Joint Budget Committee
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Speaker 4
0:49
we're going to call joint budget together Everybody getting their seats all right members it's our
intent today to finish up today so we will not come back tomorrow and that all depends on the members, OK? when we do have questions I'm gonna go to the members of the committee first and then the nonmembers will ask
questions and for that we're gonna start off with the department of humanman Services Miss Walls you're you're
Lila Walls
Unverified
1:25
you're recognized thank you Mr Chair. my name is Lilaalce with the Bureau
Chair
Unverified
1:33
of Legislative Research. I'm going to present the appropriation for shared services and then follow with the presentation for the secretary's office without stopping. the appropriation for shared services is on page 50 of your manual this appropriation pays for personal services for the secretary and it's funded by interagency transfers from other
divisions for fiscal year 27, the legislative recommendation is for nearly356,000 dollars with no changes from current appropriated levels Next step is the secretary's office, their department summary is on page 52 of your manual. This appropriation pays for I'm sorry this division houses the core business functions for the department and has total authorized appropriations of approximately $86.6 million with650 positions utilized across the department. There's4 appropriations that are funded with general revenues, federal
funds and other funds the legislative recommendation for this division is approximately $86.7 million with no significant changes so I'm going to discuss the operations appropriation briefly on the second to the last line at the on the appropriation section in the summary it says DHS admin paying account also 896 is the number at the beginning. This is the operations appropriation for this division. It's funded with general revenue, federal funds and other sources that are determined primarily by the department's cost allocation plan This comprises the majority of the division's total
appropriations at nearly70 million dollars and this concludes my portion of this presentation. Thank you Miss wallace department do y'all have anything to
add you ready for questions? good morning chair yes sir we
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
3:08
would take questions we have nothing to add. OK. do we have any
questions for our staff or the department seeing none I'll take a motion for executive rec and a s in a second any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed
it is adopted Miss Wallace I think you're
Chair
Unverified
3:31
going on aren't you sir thank you Mr Chair. Next is the division of aging adult and Behavioral healthalthervices and their department appropriation summaries on pages62 and63 of your manual. This division provides support and protective services to physically disabled adults older adults and adults with behavioral health issues and also coordinates the state's substance abusereatment and prevention efforts in fiscal year 26, the division has total authorized appropriations
about318.9 million dollars with 1,197 positions and 13 appro pri ations funded with general revenues, federal funds and various program support. let me stop you our mic system is low I'm just talking about the volume so
get it as close to your mouth as you can we have members having trouble hearing thank you do you want me to start over or
continue No you're go go ahead from there sir the
Chair
Unverified
4:19
total legislative recommendation for this division is approximately318.9 million dollars with no significant changes and I'd like to direct
the committee to preparations that may be of interest. we're going to talk about their operations appropriation which is about halfway down in the appropriation section it says 896 division of ag g ing Adult and Behavioral healthalth. this is the pay salaries and operational expenses for the division including the operations at the state hospital and Arkansas healthalth Center and it's funded with general revenue, federal funds and various program support and comprises about half of the total appropriation amount for the division at $148.5 million. The line directly below that it's listed as 898 is the division's
grantspaying appropriation which is the primary appropriation for services to older adults across the state including funds that flow to senior citizen center s it's funded with general revenue, federal funds and various program support for a total appropriation of56.6 million dollars. There are also two appropriations that don't have expenditures at the top because they were moved here via governor's letter in 2025. those are the appropriations on line four for the medicaid tobacco settlement program and online e which is theendenthoices grant
the actual expenditures for fiscal year 25 are listed in the pages for the division of provider services and quality assurance which is where those appropriations came from. and this concludes my presentation for this division.
members we have any we have some questions we'll start off with Representative Kavanaugh you're recognized Hold on
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
6:16
Thank you Mr chairir. thank you thank y'all for coming. not that you had much choice
but thank you for being here. page on67 and actually69 it's dealing with the drug abuse and treatment and the the mental health grants I noticed that we're projecting a big increase in federal funding. iss that money that we're expecting for specific programs
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
6:47
So I think that the the amount you're looking at we're not expecting any increases in our grant funds that are coming in for either of those we have block grants that we get biiannually and then we have three discretionary grants so we're not expecting increases in any of those
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
7:06
grants at this time. OK, well the reason I'm asking is your federal revenue shows your actual was 27.9 but you're asking for56.7 in federal funding so our
are we expecting a jump in federal funding to
Speaker 31
7:26
that amount So I think the the way this is working is that we always are spending basically a year behind because it's in a federal fiscal year and so when that money comes forward, so right now we're paying for our from our block grants from the previous federal fiscal year and so we're always bringing that forward so we need that space we also are looking
at sometimes we do get increases and sometimes there are changes we also occasionally get technical assistance grants that we have the opportunity so we want to make sure that we have the opportunity to go after any grants if they come up but we're not expecting there are sometimes changes in both of those block grant amounts but they are formulary grants and we don't know about that in advance. Typically we get you know very little notice. thank you
thank you representativesenator rice Hold on Thank you Mr chair you recognized thank you uhrector
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
8:39
mann. if if you would go back over heard you say seniors I'm sorry I'm having a little trouble hearing what was the seniors you
were talking about whoever whoever was given that I'm sorry
Speaker 8
8:58
yes sir that was for the appropriation summary for 898 which is for includes the funds that flow to senior citizen centers and
Chair
Unverified
9:06
that's on page hang on just a minute 78 of the manual itself and it has different line items that are included in there and senior citizen centers is one of them. and you know I can get back into cue but
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
9:22
I've got questions on on that with you on it now or
OK and director mann can you tell me on on the senior centers on a division of adult and
aging are we going backwards on those? thank you for the questions Senator Rice. um, I will start and thenrector Hill will correct me if I
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
9:52
get this wrong. We it has been bumpy due to just pull that mic to you it'll come over
yes sir here how about I just scoot up? Is that better? yes sir it was it has been bumpy with government shutdown and potential shutdown and then the flow of federal funds timely after
the shutdown. We are back to normal levels is my understanding. I'm looking atrector Hill to shake his head yes. So I do not believe we are going backwards. I think it's been timing and on senior centers specifically
Yesir. some of the older Americans actct were halted during the shutdown so it did impact some of the functions of the senior centers but not the senior centers in
total. is there going to be makeup money
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
10:46
for that time so senator that fund has been those funds
Speaker 60
10:53
have been received when the shutdown occurred the funding for the older Americans Act comes in
Speaker 62
10:57
several different streams it's all under title the majority of it's under
tile3wo of the specific lines of funding the agency exhausted for supportive services and for congregate meals once the government once the shutdown ended those funds were received the senior senator the tripleA's area agcies on aging who are the pass through for the funding that goes to the senior centers have received that funding and so we are not
Speaker 59
11:24
in a deficit from what we expected to receive and it's not addressed
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
11:28
it at any of y'all particularly at the table but It'll say this for the state of Arkansas
I continually ask I have for the last few years and and tried to abvocate for our nursing homes our assisted livings our senior centers just seniors in general because they deserve our respect and if we as a state and a nation can't show that but yet we can give extra millions of dollars to to
households that have incomes that can private school with or without any assistance of the state and I'm not saying I'm against that and we're not doing enough for some seniors and that's shameful in my my book. so I wish we would think about that in this budget session and see if we can't do something we've got senior centers that have shut some mills down and if we can do anything and we can hire these consultants
for mega buckx. let's put some money and show some respect to people that live before us and worked hard and have done everything they should and try to help them out a little bit and again not addressed that y'all appreciate what you do appreciate the the fact that I think you're concerned but you're only gonna do what we tell you to do and what we put money out there to do so I Mr chairir I'll offer that for all ho to chew on thank you thank you senator
Representative Nicole Clowney
Unverified
13:12
Representative clowney thank you chair thank you I am looking at page73 and I was kind of getting settled when y'all were doing the overview so apologies if I missed this already but I'm curious about these numbers for the medicaid tobacco settlement programme I'm seeing there was zero spend in 2425 and then it was in the budget last year agency requests for the upcoming year is0. can you just walk me through what's going on with those numbers? the tobacco settlement funds came to the division in the in
Speaker 60
13:44
the 25 session previously these this program was housed with our division of provider services quality assurance this supports the options counseling program sorry if I'm not close enough these funds support the options counseling program let me stop you right now. The more mickes we have onish youics
you turned your mic off you're not using it. it kind of helps pick it up. thank you so the funding since 25 this is the first subsequent
Speaker 60
14:07
year that the funding has actually been in division of agging Adulthavior healthalervis which would be why you're only you're seeing it is now
Representative Nicole Clowney
Unverified
14:17
ok and then what about the agency request being zero for the upcoming year? Miss
Speaker 8
14:30
Miss Walls the agency requests that are listed here are the agency requests that were also in the
Chair
Unverified
14:34
2024 regular session budget hearings so there were not this was not a thing then so thank you and there are but there are expenditures in these appropriations they're just in a different division of the department so even though
Representative Nicole Clowney
Unverified
14:50
they're in the 2627 column they are about the 2425 year while the expenditures
Chair
Unverified
14:54
for those for that division because they were made for another division for the division of provider Services and quality assurance those expenditures are in their section further on in
Speaker 89
15:03
the manual and if you'd like me to I can refer you to those pages
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
15:11
let me try to clarify we are moving these these expenditures to the division of agging and Adult Services withhavial healthal. The previous expenses
will be found located in another division dippsquaw provider and quality assurance ok thank you
yes you re representative ok Representative wooten you're
Speaker 758
15:40
recognized for a question thank you thank you Mr Chairman. I want to follow up on the comments
made by Senator Rice the senior citizens
have served the study well and this this the sinners are would not being taken care of as as in in financially like they should be and and I don't see any big increase in your budget for for the senior centers No sir there's there's very little increases in our budget for
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
16:19
anything this year we are
operating within our means and we are serving our citizens as as adequately and as it's the past couple of years with a flat budget and so that's what we are striving for
Speaker 758
16:35
is is is the request coming from the federal government to hold the spending down or
is it coming from the governor's office how how Mr Wooten yes in on the
last budget we outside the RSA we put an additional $2 million for fiscal 26 and27 so they do have
additional funding coming but it's outside the
Speaker 758
16:59
RSA right just to kind of follow up and I'm
I'm getting an awful lot of complaints relative to families developmentally challenged centers in that type of thing relative to employment what
what is your total employment in your department total employment in the department of humanman Services
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
17:28
is approximately6603 employees and I think you were referring to the HDCs or the human development centers which is housed in our DdS budget so we have approximately 2500 employees of that6600 delivering direct care and it is an ongoing not it is an ongoing practice we do turn over a lot of those position s so we are consistently hiringc andAs and working through that
hiring and training process for the HDCs what was it your total employment
Speaker 758
18:03
for the total department yes sir for the department of
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
18:07
humanman Services total is660 and maybe three or it's a little over6600, about6,610 at the most of those how many vacancies are over two years old of the
Speaker 758
18:17
vacancies that are two years older two years or older
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
18:30
I think according to Ms Eubanks just said we have about 95 positions that fell in that two year or older category. just 95 out of6600 positions yes
Speaker 758
18:40
sir but you what worries me about that is the fact
that how many of those are budgeted well we have a combination of budgeted and unbudgeted but we
Speaker 125
19:00
have budgeted about6,600 positions see that's that's what worries
Speaker 758
19:04
me. I I don't know that the secretaries and the and the director division directors and others are keeping up with the with the number of employees that that positions are over two years old and their budgeted thank you Mr
Chair
Unverified
19:25
Chairman. thank youpresentativesenator flowers you're recognized for Hold on
Speaker 130
19:35
There you go thank you Mr chairir trying to
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
19:44
figure out the summary for and I'm on page 62 the department appropriation summary the funding sources it seems like there's not the highest amount coming from general revenue how do we know where
each of the funding sources I guess a special revenue is spelled out for tobacco and meals on wheels transportation but and I don't know if that's a part of this summary or not but'm trying to figure out what does the general revenue and all these other funding sources pay for is that delineated
Speaker 136
20:44
Yes ma'am. so we will use the state revenue listed here and match it with the
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
20:51
federal revenue to provide the services for the aging and adult services and the behavioral health services that are that are in this division that includes the ash the psychiatric hospital it also includes the Arkansas Health Center which is the state's nursing home and then it includes federal grants for aging and older Americans and it includes grants for substance abuse and mental health.
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
21:15
OK, so you're just there representing the division of aging adultt and Behavial healthalth what about these other programs community alcohol safety alcohol and drug abuse prevention do you all administer that too yes ma'am we do administer
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
21:34
the community alcohol safety and the alcohol and drug abuse prevention programs or what does that involve it's
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
21:47
about $2.5 million where is that funding source is that your federal revenue grants our
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
21:55
community alcohol and safety programme is a program that is for providing services for individuals who've gotten a adWI or DUi and that comes from AoJ funds and then there's some funds where the individual who's received that ticket pays in for receiving a service, um,
basically a class ok so
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
22:21
the administration of justice funding that's allocation of55% back in 26 and40% projected for 27 so where is is that fund a part of the state revenue the general revenue or is that a cash fund
and there's zero for that where is that reflected in the funding sources that's that's funds that we
Speaker 147
23:03
received dispersed to us from another state agency so that would be a transfer interagency transfer yes
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
23:14
that's correct but you have zero in this table
on page 63 so I believe
Speaker 156
23:33
if you look at the individual pages so if you look on page 65 you
Speaker 147
23:40
will see the allocation there on the line that ends470 statedministration of justice there so that's that's where that is rather than in the summary tab so
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
24:00
executive and legislative recommendation also is that all that's received to that that is our projected
Speaker 165
24:10
allocation pursuant to the footnote that's correct for the community alcohol safety
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
24:16
programme yes ma'am so does that reflect the defendant or whoever's been
ordered to go and get these services their fees that they pay
where are they represented don't know that would be in another
Speaker 165
24:37
agency's budget we're just the end recipient of this percentage of those funds but you do receive them yes those funds come back to us through the
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
24:49
provider of that service. So when those come to us it comes in in a different funt and then we send that back out so we combine those two pots
of money the AOJ funding and the funding that we received from the provider
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
25:03
and then we send that back out to the provider to provide those um, those
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
25:10
drug court or those drug alcohol education programs why wouldn't it
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
25:15
be reflected in your budget as to a funding source
as a funding source I mean who who where would you
find numbers of how much is being paid
by individuals that are receiving these services It it is in the various programs
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
25:43
support that's where it's coming in on page 65 on the various program support line DoesdF andA want to come forward
you got it right you look very complex over there I was
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
26:12
a little worried about you. but I don't see anything that's being recommended in the last historical data was from 2242025 for various program support and that was a million dollars I'm trying to understand where is that money reported
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
26:42
en a ture flowers I think we we're gonna have to take that one back and get you some um, more detailed answers we receive that money as a transfer and then we use it to provide programs and those programs are eligible for beneficiaries recipients that have received DWIs and then we pay for those courses. So I after after that flow of money, those further details we would we would have to take back and and get some further details for
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
27:13
you. Well I, I'd like to see how the funds are traced should be reflected and how many people are using that service because that's not a whole lot of money for that program you're operating all
over the state aren't you? yes ma'am we are
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
27:33
operating all over the state. Those those programs are provided in group settings so they're not individual education programs and so they are running those classes as people in those
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
27:44
areas, received those court orders to attend classes so they're being run you know regularly in each of those areas and the
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
27:53
same thing for the alcohol and drug abuse prevention which receives a recommendation much greater than the community alcohol safety and I would think there has to be some referrals for the alcohol and drug abuse prevention as well yes ma'am. so the alcohol and drug abuse
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
28:16
prevention is to pay for treatment services both prevention and then treatment services. So those treatment services include outpatient counseling residential counseling and so if someone is identified at that point and needs treatment then they come over under that drug alcohol program or their insurer pays for that treatment and so the49 million there that's
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
28:46
reimbursement or at least reflects the cash fund source and there's zero
on that at funding sources at the bottom yes ma'am that
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
29:00
that specific alcohol and drug abuse prevention is primarily federally funded so this is our
the executive recommendation is our recommend our request for appropriation to be able to deliver those treatment services and the money
comes from the feds a lot of
it does the majority of it does. yes
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
29:23
ma'am. OK. I'd be interested in in
knowing how many people are served under those two programs the community al co ho l safety and alcohol and drug abuse prevention. Yes ma'am,
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
29:37
that to you thank you thank you Mr chairir. one other question I had ok well this one is short. it was a follow up about the tobacco settlement
the questions that you got from the representative so why do we still have this page 73 if if some other agency
is administering can you I'm trying to understand why there's no agency request
but there's a legislative recommendation and an executive recommendation senator the program is not administered by another agency it is administered in the
Speaker 62
30:24
to aging adult serviceshavial healthal from provider services and quality assurance which is just another ss another division withindHS but the program is operational and does they do work every day
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
30:38
so your agency then is satisfied that whatever is not accounted for specifically
laid out under agency requests is rolled up in some is that shared services what are
we talking about? I don't understand where
do you find the 1 point 3 million in terms of your agency that was
Speaker 165
31:07
originally contained in provider services and quality assurance under our biennial budget then in the in the course of those hearings we filed a governor's letter requesting that the program appropriation and funding be moved to
aginghaal health so that the services would align better and so it's a lateral transfer from 11 division within DHS to the other just don't understand why we need
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
31:35
then page73 why aren't those numbers senator why don't you let the staff get
with you and you're going a little farther
in detail than and and they I think they do that better one on one thank you thank you senator Petty
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
31:54
you're recognized thank you Mr Chair. my questions are around the mental health grant and and more specifically the veteran's mental mental healthal grant I I noticed that there's a a fairly sizable anticipated federal revenue increase in the mental health grants but my question is more around the the veteran's mental health and I'm I'm wondering if it it's on page 86. it talks about not
having a funding source yet and I'm wondering if the anticipated increase in federal funding is a possible source for funding some of the veteran's mental health grants because it at at least at this point it shows there's no funding source identified. just can you comment to that in general so for our mental
health um, and that's a block grant and that's that we received that
biiannually and we we spend all of that on
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
33:01
currently on community mental healthal centers so that goes out to community mental health centers and then there's required federal set asides for certain programs for that as well so we have to direct
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
33:13
some of that to different programs supporting people with serious mental illness and for children and youth with serious emotional disturbance and so those funds come
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
33:22
into us and then we send them out to the community mental health centers
largely to pay for services for individuals that are not insured largergely what we have now of individuals who are not insured are those that are in our forensic system. So when people go to jail, they're medicaid is turned off or their commercial insurance and so we have to provide services for people, um, either in jail, um, as their moving towards our state hospital so all of that money is committed and spread across
the state and covering all75 counties and all71 jails. Follow up Mrir. OK, thank
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
34:10
you for that explanation on the the mental health portion can you comment on the veteran's mental healthal there's a appropriation request for5 million that that I think we'd all probably like to find funding for but do you have you internally identified any potential funding sources or had any conversations about that it originally had some funding attached to it that was before
Speaker 31
34:33
so Jay's talked to me about that and we have not
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
34:36
had any additional funding for that program and again, you know with our mental health block grant we've had to allocate all that money to
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
34:43
those services and so we don't have an additional funding for that I would just like I would just like to add that this
was a member's bill that was appropriation only and has not been funded. realized that I just was wondering
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
35:01
if you guys had had any success identifying from
other sources funding and I'm assuming the the regular for lack of a better description mental health grants they don't exclude veterans this just this member's we just haven't identified a a funding source yet. yes sir that is correct. OK thank you thank you Mr Chair. thank you senator
Senator Tucker you're recognized thank you Mr Chair. I'm gonna
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
35:32
ask y'all about CSU funding it's
on page 88. I see Paula she's not shocked to know that that's what I would be asking about I just see where I I'm just curious. I mean is the funding gonna I see the legislative recommendation the executive recommendation
is5 million each. in the budget this last year it was3,240,000 but is the funding gonna remain consistent or what's our situation? so
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
36:04
currently we have two CSUs
in operation. and so we are funding those two CSUs at the level that they had
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
36:13
been funded at in previous years and we are looking at that full crisis continuum and making sure that we can provide crisis services and really doing that analysis of why those CSUs um, were not successful or why they were not able to stay open so really thinking about how do we use that crisis funds to get us to that goal that was originally
set that we have for the the crisis stabilization unit so we we have that money for crisis services but so the
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
36:46
funding for Craighead in Sebastian County is going to remain consistent it is for next year ok and I know I mean what happened in Pulasi County is the provider left and I know the county still look you know looking for a successor provider and if they were able to identify one would they be able to pick their funding back up or we've worked with them on that successor
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
37:12
provider had many conversations with potential providers and no one's been able to come to the table. I will say that we are doing you know we have some crisis funding that came through another source and we are
Senator Jim Petty
Unverified
37:24
looking at analysis of that and to see how we can best support um, Pulaski County in using crisis funds in the in the most expedient way so we're looking at that working with imMs and doing some other things with ambulance services and then care coordination to make
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
37:39
sure that people are getting to the right
source. great ok that all sounds good.
