House - Aging Children and Youth Legislative & Military Affairs
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Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
0:00
and get it again I went ahead and did it there's a lot of things that this committee will cover or can cover as you all know it's probably got the longest name of any committee aging youth children military and legislative affairs I call it the catch-all committee because just because of the fact that there is so many topics that actually can be covered in this committee we're gonna first start off with introductions and I'm just gonna ask you introduce yourself what district that you cover and it was one other thing I
was thinking about last night and just something about yourself maybe one or two things about yourself that you would like the committee and others to know about you I'll go ahead and start representative David Meeks from District 70 covers Conway Southwest Faulkner County and a little bit of Perry County and I served in the military for five years so this committee does have special meaning to me. I'm married and don't have any kids yet, but I love my wife, of course, so we were married on February the 14th. And I tell folks, I did not pick the date when I got
engaged. Like I was taught growing up or whatever, you let the wife pick the date. So I let her pick the date, and I said, let me know what time, and I will show up. Other than that, I pretty much stayed out of everything, let my wife do everything else. So with that said, I'll go ahead I
Speaker 2
1:24
didn't let Vice Chair Representative Saban – he's going to have to help
Warwick Saban
Unverified
1:30
me pronounce his name, but we'll get it after a few times. We're all still getting to
Representative Warwick Sabin
Unverified
1:35
know each other, but it's an honor to serve with you, Representative Meeks, Chair Meeks.
And my name is Warwick Saban. I represent District 33 right here in Little Rock, so welcome. And I guess I used to serve on the board of the Arkansas Advocates for Children and Families like you. I care about all of the issues that this committee covers, especially our military and our veterans. And so I'm looking forward to working with all of you and hope to be a resource to you and hope to be in service to our chairman. So thank you. Thank you. We're
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
2:05
going to go ahead and start with Representative Deffenbaugh, and we'll just go around the table.
You can do whatever you feel comfortable with. I guess go ahead and
Gary Deffenbaugh
Unverified
2:19
use the mic to make sure that everybody can hear you. My name is Gary Deffenbaugh. I'm from Van Buren, District 79. Never was in politics until two years ago. I retired as a teacher coach of almost 40 years and thoroughly enjoyed it. Just the last thing I want to say that's important to me is that my driving force behind my life is Jesus Christ,
and I appreciate the opportunity to serve you all.
Representative Sue Scott
Unverified
2:52
Thanks. Good morning. I'm not on. Okay. I'm loud enough normally anyway. I probably don't even need to push that button. You'll find that out, I'm sure. I represent District 95. Benton County is my home, and there are lots of fine people up there, just as you all represent a lot of fine people. I was tickled to be put on this committee. This is truly one of my passions, so I look very forward to it.
something you should know about me I love little Debbie snack cakes and with that said I just want to thank David and Warwick for leading us and I know we're gonna have just a wonderful wonderful time here thank you I'm Ken Bragg
Speaker 13
3:36
from district 15 hometown is Sheridan and district 15 covers western part of Jefferson
Representative Ken Bragg
Unverified
3:41
County which includes White Hall and most of Grant County in the
eastern part of Hot Spring County this is my first term very excited to be here we had a very special day at swearing in we're fortunate enough the the young lady that sang the national anthem is my future daughter-in-law and also had our first grandchild on the floor with us Presley Peacock so that was that was
Representative Charlene Fite
Unverified
4:09
kind of special to us I'm Charlene fight I'm from district 80 which is northern Crawford County western Washington I'm thrilled to be on this committee my dad who was 98 just passed
away in August was a Purple Heart recipient from World War two so I'm really happy to have the honor the opportunity to be on a
Speaker 18
4:33
committee that represents men like him representative Andy Davis from district 31 that's Western Plassie County West Little Rock and northern Saline County including northern Bryant and I'm just looking forward to learning about the issues for this committee and working with everyone here
Representative John Baine
Unverified
4:52
