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VI UPDATE U.S. Virgin Islands Public Records TRANSCRIPT OF PUBLIC PROCEEDINGS | Committee on Disaster Recovery Legislature USVI June 10, 2022 · 3.0 hours · gov Source recording https://youtu.be/LbC947vxsOo Status This is a working transcript produced by machine from a recording of a public proceeding. It is a finding aid, not an official record of the Legislature. Transcribed by VI Update, using OpenAI Whisper large-v3-turbo, run locally. Not reviewed by a person. Reliability Automatic transcription, UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording before relying on it. Speech recognition splits spoken digits and wraps figures mid-number, so a dollar amount, a vote count or a bill number can be wrong in a way that reads as correct. Speakers are not identified: automatic speaker labelling was measured unusable and removed. 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A verbatim transcript is mechanical rather than authored, so there is likely nothing in it to own; to the extent any copyright is nonetheless found to subsist, it is dedicated to the public domain under CC0 1.0. Please copy it, quote it, index it, train on it, republish it, mirror it, sell it. Redistribution is the point: a public record with one copy is one fire from gone. No permission is needed, and none is ours to grant or withhold. how issued to Springline Architect. Again, as we mentioned about capacity and how many projects are being taken on as more projects have also come online. So the design team is the task orders are executed and then we can now bring the design teams to start working on those. But there are a significant amount of projects that are currently in design, and it's the availability of the task order, to execute the task order and move those projects forward. 0:00:00 What is the timeline for the restoration of the Florence-William Library in Christian's Day? Right now, so the project got underway in February. The anticipated completion date, I believe was October of this year. We will have to extend that contract due to some other repairs that now need to be done that were not evident at the initial portion of the project. What timeline do you have in place or tentative timeline right now? I do not have the actual timeline, Senator. That's going to be the contractor will base that on the availability of the materials and such. any of these libraries are ready and this is a little hard question I guess between 2022 and 2023 school year should we should have one library back online within the 2022 2023 school year at that time would you have sufficient librarians for these libraries we currently have one and the we are searching for a second librarian we are the plan is to have both in whatever facility is open at that time talk about the Peterson library you said it came in a hundred percent higher than the budget cost based on the scope of what what created that it's the unknown when it comes to the mold remediation for the building, Senator? 0:00:40 The mold, Senator, again? I didn't hear you clear. It's the unknown. So mold remediation was estimated at $85,000. The cost for the mold remediation, when we went out to bid twice, came in at over $300,000 for the project. And what is taking place is that there is unknowns during that the contractor is bidding on because they don't have direct access to actually see inside of the crawl spaces, inside of the roofing area spaces, because it is primarily wooden panel on the interior. And so the estimates that are being brought up for mold remediation are four times what was actually estimated, bringing the project to 100% higher. 0:02:21 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 1 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery So what we are doing now is doing more mold investigation and having a scope of work specifically related to mold, so that now we can put the projects out for bid as two separate things. Application portal open in May 29, 2022, and as of right now, will remain open until June 18. There will be two weeks' appeal period for those determined to not be eligible. The final disbursement will be determined by the total amount of eligible applications. 0:03:15 Is there someone in your department helping applicants that are not familiar with technology to complete the application through the portal? Yes, Senator, not only us, but there are EDA staff as well. We've been doing information sessions, and there will also be sessions to assist with the portal. And it's not in the testimony because we made this decision yesterday following consultation with the EDA, but the portal period is now going to remain open until July 1st. And we are also going to request an extension on the project from NOAA so that we can extend the period out a little bit more as well. 0:03:54 As of today, do you have a count of how much fishermen have applied for that stimulus fund? Yes. The number we have in? Five. five five which is why we made the decision yes the information is getting out there senator that i hear in complaining and and the hardship that they experience in the loss of the path and stuff like that especially the guys that are going deep water you know when you speak to these fisherman and you see the cost of a fish pot that they drop in the deep water. It's rebar steel that they're using on these pots in order to get those pots to go down. So sometimes these pots can run these guys $1,500, $2,000 a pot. And when they lose these pots, how do they recoup? I don't understand it. How is the information getting out there? Because that number is not acceptable. It isn't. 0:04:41 So, Senator, I want to make sure you understand that the portal that is open through the end of this month is for the CARES Act stimulus, which is an economic stimulus, which is the loss of income during the period CARES Act 1 is from March to July, Madam Chair, if I may, and then CARES Act 2 is from July to December or August to December. so the infrastructure losses from the storm those types of things are covered by our hurricane disaster recovery period which receipts for rebuilding the actual infrastructure pots anything traps those things is a different type of program and the receipts cover those this portal is covered by demonstrating a 35 percent or more economic loss and we've had a number of both in person last night was our fourth i believe in-person information session as well as flyers being placed out media ad campaigns we've been running the program information on the spanish stations for our spanish-speaking population as well we've had about seven or eight different types of outreach events to include the uh to include the ag fair that took place as well so the information has been running the issue is that of eligibility and whether or not the fishers feel that they will be eligible because you have to demonstrate you know very clearly how your economic losses between from one year to then the pandemic year for comparison. I'm trying to wrap up on this and I'll say to the commissioner you need to go to the fishermen and meet them where they at. I've been by the fish market this week and I haven't seen 0:05:41 one flyers on that building. The only flyer I saw was the flyer for the closing of the cleaning station and and those flyers should be posted down there in English and in Spanish but I think we really need to reach out to the fishermen to make sure that they're getting fully informed of what's available for them thank you very much Madam Chair welcome Senator Johnson Senator blanton well please mark signs of vla as i think that's him that's him right yes okay yes please mark santa veille as president senator bladden you may proceed thank you madam chair good morning colleagues you enlisting audiences staff essential staff good morning commissioner oh and also um director williams and thank you so much for your testimony directly you have a lot going on a lot but i appreciate um the testimony good information um um i would just like to add my two cents when it comes to the fisher so uh i realize you have done a lot to assist them you know in terms of getting the word out there um but i thought about disconnect apparently somehow me as you said maybe some of them are i'm not sure if they qualify so if there any way we can actually have a process where they're still coming help them fill out the application and whatever we can and if they don't then they don't but at least we know we give them opportunity to at least come forward you know and don't be scared to come forward we're gonna find a way to help that because it's a it's tough out there right now and um they do spend a lot on their 0:07:43 um equipment etc and it will be nice to also have a process to really um invited uh inviting atmosphere where they come forward you know 35 that's very low and and my colleague is correct they complain a lot i hear a lot of complaints from them when i go to buy my fish etc so if there's anyway um we can assist also please let us know how we can assist because i think it's very important that we all work together because we all want to assure that we utilize those funds funds that's going to assist our people because they're going to only be spent in our economy so we all win other we thought of that um let me go through your testimony and start with um the vi council of the arts the case acts stimulus program and in your testimony you spoke to um the nea stimulus fund to artists or territory and it provided a maximum of fifty thousand four hundred to individuals how much how many individuals did that assist do you know i do have that statistics i'll pull it up if you have another question i'll answer that while i'm pulling it up okay that's fine i mean my 0:09:36 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 2 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery question i'm going to be to numbers etc and data because I think it's important that we have a better picture, an idea of who's being assisted. How did these individuals know of these programs and the funds that were available? How did they know? Sure. So, VICA does an annual grant program. And I believe there's a total of, there might be like over 100 artists that we give mini-grants to. Individuals are eligible for $5,000 and organizations are up to $10,000. So every year we have a mailing list we do a pre application actually pre application right now or no I'm sorry the application period for 2023 grants is actually open right now until August all of that went out last week. So what they did once they received those funds is they sent out notices to their entire mailing list put it on their social media that these things were available eligible and what the eligibility requirements were um so they sent it out and then they had a number of applications that came in uh i am pulling that information up right now okay um but but the i believe well i'll be able to tell you right now the total amount of applications and this will be a mix of uh So under the American Rescue Plan, we had a total of 16 companies that were eligible or that received grants. And then under our CARES Act funding, there were four, two, this was another 12. 0:10:50 like the historical theater, St. John's Singers, Caribbean Ritual Dancers, Pointe Academy, Crujan Heritage and Nature Tourism. So the organizations, again, we place the requirements out there. We send it in a blast to all of the mailing list of artists and then they respond by submitting their application. Because the arts play the vital role in our community and we have a lot of artists in many different instances And also these numbers, you know, I would like to see more individuals apply to these different opportunities that are available to them. 0:12:34 So nonetheless, I'm going to have a conversation here after the hearing, follow-up meeting, to see how we can actually get a word out to these individuals and actually have them come in and utilize and take advantage of these opportunities. Five minutes. let's go to the historical recovery program uh you also spoke in your testimony uh to as of the close of march 2021 dpr now received 223 applications and 105 were deemed ineligible of the 128 eligible applicants um 106 phase two applications and our external panel has reviewed and have scored 70 applications how does that process look like what do you mean my scored what what the um scope in our firm to um actually get through and for those that were not eligible whether because of what were the reasons why so the the there's two reasons on the eligibility i guess i can start with that senator the first thing was duplication of benefits like you had people who actually received insurance payments and then were looking to duplicate that so that wasn't allowed the second one is actually contributing to a national historic register site so you have a number of applications that are actually in the historic district and we had a number that weren't and then the question was whether or not they contributed to a national historic registered site so if you are not inside the district it's much more difficult to place that that that requirement or gain that eligibility requirement before you continue do these individuals within a historical district know they have to do that up front in order for them to be yes they do yeah so that's why we ran the application in two phases the first was the eligibility phase from november to march and then from there there was a determination on whether or not it actually became eligible from a geographic standpoint once you know or there was i think three or four different criteria like it had to be an active site you had to have been presently either living or serving as it had to be active the you know wapa bill something going 0:13:16 on there um the now with respect to the scoring panel so the one of the requirements is that again the there's so much money that's involved to be dispersed and at a high ceiling as well and so what we wanted to do was we have to create a ranking because we received more application requests than we actually have money for and so the idea of the scoring is which one met the highest criteria um and then also you know where we felt the the need may be as well And so that scoring panel was done, and what we did is invited the Puerto Rico State Historic Preservation Office to be on our scoring panel, and we're serving on theirs vice versa to assist us with this project. Okay, finally, before my time is up, let's speak to the Ford Christian Museum, PW1036. I know there was a federal population, a federal share of 51,445. What's the amount, though? 