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
37:45
I guess my I mean 11 thing that just caught my attention is that if you if you look at the budget page on 88 it says you know it's got4.8+ million in excess appropriation and you know with nothing and gr or whatnot and just from a financial standpoint iss that may
be similar to what some of the other members have been asking about on other appropriations but I'm just curious
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
38:20
I begin and and Paula will correct me we have funded we have funded that with a combination of state and federal monies depending on the grants that have come through so we we will continue to to do that but this this general revenue is very tight and flat for crisis. We try to match money and use it we have added some medicaid services for 23 hours or less trying to have the ability to grow those crisis services
that has not seen the uptake that we would like it
to take, which is why we are continuing the crisis study for the whole continuum of what
Senator Clarke Tucker
Unverified
39:01
needs to be there. OK but either way the the funding will be there one way or another is what you're telling me. yeah ok
all right thank you thank you senator senator Irvin you're recognized thanks
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
39:16
just a really simple question on the community alcohol safety grants not to
beat that one but on page 65 you have a a pretty you have a fund balance there if there is a fun and I'm not sure if the aoJ funding that comes over is there ever a a is there a mechanism to where if you already have enough funds in your fund balance that that transfer is not necessary that you have the ability or mechanism to to do that or to to not have the transfer from the state AOJ fund or
redirect those funds those allocations are in special
Speaker 147
40:03
language so we get what is allocated to us so the AOJ funding that you
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
40:09
get is is through special language OKok and is it I'm just curious that maybe we could look at that just because if we have an ample amount of
money in a program utilizing a fund balance and we can redirect or allow for the ability of a little bit more flexibility with the AOJ fund that maybe we should look at revisiting some of that special language in my opinion just because there could be other areas which have been identified I think by several other of my colleagues where maybe we could look at how we can better utilize these funds instead of having them just sit in a fund balance how
do we get them out the door? And so if you've got a fund balance and it's not necessary for us to receive a transfer from AoJ how can we give the flexibility to your agencies to make that determination you could bring it back for us obviously i or something like that but I'd like to be able to see some flexibility there where we're not just stacking money up in a fund balance and that we don't need if we don't need it. so that makes sense? so if you will look at that for me I'd really appreciate it and then my second question is on
the patient benefits was that legislatively created. I mean it's not much money but it's kind of interesting to me but what page are you on what page are you on
I'm sorry the patient benefits it's cash and treasury so it looks like it's donations and interest and parking meters proceeds on page se9 I'm just wondering if that was legislatively created or
how is that determined? how is that you know I would need
Speaker 147
42:02
to would need to take a look at the history on that and can definitely get back
Speaker 169
42:08
to you but you're correct it is supported with just the funds outlined here some donations and
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
42:15
things of that nature. OK, so you know I just this one doesn't seem like a real clear use of money to me or how it gets used
or applied for or thank you senator so the funds those
Speaker 60
42:32
funds are divided between both the state hospital and the Arkansas healthalthenter and primarily what we use that for are for personal needs
Speaker 62
42:38
for residents when they have no s that they have no revenue source they have no family for instance we often get admissions that come to us with literally what they're
Speaker 60
42:48
wearing and nothing else and so we're able to buy some of the just the very basic needs that they have just for the residency the long term residency whether it's at the
hospital or at the at the at the
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
43:03
health center. well I I appreciate that in my opinion again in my opinion when it says patient benefits that means patients in every single part of the state and anyone, I just think maybe let's be a little more specific about exactly what the need is and how we title that. Maybe just because I think that's worthwhile and I think that's worthy and if people want to donate to something like that let's be specific that these are these that this is a fund
specifically for that and let's title it that way in my opinion just because patient benefits just seems like well what's that well can I apply for that you know or can my patientssuly for that and if I'm it just seems wonky to me so let's just try to I I appreciate it. it's a great thing. I myself might want to donate it to it but I wouldn't know what it's actually going for and so if we can be more clearly defined in it, maybe people will continue to donate to it because that's a
worthy cause that's a worthwhile thing they've I know this because you've got people that are lingering in county jails and then they get to ash they have nothing absolutely nothing and this is a fund from what you're saying that provides for just their very basic things that they need and may be a comfort, a blanket something like that we can provide you with a
Speaker 62
44:20
summary of how those funds are utilized that'd be awesome and let's just
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
44:23
kind of look at trying to be more intentional and focused on how we're talking about this and how we label it so that the the
state knows and that people know hey this is available and you can make a donation to the cash treasury and people can be taken care of. I think that'd be a really cool thing. thanks. thank
Chair
Unverified
44:43
you senator that's the last member of the committee we're going to nonmembers now senator Love you're recognized thank you Mr chairir. So
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
44:52
actually wendy just pointed out something to me I want to go back to the senior centers what page are you on? I'm on page 8
so the senior centers I'm looking at for 20242025 the actual was a little over7 million dollars. The budget was at5 million so we're looking
at now we're looking at about a $10 million increase so no sir they're appropriated for 10 million. they're budget
Speaker 60
45:24
the state general revenue line is for5 million. The excess appropriation does give us some room
Speaker 62
45:29
to expend additional funds when those are received for
instance each year there is ad there's a swee up to500,000 of general revenue from the agency that goes to the senior centers as the chairman mentioned there was an additional 2 million that was granted to senior centers outside of RSA both this current fiscal year and then ends for the upcoming fiscal year and so the excess appropriation allows us that bandwidth to be able to infuse those funds that are designated for senior centers outside of the base5 million that is that is funded to the agency
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
46:05
well guess my question is cause I noticed that the that it was funded outside of RSA why are we not funding why are we
not putting that funding inside of RSa that's not a question for them that's that's something we did well then Mrir I wanted to come to you why is it that we're not funding it within RSA Well I mean is is that gonna be one time funding or is it not one time funding because we did it two years,
that's something we'll revisit in the next regular session. OK all
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
46:44
right so would would think that we should be funding it within RSA right so let's go to the senior hunger program I noticed that there was no and not think the senior hunger the singing hunger the mills and wheels
Speaker 62
47:10
Yes senator so those are two different programs the senior hunger program there was an appropriation grant to the agency but there was no there was no funding attached to that was that
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
47:20
a member's bill what's the case ok alright so that would be a separate from the meals on wheels I see that we that we requested the $2.4 million for meals on wheels correct is that yes so the meals
Speaker 247
47:33
on wheels is funded primarily through cigarette tax those and it is not a it's not a tax based on
Speaker 62
47:41
amount of sales it's a per pack tax it fluctuates from year to year it is appropriated at 2.4 I believe but what you see the funding request really follows the trend from the past us do you see us re ce iv ing the $2.4 million is that is that why
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
47:53
you you projected that? I mean like where did that number come from re ce iv ing the $2.4 million is that is that why you
Speaker 62
48:01
you projected that? I mean like where did that number come fromion for appropriation but what we've seen in the really the last several years is a relative is a steady decline even if it's gradual and the number of cigarettes that are
sold in the state so I guess I'm still at
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
48:17
the at the the point the $2.4 million you put for the appropriation do you do you foresee that amount
coming in or you not see that amount coming in where did that number come from? Why did you all put the $2.4 million versus what would the projected actual be so that we could look we could look to see if we needed to fund it the ills on wheels
Speaker 272
48:42
program so the budget request is what the projection is is is
Speaker 62
48:48
what we do project to receive an actual funds from the from the tax revenue we would love to have obviously if if we say
Speaker 60
48:55
loved I guess I shouldn't say we want more people to smoke in the state. I won't say that don't say that don't say that but I understand what
Speaker 269
49:03
you yeah ginn is like no not don't say that no no I understand what you're saying. I just want to know
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
49:09
if the if the $2.4 million that you're
that you're putting for the budget do you anticipate that revenue coming in is that an actual projection not based on our projections no sir OK so where did that number come from? why are we using the $2.4 million and that a a number that's more representative of what's going to be generated in sales tax that that that has been a historical request it was at
Speaker 247
49:36
one time that was much more closer to what the tax revenues to the
Senator Fredrick J. Love
Unverified
49:44
agency were OK so are we falling short on
Speaker 60
49:51
the ills and wheels programme? no sir the ills and wheels program is not the only funding stream that funds meal services home delivered meals those funds are those services are also provided through our TitleI funding through the older Americans Act and so our senior centers
Speaker 62
50:04
our tripleAs also have funding streams under Title3C2 which funds homeliy meals as well Meals on wheels is a supplement to that program OK all right thank you thank you Mrir.
Chair
Unverified
50:14
thank you senator p re s ent ative Ladydyman
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
50:26
you're recognized for a question thank you Mr Chairman. just so you catch up with me here I'm looking at page 150 and my question is about employees kinda adding to what Representative Woootten asked earlier about you have I think 95 sorry
Speaker 66
50:46
we hadn't got that to the division yet. Well I just want to look at the numbers but just just hold on to that thought and then when we get there you can ask a question well my que I'll
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
50:58
forget the page number I still got a question OK go ahead uhpresentative Wooton asked about how many people you had or positions that were over two years old you said 95. so when I'm looking at this page ondd over here you're down 164 employees there
and my question is and I know that we've got issues with positions that we cannot fill because of the requirements of the position. I'll give you an example in Arkadelphia at the at the humanvelopmententer I think they have 12 Rm positions and you only have5 filled and you're doing contract nursing. I know that the work center up in Boonville was ladyman we haven't got to that part
Speaker 66
51:41
of the budget yet. you're asking questions before even review I'm just giving some
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
51:47
background Mr Chairman so I'll just ask my question. these positions that are open are they open because we we're we don't need to fill them are they open because they'recNRA's RNs, physical therapists that you cannot feel because people there aren't people that'll take those positions so so which is it it's a
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
52:13
answer it pos you know in total that positions are
either hard to fill or they are um, well I don't know what the second part of your question was that we are filling those positions regularly recruiting and retention has picked up in several different areas after the pay plan and so we are trying to to see that see that level out specifically with nursing but it's also an ongoing discussion point because we do hire a lot ofc andAs that are turnover and so we are always recruiting and trying to retain if we cannot fill those
positions due to staffing ratios we will go to the staffing contracts
so that we do not jeopardize the health of any of our beneficiaries. Well I
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
53:00
mean the point I'm trying to make is some of these positions you can't feel because in Arkadelphia you've had those oriental positions open for years has not been able
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
53:11
to fully cannot answer s specifically to a position in Arkadelphia. I can talk in in total forddS and other areas of the agency that
we are always trying to recruit and retain. OK. all right
Chair
Unverified
53:26
thank you Senator Dismay you're recognized just a quick question I
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
53:30
think it's just something I'd like to see as we continue to have a conversation about what we're going to do with our senior citizen centers and our meals on wheels programs and all those sorts of things I mean those aren't state agencies and and I know that some cities counties make it a priority to you know add funding to those programs and I mean I hate to give y'all homework but if we're we I think
it's important that we have a bigger conversation about who's willing to engage and creates and sets a priority for those programs back home and who does not I understand there are limitations on how much money cities and counties have and some are in poor areas than others but I think it would be really really important for us as members if we can get the numbers of what is being contributed by each city and county to the various whether it be senior citizen centers or meals on wheel programs or the combination of the two so that we understand
again how they prioritize their needs in those areas so and then that will help educate us on should that be matching should it be you know what what should that look like and and I don't know enough to know that maybe you already be the case I mean if you know a city wants to you know make it a priority in its budget to send50,000 dollars to its senior citizen center where the county does every year do we match that or are we actually you know do they when we send50,000 do they
pull back50,000 and then we've actually then created a funding issue for the senior citizen centers because we're contributing so again in a bigger picture as we move through this and we fortunately as the co-chairs said we've got a little bit of time hopefully we can get our heads wrapped around of what we need to be doing. So again Id I hate to create homework but if that's something that we can get I think it'd be great for the members to see. Yes sir I think we can try to obtain
Speaker 125
55:19
some information and and be more than happy to come back and even potentially bring of our
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
55:26
partners that work on that those projects also yeah I mean the feds
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
55:30
are you know trimming down their fund spend we're being asked to backfill
that I mean and there should be some responsibility at the city and county level just to make sure that they have gut skin in the game and they also too care about what it is we're working on thank you thank you senator this is our last question senator
ye mean excuse me Representative Rye well no Lee Johnson wants to ask a question yes sir I'll I'll try to keep this as brief as
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
55:56
possible as just have a question miss Mr Charman where is the line item within this that covers the transportation back and forth for the folks that they're picking up and taking to the senior citizen center for for their launch and plus meals on wheels they tell me that there's nothing there at all and it's been this way for years. I mean what what can we do to make sure they have the proper transportation
Speaker 60
56:28
so transportation is included under theiritle3b services those are the supportive services that the area agencies are funded to pass that funding through to each senior center it's it is dispersed on a set federal funding formulas so that everybody gets all the senior centers get the amount of money that is proportionate to the population but transportation is something is really one of the primary uses of that
Speaker 73
56:52
defunding for for for all of our counties
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
56:58
yes sir but it's not happening and and it needs to happen because why do you want to have a program if they can't even get there to it it's in it's in panto pan to p re s ent ative
Speaker 60
57:13
I'll address that with our senior senators and I can get back with you with some follow up information Help us with this
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
57:22
please sir thank you Mr Chair. thank youpresentative that's the final question
we have a motion to approve executive rec in a second any discussion all in favor say aye any you opposed it is adopted Thank y'all
Miss Walls we're going on to family services yes sir the next division
Chair
Unverified
57:51
we're going to talk about is the division of Children and Family Services their appropriation summary is on page 100 of your manual. this division provides support services foster care, adoption and protective services for
children and families across the state for fiscal year 26, it has total authorized appropriations of about315 million with 1420 positions and six appropriations funded with general revenues, federal funds and various program support to legislative recommendation for this division is about315 million dollars with no significant changes. I'll discuss the operation's appropriation briefly on the third line in the appropriation summaries is the operations appropriation for this division it's funded with general revenues, federal funds and various program support and does
fund the people who are the frontline workers and the rest of the operations of the division at nearly $148 million. This comprises almost half the total appropriations for this division. I'd also like to point out to the committee that there are two line items that are both labeled foster care. the appropriation that's listed online too is for payments for foster care placements of children who are currently in the care of the state. The appropriation is almost entirely funded by general revenue. there's another foster care appropriation that's listed
online for this one not only supports payments for kids in foster care but also adoption subsidies for harder to place children once they've been adopted and services for foster children 16 years and older to help them prepare for independent living in adulthood and this appropriation is funded by general revenues and federal funds and this concludes my presentation for this division. Members do
we have any questions Representative rose you're recognized yes thank you Mr chairir
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
59:36
you mentioned that there were no
significant changes appreciate your presentation just a quick question. I was just looking at the 2425,2526 and then the 2627 request and it does seem that there has been an increase over those kind of those past three years of whether it's budgeted actual or recommendations. I was just curious if you could explain that from 2425 actual to the recommendation 2627 it's
about a30 million dollar increase. Could you touch on that? What
what what that is from and what that is funding Yes sir thank you
Speaker 125
1:00:19
for the question I'm I'm going to start andrector Wright and and Miss Eubanks will try will
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:00:26
add in we have added some things for state residential treatment. We are trying to also
increase some of our adoption subsidies. Did I get that rightrector right?
Speaker 323
1:00:42
what you see is an increase so go ahead there is the funding is there in the request for the
Speaker 324
1:00:48
appropriation remains there because of the flexibility that we need within our budget because we cannot plan for children who are entering and exiting our system as well as the as the services that we need to provide to prevent foster care. you also see that we are continuing to increase the number of adoptions that we're doing and when we do that and the child qualifies or the sibling group qualifies for a subsidy that is a state that
the cost that is a cost the state continues to bear if it is a federal subsidy or a state subsidy so you see that continued increase happening briefef
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:01:26
couple of followups the first Miss Walls I think it was you and the original presentation. you said that there was no funding change no
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:01:32
no significant funding change. Did I interpret that correctly or or or did we miss something?s changes in the levels of appropriation that
Chair
Unverified
1:01:42
this agency is asking for appropriation and funding are very different things so they're not asking
Speaker 19
1:01:47
for additional appropriation at this time. OK, I I follow one other question
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:01:55
that I have if it's ok to I don't want to jump too
far ahead on on page 106. I think that this is kind of what makes up your funding here so I hope I'm not deterring there are the professional fees I look back
over you know the past 10 years and it had been relatively level maybe some minor changes until the last couple of years and I look at the 2526 budgeted amount which was 15.5 million and then the authorized amount was33.2 million and you guys went ahead with the same kind of request and recommendation for 2627. I was just curious if you could speak to kind of the doubling of the professional
fees that are listed between the last year or two so this is
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:02:53
our all of our our new staff training onboarding of staff as
Speaker 324
1:02:57
well as travel vacant operating expenses our salaries and our fringe so this is where all of the pay plan and all of that and all of that went into effect for us and so the professional fees is around our new staff training and so as we continue to on
board and hire and train staff and then if they exit the agency we start again with training so that would be what that is so
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:03:26
those those are the professional fees are the expenses for training and onboarding new staff and personnel and then other and
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:03:33
then the other costs that go into that as well including this the operating their fringe etc. and I
Speaker 324
1:03:40
don't mean to belabor the point you mentioned operating
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:03:46
but that's a different line item so I was just trying to figure out where is are these are these grants or contracts with with vendors or training specific groups ok no that's fine all
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:03:54
right thank you Representative painter you're recognized for a question. Thank you Mr Chair. how many vacancies do we have in this
Chair
Unverified
1:04:04
department? Since that was a topic of conversation last department let's let's ask it this department
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:04:22
approximately 113. What's the average length or the highest we have out there last one was like 2 years or plus and if you don't have it you can get that to
Speaker 349
1:04:35
me. I just, I would like to know that it right here I'm sorry so we have 9 positions that have been vacant for
Speaker 324
1:04:42
two years or longer. OK and the other ones are less than that? Yes.
Speaker 351
1:04:45
OK. thank you thank you Mr Chair. Thank youpresentatives one follow up to that none of those nine
Speaker 352
1:04:53
positions were budgeted so that's why they remained vacant Representative meeks you reckon that thank you I'm far
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:05:01
far right here just a just a quick question. how many children do we currently have in the foster care system? I don't need the exact number but roughly how many do we have and do we see that number increasing staying steady declining what's kind of been the trajectory of that over the last couple of years. yes sir. actually as of Monday there were approximately
3400 children in foster care that is a slight
Speaker 323
1:05:26
increase, not by much but that number has
Speaker 324
1:05:28
continued to maintain in that range for the last several state fiscal years so it's been
Speaker 362
1:05:34
fairly steady then yes all right thank you thank you Mr Chairman.
