less like Is.

Heavy thunderstorms have led to flash flooding in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom and Addison County, resulting in washed out roads and at least one swiftwater rescue.

The damage is horrendous.

It's just horrible that we're hit again after, you know, third time three years in a row.

Plus an increased reliance on Vermont's prisons by federal immigration authorities is causing strain.

And the state's largest social service provider announces program cuts and layoffs.

All that.

More ahead on Vermont this week.

From the Vermont public studio in Winooski.

This is Vermont this Week, made possible in part by the Lintilhac Foundation and MilneTravel.

Here's moderator Mitch Wertlieb.

Thank you for joining us for Vermont this week.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

It's Friday, July 11th, and with us on the panel today we have Colin Flanders from Seven Days, Lexi Krupp from Vermont Public and Ethan Weinstein from VtDigger.

Thank you all so much for being here.

We have to start with something I wish we didn't have to talk about.

It seems to happen every summer now.

Let's see, flash flooding hits the Northeast Kingdom, Addison County.

We saw some images there in the show open.

What's the latest you can tell us about these storms?

Yeah.

Yesterday, there were these slow moving rain and thunderstorms that brought 3 to 5in in a couple towns.

In the state.

So, I talked to folks in Sutton and Burke in the Northeast Kingdom, which, they're in in Burke, I believe there was three inches of rain in one hour.

They had five inches of rain total yesterday.

So, yeah, this is the flash flooding that, resulted in a lot of roads being washed out.

In Sutton.

I know there was one family, a couple and a dog who were rescued from their roof yesterday.

And there are about 20 people or 20 homes in Sutton that are still cut off from road access.

So right now, road crews are out and just trying to work on getting, getting, access to those homes.

But that probably will take a couple of days.

So the good news is that as we, as far as we know, there have been no fatalities.

Most of this is structural damage.

But it's it's terrible.

It's devastating.

And, Cole, I know that you talked with some of the swiftwater rescue folks.

So what were they telling you about what they had to do?

Yeah.

So, I talked to the chief of the swiftwater rescue team, and he said they they had three state teams and then four local agency teams out until about 1 a.m. last night.

And I think the significance of this event, I think everybody knows July 10th is sort of the day.

Now, this is the 3rd July 10th in a row.

And, I think it's it's the psychological impacts of this.

I think of it.

What I've been really interested in is the fact that this is becoming starting to feel like inevitable, that we are seeing these things more and more.

And in talking to the Swiftwater team earlier this summer, as they were gearing up for what they expected to be another busy summer, I recall one conversation where one of their team manager said, after the second year, the 2nd July 10th, there was a real wake up call.

Obviously the 1st July 10th.

Storm was really serious, but to see it happen again was really driving home the point that we need to be ready for this.

And I think this is just another one of those examples.

Well, to that point, is there any kind of silver lining in that?

It's almost expected now.

So maybe they were a little more prepared this time.

Like kind of expecting it to happen.

Yeah.

I mean I think that's that is I wouldn't go as far as silver.

Maybe that's like a light gray line.

But I will say that I think that there is being more attention paid to the need not only to prepare for these on the front end, but also to be able to respond to them.

The state legislature this year, gave $450,000 to this state team to help it prepare.

It's not as much money as it was hoping for, but I think there is an acknowledgment that we need to make sure that we have swift water teams ready.

And I think a lot of people just think they sort of form, like they just come together like the Avengers.

But I think there's a lot of work that goes into a lot of planning, and this is why.

And we're going to have to keep a watch too on.

And this is a subject for another time.

But what happens with FEMA and the kind of help that could be expected there, because changes are coming to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

I want to move on to a story, Ethan Weinstein, that you were reporting on, which, is really important.

And, you know, it deals with something, on a much bigger, broader national level.

And these are federal departments, but they're happening in Vermont prisons.

And you wrote a story about this, about the strain that it's putting on the Department of Corrections.

What can you tell us about that?

Well, it's been really challenging.

As a reporter, to try to figure out how Ice and, CBP are working in Vermont.

We know that, in the past, they've been detaining increasing numbers of people at the northern border.

That's slowed down a bit.