0:15:30 So right now, what we are asking is we have been able to document about 1.4 million in damages. The project was originally obligated at only 226,000 in damages. In that 1.4, we're also asking for an increase to the amount allowable for administrative costs, which is to pay for the A&E services. So once we can get that portion through, and then we can speak to the overall, and those conversations are ongoing with FEMA right now. And that has something to do also with the skyrocketing increase in costs with everything, correct? I think right now we haven't even we haven't cost the I mean like really done a hard dive on the cost for the damages like we these are these are just a sort of a cursory review and and rough estimates that were done because right now we're focused really on what the the services from the A&E are and making sure that we can get the an approval to be able to pay for the A&E services. Okay, very well. And let's speak to the library. It says that a spout library. What's the amount of that contract, first of all? I believe it's $386,000, somewhere around there. 0:16:39 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 3 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery And $386,000? To go up. Correct, correct. And the delays by the contractor have everything been rectified, at this point not everything we have some fixes right now uh due to the assistance being offered by the office of disaster recovery to at least get it back on track um but the they're you know we we're actively working on that right now so once we have everything on track hopefully by august what what time frame have the contractor received in order to get his work completed it is really august right now okay very well sounds good to me thank you so much i look forward to having those um libraries back on online for our students and children in the territory thank you so much madam chair for the time and thank you for your responses thank you senator blighting um let's go back to the fourth question um really really quick i'm happy that the fort is being opened um and used for for the public as we were once um enslaved and imprisoned there the question i have would be um i remember years ago when the fort was closed and repairs are being done they indicated the structure of the fort at the time um was kind of shaky because it's been built a long long time ago and we always have tremors so it does compromise the structure of the fort and what is the difference between the constant tremors um impacting the structure of the fort and having events in the fort where you have a muse we have music at high decibels that could appear to be like an earthquake as well this the same um the song reverberation on the wilds it does have the same impact so um talk to me so thank you for the question center there um 0:18:14 so one of the hardest working people in all the dpnr his name is martin walter dukes and he's our maintenance person at the at the fort and the reason why like you said is every single car that goes by blasting everything the the fort is made of molasses and stone like and and no matter how many times you plaster it paint it the the the core of it is that it's molasses and sand with stone and those are the types of things that were in there and so with the exposure to the salt it becomes very brittle and the passing sound waves actually cause the paint to crack the things to chip and then you are there and martin every day is sweeping up all of that so that's why i say he's one of the hardest working people in dpnr um what we can control is who we invite to come into the into the fort and we put some very specific requirements on the noise level that takes place um for a very long time i was very careful about what types of live music like i have no issues with instruments orchestra those types of things i was being very reserved on allowing speakers dj all of that um we decided to revisit that and see whether or not if we put some very strict conditions in there whether or not and then and actually observe and have people observe the part like be there during those events and make sure that everybody is observing and following the regulations that we put in so we had one uh large event at the start of carnival and it and it was rather successful I think that a lot of people will want to see that same type of event there and 0:20:20 as long as everybody abides by what it is the regulation is in terms of how loud the sound is how many speakers those types of things I think we can in fact make it more of a space that can be used but we're being very careful the other thing we want to do it and it unfortunately it's not something that's FEMA eligible for funding but it's something that we're going to put emphasis on is on the east side you see the crumbling wall that is in there there it's called the east ravelin wall it is very important to the foundation of the fort and pro will provide additional stability we finished the design plans for those in early 2021 and so now we just need to cost it and figure out well when we go to repairs we're also going to include fixing the ravelin wall to provide that stability that's right here where you have the fence oh that's correct okay well so you don't have a cost for that yet we don't have the cost yet okay and we have sons of the virginals as well that we have in a fort but we have it's orchestra and music so I just wanted to know what what is the impact of that to the fort yeah everything sound waves do have an impact you know we we see the chippings we're trying to work with the National Park Service on coming up with a stronger plaster that does not deteriorate as quickly but the exposure to the south very nearby is you know I mean it will be something that will just require consistent maintenance on there we've switched to a silicate paint which absorbs more that silicate paint is you know it's not like you don't go to Home Depot on it it's like $200 a gallon that kind of thing so what about I'm a history buff right my favorite 0:22:19 fort I visit forts across the world but I really love San Cristobal for some reason and um for the moral in puerto rico and it's they have self-guided tours is um part of your fema plan or in the resilience or the stafford act is there anything while restoring the fort um that we can put a better signage like the old the first lutheran church is in the fort so we're so we're actually not through fema and i'm sorry quickly even grants because even within the fort there's the markings on the floor in the fort that indicate where the force the first fort was yes and nobody really knows the history inside of the fort so talk to me is there a federal grant or something that we can do to make the fort more marketable for those who are historic tourists yes there is so uh uh late last year the us eda provided a 10 million grant to the division of tourism and a lot of it has to do with improving the tourism product of the territory uh and so we have been awarded dpnr has been awarded a sub-grant of those funds and our plan is to actually do a hire a company that will not only do the conceptual plans for the build out of the exhibits pursuant to our instructions but also to do the audio visual for the self-guided tours our goal is such that we can give you a headset and you walk through each of the exhibit areas and the marker can go off and you start hearing through your headsets exactly what it is you're seeing if if you're not undertaking a fully guided tour. 0:24:19 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 4 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery Perfect, thank you, Senator. Point of information, Senator Blighton. Thank you, Madam Chair. Commissioner Romeo, what's the amount of the self-grantee for DPNR? 500,000. Okay, thank you, thank you. Perfect, thank you. Senator Joseph? Thank you so much, Madam Chair. A pleasant good morning to you, my colleagues, listening and viewing audience people of the Virgin Islands and to you Commissioner Oreo a pleasant good day I want to start off as I always try to do is to really commend you and your staff for doing the hard work and heavy lifting that you do sometimes we lock horns regarding to enforcement but know that I appreciate all that you and your team are working to achieve on behalf of the people of the Virgin Islands and I really want to say thank you I want to do a really quick review and it's a comparative review of your testimony presented today to your testimony that was presented at the committee on government operations meeting that was held on February 17th and I did a really quick uh comparison and i want to start off with vika and the virgin islands council of the arts and the monies that they receive from the national endowment of the arts as stimulus grant funds i noted in your testimony um in february that you said that vika had received over 500 000 from the it's right here uh 500 500 000 slightly over 500 500 000 0:26:11 dollars and they have dispersed around 90 of the funds to their grantees however it's a little slightly contradicted it's not a major contradiction for me uh because i know things when you're applying for grants, certain things may happen. The grantor may look at certain scope of work, and you may have had to do a budget modification. But your testimony reflects only $411,900. So we have a difference of $88,100. Would you be so kind to speak on that? 0:28:04 Sure. Thank you for the question, Senator. So the testimony for today is specifically on disaster recovery awards so the 411 is not part of the operating budget or the operating the normal grant procedure that vika actually issues okay so okay so are you saying that these two are two different grants yes oh and they're still from the same because it said vika stimulus grants here and it says the same thing here it's correct yeah for um so you're you're saying what what is the uh the number the grant award number um you'd have to give me a few minutes to be able to pull that up okay i will i will so i can i can tell you what the award number i'm sorry i i do have that right in front of me, the award number for our CARES Act grant, which is project number F80J4. F80J4. And then, I'm sorry, that's our American Rescue Plan that was awarded for 2022. 0:28:43 And then we have F80F9. But I'm not looking at an American Rescue Plan here. I'm just looking at what you represented in your testimony. I don't want to belabor this. You represented in your testimony that this is CARES Act, stimulus program, and that's the grant number I would like. And the other one that you represented in February 17th indicated the stimulus grant, and they both funded a source is the National Endowment of the Arts. So, I just wanted to get the federal project number, the award number. If you have it available, if not, you can forward it to the chair, okay, so we don't waste too much of my time. 0:29:50 Okay, so I also wanted to just, and I really want to commend the team there too because they've been spending down some of this money and doing a really good job trying to spend on the money. Let us look at, if we can, with your testimony relative to the derelict vessel removal. How are we working with that? 0:30:42 Because I noted in your testimony on February 17th, you have the same number here, 30 vessels and other objects have been removed. But in your testimony today, you also indicated that you have a funding in the amount of $186,900. I am on page four of your testimony, so you can follow me. And I know you wrote it because you're a very good, prolific writer. So tell me where we are as far as the vessels being removed because we still have some derelict vessels here. 0:31:10 So, Senator, the St. Thomas contract has been completed. And this $186,900 is for St. Croix? That's correct. Okay, I wasn't clear about that. Thank you. And how long is this contract for? Is it until October 2022? That's correct. Okay, great. All right, thank you. Now, just still moving through your testimony, I'm on page five. And you mentioned at the bottom of page four, continuing on page five, the FEMA flood mitigation grant, which is $960,000. But at the end of the first paragraph, you indicated that you have requested that the legislature pass some law regarding the building and flood management plan. Is this having our not addressing this issue having any impact on your federal funding? 