this, whatever the actual dollar loss is. I will have to figure that into my budget for future years and, and conservation camps are part of that budget. We operate the camps that are lost. But I don't know that I don't know that there's nothing specific to conservation camps. I'm just going along with the way this is reading the folks who belong to the tribe that live out of state, their children would come to the conservation camp too. They could come to the conservation camp now and nothing would change that. I'm not sure. I'm not sure what representatives of the faves reference to the conservation camp was. I don't think there's anything specific in this change to conservation camp revenue or operations. It's just general to the department. Okay. Yeah, just quickly. Janet, I wasn't sure if I heard on your list of things that we wanted to change. One of the things I had written down was also the ability to revoke or suspend licenses. Yeah, I guess I was including that in the hunter safety. Sort of compliance.  So to mention it. George. Thank you for joining us, Mr. Commissioner. These recommendations that we've just listed if I ever saw them. Did you make those recommendations to the fish and wildlife committee? Some, I, some I did and some I did not. There's been, you know, significant amount of time and an amendment to the bill since I testified in that committee. And I apologize for that. I'm not sure what to make to them. They chose not to include some of these recommendations already. You know, I, I, I, I honestly can't remember in my testimony, which of those points I raised and, and which I didn't. And I apologize for that. The only one I'm aware of is, I believe we talked about the revocation based on violations or the suspension based on violations. And I believe that the house natural committee. I thought that that was covered, that that was not an issue within the, within the bill, but I will defer to your ledge council or to representative Lafave on that. And then my other question is. If you gave an opinion, I didn't hear it about the non Vermont residents. Being given the license I share representative Brennan's concern about that. I am honestly of two minds personally about that representative bill. On the one hand, we do restrict other types of reduced cost or free income. But I would say that the number of residents on the other hand, it seems to compound the wrong done to the tribes. To impose a state boundary requirement that was not historically part of their, of their lives or their tribal organizations. That makes sense. So I'm genuinely of two minds on that one. If you have to make a recommendation one way or the other, what would it be? We can't put both in the bill. I think I would defer to the, to chief Stevens and the requesters of the bill who felt as though, having this be open to members, wherever they, whether they're residents of would, would, would be the proper way to show deference to that. So I think I would defer to chief Stevens on that. To put it another way, you're not recommending we make that change to limit it to Vermont residents. Correct. And if press to make a decision, or I would, I would not limit it to residents in reference to the chief's belief that it should be open on residents as well. Are you all set. Yeah. Yeah. Couple of things. I'm following up on what. Commissioner Porter just said, I. I would agree with the out of state membership. I mean, there, there are members of a family who are neighbors here who now live in Massachusetts and we'll come back from time to time. And. There every bit as much abnacky as those that. Remain in the neighborhood. Yeah. The other comment that was made back a while ago, a question about whether or not. A parent of a one year old would have to establish that he. She. Was a member of a, of one of the Vermont tribes. I think that's quite reasonable actually. And that shouldn't be all that burdensome. After all, if. If it takes a little bit of time. Okay. But who's going to go hunting when he's one year old. I think that's a big deal. Because I don't want to. Except about it. The bill requires that the minor be a citizen of the tribe. And I think what Lewis Porter was recommending. Is that the parent who certifies that also be a member. That's the part that's not in the bill. Not. Not. I think that's necessarily implied, but it's not stated. I mean, for instance. If I'm having that key, my children are also. But that some. Some mechanism for establishing that I think should be. If the. If I go, my kids are grown up, but if I were to go get a hunting license. And the clerk would ask me. Find a member of a tribe and I had a membership card and that should do it. I think we're saying mostly the same thing, but with a little bit. Really, but that's, it's fine. I'll look at the bill. Thank you. So that brings up a question. And I don't know who is best suited to answer. But what if, what about a marriage. And I'm not asking, I'm not asking, I'm not asking that. And that NACI and a non. Native American. And I'm asking because I don't know, does that preclude the. A sibling, one of their. Children from. Do they qualify as their 50%. Native American at that point, would they qualify for lifetime license. And I'm not asking that if, if the chair would like. Sure. Go ahead. Thank you. So the bill, the bill contemplates. The, the, the membership of the, of the various tribes or bands. Are set the mechanisms are set by them. Are not the state does not have any involvement in that, nor any vision visibility into it. And I'm not asking that. If somebody showed up at our licensing office with a card. That said they were a member of the band. We would issue them a license. We would not have a role in determining who is eligible or not. And so I suspect that. I suspect that the, the, the, the, the, from, I know