But, my reporting has looked at, what's happening in Vermont's prisons.

And we know that, Ice and Border Patrol are relying on the state's prisons to hold immigration detainees.

And these are people that, most often they're not charged with crimes.

They're, charged with civil immigration offenses.

And so we were able to get a window into how this relation chip is working by, using a public records request to see how prison officials are talking about ice.

And you know what?

That brought to light was?

They're pretty frustrated with, the increasing workload put on them by their federal partners.

What are some examples of things that they're having to do that they wouldn't normally have to do if I wasn't bringing these prisoners here?

I mean, some of it almost might seem petty.

I will just sort of list demands that come as a surprise to prison officials.

So they say we need close toed shoes.

We need bag lunches.

We need you to print out, medical histories.

And this came sort of unannounced for prison officials.

But more than that, I think it's, you know, the number of people that are being moved through the facilities.

There was one, incident that led to a lot of internal communications where in a 24 hour period, Ice had moved 35 people through the prison in Saint Albans.

And what the superintendent there noted was there's going to be a security issue that occurs.

We're not we're not built for this.

People are being lax with their keys.

They're being rude to each other during this handoff.

It's just it's not working.

And to be clear, these are people that would not otherwise be there had ice not put them there.

That's correct.

They're not charged with a state or federal crime for the most part.

There are some people.

Silly question perhaps.

Is that legal to hold people without being charged with a crime?

Yes, I believe so.

I mean, it's at least, the practice of the federal government right now, because it's a civil offense.

They're being held for that.

That's correct.

Okay.

And some of these people are able to get out on bail or bond once they have hearings, but that takes time.

Something else that, that cropped up, that you were reporting on with this is, incidents of tuberculosis, became a problem, right?

Yeah.

I mean, the folks that, ice or Border Patrol are bringing to Vermont's prisons are coming from all around the world.

And, some of those countries have a higher prevalence of TB than the United States.

And this is a disease.

I think there's something like 10,000 cases annually in the United States, but it's not something we think about as particularly prevalent.

But because there are language issues and because Vermont's prisons aren't accustomed to working with this population, although they're increasingly accustomed to it.

What they were finding was that they'd bring people in, they would test them for TB, but they wouldn't necessarily isolate them from the rest of the population.

And so there were at least a couple instances when, people were being held in general population, and then their TB test would come back positive.

And the medical contractor that the state's working with flagged this as a really significant, you know, concern.

Yeah.

And yet another problem that they aren't necessarily ready to deal with and certainly don't want to have to deal with, Ethan, hold that thought, too, because I want to come back to this case about, ISIS contract with the state of Vermont in just a moment.

But I want to ask Colin, about another story that relates to, the criminal justice system.

And you were writing about this.

It's a case of mistaken identity, that you were writing about.

And I have to believe this is one of the most surreal moments that you can ever see in a courtroom where defense attorney, says to the judge, sorry, this is not my client.

What what happened here?

Yeah.

So this was a hearing on Monday morning.

It was not just, typical in five minutes and out.

I mean, this was two hours plan of court time to vet the charges against the defendant.

And who has been accused of shooting someone in Burlington.

So this is a serious felony?

This is something that the court system has been focused on, trying to litigate these in a timely manner, efficiently.

A lot of time went into making sure everyone was there, the witnesses, everybody subpoenaed.

And then the defendant walks in and the defense attorney says exactly that, that this is not my client.

I have no idea who this is.

And this is an attempted murder charge.

Yeah.

So this is an attempted murder charge.

And so, after a little back and forth, the judge had to, call on some of his decades old Spanish to speak to this man who was there, who did not speak any English, had no idea why he was brought into this courtroom.

And it turns out that the had the wrong person.

His last name was Gonzalez.

The other guy's last name was Gonzalez.

And there was a switch up at the prison.

There were a lot of people who are frustrated about this because of the court time, because of all that, but also because of the impacts one man had his trial delayed his his case is going to be delayed weeks.

And the other man was was dragged out of prison, brought, shackled, put in a courtroom.

Had no idea why he was there, was not given a translator and then was told, sorry, you're not supposed to be here.

It's unclear how much, if any, of it he understood.