good morning everyone my name is John Bain district 7 parts of Union Calhoun and Ouachita counties my back I'm married with my wife Jennifer she is she's a state employee so she always reminds me how important what we do is here she's been working for about 10 years at one of our community colleges and my background is I spent the last 12 years in county government is just to the piece on a quorum court and understand a lot of what it involves and understand a lot about what what I hope to make of this committee I wasn't sure when I at
first about this committee but definitely there's a lot of it's a lot more issues than I originally thought we're gonna be on this committee and I've been talking a lot especially with our veterans and also with our military as they prepare for to do what they need to do to protect
Representative Mary Broadaway
Unverified
5:45
us good morning my name is Mary Broadway I am from Paragool district 57 which is extreme northeast Arkansas my background is that I'm an attorney I'm the mother of three children the oldest of which is an adult with autism so I'm very
interested in children and youth issues and developmental disabilities my legal background has involved me in the juvenile court system advocating for children and families so I think that this committee is perfect for me and it's a great fit I look forward very much to working with all of you in this committee I'm John Payton I'm
Speaker 25
6:20
from Wilburn close to Heber Springs district 64 it runs from Rosebud to Mountain Home I'm an auctioneer and an automobile dealer and so if I get too loud on the microphone y'all somebody just have to
Speaker 26
6:32
grab the volume knob there but I do like a fast pace so
Representative Deborah Ferguson
Unverified
6:40
I'm looking forward to getting busy I'm Deborah Ferguson I'm from District 51 which is basically West Memphis and Marion a little bit of Proctor Fred Smith is also in the committee we sort of split Crittenden County I have three children and my husband was a state representative in the 90s and I'm really interested in this committee because I was a dentist for 25 years and two of my patients who were
Medicaid I used to see a lot of children I guess because I'm female but two of my patients were eight in ten at the time and ran away from home and came to my office in a sexual abuse neglect a lot of issues but I ended up spending six years with them as a guardian ad litem and in the foster system and eventually had to hire my own private attorney to get parental rights terminated so yeah I'm really looking forward to serving on this committee I'm Bill Gossage I'm
Representative Bill Gossage
Unverified
7:38
currently the assistant superintendent of schools at Ozark my district is 82 it's called the pig trail district I guess it to the highway 23 from Ozark to Huntsville and south to Charleston. Again, I've been in the school business for 32 years. I was a school counselor for 13. I know a lot of the issues that involved kids. Looking forward to working on those issues. My dad was a World War II veteran. Purple Heart finished his life
in very difficult circumstances in a nursing home, but as a result, a lot of it from injuries received in World War II. My mom's 83. So I think, you know, I have had contact in the past and still do about issues that affect this committee, and I look forward to serving on it.
Representative Patti Julian
Unverified
8:33
Thank you. I'm Patty Julian, District 38, which is North Little Rock and a small part of Sherwood. I'm a retired lawyer I'm about to celebrate my 33rd anniversary and I have a grown
daughter and I'm happy to be on this committee living in North Little Rock and and representing that area we have a great many people from the base who live in my district and so this will be a very
Randy Alexander
Unverified
9:06
important committee to them a good morning I'm Mike Holcomb I represent District 10 which is Western Jefferson County Lincoln County Cleveland County Grant County Drew
County I'm a retired educator 28 years at Watson Chapel School served two terms on Jefferson County Cormacord and three terms as Jefferson County judge I have a passion for youth I also have an elderly mother lives next door to me that I take care of and since I'm one of the aging I really have an interest in this committee so thank you
Representative Randy Alexander
Unverified
9:45
nope sorry my name is Randy Alexander and my district is 88 which includes
about half of Springdale Johnson and a small section of Fayetteville my career was in higher education as administrator as most recently executive director of housing at the University of Arkansas and was director of housing somewhere for 33 years. Up until 2009, my political activity consisted of voting and yelling at the television and decided I wanted to get involved. My wife, Pat, and I have been married for 40 years.