that those children would be. I think that the spouse, the non. Tribes spouse would be eligible in some cases and in some cases not, but in any case the band set their own tribal. Recognition or tribal identity requirements. And if they show up at our licensing office, we issue them a license. Madam chair. Yes. Go ahead. Thank you. I just wanted to get a word in here that yes, the, I must point out that in the bill. It does read that a person who is a certified citizen. Of one of the state recognized. Tribes. Has that credential on him to show that he is indeed been accepted as a member into the tribe. And secondly. The commissioner is correct in terms of the testimony we receive. Each tribe seems to have its own, its own mechanism for allowing membership. But I would also like to point out that none of the. Tribes. Abinac is a testified before us. All stressed rather all stressed it. They would comply with all state game laws. They're not asking for special treatment here. Basically they go back to the tree, the treaty, the land deeds of 1796 by King Philip. Which said that in change in exchange for the land. These Native Americans would receive hunting and fishing. And that's, that's really the ethical basis for this bill and this claim. So I just wish to point that out that, you know, that. Outside of the outside of those rights. The Indians got four bushels of corn and beans for the, the transaction. So it's, it's, it isn't as if. We're giving away anything here. Thank you. Thank you. I don't see other hands at the moment. Sure, go ahead. Yeah, I was still. I think what I'm hearing here is that each one of the four tribes has their own mechanism. And Paul, you can jump in or Lewis for determining eligibility. And I'm what, and none of them seem to be in sync with each other. So that kind of worries me. Like here, here's, here you go. Here's have a card. I know you married my sister here and.  There's no real mechanism set in stone that makes this a predictable process. So that concerns me. And I, if anybody has a better answer and can tell me that I'm wrong about that. I'd be happy to hear it. Yes, I will only point out. Pat that too much of the 20th century.  And they say they got by by being. They hit by being seen. So consequently, they didn't step forward with them with their Native American identity. They more or less try not to make an issue of it. And when in the testimony we receive, a lot of them. They were only half a dozen or so, but there were a certain amount of suspicion as to whether or not they wanted this bill. They said they were afraid it would bring them more into the limelight. And they would have to go through or deal with a whole new wave. Of discrimination. So I, I, I, I just add that as a, as a, as a cautionary note as to what's, what's really kind of unfolding here in terms of how we try to kind of square. Square history with, with our present day laws and regulations. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. There's other, other questions here. I guess I. I'm going to go back. Revenue and just make one brief statement, which is that this committee has been open and willing. To look at a fee bill for this department in addition to many others. And we really. I think it's a bigger problem than the scope. Stand ready to look at that issue. Madam chair. Yeah. I just, I would be, I would be irresponsible. I feel if I didn't make one more note for the committee, which is that, that this is a good, and worthy thing to do this bill. The fish and wildlife department has been called on for a long time to do many good and worthy things. That we don't get paid for, including active 50 review, including search and rescue, including boating enforcement. And many, many, many, many, many, many, many others. And I understand this is, it's really an issue, a question for your colleagues and house appropriations. But, but just given the point you just made, I would just say that what the committee, what the, what the department really needs is not an increase in hunting and fishing. Fees given the. By those who hold hunting and fishing licenses already and given the declining numbers on the hunting side at least. Contemplate is additional sources of revenue from. Those who engage in the regulatory review process to those who use fishing accesses, but you're not paying to the system now to others. To continue to support the work. And this is a, this is a good bill doing a good thing. It's one more example of, of a, of a, of a good thing that we, that we don't have a revenue source to support. And I take your point on our recommendations to the committee, and I will continue to work on that. So thank you for hearing us and for considering that and, and the broader context of this. Thanks. Thank you. And I appreciate those comments and I'm looking for a note that I have from Amy Sheldon, which I can also share with the committee, but the house natural resources committee. I'll read it to you, but I'll also forward it to social so she can post it, but she says, that our committee should know that house natural resources is committed to finding alternative funding for fish and wildlife. And that they have a bill that sets up a study to compile all the work done to date on funding options and make a suggestion for next biennium. So it is, it is a problem. And it's a problem that's really going to require the administration and the legislature to work together. And I, I, I think I appreciate your statement that this is a worthy bill. I think it's, it's not, it's not perfect way to correct Iran, but it's an important way to correct Iran. And I'll leave it to the committee, whether they want to look at the suggestions for changes. I don't think given the time that we're going to vote it this morning, I thought we might be able to, but what I'd like to do, I guess at the moment is find out from the committee, maybe sort of a sort of general sense of support on the committee for the bill. And then a question for people about whether they want to, make changes in the reporting deadline, the effective date and the requirement that a parent that certifies is also a citizen also get testimony from legislative council on the compliance kind of issue that was out there. Jim. And Scott. I'd just like to go back to the point on. The differences in tribal membership roles from, from tribe to tribe. And I would say kind of following what Lewis Porter said that, that each tribe can determine its own rock roles as it sees fit. But the differences among them are really slight. The issue is, are you abnacky? Is what you're talking about? Can you trace your roots back?  