And it is May 6th. We've got a couple of issues that we're going to talk about this morning. The first is the municipal borrowing, the short term borrowing bill that we did some work on yesterday. And I'm hoping that we can finish our work on that. So the plan is, if the, if the committee is in agreement with the draft that we have in front of us, the plan is to take a vote on that. We'll do a roll call vote on that. And then we will send it rather than introduce it as a committee bill will send it to the appropriations committee in the form of a memo. So that they can turn it into a committee bill. It does have an appropriation section. So it would have to go to them anyway. And by doing it this way, we can move it more quickly. Kitty is aware that it's going to come to her. So that, that's the first part of the morning. And then the next piece is to look at the miscellaneous tax bill. We've looked at it a bunch of times, both when we were in Montpelier and now. And really the, in the beginning, it seemed as though we would only be able to do, you know, very few sections of it, it may be possible to do more of it than we anticipated. I've asked Sam if he would sort of take the lead on it and be the reporter on the floor so he's going to, you know, be sort of actively involved in making sure that we've got the pieces that we need to have in that bill. And I don't know that we'll finish that today, but it's, I don't think there are a lot of outstanding issues. So that's the second piece. And then tomorrow, we do meet and we are going to talk about education finance again, but I'm giving us a break today. So, so with that, I think it's Becky Wasserman who's going to present the draft to us. I just need Sorsha to bring up the draft. Thank you, Sorsha. And so Becky Wasserman legislative council so what you have in front of you is a revised draft and I have highlighted in yellow all of the changes that were made. I was able to speak with the treasurer yesterday to go over some of the comments that were raised in committee and some other concerns and so I've incorporated those into this new draft. In section one a highlighted changes in the intent section, and you'll see that the word, the words statewide education have been added in front of property tax deferrals. And this is a change that was made throughout the document. And so with respect to the draft, the draft was not clear as to whether this was specific to just short term costs related to the statewide education property tax or whether it could also be applied to the municipal property tax. She could speak to this more but the, I think the cost for having both of those included would be much higher than just the statewide education property tax and I believe it was the intent of the committee to just focus it on statewide education property tax so I've made that change throughout the document. The next change is on lines 13 to 14. I believe it was Karen Horn raised this yesterday that this intense section references using CARES Act funds to fund this program. However, it's possible that additional federal funds may be available in the future that could be used to support this program so I've added in language that allows for any other funds that may be granted to the state and used to reimburse short term borrowing costs. Then moving on to subsection B. In the previous draft there was just one definition for short term borrowing costs. In the previous draft I just, I highlighted line 15 because I added in a new definition here and had to reorder it a little bit so if we move on to the next page, you'll see that the new definition is a definition of municipality. And there are the definition that was used in the previous draft was pretty broad and included as we discussed school districts, fire districts. There are a number of other definitions of municipality throughout statute. I thought it might be most, it might be simpler to just define it for specifically for this draft in the more narrow way which is just city town or incorporated village rather than trying to fit it in with one of the definitions that are already in statute. So, so throughout the definition of municipality use would just be city town or incorporated village. So, moving down the next change online 16 is again the reference to the statewide education property tax on the next page. I have just highlighted where I had to cross reference the new terms that have been defined. And then, moving down in subsection. There's another E3 online 11 there's another reference to statewide education property tax. So, they're so subdivision for one of the eligibility requirements is that the expenses must be consistent with the use of funds authorized in the cares act, as maybe amended so I've also added in here. A requirement that the expenses must meet any requirements of any other federal funds that may be granted to the state, just in case there's another source of funding available. Subdivision five is not highlighted but one of the questions that was raised in committee yesterday was whether the treasure could go out and seek and negotiate interest rates with banks. So, after speaking with the treasure yesterday, and I'll let her speak to this. This seemed like a very difficult task for her to do. Based on the fact that interest rates are changing daily and that municipalities all have different credit profiles. So she felt that subdivision five was was sort of the best that could be done with respect to interest rates. In the administration section subdivision one there are still blanks there about when the the treasure would be receiving certifications to me for municipalities to make and receiving applications so that would need to be. That's a decision point that needs to be made. So, scrolling down to section to D at the bottom of the page. The treasury guidance that I think you all discussed yesterday. happened to have some additional information on whether the cares act funding could be deposited into interest bearing accounts. Since we are setting up a special fund here, that would be possibly receiving cares act funding. It was made clear in that document that it is it is possible to put those funds in an interest bearing account. But if that happens, that interest has to be used in a specific way that is consistent with the use of cares act funding. So, I added in here in subsection D that all interest earned on fund balances shall be credited back to the fund. If this language is not in there it would otherwise go to the general fund. And then, still highlighted in section three is the some of the appropriation, as well as whether this is just an appropriation FY 20, or whether this would need to be an FY 21. I guess one of the points I would raise with this is that I think this is aimed at the, the June collection date for the statewide education property tax but I, there is, I think that December date at the end of the year, that would be an FY 21 so I don't, I don't know if the intent is to perhaps capture that as well. Let me see if the committee has questions. I don't see anybody. So it seems to me that the outstanding issues are the dates. I'm sorry, Emily, go ahead. Thanks I was a little slow with my mouse there. George way back at the beginning around the definition of short term borrowing costs. I just, including is not next. I want to confirm that including is not an exclusive term. If they were safe fees related to borrowing with those be eligible. That's correct, including is it's not an exclusive list. I don't know if you're, I know yesterday there was a discussion of administrative costs to municipalities. So it does not explicitly state that, but, but this list is not an exclusive list. Thanks, George. You're muted. I know, but the screen keeps changing was as the documents come and go so where my unmute is moves. Just a little thing at near the end, the name of the fun. Since we're, it's not for all municipal borrowing it's really about the education property tax. Should that be reflected in the name of the funds so it's not confusing to people. I can certainly make that change. I mean the purpose of the fund is stated so it could only be used for a specific purpose but it might help with confusion. It's not unthinkable to me that we might at some point need to have another emergency borrowing fund for municipalities unrelated to the, you know, to education. So I think I'd be more comfortable if we were a tad more specific with the name. That's fine. Yeah. See other questions at the moment. And we can make those changes, you know, since we're forwarding this as a memo. They're not that not that difficult. I hope any way to make the dates. If we need to need to do George, did you want to jump back in or. Yeah, I'm sorry I had a second piece. Do I assume correctly that on the last page, page five that the dollar amount we will leave blank and leave that to the appropriations committee. Yeah, we'd be guessing. And they're going to have to make a decision about it anyway since it's not a bill. I think it's fine. Yeah. So, dates. And I, I don't know if the treasure has a suggestion about the dates I'm not, I'm happy to put in whatever somebody suggests and if it. My understanding Beth is that you're going to be in house corporations tomorrow. And so if they're whatever issues are that we've left hanging they can deal with at that point. But do you have a recommendation about the dates in here. I think you're muted if you're trying to speak. Okay, you can hear me now. And rather than put a specific date because we're looking at, you know, when this will actually be enacted and sooner obviously the better. The dates be not later than seven days after enactment and begin accepting applications not later than 10 days after enactment so that it leaves a little flexibility. I will tell you that once we are aware that this is moving forward and I think it will based on what I've seen with this committee. We would start working on it in any event, but I think that that might be a way to do it so that depending on if it gets held up someplace, we don't have to go back in and play with the dates again. Okay. Becky, does that make sense to you. Okay. That sounds fine. I can add that in. And the other note I just made to myself is that the memo is going to go to the appropriations committee because they're the committee that's going to actually turn this into a bill or introduce it. But we will also make sure that we copy house government operations because they're going to have an interest in it and I've been talking with Sarah occasionally about what we're doing but I missed a step yesterday so I'll make sure that she has. And Senate finance I think has already started to do some work on this so there is some effort going on in the Senate already to have this move fairly quickly. Any other issues on the bill. George. Yeah, also on the last on the last page. I think we need to include FY 21 to don't we. That's a, that's a policy decision. I tend to agree. But we would only, we wouldn't appropriate for both years and the truth is that we could appropriate money for 20 that would stay in the fund for 21. We don't need to do two separate appropriations I think. So the question is whether they can, whether the borrowing can happen in fiscal 21. I don't know what that says in that respect. I can, I could make it clear that the appropriation is an FY 20 but it could be for use in both 20 and 21. That makes sense to me because it's going to set in the fun so yeah Beth did you want to jump in on that. Please. So I think that where this is located in the statute, the presumption is that this is a fund that carries forward so that the amounts of money that you appropriate in 20 would carry forward to the into 21. Since the application period is through December 30, I, or excuse me, the cost incurred between March 1 and December 30, I think that that's clear that said making it clear with more clarity would be be fine. And the interest does have to stay in