I have a son, Clint and his wife live in Rogers with the best grandson in the world, about to have a brother next month, and my daughter Lauren was born with a disability, so that is important to me as well. She is now a disability-free living in heaven. I also have a 98-year-old father who has Alzheimer's, so there are several things about this committee that are important to me, and it is always an honor to serve on a committee that supports our military. My
Justin Harris
Unverified
10:56
name is Justin Harris. I'm a child development specialist from the University
of Arkansas. I'm a proud husband and proud father of five in the process of adopting two young girls. And the two-year-old was here for the ceremony swearing in with our three boys. And so we had a fun day chasing her around in the gallery. I was watching her. So I'm very proud
Representative Jody Dickinson
Unverified
11:27
to be here for the second time on this committee good morning I'm Jody Dickinson and I'm honored to represent district 47 which is parts of Independence excuse me parts of White Jackson
and all of Woodruff County. I'm a retired teacher of 34 years. I'm a proud parent of three children, three in-laws, I mean my daughter's in-laws, son-in-laws, and five grandchildren. The newest is just about two weeks old. And I am honored to be on this committee and to work with you all and you all out there also it just deals with all the
subjects that are near and dear to me and I'm honored to be here thank you thank you and
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
12:22
we're gonna let representative Talley go ahead and what we've what we've done is just introduce yourself what district you're from and then just maybe a couple things about your background thank you
Representative Brent Talley
Unverified
12:29
mr. chair I'm Brent Talley represent district 3 that's Hempston Nevada counties what an honor is to serve on aging children youth
Speaker 18
12:36
and legislative military affairs as we you know we're here trying to make Arkansas a better state for our future and what an opportunity to do that right here on this committee as we work for only
issues that involve not only the aging but also our children and youth I work at a community college where I have the opportunity to help people pursue their higher education and then I have my father two daughters who are eight and five and like representative Harris said you know had them here for the day of the ceremony and you look at them you look at the future of this state and I think we've got a very important role right here on this committee it's an honor
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
13:11
to serve thank you next we're going to allow the staff to introduce themselves it is impossible to do what we do and to have committees and
everything else without their hard work I can tell you again from serving on this committee last time I can say that they did an excellent job they were there when we needed them they provided the information if for some reason they couldn't it wasn't available they let us know so I'm gonna go ahead and take a moment and let
Speaker 46
13:40
them introduce themselves good morning my name is Venaria Vickersmith I'm the committee analyst for children and youth I served last time as committee analyst for this committee it is my pleasure to serve you and if
there's anything I can help you with I'm more than happy to do so look forward
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
14:08
to working with you all now we're just going to do just a few housekeeping things here during the session this committee will normally meet on Wednesdays at 10 a.m. and Fridays at 9 a.m. so just kind of know that that's when we're going to meet unless it's otherwise announced on those particular
days of course when we're not here on Friday which happens to be this Friday we won't meet so the next time we will meet will be next Wednesday scheduled time there we must have a quorum which means 11 committee members must be here to start the meeting sometimes you may have to slip in and out but as long as we have 11 we'll be able to actually start and conduct a meeting so please be here at start time so that we can go ahead and get the meeting going even if we do have a small agenda on that day you know let's go ahead and do it and get it done
we are going to just briefly in a moment allow some of the agencies that we're going to work with or that might come before the committee allow them to come up and announce who they are where they're where they're from or where they work at so that it gives you an opportunity to meet those those folks and maybe be able to make a connection network with them as well we'll give them just a couple of moments here let me also go over kind of a few rules
we'll just use general committee rules as we go along technology I embrace it okay so if you want to use your phone or your computer if you have one to Facebook or tweet and let your constituents know what's going on in the committee by all means do so if you have to have a take a phone call please do you know slip out of the room to take the phone call make sure your phones are on vibrate or silent so that we don't disturb the committee meeting as
well there there is some rule changes that will take place we'll find out what those are in in more detail and probably go over them but generally speaking again we use technology you'll be able to use I think your iPad or whatever for notes if you're having to testify before the committee however I think they're still not going to allow video testimony or or things like of that nature