You know, I asked Ethan a legal question, and I understand you're not an attorney either.

But I do have to ask.

I mean, are aren't folks supposed to have interpreters if they can't understand English?

Isn't that the law that they have an interpreter that can let them know why they're being taken in?

Yeah, well, the problem in this case is that they thought the defendant spoke English.

Turned out, the defendant didn't speak English because they brought the wrong defendant.

But this fits into what Ethan is reporting because the man that they actually brought the court, is not facing any state charges whatsoever.

He is actually been held by the federal government because he's accused of crossing the border illegally about a week ago.

And so this is another this fits into the prison conversation as well, that, the man, when he's charged federally, his name is on the document with two surnames, as is common in Latin America.

So this is a switch up that shouldn't really happen.

This mistake shouldn't happen.

But Vermont prisons aren't used to dealing with a lot of these, and they're really busy.

And so when you asked doc about it, they said it was a genuine mistake.

But I think there are some people who look at this and say, this is just another example of how we are just not prepared to be responding to the influx of, of the non-English speaking detainees in our prisons.

Is there anything being done to make sure this kind of up doesn't happen again?

Yeah.

So doc says they've change a few protocols, including that they're going to have supervisors oversee every time this happens.

But I think Ethan's on a lot of reporting that there's probably questions of even that if that'll work because they're, they're just they're so busy and they're also, they're understaffed.

And, a lot of these people are new to the job.

So it's a challenge.

Yeah, that that sounds kind of like a terrifying experience.

And, I appreciate your reporting on that.

Thank you for for that article.

Ethan Weinstein, I do want to ask, I had mentioned about this contract that the state of Vermont has with Ice.

Governor Scott could end that contract if he wanted to.

He has not expressed a desire to do so.

Why?

Yet?

Governor Scott is the only person who would be able to, and or modify this contract, at least on the state level.

He says that, you know, if Vermont were to end its cooperation with federal authorities, these people would just be brought somewhere else.

And a lot of times, you know, we're seeing folks who they have lives in Vermont, maybe they're, farm workers or construction workers.

And so if they are arrested by Ice and brought to Massachusetts or Maine or New Hampshire, they're separated from their families from other forms of support.

And, he said, you know, that seems like a worse situation than the one we have currently.

Well, you know, we talk a lot about, entities that are losing funding.

Ice is not one of them.

Their funding is going to jump.

It's going to increase what might be their practical effect.

Once that happens, I, you know, their operations are going to grow.

We know that in Vermont, they pay our prisons $180 per day per person, but the state prisons hold for Ice.

That's more than, the state receives from other federal partners.

It's more than Ice pays a lot of other states.

So we could see that fee go up.

We know that the Department of Corrections is frustrated with the way that this relationship is work.

And currently they you know, they want more guidelines, at least when they are discussing the Ice contract internally.

They they don't want to be receiving people from Massachusetts or from Maine.

They want people who are apprehended in Vermont to come to Vermont's prisons.

And they don't want to be a stopping point in this, larger beast that's just getting bigger.

And there is a significant date coming up.

Is it August 21st when the governor will make a decision on this contract?

Yeah, I believe it's August 21st.

You know, we expect that it will be extended it in some capacity and we'll be following if it's going to change at all.

And we'll we'll certainly be following your reporting on that.

Thank you for the update on that.

I also want to update you on on something else here.

Senator Peter Welch is co-sponsoring a bill that's known as the Visible Act.

And this bill would require immigration enforcement officers to display clearly legible identification, prohibit non-medical face coverings that obscure identity or facial visibility, and require DHS to establish disciplinary procedures for violations and report annually to Congress on compliance.

And you know, that that's, that's Senator Welch's sort of I guess his try, his foray into, you know, dealing with having some of these Ice agents become visible to the public.

I have to say, that's probably not likely to.

That bill is probably not likely to go anywhere.

Given Republicans in Congress and, what they've given so far to President Trump and his immigration, protocols.

But, you know, we'll have to wait and see on that.

But I did want to update you on that situation with that.

Senator Walz is trying to address this issue.

I want to move on to some health insurance news.

Now, Lexy Krupp, you've been reporting on this, and, this is difficult news.

