Well, there it is. Welcome back to the Vermont House of Appropriations. It is Wednesday, January 10th, 2024, one o'clock from one o'clock today. We have our public hearing on the BAA or the Budget Adjustment Act on FY24. We've been digging into it and now this is the opportunity for people who have signed up. They'll see them via Zoom and or in person in the room. We were concerned at one point because somehow our chairs keep disappearing in the evening. Who did we have enough for the company that was gonna be coming? So we will call your name. There's a timer on the screen that you will see. Each person will have three minutes. There'll be a signal as it gets closer so that you can wrap up so that we don't just end it. We're in a public hearing is something that is not a back and forth for somebody that maybe have not done this before. This is an opportunity for us to just hear. So sometimes it's a surprise to people that we don't interact. So I just wanted to make sure that we said that but that would be the, that's the natural protocol for a public hearing is to receive. If something should happen and you need to leave it, get off Zoom or you know, you are welcome to, whether you signed up or not to send a written comments in and we do read them. We do read them and go over them but you can send them to where Aaron will post in the chat where in or in the room where to forward that to. I think we're ready to start with that. Representative Shai is the vice chair of this committee and I'm Diane Lamper and I am the chair of this committee and we will get started and Representative Shai will call the names because I am terrible at enunciating them. I'll do my best and please correct me if I'm wrong. So first up, we have two people that are in the state. I'll always call the first person and the one who is next. So Steven Whitaker is first, he's here in person and he'll be followed by Mary Haidt. And people who are sitting here can see the time we're in front of them and I'm seeing it this way and I'll let you know when I, you know, with maybe 30 seconds and 10 seconds. We'll see if that works. It turns yellow at 30 seconds and then at zero seconds it'll turn in red. Okay. Okay, so. Thank you, I'm Steven Whitaker from Montpelier. I've been an advocate and subject matter expert on telecommunications and recently public safety communications for the last couple of years. I wanna call to your attention section C113 of the appropriations bill last year which this bill attempts to amend if only for a housekeeping reason. It should amend it more thoroughly for the following reasons. What's created, there's two pots of money. I'd characterize it as a dumpster fire. Jim Harrison has been diligently tracking this but I think all the committee should be aware of it. There was 11 million from a prior biennium in general funds and there's a nine million congressionally directed spending. But the problem with the nine million is that it has to be committed before the end of this year. And what's happening is the Department of Public Safety is trying to end around all of the statutory guardrails, the independent review, the thorough planning, the life cycle, cost benefit analysis, the analysis of alternatives.  And that wouldn't be so bad in and of itself because mostly you can argue that we should upgrade radios and microwave. The problem is that it fully undermines the C.114 language, which creates a thorough, diligent planning process of subject matter experts going through a methodical inventory assessment design. And to go out and spend all this money, this nine million on projects that have not yet been identified or fit into that strategic plan is a mistake. It's going to undermine integrity and confidence and morale and everything else. So I believe another proposal for how to spend that money on the Rutland County and Addison County pilot projects could result in committing the funds by this year with the proper planning done. But that would need to be specifically laid out in amended language in section C.114. I'm happy to entertain afterwards and with the 36 seconds I'll have left, I will continue to remind you that our broadband efforts are not on track, that replenishing that 20 million, which was meant as a match for federal grant that we didn't get. And more so that middle mile project, after we failed to get it, I asked for records that would say, what are the contingencies? That what do we need to do differently now that we didn't get that? And there were no records at all. So we're headed for a real problem that we should be building contingency plans which our broadband board is not doing. Thank you very much. Hi, good afternoon. My name is Mary Hayden. I am the executive director of the Vermont Association of Area Agencies on Aging. I'm here to speak on behalf of Meals on Wheels and the Choices for Care Moderate Needs Group. The Area Agencies on Aging are requesting $2 million in base funding in the State Fiscal Year 2024 Budget Adjustment Act due to the increased demand for Meals on Wheels to meet the nutritional needs of the growing demographic of older Vermonters. The Vermont Association of Senior Centers and Meals Providers, Hungry Vermont and the Food Bank also support our request. Last year, older Vermonter nutrition programs provided over a million nutritious meals to 16,257 older Vermonters, a 5% increase over the prior year. And so far, year to date, we are registering a higher number of enrollees this year over last year. Providing emergency meals and delivery to older Vermonters stranded due to this year's catastrophic flood and power-added events caused more budget shortfalls. Funding for senior nutrition has not kept paced with the aging population. Last year, the legislature added a million dollars to the base budget. This welcome increase did not provide enough meals for a growing demographic. Meals on Wheels targets vulnerable older Vermonters who cannot afford food or can't access or prepare it and helps them remain at home. It provides prepared meals meeting USDA guidelines delivered by community volunteers. It also offers therapeutic meals for chronic disease management. I'm also here to support the Vermont Food Bank's request for $2 million in additional base funding in the budget adjustment process to shore up the state's food shelves, community meal sites, and direct distribution sites stretched to capacity. For Choices for Care Moderate Needs Group, the Vermont Association of Area Agencies on Aging wants the state to restore the $2 million cut made to that program. The Moderate Needs Group program is part of Choices for Care. It provides long-term care services and supports to older and physically disabled individuals and enables many of them to be able to remain in their homes and maintain the quality of life they are entitled to, providing case management services, homemaker and adult day services. This program saves the state from more costly healthcare interventions. This is one of the most critical issues for our clients. AAAs have 606 people on waiting lists for Moderate Needs Group services. Some have been on the list for between two and five years. AAAs historically spend down this funding and could remove many older and disabled individuals off his waiting lists if the state restores the $2 million funding. Thank you for listening. Thank you. We're followed by Matthew Kiley, who will be remote on Zoom. Good afternoon. Thank you. Jill Mazolson, I'm the executive director of the V&As of Vermont, representing Home Health and Hospice. I'm here today to request $261,000 of general fund dollars. It's about 600 with the federal match in the Diva budget for skilled home health services. So home health agencies provide a variety of services, long-term care and of life care. Many things, this is our skilled service. This is nursing care at home, nursing and therapy care at home. This is the care that if you are in the hospital and need to be discharged home, this is the service that we provide. So if you care about hospital discharges, you care about skilled home health. That's, this is the work that we do. 17% of our hospital discharges are to home health in Vermont. We're asking for this in the BAA because we are on a January cycle with Diva. So they moved us to a January cycle to better align with our federal changes in our payment model and also our hospice payment model, which is also on a January one cycle. You actually have a little money in the proposed BAA for that, that's federally mandated, so it's not a question. Where we are today in home health is continuing to be under a lot of pressure. So you took a lot of actions last year and I just want you to know they're helping. So it is not good yet, but it is less bad for sure. So I just want you to understand that we are moving in the right direction but we are still in significant trouble. We have, most of our agencies continuing to have operating losses, some as large as 25%. So obviously that's not continuable or sustainable. We're still dealing with the pressures of travelers, wages and salaries, historically under reimbursement from Medicaid and then of course our migration to Medicare Advantage, which is taking our best payer and making it our worst payer, short version. We're also contending with Medicare cuts. Medicare is cutting us for reasons too complex to explain in three minutes, but it is definitely not good. So they're heading toward a 9.48% permanent cut to our base rate. They are phasing it in, but then they have a clawback provision where they can take it all the way back to the beginning of our payment model in January of 2020 and take it all away. So it's pretty substantial pressure. I think that's it. So again, it's about 261,000 in general funds, obviously about twice that on an annualized basis. Thank you very much for your time. They have remotely, Matthew Kiley, who we understand has testified with another person, so that we'll get three minutes and after him also remotely is Teresa Vesina, and I'm sorry if I'm not mispronouncing your last name, Teresa, but Matthew Kiley. Hello, I'm Matt Kiley. I'm Matt Kiley, one of 16 community volunteers working to establish a teen center here in Newport. And I'm gonna turn this over now to Chase Monfet, a junior here at North Country High School. Hi, everybody. The Northern Vermont community, especially the town of Newport, is void of accessible, affordable, and an accepting space for teens. We have a need for a space where our community can flourish and the hive standing for helping clued voices everywhere and fulfill that role. The hive will create a safe, open, and creative space for teens of Newport City, a community for students to gather without the added pressure of school. This would be a place where they could develop and learn, cultivating a productive and inclusive community. The student body needs an outlet for expression and community building. A stronger generation of teens creates a more tight knit and caring community for all. Our community of students from all areas of the N.E.K. give a voice to our future generation and provide a space for new ideas. To be a part of this process assures the opinions and values of those who utilize the space will be heard and taken seriously. Hi, everybody. I'm part of this team too, and my name is Elizabeth Emmett. I am the director of Family, Youth, and Early Education Programs at NECA, which is Northeast Kingdom Community Action. We serve Caledonia, Orleans, and Essex counties. Our youth focus programs hold contracts with AHS, DCF, DOC, and Elevate Youth to provide specific youth services throughout the Northeast Kingdom. However, none of these current contracts allow for supervised youth spaces or funding for prevention activities like the Hive that Chase was just talking about. So according to the most recent Vermont Youth Risk Behavior Survey that was completed in 2021, young people in middle and high schools are reporting higher rates of experiencing bullying, vaping and alcohol use, and poor mental health, with self-reported BIPOC and LGBTQ identities most often scoring higher for risk and harm in almost every category. So like