because it will not offer the committee a chance to ask questions so that that is the whole thing with doing video testimony you know if you're sitting there trying to text back and forth with somebody they're not going to allow that either again because we have to have the person here to be able to ask questions to explain or whatever the case may be if you do have handouts that you feel is important that you want to give out to the committee it does have to go through staff so make sure you get with staff prior to the meeting to
request those handouts as far as bills are concerned we will pretty much follow what's on the agenda you know we'll go down the line if the person's here we'll allow them to present their bill if not we'll skip down to the next of them we'll get to as many as we can within the time allotted if we need to again we may have to schedule an additional meeting in the afternoon that really didn't have to happen last session and I don't think it will happen to happen this session if for some reason you have somebody coming in to testify from out of state or
maybe even in state but at a great distance or maybe even from here in Little Rock and you know this is the only day they could get off to come in and actually do it you can request a special order to be done to have heard the bill on that day and that bill will automatically go again we want to kind of limit the use of that special order so just be cognizant of that but if you feel that it has to be heard on this day and you have a special reason for doing so let me know and we'll try to get that done for you as well at this time we'll
go ahead and allow the agencies to come and introduce themselves and where they're from so if you all want to just one at a time come before the mic and Introduce yourselves. Good
Speaker 55
18:49
morning. I'm Cecile Blucher, and I'm the director for the Division of Children and Family Services,
and we're the agency that is responsible for the child abuse hotline, child maltreatment investigations, foster care, protective services, adoptions, and then we're also the agency that's responsible for the maintenance and running of child maltreatment checks on any individual who needs that for their employment within the state of Arkansas. We in addition to doing around 3,500 investigations in a month, we're responsible for ensuring the safety and welfare of around 12,000 children on a monthly basis, which includes visits,
getting them to sibling appointment, sibling visits, medical appointments, court, those meetings, and we were also one of nine states awarded participation in the 4E waiver demonstration project set up by the federal government, which will give us a lot of flexibility in our resources in bringing about better outcomes for the children and families that we serve. And I look forward to working with all of you. And we have an open door policy at DECFS that if you have any issues, please feel free to
give us a call or come visit
Speaker 57
20:24
us. I've been the director for the past
Speaker 58
20:27
five years. By the way, I'm a retired military chief warrant officer, and I'm old, so I really feel welcome
here. Division of Youth Services has a unique responsibility. We take on the kids that have been adjudicated delinquent by the courts, and we bring them into our facilities. Our concept in the Division of Youth Services is first public safety, but also treatment of these youth, because every youth that we see all have opportunities. if they're willing to accept the treatment. So we have about 500 kids, right around 500 kids committed to us per year.
We also deal with FNs petitions before the court in which we provide services through a network of providers that are statewide. We had about 9,500 contacts last year with FNs and also delinquent kids. We do a lot of work with pre-adjudication, diversion programs, trying to keep kids out of coming into the system because, you know, I think we believe that most harm can be done to some kids is when they come into the system.
If we can keep them out, they do better in most cases. But, of course, public safety is most important to us. I have my assistant director, Dr. Lisa Hutchison, with me, and she'll be here with me a lot to speak to you over the next, during the session and in the upcoming years. We have an open-door policy. Feel free to call me if you have any questions about DYS. We recently, in case you've seen in the news, we recently came out from under a DOJ consent decree that had been applied back in, I think it was about 2003.
The DOJ said we not only met the decree responsibilities, but we exceeded them, so I feel very fortunate for that to have occurred. Thank you very much, and I look forward to visiting with you, and if you want to talk to me in person, any particular questions, I'll be glad to field them for you. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Krista Hughes.
Krista Hughes
Unverified
22:44
I'm the Director of the Division of Aging and Adult Services. Before I tell you a little bit about our division, I would like to introduce three of our key leaders that are here with me and ask them to stand since they're in the back so you can kind of put a face with a name. I have Connie Parker, who is our Assistant Director of our Support Services. Connie's role, we all have a pretty broad scope, but she's over Support Services, which would include budget, HR, access points, things like that within our division. I have Mr. Charles Thompson. He's Assistant Director.