0:31:50 Not on our federal funding for not updating. What it does is actually from an operational standpoint, it creates some issues because we're not currently using the most updated FEMA firm maps right now. and tell me this how is that going to play into effect should we god forbid god forbid we get another storm and fema comes in and they don't see this uh flood mitigation in play and it's not enacted how is it going to affect the the regular joe or jane in our community who may not have insurance so that that's where the that's where the key lies it's by updating the firm maps and then also adopting the language that the department can also use any additional tools the firm maps set what the lines and delineated markers are for the flood insurance so right now by updating it you may pull some people who are paying for flood insurance out of the flood zone based on the last instances and then other people who may not have been included are now included So there will, in fact, there could be a shift, particularly in St. Croix, where there's flatter area. The idea is to make sure that people have coverage under the National Flood Insurance Program. If we're not, one of the fears that 0:32:56 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 5 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery I have is that if we don't update, then FEMA may impact what the premium for the territory is. Hopefully not like a full point or something like that. But any increase on that percentage means you're paying more for your flood insurance. And so that has a direct correlation to our homeowners being able to be eligible and ineligible for FEMA flood insurance because of where their properties are located. And so we need to see that it's aligned to the federal standard if we are going to, God forbid, look at any FEMA funding coming in in the future. 0:34:39 That's correct. Okay, good. Understood. Now, I want to, I'm still on page five of your testimony. This property you mentioned, Mercurial Landslide Acquisition. What is the size of the property? uh i believe it's a little over a half an acre like maybe 0.6 if i remember correct okay okay uh it's about 0.6 yeah over half an acre okay and then i also had a couple of other questions uh relative uh to some of the outstanding um challenges that you see i don't know if any other a committee member may have inquired about that as far as your grants and before i you answer that i needed to get an understanding from you the performance periods for a lot of these grant award i know you supplied a very detailed spreadsheet but i i couldn't discern and understand the performance periods that's very critical for me and for all of us as legislators because we have oversight to be able to see the performance periods and how much you've completed madam chair uh may i wrap up thank you i also want to finally say i really want to commend you i was doing some counting and i saw that you have about 12 of your projects on the spreadsheet that have been completed and about five of them have not started including the one at the serial eking airport but i could understand why some of those issues those may not be started but i definitely would like to get the performance grant periods uh in your spreadsheets going forward madam chair i thank you so much uh for the time thank you senator good madam chair good morning to the people of the virginalas good morning to the testifiers good morning colleagues uh commissioner a reference of crowds lagoon i know there's the one area that's supposed to be um repaired sharply which is bridge that was it uh there's 0:35:17 an area by the bridge that's supposed to be even bigger under one of those road projects um have the design been completed and it's that out of it so i think senator we don't have the project for the bridge that's actually public works uh the public works division has received their permits from dpnr i believe it was september october of last year uh but we're we're not the ones doing the contract for the bridge let me let mr lind we're in because that is an important part one of our fisheries which is also lagoon but that particular era i don't think we got federal funds um for dredging or anything but is there a plan to to clean that particular area the amount of of the fisheries going in or where the water going is it's really the sun is accumulating and there's minimal water flow because it used to be dredged ever so often and hasn't been dredged in about 15 years and i'm concerned about the entire lagoon the inflow and outflow of water is there a plan for that so senator i can say that we have in fact judged the alterna lagoon in the past uh i would also state that we've judged it sooner than 15 years ago i can recall at some point uh while being director of ccm that that we had in fact judged that the department had um we can take a look at that because it is we we can definitely put something towards the maintenance on that though if you did it before then um when you are there you truly understand the importance of keeping that particular area open have you had a chance to see um the condition of it correctly and yes 0:38:01 i was actually i was actually at altoona lagoon uh during act fair weekend okay so you're you're developing a plan to get that area yes thank you so much what is the intended use of the enid bar library after it's completed so on the bottom floor we intend to have a shop a retail space um for uh items that are currently we want to give our vendors that work with vika on the made in the usvi pop-up shop a more permanent more prominent position to sell their goods so the ground floor will be that as well as a small welcome center and trying to bring tourists up to the western end of the main street area uh the second floor we i'm sorry yeah the second floor second floor our intention is to have a small type of library slash public computer space but we also want to have some some space that's left for partnerships maybe with the university and offering like tutoring sessions we want to really have it as library space but classroom and then also exposure to the digital library um on the and that's on the western end on the eastern end we're looking at some sort of flexible exhibit um it can be anything from you know genealogy in the in the territory um it could be one of the things that i like is something to do either virgin islands heroes or virgin island sports heroes something that that can be changed um but it's it's demonstrating the the history of of the virgin islands there uh the top floor is going to be where we are going to move our virgin 0:39:54 island council of the arts they are currently paying rent for where they are and we're going to capitalize on the reduction of the operating costs but then they also have direct access to their vendors and then we would also be providing them a larger courtyard space in the back um in order to do different events from yeah thank you so much where what are our guys removed from the bottom floor i heard you speak to some damage for those documents that were on the ground level or close to the ground and those on the wall were they removed and placed in a safe place they have not yet been removed most of them are actually in decent shape up um we turn the ac on five minutes um on a consistent cycle to to make sure that there's no deterioration when we move them we We want to move them for digitization, and that's 0:41:53 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 6 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery something that we are currently working on getting this and securing the funding for. When we take them out of those packages, we want to just get them to the digitization phase. What's the intended use? The government of the Virgin Islands is having some conversations about some private investment in that property. And because those discussions are ongoing, Senator, I can definitely speak with you offline about it, but don't want to put too much out there in the public sphere. And those discussion has been going on for quite a while, I think like two years with that particular area with this particular um venture that is supposed to take place there so i think we need to either speed that up or we need to turn that that's a wonderful facility we need to turn it into um a tourist excursion in reference to your derelict vessel this last phase is going to remove those boats that have been sunk? Is it going to go out or will we still have left back for this? 0:43:05 Well, unfortunately, particularly in the St. Thomas district, we removed a significant number and then there's now a few more that have popped up. There's also some here in Christian St. Harbour right by the seaplane as you're taking off. Is that targeted to be removed? I believe there are four vessels within the Christianstead Harbor that are in the contract right now. There are another, I believe, three in Salt River, and then there are some others that are scattered to make up the 12 in the St. Croix District. Okay. 0:44:10 The online portal that was created for the fishermen, is that the only access for them to apply? Is it only online? Yes. There's no paper application process? Not that I am aware of, no. Do you believe that that is a possible hindrance to some of the fishermen to be able to access the online portal and we need to create an avenue for them to receive some assistance and get it on to the portal? So what we're offering is assistance with entering the information directly. So we can use the different computer centers across the territory, hold workshops with them to assist them with entering in their information. But the portal is going to be the way that the applications are processed and everything. That's fine. When is the first event where you're going to open up a computer center, ask a fisherman to come and have staff there that would be able to assist them? 0:44:45 I'm not completely sure. I know right now what we're doing next week is, again, still broadcasting more availability. And then a number of the· We have some fishermen, and that's what they do to fish. And requesting that they go and fill out this online portal isn't going to work out. We need to create a venue where we invite the fishermen of St. Thomas, the fishermen of St. Croix, that's a computer, an area that is soccer computers, that we have staff to be able to relay the information and input information so we could get signed up. I think we have five individuals that there is a particular issue. If you are going to be going to find out if there's an issue with them, them access the portal or whatever the connectivity they did what they do it just be online so I would typically suggest that if possible if you can have the staff at some place at an announced meeting on a two-day child just coming up for the information that would be perfect your neighbor naval barracks yard um what's the completion date for that can you repeat the question senator you were breaking up we're saying that um the old naval barracks in starbase yes that will serve for the future home of dpnr what's the completion date for that project um i'm hoping by october of 2023. october of 2023 okay so until that time you're still in the airport no we've been out of the airport since october of 2018 uh last year i moved the department out of the turnbull library and we are leasing commercial space in the middle uh building that via is in in the st thomas 0:45:48 district okay uh going back to the brogue facility because we were negotiating awaiting for this particular venture that means that the work is not going on um that's correct right now we're we because it would take architectural and engineering um if we are not going to permanently have that space for the department then i do not want to obligate funds towards a and e that won't go to us okay and that venture has spoken to property and procurement they're in the in the process of trying to develop a lease agreement i i'm not sure exactly where that particular portion lies we can't wait on that forever no this is going to talk talk talk and that particular facility so we have to move on the in the library you said that the bids came in 100 percent higher than the the estimates. That's correct. Did you have access to some other PFA funds? I think you had some $750,000 that was earmarked for a particular project and that supplement to fill the gap or was so much higher? No, I mean the estimate for the project, the estimated cost was I believe around half a million we obligated through our FEMA funds 600,000 and it came in at you know eight and change almost nine so don't you