Chase said, we know that young people need a voice and a space to build those community connections have adult mentors and opportunities in their extracurricular time to thrive, but those opportunities are often really hard to access in our most rural communities in the Northeast Kingdom. We also know because data supports as much that youth centers work nationally and in Vermont, they do exactly that prevention work, connecting teens with critical resources at a critical time in their development and supporting families through that time. So they're an effective space for prevention. Our Northeast Kingdom youth providers are requesting that any unspent funds from 2023 in the amount of $100,000 that were previously allocated for substance misuse programming through either the opioid or marijuana tax funding streams or for mental health supports or general prevention to support youth that has been left over that that could be reallocated to the development of these youth centers, including the Hive in the Northeast Kingdom to support our young people in Caledonia or Leans and Essex counties. Thank you so much for your good attention. Thank you all. That was great. Yeah, that was terrific. Excellent, thank you. So next up is Teresa, because you know who's here in person and she will be followed by Teddy Walshner, who's the person. Welcome. Hi, thank you for having me. Good afternoon. My name is Teresa Bezian, I'm the executive director at Vermont Cares, and I'm here to testify on behalf of the four Surinj Service programs here in the state. So the three ASOs in safe recovery. Together we provide Surinj Service programs around the state in every county. So currently we are funded $300,000 to the state general funds for to be divided among the four programs. There is a certain ratio percentage that goes along with this. And I did include a supporting document that kind of goes through this number, so I wouldn't use that time right now. So our request is actually to increase the base funding from $300,000 and add an additional $500,000 to that, which again would be shared among all four programs. What we experienced, and what we are continued experience is that we are unable to meet the needs of Vermonters struggling with substance use disorder in all the areas that we need to provide these services. We can't expand our services. We are sort of hamstrung by being underfunded chronically for decades. And we are in a crisis. And we actually are finding that in our calendar year 24, which includes five months of the state fiscal year of 23, we actually have less funding than we did in the previous year because we did not receive tobacco settlement funds this time. We were unable to roll over funds which we could roll over in COI 22. And we didn't request any additional state general funds because we thought we would receive opioid settlement funds. And to date we have yet to receive one, depending on the opioid settlement funds, we are being told we'll receive $100,000 per program in the next coming months. But we really needed that before. And so I'm unclear as to what will happen. And even with the opioid settlement funds of $100,000 per program, it still does not even bring us to where we were in the previous year. And so allows us no expansion at all. We struggle with hiring staff, keeping staff. Our wages are so low and the work is so demanding, both physically and mentally, emotionally. So we are really in need of this additional funding for the programs. I think that, I'm trying to stop here. We would like to change just a couple of small language pieces. Currently the language in section E312, number five, it specifically says AIDS Service Organization, other HIV AIDS prevention programs. And we really just think that should just save or not service programs, because that's really who we are. And we want to kind of remove that sort of kind of dated language. And then the AIDS Service Organizations received in fiscal year 22, new allocation of $295,000. And so we'd like to just see if we could have that language be confirmed that's flexible to use between HIV services and harm reduction. Anything else? I have. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Next up is Teddy Wozniak and followed in person by Ninti Owens-Antu. Hello everyone. Thanks for having us in today. My name is Teddy Wozniak. I am the legislative policy lead at Hunger Free Vermont. And Hunger Free Vermont is here today to request funding for two specific measures to address what we are calling the cascading crises. And that's the end of the federal, the pandemic era federal emergency allotments for SNAP recipients. That is the catastrophic flooding of July 2023 with which I'm in very familiar as I also sit on the Berry City Council and the ongoing extremely high record high food prices across the country. Because of these cascading crises, a tremendous and unsustainable burden has been placed on the community organizations that provide food to those who need it. So the two specific requests that we are making today is to first help Vermont's charitable food network mitigate these cascading crises by fully funding the Vermont food banks request for $2 million in additional based funding in the BAA. And additionally, to increase funding for meals programs serving older Vermonters and people with disabilities by fully funding the Vermont associations of area agencies on aging. Their request for $2 million in additional based funding in the BAA to support Meals on Wheels and Concordant Meal programs. And you already heard from Mary Hayden and my colleague, John Sales, will be in to talk about the food bank specifically. But in my hat as a city counselor, I can just say that these programs were absolutely vital in the days following the flood. Our restaurants were wiped out in an operable, our food shelf was just gone in Berry and these are the programs that helped keep people fed in the immediate aftermath of the floods. So these are just two requests that we feel that hunger-free Vermont are extremely important and making sure that Vermonters aren't going hungry. Thank you. Thank you. Next we'll have Nancy Owens on Zoom and followed by John Sales here at the State House. Okay, thank you. Hello and thank you for the opportunity to submit the testimony and more importantly for your longstanding commitment to affordable housing. My name is Nancy Owens. I'm the president and the co-founder of Evernorth. Evernorth works across the state of Vermont to build affordable rental housing in partnership with many regional non-profit housing developers. And over the last few years, Evernorth and our partners have worked together to build 326 apartments over the past three years all across the state in communities like Marseville and Stowe, Rutland, Colchester, Bristol and West Burke. These are developments large and small, urban and rural. And over 65 of these apartments have been dedicated for people who are unhoused. And all of these homes remain permanently affordable and will be community assets forever. That's clear even as we think about our whole portfolio of homes which is about 3,500 homes, each month we are prioritizing housing people coming from homelessness and about 35 people every month are being moved from homelessness into housing. Permanent affordability in Vermont is a value that we have committed to back in 1987 when VHCB, the Vermont Housing Conservation Board was created. Perpetual affordability means that housing becomes a resource to a community that can't be lost. And we know there are states who did not adopt this kind of long-term affordability as a state policy. And in those states, units are lost to conversion to market rate housing when those short-term underlying covenants expire. But in Vermont, just as we conserve land which becomes a forever resource to a community, we also create housing that is a forever resource. From other resources you allocated, Evernorth has another 157 apartments in development or construction across the state in communities like Burlington, Hinesburg, Windsor and Barry. We have 12 more projects amounting to 444 new homes in our pipeline, ready to go. And but without additional investment directed to the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board by the legislature, some of those 12 projects will stall and may not be built. So continued support for funding for VHCB is essential. And I understand that VHCB's resources are going to be about $20 million short this fiscal year. And so to finance the existing pipeline and to give all the affordable housing developers an indication that we should continue to secure new sites to address the state's affordable housing shortage, I ask that you appropriate $50 million in the BAA to the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board. Thank you. Thank you very much. Yep, thank you. So next is John Sayles in person. And then after that is Amy Scott, who will be on Zoom. Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you to everyone for all you're listening today. I really appreciate it. And thank you to the folks who have already mentioned the food bank and those that will. I'm John Sayles. I'm CEO of the Vermont Food Bank. I live in Montpelier. I'm here as well to ask your support for a $2 million base budget appropriation for food acquisition and access in this Budget Adjustment Act so that the Vermont Food Bank and all of our local partners can more adequately address the ongoing needs of people in Vermont facing hunger. Hunger in Vermont is unacceptable. And I haven't heard a lot of people who disagree with that. Given the food bank's longstanding partnership with the state, we think it's past time for the state government to join in a sustained fiscal support for the food bank and our many over 200 community partners efforts and work in meeting the urgent and fundamental need of getting food on people's plates. Recently our team has been in the field. We talked to more than 150 Vermonters living in all different regions of the state and asked them about their experiences with food. Two things really stood out. First, that a lot of people talk about going and getting food assistance for the first time. And this is since COVID started and we're still hearing people coming saying this is the first time they've had to do that. And second is that really the unrelenting and impossible trade-offs that people are facing every single day.  And families are making these choices every day. One colleague heard directly from a professional paraeducator in Montpelier who said, I'll quote, I've been at my job for 18 years and I'm barely making $18 an hour. I'm kind of like too poor to buy food but too rich to get food stamps. I would love to buy a thing of apples so I can have fresh apples in my oatmeal. But in my brain it's like, well, yeah, but you need to pay your mortgage and you need to pay your electric bill. I'm just barely making it with everything. So as we continue to solve for the underlying causes of hunger and I wanna commend the legislature over the last few years, you've been doing some really noteworthy work in that effort. But in the meantime, the food bank and our community partners, we still need the state to step up as a significant and consistent funding partner to make sure that your constituents who can't regularly afford enough nourishing food have the access they require to be the best parents, the best employees and the best engaged community members they can be. So again, we ask the committee and the legislature to address the ongoing need by appropriating $2 million for food acquisition and distribution. And as well, my friend, Mary, we're also supportive of the Meals on Wheels. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next is Amy Scott, who's on Zoom, followed by Liz Sharpe, who's also on Zoom. We can hear you, but we don't see you yet. We'll pass. Give it up for you. There you are. Okay. Thank you for allowing me to speak to you today on behalf of food insecure families in Rutland and Bennington counties. My name is Amy Scott. I live in Rutland. I'm the food program manager at Brock Community Action. Brock is a partner organization of the Vermont Food Bank. I am joining to ask you to please address the ongoing needs of Vermonters facing food insecurity by establishing a base appropriation of $2 million right now in the FY24 state budget for the Vermont Food Bank. Addressing food security issues is the state's responsibility. The Vermont Food Bank and other organizations are ready and willing to partner with the state as they have been for years. They do need support in order to continue to meet the increased need that we are seeing. Since the rollback of COVID-era funding for Three Squares Vermont, the inflation of food prices in 2022 and Vermont's flooding in 2023, I have seen an exponential increase in food insecurity in the towns that we serve. At the height of the pandemic, Three Squares Vermont provided the maximum benefits to all who qualified. During that time, our Rutland food shelf was serving 263 individual households per month. Now Brock's community food shelf in Rutland serves on average 704 individual households per month. This is a 64% increase in the number of community members accessing our food shelf. A local lady on disability who's struggling for transportation stated to me in an email, just being comfortable enough to come and utilize food services has saved me so much. What I don't have to spend on eggs or shelf items means that I don't have to go without and I can choose to save. It gives me food security. To keep up with demand, our food shelf has had to request from the food bank more food and more funding to serve the most vulnerable populations in Vermont. The Vermont Food Bank is our number one resource for purchasing food and applying for capacity-building grants that allow our agency to feed an ever-growing number of your constituents. The Vermont Food Bank focuses on environmentally friendly practices such as the Fresh Rescue Program which captured and donated 80 tons of groceries for our food shelf in 2023. With the blessing of our families in Rutland and Bennington counties, I ask that you please address the ongoing needs of Vermonters facing food insecurity by establishing a base appropriation of $2 million right now in the 2024 state budget for the Vermont Food Bank. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you very much. Really good on time, actually. I was gonna ask, can she see the clock? I don't know. So next up is Liz Sharf, who I see on Zoom and after Liz will be Frank Mack and in person at the State House and I apologize if I mispronounce your name. That's correct. Yeah, it's Liz Sharf. You guys can hear me okay? Yes. Okay. So good afternoon. My name is Liz Sharf. I live in Middlesex and I'm the Director of Community Economic Development and Food Security at Capstone Community Action in Barrie. So like my colleague, Amy Scott, who just spoke from Brock, I'm testifying today to ask the legislature to address the ongoing needs of Vermonters facing food insecurity by establishing a base appropriation of $2 million in the fiscal year 2024 state budget for the Vermont Food Bank. As a network partner of the Vermont Food Bank, the Capstone Food Shelf relies on the Food Bank to provide the bulk of the food we distribute to central Vermonters who utilize our food pantry. And while our agency still needs to raise a lot of money to purchase food from the Food Bank, the amount that we receive from them in return is far greater than the cost and much of what the Food Bank provides is free to network partners. During COVID, thanks to the federal and state support, the Vermont Food Bank was able to provide most of the food for free and thereby freeing up money for Capstone to support other essential poverty alleviation programs such as our emergency housing and emergency fuel assistance programs. To give you a sense, in calendar year 2022, Capstone served 850 unduplicated families who visited our shelf over 3,700 times. And a year later, so for the calendar year 2023, we have served 1,284 families who visited over 6,400 times, which is a 70% increase in visits and a 51 increase in the number of families. But more shockingly is that since the end of the pandemic supports, which included an expanded child tax credit, federal stimulus dollars, increased unemployment benefits, and most importantly, the increase in three squares food stamp benefits, Capstone has seen an incredible 165% increase in the number of families using our shelf and 177% increase in visits compared to calendar year 2021. So what does this tell us? When people have money to spend on food, they will buy it in the grocery store. And if they don't have enough money to pay all of their obligations, their rent, utility bills, car loans, gas for their cars, the first thing to cut will be their grocery budget because they know they can rely on the charitable food system like the Vermont Food Bank and the hundreds of food shelves around the state who are network partners. As a state, we must address the reality of increasing poverty among our lowest income households and understand that nutrition and security shouldn't be acceptable. As a nation, we have the means to end poverty as we know it. The money is there, but it requires bold changes on a federal level. But until that happens, I'm asking the Vermont legislature to support a base appropriation of $2 million right now in the fiscal year 24 state budget for the Vermont Food Bank. And I'll also, since I have 19 seconds, support the Meals on Wheels as well. Thank you. Great. Thank you very much. Well done. Next up is Frank Mack, who's here in person followed by Skylar Anderson, who will be remote on Zoom. Good afternoon, Madam Chair, I'm the chairman of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. My name is Frank Knack. I'm the new executive director of the Housing and Homelessness Alliance of Vermont. Just some quick background on HHAB. We are the result of a merger between the Affordable Housing Coalition and the Vermont Coalition to End Homelessness. And so thanks to the great work of this body and the administration, we've had great strides in terms of combating homelessness in our housing crisis in Vermont, particularly during the pandemic years, in terms of increasing capacity of temporary shelters, accelerating the production of affordable housing and expanding the services that people need so that they can actually stay in their homes and have the services they need to stay in their homes. But we are concerned with what has been proposed by the administration and the DAA in terms of where we go from here. We're concerned that we might start the back slide on the great progress that we've made over the last number of years. And in particular around the temporary shelter program. So you all may have heard the June cohort, which are some of Vermont's most vulnerable people, are at risk of becoming unhoused on April 1 of this year. In addition, we have 600 to 700 households who become potentially unhoused when the adverse weather restrictions expire on March 15th. So we are asking for an additional $12 million to ensure that all those individuals will not face become unhoused when both those programs expire on both April 1 and on March 15th. And that would run us through the end of this fiscal year. In addition, we are asking this body. So last year you all identified a number of priorities in S100 in terms of things we can do towards longer-term solutions to our housing and homelessness crisis in Vermont. And we were asking you all to appropriate funds actually through the DAA to realize some of those programs. And so specifically, as you've heard from every North earlier, appropriate $50 million for BHCB to fund both the existing pipeline of permanently affordable housing projects and provide a clear signal to affordable housing providers that this is a priority for our state. $25 million for BHFA's home ownership development program, formerly known as many of you all probably know is the Missy Middle program. This would fund approximately 135 to 145 homes. $2.5 million for the rental rears funds. $1 million for tenant representation pilot project through Vermont Legal Aid. In addition, $500,000 for rental housing stabilization through Champlain Valley Office of Economic Opportunity. And just, I know right through this quickly, we have, I've sent a handout, so you all should have this available in electronic copy. And just wanna reiterate, HHAB, we are an organization that represents over 60 frontline organizations and providers working on both the housing side and the shelter side. We are ready to support and work with the administration and with this body to look towards long-term solutions to our temporary shelter crisis. But in the meantime, we need to ensure that everyone who is currently housed through those programs maintains their housing. Thank you. Thank you very much. Okay, the next is Skylar Anderson by Zube and then Katie Horblass in first. All right, can you hear me? Yes. Good afternoon, my name is Skylar Anderson. I'm the Chief Finance and Operations Officer at Downstreet Housing and Community Development. And I'm gonna read remarks prepared by our Executive Director, Angie Arbin, who was unable to attend today. So I'd like to start by thanking you for your ongoing commitment to funding affordable housing, reducing the number of individuals and families' experience and responding to the needs of flooded communities. I'm so grateful to know that these are priorities as difficult funding decisions are made this year. Several Downstreet properties were hit hard by the flooding in July and we're hoping to finally get all of our residents back home by the end of this month. Many of the multifamily buildings and Downstreet's portfolio are older and vulnerable to future flooding. And we are working to assess the risk and develop mitigation plans. At the same time, we know that we can build resilient, affordable housing, even in the face of climate change. Both Downstreet Apartments where Downstreet's office, sorry, both Downstreet's apartments where Downstreet's offices are headquartered in Berry City and Taylor Street Apartments at the Montpelier Transit Center were surrounded by water but weathered the flood with no damage to building systems or interiors. Built in 2015 and 2019 respectively, these buildings are a testament to our ability to construct resilient homes. This is just one of the benefits that the state gets when investing in community-centered, mission-driven, affordable housing. We're committed to ensuring that our residents, many of whom are living with a disability or who have been unhoused, have a chance at security even when we endure what our community did. I don't need to tell you about our community's unmet housing needs and why it's important that we continue to build housing. I will tell you that we're doing all we can to move people out of homelessness through both our turnovers and our properties and by creating new apartments where are most vulnerable. I know that it's true for my colleagues around the state who have dedicated almost 40% of their available apartments in the last six months to people exiting homelessness. But without new units, we won't solve the problem. Housing development takes time for a variety of reasons, permitting, environmental remediation, et cetera. And funding from two and three years ago means that later this year, a long vacant historic school in Berry will reopen as nine new homes for our lowest income and most vulnerable neighbors. It also means that we'll break ground on 30 new apartments in Berlin by summer. Downstreet is working to create new housing in Berry, Waterbury and Montpelier. The projects have not gone into VHCB for funding. And my understanding is that they don't have enough funding for this year's pipeline, let alone the funding to give us and our partners across the state, the green light to continue to continue to pursue much needed development of new affordable housing. I understand that you've used the budget adjustment each of the last two years to send the signal and to let us know that we should continue to seek out new projects. I ask that you do so again this year with a $50 million appropriation to