I'm sorry we had a little conversation up here senator Irvin you've got a
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
1:05:50
question do you? right thanks. OK page109 the Children'srust Fund that one yeah that was
legislatively created so my question is looking back at what was legislative created in the 1980s and seeing if it's a good use it's I'm sure it's doing good things but can is there the ability to combine this with something that we already also are doing that that that that will address the same issue or same problem. like is that money better spent
somewhere else right now or are we doing this somewhere else and then this is just legislatively created and directed and it's a good thing don't get me wrong but you know things have changed a little bit since 1987 so do we need to continue to just have a separate program or should that
be rolled into something that we are also doing somewhere else so we are using those funds for what we
Speaker 324
1:06:52
call our true primary prevention. So those are programs that you would not need
child welfare involvement to access and so one of those programs that you may have heard me talk about before is the baby and me program that we partner with the Arkansas Department of Health and you are on and that's for mothers going to the wick office to get services and so we are using that to do primary prevention that could prevent agency involvement which is a good thing right? if we can serve families before they have to touch child welfare system and we have also
used some of that funding for community schools so there's some in LittleRock, there's one in Batesville and they have put together some programs that care for families so I'd feel like the money is doing what it's intended to do which is that true primary prevention. We also invested that um, invested those funds that we had because the los says we have to hit a certain cap before we can spend the money and so we have invested those funds so that money can grow interest
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
1:08:02
OK. so I mean not I'm not arguing that it's not a good thing. I think what I'm I'm asking is the mechanism of that fund and then could it be absorbed somewhere else in another I I'm just looking at administratively like how we can simplify some of these things. does that make sense? that's my that's more my question do the same things with this money. I'm not advocating to change. I'm saying administratively how if we could
combine it, I'm always looking for those opportunities it seems like where we can combine it or I don't know if we get any federal match for this or not but I think it's something that we should look at. Maybe just look at it and you can
Speaker 370
1:08:46
get back with me was gonna ask if we could take this back and have just look at that within the agency and
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
1:08:52
and and for what you're doing with the money not changing that. I'm just looking at the administrative issues that's it and then making sure that
we can if maximize the opportunity I love that we're investing it and getting
interest but let's look at the financial you know ana ly s is of that and see if there's a way that you could poke that money somewhere else where we could draw down federal matching funds for it. Does that makes sense? OK, thanks. Yes,
Speaker 758
1:09:23
it does. thank you. ri b s into wooten you're recognized for a question
thank you my question is on page 106 and it follows along the westting earlier why why would we
why would we have a actual expenditure of 18 million and then a request of33 million. that's on conference and travel expenses again I think that's the same question but I don't don't don't understand why
we asked for twice what we had expenditures
Speaker 323
1:10:10
Also those are also all contract types as well so that gives the flexibility for my placement types as private like private license
Speaker 324
1:10:20
placement agencies growing foster homes that kind of thing is the placement contracts for kids in foster care so that's why you also see that it's the flexibility and the appropriation. Well
Speaker 356
1:10:34
it's going to double? don't understand and this
Speaker 758
1:10:42
this is throughout the budget madam Secretary it's throughout the budget it's almost double wooten of course you
know this is an appropriation and just because they got an appropriation doesn't mean they're going to have the funding to
s spend it and we we have this this is not unusual to have a higher appropriation than we have funding so I would I've got for Representative rose some detail on what they're spending on this professional
Speaker 758
1:11:17
it to you too. well they brought up foster care can I ask a question relative to that foster care placement child's placed a month a month later it's taken away it's given to a non biological grandfather he works His live-in girlfriend
takes care of the girl during the day is that something you all agree with you agreed to that's what in and
my question my question reidid ro I mean representativeoo wait a minute wait a minute wait a minute I'm gonna let you have the latitude but we're we're working into we're working into policy
now and and and and what people think not budget so go ahead but we're
Speaker 758
1:12:10
talking about a child's life understand that I understand that
but my question from a budgeting standpoint does the state save money or does it cost money? does that grandfather get paid for taking that child in and they and we reach out from a given home and take a child away and we've we've we've already placed her. she couldn't walk. she can't barely talk that's what we save money doing that
and that's what I thought thank you Mr
Chairman you sir. right that's our last question. I need a motion for executive rec have a motion in a second. Any discussion
all in favor say aye any opposed? it is adopted we're going to county operations Miss Walls Yes ma'amir thank you Mr chair
Chair
Unverified
1:13:11
next division is the division of county operations their appropriation summaries is on
page 115. this division is primarily responsible for administering local office locations across the state determining and redetermining eligibility across multiple need and assetbased programs and enrolling eligible applicants in those programs for fiscal year 26 it has total authorized appropriations of327 million dollars with 2,013 positions and nine appropriations funded from general revenue, federal funds and various program support and the total legislative recommendation for this division is327.5 million dollars with no significant
changes. I'll discuss the operations appropriation briefly on line four of the appropriation sections listed as 896 division of Countyperations is aligned for the operations program it's funded through general revenues federal funds and various programs support and has an appropriation of $194 million which is nearly 2/3 of the total appropriations for this division Mr Chair this concludes my presentation. right we've got some questions Representative Kavanaugh you are recognized
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
1:14:19
thank you Mr Chair. my question's going to be on page 132, the summer EBT. I
just want to make sure I unders make sure I understand what's going on with the summer EBT we have a legislative recommendation no agency request in an executive recommendation is that because that is in another area but
we do have actual expenditures in 2425 and2526.
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:14:51
Yes ma'am. thank you for the question. I will start Director Franklin will correct me if I get it wrong. This was a new program two years ago so it has not been built into the biennial budget yet we wanted to make sure it was successful and as we continue to see success and refine that program. I believe it will become part of the biennual budget request or at least the agency will request that in future bienniums. OK so you're not asking for it but the
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
1:15:16
executives recommended it be part of your budget? Well it was not part
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:15:22
of our original budget request when we did this manual 2 or three years ago and so we've always come to y'all with I think of various temporary appropriation to fund it and it's it's highly federally funded. I think I believe it's a total of55 million dollars but it's less than3.5 dollars to4 million dollars of state general revenue. Yeah most of it's federal but I guess what I'm saying is if we're gonna we need to adopt I guess
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
1:15:47
it's going to be for staff we need to do executive rec on this
OK, thank you Senator flowers you're
recognized for a question thank
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:16:04
you on I'm looking at the grant's paying account and snap program
one for employment and training and others the farmers market program does that what is proposed or recommended
taken to consideration change of policy in terms of the requirements for individuals to participate in those snap program it seems like there's
more being recommended for those programs for the 20
02627 bi en n ium as opposed to earlier 2024 25 and202526 it's getting an increase so how does
the policy change end up
causing an increase Thank you for
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:17:33
the question senator flowers. some of the money that funds the the snapmployment and training programme is formula funding that is shared with all states and it's it's 100% federal and in addition to that we work with providers who actually provide the employment and
training services and they they provide half of the funding to match with federal funds and so sometimes this number changes based on the budget of the providers and what funding they have that they can match and so I I mean I would say there is an upcoming policy change that we'll be bringing before the legislative body to implement mandatory employment and training in these past couple of years it has been a
voluntary program but I I don't foresee any changes in this unless we add providers who are going to be able to expand the services and then we can use their match that they provide to ask for increased federal funds well
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:18:43
employment and training program isn't new is it? it's not
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:18:51
years so I'm trying to understand why the doubling of the recommendation if before
it was authorized the same amount but actual
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:19:11
was half of that almost well and we are preparing to implement mandatory employment and training and so we have I mean the appropriation request has increased for this year just to help make sure that we have the flexibility and the appropriation as we implement this program. so our policy change would serve
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:19:32
to increase our expenditures in the snap program I thought the
whole point of the policy change for these requirements would somehow gonna decrease the amount of money we're spending this is specifically for the snapmployment and training portion of
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:19:57
the snap program this is not about the
sna this this doesn't include the overall
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:20:08
snap program. oh is the employment and training and the farmers
market programme 898 that line 898 snap is not only employment
and training but it's the farmers market programme I mean have you all that'spa with 100% federal
funds how much is that why don't we
have a breakdown when it's a double service or program that we're talking about when we're looking at these numbers these totals recommended Senator flowers we can get you that detail
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:20:50
and bring it back. Yeah I mean
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:20:54
is it half that we're spending that we're wanting the appropriate the five million plus on
just the employment and training and is
that gonna be outsource we're gonna have
vendors providing the employment and training how does that working? ma'am we
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:21:16
do we do work with providers forsnapmployment and training and they they actually provide this the employment and training services on the agency's behalf. thank you thank
Speaker 135
1:21:28
you Mr chairir thank yousenator representative garner
Chair
Unverified
1:21:31
you're recognized yes sir I couldn't find it anywhere in
Representative Denise Garner
Unverified
1:21:38
here. I know we've talked before about the education for the snap changes where would that is that that goes through community services so the folks that that are that the requirements are changing insnap where does the fund where do the funds come to educate them so that they know that those those requirements are are not ex parte whatever whatever the term is but they they're required for two months or whatever3 months before
where does that money come from and do you have enough? I'm really concerned that June is not time enough for them to to make those changes
in order to stay on to stay with snap benefits. So where where do I see that in
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:22:27
the budget or is it that would be part of our administrative costs you would see that in our operating expenses our salaries fringe supplies and things we we we educate our clients particularly in the SnA program where where there is a requirement for an interview with the
caseworker and that interview is a conversation between the clients and our staff in new requirements are are talked about rights and responsibilities are talked about upcoming changes penalties for not complying with those changes we do have that discussion in the eligibility interview and beyond that we would include information in our notices and we would work with our DHS coms team for other things like social media and and do those types of things stakeholder outreach and engagement with
our operating expenses and you think you have enough
Representative Denise Garner
Unverified
1:23:17
to do that to make sure that that's that's
happening and then I would also ask just to make sure that we have that information so that we can post to our social media to our constituents through social media or whatever I'm I'm glad to help with that but but we need that information thank you appreciate y'all. thank youpresentativepresentative
Chair
Unverified
1:23:36
meeks you're recognized thank you Mr Chair. Just, just a quick question I noticed you've got the very
Representative Stephen Meeks
Unverified
1:23:46
first appropriation the city aid to the aged blind and disabled. it's an appropriation for 400 $0. it doesn't look like it's been used. it's the the 1st 1 appropriation396 um4000 dollars not a whole lot of money in the grand scheme of things but I'm just wondering ay what that would be used for and if this is still needed and if it's not needed is there an opportunity to maybe do a little house cleaning here just just
to eliminate it. Thank you for the question Senator meeks or rep
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:24:20
this appropriation has been in our budget for many years and it ties back to an agreement between the state and the Social Security Administration when around SsI and state supplemental payments so to try to make this concise there is a declining number of individuals that may be eligible for this service that socialcialcurity is paying on behalf of the state and that appropriation existed in case the state needed to reimburse
Social Security for those expenses basically at this point we have a credit with Social Security so we have not had to dip into this fund and I, I do believe that it is something that if this appropriation were to be eliminated and we did happen to have this expense we could come to the body with the various temporary appropriation requests in the future. OK. all right. thank you. Representative painter you're
recognized thank you. I'm gonna ask the same question I asked last time how many vacancies do you have? we have approximately 26 vacancies.
How many of those are two years or plus there were two and they were unbud and
Speaker 419
1:25:32
they're not budgeted I like this trend compared to
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:25:37
the first team that came up here so thank you andpresentative rose looks like you got the last question thank you Mr chairir
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:25:52
I've I've heard I don't know varying whether
it's opinions or understandings on on some of the the TAf funding or the block grant and transfers and and all these things it seems like there has been a a changing of where those dollars are being allocated I believe correct me if I'm wrong did did some of these tanF
dollars used to go to the child advocacy centers at one point in the last year
Speaker 125
1:26:33
or two yes sir they were they were one of the subgrantees that did receive money. They were approximately7 subgrantees in
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:26:40
the past, year yes sir and
Speaker 339
1:26:44
and now they are no longer receiving those none of the sub none
Speaker 125
1:26:49
of the seven subgrantees are receiving any new funding. they were all granted time
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:26:57
only extensions to expend money that had already been granted to them through June30th. so we treated all the subgrantees the same so
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:27:06
if if I understand correctly from here forward taF dollars absolutely do not go in any form of a grant
to child advocacy centers at this time currently we have not sub granted any new money to any subgrantees
can can you you know within relative proximate amount of time. I'm not trying to drag this out but could you just share a
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:27:39
little bit about why so it's when ta of money transferred to the department of humanman Services, I believe that was on July 1 of 2023. there were reserves
umtaiff granting or Ta of spending excuse me you get grant you get
a block grant which is about56.5 million dollars a year
and I believe you have up to three years to to spend it or is it two years? You you receive it annually I think you have two years to spend it. so reserves had been built up when it came fromdWs todHS there were already sub grants obligated and as we worked through that process we quickly, not quickly I should say, we discovered that we were over obligated. So as we have worked through that process
through last year we have pared down subgrants to outside entities. We narrowed it down to7. We could then we subgranted them in six month increments to make sure that we had enough money to subgrunt them in May of last year we told all se ve subgrantees the second half of the year July1 through December31stone would have a reduced subgrant to make sure that we had the funds to pay those sub grants. I believe it
was a percentage reduction they took that percentage reduction they due to extenuating circumstances one of those being the government shutdown and receiving funds we granted time only extensions so that the subgrantees would have the ability to expend money January through June of this year if they had not already expended it through 1231 of25. so that is where we are now so now so quick
answer to a long explanation, I apologize is we
now do not have many if any reserves which I think I've we've talked about
with various committees while sitting at this table. so we are living within the block grant of56.5 which is granted to the state of Arkansas in quarterly increments. so we are trying to spend only what we receive well thank you for that and and I
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:29:58
do appreciate it and I I know it's not a short answer I'm also just
you're you're having to whether it's prioritized or triage where some of this funding goes and and I can appreciate that and I understand that we don't have the full actual for what was spent in 2526 but I do see where you know the federal revenue it looks like there's federal revenue tanf transfer for 2425. looks like moving forward there is no tanf transfer so I'm just trying to determine you know if
if DHS and county opps saw fit at one point in time to fund these child advocacy centers in in appropriate ways I think if we went around the table here everybody would say yeah those those centers do need funding if there's any way to see that to to come back as a priority in your in your taF expenditures how you how you disperse those funds how how I guess the question is how to get them to maybe a
higher priority on the list of of subgrantees and I'm sure there's other subgrantees who you no longer funding either that is
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:31:17
correct sir we are not we are not doing any new subgrant funding to any of those seven or any other subgrantee so we've not done any new money or any sub grants to anyone else. we are trying to gettaa stabilized and to have
some reserves reserves are recommended as a best practice by the federal government to have almost a full
quarter in reserves and we got very dangerously close to zero and and so at this timed I don't have an answer for you. I unders I hear your request but I don't have
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:31:51
an answer at this time. I think I'll finish with this the the the prioritization that you guys have to come to in making these decisions that's done that's done through your team or through your office it's it's not something that we have in any legislative capacity where we're we're weighing in on that
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:32:10
is that correct? actually there is some special language that does designate how some ta of funds are spent um, I believe that is for education and then CPI don't mean to
to stop you. I just mean specifically on
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:32:25
the decision making with the subgrantees is that an inhouse sir it it's it is done atdHS OK thank you so
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:32:34
detail on that thank you for the latitude Mr Chair.
Speaker 432
1:32:43
Representativehammer you've got a question thank you Mr Chairman. what is the current reserve balance in the in the
fund we will have to get it for you.
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:32:55
I I did not bring it this morning. I'm sorry to say I brought everything else I think but OK if you don't
Speaker 432
1:33:02
mind getting that maybe get it to the chair so the chair could get out to committee members so we could know that and then the second thing is based on your projections the the full effects of the
the full effects of the adjustments that are coming down from the federal government that being factored into the entities that you've decided that would be the recipients of the money do you anticipate that the reserve fund and the money coming in is going to be able to be sustainable based on current trends because the FMmap number changed to know so just hit on that real quick if you would have a clarifying question
Speaker 125
1:33:39
are you asking aboutAF? are you asking about an F mapan I'm
Speaker 432
1:33:44
sorry tan on tan of and on the reserve you know what you have in the reserves on the tan of funds the adjustments coming down from the feds and the the organizations that were obligated to now do you think that we've leveled off and we'll be able to continue to build a little bit of reserves I believe so
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:34:03
but just to be I just want to be clear and transparent. The block grant for TanF has not changed of the annual amount of56.5. We just spent down our reserves to where
we are now level setting on annual spending right and that's what I wanted
Speaker 432
1:34:18
to hear was the adjustment period for what you inherited and the organizations that are obligated or dependent and and all the adjustments you feel now we've worked through that transitional period for moving forward we ought to we ought to see some consistency then. is that fair? sir OK thank you all right we're going back around 2 time Representative Ggarner you got a question just
Representative Denise Garner
Unverified
1:34:46
to follow up from earlier I think when we talked earlier Mary you said that the snap shift cost would be 25 million and then yesterday Secretaryhudson mentioned
18 million. can you just clarify yes
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:35:05
yes ma'am. The Snap administrative costs increases from a well decreases from a50% federal match to a
25% federal match which is going to increase the cost for the state and the estimate for that is about 24 million and I believe what Secretaryhudson was referring to yesterday in the 18 million would be the app that would be for three quarters of the year because this cost does not take effect until October 1st. OK great thank you appreciate it and if I may, I need to correct a number that I gave to representative painter I told
you two un budgeted positions they were3. were3 all right our hopefully our
Speaker 109
1:35:58
last question will be Senator Flowers it it's short
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:36:03
and I'm just wanting to inquire about your statement that
we the feds want us to have a reserve fund is that for the tanf benefits snap benefits what
is that for and do they distribute the funds to the state and then they want us to hold them and not use them to have this reserve what is is that it
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:36:37
ma'am was specifically referring to Ttana funds in that statement of reserves and that is been a best practice verbalized from our federal partners to DCO
to hold in reserve for unexplained contingencies. a great example is when the federal shutdown went for44 days.taf was not funded until well30 days after the government shutdown we and we did not have a whole bunch of reserves to to continue paying any of our obligations that we use TAna for so that is that is that why that is a recommendation so are the tenant funds that we receive as a state
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:37:25
that's pursuant to some formula from the feds yes ma'am I believe
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:37:31
it's a formula for the block grant that's applied to all5y states and we portion of that is tanni ma'am our grant is56.5 million dollars a year which is distributed quarterly to the state and and that's what they want
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:37:46
us to hold a reserve of at least quarter that is their recommendation yes ma'am
and so that's delivered it's in our state treasury that reserve is that no ma'am no ma'am we don't have
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:38:05
a a a current reserve. We are trying to level set and not overspend in that area.
So I think moving forward there there will be lots of discussion of what should be held in reserve. and the reason we don't have anything in reserve is because of the shutdown ma'am we
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:38:22
don't have anything in reserve because we had been over obligated and
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:38:29
we honored those obligations and we've made reductions when we've had to make reductions in
new grants to to subgrantees. so does the state have an opportunity to request
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:38:39
additional funding from the feds no ma'am we do not it is a formula it is driven by a
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:38:46
block grant and it is distributed if we were to request or had a way to ask for more money that would mean a reduction to another state. and I don't know how well that would go
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:39:02
well the the on page 115 it has restricted reserve fund 2.9 million that was in 2425 yes
ma'am that was that was tied to summer EBT
Speaker 452
1:39:15
I believe and and so it's all gone is that right?
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:39:21
Yes ma'am that's an annual expense to
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:39:24
administer the summer EBT program. thank you Mr chairir. thank you senator
that being the last question centralnebraska gonna make a motion for executive rec is that correct senator you're gonna wake up we have a motion in a second
Speaker 378
1:39:47
any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed it is adopted
we're going now to development disabilities M Waltz yes sir the nexx is the division
of developmental disability Services and its appropriation
Chair
Unverified
1:40:04
summaries on page 138 this division administers programs and services for people who are intellectually and developmentally disabled through communitybased services and programs and at the five human development centers it has total authorized appropriations for fiscal year 26 of220 million dollars with 2490 positions and aid appropriations and is funded with general revenues federal funds and various programs support and the total legislative recommended recommendation for this division
is $220 million with no significant changes. I'll discuss the operations appropriation briefly it's the second trend from the bottom 896 division of Developmental Disability Services this supports the operations of the division including management and operation of the five human development centers and it's funded with general revenue, federal funds and various program support and at $199 million comprises most of the appropriation authorized for this division and that concludes my presentation. the presentation any questions?