don't you have PFA funds you have 700 I think it's 750,000 dollars in PFA funds from one of the bond proceeds for the Macfarlane library can't you use that to supplement and get the project going senator I'm not aware of any bond proceeds for Peterson library we had PFA funds for the Turnbull library and we 0:47:50 had PFA funds for the Fort Christian Museum and and we are regularly spending on that but not for the Peterson library at least not to my and nothing that I've seen in three years I'm almost sure I'm going to check it and get back to you because I'm almost It's not on my quarterly statement from the PFA. Maybe it's a different funding. So I'm going to look and see if I can find it. And your plan is to spend the remainder of the events during course week in September. We are, I mean, we have broadcast even recently. We've spoken to a couple of organizations and we'll probably also get out a 0:49:52 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 7 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery couple thousand dollars here and there, but typically when Coast Weeks is coming up, you have schools, you have different organizations. They're all organizing beach cleanups, so we know that there will be sort of a bulk of requests in September for Coast Week. The permitting process for Envision, is that a streamlining process now? It is, yes. So you're able to get those permits out in what, a couple weeks? Less than that. of them are are really like repairs and pulling electrical there's most of the envision is is repair work and so they can take like two weeks um if it is a complete rebuild which i know we've had two or three of those that would be you know our our average right now on on building permit for residential structures is about 21 days right now are you seeing a lot of activity with the envision program can we still get in a tremendous amount of complaints in reference to no homes no not not a tremendous amount on the building permit we do have a lot on the time um madam chair if i may the um the clearance because we also have to do 106 clearance on each application which is under shippo uh so those are usually done in volume like sending 30 applications at a time for review to get the 106 clearance thank you so much thank you you conclude it 0:50:52 just about let me just ask director williams one question has a group been selected for their vision program have they finally executed a contract the staff augmentation contract is currently being evaluated so no no they have not selected but they're in the process and we expect that we should have a recommendation to the board uh by by monday of next week okay thank you thank you madam chair thank you uh let's go back to the union and bar library the what's the time frame because they I believe not believe I know when Senator Jackson spearheaded that legislation working closely with him you know you said that you believe the bottom floor is gonna have this and that the law does specifically indicate the use of the building and it's exactly what you said and I think he had this vision of every time we travel to DC we would end up meeting with the smithsonian institute in the african-american museum and he has his his connections there and i think he wanted the enid emba library to really be the smithsonian institute um of the virgin islands that was his dream his vision that you can go ask the archives for information old maps and it would be there and that would be that would be our re in a harder downtown the smithsonian type institute of the virgin islands so what's your time frame to get there um so i'm hoping to actually have that senator before the end of this month when so the drawings have been completed um i think at 90 there's a little bit of the mechanical that's left And so the idea is that by the end of this month, we get from our A&E contractor the bid schedule, the bid timeframes, and being able to put the project out to bid. 0:52:43 And so I don't know exactly how long. I mean, I think what we would like to do is really and truly, like, maybe prioritize one of the floors, like, get a lot of work done on the ground floor, get that portion back open. And, you know. What does your recruiting effort look like insofar as I know a lot of Virgin Islanders away who are anthropologists, archaeologists, they're into historic preservation, and they would like to move home, but we don't have the market for them to move home. Do you envision the Enid Embar Library to be that place for them? No, I don't. And the reason why I say that is because when the Turnbull Library facility was constructed, the ground floor, the build out of that was approximately $1.3 million just for the archival lab and facilities to not only display the archival materials, but also be able to perform work on them. And are we doing that now? 0:54:48 All of that, and it is storing a bunch of material. Because, you know, we're storing things everywhere. That's the problem. Okay. I don't think that's adequate because we have a lot of antiques all over the island in different areas. Yes. So can the library downtown store the archives that we have in various satellite locations? I mean, the library downtown could store, I mean, materials. But then in terms of having the display, having the work that's done, it's not the ideal location, particularly after we've spent all this money at Turnbull to do all of that. And so there would be a minimal amount, if anything, in terms of actual storage because... 0:55:59 Okay, let me go back, not storage, but when you come off the cruise ship and you stroll downtown and you end up to the bottom of Main Street, coming from the east side, that would be the bottom, that would be the beginning from the west, and the tourist wants to walk in and see like an old coal pot used by a slave or a mortar and pestle, and would those things be on display? So I would say that's where we want to have them on display at the Fort Christian, because that's sort of the museum for there. The idea that we're trying to move towards is archiving our records digitally, and then there would in fact be a section on the Enid Bar on the second floor that you would be able to do all of the records review from everything that we could digitize. The priority for me in order to be more resilient and not lose any more paper is to have all of the records that we have digitized properly and then readily accessible and searchable, not only on the web, but even as we put screens and different places where people could come and actually research those things there. So the eastern side of Bow Library on the second floor is what we're trying to reserve that space for. Okay, I'll get back to you. I have a whole discussion with you on historic preservation. Senator Francis, I see a mic, but I don't know if you have a point of inquiry or something. I don't know. I can't hear you. The point? 0:56:48 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 8 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery You do have a inquiry. I'm just waiting for you to cease your... Go ahead. Point of inquiry. Well, thank you, Madam Chair. I know back in the 33rd legislature we had this body had approved for a line of credit. I think it was like about 80 million dollars for the purpose of being able to advance the need for payments and projects. Have there been any opportunity for you to be able to access the line of credit? It's still a good instrument or what's happening with that? So, Senator, when we petitioned FEMA to be able to pay on invoice, the need to draw on a line of credit and spend resources that was not a vote, so we did not have credit. What we're seeing now is a fact that some of the bids are over. we we need to be to do so although the bids come in higher we also ensure that these are reasonable bids and accept them because that is one of the tests of the federal agencies we just we we're able to ensure that these are valid bids well we're not a lot of being challenged by the fact that um you know we're delayed in unable to access certain projects because the abundant is not available any given time um have we been able to close that loop but any any project that is obligated in in other words we have the funds that the funds have been afforded to the territory we're able to draw on those funds as long as we provide the proper documentation we're able to draw on those funds immediately so that's no longer issue that's one of the very first things that 0:58:24 when the manual draw was lifted that we were able to gain back that control here in the territory very well thank you thank you madam thank you for your reason you're welcome um so i'm going to ask some some questions right now the the fisheries disaster relief recovery program what's the status of the funds um allocated for the sculpture guardians so that we're senator we're working with uvi on those not tourism anymore for this the i mean what they marketing it but i mean yeah right now they're in there as artificial reef sites and so um we are working with uvi the project i I think will be to have several small sites rather than one large type of site. Have you identified what those sites will be? 1:00:15 I believe there's some preliminary discussion. There are, because what we're doing is using some of the models that have been developed that look at larval transport and looking at both the fish and coral larval transport models to see where some of these locations can be. And would it be in a timeframe Because we had four years to spend this funding, right? Yes. How close are we to that timeline? I think we're a year and a half off still. We have until August of 2024 to spend that money. Do you think we'll be able to spend it before 2024? 1:01:07 I believe so. Okay. And the remaining funds from the very same disaster recovery program, what do you intend to use the remaining funds for? so again what we're doing is we've requested a reprogram it's a little more than 10% so we had to request it but the when the original application went out it was to give somewhere around you know I want to estimate it roughly like eight million dollars out as direct payments we've received six million or paid out six six point one in requests by doing an additional no questions asked five thousand dollar payment to the fishers that qualified I believe it's either it's phase two or all we now get to that eight million which is how the which is how the the original award was broken up and so that's what we've requested is to do the reprogram request what did you request it to go to like commercial fishing yes also commercial fishing would be okay and what was it of the total dispersed amount what was spent on um administrative costs uh 298 000 so it was just under the the 10 percent of the 298 000 went to the contractor yes tsg yes so i believe two well so 225 went to um widow brian tsg and then we carved out the monies that were being for the two uh ladies that were the program assistants miss joelle anderson miss charlene isaac so we were paying people through the pfa to be on the ground to assist with the fishers with all of that. So what was the purpose of the 225? What was their role? So theirs was the development 1:01:41 of the program, the portal system, everything that they did on there. And then the additional $98,000 went to? The additional? It was $98,000 you said? $98,000? No, for the two program assistants, it was like the balance, I think it was like $50,000 or $60,000 for the two of them and right yes and they've been able to square with our fishermen so the all the fishers all the registered fishers in the st croix district were completed um i heard that up to june 1 we got a new application in the saint thomas district so okay let's move to um the brugal facility in your testimony um what would it be used for um the original use of the facility is for a distillery um it has the tank in there uh it has the structure in there i mean and and a lot of the existing things could actually be polished up and used as part of a display museum those okay because one part of it is still used for fish and wildlife storage not anymore we've had too many break-ins and so we've actually um taken all of our equipment out of there but it's just the distillery the old distillery yeah and then um while we're at that is that's one of the largest multi-species of the bat colony yes so do you have plans to safeguard that colony so i know one of the things that we did is we have these bat houses that we've been erecting to have them and then you can move those around um and we've been putting more of them up on the west end of saint 1:03:32 croix trying to get the we try and move the bats from the brigade to the west i mean exactly just to distribute break up the population because at some point if you're going to use the building the bats have to go so we're trying to just get them to but we're going to preserve the colony because it's a nice i love a little bit about bats didn't really focus much in science but you can you can do things that get them to not nest and roost there like you know there's different sonic waves you 1:05:23 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 9 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery can push they don't like that pulse you can tell them go somewhere else and so it just prevents them from coming and sitting up in there all day all night long okay i just want to make sure that we're preserving that um on a brigade facility let's move to um the fisheries cares act one testimony um and stimulus two program what's the um anticipated cost to be paid to the eda for disbursement activity so right now i I believe it is around $300,000. It's a little, like what's in the award is I think 9.8 or something like that. But if there are some additional costs, I don't mind moving it to cover a little bit more than 10%. And what's the anticipated plans for the unobligated funds? Unobligated? Right now, we don't have. Yeah, the idea is that. spend all of the funds correct the idea is that the the amount of applicants divided by the total amount of money is going to go to as a stimulus to the fishers so the more people apply the the more parsed out that um the more parsed out that payment becomes okay um just two more topics quickly and then we move to Santa Francis for the second round. Project worksheet. Seven zero eight eight nine. Fish and Wildlife building on Red Hook. I see that it's been repaired. But I doubt that the staff can occupy that building half of the year from the toxic levels of sarcasm. That's correct. okay so we fix a building we can't occupy it because of the levels because i don't even know how your strength or you can function because the smell is really really bad was the department plans and we've currently gone to three different locations to move the staff seeking a two-year lease because by the time when we finish the sub base building the fish and wildlife staff will be there and the plan for the red hook is really to be sort of a lab opportunity for us so not full-time operational will be okay because that's really now the students are you there again as well so while we move fish and wildlife out and it'll be a lab in red hook how do we still help people of that area that's a tourist traffic area people work there um students go to school there and it stench sucks yeah so unfortunately once the sargassum sort of bends its way into rendit and so it just sunk the dampener um we've been working with uh several marinas to allow them to see how they can go but you need a lot of reinforcement based on the volume that comes in Either that or you have to go out and trawl it right away. 1:07:33 Director Actelene Williams, can this be a disaster-related project? Climate change, everything that's happening, sargassum will be impacting coastal regions. Any discussions with, like, NOAA to the delegate to increase our federal fund? You? Okay. Yes, we have put that out there because, again, most of the dealings is federally declared disaster. We have raised the level of significance because of the public health issues that arise from the dissolved oxygen and the sulfur dioxide and everything. 1:09:09 So we have put that out there on several occasions through the U.S. Coral Reef Task Force, and that's made up of the really high ups in the different federal agencies, including FEMA being at the table. So we'll just continue to push that. I know we push it with the fisheries administrator of NOAA as well, and recently during their visit with the assistant administrator of DOI for the insular area. So we have been pushing that discussion, us in Puerto Rico, very much so. 1:09:49 Director Actelina, you wanted to comment or you're good? I was going to basically support What Commissioner Horry only said. Okay, good. Now let's move to the Gustave Quetel building in French town here. I had the opportunity to tour that building and you said repairs are complete, right? Yes. Okay, who did the work? So the staffer at the time that we had our maintenance supervisor, a lot of the concrete work and such that was done. So it was done in-house and then I think a few small contractors. There's the total amount on that was under like 30,000 or something. Okay, I think we need to revisit the detail. 1:10:25 So we're working on a capital project. Okay, because it's leaking right now and fishermen pay for those tiles. And when it rains, it does leak. Yeah, so we we actually had public works out there several months ago to give us a to give us a scope of work of what it would take. We have a capital cost. We actually applied for some additional funding through an opportunity that came up last year. I mean earlier this year and and we're going to be doing actually first the paving in the rear at the end of this month and fixing the cleaning tables and then we are going to see where we can get that three to four hundred thousand is what we're estimating to do a capital repair on the building okay so as long as you know that we have to repair okay and then the tombow library so staff is at the via building correct uh yes they should move next week how much is that costing us for the building itself uh our annual lease i believe is 235 000. 1:11:07 okay and then what's the timeline to get staff back into their building um and to get the general public back into the library and i'm asking this because we talk about everything is correlated so we sit in education hearings and we talk about the literacy rate and we talk about our students not testing well and blah blah blah and it really goes back to reading and comprehension because even if it's math if you're reading a math word problem you still have to be able to decipher what the and means and what problem and what's not and i think that our community holistically we do not um have an appreciation for literacy and education and then of course we send the wrong message when our library is not being used as a library and it's closed at five in the afternoon and then the uvi library becomes a de facto library for the community um so education is impacted by the lack of library resources that we do have because you have seniors you know doing applications fast for forms you have students that want to probably go and read our young people elementary students we 1:12:31 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. 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VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 10 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery have to get them excited about learning and reading and libraries and the libraries occupied by your department now um so what's your timeline to to really restore the library to a library so my goal is to actually have turnbull library open not this coming week but the week after it'll be the main circulation area including the computer center we have replaced the chiller unit inside so that was the main issue is that the the rent the chiller that was being rented while the main chiller that was purchased as a result of our fema pw that broke down and it broke down to the point where it could no longer be repaired and those big chillers are things that you have to spec and bring in and it broke down completely in march uh and you know from the time we executed the contract there were delays in manufacturing of the one that has now arrived so the the the main chiller has in fact been replaced the new one has been installed it is installed right now it is blowing um so now the issue is we have not been in that building for the last three months so we're having it professionally clean next week i'm already made more remediation as well so the mold remediation the larger mold remediation is going to involve the removal of the walls so what we are doing right now in terms it's exactly correct senator until they came in a million dollars over and that is because the roof is being replaced in its entirety and a sub level is being put on so that if it gets damaged in the future that we don't have the rain proliferation we're replacing a lot of the walls with mold resistant wall board we're replacing all the walls in the archival area with mold resistant wall board and making it more resilient to damages in the future so it's a it is a big project um and we will have to close the library because we won't subject our employees to be work to work every day we want to subject the the the visitors so we so we have to find a plan b to put basically a temporary library for the public because the scope of work does sound extensive correct okay all right and then the library hours so we have already notified the librarians and their union that when the lights were replaced in the parking area that we are now going to create shift schedules and we were going to be extending hours they were notified at the beginning of this calendar year and then any discussions with public works on their route 1:14:53 we have had those discussions the bus does need to come to because by the time i don't know how we get students to a library when you the bus drops them way down at the main road and they have to traverse through the mile up to plaza extra then to climb the hill again we make we're making learning hard and inaccessible yes so i mean the the bus we have i have had that conversation with commissioner gabriel personally we did see an increase because we are we're also working with their vitran program trying to get our buses back on the street as well so the vikings are working together okay good always um senator francis director actually quickly i saw you have something to say because i see that the tv is on you yes i do i can i get a recess to sure sure sure the committee stands in a brief recess and then when we return senator francis you're up for seven The committee stands at recess. 1:16:41 Thank you. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 1:18:09 Thank you. Thank you. 1:21:39 Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 1:22:39 No, it isn't. I can't. Am I good? the committee's back on the record ah okay good we're back on the record senator franzas you recognize for your seven minutes very much madam chair i just have a few more questions real quickly uh commissioner orio in regards to enforcement and i know that there is some funding that have been a mark for environmental enforcement and i see here there's a spreadsheet as with balances as of june the 8th where um there was 2.1 million dollars earmarked or um allocated over there's still a balance of 1.8 million dollars and a lot of um environmental enforcement what so senator that you broke up at the end there but i'm assuming you're asking what's the status on on the the the funding for environmental enforcement yes i'm asking for you know what what's the um what is happening in that year in respect 1:24:39 to environmental enforcement and the expenditure of that balance of the fund 1.8 million dollars okay so uh thank you for the question senator so uh all of our purchases are actually beyond the threshold for 50 000 for us to be able to solicit for bids internally so with respect to the 1.5 million dollars for the purchase of the new vessels we actually completed the public process so we received the funding um in in november of last year i believe is when we received the initial award we got the award funds on the system at the beginning of january we worked with the contractors on specs and then we put out the the the vessels to bid in february uh it closed in march and we entered into an agreement in april i believe the contractor has now signed the contract so we are waiting their first uh invoice for us to liquidate the first payment um but the fabrication the completion we won't liquidate all of the funds until we take delivery of all four vessels it's going to be anywhere from 10 months to hopefully no delays but maybe 12 months is when we we get the um the vessels delivered here in the territory so we're really actually right on track um with that in in terms of fulfilling the the procurement process but we've done everything we can do now so the money will start to move once we get the 1:26:24 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. 