VHCB, the Vermont Housing and Conservation Board. Thank you for your time. Thank you very much. Next up is Amy Hornblass and then Ashley Griggs remotely via Zoom will be after that. Hi, hi, hi. Yes, good afternoon. My name is Amy Hornblass. I'm the executive director of Neighbors in Action and we have two programs, one in Cabot, one in Linenville, where we provide food services, boxes of food and food support for families at the edge of the Northeast Kingdom in Vermont. And I am here to support the Vermont Food Bank's request for a base appropriation of $2 million. We simply could not do the work that we do without the help of the Vermont Food Bank. And if I could take you right now for an instant field trip to Cabot at this moment, there is a line of cars in front of our building and we are expertly loading them with boxes filled with three days worth of food for families between one and nine people filled with fresh fruits and vegetables, canned goods, salmon this time, protein, eggs and all of this wonderful stuff including paper products, toilet paper, tissues, tampons and dental hygiene products all possible by the Vermont Food Bank. And we run exclusively nearly on volunteers. We have amazing volunteers from youth to seniors. And I did bring our newsletter. I'm not sure if you did. I have a lot of the statistics that I just mentioned are in there. We doubled our numbers last year. We are now serving an average of 670 households a month out of our two locations. And to give you an idea in 2022, it was only 337. We sign up about 20 new families per month between our two locations. And what this turns out to be is about 900 of these boxes that I'm describing are put into cars every month out of our two locations. We simply could not do it without the Vermont Food Bank. I've averaged it that it's about $15 per box. That includes our rent, our electricity for our freezers, everything that we do to make sure that we can get these boxes delivered to these families. It's an incredibly inexpensive way to go about it and we couldn't do it any other way because we rely on donations. We have over 50 dedicated volunteers, about 6,000 volunteer hours. So this is a community event and it really lifts everybody's spirits. And as a health educator, a licensed health educator, I can tell you that without proper nutrition, of course we're gonna see Vermonters suffer physically, socially, and mentally as well. So it is the key to health. It's key when people are strong and feel healthy, they have enough protein, right? They can come and help us fill boxes and we all work together and it's really bringing the community together around food. So it's really been a healing endeavor as well. So I appreciate your support for the Vermont Food Bank and thank you for everything you guys. Well, thank you very much. Yeah, thank you. Next up will be Ashley Greig. So I see you on Zoom followed by Karen Seedah who's also on Zoom. Hello, thank you. Happy, good afternoon. I am Ashley Greig, this is from Chester. I'm a board member and former student of the Vermont Adult Learning Program. I'm here to ask you to please provide an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill a gap between our original budget requested in the actual budget of last session. The adult education and literacy network of which Vermont Adult Learning is a part of, changes people's lives, helps build individual success as well as a better prepare students with knowledgeable and the workforce and further education goals.  I attended Vermont Adult Learning after being out of school for seven years. I graduated in 2020. Therefore, my literacy and skill math skills were lacking alongside lacking a lot of confidence in myself. I found it hard to obtain a job due to lack of education and not having a diploma. But Vermont Adult Learning and programs much like it helped me and so many others gain the skills needed to get a fulfilling job and to move to further educational goals. And now as a Vermont Adult Learning board member, I see the new opportunities that these programs are offering for members, each individual learns differently which is why these programs are so important. Again, please provide an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill the gap between our original budget request and the actual budget appropriations of last session. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you very much, Ash. Okay, next up is Karen Suta also on Zoom followed by Karen Harker, who's here in person. Can hear you, but we can't see you just yet. Yeah, unless I look like a supermodel, I'm not really one that likes to be on TV. So, you know, but there no man recognizes the prettiest black girl in Vermont. The governor has said that himself, I was your miss black Vermont but I don't look like Naomi Campbell today. So therefore I don't show my face. The girls that get it are the women that get it and the men that like it are the men that like it. Is it time? Isn't my time? Yeah, yes. Can you see the timer on the screen? I sure can, yeah. Okay, great, thanks. Okay, great. My name is Karen Suta. I am recognized as a citizen that constantly demands change besides being incredibly intelligent, incredibly beautiful.  I don't understand why Vermont is like California meaning in the homeless department due to the fact that, you know, California, at least there's things to do here in Vermont. All I see is our Vermont is doing nothing but drugs. My thing is I'm asking that the governor appropriate, what's that handsome man that talked about appropriating at least $12 million to this homeless community because we cannot survive. These, a lot of the Caucasians that are here in this homeless community will suffer on March 1st and April 1st unless the governor appropriate. It's at least $12 million to ensure that people have an ability to stand on their feet. I, you know, Harvard is fighting for me. John Hopkins is fighting for me for grad school. So women like me really don't suffer. We can use our beauty to get it wherever we want in this world. But all these other people, they are going to suffer. I also am asking that the state acquire at least $5 million to the legal aid. So when this is over that, you know, the new Hajiib wearing law executive attorney for the legal aid department can start suing the hotel managers because, you know, if you're a regular person who just happens to go into homelessness, they love to discriminate against you. You know, they have favorites. They, all these things are unlawful against the law. And again, I'm excited that they've acquired a Hajiib wearing legal lawyer for Vermont legal aid because she knows what it's like to be judged on face value. And I'm sure she's going to use the law to make sure that all Vermonters regarding their situation, regarding what they look like, regarding their intelligence, regarding how they ended up in homelessness having ability to overcome and be able to sue these house owners, these hotel owners for their unlawful discriminatory behavior. So I'm here to testify to the governor because, you know, when I write him letters, he doesn't want to know that he doesn't respond back to me. Why is that? Because I'm the chosen one. And also because I speak the truth.  Women like me are survivalists. We rise to the top. But the other Vermonters that are suffering now, crushed by this system, will not survive unless millions are sent to them. Now I was born to be one of the wealthiest black women to come out of the state of Vermont. So this will be a cause that I will constantly donate to. However, while I'm here now, we must fight now. We must get the millions of dollars because people will not be able to overcome and pay housing, how people are supposed to pay for their housing when they have to pay for these hotels that are janky. And all these things that people are not thinking. And this is why, again, I was sent on this earth. One, for the legal aid because our lawyers must fight for Vermonters. And two, for people to overcome because you spent years ignoring people. And all of a sudden- 10 seconds. We think that they're all of a sudden going to be able to stand on their foot. And that's not possible. So fight for the people. Herrad seats, the one and only. Thank you. Now we have Karen Harper, who's here in person, followed by Sarah Russell, who is on suit. Hi everyone, my name is Karen Harper and I live in the town of Sharon and I'm the Regional Director of Vermon Adult Learning, Windsor County. I'm here today representing the Adult Education and Literacy Network. We are asking for an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill the gap from the original budget request and actual budget appropriation from last session. Last year we asked for $1.5 million and received $1 million. The 500,000 increase would help to fill the gap in last year's funding. From helping our students earn high school diplomas to helping them learn English, the Adult Education and Literacy Network changes people's lives and helps them to build individual successes. It also prepares Vermonters for good-paying jobs. Our services are vital to the further development of Vermont's workforce and our broad range of services are targeted and tailored to each student's needs. It's a beautiful thing to watch students grow and develop within our programs. One such example that comes to mind is a recent student who we helped achieve her GED in Windsor County. The student not only grew within our program moving from our lowest math level to our highest, but by getting her GED, she is now able to move up within her workplace and into a management position. She has even thought of continuing her education at CCV and pursuing a career in phlebotomy, none of which she would have been able to do or inspired to do without our program. This 40-year-old Vermonter is now empowered to do things she once never thought possible, but without funding, we won't be able to continue services to people like her. In fact, we're already facing serious challenges due to our budget, and my centers in White River Junction and Springfield now have waiting lists because we are unable to keep up with the demand for our services with our current staff. Vermont's traditional schools are not serving students well, particularly since COVID, and the adult education programs have become the safety net to catch students for whom traditional school is not workable. In comparison to other Vermont high schools, we serve a higher percentage of BIPOC students, students with disabilities, and low-income students. This is the demographic that we are asking you to support in this budget adjustment.  Please provide an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill the gap from our original budget request and actual budget appropriation from last session. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next up is Sarah Russell, who's on Zoom, followed by Matthew Bentley, who was also on Zoom. Hi, my name is Sarah Russell, and I'm the Special Assistant to End Homelessness for the City of Burlington and the co-chair of the Chittenden County Homeless Alliance. The City of Burlington and the Homeless Alliance have serious concerns and questions about AHS's proposed plan to end the pandemic-era motel program, and instead support expanding motel stays while we continue housing everyone, which will be less expensive and more effective. We believe new investments and expansion of emergency shelters should be made for the hundreds of Vermonters currently living outside. Officials from AHS have reported new temporary shelters would serve about 225 people from the motel program, which leaves the remaining five to 600 households from the June cohort without shelter of any kind after April 1st. It's widely known that households in the June cohort are comprised of our most vulnerable community members. Beginning with 256 households in Chittenden County, the June cohort has been reduced to 116 households. Our plan to responsibly transition these households to permanent housing is working, but without the stability of shelter, households will no longer be able to focus on moving toward permanent housing as the priority becomes focused on survival. The cost projections for the proposed temporary shelters do not result in significant savings. They requested $4 million to fund five new emergency shelters over three months, equates to an average of $197 per bed night. The average cost of the motel program as reported by DCF is $132 per household. The Burlington warming shelter provides low barrier shelter at a rate of $217 per bed night per person. It seems to create and operate new temporary shelter for April instead of paying for hotels would likely cost an extra $60 to $90 per person per night. In Chittenden County alone, the impact of the June 1st motel exits has resulted in a 500% increase in unsheltered homelessness from an estimated 42 individuals at the last pit count in January to over 250 individuals as of November 2023. Anatolia, a mother who was six days postpartum, had a two year old was referred by ESD to seek accommodation from the Burlington warming shelter for herself, her toddler and her infant last week because there was no motel capacity. The warming shelter currently serves someone with cancer, someone with a colostomy bag and one pregnant person in addition to many others with critical medical mental health and substance use challenges. The shelter as all shelters in Chittenden County are over capacity and turning people away each night. And Burlington people are living intense without access to heat facilities or resources to meet their basic needs. As encampments grow, they become public health and safety concerns most recently demonstrated by a fire and battery park over the holiday week. AHS has shared concepts ranging from purchasing motels to be converted to permanent housing or emergency shelter to non congregate shelter to semi congregate shelter with temporary structures to mass congregate shelter and public buildings. Our communities can not continue to respond to variable and nonspecific proposals. Without the stability of emergency shelter system are just as our clients cannot focus on permanent housing efforts. Now, without clear communication and partnership, service providers, legislators and stakeholders continue to play catch up and are unable to be proactive. Thank you.  If you've submitted testimony, then we've had that also. Thank you very much. Next up is Matthew Bentley, followed by, sorry, I'm gonna mispronounce your name. Too big, we wait. You'll correct me when you're on, Matthew. Hi, can everybody hear me? Yes. All right, I'm first apologize for my voice. I do have the flu, which is why I'm not coming there in person. So I'll try to keep this concise. Hi, my name is Matthew Bentley. I am the regional director from my adult learning in Wyndham County. I am here as a member of the adult education and literacy network. Please provide an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill the gap from our original budget request and actual budget appropriation from last session. The adult education and literacy network changes people's lives and helps them to build assets for individual success. We know increasing literacy and reading, reading and math will open up opportunities for students, including better jobs, furthering their education or developing job skills, having a better life for their family and being able to do basic tasks for themselves and be self-sufficient. At our home office in Brattleboro, we witness such great growth in our students we serve despite their barriers, of which there can be many, aside from the disadvantages of traditional students, ages 16 to 60 can face from low income to physical, mental and emotional health concerns to bullying and homelessness. We also provide services to hundreds of English language learners and new Americans that have come to our area. In Burlington alone, our ELL for new American classes currently hold 58 individuals across 22 classes that we offer weekly. And we are expecting another 150 new Americans in the next coming year. This has increased our need for instructors as well as paying for space to hold these classes. Again, I would like to ask that you please provide an increase of $500,000 in base funding to fill the gap from our original budget requests to natural budget appropriation from last session. Thank you for this time and I'm glad I was quick for you and thanks for considering it. Thank you very much. Hope you feel better. Thank you. Next is Chupai Wibway. I apologize. Followed by Helen Gordvet, who will also be on too. Take some moment. It's like my name here. Go here and left her. You can hear the keyboard going out. Would you like to unmute yourself? I think we cannot hear you. Okay. There we go. Great. And state your name for the record because I've, I forgot to pronounce it correctly. Hi everyone. My name is Tupate Fidel Mubiani. I am board member at the Vermont Adult Learning. I am originally from the Democratic Republic of the Congo in Central Africa. I came to Vermont in 1998 and since then I got stuck in Vermont. I started my school. It happens to me. It's a good state. Very nice state. I started my school at the community college of Vermont, CCV, where I got my associate degree in human service and I'm now working at the same school as coordinator of student advising or academic advisor. After CCV, I attended Johnson State College, earned my best bachelor degrees in psychology and behavioral science and I went on for my degree in social work at the university of Vermont at UVM. I tell you just short story of my life in my studies to emphasize the importance of work done by organizations such as the adult education and literacy network. So I'm here today to testify about the work and the benefit of the adult education and literacy network. I'm here to ask for additional $500,000 to support the work of ELN in my community. I know and meet many residents who come from countries where English is not their first language. When they arrive in the United States, they need to learn English and other skills in order to integrate into the mainstream culture, be able to communicate, get higher education and look for a good paying job. I also work with many American born students who attended one of the AELN schools in their towns. Both refugees and immigrants as well as American born students have been successful because the education they get they get from those organizations where so well structured and the student focus. There are many benefits when attending an adult learning school but because of the short time given me I will address a couple of them. Our schools offer a broad range of services and those services are target, tailored and relevant to each student goals and need. Our schools offer different tools to enable students to reach their full potential. If you have a chance to meet our alumni from your cities or towns they will tell you how they enjoy their journey. And also they will tell you that attending AELN school was one of the best choice of their lives. Our schools also prepare their mentors for a good paying job. I have seen a student going from learning English to becoming teachers, registered nurse, doctors. Thank you. Politicians. I'm afraid your time is up. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next up is Helen Wordfett also on Zoom followed we are skipping one person who had to sign off and will submit testimony. So after Helen is Eric Fritz also on Zoom. So Helen, there you are. Hi everyone. Thank you for having me today. My name is Helen Wordfett and I am the director of programs for the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont. I live in Burlington and we work statewide to represent organic farmers across the state. And I am here today to ask you to please include $252,203 right on the nose in supplemental funding for emergency organic dairy farmer relief in the FY24 Budget Adjustment Act. As you may remember, last year organic dairy farmers found themselves in an unprecedented financial crisis due to national and global economic circumstances beyond their control. We are immensely grateful to the legislature for recognizing the significant economic, social and environmental importance of the organic dairy sector here in Vermont and for supporting them with a one-time appropriation of $6.9 million in emergency relief in the FY24 Budget. So fast forward to today and the appropriated funds have been distributed directly to organic dairy farms throughout the state by the agency of agriculture providing much needed relief at a critical time. It is also our understanding that due to a small miscalculation in the total amount of funding needed to support all qualifying dairy farms, organic dairy farms, the fund fell just $252,203 short of the total expressed need for the program. So in conclusion, I'm just here to ask that you please include that remaining $252,203 in supplemental funding for emergency organic dairy farmer relief that was already passed in the FY24 Budget to ensure that all qualifying organic dairy farms receive the support that they need and that was committed to last year. So thank you so much for having me. Welcome. Thank you. Next up is Eric Fritz who I see on Zoom followed by Zachariah Watson who is here in person at the status. Thank you. Good afternoon. My name is Eric Fritz. I am the current president of the Vermont Association of Adult Day Services. I am testifying before the committee today to ask for the restoration of the $2 million that was cut from the Moderate Needs Group funding in the original 2024 fiscal year budget. The Moderate Needs Program is part of the Choices for Care Program. Choices for Care provides long-term care services and supports to older and physically disabled individuals allowing for more choice in long-term care services whether it is in a nursing facility or a home and community-based services. Moderate Needs Group funding enables many older people to be able to remain in their homes and maintain their quality of life, providing access to services such as case management, homemaker services and adult day services. Remaining safely in their homes is both a benefit to the client as well as to the state given the high cost of long-term care services and supports. The Vermont Association of Adult Day Services requests that you restore the $2 million of Moderate Needs Group funding that was cut from the Fiscal Year 24 Budget Adjustment Act. Adult Day programs received a reduction of $832,138 in Moderate Needs Group funding in Fiscal Year 24 as compared to Fiscal Year 23. I reached out to my colleagues and other Adult Day programs to establish the impact of this reduction. Currently, there are at least 25 people on wait list to receive Adult Day services. Adult Day care providers will hesitate to accept Moderate Needs Group referrals if they anticipate not having enough funds. And there is a backlog of individuals waiting to be approved for Moderate Needs Group programming. With the exception of one program, we all have the capacity to serve more in Moderate Needs Group participants. However, we would not be able to do so if this funding is not restored. The Vermont Area Agencies on Aging were also impacted by the same funding reduction. And as you have heard by earlier testimony regarding, as you have already heard from their earlier testimony regarding the impact of their Moderate Needs programs. Thank you. I'd like to thank the committee for your consideration. Welcome. Thank you. Thank you very much. Next up is Zachariah Watson, followed by Sarah Keblin, who will be remote. Who will be remote. Part of visual for you guys. Hi, I'm Zachariah Watson. I'm the Executive Director for Central Vermont Habitat for Humanity. And I'm here testifying on behalf of the six Habitat for Humanity affiliates that are providing affordable home ownership opportunities for in every corner of the state. So today we are asking for the General Assembly to appropriate $25 million to the Middle Income Home Ownership Development Program, otherwise known as the Missing Middle Program, in the Fiscal Year 24 Budget Adjustment Act. So last year Habitat affiliates received Middle Income Home Ownership Development Subsidies to build 15 housing