I bet I know what representative painter's gonna do you you're
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:41:16
recognized thank you Mr same thing other directors be prepared to how many vacancies do you have and how long? So currently we
Speaker 463
1:41:28
have a little over 100 budgeted positions that are vacant that we're actively recruiting and hiring for what's what is how many are two years over? We have two
and those are budgeted you said they are one is for a psychologist and one for an
Speaker 147
1:41:50
APRN thank you thank you and then they had 23 that were unbudgeted so they had 25 positions total within the division, only two of which were budgeted thank you Representative Eaves you're recognized for a question. Thank you. just a quick question about the human development
Representative Les D. Eaves
Unverified
1:42:07
centers in and I don't have the the book open, but can you tell me if you
have any money that's dedicated toward refurbishing or rebuilding any of these facilities and if so what is what is your balance in that fund if you have that fund so currently
Speaker 463
1:42:23
we have around $9 million in the fund balance that is committed to some new construction that we're doing at the Boonville Human Development Center what about the one in Jonesboro Jonesboro we're currently building a new wellness center and that's also in the budget and that's specifically on page
154 OK and then what about the
Representative Les D. Eaves
Unverified
1:42:47
others like Arkadelphia and Conway? we are currently working
Speaker 463
1:42:51
on several projects for the other centers as well a lot of that comes out of one DE which is funding in the secretary's office. does that I don't know what one d is
Representative Les D. Eaves
Unverified
1:43:03
is that a a separate fund balance or
Speaker 463
1:43:13
in defer to missy on what that is named exactly.
Speaker 147
1:43:18
that's a that's a lawn item and we have that lawn item within the secretary's office so that we can manage across our three divisions that have facilities, and that is appropriation and then once there is funding then that appropriation flows out to the divisions with the funding and it's committed once we have appropriate construction bids and go through the procurement
Chair
Unverified
1:43:44
process thank you thank you thank you Representative
Speaker 758
1:43:54
wooten you're recognized for a question thank you
Mr Chairman. How how many nursing positions do you have open at conway and Arkadelphia and Jonesboro just one a lump number yeah I'll have to get that for you
Speaker 463
1:44:10
Representative Wooten. I know from a previous question, I did find out real quickly on the Arkadelphia we
have two open Rn positions. One is currently being worked and one is currently being reposted. but I can find out those
Speaker 758
1:44:26
others for you and follow up if I may has the compensation increase that has been approved for nurses hass that helped in recruitment Yes,
Speaker 463
1:44:38
it definitely has helped when the recruiting licensed professional nurses. thank you thank
Speaker 486
1:44:43
you Mr Chairmanir Representative rose you're recognized
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:44:48
thank you Mr chair kind of piggybacking on Representative Eaves and Representative Painter's question. there
had been some discussion over the last couple of months about the work program I think it was at the Boonville Development Center that it had consolidated those positions had to be moved short staffed whatever it was and that that program was either paused or closed can you speak to that you know if those positions have been staffed if that programs
reopened if it's active if it if it's being planned to be reactivated if it's not activated it is it's been reopened since
Speaker 463
1:45:28
December early December the active work training program at Boonville and so that's that is staffed and the plans are
Representative Ryan A. Rose
Unverified
1:45:35
to keep it staffed should it open you will resttaff yes sir ok thank you so much all right p re s ent ative Painter we're back to you
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:45:50
thank you secretary mann, do you mind getting the committee out of all the vacancies you have the total amount of dollars that you're
budgeting for those vacant positions thank you yes we can get
Speaker 494
1:46:03
that for the committee. thank you so much with
that being the last question, I entertain a motion for executive rec and a second
any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed? thank you we'll go now to
Speaker 496
1:46:21
medical services yes sir Mrir division of medical
Speaker 8
1:46:26
Services appropriation summaries on pages 156 and 157. this division
Chair
Unverified
1:46:30
administers the medicaid program for fiscal year 26 it has total authorized appropriations of $10.5 billion with 92 positions and 14 appropriations it's funded with general revenues, federal funds and various program support leggislative recommendation for this division is for total appropriations to continue at rough the same level at $10.5
billion with no significant changes. I'd like to direct the committee to appropriations that may be of interest on line seven in their department appropriation summary about midway down is 896 division of Medical Services this is their operations appropriation and it supports the administration of the medicaid program and it's funded through general revenues, federal funds and various program support at $12.7 million. these seven appropriation line items that are below that they're listed as 897 and 898 are the line items that combine to form the
medicaid grant's appropri ation which pays for the bulk of the medicaid program. these items are funded with general revenues, federal funds and a variety of other state funding sources they're listed separately to more transparently show funding as some of the funding sources are unique to each item and this concludes my presentation Mr Chair. re m ers we have any questions Good gracious Senator Irvin just a quick one what's our current F map
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:47:58
Current SMopP I believe is69.23 and inoctober one it will be going to70.52.
OK thanks. Senator flowers you
got a question hold
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:48:16
on now you're ready so from the appropriation summary with the where recites reports reflects the federal revenue
compared to the general revenue it looks like65 to1 or6 to1 is that a
match I'm on page 156. yes
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:48:45
ma'am it is a match. it is approximately3 to1. The current FMapP rate is at69.23. we usually have a blended FmapP rate of close to70% because admin is at a different F map and so it's
basically a3 to1 match. so the our kids
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:49:04
B program 897 that's for operational expenses administering the program no ma'am that is for our our kids B programme is for ourI program, childrenldren's healthalsurance and so that is
Speaker 501
1:49:16
the children who are their income is a little bit too high to qualify for medicaid but we provide them services through a program called our KidsB and it is at a slightly higher match rate than Medicaid. it's in that
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:49:35
80% and and but the feds give what to that is that reflected in that6 million yes ma'am they're they're
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:49:41
match rate the match rate for that program is around 80 % 80 % ma'am
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:49:46
and so other she said was3 to1 so this is about3 to1 too it's a little bit higher on my
math skills aren't great so it's more like
Speaker 188
1:49:55
how many kids are being served in the our kids B program
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:50:08
as of February1st our our kids be programs served approximately44,000 children in the state of Arkansas. is
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:50:16
that based on those who apply or how how do we determine who's
eligible and who receives services that is the number that are eligible to receive
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:50:29
services so they have they have applied and they have received eligibility notification I don't have a number of who has sought
utilization of any services. So normally
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:50:43
that would be recipient of services would be someone presenting at a doctor's office or a hospital and don't have the money to pay is that it now ma'am they would have an
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:50:57
our kidss B card or documentation of that they are on our kidsB or on medicaid and if they go to the doctor or the pharmacy or to the hospital those entities will bill medicaid by
their recipient number to then be paid for the services rendered. so
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:51:17
they seek to qualify before going to the doctor but if they appear at a hospital emergency what do they sign them up there what happens they can sign them up there yes
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:51:29
ma'am if they are not insured they the respective entity that they are seeking care from can call the county office or work with others to to help obtain
qualified applicants to receive services. Do schools
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:51:48
do public schools provide assistance for signing up for the our kidsdsb program
schools do assist with eligibility not
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:51:58
it's not just limited to our kidsb. There are services delivered in the schools for medicaid and the schools do help administratively with eligibility. So are any
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:52:14
of the operating expenses listed here in this summary transferred or distributed to public schools
yes ma'am. some of our grants line is distributed to public schools they
Speaker 501
1:52:25
bill us for services they do not have a separate line they'll show up where those services are billed either in our kidsds B or in the medicaid grant but they enroll as providers and bill us for services.
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:52:39
Well I'm curious to know how much of DHS budget you're with the
medical services right that that division now ma'am so how much of the of the monies that the funds that you receive are distributed out to public schools we can get you the number of how much of the federal dollars the schools
Speaker 501
1:53:02
typically pay the match rates for those most of their services so we can get you the federal dollars plus what they're paying plus anything that we might be adding to that and it what the feds
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:53:13
give the school it passes through your office it does pass through our
office OK I'd like to see that thank you thank
you Mr chair. yes ma'am re representative columns you you're recognized thank
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
1:53:30
you Mr Chair. So I'm looking on page 184 at this transfer from py residual general revenue of 294 million is that the set aside from when we last ok that is not to set aside. all right well I see you shaking your
head. what is that then that what is that 294 million? And I guess the other question is while you're thinking about that did we when we did do that set aside last time when we were doing this process of I believe it was $200 million. Did all of that money end up coming in and where did that where does that show up here? andrector Pitman will correct
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:54:20
me. I believe last year or in the current year that we are in there is $100 million set aside for Medicaid. We have not used it we have not we have not worked through the executive channels to come to this body to request that that amount of money. so we've not touched
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
1:54:36
it and then as far as what is that 294 million transfer from py residual general revenue Yes sir that came from the TMPO900, the trust fund account
so that was just a transfer from the trust fund account to what would then be spendable essentially yes sir it was it
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:54:57
was a transfer in to pay the bills. OK thank you Representative Kavanaugh you
Chair
Unverified
1:55:06
' re recognized for a question thank you. I just have
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
1:55:10
a quick question. Going to nursing homes in distress do we how many have did we have to help with closure and do we have a number of how many are in the stress at this time
Speaker 523
1:55:31
so that is actually administered that fund is actually runs through my division but is administered by Director Smith so I'm going to let her
Speaker 525
1:55:45
answer that question thank you Good morning Martina Smith at this time we do not have any nursing facilities in distress or working towards a closure and we have not had any closures of our facilities since 2024. thank you all right
Chair
Unverified
1:56:04
p re s ent ative painter you gotta know
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
1:56:09
you got a quick question yes very quick madam director just how many vacancies
do you have we have yes sir how many of those are budgeted or not budgeted those tel
Speaker 527
1:56:19
are budgeted we have7 unbudgeted vacancies. OK, great thank you thank you Mr
Chair. thank you the ladyman you got a quick one well my hope Director Pittman I think he can
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
1:56:36
answer this question. I just on page 188 it it talks about infin infirmary and we only spent $13,000 and there's327,00 budgeted for that what is that and why aren't we spending more money and can that help our infant mortality rate. Yes sir. so infant infirmaries are pediatric
Speaker 527
1:56:57
and ICfs institutions for those with Idd those services are primarily paid for via the pass and so what you're seeing there
that very small number are the few children that were waiting on eligibility for pass and they were emergence they had emergency medicaid or something like that and so we paid for those services for through fee for service pending that so we should continue to see that number decline although we don't anticipate it ever reaching 01 quick follow up Mr
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
1:57:27
Chairman. next page 189 same kind of question you know we didn't spend any of that money and there's 2.1 million can you explain what that is and why we're not spending that money
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:57:42
sir this line item is actually the child and familymily lifefe institute. it is used with funding children's hospital. we we
Speaker 534
1:57:54
do use it thank you right b p re s ent ative Mclinon, you had you had
Representative Mindy McAlindon
Unverified
1:58:03
spoke today haven't thank you chairman. I know weird to see me quiet. so just a quick follow up frompresentative painter those positions that are budgeted but are not filled are you filling those with
contract employees and do you have a feel for the difference in cost to do that? No ma'am we are not filling them
Speaker 526
1:58:19
with contract employees and many of them were actually advertising right now or in the process of hiring we're about to onboard two new employees actually so we're not using contract employees to fill those vacancies. OK thank you thank you chairman you uhenator flowers we're coming back but maybe this
Speaker 541
1:58:34
is very quick and it's just additional information that
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:58:44
I'd like to see when you get the figures for the moniess paid to schools where are the schools is it are we talking about I'm trying to determine if it's a certain part of the state where you're seeing more need for these funds to schools and whether they support services for individuals with special needs
is that a part is that what what the money is is distributed for or
or just what I'd like to know yes ma'am and we can get you information
Speaker 501
1:59:25
on how much how much money is being spent in each area of the state, any school that provides services is eligible to receive Medicaid dollars for the services they provide. They are primarily for children with special healthcare needs and those with special with disability or with medical needs so they typically will have an individualized education plan
that requires occupational therapy or speech therapy or or some other type of service or they'll have a help we're working on providing services through school nurses so
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
1:59:54
we'll be able to provide medical services as well and so you
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
1:59:59
said any school does that include private an additional to public or public charter schools no ma'am
just public schools. OK thank you thank you Mr Chi. thank you Representative wooten, we're back to you. Thank you Mr
Speaker 758
2:00:16
Chairman I'm on page 156
and I'm just curious on the 648 medical medicaid expense it's got4 million actual4.6 million actual it's got a budgeted41.2 million and then arthurized is 140
million in in and in the request and it stays at 140 million and we only actually spent78. why is that Yes sir that that fund in in
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:01:03
combination with several funds listed below is how we pay for
all of our claims throughout the year and so that one is level and during sometimes during the year we will bring y'all requests to move line items
Speaker 119
2:01:19
around depending on the expenditures so we've left that one flat for
Speaker 758
2:01:31
next year. so we we budget41 million and then we're authorized 140 million I mean it's the same question but why why the difference between7041 million budgeting in 140,140 million
recommendation by the legislative executive branch and the agency why why is that Yes, sir. so the two
Speaker 122
2:02:02
lines above it medicaid expansion, medical
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:02:05
services, prescription drugs and then medical services. Those three lines make up the appropriation for
our tobacco settlement funds. So this is appropriation only. OK. then that's let's look at line one
Speaker 758
2:02:24
actual expenditures was 14,000 budgeted4 million authorized4 million why why why do we do that? Yes sir. so this is our appropriation for our nursing homes if
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:02:38
they close this is this gives us the flexibility
we've as director Smith said a few minutes ago we've not had a nursing home close in over a year but if one does become in jeopardy to be closed we can use this line item
in this appropriation to hire to help us with the receivership to make sure the patients are taken care of while
Speaker 758
2:03:06
it's undergoing change. Well well are we gonna
have4 million that needed or we do we need that? I mean I can't keep I can't get my arms around while we're budgeting for 4 million and we're expending 14
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:03:26
000 yes sir we have asked for that appropriation to be4 million dollars to give us the flexibility if a nursing home or multiple nursing homes close. We also have a small window as Miss Walls mentioned to me that we can use some of this money for training we have not gotten clearance from Cms to do that but if we if we do get that training we will be coming and using some of this appropriation to fund that in other words that's anticipation in
Speaker 758
2:03:52
the in the event that that occurs thank you thank you chairman thank you
thank you all right need a motion for executive recedicalervis have a
motion in a second. any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed
Speaker 305
2:04:11
sands approved we will go to quality assurance you recognized this is the
Chair
Unverified
2:04:23
on page 194 is the appropriation summary for the division of provider services and quality assurance this division
provides administrative support and oversight of providers enrolled in the medicaid medicaid waiver and our kids programs and licenses surveys and regulates child welfare agencies on behalf of the division of Children and Family Services in fiscal year 26 it has a single authorized appropriation. I know there are three line items but there's they only have one appropriation and it's for 19. $4 million and this is the operations appropriation for this division. It has under an 86 positions it's funded with general revenue, federal funds and various program support and the legislative recommendation
for this division is for $19.4 million with no changes now the appropriations that are listed on lines one and three for this division are the two appropriations that we had that transferred to the division of agging and Adult and Behavioral Health Services over those many years ago or moments ago anyway as part of the govern or ' s letter during regular session 2025. They appear here to show the expenditures in those appropriations prior to their shift to the division of agging, Adult and Behavioral healthalth Services and this concludes my presentation for
this division. any questions OK Representative Painter
let's have it all right same thing director. how many vacancies
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
2:05:43
you got? We have51 vacancies 15 of which are unbudgeted.
Speaker 525
2:05:50
any over 2 years4 over two years one of which is unbudgeted. thank you thank you thank
you seeing no other questions we'll
need a motion executive Rick we have a motion in a second. any discussion all in favor say aye any you opposed stand
to prove and our last one is the youth services its walls thank you Mr
Chair
Unverified
2:06:19
Chair. The final division is the division of youthervices their appropriation summary is on page 201. this division was created to handle the problems of youth involved with the juvenile justice system through a variety of community-based and residential options for case management diversion and
rehabilitation of atrisk youth in Fy26 it has total authorized appropriations of $83.2 million with 121 positions and five appropriations funded with general revenue, federal funds and various program support and the legislative recommendation for this division for fiscal year 27 is for total appropriations of 83.2 million with no significant changes I'll direct the committee to appropriations that may be of interest on line four is the operations appropriations the second to last I'm sorry it's the residential services appropriation. This34.6 million
dollars appropriation is funded primarily by general revenues and is for the cost of running juvenile treatment centers. and the final appropriation in the summary is the operations appropriation which supports the operation of this division. it's $14.4 million and is funded through general revenues federal funds and various program support and this concludes my presentation for this division and the department. all right members any questions
right, bs into flowers you are excuse me senator flowers you are recognized for a
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:07:43
question communitybased sanctions what what is that if DYS
fails to abide by a court order what is what is that it's on page 201 so those are from juveniles that
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:08:04
are not compliant with court orders or conditions
of supervision. those are sanctions that the courts impose and then they are
distributed to us they're they're fines or penalties ma'am well
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:08:23
are are those funds shared with county government there's a administrative office of the court get any I mean we'll need to
take that one back. I I just
Senator Breanne Davis
Unverified
2:08:42
I don't know if the courts get, I don't know
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:08:47
where they are funded through d appreciate your researching that and exactly what is communitybased sanctions
because community based you you're not talking about an individual juvenile you're talking about community I mean I don't understand the whole phrase there community based sanctions is that court sanctions is it DYS sometimes goes into court and they failed to comply with
the court's order so is it what is this this
Speaker 165
2:09:21
this is part of our communitybased diversion program and we work with a number of vendors out in the community and have contracts with them to avert custodial placement with our juvenile treatment centers
Speaker 169
2:09:33
but we'll get you more information on the revenues here. and the whole idea of
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:09:40
communitybased sanctions there should be some description or
definition of what that is I I don't don't understand what what that
Speaker 165
2:09:53
phrase is this is part of our continuum of options for judges and local communities prior to committing juveniles to our juvenile treatment center so this is actually diversion programs that juvenile probation officers and juvenile judges ask families to participate in as part of their court involvement. So these are
actually prior to them coming into placement at a secured facility so these these can be anything from probation, these can be other interventions such as after school and things monitoring, mentoring, things like that in the community that are
Speaker 169
2:10:38
provided by contract providers in communities. well under the funding sources would
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:10:49
any of the source be from individuals that appear in juvenile court
Speaker 172
2:10:53
no not that I'm aware of it's general revenue it's state
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:11:02
kid or family paying fees or penalties for contempt not not here no not in our budget.
Speaker 169
2:11:10
OK. but wouldu would you agree somewhere that
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:11:13
that's the part I would have to get with administrative office
Speaker 169
2:11:20
of the courts about but I'd be happy to make that contact and and get you
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
2:11:26
that information. I'd like to know if any of your budget comes from fines fees cost
that are received in juvenile court are ordered in juvenile court. yes ma'am, none of that is in our
Speaker 165
2:11:41
budget thank you thank you reverend wooten
Speaker 758
2:11:52
you're recognized thank you Mr Chairman.
I'm on page 201 still you have 121 positions authorized
by 120 the agencies requesting 122 how how many of those 121 are vacant yes we have a total of 23
Speaker 758
2:12:24
10% a little over 20%2 OK. how many of those are over two years we
Speaker 147
2:12:31
had positions that were over two years old and of those six were budgeted.
Speaker 557
2:12:40
the eight down under funding sources
Speaker 758
2:12:43
under performance performance fund we have zero amount but we but actual
but we have budgeted625,000 but we're not requesting any is that a change what it's a change but that's correct. we
Speaker 199
2:13:22
don't budget performance fund in the future we just utilize what we need in the current budget year
Speaker 169
2:13:30
based on field positions and things like pay plan and things that are unanticipated so we ask for a performance funding in the current budget. follow up if my where does that funding come from? from the
Speaker 758
2:13:40
performance fund held by and dispersed by DFfa all
Speaker 169
2:13:43
right thank you thank you Representative painter you got a quick one yes sir and I'm sorry I
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
2:14:01
thinksentativeooton stole my question but you don't have to ask it again well no you got me there. No out of those vacancies how many of those are two years or older
Speaker 564
2:14:15
there were 8 of those,6 of which were
budgeted., great. thank you thank you all right. supposedly the last question ispresentative gonzalezortham you're recognized thank you chairman and thank
Representative Justin Gonzales
Unverified
2:14:28
you for answering my question.