the fund as Becky pointed out. Are people comfortable with the way it's structured in terms of dates and timing. Okay. All right. So that the change that you're going to make Becky is on on the, the dates for the start, you know, the applications and the date the name of the fund that are those the two things that we've got. And would you like me to change in the appropriation that it can be used in both years or just leave as is since it will be the balance will be carried forward in the fund. I wouldn't mind if we said both years in the appropriation section. Yeah. Emily. What I want to better understand what are the risks to leaving it a little more open so that we could be say flexible in six months if we see another need that might be easier to sort of use this fund for then another one. What do we gain by sort of narrowing the title of the fund and the dates associated with it. Go ahead. And one thing that comes to mind if cares act funding is used, then that has to be expended by the end of the year. And the fund is open to getting appropriate other appropriations, but if those federal funds are used, I think it does have to be limited to there is a time period that limits the use of the funds. So, so to go back to the two dates that we were talking about, you know, five days before five days after or 10 days after it's exactly how they were structured. Those are just when the treasure has to have the applications available to towns. So that doesn't restrict it to one year or the next. The other day, which is the appropriation language what we're saying is that we're going to appropriate the money now and house appropriations may change this structure because they know more how to appropriate money than we do but that we're going to appropriate the money now and you can use it for both fiscal years that that's going to be the way it's set up, but the limits on how it can be used that it's just for education property tax that's embedded in the whole bill at the moment. And then if we decided to make it available for municipal property tax or something, we would have to come back and create a new fund or amend it. I mean, does that make sense at least. Yeah. So, subject to those changes. Does somebody would somebody like to move that we endorse this I'm not sure what the right word is but yeah Becky did you want to ask a question first. No. Yeah, George. I was going to just say that I'll move make that motion to endorse this with the changes we have just discussed. Jim, you're muted. Unless someone has already. No, you're all you're you're right in order there. So, so it's been moved and seconded that we endorse the language with the changes are people comfortable voting without actually seeing the changes at this point, or do you want to wait. People are good. If you've not just raise your hand and tell me and I'll wait. Okay. So, it's been moved and seconded that we endorse this we will put it in memo your motion I'm sure includes the memo that we're going to send house appropriations with a copy to house go box. And Robin, if there's no more discussion, perhaps you could call the wall. Okay. I'm just finishing writing to copy to go box. Okay. Representative Anthony. Yes. Representative back. Yes. Representative Brennan. Yes. Representative Donovan. Yes. Representative corn hyzer. Yes. Representative Masland. Yes. Representative shy is yes representative to. Yes. Representative young. Yes. Representative can feel there's not here. Okay. And representative answer. Yes. 1001. Okay. Nice work. Thank you all. I think this is this will make a difference. And I was, I was glad to hear that the league actually felt that this would actually make a difference for the towns that are in a really tough spot. And, you know, who knows it may be a vehicle for doing more in the future. But I think it's a good question. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. And your involvement has been really productive and useful. So thank you. My pleasure. And thank you very much. The committee and chair for all your good work on this and so many other issues during this. Very unprecedented time. The number of hours that you must be putting in are extraordinary. But thank you. Yeah. Everybody I think has been doing a lot of that. Yeah. So I'm going to go to miscellaneous tax. And I think it's Abby and. Let's see, who do I have? I have Abby and Graham. And. Is that it? On this. Okay. I don't know. I don't know which is the best place to start. I'm sorry. I should have my, I should have this sitting up in front of me so that I'm. Exactly what I'm talking about. Abby, why don't you start a lot of it? We've seen, we don't need to go through every detail, but if you could tell the committee. Describe the two documents that we've got. And maybe flag any part of it that we need to focus on. We've been through these small sections interminably. I don't think we need to do it again. I don't think we need to do it again. Also, I'll save everybody from that. Everybody wants to stop on any of it. They can, and we'll have a discussion if you've forgotten about it. But the question that I've got for the committee. Is, are, do people think that this is the right time to do basically the whole bill that we had in front of us? Or do they want to focus just on the most critical pieces? Yeah. I mean, we met on this two or three weeks ago. We were looking just at the most critical pieces because we didn't even know if we were going to be able to vote on the floor, let alone. Well, on something complicated. But at this stage. Things seem to be moving. I wouldn't say rapidly on the floor, but they're moving. So, you know, I think, I think it's. How much of this we want to fight off. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just, let's, we spent a lot of time with the whole thing. Let's send in the whole thing. And if the. The Senate. Says we can't take a bigger bite than they compare it now. Yeah. They're more agile than I am, which is not a word I've ever thought I would use for the Senate, but they are. So I think they're fine. If they get a whole thing. Robin. I was going to agree with Scott. I think we're going to be able to. Get it through unless there's something that's glaringly obvious that we shouldn't. We should go for it. Okay. The other. If there's also a question about whether there's anything that we need to add to it based on what's been happening currently. The one piece that I would love to have included in the bill that we just did. But we don't have the language ready. Is the piece that gets us started on the state collection of the education tax. And it could easily go in here. If we can, if we can see language that we like. And so that, that would be a piece that I'd like to have us at least look at. And there may be some others as well. George. Jim and Emily. Well, there were like eight things on the side by side. There were about eight things listed at the end. That we're going to get put into other bills. And I would need to go through those again, because I don't know what's happening with those other bills. So I kind of would like to go through those and make sure we shouldn't. There are things that need to be included in here. Good. Jim. Yeah. Just back on. The Senate being more flexible for whatever it was. I'd say, I'd say times like this, they're less inhibited. They just, okay, let's do it this way or that way or something, you know, which comes across as flexibility. We've been voting a lot, but we haven't actually introduced a bill yet. Emily. I appreciate what you said about the few extra pieces we might want to put in. And I wonder if we want to go, you know, one step further on our education finance conversations to see if there's. Anything else that we might want to drop in here based on what resolution we might find in the next week or two. I don't know what timeline for that. Yeah. So my thought is that the, the, that this, this bill, which is generally technical, generally non-controversial would sort of go on. But it's long. It's got a lot of stuff in it tends to go on its own. And that we would do an education finance bill that sets the yields and the rates separately. Because that will inevitably be controversial. And it's not going to be. So. At the moment, I was thinking of keeping those separate the state collection issue. Because it's just getting a. Plan in motion is. And the league is supporting it probably wouldn't be controversial. So that's why it would go in this one. It could go on either one. Joey. Yeah. So that's why it's so important to be able to collect that tax. And obviously if they're supporting this change, it's not a significant amount of money. And it's easier for them to do the statewide collection. That's the discussion that. At some point we would definitely would have, we've had in the past, they. Some towns get make more money off it than others. But I think at this stage, they're seeing all the downside of it. They're, they're, it's sort of like a trust tax. You know, if you're, if you have a retail operation and you're collecting sales tax and you get to use that money for a month or so for cash flow, but suddenly you're at a place where you've got to hand it over and you don't have it anymore. Then it, you'd be better off not collecting it in the first place or not. Not being the middle man. So what I'm hearing from them is that they're ready to step forward and get to the next level as, as middle men, because it has been hugely problematic for them. But that would, that would be a, just if we get to a point of actually making the change, that would be a discussion we'd have to have with them. Scott, Sam and Emily. Yeah. I would just, I would echo what you said, Janet, and just saying everybody keep in mind that. Not only is it a trust tax, but it's a trust tax that dwarfs their municipal budget in a way that they can manage. I was just going to say that they didn't exactly say that they support it. They said they support exploring it. So it's not like we're doing it. We're just like, we're just like going to start the process. So, you know, Burlington shouldn't get too concerned just yet. Just, it's not a, it's not happening. It's just like, how would we do this logistically? It's just the exploring the questions. Emily. This is another way I'm just stumbling forward as a new person on the committee without context of either time or physicality. But mentioning trust taxes, I've just, and technicalities and the other trust taxes that we have and sort of the challenges that we've experienced with them over the last month and how they're held and how they're delivered to the state has struck me as confusing just as a newbie that how folks seem to feel an ownership over them, even though they are trust taxes and wondering if there's space for a step forward on that here or not. What does that mean? Like with the restaurants seem to like, you know, collect. I don't, you know, I know I'm stumbling into like probably a huge fire here with talking about restaurants and meals and rooms taxes, you know, all of that. But that it seems like a lot of restaurants think of that as part of their income and like what they're sitting on as a bank account and, you know, what they might use for payroll right now and further shifting it to when in fact they're collecting it on behalf of the state. And that just strikes me as a confusing situation that's we're really sitting with in a substantial way right now. Yeah, one of the ideas that somebody mentioned over the last couple of three weeks is that they should be required to hold them separately. I don't, I'd like to know if any other state requires that before I, before I endorse it, but is that what you're talking about that kind of thing. It is and I know that, especially, you know, in the very small micro business environment of Vermont, asking anyone to do any extra administration, which is what holding something separately would be is a big lift. But it is sort of what I'm moving towards or lightly suggesting and I think Scott said something slightly to that effect yesterday or at some point in the recent past. Yeah, I mean, I think the, what you have to get at with this whole conversation is basically what businesses are doing with these rooms and meals and sales taxes are they're using them as cash flow. And as long as cash flow turns out the way you think it's going to turn out down the road, you're fine.  