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VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 11 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery periodic invoices which i believe will be on the completion of the the actual vessels being ready for us and then we do have an inspection that we will do in the states before they're sent down as well um for the 314 the so we just received that cares act lepc sub grant in at the end of march of this year we are currently we completed the actual specs we were trying to source uh what we wanted locally but the cost has gone up beyond uh like initially when we were looking at this project the the skis are going to be somewhere around 18 000 per unit they're now up to 26 000 per unit again initially we were only going to do two but now we're actually at four so we have to run a public bid process um and that actually we sent the i have it right here we actually sent the uh scope of work to bid uh to to property and procurement actually just yesterday so we hope to be out for our bid process um if not by next week then it'll be by the week after to close within i think 21 days after that well and in respect to online improvement obviously dpnr is one of those critical agency in regards to the recovery projects um as well as the construction projects that's going on throughout the territory how are you wrapping up um i know that last year we had um allowed for some leverage for uh i think it was online software that you're trying to improve upon yeah where with that and and let's talk about online so um we i was hoping to launch the online platform um for our permitting our full like our applications for home repairs and ccm applications my goal was to launch it for this june uh the contractors have now pushed that date out to hopefully july is when we fully do it um but the there are some bugs that are happening on the application side and so we clearly weren't ready to go out for lunch until those were dealt with um our division of environmental enforcement however received cares act funding and we entered into our contract and so we actually have a separate online platform for mooring anchoring and registration of vessels which is currently live right now we started our vessel registration officially starts on june 1 we started it i think on may 24th this year um we have been doing pretty well i think we had one day where the system from the vendor was backlogged and so when people were trying to make their payments they weren't able to 1:28:11 but we have since one minute clear up those issues but we should be fully automated in terms of i'm sorry senator we should be before the close of this fiscal year definitely will be live with our permanent online permitting platform well yeah we really got to drive that technology and um and get that going in respect to marketing um and you know when we look at the new policy updates new building code requirements essentially uh again um adhere it to some of our the federal requirements how are you marketing that information and getting out to the public those new information so i know that um during when we were pushing forward with the with the building code um requirements that we actually have now promulg had promulgated we were marketing that i think in the building codes update every three years some of them are not significant madam chair if i may some of them are not significant changes i think one of the things that that was a major concern a few years ago was whether or not the wind load speeds would be for roof design would be pushed really much further out beyond the 165 to somewhere around 185 which could which would come at a significant cost to the territory i think that luckily we were able to um to to demonstrate that we didn't need to go that way that we had enough homes that were built after maryland that sustained uh the damages that that the storms wreak so um we do some marketing particularly around when we know there are going to be some changes and updates our next round is going to be focused a lot along the flood regulations but there are some other things that we are going to be doing um i know that i believe it's the housing expo is next week being hosted by the virgin islands housing finance authority um we are partnering with them we're going to have uh some details and exhibits about the stronger home guide 1:31:25 and and some other things that people don't necessarily think about but if you do them you're better prepared in terms of your your home is better prepared to to resist any kind of disaster that you could encounter very well um madam chair i heard my time call can i just so i wrap up with this yeah yeah we um this is the only agency today so i'm gonna give latitude go ahead well thank you so commissioner orio um i'm always impressed with your ability to really articulate um you know your agencies and i know your agency and i know that there's a lot of component within your agency and you have a pretty good handle on it how are you you mentoring or who are you mentoring to make sure that this vast knowledge is not just kept to yourself, but in fact, that even a level of succession and at least, you know, just having the information spread throughout the department. Thank you for that, Senator. So, I mean, what I try to do is meet with my senior staff regularly, like on a quarterly basis, but then I also meet with them individually. 1:33:36 And I think that's why when I'm able to come here and speak on a lot of the programs, it's because we do have a lot of one-on-one conversations about what specifically is taking place in each of the divisions and where it is I can help and also impart just the things that I did as a director that I know that they're going through and having to work through. I'm also trying to do some leadership training for them. 1:34:46 You know, it's been very useful for me over the last two years, the leadership training that I have received. And so I want to also impart that because right now, I think everybody in DPNR should have the attitude that I had, which is, or that I continue to have, is that I celebrate my 23rd year of employment with DPNR next week. I think that everybody should realize that the work that we do is extremely important and that the question we should be asking is, what can I do to make things better? Because DPNR is out there and we're just trying to protect our home. So I think that for me being an 1:35:19 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 12 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery inspector and now being the head of the department that if people set their minds to what can i do next to make things better then we're going to have a whole bunch of leaders inside of the department and that's what i want everybody in my department's attitude to be towards coming to work every day what can i do to make my department better so that the people of the virgin islands are better for that work that i put in well thank you thank you very much thank you for your contribution uh thank you department as well for the work that they're doing um madam chair thank you for allowing this non-committee member to um some leniency in asking um some questions thank you very much yeah i remember of every committee um so thank you uh senator johnson thank you thank you very much madam chair i too would like to share some kind words to odr mr actlin and and uh jp oreo you guys answer the call every time we call and it's your job some people say why do i honor and give you this you know praise but there are commissioners that just don't respond there's some of them i've been in here a year and what five six months some channels i've seen it here twice and not that they don't be invited they just don't show up so for you guys who show i appreciate time i want more because people want more people want the answer they want the information they want confident that we're going to build this earth or saying and better than what we meant it i sure hope that you know we're working together we can get this place going to get these funds used because everybody valid the money's here and and what you guys saying about you know the capacity and and some people is unacceptable one the job done that seems to progress the commission i want to start out with asking you this question about how many artists from each island receive stimulus from from the vi council of arts in their stimulus program national endowment parts Can you repeat the question, Senator? You were breaking up a little bit. 1:37:16 How many artists from each island receive stimulus funds from the VI Council of Arts from the CARES Act stimulus program? So what I have on the CARES Act is 16. We had 16 recipients, 16 business recipients. I don't have a breakdown on individuals. How is this information getting out there to make sure that more people can apply? And what kind of funding does remain there right now as we speak if you have that information? 1:38:25 So the CARES Act and ARPA funds have been expended 100%. and then our grant cycle for fiscal year 23 recently opened and we put out a call on that last week alerting all artists in the territory to please submit their applications along with what some of the prerequisites are and we'll be taking applications I believe until august uh and then decisions uh the application period will close and i think we start issuing awards either in december or january is this information put out so that artists could know where to apply for these uh grants yes it is through our you know four minutes through our written press releases through social media um you know our artists also have one of the reasons why vika is looking to remain in the downtown district is because that's where a lot of the artists actually are have their galleries up and around whether it's um in town main street itself or even at the door center uh working with kendall so we have we place our staff directly into the zones where a number of the artists are and they have direct access to them them, you know, almost seven days a week, really, with the amount of events that VICA does as well. 1:39:06 All right. Thank you. And I'm not sure if this question was asked. I think I heard about it. Under the direct assistance program, what determines the eligibility for these programs? I'm not sure of the specific criteria, Senator, on the ARPA fund. I mean, on the VICA fund. I didn't hear you. I don't have that, like, I don't have the eligibility requirements for each one of our disaster assistance programs. May, can you further explain about your mitigation project, especially the community cleanup events? Also, is the community aware of these events? Is it advertised? So, yes. They are advertised. Like it shows in there, we've issued over $145,000 in community cleanup grants. Our education and outreach coordinator, Ms. Christina Kitty Edwards in CZM, is somebody that's been doing our cleanup program for years and is known throughout the community. 1:40:41 What we did is that there is some large-scale debris that's going to be more costly, particularly vessels, and that individuals do not have a legal right to pick up vessels. And so we made a chunk of the money for the vessel removal, but then that the communities themselves, whether they be owners' associations, whether it be grassroots programs, but that nonprofit groups, but if they wanted to organize a cleanup event, that we would be able to give them some financial assistance to purchase the supplies, bags. Some of them rented canoes when we did the great mangrove cleanup in April so that we could get some of the things that are further off in the water. 1:41:53 Our goal is to reduce the amount of debris that ends up as coastal pollution. And we're being very broad in how we see that and making that available to be able to pick things up that could eventually make their way into our coastal waters. a little bit about the the ships that i don't know if my have my time in common chair you have one minute senator johnson you may proceed thank you um in you speaking about these ships and and boats that are sunk do you have any information about that boats that in the water patch that in sub-base it was a big um the water So I tried on numerous occasions to get our funding to be allowed to scuttle that boat and make an artificial reef out of it. 1:42:40 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 13 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery NOAA's marine debris program told me, no way, no how, you're not going to be able to do that. So we are still working on how we can get rid of that particular boat. When the contractor comes down for the $3 million project, which is all the sunken barges, Madam Chair, if I may, all the sunken barges that are on the south side of Crumb Bay, so that $3 million contract is to remove all of that debris. They're going to take a look at the water barge because just on the scrap metal alone, they can make some change off of it. So my goal is to really get it off the seafloor and, if possible, find a way to use it as an artificial reef and we can put some dive moorings around it and have it be sort of a feature for people who are chartering for the day or just being out on the boat for the day to be able to see. 1:43:39 But that also, we already started our conversations with the Army Corps of Engineers on a permit for that and what that entails. So if I can identify the funding, it is a goal of mine. But it may be that the contractor who's coming in to do the $3 million project says, OK, if we add $200,000 to the contract, they'll take it away as scrap metal and they'll just collect the profit on the scrap. We may do that as well. Thank you very much. Thank you very much, Madam Chair. 