I'm not exactly sure if this is the right setting for the question but I'm gonna ask it because it's related it may be an education question it might be a question for you so I'm just gonna ask it so when you have students who are in juvenile detention centers or they're an inpatient mentalhaal settings or other settings other than treatment centers etc. other than they're in school, they're not in school. and you have students who
who are not yet reading on grade level or they're English learners or they are in special education they're receiving services how are how are those students served in settings outside of the
school district thank you for the question. I can only speak
Speaker 199
2:15:26
to division of youthervices. I'm not the other settings however division of youth services we are considered
Speaker 165
2:15:36
a school district and we do participate in planning educationally for each juvenile that we have on our campuses and those are supported through different mechanisms some of whom are on traditional tracks and they do earn credits that transfer back to their high schools of origin when they go home. we do have some youth who are on GED track often pursuant to the judge's court order and that may
be a condition of their release from DYS or return to home and lately we have had a big focus in education on career exploration as well as actual job training and certification we're super proud that several of our juveniles who have completed their formal education have gone on to get things like their Cdl and truck driving as well as some welding certifications and things like that we do support special education
through we have some special education teachers and things like that to support our juveniles who come to us behind on reading level and we do know statistically that many of our juveniles served have special education needs and often are behind in their education for various reasons thank you Representative Annnett do you have a question
Hold on. wait a minute just like back push back on there you
Representative Denise Jones Ennett
Unverified
2:17:16
go thank you Mr Chairman I have a question the piggyback off a representative gonzalez Worthing how many of these students in DYS are on Ip I
Speaker 571
2:17:24
don't have that number with me today but we definitely have that data as well as some other
Speaker 165
2:17:31
data I'd be happy to share with you thank you thank you You got another question
Chair
Unverified
2:17:42
all rightrivers Gonzalez you're recognized piggyback off ofpresentative annneitz I would also
Representative Justin Gonzales
Unverified
2:17:46
like to know the number of English language learners that you're serving. Thank you absolutely be happy to provide that thank you. our members being no more questions we'll take
Speaker 199
2:17:54
a motion for executive rec have a motion
in a second. Any discussion all if they ever say aye any opposed san stands approved uhpresentative Gardner you got
a personal point of privilege you want to do right quick
Representative Denise Garner
Unverified
2:18:13
you're recognized thank you Mr Chair. very quickly, I just want to thank DHS and every agency in the room presenting today for I wanna thank you publicly for for answering my questions on the First ammendment issues one of the questions I did not ask very clearly obviously so I am sending out another letter to the aggencies that if you don't mind answering those for me and getting them back then we'll have a little more clarity in some of the information that we
need I just wanted to thank you all and uh'll keep you posted as we look at that information and we'll gather gather back after that but I will send another another letter with with the information that we need and we'll go from there but thank you very much appreciate y'all. all right members it's been a long morning just to let you know the chairs
have taken down the calendar there will be no calendar tomorrow we will finish this
afternoon and before I bring it we're not gonna bring education up with 10 minutes so we're gonna come back at 12:45 and we're gonna finish today no matter how long it takes we still got education public safety and the health department so we'll break till 1245 which we'll start pick back up thank you
Speaker 579
3:46:23
iss everybody here with the departments that's all
Speaker 581
3:46:29
right all right members if you get to your
seats we're fixing to start in one minute.
right members we're back from recess Miss Walden you got the Department of Education public school fund please proceed thank you
Speaker 584
3:47:29
Mr Chair. good afternoon members Katie Walden Bureau of Legislative Research Fiscal division as Mr Chair stated, I'm gonna be reviewing the public school fund appropriations with you today. Those include the division of elementary and secondary Education appropriations the
state library state aid as well as the division of career and technical Education. so while these appropriations begin on page 212 of your manual. if you'll look at item C in your packet staff has prepared a summary of each of these appropriations for you? members should have this in your packet has C on it kind of a cheat
Speaker 496
3:48:00
sheet if you will go ahead thank you Mr chairir and I'll just kind of go over with you
Speaker 584
3:48:08
how this is organized so we took all of the appropriation lines in the public school fund budget
and we organize them by an alphabetical order and you'll see if you look on your left there's the page number where you can find the detail describing each appropriation, the line item and then all the rest of the information that's already in the budget manuals associated with that line. As I said I'm going to begin with the division of elementary and secondary education public school fund this is all state aid distributed to local districts charter districts education service cooperatives this is where all of the
adequacy funding is there are70 appropriation lines in this appropriation section. and there are also49 positions appropriated and that includes45 positions in the appscan and for in the office of Education renewal zones on page
Speaker 587
3:49:01
three of the schedule you'll see that the total for the public school fund the total request and the total
recommendation is for3.5 billion dollars for Fy27. there are no changele requests associated with this amount and so that's really it on the public school fund there are no change
Speaker 584
3:49:30
levels it was3.5 billion last year it will be3.5 billion requested in 27. I'm happy to answer any questions the
Speaker 586
3:49:36
department is ready to come forward we would love to see you today
because we have questions if you got anything you want to say on an opening statement or you're ready to
Speaker 590
3:50:03
go into questions I defer to the chair if you want to go
on this questions I'm OK with that right our first question will be Speaker Evans you're recognized sir. thank you Mr
Speaker 592
3:50:15
Chair. Secretary, good afternoon. looking at the sheet C with the breakdown of the various appropriations
Speaker 654
3:50:27
there's $190 million that is set in here for minimum teacher salary and raises if I recall that originated back with the Learns Act I believe in September of 2022 there was a I'm gonna use the word census that was done on all the400 plus or 27pl school districts across the state and what we were doing as any teacher that was not at50,000 we provided funding to them to get
them to50,000 and as long as they met some of the criteria that was set aside and learns they would continue to get that funding amm I correct with that that's correct yeah and so since that time I just have to think that there's been movement and so since September of 22 have we gone back whether through you know in echool and e-finance or however we established that initial baseline have we gone back and recalculated that to make sure that the schools who have taken
on teachers who that teacher was getting that funding at school A but now they're at school B and that that school is getting that funding have we have we taken another snapshot in time so today we have not
Speaker 591
3:51:41
taken a new snapshot in time it it would
Speaker 597
3:51:43
require a legislative change for us to do that that would require legislation to ask you
Speaker 654
3:51:51
to go back and take another snapshot so the way that the statute is currently written. it
Speaker 602
3:52:01
established that first year as a as you put it the the census or the snapshot in time on at which the salaryary funding is based and so if we were to base the funding on a different time period that would need to be reflected in
Speaker 654
3:52:17
the statute. but is it safe to assume that there have probably been teachers that have moved to different districts because of recruiting, better benefits, better options, less travel possibly moved to charter schools that were not included
Speaker 604
3:52:33
and then we're actually still potentially sending funds to a school that no longer has those teachers and and I think you know
Speaker 597
3:52:40
even as enrollment changes we've got some districts that are growing as students so they're adding more teachers we have maybe some districts that are you know declining enrollment may not have as many teachers so that's definitely happening ok thank you very much thank you Mr Chair. thank you sir all right
we're going to as practice this yesterday and this morning we're going to members of the committee first then the
nonmembers senator flowers you're recognized thank you Mr.
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:53:10
I guess it's it might be answered by Miss Walden when you presented you I thought I heard you say this exhibit C includes adequacy too
Go ahead yes ma'am. the appropriations for all
Speaker 584
3:53:31
the adequacy recommended items are included in this
schedule so that includes state foundation
Speaker 586
3:53:38
aid all of the categorical goals as well as the supplementals that are listed when you make your adequacy recommendations and they should be named corresponding with what is
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:53:51
listed in the matrix. OK so we we then could look at this sea and expect that the recommendations at at the minimum should be part of the adequacy that we establish
Speaker 608
3:54:09
this is the appropriation recommendation for 27. so how does it how do we use this to determine adequacy
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:54:18
are we aren't we gonna get another report or something for adequacy that's going
to be in the fall of the
year for the next biennium. This is the second year of this biennium so they we're working
off the adequacy that was done
I guess a year and a half ago
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:54:45
ok so this this is like
supplementing or just this is the
appropriation this is not the recommendation this is the appropriation well
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:54:59
it says appropriation request and recommendation so I was trying to figure out so we
won't have to the determine adequacy funding
Speaker 543
3:55:13
during the fiscal this this year is that right Mr chairir
Speaker 613
3:55:20
this you likereg rogers department his department of Education correct the adequacy recommendations that were done in I think it's 24 that set the foundation funding for 26 and27 as well as the categoricals that appropriation is contained within this budget so we are we do have adequacy in this budget and so we're just appropriating it for the next
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:55:43
fiscal yes ma'am ok and I guess my other question right now Mrliva Secretary Oliva, you may be able to answer concerning the educational renewal zones and in the description it says it's not limited to but what purpose is for improving public school performance particularly
the state's most academically distressed public schools have those schools all
been identified and how many do we have and are
all of them participating in a collaborative agreement or interlocal agreement as is described here between a public school education service co op or institution of higher learning to
Speaker 617
3:56:46
the short answer is yes I I when we say which are the schools that we've deemed to be at risk we look at all the DNF schools they all have an an improvement plan that's reviewed by our agency that's done
Speaker 597
3:56:59
in development with the educational cooperative that they're in with that zone the educational res the ERZ's educationalour zones is also a partnership with a lot that runs through a lot of our universities as well as making sure that they're help providing additional support and training in those
Speaker 617
3:57:13
targeted areas as well so I think it's a
it's a to describe a brief it's like a holistic approach with everybody making sure we're getting those schools what they need how
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:57:26
many such zones do we have in the state in schools participating
I guess the question is how many schools are participating or school districts have to get you the exact
Speaker 597
3:57:37
number I wanna say there's about6 educational research zones that cover the state but then we can get you that information for sure.'d like to have it
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
3:57:45
and just a reminder that I had asked you I don't think it
was in a meeting about where these students are our schools are that have these or are likely to retain third graders that are in these academically distressed public schools I'm still waiting on that hopefully you can get that to me I know you got a lot to do but I'd like to know how these third graders are doing
in in these distressed school districts particularly those that have been under state control within the last5 to10 years. happyppy to get that for you thank you thank you Mrir
thank you senator next member is Senator Irvin you're recognized thank you just a quick if you could just give me
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
3:58:47
an update I think on the leg audit finding number one on the
potential for the duplicative duplicate enrollment. there was a completion date of August 1,2025. have we gotten that? do we meet that and are we doing good there
on the duplicate enrollment so we've since that we've gone and
Speaker 613
3:59:11
increased our controls 11 of the things for homeschool now is we've added an a school within Avscan so when a student in elects to enroll as a homeschool student it's going to
be in Apscan and if that student also applies to another school a traditional school or charter school it's going to kick out so that's one of the different layers that we're doing it on there and so we're also going through different controls withlas wall to make sure that if there are duplicate enrollments whether it's in another private
Speaker 623
3:59:41
school or home school or traditional we are going to try to get better at finding those and then is
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
3:59:47
it was I mean if if if we're doing the EFA and then we were they were enrolled
in a public school. is there can we claw that money back or no?
from the school since they weren't
really educating them so of all of the
Speaker 602
4:00:03
instances of potential dual enrollment that were identified to my knowledge we did not identify any that were were fraudulent or falsely dual enrolled there are many instances in which the student may have left public school and the public school had just not dropped them on the roll soon enough or the student needed to still be enrolled in the public school because they were receiving special ed services or
or other services that they are legally ent it led to receive and so in order to get funded for those students even for the portion of time that they're in the public school they had to remain enrolled ok no that makes
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:00:41
sense. OK and then thank you for that and then just a quick question on the sexual risk avoidance program. we have a the recommendation is4 million but we don't have an agency request but we do have an exec and legislative recommendation for
that so I'm just curious because there was no actual expense from 224 to2025. so just can you just give me an update about that so yeah so since since this was the biennial budget request it doesn't reflect an
Speaker 613
4:01:13
nation's request in there because that was picked up after the the bienn budget process had gone through legislation that was passed so that's why you see it reflected in the executive recommendation for me so it's in there it just was not part of
the request two years ago. got you so this is new
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:01:34
and so do we have plans for this new program or do we have any that don't know I'd have to check
Speaker 628
4:01:40
with you I'd have to get the what we have going on with that if I can find mind I'm just
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:01:45
interested in thank you appreciate it thanks Representative Woootten you're recognized for a
Chair
Unverified
4:01:51
question. Thank you Mr Chairman. thank you all for being here
Speaker 758
4:01:59
today and my question has to do with the cell restructure relative to a tenured teacher that has 20 odd years in service and her salary it was48,000 now it's50,000 because she got a2,000 dollars raise she's mentoring a teacher that is making50,000 a year which is fine I mean there's another problem with that the entrance pay was low but
also the other salaries for our teachers are very low and I know that the district itself has some control over that but am I correct in in assuming that the funding for the pay raise that the initial teachers are beginning teachers received we're paying that is that correct just wanna make make the clarifying question if I may when
Speaker 597
4:02:55
you say the initial salaries that that you'd receive are you talking about the
difference between like with the learns adjustment was from the36,000 to the50,000 is that OK yeah that that was part of the learns package was to
Speaker 758
4:03:16
right what are we doing to try to make equalization in the salaries for teachers that have can cite you one incidence just secretary where I have a teacher that that is mentoring a teacher
a younger initial entrance to the school classroom she's mentoring her and she's making the same amount of money with 28 years as the one that first out of college and I'm not being critical I think we needed to do what we did there but what what I'm asking or do we I didn't see anything in in your budget to try to equalize to help the tenured teacher that has has a long time
Speaker 590
4:04:06
so in and the point you bring up is think we've discussed before and with with the learnarns bill did
Speaker 597
4:04:11
with the teacher are so solid allocation is ensure that everybody got at least I think it was $2000 raise from their previous year and then the cover of the the difference but a lot of school districts to develop salary schedules on their own. So I maybe we need to follow up with the school district because some school districts and now have the flexibility and freedom to be a little bit more creative they they some districts are saying we can't find chemistry teachers
and and physics teachers so we want to pay them a little bit different than maybe a different you know a math teacher in eighth grade. some some school districts look at years of service you know they they value that a lot of districts have incentives in place if you do mentor another teacher you can get additional dollars but one of the ways I think that the more seasoned teachers are getting additional compensations through the teacher merit salary allocation and in fact last year because I pulled the numbers we had almost4,300 teachers
received teacher meritpa on an average of that payment was around3,300 dollars so typically we're seeing our more veteran teachers that are mentoring new new teachers teaching and hardest staff areas geographically loc located challenging areas to staff have have high studentg growth scores are getting those additional layers of conversation as well so that's not gonna be reflected in their base salary because that's additional compensation. Well my question is
Speaker 758
4:05:33
and I appreciate your answer on
that but my question is are we are you have y'all considered or have you looked at the state picking up some additional pay in order that some of these salaries can be raised four
of the teachers that have 20 years or more in the classroom and a and a good teachers and the
many interruption but the merit the merit system is good that I mean it it's recognizes those who went above
and beyond is what I would consider. OK but then but then you have some that meet the standards that are good teachers solid teachers and they need they just need more pay and I don't see anything in here and what I'm asking have y'all all thought about that addressing that through more state money going to the districts so me personally, I I'm always gonna
Speaker 597
4:06:34
advocate for more dollars for teachers if we know what the number one impact
on it for investment for getting students to perform better and learn better it's those teacherstanding in front of the classroom and and there's a lot of research that says you can't pay a good teacher enough money because they're worth every single cent but what we have what what we have done and what this budget allows is the distric t s to come up with a compensation plan that works best for the district I I don't think the state should prescribe to every single district how they should compensate teachers we're not in every district we want to give that decision making to the folks that are
there to the administrators the principals the school boards and the increase in foundation funding gives them some flexible dollars that if they want to directed towards teacher salaries they can. other areas that I definitely hear from school districts is they want salary schedules in and the funding flex ibility say for bus drivers or maintenance folks across the board we want to make sure we invest in recruiting retaining and recognizing the talent in our schools because they're they're the ones that are making it happen each and every single day
Speaker 758
4:07:46
Well I appreciate that and and but let me in my comments with this remark
something's wrong when we're paying the salaries we're paying the teachers and we can pay6 to89 million dollars for a football coach or we can pay 1 17 million to leave. I mean it's just it's just not fair it's not right. God no life's not fair so thank you all thank you
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
4:08:18
senator dismay you're recognized thank you Mr Chairman and this is gonna y'all probably weren't here earlier but we had a little bit of discussion about how we're funding senior citizen centers and other things and I guess what I wanna make sure that we have I mean topresentative wooten's point I mean we're spending districts when I say weeds in the collective we are spending money on things that aren't directly tied to education may be very beneficial for the district to have a football team or a basketball team or whatever it is they may believe in and there's different areas that they want to focus on and you know
build whatever it is they want to build but we want to make sure that they're prioritizing their teachers and teacher pay first you know outside the box you know the difference that needed to be ba up for the50,000 the state paid for the $2000 bonus the state paid for the merit pay the state paid for. those are all things that are outside of their per student allocation and I guess we want to make sure that districts and I'm not saying they did because I don't know didn't use those supplemental
dollars that we gave them and not let that coincide with increasing teacher pay elsewhere is there a way and I've always kind of been curious about that because every time we do a superintendent buyout and we have to pay that superintendent for two or three years that they don't actually work that's less money that's available for the district to pay for teachers right and we can go through a laundry list of payments that are being made for things that are providing zero services or education to children because someone entered into a contractual agreement
that was to the detriment of the school district it's just the reality is there a way for us to do a better job tracking how those dollars are being spent on the district level so that the citizens back home can help us make sure that things are being prioritized that
should be prioritized. so I I think that's a great question and and ultimately the
Speaker 597
4:10:14
answer is yes because we need to have transparency in fact we built a transparency dashboard that anybody can log in and see
where the expenses are going at the school district and school level we can make sure the members are aware of it it has an interesting acronym for a name. Everything has an acronym in education I can't remember the name of it directly but this is why I feel strongly in accountability and this is why I think even the legislative delegation was supportive in issuing school district grades typically when we find an F rated school district that's not one building in a school that's failing when we find failing districts we have
failing systems and when you find failing systems students aren't learning and typically they're not being good stewards of those dollars and we want to take a greater control and accountability especially at the state board level they've made their intentions clear that when we start looking at DNF districts what they're doing with their money needs to to be a big part of that conversation because typically what we find is they're not putting the money and the resources where they need to be to protect and improve student learning
so I I think the the the overall arching question is can we do more? absolutely right should do I believe in local control and local decision making 1000%. but if you're failing kids and communities and we need to be able to call you to the table and hold you accountable. one thing I'd like to ask then is maybe
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
4:11:42
for education chairers or whoever I I'm not aware of the program how it works you know what that platform looks like for us to go into I'm gonna bet our school board members aren't
aware of the program how it works or how to kind of dig into it. it might be really beneficial for starting with the members of education especially as we're going down the adequacy path to have a tutorial on what to look for and then ultimately I think each member would be it'd be advantageous for members to be able to look and see what was happening because we often just read what's in the paper after it's happened to see what's what's going on inside of a district so that that would be my request is maybe we can get with the
chairs of those respective committees so that we're all
better informed about what's happening yeah maybe as we go through
Speaker 617
4:12:31
this process that could be an agenda item we'd be happy to to bring the folks in and and start walking through and navigate that because I think that'd be
Speaker 597
4:12:41
beneficial we we are hyperfocused on criticizing the state
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
4:12:43
on how we spend education dollars and it feels like there is almost zero focus on how the districts are actually spending the dollars after we send it to them
and that may be largely because everything's being done correctly but I don't think any of us have the tools or knowledge to know or what and where the tools even existed to know how to dig in and find out. So I appreciate that and thank you senator I
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:13:11
would just add that on its part when you said that the education committee going through that adequacy process one of
Speaker 613
4:13:16
the things that we've been working withblR is reviewing the resource allocations that I believe will be presented to the the education committee next week where they go through I think there's two parts where they're breaking down and actually going
through the the revenues that districts have received in the allocation and the resources and how they spent those over the last year last two years so that is something that will be incorporated in the adequacy study. all right Representative
Kavanaugh you're recognized for a question you Mr Chape thank y'all
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:13:49
my question's going to be around declining enrollment and growth enrollment. so on our declining enrollment, do you know how many is school districts are approximately or currently being given that funding
we just we just went through the through in peer last month I want to say it was
Speaker 613
4:14:08
around 120 that had declining enrollment last month that we came and had to get additional preparation for it and is there
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:14:13
any one particular part of the state that has more of that than another ' m trying to go through the list. I don't I
Speaker 613
4:14:20
don't know I'd have to look at it. I don't think so. I think you see movement around the state and it just kind of varies. definitely I think in southeast Arkansas you've you've seen a decline there but I don't I'd have to look at the report of all this to cools yeah if you
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:14:33
don't mind if you would get that so I'd kind of be interested in knowing where that decline is happening like is it relating to you know population shift or is it another factor that's affecting that so I'd kind of like to know that the same thing with the growth how much how many are getting growth funding didn't didn't bring how many I can I'll send that to you
Speaker 644
4:14:53
as well and also kind of wanting to know the same information I'm
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:14:56
trying to see is it economic factors that's growing it or do we have another problem with those declining enrollments so
thank you Representative Gramlich I'm glad to see you came back to the
right side you were kicked back over there on the senate side this morning I was a little worried about you you're recognized Well you gotta dip your toes in to know it's hot so I just
Speaker 654
4:15:34
did a learning exercise couple questions I saw one was you haven't had this before but was the school funding contingency for $25 million it seemed pretty significant I I would assume you're assuming there's gonna be some shortfalls do you have any ideas what that might be used for the school funding contingency 25 million is unfunded appropriation to
Speaker 613
4:15:54
address those shortfalls or something that we see during the year that we would do a we have we can do special languages allow us to do two reallocation of resources a
year and if we needed that additional appropriation that's where we would bring the letter to the peer committee to be reviewed to move appropriation when we had those shortfalls. OK and then the
Speaker 654
4:16:15
next one was the consolidation incentive I see we didn't have them for 2425 now it's for nearly6 million dollars are there districts we have id ent ified that
are going to be consolidating or right that
Speaker 653
4:16:27
that is for the voluntary consolidation where we work
Speaker 613
4:16:30
with them to make sure that we pay up to at least350 ADm of the foundation funding to
help with the consolidation of those depending on which one the smaller district because it's usually a smaller district moving into a bigger district so that consolidation incentive bonuses there when they are consolidating two school districts together so but I mean we don't are there districts that are going to consolidate and that's
Speaker 654
4:16:50
why we have this money I don't know that have we have it there
Speaker 613
4:16:54
in case they do we don't we wouldn't know until they started that consolidation process that hasn't happened we don't know if
Speaker 654
4:17:00
any districts are consolidating in the state right now OK thank you Representative College you're
Chair
Unverified
4:17:07
recognized for a question thank
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
4:17:12
you Mr Chair. so I'm looking now at page 241 which is funding sources I know that you're going through the spending but it's the public school fund funding there was a um3 million dollars in fiscal 25 federal revenue and then it's budgeted zero for fiscal 26 and not expected in 27. what was
that? why did it go away Will it ever come back that was a a journal entry
Speaker 613
4:17:44
that we did the last year to use some of our esser funds when we were doing the free
Speaker 657
4:17:49
breakfast so it was just a one time transfer that we were doing to pay
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
4:17:54
for the free breakfasts and then the other question I have is that same area there it's something called unfunded appropriation
and it's budgeted for $25 million in fiscal 27. there's a lot of unfunded appropriations why does this get
Speaker 657
4:18:08
its own line item that's the that's the 25 man that Representative Grambles was
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
4:18:13
just asking about that's the same thing there OKok I see well all right and and just being called unfunded appropriation is that the best way to do that that way it would it would properly reflect our
Speaker 613
4:18:24
phone balance and our other sources of revenue because if we had unfunded appropriation up here when it falls down at the bottom in there it would suck suck up the revenue so to speak. it's a to show that we were actually budgeting more than we intended to budget so they show
that $25 million unfunded budget lying on there so all the revenue is correct that is accurately reflected thank you right senator
Irvin you're recognized for a question thank you is
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:18:57
there any kind of mechanism to where superintendents and districts give us a report they submit a report to us about the way they're spending money
or is it just us having access to them to their information and we generate that so I'll say that
Speaker 602
4:19:20
they do have to post some of that information on their website, but then I'll letreg but there's no
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:19:26
but there's no mandate that they come and present it to this legislative body so I mean I'm just following up on this conversation that senator Dismay had that Representative Wooten started but
you know during the was the esser the federal funding you know we, I think senator Disming I think you put into place for some pretty high level accountability for them to come before our committees and discuss those funds and how those funds were going to be requested and then utilized and so you know, and there's would 100% agree and I want to go back to that conversation cause I really think that there's got to be some
back and forth communication and with this legislative body because we're we're we we are I believe in local control and they're ability to have flexibility and spending but I can tell you as a parent going to a school board meeting where the teacher committee you know recommended to the school board, certain amount of raises for the teachers and it was denied that you know if if you're a parent and if you go to the school board meeting, then you know that happened but if you don't
there's no accountability for that and so what you know what I'm seeing is where districts are choosing to spend a ton in administration as far as all these different levels of assistance and assistance and assistance to the assistants and not paying teachers and you know that is problematic and troubling to me because we see high salary I mean huge exorbitant salaries at the levels of of superintendent
and a super attendance assistant superintendents and principals and assistant principals where that's probably not necessary to operate in some of these sizes of these schools in my opinion and they're not spending that money and they're not choosing to spend that money to increase teacher salariesstead it's going to one or 2 or5 people versus to the teachers but that's a decision that is being made at the local level with the school district so those teachers could have gotten a $2000 raise but instead
it went to upping the salary from 17,500 0 to now 187,000. so is there any level of accountability to this body about how they're spending those dollars.