What's not clear right now is if there's, I mean, businesses have lots of strategies for that. You can go get a line of credit, you can go to the bank, you can do a variety of different things. The question is just that does the state want to get involved in all those little individual strategies that every business has? I'm not sure I know what the answer. I'd be interested to know what other states do. Peter. I agree on having raised this issue in the past. The more I think about it, the more I would think it useful to make a difference between those folks who file a report. Quarterly as opposed to monthly. That is to say it usually reflects the size of the cash flow. And Emily's probably correct. Why would you want to add administrative burdens to a small operation? So if there were a way to essentially leave the situation alone for small operators, but nevertheless make sure that the collections amongst the high cash flow. And that the amount of money that a large number of operators and businesses came in, timely manner, that might be a way to do it. Since we're all just waiting on this one. I just want to think about it like logistically for a second. Like. Let's just say you're a restaurant and you get your credit card deposit every day from, does that mean that every day you need to go in. And you get a certain amount of money over to a separate bank account, like on a daily basis. Is that what we mean by segregating it? Cause. I mean. I don't know. It seems like a lot of extra work. Yeah, that's the conundrum that Sam speaks to. I mean, they're the, if cash flows, the problem, the way you solve that is by making the submission more complicated. I mean, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Daily, weekly. But the other side of that is, of course, is that now you're increasing the administration on the, the business to make that happen on a daily or weekly basis. So that's the. That's the conundrum to find yourself in. Well, so. This is speaking from my old experience as a tax commissioner. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. The way it needs to be treated, which is that it doesn't belong to the business that belongs to the state is that you have significant penalties if they don't do it. And that's why the 8% is there. What happened this year? Normally it works more or less. You know, there are businesses that are on the edge. That. Start using it for. Payroll typically. And they get themselves in trouble. And they're like, well, I don't know how many of them are in the business. I don't know how many of them are in the business. But I think that's probably what they're struggling anyway. What happened this year is the department said, well, we're going to waive the penalties and in the interest. And so suddenly we're having a conversation about whose money it is. But if that hadn't happened, I think we'd be. In the world that we've always been in is that businesses are. Understandably very cautious about incurring those penalties. They percent was a lot of money. They tend it's to their benefit to keep it. Separated and be able to make that payment on the 25th of the month. Because the consequences of not doing that are pretty significant. This year, the department just said. Well, you know, we'll get rid of those penalties for some extended period of time. We don't know exactly when that ends either. Peter. I agree with you, but then the fix to that would be to. Enjoying in some way. That parent ability of the executive branch. To simply say, don't bother. And then the 8% would remain and could not be removed as you've pointed out. Anyone else want to weigh in on this particular issue. So, so. It's a continuing problem. And I don't know whether. Same. Good. Save me. In terms of this bill. That we're talking about that I've said, I would be happy to report. I would. I would not like to have this in this bill. You mean a separate account. Yeah. I am the 8%, the 8% does the thing. You know, people are required to keep their records. Not. You know, not to mention that, you know, the business is pay all the credit card fees for the tax tax collection. There's. Just not interested in going there. In this bill. That's all. Thanks. I agree about not going there in this bill, but I would like to talk to some small businesses in town and just find out. How that would work and what would be the problems and. You know, so something to think about for next year, I think that that's too much to be, to be adding into now and maybe it'll never happen, but I guess for myself, I'm going to see if I can find out more from some local businesses. Well, and one of the things if I'm back next year and if I'm chairing the committee, I'm going to be back next year and I'm going to be back next year.  One of the things that I'd like to have the committee spend some time on is. The authority of the commissioner with respect to sort of blanket waivers. Because I felt that that was problematic. I'm not. I even have some questions about whether the statute really allows that. But. You know, I think it's a little bit difficult to get up in the air and too difficult, particularly for these small businesses to engage in that discussion right now. So I'd prefer to wait till January to have it. But if people want to discuss it now, we, we can. That's a slightly different issue, Sam, than what we were talking about earlier. This is really the question about whether you can do a blanket waiver of penalties for an entire tax for a period of time. So I think that's a good question. I think that's a good discussion. That is probably worth having. Anyone else on this. Sort of general area. So. Abby, I think I'm back to you. I'm a bill. Sure. So good morning. Abby separate office of legislative council. I think that's a good question. I think that's a good question. I think that's a good one of your questions about what other states do. I see that. New York. Does recommend that sales tax vendors. Or sorry, vendors who are collecting sales tax, do establish a separate bank account and they have the authority to require certain vendors to, to segregate funds. If those vendors have failed to collect and remit sales tax or the money to apply. If that, would be a little bit of a 10-minute search. I would want to do more sort of looking through Vermont statutes. I don't think there's a similar requirement in Vermont statute, but just to put it out there, there are other states that have looked at this. So I would want to do more research first, but just so you know it is out there. So, Yeah, I think that's fine. Sure. So the two. Remittance deadlines that were waived by the commissioner of taxes were for March and April. So those are her collections in February and March. So they're always remitted a month later. So as of May 25th. I think that's fine. I think that's fine. Sales and use tax and meals and rooms tax should be remitted again. And. Penalties would apply if they miss the May 25th deadline. To remit for. Certainly for April, what's not what the. Deferral announcement is silent on is whether. I'm sorry for February and March. It's not clear that penalties and interests will apply. If they never remit those. Two months. So that I just wanted to point that out that it's. No end date. That was, that was part of the concern that I had. Part of it was the authority and part of it was the fact that there was no end date. Yeah. Right. So yeah, that was all I had on those two. Discussions. What I think that where that idea of segregating had come from was the requirement in the miscellaneous tax bill right now to segregate funds received from the state. So I can pull the. In terms of property tax. I'm sorry. Let me just. It's in section three. So when the state is providing. The funds that are needed to segregate funds. So that's one of the. Meeting the cost to prepare the grand, the education property tax grand list. This new language would require towns to segregate. So that's I think what it's sort of sparked that question about what do we do for trust taxes. So that's in the current bill. That's one of the. It's also one of the sections that. We're going to talk about, but how many towns are receiving some funds currently. For collecting and administering the education property tax. Yeah. I can't remember the amount. Is it like five dollars? It's quite, I think it's $1 per parcel. I thought it was. I think, well, so I also want to do some more research to get back to you. I think there are other, there's another provision where towns receive. Funds from the state for the administration, but in this particular section, it's one. Just a dollar. Okay. Yeah. Yes. One dollar per grand less parcel in the municipality. Thank you. Yeah.  Sorry, I'm going to just, can you hear me? Okay. It's very cool. I can. I don't know about everyone else. People. Good. Yeah. So the, the few sections that we, the committee had discussed, I think I was last in March 31st on this bill are the first two sections in particular, having to do with property tax. And the first. Extends the deadlines for towns to make corrections to the grand list. Right now it says before December 31st, it gives towns one extra day. So that could be helpful in the current environment. There's also in the second section of the bill, there's also in the second section of the bill, there's also in the third section of the bill, the recording requirements towns are currently required when they make an extension for filing the grand list with the Department of Taxes, PVNR. They have to record it in the town records. This removes that requirement, which also would make sense. Removing one of the administrative burdens on towns. And then the third. And then the fourth section of the bill, which is the first section of the bill, there are some changes that are proposed in this bill. It's a slightly different proposal than what the administration had initially proposed, but it decreases the amount that individuals have to pay. When you talk about third year, you're reading from a list that we created two or three weeks ago when we were thinking we needed to focus just on the most important pieces. Correct. That's section seven of the bill. And that's okay. I appreciate that. So. Abby or has given us the entire section by section. I think somebody was asking about the items at the end here. Do you want to touch on those briefly so that we know what we didn't do. So the final page of the section by section lists. All of the proposals that the administration had made that the committee removed either. That went into another bill or that did not. Were not taken. Yeah. And it's the last three. And I've noted the bills that they were moved into. These three are all technical changes. And I'm not going to go into the technical changes. I'm not going to go into the technical changes. Mostly. So the first is to. It's purely technical. I'm looking at 32 VSA 92 71. This is the third from last change. It amends which to that. It went into the technical corrections bill. That I don't know if you'd want to add back in here or. No, that could wait. I'm not going to go into the technical changes. I'm not going to go into the technical changes. I'm saying with the next change under that in section 9202, it has been in statute for a very long time. It's an incorrect reference to federal statute that can, can wait. However, the final change on this list. That amends. Last year's. Market based sourcing effective date. That was the first of this year. So this might be a change that you want to include to add the on or after talking about the taxable years that the change applies to. Well, that ended up in. Budget adjustment. Oh, I'm sorry. I was thinking that's a budget. Oh, let me check that then. I can check that to see if that. To do it twice. Cause that'll make things. I don't know if it is elsewhere. It is an important one to do. So if it's not elsewhere, we'll put it in here. Great. And okay. I don't know if we had a chance to look at any of this, but other questions about any of the other. Sections here or concerns about anything, anything you want more information on. I'm looking to see if anybody is jumping in. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Sam, you had, um, you were going to. You had some additional information for us, which is, I guess related to, um, to this or to, um, sort of timing questions and. Performance with federal law. Do you want to talk about those now or. I can. Um, it's whatever you like. It's not, it's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. It's not. I think just thinking about the. The link ups and I think things to put on the committee's radar for. So let's wait on that. Let's, let's finish with miscellaneous tax. And then if we have time, we'll, we'll shift to that. Um, I just had one thing on the. Yeah. Just to give the community a sense of the section seven of the bill. The use tax table. I had that as a revenue impact. That was the only major revenue piece in the bill. Yeah. Well, it doesn't seem like a time to. Reduce revenue. On the other hand, those use text tables are too high. They don't seem fair to me. So. Bill. Hi. Um, anybody have any thoughts about the use tax table? Yes or no. That's a, that's a big decision. I mean, a million dollars is a million dollars. Sam. I thought. What we. Came up with, which was more than the administration proposed was. Pretty fair. Um, it is a million dollars, but it's a million dollars down because we collected many several million more because of the marketplace facilitator. Yeah. Language from last year. So it makes sense to me. Yeah. It tends to be where I am, but I'm interested in George. I just want to say, I agree. 100%. It doesn't feel like a time that we should be giving up money, but it really is about fairness here. Well, anyone else. So for the moment, unless I hear an objection, it's going to, it'll stay in the bill. Um, it's probably the one substantive piece, the most substantive piece that's in the bill. Um, I missed it. I had a phone call. So I missed the conversation here. I'm sorry. Um, I don't know when you came in. So I'll do the best I can to catch you up. Um, the, um, We're talking about the miscellaneous tax bill. And, um, Um, Um, We're going to have some discussion about test taxes and various sort of related things, but nothing that's in here. Um, and then we're looking specifically at the changes in the use tax, safe harbor language, which we all agreed early in the session needed to be adjusted because of all the online. Uh, purchasing that's going on. Um, Um, Um, Um, So we're, I think, I think we're generally in agreement that we should, Um, Right. In the bill. Okay. Thanks. Anything else, anybody wants to. Um, Um, I think a lot of people feel about including, uh, Language on the state collection of the education tax in here. Um, You mean from Rebecca's. Washerman. Well, I don't, I don't know that she, uh, she was working on something. I don't think it, I didn't, I haven't seen it. Um, so, um, So it would be Becky who would, who would work on it. Um, but it wouldn't, it isn't to change the way we administer it is just to get the thing moving. Let's see, George, Robin, Jim, and Sam. Yeah, I would, I would agree with putting it in this. I think it's better sooner than later to, um, Begin that discussion. So I would agree, putting it in here. Okay, Robin. Um, I agree. I think for the same reasons, we need to get started. It's going to be, um, you know, a little bit more than one year to take. To get this done. So start now. Yeah, Jim. Yeah. Um, we've. Gone through this many times over the years and it's time to get it moving.  Uh, Sam. I think it's fine to include in here. It's just. You know, a little bit of thinking about how to get the ball rolling on it and how to get the ball rolling on it. And, um, you know, what all the logistics would be involved. So certainly not doing it, but it's important to start thinking about it. And we have, we continue to bring it up. And now, um, it's actually this situation that's really kind of brought it to a head. So I think. I think it's worth putting it in. And this would be a good vehicle. Okay.  Um, I think we're going to hold off a vote on the bill until we get the language on the state administration. Um, so, um, I, I, if we're ready, um, to do a straw vote on this, um, all of the rest of the material that we have in front of us. Um, Which doesn't foreclose adding anything. It just says we're done with all this. So we're going to call it a straw vote. Um, So moved. All right. Uh, second and look like it's seconded by Jim over there. Um, and, um, just because of the awkwardness of the way we vote here, we're going to call the roll, but it is a straw vote. Cause it seems like the easiest way to do it. Um, so. Uh, Robin. So the motion Robin. Um, is to support the, uh, miscellaneous tax bill. And described in the section by section summary, understanding that we may add sections to it. And one of them is going to be the state administration section. Uh, George and Joey. So in, I went briefly through Graham's presentation last night. Um, and there were places in there, at least one place where, um, Um, part of the, I think it was PPP, um, loans could become taxable in Vermont. In his words, depending on how Vermont. Um, links up to the federal system. And I just, I would like to explore that before we close this bill out. I mean, I'm happy to take a straw vote now, but I want to make sure that there aren't other pieces. That have come up to the federal. Right. And that's why it might, we might have more than just the state administration to this, because there may be other pieces. Once we hear from Graham, that this bill includes link up language, but it's to fiscal. I'm sorry, not fiscal calendar. Uh, 2019. So it doesn't include any of the cares that changes. So there is link up language in here, which is the way we normally do it. We look back a year. Um, so, um, I don't know if it's, um, I don't know if it's, um, I don't know if it's, um, but yes, that will, will. We'll close out all of this if the committee agrees. Um, and then we will continue to talk about what we might want to add to it. Uh, Joey. I'm also at Jenna. You're also. Um, so are people clear on the motion? Um, Yeah. I did not write down who I don't know that it matters who it is. I don't know. I'm not. No. Peter and Jim. Okay. Um, so what we're, what we're, um, voting on is. The sections one through. One through 24. Um, In this, in the section by section understanding that we may add sections to the bill. That we're voting to agree with those. Okay. George. As I look at the section by section, um, there's not a check mark in the boxes of 22, 23, and 24. And you just said we're voting on those sections too. Did they have, did they need more discussion or is it just. Abby, you want to explain. Um, so the sections 22 and 23 were the judiciary fees. Um, and I actually hadn't gotten a solid, I think we had discussed this again at the end of March. Um, and I think that there was a general consensus to move forward with these, but I haven't had a solid. Okay. From the committee. Do you want me to. Briefly touch on what they are. Would that be helpful to be sure. Um, So the $10 surcharge is for failure to pay a penalty after healing hearing or default judgment. Um, at the municipal level, the judiciary currently collects this surcharge and transfers the collections to the municipality where. In fraction occurred. It's a very, um, small amount. We were discussing this right before the, um, the, um, the, um, Um, I think it was very small. I think of $1,000 a year. It's something pretty limited. Um, and the judiciary had requested this and the other change. This change is really to. Just do away with what's more, um, More of an administrative burden than the amount that they're actually collecting. That was their recommendation. The second, um, I think. Um, It applies to all filings. Um, And this is what the judiciary has been charging. They just wanted it to be clear in statute. So it's really just a clarifying change. And I can add a check mark on those. Yeah. The judiciary committee did look at these. Um, and. Um, I can't remember. Um, Correct. There was a third recommendation, um, which was to increase, um, The department of taxes. Turn them over if it's offset or collection authority from $47 to 50. Um, because there's a $47 fee that the judiciary charges. So the tax department, I think. Just offered. Um, I think that's a good point. Um, And then I didn't put a check mark in the effective date section just because those are probably going to change if there are other additions to the bill. So I left it open. Yeah. Is that coming back to everybody? It is to me. Um, Uh, Is there more discussion on the motion? Um, and again, understanding on the effective dates that even though we're endorsing them as they applied of what's in here, but if we add things, obviously we're going to change. We're going to add a effective date if we need it. Um, Okay. Everyone. All right, Robin. Um, people understand the motion. Okay. I'm going to go. Yep. Representative Anthony. Yes. Representative Beck. Yes. Representative Brennan. Yes. Donovan. Yes. Representative cornheiser. Yes. Representative Masland. Yep. Representative shy is yes. Representative till. Yes. Representative young. Yes. Representative Canfield. Yes. Representative Ansel. Yes. 1100. We're back to you. Unanimity. Wonderful. Um, so that's a straw vote. At least that's how I'm characterizing it. Um, if we decide to add sections, we're not, it's not, we're not going to be amending the bill. We're just going to put them in and ultimately we'll have a whole bill. Um, that the committee will vote on formally. Um, and hopefully sooner than later, but we'll. Just keep, you know, We've kept this open partly because it is a place to put. Bits and pieces of things as we, as we come across them. So. Um, I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe Sorsha does. Uh, whether, um, Where Becky is on the language on the state collection. Abby, are you working with her as well? Do you have. Yes. So I can weigh in on that. Um, We did find the last proposal was 2011 or. Or 2012. And we're looking at some language that was brought up then. Um, I don't know if you were thinking more along the lines of a study or a working group. It sounds like it's not something that would need absolutely every detail ironed out immediately, but using that language, we could set some sort of parameters of what. Um, and who you'd want to be doing that study committee. I guess are my questions. Right. I think, um, So, um, I don't know if others want to weigh in. Um, but, um, Um, Um, Um, Um, a little, um, A little more weight to it than a study committee, but, um, But less weight than doing it. So, um, I think the idea is to say we'd like, we want this done. Um, but we want to know. You know what it, how it's going to work and what it's going to cost and how long it's going to take and what the, you know, we have a law of another chance to look at it. Um, Um, Um, Like a tax department proposal in collaboration with Vermont League of cities and towns and the clerks and treasures association or something like that. That's great. I can't think of anybody else, particularly. That needs to be involved. Peter. Uh, back to a, uh, A query of scots. Um, it would be good to find out whether or not. Uh, there will be forthcoming. Um, A similar or parallel, uh, Recommendation from the tax structure commission. Uh, not that they need to be included, but it, it, it might be nice if, uh, Uh, Abbey or whoever our staff person on this is going to be. A context of staff person for the structure committee and say, we're, we're probably going to plant the seed for this. And we hope you're in concurrence. Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, Um, It might be something they'd weigh in on it's sort of more administration than, um, You know, the kind of policy that I think they've been looking at, but, um, That's still. We can. Um, I just wouldn't want to slow it down. I mean, they're, they meet monthly, I think, right? Um, I wouldn't, I wouldn't break right now. Yes. I wouldn't, I wouldn't want to have to wait for them to weigh in. Um, To actually get something moving. Um, What's that going to say? Um, Mark, do you have anything you want to, he just popped up on my screen. Um, Yeah. Well, I did this conversation caught my interest because we, we worked quite a bit on this back in 2011 and 2012. So we do have a lot of research that's been done. Yeah. Um, Yeah. I mean, I think I, I think you're right, Sam. I think the idea of asking for a proposal, I think I would include joint fiscal. Um, and, um, Legislative council staff and that discussion. Um, I think one of the things that I think is that it takes an astonishing like long time to implement. Um, and so that's the reason for wanting to start to move on it. But it, it really, because of all the transition issues, maybe some of them are better now than they used to be, or maybe we have ways of working around them that we didn't used to have, but, um, but it really took a long time. Um, I think it's one of the stakeholders that we weren't necessarily, um, thinking about when we did it last time, for example, local banks and things like that had a lot of, uh, a lot to say about it. It wasn't readily apparent. Right. It strikes me that the local delinquent tax collectors. Uh, are, are their own little mafia in some places. And I'm not running again. So you can quote me on that. We have to, I think you're quoted. That is the wonders of, of live stream. I think you're already out there. Um, uh, let's see. Uh, anything else. Um, that's coming up, Graham. We've got a few minutes. We're going to have a quick break before we go on the house floor. Um, do you want to quickly tell us what's in your memo? We can come back to it, but maybe just give us some highlights. Yeah, sure. Um, so what I was going to talk about is somewhat related to the miscellaneous tax bill, but it's essentially looking at some of the federal, um, legislation that's passed related to the coronavirus and some of the tax legislation that's in there that will affect Vermont in some way. Um, and I think at some point, the committee, um, needs to take a look at either through the miscellaneous tax bill next year or you decide to, you know, look at it through a piecemeal approach saying we want to attach to this. We don't want to attach to this. So, um, it's essentially looking over those, those pieces. Um, and the bigger pieces are on the first coronavirus bill. There was the, there was some payroll tax credits that are that could be considered taxable income in Vermont if the community, if Vermont doesn't, or Vermont decides to link up to the 2020 federal language without any changes or doesn't take a whole, doesn't take legislative action. Um, in the CARES Act, there were a number of, there was a couple of big provisions and two or three smaller provisions. The bigger provisions are the payroll protection program, the small business loans that everyone's heard about. Um, those loans can be forgiven for businesses that, that maintain the criteria for receiving the loan and that forgiven income is not considered taxable at the federal level, but could be taxable at the Vermont level. Um, if we decided to sort of link up to the 2020 language, the 2020 federal statute, um, as it is for at the end of December 2020, so the committee, the, the legislature might decide to do something different there or take a piecemeal approach to that. The second big one is the, uh, the economic stimulus checks, the economic impact payments. Um, that's the $1,200 that everyone has received. Um, depending on how much money they make. Um, and that doesn't appear to be taxable in Vermont. Um, so I know I've received a lot of questions about that right now. That's not taxable. And it's my understanding that the legislature doesn't need to take any sort of action on those to make, to make, um, to leave those as not taxable in Vermont. Um, some of the smaller provisions in the cares act. Um, the, in the cares act, there was a, a provision that allowed people to take up to $100,000 out of their, their IRAs 401ks deferred comp without having to pay the federal penalty set up till December 31st, 2020. And so, um, there's no, uh, federal penalty on any of those withdrawals. Um, which means that I think, um, absent any sort of changes about legislature, we would also pick them up sort of indirectly because our penalty is 24% of the federal. So 24% of zero penalty is zero penalty. So, um, we would not be taxing, we would not be applying our penalty of those withdrawals. Um, however, the withdrawals themselves will be considered taxable income. The, the next one I had there was in the cares act, there was a new $300 quote unquote above the line charitable deduction. So recall the federal level. Um, you can itemize your charitable, um, giving, um, only a few itemized to get that deduction. This created a one year tax year 20 above the line charitable deduction of $300. Um, and so this would flow through to Vermont because our starting place for personal income taxes is adjusted gross income. So when you hear the words above the line, that means is that it happens before the calculation of justice grossing. If you start with gross income, then you take your above the line options, which are things like student loan interest, um, educator expenses and another one. And this will be another $300. So what this is somewhat important, I guess, or for consideration for this committee is, um, if no legislative action was taken or we linked up completely to the federal statute of 2020, you'd have people who would be essentially double dipping on their charitable deductions. Um, so they'd get $300 deduction worth, um, at the federal level, which would flow through to Vermont and then they would get our 5% charitable tax credit on top. So let's say someone gave $300 to charity, they would get deduct that from their income. Plus they would get 5% on top of that. Um, so that's another piece of action. Kind of thank you with the other ones. Another one that's a little bit more minute, but actually it was a pretty big federal, um, revenue impact was the, the ductibility of a business interest. So prior to the tax cuts and jobs act, um, businesses and tax cuts and jobs, that being the federal tax reform in 2017, um, and that affects us because the starting place for Vermont corporate income tax is federal corporate taxable income. Um, and so that change would affect us. Um, if we, there was no legislative action, however, I don't know what the side of the magnitude of that revenue impact was. And we don't know when they changed the tax, but we don't know. Um, what the side of the magnitude of that revenue impact was. And we don't know when they changed the law back in 2017. We did not estimate what the impact was there, but that's another, um, peace. And then I think the final piece is the deduction that, um, individuals can take if an employer pays for their student loans. So right now, if an employer pays your student loans as considered taxable income for you. Um, and what this did was for up until December 31st, 2020, an employer pays your student loan than that is considered. You get a deduction, um, from your, it's not considered taxable income. Um, and so if it's not considered taxable income, it doesn't calculate as part of gross income. So that would flow into Vermont. So I think largely those are the pieces that, um, I guess the committee is going to have to consider whether they want to take all of those or whether you want to just take some of them. Um, and then one more thing I just want to quickly add is on the payroll protection act, there's some on the payroll protection program. There's still some debate over whether a business can deduct the payroll expenses related to the actual program itself. So in normal times, a business will be able to deduct the wages they paid and the rent that they paid. However, if the IRS has said, if you take the payroll protection loan and use that money for those reasons, you are unable to deduct those expenses. And in Congress, they're sort of lobbying to get that changed. You'll also be able to deduct those things. So it's another potential area that the state might want to consider whether they want to, um, allow that sort of deductibility for payroll protection expenses. So that's sort of the quick overview of what I was going to talk about. A lot of super complicated things. Um, so, um, I'm not going to reset it all back because I don't think I put it all in completely. Um, but one thought I have, um, is that normally we do the link up looking back a year. Um, things are changing really rapidly. Um, and, uh, in Congress and a whole bunch of areas, including these tax code changes. And it, it feels to me risky to do any kind of link up for fiscal 20. Now, um, without knowing what we're going to end up linking up to. Um, I realize that we can link up to a specific provision, but it sounds like even some of those are changing, you know, the underlying elements are changing. Um, so that I've my own preferences to wait, but, um, I'm hoping to hearing others view Sam and Scott. Um, I realized that, uh, we just approved. Uh, in this, in the miscellaneous, this bill that we were going to do the annual link up. We're lost. 19. Cause we didn't do it last year. We always do it. Yeah. It's a little bit, I guess, but you link up the miscellaneous tax bill for the tax year previous. So it's just essentially covering last year's tax year. Yeah. So let's say if you wanted to cover, if you wanted to loop all these changes under Vermont, that code, or you want them to flow through, then, you know, next year you could pass the miscellaneous tax bill and just say, as of the federal statute of December 30. Um, And, um, you know, I think that would be helpful to you. That our times December 31st, 2020. And you would capture the mall. One of the things that we typically do in January and it usually doesn't make any some, some years it's, it's hugely impactful, but most times it doesn't make much difference at all is that we go through what the changes are that we're looking up to. Looking back the year. Um, And, um, You know, I think Abby helped us with that this year and. or it was Peter who would do that and just go through and say these are the, this is what, when you link up, this is what you're incorporating and this is, you know, these are where the decision points are and once in a while there's something we don't link up to, you know, we'll look at it and we say, no, we don't want to do it. Scott. Yeah, I would just echo what Janet said. I think we should be very, very cautious about linking up to any of this stuff. The feds have a printing press and the ability to borrow trillions of dollars. We don't have any of that. So we're going to adjourn because we need to go on the floor and I don't want to get people a momentary break. But this, what Graham has just gone through is complicated enough that we're going to listen to it again and have a chance to ask questions as we go through it a little more slowly. Tomorrow we're looking at ed finance, I believe, and so be prepared with your good ideas about what we can do, understanding that it doesn't look like we can use CARES Act money. So just be thinking about how to approach the problem, but I will see you all a little bit later, okay? I'm ending the live stream now.