Coming up, this has to do with the just passed federal budget bill, that has now cleared, Congress.

A lot of people in Vermont could end up losing health insurance.

What kind of numbers are we talking about here?

Yeah.

So this is a huge, sprawling piece of legislation with all these different provisions, but it impacts the Medicaid program, and the state marketplace.

And so, and some of those impacts will be immediate.

Some of them will be in a couple of years.

But the the number you're referring to, state officials have said, when all is said and done, we expect 45,000 Vermonters to lose health insurance because of this legislation.

Part of that has to do with changes through the Medicaid program.

Collin's done some great reporting on this, basically adding more red tape.

You may have heard about work requirements that, you know, it may be that many people meet these work requirements, but it's it's just getting that documentation in every six months now or even more.

They they may not be able to do that in time, in the right way.

And that's why the, the state is expecting, you know, this, this large number to lose insurance.

Likewise on the, state marketplace side of things, there's there's going to be several changes there.

One is that there's no longer going to be automatic renewals.

So if you have a plan now you just get rolled over.

Instead you're going to basically have to go through like your whole application again.

So put in where you work, you know, why your employer can't cover health insurance, yada yada, yada.

And a lot of those plans are going to be way more expensive this year because of something called the expiration of enhanced subsidies.

But, basically, during the pandemic, under some legislation from the Biden administration, it it got a lot cheaper to, to buy these plans, especially if you make, $60,000 or more a year.

And now as of right now, those, those enhanced subsidies are tax credits.

Those are going to go away starting January 1st, 2026.

And, and many people, their plans could double in price here.

And we've, we've talked about this a lot.

Health insurance plans in Vermont are particularly expensive.

We're talking, you know, $1,000 or more a month.

You know, for someone with $60,000 in income, and, yeah, there's this real concern that a lot of people are just going to go without insurance.

Because they're like, you know, I can't afford it.

Yeah.

I don't know, Colin, if you wanted to weigh in with any reporting you've done.

Yeah, yeah.

No, I think you summarized well, I think the second half of this then is like, okay, so what's the impact of all of these people losing insurance?

And and I think that's a really scary place that a lot of health care providers are in right now, knowing that they could be seeing a lot more uncompensated care, which is that they have someone come in their doors, they treat them, and then they try to figure out, how do we get our money back if you don't have insurance, if you're not covered by Medicaid and you don't have the funds, where does that money come from?

The hospital or your primary care?

Whoever the Howard Center, they just have to eat that cost.

And as we know, a lot of these agencies and hospitals do not have a lot of extra cash lying around.

And so it is kind of this perfect storm of, we're seeing a lot less money going to the hospitals and also a lot more people who are needing their care and might not have the money to pay for it.

It's kind of a scary prospect.

I talked to some hospital leaders who are also like, we think a lot of people just aren't going to come in, you know, they're going to defer care.

And so when they do come in, it's going to be an emergency.

And like we're going to see sicker people.

You know, and what's so interesting in Vermont is that we actually have a really low, un uninsured like population here.

It's about 3% of the state does not have health insurance.

And some people think like that might be, you know, as good as we're ever going to get.

And now, I saw a quote from Bernie Sanders that it's expected to double that, you know, 6% of the state, could could no longer have health insurance when all is said and done.

But I did want to add, like, as I said, you know, a lot of those changes might take a couple years to, to go into effect.

There are a couple of things that are happening right now.

As a result of this legislation.

One of them affects Planned Parenthood, right?

Yeah, yeah.

So, again, this this bill is like 1000 pages or something.

It's huge.

Big.

And and one provision in there, is a change to the Medicaid program, which says Planned Parenthood is no longer eligible to receive any Medicaid dollars and also is no longer eligible to receive something called title ten funding.

But, those are federal grants aimed at helping low income people access birth control and other forms of reproductive care.

So in Vermont, about a quarter of the patients who, get care at Planned Parenthood have Medicaid as their health insurance.

So, so under the law, it means that they can still go to Planned Parenthood.

But Planned Parenthood can't get paid for any of the services they, they provide.

That's about a little over 40% of their revenue from seeing patients.

