SmartTranscript of Senate Session - February 26, 2025

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[205 seconds of silence] [Mr. President]: Will senate please come to order? Our devotion exercises will be conducted by the Reverend Leon Dunkley of North Chapel Church of Woodstock. Welcome. [Reverend Doctor Leon Dunkley]: Good afternoon, beloveds. My name is Reverend Doctor Leon Dunkley. For eight years now, I've been honored to serve as the minister at North Universalist Chapel Society or North Chapel in Woodstock, Vermont. It's an honor to be with you today. I wish that my words were as elegant as Sabre Fields art, which is my hometown. She lives in the town of East Barnard, where I currently reside. But my words for devotional are few. They are about finding hope in an unlikely place. My words are few, but they require a context and it's a weird context. I confess. I have honest reasons for this. So I beg your indulgence for just a moment. I would like to begin by thanking you for your public service. Who we are as a people so very much depends on how we are as a people. Thank you for stewarding to the best of your gift, the health and vitality of our brave little state. I wish that I believe that my words were magical. They are not saving their ability to remind us, myself included, of the best in us becoming possible against the odds and against the grain, prisoners of hope one and all. I helped to lead a retreat months ago, a retreat that was co led by several indigenous leaders, elders, wisdom keepers from Northern New England. As a second career minister from Central New Jersey, I felt underqualified. Of course, I was treated respectfully until I shared that one of my most admired people was an imaginary hero named Jason Bourne. Not Matt Damon, the actor who plays this fictional character in a series of popular movies, not Robert Ledlam, the author who wrote the books on which these movies are based. But the imaginary hero that lives in me and perhaps in us because of Matt Damon and because of Robert Ludlam. As you may know, the movies that I'm talking about are action movies. There's a lot of running around. There's a lot of racing around in cars. There's a lot of gunplay boy energy and lots of things explode. These are mainstream American films. Needless to say, the indigenous wisdom keepers, well, shall we say, concerned about my presentation until I was able to share the reasons that I think that Jason Bourne is heroic. And those reasons are conveyed in a three minute long passage at the end of the second of the five movies. When the hero understands, accepts, is honest about, and takes responsibility for the pain and suffering that he has caused when he moves towards spiritual maturity. None of the running around and the racing around matters. None of the gunplay explosions matter. In ten hours of American popular film, those are the only minutes that matter. And though it might seem wasteful, those three minutes never fail to fill me with hope. Hope in the power of self acceptance, forgiveness, and the peaceful choice moving forward. In nineteen sixty three, Martin Luther King talked about his new sense of faith that was growing in American life. He said that with this faith, we shall be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope, And that with this faith, we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together. My devotional words are only these. Be wise and brave. Your own soul to save and your message engraved in gold. I'll settle up in the meantime to make my way closer to you, to pack up my sorrows, to throw down my guns, and pick up the best of my heart. May we learn to meet again in hope in this, our young and beautifully heroic American dream. Maybe so. [Mr. President]: Are there any any announcements, senator from Windsor? [Senator from Windsor]: Thank you. I move that the committee on economic development, housing, and general affairs be relieved of s seventy one, an act relating to consumer privacy data privacy and online surveillance, and that the bill be committed to the Committee on Institutions and Technology. [Mr. President]: Senator from Windsor has moved that the Committee on Economic Development, Housing, and General Affairs be relieved of s seventy one, an act related to consumer data privacy and online surveillance, and that it be committed to the Committee on Institutions. Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. All those opposed, nay. The ayes have it and the bill has been committed to the Committee on Institutions. We have a Senate Resolution for introduction. JRS fifteen, joint resolution supporting Vermont's transgender and non binary community and declaring Vermont's commitment to fighting discrimination and treating all citizens with respect and dignity offered by senator Hardy and others. Please listen for the reading of the resolution. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: JRS fifteen, joint resolution supporting Vermont's transgender and non binary community and declaring Vermont's commitment to fighting discrimination and treating all citizens with respect and dignity. [Mr. President]: Now you've heard the reading of the resolution. And at the chair's discretion, we will treat the resolution as a bill and refer it to the committee on judiciary. We now have senate bills for introduction. We have s ninety, an act relating to employee privacy protections introduced by senator Vyhovsky. Please listen for the first reading. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: S ninety, an act relating to employee privacy protections. [Mr. President]: Now you've heard the first reading and the bill is referred to the committee on economic development. S ninety one, an act relating to tenant rights introduced by senator Vyhovsky. Please listen to the first reading. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: S ninety one, an act relating to tenant rights. [Mr. President]: Now you've heard the first reading of the bill and it is referred to the committee on economic development. S ninety two, an act relating to retirement allowance for interim educators introduced by senators Perchlik and Watson. Please listen to the first reading. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: S ninety two, an act relating to the retirement allowance for interim educators. [Mr. President]: Now you've heard the first reading, and the bill is referred to the Committee on Government Operations. On our new business, we will now take up H-one hundred and forty one, third reading. H-one hundred and forty one, an act related to fiscal year twenty twenty five budget adjustment. Please listen to the third reading. Excuse me. Are there any amendments before third reading? Seeing none. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: H one forty one, an act relating to fiscal year twenty twenty five budget adjustments. [Mr. President]: Okay. The question is, shall the bill pass? Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor please say aye. Aye. [Speaker 4 ]: All those opposed nay. [Mr. President]: No. The ayes appear to have it. The ayes do have it and you have passed the bill. Senator from Chittenden Central. [Senator from Chittenden Central]: Thank you, Mr President. At this time, I would move that our actions on age one forty one be message to the House fourth fourth with that. The rules be suspended in order that we message our actions forth. I beat the secretary on that one. Let the record show. [Mr. President]: Senator from Chittenden Central has moved that the rules be suspended and that H-one hundred and forty one be messaged to the House forthwith. Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. All those opposed, nay. The ayes have it and we have messaged eight one forty one to the house forthwith. We now have S3, an act relating to transfer of property to a trust. And it is up for second reading. Please listen to the second reading of the bill. [Assumed Legislative Staff or Clerk]: S three, an act relating to the transfer of property to a trust. [Mr. President]: Senator Erwin Wyndham. [Senator Erwin Wyndham]: Thank you, mister president. So I wanna start by saying over the, the past couple of years, I've been hearing a lot about the benefits of getting married, primarily hearing it from my mother. But there is one benefit that she has not talked about yet, which is the ability for a married couple to purchase property as tenants by the entirety, which is what I'll be discussing today along with the creditor protection, that accompanies that and the, process of transferring assets to a trust. So tenancy by the entirety is a long standing legal tool used by married couples to purchase property. It is widespread throughout our country, and one of the main benefits is the ability for a partner in this marriage to avoid being attached to their spouse's independent debt. If it's a joint debt owed by both spouses, then the property could be attached to pay the debt that cannot be done if it's only one spouse who lose the debt. So for example, let's say spouse one and spouse two own a piece of land and a home as tenants by the entirety. Spouse one decides to take out a personal loan and it's in their own name, and they begin to default on that loan. The bank that gave spouse one that loan cannot put a lien on the property, because it's protected from creditors due to the spouses having purchased it as tenants by the entire. So instead that creditor will have to seek out other assets from spouse one in order to acquire the money that is owed to them, And that is tenancy by the entirety in a nutshell. So the issue that this bill seeks to address is that in the current system that we have, that creditor protection that I just described, it ceases to exist when the property is transferred to a trust. And this makes estate planning very difficult, can also cause estates to have to go through probate, which is much more time consuming, expensive, and generally burdensome. So if this bill were to become law, a married couple that wants to prepare their estate for their beneficiaries would be able to transfer their property to a trust without losing that creditor protection. And one thing I wanna emphasize is that the creditor protection would not apply to any secondary beneficiaries. It only applies to the married couple while they are alive. Once one spouse has died, the trustee can manage the assets as determined by whatever rules were put in place during the trust creation and that creditor protection goes away. The only issue we ran into in committee, raised by committee members and the Vermont Bankers Association was a concern about passing on creditor protection to secondary beneficiaries. Once we clarified the language to ensure it only remains with the trust during the life of the spouses, the association came to support the bill. So I'll do a section by section walk through, starting on page fifty four. It's a relatively short bill. And on page fifty four, we can see the beginning of the changes proposed by the bill and subdivisions c one a through e. This language sets up the criteria that must be met in order for the property to retain creditor protection. Those criteria are as follows. The spouses must be married to each other. The property must be held in the trust, if it's a joint trust, it must comply with specific revocability rules. The property must be the spouse's property, and both spouses must be current beneficiaries of the trust. Subdivision c two permits that the [Mr. President]: spouses Sorry. [Senator Erwin Wyndham]: Permits the spouses to opt out of the creditor protection rule if they choose, as long as they state in writing that they do not want it to apply. Subdivision c two also provides that the creditor protection feature no longer applies after the dissolution of the spouse's marriage. Subdivision c three concerns the applicability of the new law, provides that when spouses transfer joint tenancy property to a trust, and the property retains the creditor protection benefit regardless of whether the transfer happened before, on, or after the effective date of this act. Section two provides that the act takes effect on passage. You heard from legislative counsel, the Vermont Bar Association, the Vermont and the Vermont Bankers Association. The vote in committee was four zero one, and I ask for the senate support. [Mr. President]: The question is, shall the bill be amendment amended as recommended by the committee on judiciary? Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. All those opposed nay. The ayes have it and you have passed no, sorry. The ayes have it and you have amended the bill as recommended by the Committee on Judiciary. The question now is shall the bill be read a third time? Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. All those opposed, nay. The ayes have it. And you have ordered third reading of [Senator from Chittenden Central]: s [Mr. President]: three. That completes the orders today. Senator from Kitten and Central. [Senator from Chittenden Central]: Thank you, Mr President. I will be making a slightly different motion today, and I'll explain the reason for that. In coordination with the House. We have sent them the B a They are planning to ask for a conference committee when they received that, and then we will respond to the conference committee today to try to move this along quickly. So at four o'clock today, we will come back for an administrative session only. That is the we does not need to include anybody here. It can be just myself and the secretary. It will be solely and, the lieutenant governors will be solely for the purpose of announcing the conference committee for, for the B A. N. So. We will gavel in the president will announce the conference committee and we will gavel out until one o'clock tomorrow. So with that said, my motion is to recess till four PM today for the purpose of announcing the H one forty one Committee of Com. [Mr. President]: The senator from Chittenden. The state of the vote. The senator from Chittenden has moved that we stand in recess to four pm for the purpose of announcement on H one hundred and forty one committee of conference. Are you ready for the question? If so, all those in favor, say aye. [Speaker 4 ]: Aye. All those opposed, nay. [Mr. President]: And we will stand in recess until four p. M. For the purpose of the announcement.
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