His unit is pretty broad. It includes Adult Protective Services, the Elder Americans Act, of which there are many facets in. We have a lot of special grants and programs within our division that also fall under Chuck's leadership. And then I have Doug Walker, and Doug is the Director of our Adult Protective Services Unit. So you will all want to know them, and so now you have a face to put with that. our division is the focal point of all issues related to the elderly excuse me
and adults with physical disabilities in our state the primary point for which you can kind of associate with us is as you drive down your streets and you see the area agency vans transporting people to the doctor's office or the senior centers for people go to socialize and to receive meals we serve over two million excuse me home delivered meals in a given year and we serve over about 1.5 million congregate meals and that's just one part and that's the focus, the central focus
or the cornerstone of the Elder American Act is the nutrition and the transportation programs. We transported over 7,000 people with about almost half a million transports in a single way transports to the doctor's offices. Also within our division, excuse me, Adult Protective Services, you're all familiar with adult protective services and that's for persons age 18 and older so if there are allegations of abuse neglect or exploitation we have an intake point where we do screening and then we have staff throughout the state we have about 45 people throughout our state
that go in and investigate on that. We have our Medicaid waiver programs you might be familiar with those the oldest one in this you know for us is our elder choices program that's a menu of services available to people 65 and older who are at the institutional level of care need meaning that they meet the same level of care as someone who does need to be considered to be in a nursing home in the state of Arkansas the
eligibility criteria are the same for our Medicaid waiver programs to that of nursing home care in the state of Arkansas we have about 7,000 people receiving services under that and that's a large menu of services from everything from adult daycare to meals to those lifelines you know for people who might live alone homemaker chore and personal care are the main you know one-on-one non-skilled services to help people in their home we have a very large consumer direct program and what that is it allows people who are in very rural
areas who are having difficulty finding someone through the agencies to deliver care to them, it allows them to hire someone, whether it be an extended family member, a neighbor, church member, who can be trained by that client, hired and fired by that client, who in essence works for that client. That's a very popular program throughout the country that we have two different programs for that. Our Independent Choices Program, you will hear that name as well, and that is actually a
state plan service which allows people to hire a personal attendant and we have, I don't know, 3,300 or so at last count, I believe, on that program and then the other program that allows an option of either an agency-delivered care model or a consumer-directed care model is our alternatives for adults with physical disabilities. You'll often hear that as AAPD or alternatives and we have roughly 2,600 people receiving care one way or either, again,
through the agency or adults with physical disabilities or direct consumer-directed services. Gosh, we work on employment opportunities for not only senior adults but adults with physical disabilities to try to expand the opportunity for people to have very meaningful activity in their lives, and they are integral to the delivery of the services that are senior centers in the state of Arkansas. I think that just about covers it. I'd be happy to meet with any of y'all and give you further information. And I also do want to put a plug. If you would, if you want more information in a concise manner, our website is a really good place to start.
Speaker 63
27:38
And that is daas.ar.gov. Thank you. In August of
Speaker 67
28:01
last year, I assumed the duties as Division Commander for our Crimes Against Children Division. Our division is made up of two sections.
One is the investigative section in which we conduct investigations involving severe maltreatment. And the other section is the administration of Arkansas's child abuse hotline. with me today I'd like to introduce two very important people in the division first Miss Debbie Roark who is the investigative administrator for the division and mr. Gary glisten who is our hotline administrator I'm a Jefferson County resident and look forward to working with each and every one of you
Speaker 69
28:52
Yes the juvenile ombudsman on behalf of the Public Defender Commission it's a fancy word which means I get a chance to be an advocate for the youth that are involved in our juvenile justice system most specifically the role is carved out for me to keep an eye on the Division of Youth Services Mr. Angel and I formed a very close relationship but I'm an independent body that gets a chance to observe those issues and provide commentary I'm very grateful for the
leadership and the members of this committee because you provide voice often for individuals whose voices are rarely heard so I'm thankful for your presence in your commitment to public service good morning
Speaker 72
29:45
my name is Renee Robinette I'm the director of the attorney of litem program for the state we work outside of the administrative office of the courts it's a branch of the Supreme Court of Arkansas we represent the kids
who've been abused and neglected in dependency neglect cases around the state so any child who's in foster care or where a petition has been filed declaring that the child is dependent neglected they're automatically assigned an attorney on litem our role is to independently investigate the facts of the case and to act as an attorney representative of that child to represent their best interest. So it's not necessarily a client-led representation like a typical attorney that you think of. Our role really is to look at the facts and to make a decision about what we think is the
best interest of the child and to make sure that all relevant facts are presented to the court so that the court can make a decision about the best interest of that child. So we will be here at the committee and we'll be glad to talk to anyone if you've got questions about how a particular bill might impact children and we certainly have an interest in that so thank you very much
Speaker 76
31:08
with the administrative office of the courts just like Miss Robinette's we work with the 25 local programs across the state that recruit train and supervise volunteer advocates for those children that have been removed from their home to do abuse or neglect we're there in the administrative office of the courts look forward to working with all of you this is my third day on the job so I'm learning right along with you I've been a director of a local CO CASA program and Child Advocacy Center in West Memphis for the last eight years years thank you
Speaker 77
31:52
and I'm assigned to the commit this committee this session it's the first time I've been in this
Speaker 54
31:58
committee I look forward to working with all of you I'm I'm a member of Representative Julian's District, so
Speaker 78
32:12
I'm looking forward to seeing you. Hi, I'm Lisa McGee. I'm with the Department of Human Services. I'm an attorney. My primary areas are in adult abuse, adult maltreatment, and child welfare. And
Speaker 79
32:20
so I'll be here a lot to provide assistance when bills are running through committee.