Hey guys, it's MJ the students actually and in the beginning of the year We said that we were going to learn how to create our own decentralized applications And what I've done is I've used you out the past 24 days to learn how to create websites and Solidity contracts and all these other things to create something that I'm calling crypto rose and essentially a crypto rose is a virtual rose that you can give to someone on Valentine's Day and I'm calling it the most romantic thing that you can do because They're quite expensive. So it's like better than getting a diamond. They're unbreakable, you know, it's on the blockchain So there's lots of security. They permanent It's a great way to show your appreciation You can see I've done a whole little marketing thing on why you need to get a crypto rose for your lover And then what we've got over here are a few examples of what they would be For instance, I'm ready to deny the existence of space and time Rather than admit that our love might not be eternal, you know, some really romantic stuff like that So these are the examples What I want from you guys is or what we've done now is we have put this on Something known as the rink be Testnet okay, so the rink be testnet is the aetherium testbed where you Deploy your contract before you put it on the main net to see if there's any bugs. So what I've done Or how you guys can participate is if you go to a website and you get metamask So metamask is this little website. It's got this cute little orange fox that you know follows your mouse around What you want to do is get the chrome extension it's going to look like this little guy here in the corner and then You can click on it and you can see there is my little Metamask and we're going to use this metamask in order to engage with the aetherium testnet So what we're going to do is we want to go back to our little thing over here Once you've installed metamask, we need to think of someone special and now we need to Dedicate a rose. Okay, so What I'm going to do is I'm going to dedicate the rose to you guys the YouTube channel I'm going to say thanks for Subscribing and for all the lovely comments That you send me and Then we can sign off by MJ the student Actual now, of course, this is the moment of truth it's going to be a little bit awkward if this doesn't work, but then what we're going to do we're going to click dedicate and We seeing the metamask thing come up. That is very nice Very nice.  Testnet I want to check everything here. I want to click submit Okay, now what we do is we wait because what we come here and we can see the three little dots It's pending we can go now onto the blockchain and We can see that it is pending. So while it's pending I'm going to tell you how you guys can get some free test ether in order to to buy some crypto roses So in order to get some free ether what you want to do is go on to the Rigby Website which is over there You then need to post on social media your address that you've got you so actually sorry first things first is You would come here. You would create an account. You would then copy that address You click here. You'd say copy address to clipboard You'd then post it on social media copy that social media link and then post it in over here And then say give me some ether but let's see How is this is this the is this the success? Okay, so our transaction has gone through And now what we want to see is if that rose now pops up on our chain so what we have is I made a gold one earlier and We want to see now if I refresh the page if we're gonna see the red rose over here. So This is the moment of truth. Oh My gosh, there it is. There it is That is that is pretty cool. Sorry. I know it's nothing exciting Like it's not like we you know, we've changed the face of finance or we've shown that we don't no longer need banks or anything But it is still pretty cool that you can create a crypto rose write a little love letter and store it on the blockchain. So What I'm gonna do now is I'm gonna leave it to you guys Go check out the website. That's that's current URL, but there's actually a short one which I'll also put in the description Let's go straight to the Instructions remember you want to install metamask? You want to obtain some free ether? You want to do it on the rink B network for now and Then go on have some fun and if you run into any problems Please let me know on this YouTube channel Because I want to sort all this stuff out before we post to the main net because then it's you can't change once It's there. It's done Which can also do is all of the code is on github So you can actually come and check out all my code and see exactly how I did it Whether it's the JavaScript the HTML the solidity All the stuff is here Open source on on github as well So make sure you go check it out and please let me know if you do run into any problems Thank you guys so much and I look forward to to reading a whole bunch of roses from you guys Awesome. I'll see you guys I'm off to Joe book for a bit and then when I come back I'm gonna try to get this onto the main net really in time for Valentine's Day. Thanks guys. Cheers


How weird is it me without glasses? She used to be at me every video first like five or videos and everywhere glasses Now I just like naked. I don't like it. All right boys wheel of mud is culminating Look it up. Although it sounds like it. We are three wins away from the playoffs. Oh wait. No, ah, ah, we're in the playoffs Oh my god, what is wrong with me? We're in the playoffs coming up with a 17-14 victory to push us to the playoffs We've got the wild card right now the divisional the conference and then the Super Bowl I think this is gonna be my last season of wheel of mud like for this year And then we've got all of July and all of August so maybe I'll run it back one season It depends off I win the Super Bowl I might just keep it or what we can also do is we can run a season that determines what players we can get at The start of next season if that makes sense It'll matter for how good of a team I can start man 21 with I do something like that every year But I want to make sure I really lay something out So for now let's focus on winning the Super Bowl to end this season off hot All right, our first wheel spin coming up here. Let's touch up this D line Let's definitely touch up this D line see if I can get someone in for ever since Griffin Can't touch up anybody yet, but I really like this one especially with how dirt cheap players are right now So however many points I get we're going to multiply that by 3000 coins and buy one player for that amount So good start or second one. Oh I haven't gotten this one yet, but gold rush is in right now So this is gonna have serious potential we get three total plays It's super start KO the sum of all the yards that I accumulate in those three plays Multiply by 3000 coins and I get that many to spend on one player So I threw three straight touchdowns 80 yards each I'd have seven hundreds a lot I'd have a lot is it 720,000 coins realistically. I'm shooting for at least 50 yards in three plays Which should be very doable. Oh old rushes out. Okay. Dalvin cook. Oh, that's actually bad, bro Oh offense. I need somebody insane my Kevin. Yes My Kevin's thank God. I'm just lobbing it up to him three times. Just gonna let him score. All right Let's get our yards now. All right, we're gonna double team this X factor and at the end of the day I can always look Dalvin cook, right? I'm throwing this up to my Kevin's go get it I said not past interference. We just mean mugged him. All right, we're gonna try the same thing I kind of just want to see Dalvin cook do his thing. Oh Is that open?  I really need you right now, buddy Oh my Kevin's still the biggest glitch. It's it's super sake. Oh my god I just quit out because it doesn't matter now. So 65 yards times 3,000 coins for yard 195,000 coins to spend on a single player. Let's go simian rice. It has 90 speed freak, dude I'd send me a rice. You got a brand new 99 on the squad almost good X factor this dude. All right, baby Begin wish me luck boys. And of course Certain night absolutely fumble the bag on this last time, but we'll give it a go So I was feeling good. No, this is where it got messed up Was this dude's NFC championship? It's my divisional playoff game You can see the NFC championship logo on that field right there boom He disconnects from the game. He disconnected from the game Okay, my wife. I still running. I'm still recording. My wife. I is definitely still up. I just watch this shit I'll let it speak for itself I'll start playoff zero win reward. I got the law And then I sent look through my screens in total disbelief somehow it gave me a loss for that game It booted me to MVP and now I have to go do it again. Hey boys I know I'm wearing a different outfit. It's a different day. And let me tell you why this is so unfortunate Basically, I got to the playoffs. I loaded up a game It said Pierce conceded the game or Pierce disconnected something like that and I took the loss I don't know if my Wi-Fi blipped out for half a second But my Wi-Fi was good after that this has happened to me in games before it happened to me a bunch on 2k Don't think it's my Wi-Fi so unlucky. Here is how we're handling this I have slept on this flight two days trying to figure out what I should do one option I thought of was just playing through a head-to-head season by myself off-camera getting back to the playoffs and playing The problem is we're getting really close to man 21 If you guys remember if you've ever watched wheel of mud in the past one thing I always do is I have a Specific certain way where I can upgrade my man 21 team based on how I played man 20 And I didn't have anything in place for that So this is a blessing in disguise basically sucks that I don't even get to play the playoffs now But I was gonna end a wheel of mud after that Super Bowl if I got to it So that would only been three more wheel of mud episodes Well, we're gonna do instead because I'm gonna play through a whole new season wheel of mud Which means you get at least anywhere from seven to probably 11 or 12 more episodes of wheel of mud format 21 Which is super exciting and this is gonna determine how we can get new players on our man 21 wheel of mud team now Now I'm mad at 21 I'm gonna be guaranteed my three team captains my prestige players, right? I'm already pretty sure I'm gonna do Lamar Jackson Tyree kill I gotta think of the third though. It's gonna be someone really good defensively So how we're gonna run this if I make the playoff I get one jackpot player any player of choice on man 21 for wheel of mud if I make the NFC championship I get one more jackpot player and if I win the Super Bowl It's two more so my goal right now is just make the playoffs lock in one Guaranteed jackpot player for man 21 and that's how we'll go So I'm gonna play this game as if it was that wild card playoff game all the wheel spins and everything you just saw Opponents top three duties phase destroyer. Are you kidding? I literally wasn't commentating because I thought he was gonna throw a touchdown on me on the left side And I was so worried. That's a good start to this game. Also boys. I realize I have the wrong line I've been right now all my life is crumbling So what I'm gonna do is I'm just gonna sub out all the players that shouldn't be in right now All right, this is the wheel of mud team that I should have in here. We go get that edge And I don't need a stretch again, I I'm not really sure what he was doing there edge. Oh, Mary I don't need X-Veders at all. This is wild. He dies. I'm gonna throw underneath to Barry All right, I'm on the three.   You don't see this bubble You don't see it. Shit, he sees it. No, I have to give it to Edmunds. No, I wanted that touchdown with Schleschensko It's so bad. Damn. Yeah, I mean if I lost this game though into a guy named FaZe Destroyer I'd have to FaZe destroy my whole life I have a 5-Wide. I think this should be Zach Gentry in the middle of the field. Um, oh my god Wait, no. He dropped that one just to go up and make the biggest catch in the game so far Get more rushing yards. Edgy's sealed You don't need X-Veders. You just don't need them. Oh my god. There's no way you're stopping this out of that set. There's no way 14 to 17. So I have 14 times 3. I have 42,000 coins to spend right now. So I still gotta win the game now Okay, he throws underneath, hits Megatron. Oh, he should be worried He should be worried. No, that's a pick. Damn. You're not gonna commit. You're not gonna commit to the goal All right, looks like he committed but Barry is gonna get solid yardage. He's moving forward Dude, I think this this is the most scuffed lineup ever I have no X-Veders on the field and I just put it away And I am gonna kick a field goal to actually ice this game because then I get a little bit extra coins to spend I'll have 51,000 coins to spend on a single player, which is definitely going straight to my offensive I also completed my challenge wheels. So I get to spend something for that. Bingo Dude, we really just put the game away with our PO peaks on bubble getting disconnected out of that playoff game Blessing in disguise. Taylor Mays gets player of the game probably first interception right off the bat Yo, so team stats my Lamar did not nearly play as well as his.  That's lights out. That's so high. Corey Schlesinger five receptions 46 yards No touchdowns. Oh What it all baby start boys very good start, okay? So two things I have 51,000 coins to spend on a player. I think I'm gonna grab an offensive lineman Switching up our challenge wheel bonus before it was an upgrade set now I'm gonna do 97 overall theme builders MVP It's the final season and training is worthless. So I think this is a perfect pack for it Especially if I can get an offensive lineman, I get an offensive lineman Jarvis Lane, that's not offensive lineman, but he might go somewhere on the team. He could be a backup I guess all right now 51,000 coins on one player. The thing is the market is so tanked. There's actually a pretty good chance This will give me something good. Oh, that's a that's a really good price actually y'all the Castro for 47,100 that's a huge upgrade This is what I mean dude that wheelspin look kind of shitty, but I get a 97 right guard for it So that's fire dude. All right, that's gonna conclude today's episode We're one and all in our brand new season gotta make it to the playoffs to lock in a jackpot for men 21 I'll see you in the next episode. Peace out