Theres there is none as far as reports that they have to, I can't think of one right now but I think like the there are
Speaker 613
4:22:11
reports that we are required to turn in which is the AR which does go through and show all how
all the expenditures are done on there. since all districts are required to use e finance there are reports that we can pull and do that to show how the the allocation of funds is being used as as I mentioned earlier with the resource allocation that's going to be presented to the committee those those are the only 23
Speaker 623
4:22:32
things that I can think of right now off the top of my head but the impetus is on y'all
Senator Missy Irvin
Unverified
4:22:37
pulling the information not on them actually having to prepare it and submitting it ok and I think that needs
to be addressed to be frank with you,
I think that we should address that. I think that we should demand that. I think that this body should say how are you spending those monies and you prepare it and you present it to us because then you're accountable and and that that even just them preparing it themselves and submitting it to us provides a level of oh you know they now know I'm going to have to present this to me I feel like that's appropriate and I think it's worth exploring. thanks.
Speaker 220
4:23:19
thank you senatorative wooten we're back to you Thank
Speaker 758
4:23:24
you Mr Chairman. My question is
on page 213 what what is what is the content standards it's zero expenditures but yet we budgeted $161,000. what is that? that is for when we do have the review for the content
Representative Frances Cavenaugh
Unverified
4:23:44
standards to come in the expenses to reimburse teachers for mile or
Speaker 613
4:23:50
any expenses they have to come in because when they go through the content center they do try to get teachers from outs from all parts of the state to come in and review content to
Speaker 663
4:24:03
update standards. but we didn't spend any money. I don't know that they had it last year. I'd have to go back and look to
Speaker 758
4:24:11
see when they were doing it you do that yes sirext question is right under it school funding contingency is 25 million budgeted authorized but no expenditures no budget that's
Speaker 613
4:24:21
earlier when we talked to representative grams but that's the 25 million of unfunded appropriation that during the year if we have a a lot if we don't have enough appropriation and we and a certain program then we have to come back to peer to do a reallocation of resources and move that appropriation to that line item so it's just an unfunded appropriation to use if needed and then one
Speaker 758
4:24:42
more question Mr Chairman on the isolated special needs isolated funding
we we spent45 budgeted 175 authorized 175 and then two lines down there's another isolated yeah 2 million 2.1 million or
2.2 million and we budgeted almost 8 million so what are the what's the difference in those funds and and why the why the amount so isolated funding in law there
Speaker 613
4:25:22
are districts that were identified as isolated school districts and they receive foundation funding based off of the amount of isolated funding based off their current Adm for those districts listed in there once we've met the law also then says once we've met alllla qualify for those I districts any additional funding left over that moves down to isolated fund special needs isolated funding. special needs isolated funding is for those districts that have are considered isolated by law definition that have additional transportation route
miles or square mileage to would make them that they get additional ADm funding based off their isolated status so that's those two different lot items one is listed in law by by the district that has to get it and so due to consolidations or school closures that list is not as many get to isolated funding so that additional leftover isolated funding I guess I'd call it goes down to be used in special needs isolated. OK so
Speaker 758
4:26:21
a special needs is like transportation there's a difference and then but
but but isolated district is a whole district entirely thank you one
more question for you Mr Secretary relative to economic education. there's400,000 in the budget but it's my understanding that in special development or in professional development there will be additional funding for that education economic education program so when we submit our governor's
Speaker 590
4:26:59
letter there there's going to be a request for additional funding to support that initiative so let's but
Speaker 758
4:27:05
the but the money that's requested is in another category rather than dead in an economic education it would come out of this
Speaker 590
4:27:12
budget so we we feel like we can cover that thank you thank
you Mr Chairman. thank youpresentative all right resented flop excuse mesenator flowers you're recognized thank you I'm looking at
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:27:35
pages 233 and221 dealing with special education services do we not receive any funding from the department of
education the United States Department of Education for special ed servicevices Senator flowers, the federal funding is appropriated in
Speaker 584
4:27:55
the dei operations bill so that's not included in this budget it's just in the desiations Act.
Speaker 138
4:28:07
desi meaning department of the yes ma'am is that
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:28:10
so it comes up in a different appropriation bill yes ma'am and that one
Speaker 584
4:28:18
is not part of the budget presentations for for right now but the bill has been drafted and will be introduced in the fiscal session for this committee to hear Senator it's funded out of the public
Speaker 667
4:28:31
school fund so is that a part of this adequacy
Speaker 584
4:28:39
No ma'am so the Department of Education appropriation bill has one large federal appropriation that's not part of the budget that you're hearing today that budget is separate and you
Speaker 586
4:28:54
will see that full bill once the session begins when the bill is filed this is only the public school fund appropriations that you're hearing today so what
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:29:05
we received from the fed's department of edd augments what
the appropriation recommendation is for what we're looking at
Speaker 551
4:29:24
today it's supplemental fundings is supplemental yes ma'am well the
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:29:30
state funding or the federal funding would be supplemental. So I think I'm gonna make
Speaker 590
4:29:41
sure I'm getting the right question we
Speaker 617
4:29:44
will receive federal funding to support public schools and the students in those schools those dollars are used to supplement what is the investment by the state in fact there's federal restrictions that says we cannot supplant so because we get federal dollars we cannot take away state dollars so we have the state dollars that we're gonna support schools and education then we'll receive additional federal dollars to help those students in those schools that may need additional support and resources my understanding is that federal
supplement components gonna come to the committee next week during fiscal session or next month I apologize. so is the is the federal
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:30:24
funding specific for special education services not all of it so there there's different federal funding categoricals
Speaker 597
4:30:30
but there is a category for special education
Speaker 617
4:30:33
funding yes ma'am. OK the other question I had you know I wanted
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:30:45
to see if you had a take on transportation I don't
know whether it's isolated funding or something dealing with transportation we're I learned this past year we have
these this formula for that I didn't understand and I don't think anybody understands it was created by somebody in the bureau of legislative Research years ago when I'm hoping to file an interim
build study it but do you have any comments about transportation needs in the school districts when we went up there to I think it was White countunty or White River County I don't know I think it was White countunty their school district superintendent has to pull monies from other things that they really could
use for those other things just to get transportation and access for the students to come to school or go to other places that the children need to go to so think your point is
Speaker 590
4:32:04
is well received because we have to transport students right and we don't want to
Speaker 597
4:32:09
create a system where it's called an unfunded mandate the the reality is if you're asking what I'm hearing
for districts setting competitive w ways to get bus drivers is a challenge in a lot of parts of the states every time the price of diesel goes up the cost of operating buses goes up buses aren't cheap. in fact trying to trying to buy a bus sometimes you you may be on an over a year waiting list to even get bus buses or replacement parts but certain part of our state's geographically, you know you you may look at a map and it says it's only3 miles away but it
Speaker 617
4:32:44
it takes45 minutes to go3 miles because of the way you got a
route and that's part of the challenge of why you have the enhanced transportation to try to recognize that there's some challenges especially in more of our isolated more rural areas that have really long bus runs the cost of transportation is significant and it seems to increase is the department
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:33:11
going to make any recommendations to add additional funding for transportation especially now that we're in a war and gas
prices are going to go up and that are going up is there what thoughts do you have about helping the school districts maintain their ability to get students to and fro think that's one of the great things about learns is
Speaker 597
4:33:38
there was a set aside and the legislature put a pot of money that allowed districts to apply for a specialized transportation monitorization grant and it was I want to say it was
around a $15 million or5 million dollars sorry about a5 million dollar categorical that we put out calls to school districts to find is there ways to be more innovative and we we have found some districts that have really embraced that and I I think to answer your question is is if we can find places like I I know like even educational cooperatives are helping some districts with scheduling and routing and getting more sophistic so software to be more efficient if we can identify some of those best practices we want to share that with other districts but that
that's just one of those little innovative pieces about learns that we're seeing in action and we're starting to see the results which can help that so and anytime we can find ways to modernize or be more efficient transportation we can reduce those costs it would address like what you were saying you saw in whitehi countunty how many school districts do you
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:34:43
have that have applied for those transportation modernization grants it was pretty significant we I'd have to get you that
Speaker 590
4:34:51
list I don't know the number off the
Speaker 630
4:34:55
top of my head there's a lot of interest
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:35:00
in that well it appears it just says budgeted5 million for fiscal year 2526
we don't know how much has been spent of that yeah we can get you
Speaker 602
4:35:15
the exact amount. we've only awarded I want to say about a little over 1.5 million based on the over 100 applications that we
received because it's not only school districts that could apply. You had early childhood centers, um, different organizations, community, organizations that could apply for it so we received several 100 applications, um, but to date we've only awarded less than 2 million because again we it's directed towards modernization and so a lot of what we saw requested was to purchase more buses and while there is a need for that, we really wanted to direct these funds towards what are ways that
we can look at different transportation to the secretary's point being more efficient finding alternate ways to transport students or software that can help you readjust your schedules and things so we have not spent all of the
Speaker 625
4:36:10
funds that were previously allotted. and the funds
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:36:14
that you mentioned Mr Secretary about that have been set aside Will those be able to be tapped into by school districts
that will have rising gas costs I'm'm not sure I followed
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:36:35
that there is some set aside for transportation I don't know if you said transportation or just some set aside but yeah I think that's the grant
Speaker 597
4:36:50
we were talking about but then some school districts get additional categoricals for enhanced transportation so that that enhanced transportation
Speaker 617
4:36:58
categorical is to go to those districts to help offset
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:37:03
those costs that enhanced transportation deal that's that one I was speaking of about the formula well we will your department give that a look? I mean if you if you've got feedback from other school districts about the difficulty and some of them that had been receiving that
enhanced transportation funding they went to zero or it was decreased quite a bit so I mean it seems like the department would want to make a recommendation if they're hearing from school district as I heard from that one up there I forgot the I think it was White countunty I would think we'd want to look look at that we'd be happy to work withblr in and see how we
Speaker 597
4:38:00
can kind of gotp capture that feedback and see if there's
Senator Stephanie Flowers
Unverified
4:38:05
any recommendations absolutely. OK well thank you and the last thing was about the joint use agreements I see it's only5
million dollars that has been requested our recommended and how are we doing with especially you
know I always thought that these joint use agreements would be great especially where you have
health issues obesity diabetes and things like that with the students and the parents of students in the district for physical exercise of track walking way or whatever but I've only seen that joint use agreement maybe one time used in my district over in Dewitt when they put in a walking track but it seems to me like if we are
looking at things holistically we would look at not only the academic achievement of the student but the health the physical well being of the student and their parents so you know I ask of the department many times in the past about why don't we see these joint use agreements especially in areas where the the state has taken over school districts and even with with
the idea of retaining third graders seems to me like if there was a joint use program between the community and the school district that would focus on that child's wellbeing in the classroom and outside it would seem to me that that would help strengthen the ability of the child and the family the parents to be more engaged with student achievement
academically senator and that's it would you agree? I would not
Speaker 611
4:40:18
you I'm asking the secretary'm trying to move this
Speaker 630
4:40:25
along he can respond and we we can have further conversation on that thank you thank you senator all
Speaker 220
4:40:31
right Representative McAlinon, we're going to nonmembers now
Representative Mindy McAlindon
Unverified
4:40:40
right so thank you chairman. I had a quick question for you on the maternity leave. I assume that ginormous jump is because of Act904 is that correct? Yes ma'am and then does that cost include the cost for subs that will be needed for that period of time or is that cost picked up by the district? so we reimbursed for the
Speaker 602
4:41:02
cost of filling in for that teacher. So obviously through foundation funding the school district is already getting the funding for the teacher's salary but whether
it's a substitute or a contract for someone else a stipend to another staff member however they are choosing to fill that position we reimburse for the cost to fill it. OK, so just to sum
Representative Mindy McAlindon
Unverified
4:41:23
that up the district is not paying
any of the costs for the increase in maternity leave correct thank you thank you chairman thank
youpresentative Representative Duke, you're recognized for a question thank you Mr Chair. my question has to
Representative Hope Duke
Unverified
4:41:38
do with the master principal bonus and the national
board offessional Teaching. um, I think page 225 in the larger manual in 228. so on those bonuses it's they were the same question are you
all tracking to see if when these they're being awarded these bonuses are they is it is it improving our students and our test scores or are we just putting the money out there and hoping that it does that because they've done this program or so forth. Is
there any accountability on this was successful so we want to continue to do this in the future do we revisit that? the short
Speaker 590
4:42:22
answer is yes and I and when we look at kind of that
Speaker 597
4:42:26
teacher merit programme that was implemented withEns we've been moving more of those dollars and resources we we wanted to kind of grandfather folks in but we're moving more people into that evidencebased program where they're doing the master lead teacher program that has an evidencebas component on if
students are learning and making the national boards and master principals part of the teacher merit programme so we do want to track that so we are tracking
Representative Hope Duke
Unverified
4:42:52
like their test scores which is what we're measuring by that it is tracking with the people who are doing
these programs that we are incentivizing to do this and we're seeing long term that this is effective use of our money that's correct now we're we're in the
Speaker 597
4:43:05
third year of the teacher merit program so long term that's the goal right is that that that's the anticipation but in the short term when when we
look at the like the teachers that that are eligible to earn up to $10,000 and we're seeing repeat teachers those are your master teachers those are the ones that we want to help menor and lead the other teachers because you're not getting those kind of results on accident there's something special happening in your classroom and that system is in place for the future
Representative Hope Duke
Unverified
4:43:34
so that that is gonna be continual to make sure that that is reevaluating the money just doesn't stay there're assuming
that it's doing its job that's correct thank you
Representative Gonzalezortham you're recognized for a question. thank you
Representative Justin Gonzales
Unverified
4:43:53
chairman. my question has to do with English language learners the description on page 220 talks about it's the fourth paragraph English language learners serves students identified as not being proficient in the English language. This categorical funding program helps school districts provide specially trained staff instructional materials and
training for teachers summer training academies are offered to teachers desiring additional training in teaching and assisting these students and there's been funding set aside at384 dollars for each identified English language learner in the 2627 school year my question has to do with the training academies and the professional development for teachers those that have been involved in offering the EOl and is the second other language
institute had received a three year contract but that third year contract was eliminated that particular Esau institute initially had been the ES so academy that started 30 years ago that particular training is one of our most comprehensive trainings for teachers who serve English language learners. So that training has been around for30
years teachers do receive their ESL endorsement. they're taking the four required graduateleve classes and and actually Arkansas is probably one of the leading the way in terms of how we train teachers of English learners. several other states have actually used our model to train their teachers because it is comprehensive so I've been receiving a lot of questions related to that related to why we are removing a comprehensive training program
that has really been doing a lot of good and it's not just inservice teachers that attend that it's principles it's coaches coaching staff in the in the teacher coaches instructional facilitator s counselors because they all if they are serving even just one English learner, they need to be up to date and know what to do. lastly, oftentimes that individual if they're representing a building in their school district oftentimes they
end up being the EO coordinator or the ESau lead in their building and so there's a lot of concern. I've just had a lot of questions related to eliminating this and I just wanted to see if you could maybe explain why and what are we going to do in place of that so thank you for the question
Speaker 597
4:46:45
and thank you for always having a special language on our English language learners because we know we we gotta make sure especially in certain regions of the state where there's large populations
we're doing everything we can support those students and families so we always appreciate you keeping us grounded on doing this right for students the the summer academies that you talked about are happening again this summer but I but I think the question that we need to ask is is that the best youer our funds to support teachers and students in these programs because when we looked at the overall categorical and we pulled that together at the385 dollars a student it's it's almost 1.8
almost $1.9 million so we had RfPs out with four universities to do this summer training and what we're finding is most of that training's not providing direct support to students and those teachers so I'll give an example one of our summer trainings we had 20 participants that cost $256,000 we're spending over 90 0 $0 a teacher to get trained is that the best use of our funds when we're spending on average if you look at the total program we trained 289 teachers last year at almost6,400 dollars
a teacher so I think the question that we're saying to ourselves that's a lot of money per teacher for training how are we supporting students with that? can we do that more efficiently? Can we hit more teachers? would we be better off just giving these dollars straight to districts to do the professional development at the local level and impact more teachers and support more students so I think the the short answer to your question is we're working on developing a plan we'd love to bring you in and have a seat at the table but the way we're doing the institute now, I don't think we're getting a very good return
on that investment we're making hotels very rich and I think we should be working with students in classrooms and not spending the summers in a fancy city and giving
Representative Justin Gonzales
Unverified
4:48:44
yes ok I understand in terms of the cost and that cost is more than likely going to be a little bit high because they're receiving graduate level credit at either at u of afayetteville, Arkansas Tech University, UCA Henderson State University and John Brown
had been a part of that so those are those are for graduate level classes which the tuition and fees for graduate level class is is higher and the hotels we're bringing in faculty, specialized faculty and also helping for their for their tra for doing the training and also for teachers that live more than an hour away so that they can attend that EL Eau Institute.