1:44:41 You're welcome. Commissioner Oriol. You have a lot of illegal construction projects happening and I doubt that you have the manpower to really, I think it's a two-fold issue. One is I think you wanted a code to change or reflect more enforcement power or increase the fines. Was that it? It depends on which section, but all of it needs to be revamped. Okay, good. 1:45:15 So we need to revamp that. and two i'm asking how much illegal construction projects because it does impact um the environment it does impact the level of resist resilience for the territory and then it becomes a disaster at some point right so given the circumstances now how are you um dealing with the massive constructions that we're having illegally and built out of code thank thank you for that question um so one of the one of the things that we have put a proposal together for is to do um we would like to run an in like a free inspection program so that people could have their homes assessed at because we know so many people just went to anybody who call himself a contractor to get make sure whatever can be done as quickly and as cheaply as possible after the storm and so we just want to run a home inspection program that gives people the knowledge as to whether or not they're what was done to their home the repairs that were done are good or if they need to make improvements um and and so we want to take the penalty out of that like the penalty portion out of that and just give that advice out there um it is something there's a a grant program under fema called brick uh and and we have put together a small proposal for for brick under that we're We're hoping it gets funded. 1:45:41 The illegal construction from a regulatory standpoint, so my officers or my inspectors stopped a job on Tuesday of this week in Estate Nazareth. And a neighbor called yesterday and said, the contractor is out there again already. And so now it's twofold. One, first and foremost, it's on the owner to make sure that they are fully compliant. And then now the second one, and I think that for years they've believed that they were exempt from being held responsible, is the contractor. 1:47:30 Saying, yeah, no, you don't need nothing from DPNR, and they keep going. So our plan has in fact been now to levy penalties on the contract. And once you start to state that the contractor has been non-compliant, and I now share that information with DLCA, a DLCA says, well, do I have a show cause hearing on their business license application? Because you're required to be compliant with all of the laws of the Virgin Islands in order for you to maintain your business license in good standing. 1:48:12 So gone are the days where the contractor will feel like they're exempt from any of this because we're starting to implement penalties on the contractors. But there's just a significant amount of things taking place. So pause right there for one second. Going back to your original point that people are building homes without construction licenses. So in that case, who do you find? So for us, when people are coming to us to submit their applications, they may not have a developer yet. They may not have the contractor yet because they're still seeking bids based off of what the plans are. 1:48:48 And so those aren't listed. I know the goal in DLCA re-instituting the contractor's license was so that the public would know who is a licensed contractor in the territory, and that people are using the list from DLCA to select or to make their selections when they hire a contractor. For us, who you select, I mean, I can put, if I'm building a house that I'm the contractor, and that's legally allowed. And so, and I won't have a contractor's license, but it's for my residents, I'm allowed to do that. So it really is a fine line, but what the penalty ends up being is for the work that was done either unpermitted or improperly, nobody can escape from that. Perfect. So we're closing a loophole in that area. The gap really on the construction side is that the penalty cannot be assessed. 1:49:32 The penalty can't be assessed for work that's not done. It's assessed, you pay a penalty cost for failure to obtain a permit in that instance. And if one day we can have a discussion offline to see how we can fix the code to better assist you. Yes. because it does become a disaster right director actively williams you know having to beg and fight and plead for funding to fix um structures after the fact that weren't done correctly hence we have our envision program because it's interesting 1:50:39 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 14 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery to see how many homes that have ring beams and a code requires these things to be done and then when you see after the storm so we have a massive amount of homes that need to be repaired in our envision program because they weren't constructed properly so and I can't say that after the storms in 2017 when the FEMA when when the FEMA first the NCR team came in and they were working with our staff and they were doing the assessments across the territory they found that homes constructed following the issuance of the 1996 stronger home guide had actually withstood with the exception of some areas where you had those micro tornadoes that took down everything so the the that was one of the reasons why we were able to not increase the wind load speed on the roofs to what fema was proposing at 185 which requires you know thicker wood all of these things that would have been a higher cost for people because the cost of construction has to come into play when we decide all of those things i'm gonna be quiet now because the constructor the contractor next i'm going into his question so senator blight i'm sorry you may proceed thank you madam chair um commissioner um there are several moving parts in addition to what we're speaking today because um dp and i have their role to play and three the dp and i have the role to play the contractor and the homeowner um i know of several instances like the house in tutu where they are are one and they have actually built four units and dp are not doing trying to do their part they continue to do the job etc so i'm happy to hear what you're doing in terms of the contractor is themselves you know because who's to stop them even though you give them the fine they continue to build so there's several moving parts that we do need to change um amend the code and do some changes and i look forward to those um discussions in terms of um basically assuring that they do the right thing and not only that you have other instances where like my colleagues spoke to the ring beams some people do have the ring beans but at the same time they were not installed properly you don't say there's a lot of moving parts that we really need to um focus on because i know you had a 7.3 million dollar grant that allow you to hire 23 additional staff of those staff how many inspectors um have you onboarded uh i believe it's nine in the saint thomas district uh for inspectors there's eight in the saint croix district and is that sufficient in your opinion um i honestly i'd like to see a few more um i think the grant only permits us to to actually put on board one more my goal actually is now to put at least two full-time building inspectors in the district of saint john 1:52:34 because the there's a significant amount of of construction taking place in saint john significantly a lot and that's why i asked that question um i know them inspectors have the hands four uh in addition to that what what can be done in terms of um what did the structure of the process look like in respect to um illegal building etc what how does that process work and and how can we get it to work efficiently and effectively so so senator the the the you know for every every construction site receives two permits you receive either an earth change or a CZM permit and then you receive your building permit your earth change deals with just that the the odd change itself and then the building permit deals with the structural a lot of the repairs that we see also are just structural they don't have to have uh the or change or its wave because there's no like if you're building up a second story or something like that the way the code is written right now is that if i stop you for doing work that wasn't permitted When you now bring in the application to permit that work, you now pay a penalty on that. But up until you come in with that application, like if I issue a stop work order for you doing unpermitted work, there's no mechanism for me to assign a penalty for you to do that until you bring in that application. So, one of the things that we're stating is that there needs to be a penalty for violating the stop work order itself. And then that is where we know can do the per day fees and those types of things. So, now you're willingly and knowingly violating the law. We have provisions like that in our CZM, in our earth change, but not in the building itself. 1:54:25 um ccm is a you know it's it's it's two thousand dollars but for your first time and then if you knowingly willingly it goes up to 10 000 per day um but my air regulations is 50 000 per day so at some point too we want to touch on what's the actual number because some people do a cost benefit analysis for them and say yeah it's more it's easier for me to meet my deadline by breaking the law and that's a good point because i know in an early hearing my colleague spoke to some um owner in st john who had a significant amount of capacity and money they didn't care and continue to build so i think we need to also um make make provisions where those who continue to violate knowing they have the resources we need to talk them more than a common one who don't know better yeah we really do so um nonetheless let me actually um let me go to our next area in respect to uh the medic the mid-france and i know over the years you know um we have a mass thousand and thousands of historical and official documents that we know must be preserved two minutes both historical preservation and the continuity of government um and that's where you come in and we also have thousands and thousands of hours of critically important video footage from folks related to like the likes of bakery mighty park what the late wadably lewis in terms of our culture so when it comes to your department uh how are these historical and cultural artifacts being digitized in terms of our history and can we use medication funds 1:56:28 to assist us in an area? So we've tried to use the mitigation angle, particularly when we were dealing with the funding for Enid Bar that's coming to us from FEMA and a very small portion amount was set aside for digitization. How small? I wanna say $30,000. That's small. So the records that are in E-Nidba as an example, they actually went through a process 1:58:20 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 15 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery of being microfiche. And so at that time, you know, microficheing was still a fairly prominent type of measure to preserve your older documents and such. But what has happened is that due to the climate that we live in and those types of things, those microfiche actually suffer from iodine decay. And so we can't lose the records that we even microfiche because now we have to redo them and do full-on digitization. I mean, I think digitization is the step that is necessary for a big amount of funding. And there's no equipment to do that level here in the territory like that. So we're going to have to work, if I can just wrap up, I think we're just going to have to work with, continue to work with the Sisonian, continue to work with other schools that specialize in this. 1:59:08 But the records will have to be sent away. But our plan is to have higher staff specifically to get trained, know, and then purchase the equipment. And then in the future, we'll be able to digitize our own records as well. So let me just emphasize for the record that it's critically important that we do preserve our history and culture moving forward for those that are going to come in the future. And I believe that based on your statement, you know, we need to honestly find other ways, creative ways, because I like how creative you have been as far as some of your ideas, et cetera, when it comes to our history and culture, because that's critical in my opinion. $30,000, yeah, we have a long way to go. As you say, you need to train, et cetera. See it right now in the PRNR with those precious, you know, memories. I hope that we do not lose them. No way, shape, or form. Thank you so much, Madam Chair, for the time. 1:59:53 Thank you, Senator Blyden. I want to acknowledge the presence of Senator Whitaker. Good morning. Good morning. One minute, too. Good morning, Senator Joseph. Thank you so much, Madam Chair. In our first round of questioning, I ended, Commissioner, with commending you and your team for the number of projects that you have completed. Like I mentioned I noted it was about 12 projects that you've completed and two well actually five projects have not started now let's look at the ones that have not been started and I'm on your worksheet that you just spreadsheet that you submitted tell me what are the challenges you're facing in preventing you from starting the projects at the Sierra Eking airport, which is really with your vehicles that were damaged, as well as the contents of the offices. What is preventing you from starting to implement those projects? Sure. Thank you for the question, Senator. 2:01:03 So on the vehicles, one, some of those vehicles were so badly damaged that they were turned in and they were sold at auction. So based on their year, mileage, everything. And so now those funds have been provided to do repairs to those vehicles and they don't exist anymore. Six of those nine vehicles don't exist anymore. They've been sold at auction. So are you gonna use this money to augment any purchasing of any new vehicle? 