Well, she's your spouse or he's your spouse. They are members of the tribe and their children. Have. Abnacky blood, abnacky heritage. And that shouldn't make a difference here. I think that's. The drug, the tribe. Band is Lewis also sometimes said. Determines that these individuals are member of the tribe. And that should be sufficient. It's not a. It's not a. What can you do for me? Kind of thing.  It's to have Native American blood Northern tribes or not. So I just. Pass that comment on. So for the committee, I'd like to get a sense about general support for the bill. And it's not, not a vote, but I just want to know. If there is, if there are enough votes on the committee to support the bill. And I don't know exactly how to do that. Because I have two hands up at the moment. So. I guess I'm looking for a show of blue hands on whether you support the bill. Well, I should put me up there. So I've got one, two, three. Okay. I've got enough. So there's enough people to vote the bill out. That was, that was my main concern. Our question. So we'll continue to work on it. Do people want to see a redraft with the change in the report date and the change on the effective date? Generally. Yes. I'm going to see. Yes. To do those. And I think I'll ask for a draft on the. Requiring that the parent also be a citizen when they certify. Jim. I think made the comment that that would. Implied. I'm not sure about that. But we'll get a redraft that says that. And we'll have. Have legislative council and next time we take it up to talk about the compliance, hundred safety issues, just so we can either be reassured that they're covered or make a change. At that point. I will, once we have all that, I'll ask that we make a decision that is to. Get a, get a vote on the bill. And George wants to jump in. Go ahead. Yeah. The other. Unresolved issue is this. Issue of Vermont residency. And I, you know, I'd like to get a sense of the. The rest of the committee, how they feel about. About that. Yeah, I can speak for myself. not have a Vermont residence requirement, but let me get a few people to jump in, Emily. I think towards what Lewis said about the fact that we're trying to right a historic wrong that did not involve the specific borders that are now Vermont is a really important part of this to me. And so enforcing arbitrary borders sort of around Canada and New Hampshire seem out of the spirit of the bill. So I'd rather leave it as is. The people wanted to- Janet, I agree also with the exact reasons that Emily just cited that I think this is an important bill to address very, very serious past wrongs. Maybe I'll ask the question the other way. Are there other people besides George who would like to look at a residency requirement? Pat, yes, anyone else? Okay. I don't see anyone else. So I won't take it off the table. If you wanna get something prepared and try to convince the committee, you are obviously welcome to do that. At the moment it looks as though a majority of the committee would not wanna incorporate that change. So next time we take it up, if you wanna bring it back up, that's fine. So I think that is it. I have a same, I have a noon meeting because that's when I'm running to the finish line here about. Oh, okay. Maybe this can be really quick. I'm just wondering how functionally it would work. You would still get a license, right? That you have tags. It's not that you just have your card that says I'm a citizen of a tribe and you're free to hunt to any amount. You still need to have a license to the tags and that's what the revocation was about. But Lewis. I think that's right. And that's what we'll hear from legislative when we have a little more time to explore it. But yes, I think what this bill does is it says you get that permanent license for free, but if you meet certain requirements. But we'll delve into a little bit more. I'm sorry to be in a rush with it. I've got a meeting that starts right at noon. And so I'm gonna have to close this down before we're ready. Bill, did you wanna jump in before I did that though? Yeah, I just wanna, you're gonna have another draft. Did you mention changing the effective date that Lewis had requested? Yeah, we'll do a draft that changes the report, changes the effective date. We'll look at language on the parent being a citizen and we'll hear about the Hunter Safety Compliance question, but we won't get a redraft on that. And Pat and George, if you wanna prepare language on the borders issue, we'll look at it. My sense at the moment is that there wasn't support on the committee for that, but if you wanna make the case that we'll give you time to do that. So that is it. We're looking at education finance tomorrow. I may carve out a little bit of time for this bill if I can, if we're gonna have the draft ready, so we can make a decision and move it along. Thank you everybody for good discussion and we'll see you tomorrow, I guess at nine. Is it nine? It's nine o'clock and I am ending the live stream now. Great.


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