Llywodraeth gydigol, ddim yn ddim yn cael ei wneud. Alun i gael yr ystafell ar gyveldiau'r ystafell. O'r Unibynt yn gyfath rhan o'i gwasanaeth ar gyfer y cysylltu swampio a Lolaith. Yn y gweithio'r lŵr i'r Lloeddan Lucy Anhysledo ac Alas Kestillol. A gallwch chi'n ffobl. Woof, ddim yn ddweud. mae'n dweud yw'n dweud yw'n dweud yw'n dweud yw'n dweud yw'n dweud yw'n dweud, ac mae'n dweud yw'n dweud yw Arden University yn y pandemi COVID-19, yn ymgyrch, yn ymgyrch, yn ymgyrch, yn ymgyrch, ac mae Lluciaenna Clethw. Mae'r cyfnodd cyfnodd yw'r cyfnodd yw'r cyfnodd ar Arden University. A mae'r colleg. Yn ymgyrch. Yn ymgyrch. A dyna ni yw a ni yn fawr am gyfnodd ymgyrch a bywyd yn fwyliadau i ddygiadol yw'r cyfnodd ar Arden University. Mae'r cyfnodd ar Ysgriffa o hyd yn ymgylch i Lleidafolion Lleidafolion Ffisiadol. Yn ymgyrch. Mae llawer am gyd-oedd y gallai gilydd yn y pryd. Byddwch, bod ymgrifiad pa gweith rydyn ni'n gwybod a fywyd i chi'n meddwl gydag ynddo i ddweud â'r Arden. Ond yna, rydym wedi'i gwneud y rhai yn y model yw'r swampillolau. Dyna ymddefnyddio'r ddweud sefydliadau o'r hyn. Rwy'n dweud hynny'n gweithio ymddiadol. Wrth gwrs, rydym wedi'i chi'n siaradau'r ddiadol a'r cyffredinaf i chi'n hynod i gael ar y dyfodol, ac mae'r gweithio'r ddaeth yn dweud â'i ddefnyddio'r ddweud â'r cyffredinaf a'r gweithio am hynod i chi. Why did we choose Charn Swampilolans? Basically, in higher education we work and learn in the Swampilolans by trial and error and from learning from mistakes. Everybody needs a map or a method to sort through and learn from all the muddles, the uncertainties and the clarities and mistakes that happen along the way. The Swampilolans was a useful image for our reflection your degree your way. As during the pandemic we couldn't climb out of those lulans and had to do our best down there. And it required us to enter that place of not knowing. And so it fitted very well with with what we wanted to reflect on and we chose this method because of the reflection in action, and the reflection on action. And the reflection in action is this hovering hawk or this image of this hovering hawk that is in the mind, that has about remembering skills, experience and knowing at the right moment and then allowing us to draw on theories and knowledge as we go along. Whereas the reflection on action is the reflection after the event and it's there to increase the effectiveness of that reflection, in action. So with this in mind I'll begin by giving you a short introduction to your degree your way, which is a teaching model which originated at Arden, with the premise of attempting to provide a have your cake and easy approach to our provision. We wanted to give the students the chance to continue their learning, not pressing pause, but attend and engage by whatever way they felt best during this period. At Arden we have programmes that are distance learning and blended learning and so this particular approach was for the synchronous sessions for our blended learning students. So how did we start? Well we put together a working group which was formed in June of 2020 to look at how to take teaching forward during lockdown for our blended learning students who are required to attend face-to-face classes as part of their learning which is coupled with asynchronous content and activities. The initial roll out of your degree your way took place in September of 2020 so we had between June and September to get things into place and whilst that was happening students attended online sessions only. So as a working group we had to think about the safety of the staff and the students as well as the setup for the rooms so as well as protective equipment and social distancing parameters for all of our study centre rooms worth fitted with equipment for online sessions such as cameras which were controlled with remote controls by the lecturers and shore microphones to enhance the same quality. Students could use a booking system to book onto the sessions which each week for each week so then they would come into the centres and they could choose to either join the class online or in the centre and this meant that our teaching staff would be teaching to a class of students who could be in the room or they could be joining in the Zoom room and this model was chosen with the aim of accommodating all of our students to give them optionality in access and to avoid pausing their learning. I'm thinking now about reflection in action and what lessons were learned so more time for intensive training would have been a real benefit and as with the rest of the sector this is something that obviously it wasn't possible but our lecturers were they were very used to teaching face-to-face and they were thrown into using Zoom to teach via this new hybrid model and some had never taught online before so that intensive training that took place would have really benefited from having more time with them. It's not just the teaching that I shifted so working practices of a university had to change the working group consisted of people from academic and professional service roles across centres and the head office meeting online and we needed to use meeting software to test the model remotely so we did this by having some centre staff present to others that were working at home or in our offices. We needed to check connections to make sure the equipment would work as intended and would be accessible for all of our students joining on varying devices and in addition to this we needed to test these things not just in our UK centres but also deploy and equip our centre in Berlin as well. There was also a need to acknowledge the differences between teaching a live session online and a live session face-to-face to deliver a good learning experience for our students and I think not only at Arden but across the sector having gone through this experience there is a better understanding now of online distance blended and face-to-face learning and particularly with those hybrid models there is a need to have engaging and interacting activities which are asynchronous and that complement and support face-to-face sessions. Okay, so after the event then we reflected on and used the reflection on action to see what improvements needed to be made and this is just a summary of some of the main things that we found which first of all was that the digital capabilities of not only the staff but also the students needed to be improved to use the tools that we were using really well and obviously hindsight is a wonderful thing but we want to use this experience as a learning opportunity and that has included collecting regular feedback from both our staff and students but one of the main themes that came up for us was about humanising online teaching and by humanising online teaching we can be more inclusive we can use digital pedagogy as a tool to support with delivery rather than it just being the form of delivery so digital technologies instruct teachers how to teach and how to interact in digital spaces and we have adopted these without sort of looking critically at them and their impact on the teaching and learning so what's come to light from this pandemic and across the board in the sector really is not that we need better digital tools although of course in some cases we could do with that as well but more that educators have no idea how to reach out across the screen to students that we can't see so how do we start thinking about humanising digital learning well we need to start thinking of learning as happening solely online and because learning does not happen online without that human interaction and it happens in real places with other humans we need to add space into our relationships with students because the immediacy of the classroom is no longer an affordance and technology alone does not know how to teach or how to build relationships it's vital to build that connection with our students and we as educators need to trust ourselves we need to invest in digital capabilities and we need to grow in to create learning experiences that ensure our students are more than just faces on screens that we can mute and we can give grades to and we also need to start thinking about acting inclusively to help with promoting humanising learning and all teams and departments can use inclusive practices which help to make things more personal more accessible and more human and it's been really great to see access and inclusion in so many of the presentations at the AUK conference highlighting the way forward for us as a sector really and we would like to invite you now as we continue this discussion by input into our padlet board which the link will be shared in the chat with you and if you've not used padlet before you just need to click on the plus sign at the bottom of the screen on the right hand side and you can add in your thoughts there and we are asking what does humanising online teaching mean to you and why is it important and hopefully there'll be some time at the end of the session for us to have a look at at some of your thoughts and while that's happening we're going to talk through some of our thoughts on this area as well. Yes so the next section really is about practices to humanise education or humanise online education so we're going to focus on the pedagogical practices that promote care for the whole student and class experience rather than just the technical aspects of online teaching so these are some of the areas that we're going to cover over the next few slides and the first one then is build and maintain community which is one of the really crucial areas when humanising online education and we're just going to focus on online class commitments, building connectedness and then temperature checks as well because it can take time to establish norms and practices of being present and mindful and safe when you're online and so you might bring a set of values to your students so that they can expand on and provide feedback so that you co-create what is expected in your online space with your students and some examples that you know you might put in there are things like about being present, listening deeply, using one mic and trying not to interrupt each other and if you do to apologise you know and making space and also taking that space so that it is there for everybody, being open to learning and being comfortable with being uncomfortable as it often can be when we're learning new things and even also to some people in an online space. Other things are things like using personal pronouns and gender-conscious language and you can support that by using the rename function online so that students can add that as well and so can you, being punctual and that you know saying that we expect full and safe participation in online sessions so you know trying to avoid distractions like driving while they're in a lesson, multitasking and I know it's unavoidable at times but just sort of trying to make that expectation as well and you know and also just asking students how we need to engage to foster respectful and creative community and asking them to participate in that so authenticity does tend to transfer across the digital platform so it's wonderful practice that sort of makes space for co-learning and being transparent with students when you're working out technology glitches for instance to support their learning as well and it can be really helpful to