So it's like the folks who leave Planned Parenthood are like, either we see, you know, if we see if we continue to see these patients for free, like, we're going to have to cut, we're gonna have to close some health centers.

It's unsustainable.

Yeah.

We can't afford this.

Right now, Massachusetts judge has, said that this put put has put a temporary hold on the legislation for 14 days as of Monday.

So I'll have to do that math in my head.

But we got another week or so of, you know, Medicaid can still pay Planned Parenthood or reimburse Planned Parenthood.

That court order might be extended for another 14 days.

But if, you know, if if the if the courts decide that, you know, this is indeed legal, then, yeah.

Planned planned Parenthood leaders, are are really worried about what this looks like.

And they, you know, they.

Right.

So they're asking they're talking to, the Scott administration to say, hey, can this state help fill in any of this hole that we're facing right now?

Well, so it's about, in in Vermont, the the what?

I talked about those Medicaid dollars and the federal, grants account for a little over $2 million in revenue.

So, I mean, maybe the state can fill that in.

And lawmakers have set aside a big pot of money of $100 million.

I believe that is going towards, like sort of planning for getting less money from the federal government.

But there is a lot of things that that money will, you know, a lot of asks for that money, including all of these other, cuts to the Medicaid program in Vermont, because we're going to be seeing, you know, all of, like, fewer people on Medicaid means, less state money and less federal money coming in to, like, help cover some of those costs.

And it feels like a bit of a slow boil.

Like you said, a lot of this stuff won't be felt right away, but we're we're staring down the barrel with this one.

This comes also on the heels of news that the Howard Center, the largest social service provider in the state, is going to have to lay off at least 30 people.

They're going to have to cut some programs.

Some of this deals with housing and some, dealing folks who are dealing with substance use disorder, issues.

That's, some difficult news.

But the Howard Center legacy, they've been losing money for years, right?

I mean, this isn't necessarily new.

Yeah.

So they've had three years of multimillion dollar losses.

Part of that is something that all Vermont businesses have been dealing with.

Their health care costs have doubled in the past five years.

They're also, you know, seeing inflation, rising rent costs, a lot of different things.

So their, their expenses are up, their revenue, they 90% of their revenue comes from Medicaid.

So this.

Yeah, this has nothing to do with the, you know, Medicaid cuts that, are sort of coming down the line.

But, yeah, they were just like they in the last year.

They've had, single days cash on hand.

So they're saying, you know, this is not, sustainable place for us to be in.

We need to change our programing.

And sort of thinking about.

Right.

What is our core mission here?

And they said, you know, they said we're not a housing, organization.

They are cutting some of the, temporary housing units that they had offered to people, who are in there seeking, mental health treatment.

Those are in Williston and Burlington.

So, so they're losing around a dozen, a dozen beds, along with, a couple other programs.

They're closing a a day use program for people with mental health needs.

That's going to be tough.

There's no question about it.

Ethan Weinstein briefly, there's a there was a plan for a dental therapy program at Vermont State University, but not happening now.

Yeah.

The legislature had paved the way about a decade ago, for this program, which sort of served a niche in between dental hygienists and dentists.

It drew some scrutiny from the auditor a couple of years ago because, it had received a few million dollars and not gotten the program off the ground.

It turns out it's never going to get the program off the ground.

But there is a little bit of a silver lining.

MTsU is going to expand their dental hygiene program, which, is super competitive.

And so we will have some more folks working in the dental field.

Okay.

Well, all right, there's a little bit of good news, and I'll try to follow that up with letting you know if you're a fan of soccer of the Rock Green Football Club tonight, if they win against the Western Mass Pioneers in Ludlow, they will, for the first time ever, win their regular season division.

And they'll finish the regular season undefeated.

If they can win tonight or get a draw, that's all they got to do is get a draw and they'll win that division for the first time ever.

So good luck to Vermont Green tonight against the Western Mass Pioneers.

We'll have to leave it there for this week thanks to our panel, Colin Flanders from Seven Days, Lexi Krupp from Vermont Public and Ethan Weinstein from VtDigger.

Thanks so much for watching and listening.

I'm Mitch Wertlieb.

Hope you'll join us again for Vermont this week.