units, which will provide affordable home ownership opportunities for low-income Vermonters. These homes are being built in seven counties in the towns of Greensboro, Randolph, Berry, Virginia, Manchester, Rutland, and Burlington. And the average subsidy for each unit was $73,000, a little bit more. The Middle Income Home Ownership Development Program is particularly important to us because we, like everyone else in the construction sector, saw an enormous increase in the cost of construction. And even with the use of volunteers and donating materials, for the first time we were actually seeing a cost of construction that is exceeding the appraised value of our homes. So this program has actually helped us bridge that gap of construction versus what it can actually be sold for. It's also enabled us to increase our subsidies so that we can partner with even lower-income Vermonters. For example, these subsidies enabled us to partner with three families who all earn below 70% of the area median income. This includes a teacher here in Berry City, an immigrant from Rwanda, and a single grandmother and her two children. Two of these families don't have enough room for their kids to sleep in, so one of them sleeps in the living room. The other sleeps in a makeshift bed in the hallway with a curtain draped from the ceiling for privacy. Another lives in an uninsulated barn with a bathroom. So one of these partners also lives in subsidized housing in Montpelier and is a rare success story of a larger problem of a broken housing pipeline, which I believe the Middle Income Homeownership Development Program can help fix. So that's why I brought this nice visual. So this represents the housing needs or the pipeline in Vermont. And at the start here are those that are in need of subsidized rentals. There's a huge need for this, we know this. Organizations have waiting lists that go on for years. So there's our first bottleneck, it's creating a bulge here. So anybody that's able to get in this and access these subsidized housing, then if they want to actually get out of subsidized housing, they run into the trial challenge of the benefits gap. Right, so anyways, they can't get out of it because there's not enough affordable housing that's being built that they can afford. The Missing Middle Development Program is a way to open that spigot so we can start to build more affordable housing, start to get people out of the subsidized housing, which opens up more beds for these folks over here to get into the subsidized rentals. Thank you so much, I appreciate it. Thank you very much. Next up is Sarah Keblin, who's on Zoom, and we follow by Mike Miller, who is here first. Good afternoon, thanks for having me. My name is Sarah Keblin, I live in Huntington, and I'm the Director of Communications and Marketing at Vermont Food Bank. I'm here to ask you to support Vermont Food Bank's request to address the ongoing needs of people in Vermont facing food insecurity by establishing a base appropriation of $2 million for Vermont Food Bank in the 2024 state budget. Food insecurity, I think as we'll all agree, for any individual or family in Vermont is not okay. We all know there's an urgent and important need right now that will continue for the foreseeable future. We're asking state leaders to support the work of Vermont Food Bank and its many, many community partners across the state in continuing to meet this increased and urgent need. As I listened to the many challenges facing neighbors across the state, and I thank the many folks testifying and advocating today for so many important supports, it reinforces that Vermont Food Bank and our partners, some of whom you've heard from today, are a steady resource for meeting basic food needs as so many other challenges mount. We see increased people coming to us and partners for help, and we'll plan to be here for the next acute crisis as well, whether a weather event or program disruption. I had the opportunity to hear directly from one neighbor this fall, professional, a single mother from Montpelier, she shared, there's electricity, there's gas, there's my car, car insurance, the rent, the food. I was really trying to get myself under $50 a week for food. What I actually stopped doing was taking my son grocery shopping with me because I couldn't afford for him to make the kind of choices he wanted. It shouldn't be this hard. Until we solve for the underlying causes of hunger, we need to continue to work together as we have to make sure the tens of thousands of people in Vermont facing food insecurity. Neighbors, friends and family have this very basic need met, access to the nourishing food they need and want. Please help address the ongoing need of Vermonters facing food insecurity by establishing a base appropriation of $2 million for Vermont Food Bank now in the 2024 state budget. Thank you so much. Welcome. Thank you very much. Next up is Mike Miller and followed last but not least by Jonathan Hoyes. Good afternoon, my name is Mike Miller. I'm the director of planning and community development for the city of Montpelier. And I'm here to represent the request, the urgent request for the budget adjustment that has been sent to you by representatives Peter Anthony, Connor Casey, Kate McCann and Jonathan Williams. And you have some information that they have sent you. While we anticipate that many of our proposed measures will be considered for the FY25 budget, we wish to highlight two immediate areas that require attention. The first is a $15 million municipal funding request. In addition to the pressing issue of tax abatements, cities and towns impacted by flooding are grappling with severe compromised budgets. As communities prepare for town meeting day, we face the prospect of making drastic cuts to essential services, including cutting public safety, senior programs and public transportation. This financial strain comes at a time when these services are most critical and more critical than ever during our ongoing recovery. The second request is for $10 million and this is for funding for the flood resilient community fund. The flood resilient community fund provides flexible grants to raise buildings, demolish or buy out homes severely affected by the flood. Individuals in this category have lost everything in urgent need for grant assistance to navigate the current situations as needed. As we seek to enhance housing opportunities across the state, we need to ensure that we are preserving our existing housing and this should be a priority, especially for those unfairly placed in this position through no fault of their own. We acknowledge that these requests come amid budgetary constraints and competing interests and the city's, Barry and Montpelier will provide a more comprehensive overview of the specifics needed and we are available to testify and facilitate testimony from concerned parties. In the last minute, I wanna go and give a little bit of my experience this summer on July 10th and 11th. After the flood, I had the opportunity to go and find and seek out the most impacted members of our community of Montpelier to go and find out what were their needs and this included two single moms with kids, retired seniors and these were on Lower State Street, Lower Elm Street, these were houses, modest homes, modest departments with flooding into their first floors. So we've tried to prioritize these individuals to try to make sure that they have the assistance that they need. In my role as planning director, I contacted the regional planning commissions and other planners about their experience with Irene and FEMA is not going to be a good program to help these individuals raise and save their homes, which is why I requested, I requested from our delegation to bring this request to you that we could get funding, very urgent funding to help folks, regular folks just get to housing they need to fix their houses. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, esteemed colleagues. My name is representative Jonathan Williams, Barry City. The last time I spoke in front of representative Lanford and representative Brennan was in 2012 in house transportation. I'm here today to reiterate the requests for our flood recovery omnibus bill. The total amount of requested appropriations in that bill is $85.6 million. However, we are not asking for that full sum in the budget adjustment act. We are asking for two urgently needed appropriations through the BAA. As you heard, one was for the flood recovery fund or flood recovery program now renamed in the act to flood resilient recovery program to lift or buy out homes, remediate homes impacted by the flooding, specifically homes that were denied buyouts from FEMA. I would note for you all that one prime example of such a home are the homes that were impacted by landslides in my community during the summer. At one time there were 25 active landslides in Barry City. We are four square miles. Those homes, many of them are not eligible for FEMA buyouts because they were not flooded. The second and to my mind most critical element of this entire bill is $15 million through the BAA for municipal lost revenues. That would cover in part, the $1.45 million Barry City budget deficit that we are facing because of the impact to our grand list and the $1.5 million budget deficit that Montpelier is facing. These are not made up numbers. This, these numbers are based in fact, an eighth of our grand list was damaged or destroyed from the flooding, an eighth. If this is not addressed through the Budget Adjustment Act, we are facing on just the municipal property side tax of things, just on that, not ignoring the education component, a 20% property tax increase. No community, no community could deal with that and survive, especially not Barry City. Our median income is half that of the surrounding communities. So I ask for your consideration, especially considering the fact that town meeting date is fast approaching and our community members need to know what we're facing when it comes to our town budgets. And so there is a severe time restraint that we're facing here. And that is why we're asking for those two elements to be in the Budget Adjustment Act. Thank you for your time. Happy to talk offline. Thank you very much. That was our last speaker, Madam Chair. And last call, anybody? So just if you're listening online, thank you very much for all those that have attended and those that are even listening in. I think you can get a flavor of some of the issues in Vermont and some of the things that were not in the recommended BAA that we'll have to consider how everything's a trade-off in many ways. So committee, we're a little bit early. We, why don't we take a break? We'll reset, come back, say like at a quarter of three, 10 of three, or let me ask. Yeah, quarter of three? Two point five, yeah. Representative Bloominley has to be on the floor at three. So then she can participate for a little while before we. I know. First, I would love to go take a detour on that. The gentleman who's doing the devotional today, came from Ireland, was a part of our group. I'd loved it. So if you want to start us, or something, all right, I'm not too sure. So I'd like to go check that out. All right, let's go. Two point five. Two point five. Okay. All right. Three.