And I'm glad to see that there are two lawyers on the committee, so this is really great. So if there are any questions you have about areas of child welfare law or adult protective services law,
Speaker 6
32:38
I should be able to assist you. Okay, I think that everybody, as far as state agencies is
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
32:43
concerned, I do see at least one advocacy group out there. And if you would like to come and introduce yourself to the committee, if there are any other advocacy groups as well that usually will come before the committee, you're also welcome to let us know who you are as well.
Maria Reynolds-Diaz
Unverified
32:56
Good morning. My name is Maria Reynolds-Diaz, and I'm the state director for AARP in Arkansas. AARP is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization. We actually have 37 million members nationwide. Here in the state, we have 325,000 members. Here we provide advocacy on both federal and state issues.
We provide information and education and also community service on such issues as hunger, nursing home visitation, and advocacy, and other community service issues. We rely on the position of our board that selects our issues. This is a 22-member board that is made up of volunteers.
They get information from a policy council, and we are very proud that one of our very own Arkansans serves on this AARP National Policy Council, and that is Mary Dillard from Farmington. We rely a lot on our volunteers, so you will be seeing them. They quite often will be wearing red to catch your attention, and they reside in all of your districts.
We communicate with them through various measures. We have several issues that we are supporting this legislative session based on research and information that we have received, and that is Medicaid expansion. We feel that is good for Arkansas. Also, the implementation of the Affordable Care Act, such as health information technology and, of course, health insurance exchange.
We believe it would be better served to have the state run that program. And then, as always, long-term care issues. The balancing of long-term care services between institutional care and home and community-based services and giving people a choice as to, you know, where they want to receive care. I want to just share with you that we have a saying within AARP, and because we're nonpartisan, we have no permanent friends or enemies,
but we do have permanent issues that we work on. So we look forward to working with all of you. We have an array of information that we gather from different sources that we'd love to share with you. Please call on us. Our advocacy director is Herb Sanderson, who worked with the State Department on Aging and Adult Services for 25 years. We also have an outreach director and a communications director. You will see our state president, Sherry Walker, quite frequently.
and we all look forward to working with you. I also want to close by just saying thank you very much for your service to the state of Arkansas. We realize the many hours that you put in studying the issues, and we'd like to be of service to you.
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
36:31
Thank you. Any other advocacy groups that would like to come up and introduce yourselves? Okay. Looks like we've got done with all that. A couple of other things, this committee is broadcast, live-streamed over the Internet, and archived.
So whatever you do is being recorded. So just note that. But, again, it's a good tool for your constituents who may not be able to make it to Little Rock. They can watch over the Internet. If they work during the day, which I'm sure a lot of your constituents probably do, when they get home at night, if they really, really want to, They can pull up the archive and see what happened in the committee during that day. We do have tablets. This is brand new for this session. We didn't have them last session, so I'm sure that there's probably going to be some bugs
and some learning that will need to be done on them. Thanks to the staff, they do have a little cheat sheet for you to use there. But if you do have any questions about how to use or if you're having any problems using them, they'll be available to help you out there and if you want to stay after the committee today and get used to them or whatever then by all means please do so with that house leadership has directed that you will not be provided with a
hard copy of the bills because they will be on your tablet if you really want one if you want a hard copy a dedicated printer has been has been set aside in the committee room for us to be able to print them out the purpose is just try to save money so hopefully you'll be able to get used to the tablets and we won't have to do a whole lot of printing before we had you know stack sometimes you know that you had to go through I think that's about it vice chair I don't
know if you have anything to add or anything that we may have forgotten at all anybody I'm gonna throw this out to the committee anybody any of the the second or third termers that are coming back do y'all have anything else that you want to add or anything we forgot to mention yes room 130 will always be our meeting room I don't foresee that changing it could but if it does we'll let
Representative Randy Alexander
Unverified
38:53
you know on the technology issue you talked about
have we considered using Skype real-time for testimony that has
Speaker 84
38:58
been discussed but I don't know that they've
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
39:02