my understanding is that's not going to happen this summer I checked them today. my understanding
Speaker 597
4:49:39
is the institute is gonna happen this summer and we want to plan something different but at6,400 dollars a teacher they shouldn't get a college credit they should get a master's degree, right? So I think like we need to just start asking those questions about how are we making sure that we're supporting students and those teachers so that they don't have to travel because right now this program is limited to folks that have the capacity to travel and spend 10 days in the summer.
we're hearing from a lot of teachers that says we need training I can't give up my summer how do you get people in our schools so it's it's about finding
Representative Justin Gonzales
Unverified
4:50:12
that balance. I understand and I think that's a great point and I think we're very much aligned in trying to find multiple pathways to provide the teacher training for our inservice teachers but also for our administrators counselors etc. that serve the students however, it would
is it possible when you're working on restructuring or when you're looking at how we're going to deliver these services in a different pathway to include some of the individuals who had been part of the 30 year plus you know years of of doing the institutes because they have they have a wealth of knowledge and can give you a lot of feedback along with I don't know there's probably at least75 or more ESO coordinators statewide that could give
input as well just just an idea I think we have
Speaker 597
4:51:07
to mean we need to listen to the experts that are working with the students
Speaker 617
4:51:11
in the classrooms to make sure we get these programs right so and we'd love to to engage in that conversation
absolutely thank you all right we've got one last questionpresentative Rye can you make it brief? sure will. thank you Mr
Representative Johnny Rye
Unverified
4:51:28
Chairman. Mr Secretary backst step a couple of steps we were talking about school buses
does that not fall under the 25 mills maintenance and operation that comes
Speaker 690
4:51:40
from on the local level sir I think it can
Speaker 670
4:51:49
be right like they have that flexibility I believe so yes thank you you're welcome all
right members seeing no other questions have a motion for executive rec in a
second. any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed it's adopted
Speaker 584
4:52:09
as Walden we're going to the state library thank you Mr Chair. The next public school fund budget for your review today is for the Arkansas Statelibrary. This is one appropriation amount this is their aid to local public libraries it's in the manual on page 243 and page four of packet C. This is one appropriation for6.5 million dollars annually funded with public school funding that's general revenue
and money for this appropriation is used to provide aid to local libraries and library systems across the state the budget is flat it was6.5 million dollars and it is recommended to remain6.5 million dollars. Thank you Mr Chair. pretty straight see no questions have an adoption for
prosecutive ick and a second any discussion all in favor say aye
any you opposed and the last one on the education is career technical Miss Walden you're
Speaker 583
4:53:14
thank you thank you Mr Chairginning on page 248 of your budget manual
Speaker 584
4:53:20
on page 5 of your schedule. this is for the division of career and technical Education. these are the public school funds that they receive to provide vocational center aid career coaches, coordinated career education services to districts statewide as well as vocational startup grants the total budget is34.3 million dollars and that's a flat budget from Fy26 to Fy27 that's the budget for career and technical education Mr Chair.
seeing no questions we have a motion to adopt for executive rec with a second any discussion
all in favor say aye any opposed we thank the department and we'll ask Mr Coleman to come up and we'll start on the department of public safety
and to just go ahead and save time just have the department
come on to the table and Mr Coleman whenever you're
ready you can proceed. all right thank you Mr chairir. My
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
4:54:23
name is Dalden Coleman I'mblr fiscal staff. if you'll turn to page 256 with me we'll go ahead and get started looking at the department of Public Safety Now Mr Chairman there aren't too many changes to talk about throughout the entire department today with public safety and the division of administration and shared Services that we see on page 256 is is no exception to that for instance if you look at the fiscal year 26 authorized appropriation totals is $22.1
Speaker 695
4:54:46
million. the biggest chunk of that's coming out of the public safety paying account at $8.9 million nearly the same thing in fiscal year 2027 we have a total of $22.1 million again and the same or near the same amount at $8.9 million coming out of the paying account. with that Mr Chairman, there are no significant changes to this division at all and I'm happy to ask or answer any questions Senator senator ice you go off or you back on
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
4:55:17
all right you're recognized it's gonna be for the department head Say that again it's gonna be for the department OK
well go ahead thank you appreciate you all being here today can you give me an update on where we are on the intended elimination of the federal surplus program
in the entities tied to that or is it still open for discussion in the budget session or update me please Yes sir I go ahead and identify
Mike Hager
Unverified
4:56:06
yourself sorry Mike Hager secretary of the department of Public Safety and director of state police we're still working with the governor's office and that process it as far as it being up for discussion we're
we're kind of past that point and we're in the close out procedure of doing that it's a process so that we're having to follow through the federal side of the house as well as state on the rear program or the the process but also the closed out program with the federal side so I can if there's anything specific that questions you have I can try to answer those or I may have to plan torector Gary or Karen
our CFfo to answer anything have you been
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
4:56:53
made aware of a long list of cities and towns that have requested that to continue. yes sir we have. OK. and would you be in agreement with what in previous meetings that we've discussed that there's been do I remember correctly there's been something around $9 million worth of goods obtained for entities in Arkansas cities, state or excuse me cities towns
fire departments various things for roughly a cost of300,000 dollars or less loss per year in the last three years would that be correct? I couldn't speak to those specific numbers you got somebody there that could
Mike Hager
Unverified
4:57:35
centri we haven't got to that part yet I Id I
realize that and that's the reason I
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
4:57:42
I ask he he he took the question so he's the man at the top and he's the one talking to the governor so I'm I'm willing to talk to his underling and
that's respectful but this this has a lot of eyes on it and it and I realized there's some big ticket items that are not available anymore we're told they're not available anymore but there's a lot of goods that is still federal surplus that is gotten for the state of Arkansas that if we try to do anything for the cities and towns and fire departments all across the state we can't we can't touch it with what we could fund them so the other thing I want to
know and you can tell AJ to do it when he he's up here I want to know what's your plans for that facility I want to I want to know upfront if you know it is this a plan that y'all are gonna do something else and that the thing that's
Speaker 702
4:58:41
standing their way you've got to get rid of this no that is
Speaker 697
4:58:46
that a fair question? yes sir absolutely we've heard that speculation I'm not sure where that started or where it came from but no sir the only
Mike Hager
Unverified
4:58:52
plans for that facility right now is to stockpile preparedness
program for natural disasters specifically we had heard that the state police wanted to acquire that property for an auto shop and to be completely honest with you we have3 auto shops right now that we have a tough enough time keeping staffs funded and so there is absolutely no need or no desire for the state police to to use that property at all so if if if we're not going to
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
4:59:22
use it for good of of what it's used
for now would you be ok state just selling it and getting rid of
Mike Hager
Unverified
4:59:32
it that would probably be a better question forrector Gary because I know he is planning on using that to stockpile prepared its items so I would hate to dive off in that too much and I also don't know as far as the agreement that we have I believe with the city of North LittleRock that the way we acquired that property to begin with, I don't know if we're in a position where we could just sell it but that's so that would certainly be entertained well letrector
Speaker 705
4:59:57
Gary sir thank you Representative wooten you're recognized thank you Mr
Speaker 758
5:00:10
Chairman. colonel on the number of employees in the department of public safety how many do you have total?
counting state please to everybody Philip Warner head of HR we've got 1,433 fielded
positions with total positions in public safety and
Speaker 706
5:00:31
and state police it's is it included in there
Speaker 758
5:00:35
sir but it's a breakout it's how many vacancies do you have right now we have 182
Speaker 706
5:00:42
vacancies. OK, how many of those are two years
Speaker 758
5:00:45
or older. so at this point it's3838. are y'all looking at
Speaker 758
5:00:51
mean to see if you need if you need that many how many of those are budgeted
Speaker 706
5:01:01
of those honestly most of those are not budgeted that because of the act that you had where they were 2 years plus that they be surrendered most of those are kind of gone to OPm and they're held aside so
Speaker 758
5:01:17
we're not utilizing those has the on another subject has the additional compensation that that we've
done in the last two sessions and again this session we anticipate to be done is that helping in recruiting I
know you just had a excellent ceremony for a graduating class is that is that helping you and your attention of troopers.
Mike Hager
Unverified
5:01:41
yes sir absolutely it's it's been a a complete game changer for us and not only recruiting but retention of our current personnel so absolutely thank you thank you
Speaker 758
5:01:53
Mr Chair and one more one more on the on the senator icess's questions and comments. I'm hearing the same thing from my cities and
counties and small particularly small fire departments in that time so uhm I'm asking you is in your consultation and and consulting with the governor that you you share that concern. Thank you colonel. thank youen Dism you're recognized thank you and then this may circle back sounds like we're gonna have another discussion
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
5:02:20
about this Senator Rri has left the room I I was I'm not aware of the
rumor. I don't know if that was an accurate response that it would be used for
I guess vehicle maintenance or whatever I would just was going to ask the senator rice could kind of let us know when we come back around to that later on what is the rumor to make sure that we're all on the same page of what is getting sold for because if I'm mad I would like to know a little bit more so maybe he'll be back here in a little
bit and we can have that discussion. all right looks like right now the last question ispresentative uhgramlich
Speaker 207
5:03:01
you recognized thank you chair just real quick and it's just for my own education I see on
Speaker 654
5:03:07
256 you have the not requested for the biennium like is that are we going to be seeing that again in a year or are these going away just kind of educate me on that there's BL1 BL2, Bl3 goes down the list. Karen Perry Department of Public Safety. those appropriations were moved to the Commission
Chair
Unverified
5:03:24
on Law Enforcementandards and training so there later on in the budget manual thank you all right do we have a motion executive rec have a motion in a
second any discussion all in favor say aye and
you opposed all right we're going to the crimeme informationenter Mr coleman thank you Mr Chair.
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
5:03:49
Therimeformationenter division appropriation summary is on page 279 of your manuals. there's only one change within us vision and that is the ACIC National Criminal History Improvement Programme so the fiscal year 26 authorized amount for this appropriation is
$823,000 and you'll see that decrease to405,000 dollars it feels like you're 27. it's a roughly a418,000 dollars decrease and that's simply to align better with federal grant awards that makes our total for fiscal year 26 authorized 10.1 million and you'll see that decrease in the $9.7 million recommended for fiscal year 27 Mr. Chairman that concludes an Arkansas crimeformation Center. any questions for the department or staff seeing none I entertain
a motion executive rec we have one in a
second. any discussion all in favor say aye in your opposed and to prove we'll go now to the
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
5:04:48
crime laboratory thank you Mr Chair on page 294 you will see the division appropriation summary for the crimeme lab now there are no changes at all within this division our totals for fiscal year 26 authorized are $24.9 million in the same exact thing for fiscal year 27 executive recommendation. Mr Chairman, I'm happy to answer your questions but there are no significant
Speaker 695
5:05:06
changes members we have any questions for staff or department?
seeing none will entertain a motion for executive rec we have it in a second in a second any
discussion all in favor say aye any opposed sands approved Next item is the department of emergency Management you recognize
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
5:05:31
Mr Coleman. thank you Mr Chair. we can find the adam division summary on page 311 of your manuals Now I really only have one change here just like just like Arkansasrime Information Center and that is the addition
of the Arkansas Nuclear One programme Act583 of2025 moved this from the department of healthalth to the division of emergency Management that's about a $2 million appropriation if you want some more information on that you can go to page334 of your manuals and you'll see the breakdown of that Mr Chairman that is the only significant change level to this division and I'm happy to answer any questions about any of the other appropriations. right Mr Gary you want to come
up we think we got some questions for you
and we'll start off with our members Representative
Chair
Unverified
5:06:24
wooten you're recognized Georgeary I
Speaker 758
5:06:29
noticed on line item on the Arkansas nuclear one we have almost 2 million recommendation on the executive branch and the agency but we don't have one there's no expenditures what what is that
for an emergency up there or so it's on page 311 so this program came from the department of healthalth
Chair
Unverified
5:06:56
so Department of emergency Management did not have any expenses till this fiscal year. they'll say that again this depar this program moved from Department of Health to emergency management of no it came from department of came from the department of healthalth
Speaker 758
5:07:18
well they didn't spend any money or we not spending any money you you agency it's because it has in 2425 and2526 it has no expenditures the expenses are going to
Chair
Unverified
5:07:36
be reflected in the health budget manual for the
Speaker 758
5:07:41
new budget and here you're showing 2 million that's our agency request Mr
Wooten yes we're gonna do the department of healthalth later those figures will be in that budget when
we get there to it they weren't in this budget till this year so there's no prior actual expense but you'll see it in the department of healthalth when we get to it you righty thank you sir right next member of the committee is Senatorice. you're recognized thank you Mr Gary you heard my questions earlier and I know you're well
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:08:18
up on the interest and concern about the federal surplus program you give me any updates has there been any movement of hearing from the municipalities
across the state that that feel like this program is worthy of funding
Speaker 724
5:08:37
yes sir AJary director of the Arkansas division of emergency Management so just kind of go back on what Secretary Hager said we are in the process of working through the closure of
federal surplus property that is not something that happens quickly so it currently we had to produce our write a plan on the liquidation of the the the property that's inside the warehouses so we're
Speaker 725
5:09:01
waiting on approval of that. and that will then have to go to GSA and then we'll have to have I believe a public comment period after that so we're still a little ways down the line before that can be totally closed
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:09:20
can you substantiate my figures up from memory is that we were garnering something like $9 million worth of goods and coming up about300,000 short for the last three years is that correct so I I cannot say that those are
Speaker 726
5:09:37
exact numbers. I know that throughout the years with that program
Speaker 725
5:09:41
we have pushed a lot of items at a great saving to the localities to fire departments cities and counties
I do know that that over the last few years because of items that are coming in we weren't we weren't bringing in enough to sustain what we had going with the number of personnel that we had at that time it wouldn't sellfund that is correct it was done before
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:10:10
you sir are are we still the only state right now that that is in process shutting down the federal surplus program That was testimony I believe I
believe that was testimony previous and and and and then there's maybe one other state considering it looking at what we were
Speaker 726
5:10:31
doing yeah yes sir as far as I know we were the only ones
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:10:36
that are at this process of closing down OK can you can
you state in with this proposed budget it the colonel said that you're gonna use it for some other storage it it do you have a a value of that property
Speaker 726
5:10:53
the state value of that property I don't right now the value of it
Speaker 725
5:11:01
that that property was turned over to the Arkansas division of emergency Management when the FSp federal surplus property programme was moved over to us from I believe it was workforce services quite a few years ago that property is is deeded to the Arkansas division or yeah division of emergency Man so we we do have control over that facility
when the discussion started taking place of FSp closing down then we we are looking at the possibility of utilizing that that facility that warehouse throughout the years during disasters federal surplus property personnel have have helped us with storing disaster related items there at that warehouse. in fact if we you know, don't really want to talk a whole lot about theOVId years
but during that time period we ui utilize that warehouse for lots of PPE if y'all remember it was very difficult to get items like that hospital items into the state so we use that as a dis distribution center to push out those very important items out to our healthcare officials and and other first responders we do currently have sandbag machines that are owned by us that we deploy out into the state of Arkansas whenever we had flooding events right now
they're sitting in a parking lot behind our facility so you know one use for the for the FSp facility is to be able to store that to be able to continue to store pallets of water for our water missions around the state that that pop up pretty frequently also store you know tarps and stuff or tornado damaged things. looking forward trying to plan for the future as changes in the
federal FEA programs take place. I feel like that there will be more things put on the state of Arkansas and I think it's going to be imperative that we're prepared for for any events that happened that we may have to take on on our own so we could also possibly use the warehouse for a joint field office when we do have a federal disaster declaration and we're bringing in additional federal resources we could do the logistics out of that facility. Do you concur with what was mentioned before that it can't
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:13:26
be sold that it would go back to city of what
Speaker 726
5:13:32
North LittleRock my understanding of that is deed to the Arkansas division of emergency Management so I'm not aware of anything
Speaker 725
5:13:40
that would prohibit the state from doing what they want with the property I just it concerns me
Senator Terry Rice
Unverified
5:13:46
with the amount of money that we had previous testimony and I I
can't remember who from I have to go back and look that helps the
state of Arkansas across the whole state for the amount of money that we spent in and realize it's not self funding anymore because we're not getting the big ticket items but it's still a pretty good deal miss chair we've flagging anything at this time or we gonna you can flag any any item you want to flag
I'd appreciate that being flagged thank you all right en ator Di man you're recognized so I I just want to make sure I'm tracking along I asked this question
Senator Jonathan Dismang
Unverified
5:14:30
so this rumor that it's going to be used for something else I think what was that all about? I mean what what have I mean is that accurate senator as far as it it being used to repair vehicles or was there something else that I'm missing here so I received a lot
Mike Hager
Unverified
5:14:50
of phone calls from you know different stakeholders around the state from city county and also members of the legislature and
I had multiple people say that they had been told that the state police had an interest in shutting down this program because we wanted to utilize that property for an auto shop for the members that are familiar we have a driving track that's basically right across RemountRoad that sits on Camp Robinson's property and that we were wanting to utilize that property as an auto shop we actually have an auto shop at the tri facility so I've been
told that another member had indicated that they had heard that we were wanting to house inmates on that property and neither of those are are factual that's that's never been in consideration at all Representative
Chair
Unverified
5:15:49
beatty you're recognized for a question. Thank you Mr Chair. I'm over here AJ appreciate you being here director. I've got
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:15:55
a question more on the 911 rule enhancements in the ain budgets I see under 911 you've
got $2 million in grants that you administer and I understand some of the cred you know qualifications on those counties under 275 and some of the restrictions. how how often does that money turn over and awarded out and and replenished? yes sir so just for clarification we're on
page 336 the 911 rule enhancement fund yes yes yes so a little 2
Speaker 724
5:16:27
million of that it goes out to the local paps and that goes out I believe annually
yes in april of every year so that's sent out to to the paps based on that formula that's that's in legislation and and so it your
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:16:43
department you you send that out so that that goes to sea row is there are certain time that you you send those out and how how are those awarded out through the counties and could you provide us some of that information yeah so
Speaker 724
5:16:56
april of every year is when we push that money out to those localities to the paps in the state right my
Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
Unverified
5:17:01
my question I I really the heart of my question
is sending the money out is is one thing but but I'm more concerned about I I guess the speed at which we address requests from the county for implementation and improvement to their 911 and their A wind communications and and specifically I'm referencing Chico County and and their tower there are five emergency services in that county that rely on that equipment. These these guys purchase new equipment to put up the tower issues they've been concerns raised on both sides and I I
need that to be taken care of and and I need that to be taken care of immediately and note my hold on this budget until that's done. Thank you. we'll put a flag on on
the budget I guess reative ladyman you're the last one on the list well thank
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
5:17:59
you Mr Chairman. I'm over here uhrector Gary I had a question a nuclear question, I mean a question about nuclear energy. I don't
want to scare you off. but Representative Woootten brought this up a while ago and I know you got this transferred from Department of Health and we're gonna that's on a later page but the department of healthalth had a budget of325,000 and your budget is 1.9 million total I think and my really my I think that's a great thing. Your budget breaks down more into the detail on how you're going to do that you've got different line
items where they only had one line item the thenergy committee was up at the nuclear plant last week and toured that they showed us their safety protocols which are very good but my question is what maybe you don't know yet because it's new to you but how are you going to implement this program? I know it talks about training the public. it talks about environmental monitoring can you just kind of give us an idea of what your thoughts are on that. Maybe you haven't got
your plan developed but what's your thoughts on that? Sure so able to get a
Speaker 724
5:19:15
little bit of information so we are federally required to train all offsite emergency response organizations workers who may respond to an a andO type event for the year of 2025 we trained767 emergency workers we also mail out instruction booklets to every address within a 10 mile radius of A andO this is done on an annual basis