Welcome to Hard Questions, where we gather pastors together to take on your tough questions and answer them right from the Bible. I'm Tom Hollis, the moderator, and today our panelists include Ray Hypole Providence Presbyterian Church in Robinson Township. Mark Motor Pastor of Berean Church in the South Hills of Pittsburgh. Pete Giacalone, South Hills Assembly guy church in Bethel Park, PA. J. Anthony Gilbert, pastor of another level in the North Hills area. Thank you again, pastors. You've been with us. We always have a good time. We love taking your questions from our hotline, so let's start right away with this one. What do you do? I'm a Christian. My son was raised in the church, but he went stray. He's been battling, he's had a demon for 20 years. He drank alcohol, but he now is dressing like a woman. He wants to be a woman. He quit drinking alcohol and vaping, but I cannot accept him dressed like a woman. He's a man.  How can I handle that? Well, thank you for your question, and it's very, again, our hearts go out to you and believe for your son's return to the Lord. But this is very pertinent for our society right now, Pete. You know, right here, Tom, if you see in my notes, I have my son, my son. And when I read this, I thought, I can't even imagine, ma'am, what you're going through in your heart. In a case like this, I believe, now listen to what I'm saying. I believe open rebuke is better than secret love.  And I believe that you're in love. I believe in love. You're able to go to him, and the approach is the most important thing. That you can continue to love your son, you can continue to accept your son, but not condone your son's lifestyle. And I know that that might be difficult. But I think, again, going with the scriptures, having some scriptures, not to beat them up, no, the scriptures aren't there, but to be a sav, and sometimes you have to cut the scripture, you know, the Bible says there's a scripture's cut. It's a double-edged sword. So I believe if you approach him in love without condemnation, you'll get more headway than just taking all this pain on yourself. And open rebuke is better than secret love. Yeah, absolutely. Well, you're not think having two sons of my own. I think it's so easy to share what the Bible says we need to do when it's not your son, you have no emotion invested into it. I'm not saying we should compromise. I'm just saying, if my son walked in as an adult and came in as a woman, I know how much I love my sons. And as much as I know they're wrong, how do you handle that? And do you cut them out of your life for good? Do you bring them in but still talk to them? I mean, what exactly, how do you handle that? I mean, we're battling with this stuff now more than we ever have. And my prayer is that all of our children know their identity from the time that they're young. But I believe at the end of the day, you never compromise. But my approach and how I deal with that person, there's no point of reference for that scripture. There isn't cross-dressing and transgenderism in the Bible.  I mean, I get all that. But I mean, I'm talking about we're verbally like you have a written where there's a person that does that and what we're supposed to do. We know it's sin. We know it's an abomination. I get all that. But how do you evangelize to your family in that matter? Do you cut them completely off? And I think that's something you really got to ask for wisdom on. How you're going to address that? Do you tell them you can come to our house, but you can't come only as a man? How exactly do you deal with that? And I think that's going to take some wisdom and some prayer to get through to determine how you're dealing with that. Prayer is the key, certainly, to have that wisdom. And speaking of prayer, Paul and Ephesians one had a prayer that he declared in its inscription and he prayed that the eyes of the Ephesians believers understanding her heart would be enlightened. And we know this. The Bible says the God of this world, Satan blinds the minds of those that don't believe. So if there's a blinding there, our prayer needs to be God open his eyes to see Jesus for who he really is, to see his sin for what it really is. And that can be done privately. So that's Ephesians one versus 16 through 18. You can put his name in there. His name is John. I pray for John. May the eyes of his understanding be enlightened and I bind the enemy that would endeavor to blind his mind and deceive him. Yeah, God's got to work here. I'm glad that we're all in agreement that this is a sin. This is bad behavior. And there is a verse that actually speaks to it. Deuteronomy twenty two five says, a woman must not wear men's clothing nor a man wear women's clothing for all who do so are an abomination to your God. Now, I know some will try to say, well, that's the Old Testament ceremony. Oh, you know, you're not supposed to do other things that we have passed away. This isn't something that's fulfilled in Christ. This is about who we are as God's creatures, male and female. And the principle continues, I believe, in the New Testament. So I would, ma'am, I would if your son was raised in the church, if he claims to be a Christian, I would give him Deuteronomy twenty two five and say, the Bible says you can't do this. And the key is, as she said, he wants to be a woman. It's not like, OK, the house was on fire. I need to run out and all I can do is grab some woman's clothes. It's not the external again. It's I want to pretend like I am a woman. That's what's going on in our culture. That's the sin. And that's what Paul addresses in first Corinthians eleven, when he talks about, you know, the long hair on the man or the head coverings on the woman.   I don't look at those verses literally. I don't think women have to wear head coverings. It's was he trying to like be a prostitute or be a man? Was the man with the long hair trying to be a woman? Again, the Nazarites weren't allowed to cut their hair. Samuel Nazarite from birth, Samson Nazarite from birth. Paul has it. It takes a vow. He cuts his hair at Centrae in Acts 18. So he grew long hair for a time because that was part of the vile system. So again, technically the outward long hair and a man. Is he trying to be a woman? That's the issue. Is he trying to and you said that's what your son is doing. And so therefore this is a great sin against God. It denies who God is. He made us male and female. We are in his image male and female and that doesn't change. And so this is a real spiritual thing. I would pray for your son. I would never compromise and say he is a woman. And but I would point out to him from the scripture. As you said, Pete, you've got to tell him this is a sin. I think, you know, if we could expand this for a little bit is our society, our culture is is promoting this. I hear I was watching a it was a TV show on the 60th anniversary of Star Trek. OK, and it had a drag queen on as one of the the host is hosting a segment. Deep voice, but made up like a like a beautiful woman, really. And it just was so I didn't even I was like, I'm not watching this. You know, and so what do we do? How do we do the thing that you said of showing love of but standing against the culture? How is that done? Well, I think, like Ray said, you can't argue with the scripture. We can take a scripture and and you can very lovingly present it and and then, you know, open rebuke. I keep coming back to that is better than secret love. And and I thought of your testimony, how that, you know, sin is sin. We can't, you know, say one sin is greater than the other person about your father, your father. You know he loved you, but you know you knew he wasn't condoning everything. I heard your testimony this morning. But so you can still love them, but not condone what they're doing. When I think that's the difficulty of this. And that's why I said I rest. I know what the right thing to do is I know I would call the sin. I'm not going to compromise on it. I'm not going to say it's OK.  Do you say I'm not going to let you in my house anymore?  I mean, that's a heavy thing to do to your child. I'm not saying it's not the right thing to do, but I'm saying that's why I think that's a fear and trembling scripture there.  But the gravity of that, of knowing that you may never have an interaction with your child anymore, that's a heavy thing. So I'll be honest, that's something that I pray for wisdom and ask God and seek counsel on how to go about that, because that's such a major thing. Because you know, like if somebody's you have someone that maybe they're sleeping together, you know, you say, that's not going to happen in my roof. But if he comes in as a woman, do you say that doesn't come into my house anymore? Or do I have to go outside? I mean, there's a lot of things you could look at when you say killing your son. You're talking about not like Abraham. We're talking about the breaking off that relationship. So I just want to, Mark, just to just have a little bit left in this segment here and how do we battle this in our culture?  Do we just accept and say the culture's going to hell in a handbasket or what do we do? What I found as a pastor, I taught on transgenderism a couple of months ago, I spent about a month researching it a lot because it was a newer subject to me. And to my amazement, my congregation gave me a standing ovation. Now, I wasn't looking for that. That wasn't the goal. But they were saying no one teaches about this. No one talks about this. And if the church doesn't rise up and speak the truth in love, then they're going to believe culture. And so I do believe we need to be a clarion voice. We're not against anyone, but we do need to stand on the word of God. People are starving to hear what the Bible really says in a loving, balanced way. We're going to go to break it just a second. Anything else that we need to say here? As a father, I had to do that one time, Jay, with one of mine. They really overstepped the bounds. And I said, you got to go. Wow, yeah. And I was weeping. But boy, did God do a turn. God brought the restoration. Amen, amen. Well, thank you so much. A very important discussion. We took a little extra time on that one because of how important it is. Stay tuned. We'll be back in 60 seconds and ask if God forgave our sins on the cross why do we continually have to ask for forgiveness? Welcome back to the show. We're taking your calls from the hard question hotline. If you would like to leave us your question and I really would encourage you to do that. Call<PHONE_NUMBER>. We'd love to answer your question here on the program. So let's go to the next one. My question is if God is in control and sees all and knows everything we do before we do it, why would God put a tree in the garden of Eden that has apples that are forbidden to eat? Why even put that temptation there? This is a very good question. I'm gonna turn it over to my man, Jay, to answer. Well, the first thing I'd say is just, I'm sure everybody always feels that way but there wasn't really apples. It doesn't bother us to say what type of fruit it was. And we've all heard that it was supposed to be apples. Reminds me of a movie I was watching and the girl was talking to this guy and he owned this restaurant. He said, why did you call this restaurant such as a thing? He said, because when you own it, you can call it what you want. And to some degree, God is sovereign. Why did he do that? Because he's God. For one, that's one answer. There's a myriad, I'm sure there's a myriad of different ways everybody's gonna go with that. I'm gonna give you my take on it and why I feel it's so important that God did this. For one, when Lucifer became Satan, he was the worshiping angel. There's now a void in heaven, there are no worshipers. You have Gabriel who's a messenger. You have Michael who's a warfaring angel but there was no worshipers. And that's why Jesus comes on the scene after all these years and says, he's looking for one that worships and spirited in truth. You can't be a worshipper without a sacrifice. You can't determine love unless you have to give something up. So he has to put something in place. Otherwise, if he didn't put anything in there for us to make a choice, there's no, there's no, there's no be able to determine who's a worshipper and who's not. So in order to be a worshipper, I have to choose this and make this a priority and I have to shun this. So we had to leave one thing in there for man to say, I could have that, but I want you more. And so all of us have that, whether we realize it or not, it doesn't matter whether it'd been apples on a tree, fruit on a tree or whatever it might have been, there had to been something where you have to choose between God and this. And as a result, we will become the replacement worshipers, the bride of Christ in heaven. The key thing is your choice, right? It's gotta be your choice. I agree and I know that God could have made robots that automatically worshiped him or served him, but he wanted people that would choose him, choose you this day. And so I don't understand all of the reasons why God did that, but he is sovereign and he's looking for those that will fellowship with him, even as Adam walked and talked with the Lord in the cool of the day.  