engage students in a temperature check at say at the beginning of a lesson because it's just much harder to tell how students are doing when you're in a virtual space and this can help get a read on the virtual room that you're in and can just help students to feel more comfortable and warm up to speaking online as well. There's lots of different ways you can do that and also quite quickly so whether it's like a high and a low point for them or representing their week with an emoji or a hashtag or sharing how they're doing in the form of a weather pattern or forecast are just some ideas that you can bring in as well. Also things like inviting announcements, celebrations because these are the sort of things that students would do in person when they walk into a classroom so it's just making an intentional space for that to happen so also just taking time for students to share appreciation of one another again whether it's related to class or not so that it can help to foster community when you're not in person and also you can ask students to use video to help maintain human connectedness I know that's not also always possible but again encouraging students to have that connectedness with each other outside of the lessons as well. So one of the other areas is about being prepared and one point we were thinking about is about sharing your agenda and I know we've added in our contents at the beginning of this slide but it can be useful for students to have that separately so that they can actually look at it while you're going through the session and sort of know what's coming and have that in advance. The other points about being prepared are all sort of linked to group work and also making sure that we have group rules so things like the breakout rooms you know so planning that in advance and deciding you know if you're going to add in polls and things you can always set that up before but then also giving really clear instructions about how those groups are going to run in the breakout rooms giving people assigning roles to them so whether they're the timekeeper or the facilitator what they're going to do when they come back into the main room and being really clear about that starting classes with a tech tutorial you know not assuming that everybody knows what they what they can what they have to do and you know giving instructional activities so when the students come into the session they can already be working on those before you get started on the session. So it's sort of looking on from that really it's really important to be prepared for your sessions and part of knowing what to do with your tools is part of that and at Arden we use Zoom to teach our online sessions so using that as an example we encourage our educators to use the functionality within that and so it's really important for our students to have the time to learn how to use the tool just as much as the educator and so taking the time to explain how to use Zoom at the start of a module means that they can fully utilise and access it properly making the most of the breakout rooms the different views and things like the keyboard shortcuts as well and the chat function is a really good way to help with humanising learning we can encourage our students to use the chat function during class you might want to set some community norms for your course as well but you could you can do things like sending comments sending thumbs up using the emojis as as whilst others are speaking because when you are face-to-face you have things like gestures and remarks that students might make and that's when you know that they might be engaged but by using the chat function you can invite this interaction into those sessions as well and students might share encouragement or appreciation for each other's ideas too and something else that we have reflected on to improve in this area in terms of our practice is to think about selecting certain tools to use throughout a module or a programme so it might be padlet or jambord, weight clear tool, mentimeter it's a really good idea to choose one or two tools and stick with them for the duration of a module as well as helping to overcome institutional license queries this just give both educators and students the opportunity to learn functionality and really enjoy the tool for learning and encourage more participation and taking the time to know your tools can also encourage the use of them to support and foster equitable participation and thinking about access of tools and the content and give yourself time to ask questions and think whether there's something that you can do around this area so while you're setting things up could I do this if I couldn't see could I do this if I was using a keyboard instead of using a mouse could I do this if I am colour blind and can't distinguish between red and green could I do this if the content triggers memories of something traumatic that might have happened in in my past and these questions could be related to several different things so access needs queries on inclusivity, digital poverty, decolonising digital learning and sensitivity so it's really important to think about these areas while we're planning four sessions and using things like trigger warnings ahead of especially difficult topics and clear signposting to university support can help with students feeling more confident in wanting to engage too. Other areas that we can think about with this really we can use the raising of your hand function to track and making sure that you are tracking so it might be the tech hand it might be the real hand but you might want to have a protocol in place in acknowledging as these hands come up so then the students know that they're their their engagement is appreciated and wanted in the session and if you have to do a roll call to check in on a topic let students know in advance that you're going to be doing this so that they don't feel vulnerable and put on the spot and think about as students are sharing out pause to invite anyone to speak who hasn't yet spoken and obviously that's a difficult thing to do while we're we're all working online and trying to encourage that participation but give them that opportunity and and it's you can be surprised as to how many students are going to take you up on that as they are asked to engage and looking now at sort of sharing out well when we want to when we want each person in the class to have an opportunity to speak to something we could be asking for a volunteer who would like to begin and when that person finishes we could ask them to then tag in another student so this keeps the flow going and ensures everyone's speaking it builds up the community environment for students to engage in in that collective work and thinking as well about things that we would do in a face-to-face setting so a student might be having a difficult time and students or they might find that they've been triggered by something and students can't give their classmates a consensual hug or if they're sitting next to them they can't just grab a tissue if we're online it's not that easy so if you are teaching a class where challenging topics and experiences come up be prepared to hold that space and offer validation and affirmation and create space for that dialogue and provide guidance for those students that need it and sort of thinking now in terms of our our model your degree your way model we also suggested getting students to monitor chats so having a role for your students within the space within breakout rooms so that being in the class or online wouldn't be a hindrance as they could still participate and interact with their peers and finally the last point that we wanted to look at is just about being flexible being patient and most importantly being yourself because i think we all know that technical glitches happen and that some of the things that were supposed to happen in person just are not the same online so you know we're all still all students and faculties are still adapting to the new challenges of being online and and you know this is something that's happening still now and everybody's holding a lot because of that and it's just important to sort of remind ourselves and the students of this and that we really need to cultivate compassion for one another and ourselves and having that authenticity when glitches happen can create bridges of connection as well and also just remembering to take breaks you know and taking around five minutes each hour as a minimum and encouraging people to to move and stretch as it can otherwise can just take a really long time that you're sitting at your computer without actually taking a break and also just you know logging in a few minutes before class so you can chat informally with students as you would normally if you were in the classroom and invite students to ask questions as others are logging off but obviously keeping boundaries so that you're not spending hours and hours doing that and like i already mentioned just encouraging students to use video conferencing between themselves to connect to one another outside the classroom that can also help as well for group work but socialising and you know sort of sharing virtually as well and you know you need to bring your energy as well because online learning spaces do need energy so that's really important as well and just being being yourself and these are just a couple of our references and thank you all for joining us and we've got our contact details there and we can see that people have already been adding some comments to the padlet which is fantastic there's lots of things on there it was just distracting me a moment ago just having a look at all the all the great comments i'm not sure if we can share that now or if there's a lot of things coming through in the conversation you see and we've got a couple of questions the first one is from Caitlin Caitlin has asked how did you do how did you go about defining each of your modalities we're in the process of creating shared language at our university now that's a great question so we when we were looking initially at the sort of your degree your way model we already had in place distance learning programs and blended learning programs we had when we set up the working group the initial idea came from a conversation where CEO had said i want the students to have their cake and eat it and so for about three or four months of the process that was the reference to our working group and that was the reference to the model and it took a bit of time really to think about how we wanted to take that forward but as we continued to work together as a group and i think having that shared understanding across the departments and bringing in people from all different teams it helped us to distinguish between those models and it wasn't just sort of a something that was siphoned off as an academic project or something that was just sort of led by the academic registry it was we worked together and i think that was where we saw our similarities with what we wanted to bring for the students and we wanted to bring that equitable experience for our students as well and i'm not sure whether that really answered the question but that was sort of how we how we came to that model so my advice would be to have those conversations with across departments not sure whether Lucy's got anything more to add on that really no i think i think you've pretty much covered it and yeah i think it helped that we had the distance learning and the blended learning to start with so so now i think that covered the question thanks um you've got another question come from kaffee kaffee's asked have you considered adopting the same tools across the university rather than just across one module yes yes we have definitely and and that is something that we've we've sort of been working towards rather than just having different ones across all the all the modules because obviously staff new training and those so so we have been looking at some sort of basic tools that that could benefit everybody really and then trying to stick with those because we found that otherwise what what people do is they tend to go and sign up to free tools themselves and then that brings a whole host of other issues so so yes definitely rather than just across modules it's been looking at um you know tools across the whole university i think that's the last question unless anyone else has any further questions they want to ask we've got a lot of applause going on or wash hands as people are saying at the moment so yeah um we seems to be that everyone's really enjoyed the session and it'll be great to carry on the conversation and discord if you could share your slides and resources over on there um i've shared the padlet for everyone already so yeah thank you for joining us thank you thank you to everybody for going getting into that padlet as well i'm really excited to have a good look at what's in there yeah thank you thank you