to make sure every home is aware we have emergency postings located at the parks and boat ramps within a 10 mile radius of ANO with instructions on what to do in case there's there's an emergency at at the facility we do a lot of outreach or the team does to local county fairs Arkansas Tech University outreach events several other small organizations including nonprofits and any other group or companies within that within that zone we're continuing to work on that continuing to
work with the the county judges and the county OEMs that are within that the vicinity of that facility we actually some of that money is pushed out to them to grants to help them also prepare so our team at at A andO is working hand in hand with them we are continuing to evaluate this program. what we want to do is make sure that that we're doing everything we can with the with the funding that we have I've already along with my senior staff have
met with A andO Energy officials and just kind of talk through some some different ideas some some different ways that maybe we can enhance alerting and so forth so we're continuing to work on that and we'll continue to to try to you know advance
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
5:21:01
so with all the discussion advancement in nuclear around the country executive orders from the president and a lot of other things you you feel like we've either got adequate abilities to respond to the
to to make these sites safe or we can develop those do you feel comfortable with that
Speaker 724
5:21:22
uhir I do I do right now I know there's a lot of discussion I I will tell you first off I am not a nuclear expert on any of this but but after this being moved under my responsibility I've had the opportunity to to reach out and try to learn a little bit more. I know there's going to be there's a lot of talk about additional nuclear type things including small module reactors so I
think that's some things that we're already talking about and already trying to look at what will that look like if we have those in the near future or in the future that are deployed in the state and looking at what we would have to do to to
Speaker 741
5:22:00
to increase any type of safety or or security things in those areas thank you director yes sir is a painter you're ready
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
5:22:16
thank you and this is not a vacancy question so appreciate that uhrector Gary can you talk to me a little bit about the 2019 levy mitigation cash fund. I get that that was for the record rainfall and
all that but it's just sitting there it hadn't been used so why why are we still dealing with that67 years later? Yeah so that as you know I think you know
Speaker 724
5:22:38
that that was a program that started after the record Arkansas River flooding we had a lot of issues with levees in the state I think there was
10 million if I remember right that was put into that program so that we have finished we have finished out all those grants have gone out so you know I believe Miss Perry is saying that we're we're ending that so that's coming out of
Speaker 747
5:22:58
out of this section so what do we do with the you know it's a little it's minor, very minor compared to
Representative Stetson Painter
Unverified
5:23:04
the whole budget but what do you do with that money since it's you're closing the program you gotta give it back to the s you give it back to who or what how does that work? Well we don't have the money this is just the appropriation that was
left so after that we will no longer ask for the appropriation ok thank
you all right members seeing no more questions we'll entertain
a motion executive rec we have a motion in a second. any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed Mr. Coleman we're going to law enforcement
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
5:23:40
standards and training thank you Mr Chair on page 354 you can find the law enforcement standards and training division appropriation summary
first line item of this table shows the operations portion of the budget for the division at about4.6 million dollars for both years of the biennium our totals authorized for fiscal year 26 is6.6 million and right about the same number for fifthy year 27. Mr Chair, there are no significant change levels to this division. I'm happy to answer any questions. members do we
Speaker 695
5:24:07
have any questions for staff or department if not we'll
entertain a motion executive rec we have a motion
and a second any discussion all in favor say
aye any opposed it is adopted we'll move on to public safety state police. Mr. Coleman, thank
Dalden Coleman
Unverified
5:24:30
you Mr Chair. We can find that division summary on page 386 of your manuals looking at the totals firstil skier 26 authorized total for the division is $136.1 million and just a slight increase to that in fiscal year 27 at $136.1 million I think there's an extra $7000 in there there
is one change to note on page 397 of your manuals at the ASP operations appropriation and there's just a small difference here the department is reallocating $106,450 from confidence and travel to professional fees to better align with program needs and Mr Chairman that's the only change within state police having to answer any questions we got a questionpresentative
Collins you're upe firstcent you're a member thank you Mr chairir just on
Representative Andrew Collins
Unverified
5:25:21
that last change that one change what is that what are the professional expenses we're talking about we' need more professional
Chair
Unverified
5:25:34
fees for promotional testing. We do promotional testing every other year and this is the year that we would do the testing
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
5:25:43
all right thanks Representative ladyman, you're recognized for questions. Thanks
Mr Chairman. Senator Hager, this might be a question for you and
I think I'm in the right section here. I hope I am. training when we do training for people that folks that come in to get their driver's license. you know what's happened in like Minnesota and some other places where people have reacted badly to law enforcement officers and bad things have happened. I had an incident or a person asked me do we do training for new people getting their license on how to
respond to an officer if they stop them you know what what should I do as a citizen if I get stopped by a police officer do we do that kind of training if we don't, could we do that and would that be a big expense? I don't know that well I
Mike Hager
Unverified
5:26:42
I can say pretty comfortably that we do not do that type of training as far as in thedL testing and the administration of those testing on thed examiner side
of the house in the past we have done educational programs on what to do if you're pulled over and it's probably time to do that again. We could reach out to our communications staff and ask if we could prepare something in the form of like public safety announcements things like that to reite reiterate the dos and don'ts and have to make the safest encounter for law enforcement and for the public and I think that's an outstanding idea that something we could definitely do. Well thank you for that answer and
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
5:27:26
you know, I mean my dad was a police officer and he told me how to act but I'm not sure young people nowadays get that same training and I think it's something that we ought to consider thank you completely agree seeing no other questions we need
a motion executive rec. I have a motion and a second. any discussion all in favor say aye any opposed stands adopted Mr Coleman I think that relieves you of your duty today and we'll
have Misss Misshitt come forward and we'll take up the department of healthalth secretary's office And if the the secretary will come on up save a little time and as always
when you're called on identify yourself before you speak thank you Mr
Cameron Witt
Unverified
5:28:23
Chair. good afternoon. camemeron Wittblr fiscal division the Department of Health
secretary's officef appropriation starts on page 414 in your manual there is a continuing level of appropriation in this request. it's about425,000 dollars and the executive recommendation provides for the agency request and if it's all right I'll just go ahead and go to the department summary page
The department has 11arpa appropriations that are not requested to continue for the next fiscal year as well as 8 other appropriations that they are requesting to continue I'm on page 417 in your manual the agency is requesting changes for two appropriations their health operations paying account in the nuclear planning grants appropriation which both reflect a transfer of appropriation and administrative functions due to legislation
enacted in 2025 Act583 the result is an overall decrease in spending authority of about 1.8 million the detailed budget summary for those appropriations are on page 422 and425. which I can go to next. in total the agency requests about432 million in appropriations which includes about 82.7 million in general revenue in the executive recommendation provides for the agency request.
So on page 422 you can see that there is an overall decrease of about 1.5 million and most of that is due to the Act583 transfers of appropriation and functions while on the next p page the nuclear planning grants appropriation you can see that the agency request and recommendation on page 425 is zero
and Mr Chair that concludes my presentation on the department of healthalth those are all their major changes for this next fiscal year and I'll be happy to take any questions. thank you. youhit we do
have questions does department want to say anything starting off or just go ahead and dive into questions. Mr Chair, since it's been a very long day and
Renee Mallory
Unverified
5:30:56
we're standing between y'all in the door we'll take questions. thank you excellent answer probably the best one of the day so passed
the first right all right we've got uhs
representative wooten up first thank you thank you y'all for
Speaker 758
5:31:13
being here. my question is is straightforward. How how many employees total are in your agency not not just the health department but all the whether you're encompass don adams healthal department represented wooten we have are you
Don Adams
Unverified
5:31:32
talking about field positions at this moment in time? No I'm talking about all your positions
Speaker 758
5:31:41
how many allocated position allocated we have about 2300 allocated positions how many of those are vacant we have
Don Adams
Unverified
5:31:55
1838 positions fielded right now so you you have a total
Speaker 758
5:32:01
of 2300 so you have about500 vacant positions yes that's across all our business areas not just this one
yes sir of those how many of them have been vacant over two
Don Adams
Unverified
5:32:19
years but we just had that report OPm ran the snapshot on vacancies over two years and we had494 yes
Speaker 758
5:32:25
sir how many of those were budgeted do you know not exactly but but most of them were most of them were budgeted yes why why have they been vacant for two
years well over the last several years as we have vacant positions come
Don Adams
Unverified
5:32:43
open we evaluate whether or not we need to fill it based on needs and on budget and of course we've lost federal funding and other things over the last few years and we've had to take austerity measures to adapt to that new funding environment but you're still budgeting them well not
Speaker 758
5:33:00
all of them and we're going to
unbudget a lot of this fiscal year asked the question how many of them are
budgeting and you said most of them that that's what the how much money
are we holding in reserve out there that are actually not funding you are they are funded and you don't intend to fill them but the money is there and so you
Don Adams
Unverified
5:33:28
have access if they're budgeted we pay the roughly6,000 dollars EBd money but but wes the issue right there and
Speaker 758
5:33:35
I appreciate you sharing that why are we paying health benefits and I want you to be truthful because that's that's not right
that's a that's a that in my estimation that is illegal and that's what I've been waiting for somebody to say that money is not being applied for medical health on a person that doesn't exist is that not correct? Mr Wooton let me the
there we're we're not going to just pick on the department of healthalth that's that goes statewide it so
Speaker 758
5:34:20
let's let's but he is the first one that has honestly stated why that position is funded and that's not your fault's not that's why we's our fault didn't mean to interrupt's it's our fault
Don Adams
Unverified
5:34:33
we budgeted the position so that we could these are these are mentioned EBd yes sir we're required to
pay that on all budgeted positions whether they're vacant or not and we budget positions where budgeting the positions we're allocated and the funding
we have to budget but sometimes we don't feel them and we've done that a lot lately because the budget has shifted and so we weren't able to fill them or we determined through our current needs and shifting demand that we didn't
Speaker 758
5:35:05
need to fill them for the media purposes and wanted to be very
clear that this is a requirement that was passed by the legislature and has been approved by governors for several years and it's not right now I know why we're doing it
we're doing it to reduce healthcare costs for the employees what we ought to do is include that in the cost we're not being truthful with the taxpayers of this state on the true cost of insurance and because it's spread out through all the employees and so what we need to do is assume that cost at the state level I passed an act 2 four5
years6 years ago they required all employees over two years to be listed and if they're still there then they'll do away with them. Yes sir and and and now we've we've put that act in abeyance awaiting some solution to figure out and the solution is very easy. We just need to adopt and occur in the state at our cost not the employee's cost. We
don't need to spread this among the employees because we're the ones that said you you budget them and you'll pay the EBd portion of it chair if I could just clarify one thing for the record the
Don Adams
Unverified
5:36:38
decisions that to budget or not budget position in our agency has nothing to do with you're talking about understand that's I'm not saying that and I'm not accusing y'all of anything
Speaker 758
5:36:50
because we required it but it's not right thank you
you you youpresentative OK, let's go to Representative Hudson for your you're recognized for a question thank you Mr Chair and
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
5:37:07
this is for the the department and not forblr I wanted to stick to the question of of the allocation for employee salaries so I'm looking at page422 and I just wanna I'm trying to make sure that we have this allocation correct. So I know that Representative Ggarner sent over some written requests for
some responsive answers earlier this week with some questions about employee policies my understanding is that the department responded and said that they could not answer her questions due to ongoing litigation is that the department's position today yes ma'am. OK. so is it the department's position that you can't discuss existing policies regarding personnel policies you can't discuss those so based on what our legal representation has told us we don't need to
Renee Mallory
Unverified
5:37:58
answer those questions. yes ma'am. OK, so you you won't talk
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
5:38:02
to the legislature about your personnel policies. I just want to make sure I understand that
Don Adams
Unverified
5:38:11
if there's a specific policy that you are requesting and I mean obviously we would be happy to provide a specific policy and there's a question within that policy so here
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
5:38:20
here's my concern I believe that Representative garner's questions were asking for a very specific policies regarding how the department balances the first amendment rights of their
employees against political pressure from from any source from the legislature or the executive judicial wherever. and my concern is in terms of the budgetary items that whether or not we have appropriately allocated for whether you have any idea of how we allocate for the cost of litigation and and potential settlement expenses associated with the these causes of action if we don't have a policy so I'm interested in what that policy is and how it's being
applied I apologize I'm not sure I'm clear
Speaker 771
5:39:04
on your question as far as the the budgeting piece of that yeah
Speaker 772
5:39:08
so let me let me give you a hypothetical you
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
5:39:12
hire a new employee into the department who is in about atheist they post on social media about the fact that they believe that there is no God and that me as a devout Christian I very upset about it and I call you and I offer my my thoughts on this higher
and tell you that I'm going to hold up your budget unless you fire this employee. do you have a policy in place with regard to how you deal with those employees because that is a very specific budgetary item if if I as a legislator am telling you that I'm going to hold up your budget because of something I saw on social media that one of your employees posted so I wondered if you could walk me through what that policy looks like. we don't have a policy specific for that circumstance
Don Adams
Unverified
5:40:02
and we would you know apply the policies we we do have employee disciplinary policies conduct policies, code of ethics those sorts of things and we would apply our standards that we have consistently based on the situation but and you know we would do that to the best of our ability and not have outside influence determine how we apply that policy could we have a copy of those policies? I do believe we
submitted the social media policy if you also want a copy of the disciplinary policy we'd be glad to to provide that
Representative Ashley Hudson
Unverified
5:40:41
would be helpful that'd be great and then and then last question does the department maintain a litigation budget or a settlement fund budget
Speaker 68
5:40:53
ma' ok thank you all rightypresentative hammer senator hammer,
Speaker 432
5:40:58
I'm sorry I demoted you I appreciate the compliment both ways sir you're recognized
going back to the positions that the debate was going on a little bit about a while ago. just give me an idea of what some of those vacant positions are those like nurses that were waiting to get them hired up or can you just kind of hit the high level on
Don Adams
Unverified
5:41:18
what some of those are that you're waiting on or you're holding them for yes sir it's a variety of positions across the age
some of them are nurses some of them are more general analyst positions and administrative positions clerical positions it's really a variety of different class codes that over the years you know based on the
evaluation that we've made both on fundings and needs you know we we don't fill a position if we don't feel like it's necessary or we don't feel like we have the funding to cover it and but
Speaker 432
5:41:47
all those are all those positions in your are all those positions essential it's just you don't have anybody to put in them no
Don Adams
Unverified
5:42:00
like we have a need in order to provide the core services we provide then we would you know move things
around we would do what is necessary to try to fill that position and and we don't want any more positions than you got to
Speaker 432
5:42:13
have but at the same time we want you to have what you need so that because you guys have been very responsive to anything I've called and asked about you guys have been very responsive and I wanna compliment you want to make sure you got enough but not too many and we trust your judgment that that's where you are and so anything else you'd want to add to that no sir we appreciate that thank you
All right members we're about to land this airplane. Representativeladyman you got the last question thank you Mr
Representative Jack Ladyman
Unverified
5:42:48
Chairman. I appreciate you recognizing me. I'll try to be short. my question is about the full independent practice credentialing on page 435 and the question there is you've got a budget of it looks like350,000 and you spent zero on that credentialing and I know it's been around for a few years
now. so my question is did you really not spend any money are we do we not have nurse practitioners that are requesting that or kind of where are we at are we acting on those requests
Matt Gilmore
Unverified
5:43:30
Represented ladyman Matt Gilmore department of healthalth so that committee has formed it's meeting we've got currently about a little over 1000 of those
individuals out there we're going through renewals now this is the first cycle of threeyear license so as far as the the expenses and costs the department's been and that the board of nursing and the medical board have been kind of just sharing that we've got a plan now to put some staff there and we'll be working through those those funds we've collected there to help pay for that all right thank you
Chair
Unverified
5:44:17
gott some funny people over there no more questions we'll need to entertain
a motion executive ick in a second all in any discussion all in favor say aye and you oppose stands approved Miss Cartwright you got two items on 1 and two and we'll batch these together under one vote. you're recognized thank you Mr Chairman Wendy Carveal our fiscal
Speaker 782
5:44:48
item F on today's agenda. These deal with special language
Speaker 783
5:44:51
itemtem F1 as we spoke about yesterday through letters that Miss Barnhill spoke about from OPm the pay plan that was adopted in the 2025 session changed the titles and grades for the positions there's a spreadsheet here. there are some pieces of special language that are currently in some agencies bills that reference those old titles and grades that no longer exist. And soblr worked with the office of
personnel Management and DFfa officefice ofudget those columns on the right hand of F1 those would be the corresponding updated titles and grades in the current pay plan and so if the sub excuse me if the committee adopts this spreadsheet it would direct staff to update those sections of special language with the updated title and grade according to the pay plan Mr Chairman. item F2 is also related to special language. it is a request from the bureau of legislative Research related to the pay plan in the 2025 session the bureau
updated both their personnel section and their special language to correspond to the new pay plan with that special language amendment. there were some titles that were inadvertently left out of the special language section once again in the letter that column to the right would add those titles to that piece of special language and get it in line so Mr Chairman those are the requests for item F. Any questions for Miss Cartwright Singon will entertain a motion to adopt
F1 and F2. we have a motion in a second any discussion
all in favor say aye all opposed say no it is adopted members we appreciate you being here a joint budget we'll meet again on the afternoon of april 8th when we come back in for fiscal session and I appreciate everybody for stay the time and finish the work we are adjourned
Agenda
A. Call to Order
B. Department of Human Services --Ms. Janet Mann, Secretary 1/48 215 Lilah Walls
Recess for Lunch
Return from Lunch
C. Department of Education Public School Fund (0505) 1/213 114 Kathryn Walden --Mr. Jacob Oliva, Secretary
D. Department of Public Safety (9913) --Col. Mike Hagar, Secretary 1/256 293 Dalton Coleman
Criminal Background Checks 404
ASP Training and Equipment 406
E. Department of Health (9907) --Ms. Renee Mallory, Secretary 413 195 Cameron Witt
F. Special Language Revisions
G. Other Business
H. Adjournment
Documents
Speakers
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Representative Lane Jean Chair
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Lila Walls
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Senator Breanne Davis
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Representative Frances Cavenaugh
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Senator Jim Petty
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Senator Terry Rice
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Representative Nicole Clowney
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Senator Stephanie Flowers
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Senator Clarke Tucker
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Senator Missy Irvin
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Senator Fredrick J. Love
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Representative Jack Ladyman
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Senator Jonathan Dismang
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Representative Johnny Rye
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Representative Ryan A. Rose
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Representative Stetson Painter
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Representative Stephen Meeks
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Representative Denise Garner
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Representative Les D. Eaves
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Representative Andrew Collins
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Representative Mindy McAlindon
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Representative Justin Gonzales
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Representative Hope Duke
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Dalden Coleman
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Mike Hager
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Representative Howard M. Beaty, Jr.
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Cameron Witt
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Renee Mallory
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Don Adams
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Representative Ashley Hudson
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Matt Gilmore
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