Let me throw a scripture to dress it up a little bit. In James chapter one, 12 through 15, and this is gonna help you out, ma'am. It says, blesses a man who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, what the Lord has promised to those who love him. Let no one say when he is tempted, I am tempted by God. Now here's the fact, for God cannot be tempted by evil, nor does he himself tempt anyone, but each one is tempted when they're drawn away by their own lust and intent of course we know the rest of the scripture there that gives birth to sin and sin when it's full grown brings forth death. So the bottom line here is, God did not do that to tempt man to evil. I don't believe God will tempt a man to do evil. I just don't believe this. His character is the nature. Right. I do believe, Jay, what you said about the test and the tree clearly was a test and it was intentionally put there by God and God had not only intentionally put the tree there but everything that happened in the garden was a part of God's plan. I mean, we have to say that. It wasn't like God was unaware or, you know, if God didn't want that to happen in some sense then he wouldn't have done it. And therefore I think that the most ultimate answer is, as you said, God is sovereign. So the tree is there, the reason why everything else is here for the glory of God.  They will glorify God forever. In fact, the saints will sing, the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever. It's the glorification of God's wrath which is part of his being, part of his character. And that was part of his will. And it's also for the good of his people.  So that has to be sin. And in some sense, the sin of man works for the good of God's people. And I personally believe that we have a much higher and greater inheritance redeemed in Christ than we would have had standing in Adam. That in Christ God has something greater and therefore sin was a necessary part of it but sin was entirely on the part of man. It was entirely by his choice. God never makes anybody sin. But he did put it there and he shows forth his glory and his grace comes to those of us who do make that choice in all kinds of ways and that were saved in Christ. Right, good answer. Good question. Thank you so much for that. Let's go to our next hotline question. Yeah, so I have a good question here. If God was forgiving us our sins on the cross, why then do we have to ask forgiveness every time we sin? Okay, this is an interesting one. I'm really looking forward to the answers. Go ahead. Well, salvation comes, we know, by grace through faith. But really so does forgiveness. There's a verse in Titus 2.11 that says, the grace of God that brings salvation has appeared to all men. But it doesn't mean all men have received it. It appears, it comes, but they need to choose it. And so even Ephesians 2, our salvation, by grace you are saved through faith. And so yes, God has made available all of the forgiveness we need, but there's something about through faith. Lord, I'm reaching out and asking you, forgive me. And I think there's a power in forgiveness. We're living in a culture that really hasn't been taught to say, Lord, I'm wrong, I blew it. I think my favorite hero in the Old Testament relative to this is King David. We know that he, as Pete said earlier, sin greatly, but I believe six different times in the Old Testament, he said, I have sinned against the Lord. He was quick to repent. And that's, I believe, one of the reasons he was a man after God's own heart. So God wants us to come to him, not with a sin consciousness, but at least with a sin awareness. I have broken your heart. Please forgive me. And then we receive that forgiveness by faith and say from now on, no more condemnations. That's really good. Ray, what are your thoughts? Yeah, I think that this question comes up sometime. People will say, well, if Jesus died on the cross and forgives all my sins past, present, and future, and I get that the moment I believe I'm justified, I can't lose my salvation. So why should I continue to confess my sins? Well, number one, God commands it. Jesus said, when you pray, say, forgive us our debts. Luke's translation is ha-martias, sin. It's the word for sin, forgive us our sins. And so we are commanded to do it. So that should be enough for us right there. We are commanded to do it. But I think part of it is that we live in time and we work out our salvation that way so that when we sin, I mean, the believer should be sorry for his sin. We have a new nature. I'm not sorry for something I haven't done, but when I do it and I realize it, I want to go to God and confess it and know that I'm, it's not like I think, oh no, I've sinned. I've lost my salvation. I have to go get forgiven again. I want to be restored. I want to glorify Christ by seeing his blood wash this away. So it's something that we should want to do because we love God because we hate sin and we need to do that as we sin. Just as we thank God as he gives us this, just as we praise him as, you know, we do it in time. And so, you know, we have to ask forgiveness when we sin because we live that way. We live moment to moment. So we respond to what comes into our lives. That's interesting because no matter really where we stand in the theological spectrum about this, we all know we walk and live in time and we have failed and we need to go to God. Well, we're going to go to a break. So coming up in 60 seconds, when we ask, how do we distinguish God's voices from our own will? Oh my goodness. My goodness, an argument on theological argument almost broke out here during the commercial. Well, let's listen to our last hotline question of the show. My question for you today is, I really want to hear from God. I really want to see his face and hear his voice in a still small way inside of me. Sometimes I think I'm hearing from God. And sooner or later it turns out that I was not hearing from him at all. How can I be sure that I'm experiencing God's voice when I pray? Okay, this is a question I think a lot of believers have had and I think we'll have some, probably some differences of opinion on this, but Ray, what are your thoughts on this? I think the man is, and sir, I just think that you're looking for something that you shouldn't be looking for. I don't think we should expect to hear the voice of God, even those who believe in ongoing revelation. I don't know too many people who say they actually hear the audible voice, their eardrums go and God's a baritone or whatever. I don't think that's what we're supposed to do when we pray and I don't think we're supposed to desire that God's gonna show his face to us or to hear his voice. We pray because number one, he tells us to pray. Number two, we adore him. We confess our sins to him. We give thanks to him and we supplicate. We pray for others, but when the Bible talks about prayer, it tells us that we do so in order that we can know God more and we know him by faith. I think part of it is knowing him by faith. I had some scripture here for some reason I'm not able to find it, but where it talks about, oh, here it is. Now this is the confidence that we have in him, 1 John 5.14, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us and we know that if he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked for him. John's saying, look, if you come by faith and you come in the name of Jesus and you pray according to the will of God, you know that he hears. He doesn't say, and then you'll hear him. I think we need to rest in the fact that we've come in Jesus' name and we trust God has heard us. He's gonna do what's right. And I think to want more than that, on this side of eternity, I just don't see where God says, pray and you'll get to hear my voice or get to see my face. Well, I think what you need to be careful is Ray said is when you go in your prayer closet, when you do seek him, then what I would encourage you, take your Bible in with you. And then after you're done praying, just go through the scriptures and you'll be amazed how the Holy Spirit will take the scriptures and God will speak to you through the scriptures. And everything else that you do here, it still has to line up with the scriptures. Absolutely, this certainly, we're gonna hear God's voice through those scriptures. Yeah, I agree with that. And I think there are three voices, I believe we have to learn to discern. There's our voice, there's Satan and there's God's. And you have to be able to discern all three.  Matter of fact, if Jesus would have been discerning, he would have listened to Peter when he said, you don't have to go to the cross. So there's a lot of things that you may be thinking you're hearing from God, but aren't. I think one of the things you wanna do is you wanna have a pastor, somebody that can walk you through that. If you constantly see yourself tripping over that, some things, it's just us. And I think a lot of times we don't give ourselves enough credit that it's amazing. The Bible says that God brought the animals to Adam to see what he would name them. And I think a lot of times we think, that's the Lord, that's the Lord. Maybe that's just you. And it doesn't make it right or wrong. Maybe that's just you. And so you have to learn to discern those and how you find God, I believe, is by missing him. You learn what isn't him. At the same time, you'll also learn what is him. And you find that also with the scripture and by having somebody that walks with you to help you to decipher if that's the Lord or not. And we know in the Old Testament, the Bible speaks about the fact that he ministers to us in a still small voice or another translation, a gentle whisper. When you come into the New Testament, the scripture says, as many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. And I love the Kenneth Weist translation, as many as are being constantly led. So I do believe we have a right not to necessarily hear a voice or see Jesus visibly, but to be led and led by the Word, obviously, but also led by the Spirit of God. And so you need to just say, Lord, I trust you that I'm going to be led by the Spirit all throughout the day. How does that happen, Mark? How does that, we understand being led by the scriptures, I think, but how does being led by the Spirit happen? I think the number one thing is being led by peace. Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts. Many scriptures talk about being led by peace. It can be an inward witness. It can be an inward voice, but most of all, it's just that peace, that green light, so to speak, compared to a red light. Sometimes you have that red light stop. I'm not really going to get down that road, but sometimes you have this peace or this green light and you feel the Lord is leading in that way. And to me, that's what I'm looking for. If the other ways come now and again, that's great, but the ultimate way is that peace on the inside. Any last quick thoughts? I believe it's important to walk in the Spirit too. To his point, prayer is vital. I don't believe you can hear from God and be led by the Spirit if you're not a man or woman given to prayer. That is utmost important, not just praying, but getting alone until you're no longer alone and then allowing him to lead you to the rest of your day. There's a book years ago called Practicing the Presence of God. And the more you get in that presence of God, that voice doesn't get louder and louder. So thank you pastors. And thank you for the question. We're going to end with a scripture. We love to do that. It says, bear with each other and forgive one another. If any of you has a grievance against someone, forgive as the Lord forgave you. That's Colossians 313. Boy, is that something we need to put into practice? We hope you enjoyed the program today. Remember, you can always email us your questions, hard questions at ctvn.org or you can call our hotline. Have a great day.