actually made a decision on that we do have I think we have the capability to do that in here and if we do where we can project it on a big screen and not have you know a little screen not on your iPad down there trying to hold it up you know I'll have to talk to the leadership and see what they want to do about that we do have one of the things
that we do in here I just again remembered this we do have reports quarterly reports and there are some monthly reports that we do go over we the first one will actually usually take place in the end term but what I wanted to do is I wanted to give you all an opportunity to look at the report the last report that came out so I've directed staff to go ahead and send that to your email so you should receive that today kind of gives you an overview
Speaker 46
39:57
again of that there will actually be two quarterly reports that I will send to
you they are the reports from the Division of Children and Family Services as well as the report from the Division of Youth Services so I'll be sending those to you after the meeting I believe it's important to get
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
40:15
that information into your hands now because if you know we feel that we need to make some changes or whatever it gives us plenty of time to be able to look over those reports to see to ask questions because when we get into the interim it's you know it's too late to pass a law or whatever the case may be to try to
improve some things so please take some time look over that report if you have any questions we've met the people today who will be able to answer the questions and so I hope you will contact them to be able to do that anything else I
Representative Warwick Sabin
Unverified
40:48
do have one question I should have asked you before the meeting and I forgot but mr. chair do you know anything about the subcommittee assignments and when those are
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
40:56
going to happen I'm glad you mentioned that because I needed to do that subcommittee we will start making those assignments but I didn't want to give you all a chance to request to be on a subcommittee I just didn't want to
put you on one so if you want to be put on a subcommittee let me know that you want to be put on otherwise I'll just fill you in however
Speaker 44
41:22
that is could you tell us what those subcommittees are yes from memory the first
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
41:27
one is basically the aging part the aging subcommittee I put out the second one has to do with children subcommittee and then the third one is military and legislative affairs so there
Speaker 25
41:40
are three subcommittees yes representing mr. chair I have a question on rules will it take a majority of the committee or a
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
41:56
majority of the quorum to conduct business to can actually conduct a business it is a majority of the committee meaning we need at least 11 folks to start off with now if it drops to 8 or 9 because some people had to slip out we will continue to do business we will continue to vote on
bills by voice vote okay now you now if it comes to a roll call vote on a bill it will take 11 regardless of how many people in the committee so just keep that in mind as you potentially will run bills as far as voice vote is concerned that's the way that we will use I'll do the best of my ability to make it determine either way whether bill passes or fails but the committee is yours if you want to do a roll call on a bill or on all the bills that is your discretion
you only need two people to do a roll call yes representative Scott yes we can and if you all have Twitter and can stand my tweets or whatever all we usually send out information via Twitter as well if you all use that any other questions from any members of the committee all right with that our first
meeting is adjourned next meeting will be Wednesday oh I'm sorry Cecile did you have something real quick I'm sorry Lisa I'm says
Speaker 91
43:32
Cecile's I know there's been a house rule about prohibition of using iPads for witnesses is that still going to be in
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
43:39
place now that you guys are using iPads I will check to make sure because that rule change was done yesterday and rules committee I will find out the details of it as far as I know if you know if it if it's been allowed for testimony and by all means yeah we will follow those rules okay
wonderful thank you okay so with nothing else our next meeting but will be Wednesday at 10 a.m. there are a couple of bills already on the agenda so as long as the presenters here we will go over those bills meeting adjourned
Agenda
No agenda available.
Documents
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Speakers
Venaria Vickersmith
Unverified
Speaker 2
Warwick Saban
Unverified
Representative Warwick Sabin
Unverified
Gary Deffenbaugh
Unverified
Representative Sue Scott
Unverified
Speaker 13
Representative Ken Bragg
Unverified
Representative Charlene Fite
Unverified
Speaker 18
Representative John Baine
Unverified
Representative Mary Broadaway
Unverified
Speaker 25
Speaker 26
Representative Deborah Ferguson
Unverified
Representative Bill Gossage
Unverified
Representative Patti Julian
Unverified
Randy Alexander
Unverified
Representative Randy Alexander
Unverified
Justin Harris
Unverified
Representative Jody Dickinson
Unverified
Representative Brent Talley
Unverified
Speaker 46
Speaker 55
Speaker 57
Speaker 58
Krista Hughes
Unverified
Speaker 63
Speaker 67
Speaker 69
Speaker 72
Speaker 76
Speaker 77
Speaker 54
Speaker 78
Speaker 79
Speaker 6
Maria Reynolds-Diaz
Unverified
Speaker 84
Speaker 44
Speaker 91