2:02:22 So we requested that it was rejected. And so now what we have to do is we have to put together something called an alternative plan, and we're looking into that. There are a number of vehicles that did receive a little bit of damage, and what we're looking to do now is say, okay, can we increase, use those funds for those that don't exist anymore to increase the costs to make better improvements to the one that do? Like, and another issue I have in there that vendor availability is one of those things. So again, we're using FEMA funding, which means that you have to have specific criteria for eligibility as a vendor, particularly your SAM and your SAM registration. 2:02:54 And DUNS number. I've been to a number of body men all over the territory and nobody have a DUNS number. So, but I'm offering. To assist them. I'm offering $60,000 of work. So for me, I would sign up. We make it easy. And getting a SAMS number and DUNS is not a very difficult endeavor, if you know how. Correct. 2:03:42 And so that may be somewhere you could assist them. I don't know if there's any local or private entity that does it. But I do know that there usually are private entities externally, outside, who would do that work for, of course. a cost so it's whether they see it's feasible or not to actually go through that process i want to look at uh one of the other items because i only have four minutes i have a whole bunch of questions here but let's talk about your permanent home that you're looking at in subways where are you with that what funding source are you going to use to demolish the existing structure and everything so So right now, the interior demo is, I think, 50 or 55%, actually, the demo portion is 100% completed, and we are now dealing with the remediation, the removal of the mastic material in there. All of that was a set-aside from FY20 budget that the 33rd legislature appropriated for us and allowed us to use the funds until expended. we have an additional million dollars um in a grant from the national park service for the rehabilitation because the sub-base barracks is a historic building and so for us to put that back uh into use um it it also promotes the the old building itself so that's for the construction piece um in terms of outfitting the um so the the the the not started project that you see for approximately four hundred thousand dollars in for syria lee king yes so that's all contents 2:04:10 that's the loss of desks everything the reasons why it's not started is because we don't have anywhere to move those things too that's why i was wondering about the permanent home because I'm suspecting that that's all part of your faith to relocate into that permanent home once you have completed this project. What is your timeline to complete your 2:06:03 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 16 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery relocation to your permanent home in Subbase? October 2023. Okay, October 2023. How much funding do you still have from the fiscal year 2020 appropriation available? I believe· Because this is because your facility at the Serial Eking Airport was severely damaged. Correct. And so now you have to relocate to someplace else. Correct. Okay. So how much do you have of that money available now? I believe it's a little over $300,000. $300,000. Okay. Now, let's go to your testimony. I just have a few questions, and I had stopped on page five of your testimony. I'm still on page five. Your territorial watershed plans, you have an amount of $800,000 there. Kindly indicate to us how many watersheds you have. You said eight watersheds. How many watersheds? Is it like $1,000, $100,000 per watershed you look at budgeting? And name those watersheds for us. 2:06:30 I don't know all of them off the top of my head. I know in St. Thomas, we have three. I know Bordeaux is one of them. The area- Is Mid Bay one of them? Mid Bay was done prior to. Okay. So that plan was finished a few years ago. Okay. I believe the content including going all the way up to the hill. Well, would it be possible through the chair that you supply us with the name of the eight watersheds you have identified and where we are as far as the project is concerned. You indicated that the project is near completion with the first eight watershed plans to be released in July. So it would be good for us to at least have an idea about these watersheds. Watersheds are very important because they look at the runoff and all of those things and also the floodplain area. So everything is really tied into each other. So thank you so much Madam Chair for the leeway. 2:07:31 So you're asking through the chair you wanted the list of watersheds. Yes. Commissioner on your upper funds. i didn't see any um where are we division of libraries archives and museums you have 223 68 223 068 dollars look allocated for um to prevent prepare for and respond to coronavirus including to expand digital network access purchase internet accessible devices and provide technical support services nothing has been expended under that category why and you're the end of the fiscal year this year is actually when it ends yes uh so senator what what we really want to do with that money is purchase a number of e-readers and tablets and basically give them away for people to have access to the online library that we purchased our goal was really to fulfill that order using a local vendor and the volume is has been the issue so initially when we started reaching out vendors are saying you know we won't be able to fulfill that order at that volume right now you know delayed And so we recently now have gotten more contacts that says, okay, things have changed a little bit and we'll be able to fulfill that order. It will, in fact, be in stages. So now we didn't want to put out a public bid and then nobody was able to fulfill the order or bid on it. And so now that we've gotten some confirmation that the order can, in fact, be fulfilled on that volume scale, we're going to put out the public bid and then have them bid on it. Did you run the numbers? How many per district? So our goal, we know we can't supply, our goal is really to release at least 3,000 units. Per district? Not per district. 2:08:41 So we're looking at the Amazon Fire tablets, for example. Individually, they run at about 125 each unit. we can get it down to around $100 per unit so with the money that we have right now it can all we can really only buy about 2,000 maybe 200 up 2,000 2300 we have spoken with the governor the governor likes our idea he wants to support it and so we're trying to get that number up to 3,000 and then so we can do 500 in st. John and then we can do 1250 in the other districts if we can get more money then we can add on to that contract as well and what is your data collection look like because sometimes you like to break that break things down evenly in districts and we don't really get to the areas that have the most need because you just want cut the pie in half yeah so you do have a a strong Hispanic underserved community on St. John. You have them in enclaves in this district, and you have them in enclaves on St. Croix. 2:10:54 So my hope is that you use the data maybe through education to find those areas where the greatest need are and don't just cut the pie in half. Right. And our goal really is to also promote this using sign up for library cards. Oh, OK. So you have a plan? Yeah, so the idea is that because we have purchased the online library subscription through a company called Hoopla, now when we promote Hoopla, we also are giving people devices to be able to access. And then the sign up of your library card also then gives you the device. 2:12:05 And that's the goal is how we wanna execute that. Okay, and the last point before we move to the senators that came would be, let's go back to these bats, moving them to Frederickstead. You have over a million bats in the Brugal distillery. I wouldn't say we have a million. You have a lot of bats, but if you, so Frederickstead already have the wins from the refinery. We know that we are struggling to restore Frederickstead and really bring it back to its glory, because it was once the breadwinner of the territory. And I don't want us to just, this bat, do you intend to hire somebody to help you with the bat relocation? 2:12:44 Because I don't want the whole of Frederick State to look dark and gloomy. I think we're definitely going to take a look at it. I know one of the things that we did last year was we constructed several small areas for bat habitats. Do you intend to hire a trained bat expert to help you with this process? I'd have to check with our staff, Senator. I mean, we have three or four PhDs in wildlife biology on our team right now. And some of them are carpetologists, they focus on reptiles and 2:13:32 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 17 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery such. But I do know that, again, our goal is to create, if we have to create artificial habitats for them to move to just like, because that's what Brugal is. It's an artificial habitat. It's just a structure they took up residence in. We don't want to scatter them all over so that they then crawl in other people's crawl spaces, hide in their roofs and all of those things. No, we want to put things that they'll be attracted to. you know, those things are usually collected in trees and stuff. Because they did take up residence in the distillery, and there are so many abandoned buildings and areas of Frederick Stead where they can take up space, and I don't want that to be the next issue Frederick Stead has to face where, okay, we want to fix this building, we got a bat in this one, we got a bat in this one, we have a bat colony over here, you know? Yeah, no, I mean, that Brugav facility is perfect for them for, you know, it's big, it's dark, and there's not a lot of exterior noises disturbing them. 2:14:37 And those are the types of things. I don't foresee them, like, say, going into the town of Frederickstead and just taking up residence there. I think there's too much ambient noise that takes place that they wouldn't want to be there. And again, I'm not a bat expert, but our goal is to create these little habitats where they can go and find them, and they'll be in the fruit trees, they'll be in similar natural spaces. But if, in fact, it gets to the point where we have to remove them, then we're going to work with who is necessary to remove them properly. We don't want to see a decrease in the bat population. and we know how vital they are in terms of seed distribution and all of those things. Okay, good, perfect. Senator Whitaker, please mark Senator Cariunga as present, and I will give you 10 minutes to ask your questions. 2:15:16 Senator Whitaker? Thank you, and good morning, good afternoon, rather, to Chairwoman, good afternoon, colleagues, good afternoon to the central staff, to the listening and viewing audience, and to our testifiers. I just want to first start off, I want to also echo, I do want to really openly say that definitely communication between your office and I'm Commissioner Oroville is good. One of the things that I engage you over was the audit that brought up in a 2017 audit that really shined a light on a lot of our areas, just and really the forward movement. I do want to say that one of the have to do for the first to do oversight and have transparency is that there has to be a record full of information. So even as you sent me, you said, okay, I sent her the consent address and we address these different areas. Is this supposed to be some updates with this body? 2:16:13 Well, hold a second, hold a second, Senator Whitaker? We hope to have a date. Senator Whitaker, Senator Whitaker? I want to focus in on the historic area. I was forced late to this hearing because the Housing Authority is engaged in the restoration of the town, not just the town, the area of Frederickstead, and we know one of the areas, of course, as even I've heard other colleagues speak about, the concerns of restoration. For the VIA historic recovery programs you outlined in your testimony, page two, a number of applications were ineligible, right? And with that, do you have any plans for those individuals who applied, for those who are not eligible? 2:17:13 Is there any plans to reach back out to them and see how you can, I'm assuming, who's all the applicants at minimum at historic properties? And one of the things I also wanna also ask you is what kind of interagency collaboration are you engaged in? Is the PNR really engaged with all of the stakeholders in the town on, you know, nonprofit, how are you engaging to assist them in that regard? There's a lot of questions in there. I'll try and go through them systematically. How are you going to reach back out to those 128 people who are not eligible? And how can DPNR, as we not only just dole out funds to individuals, but how can we help them with their projects and the ones who we were not able to help, how do we reach out to them? That includes a lot of the nonprofits and organizations dedicated to a lot of recovery work. 2:17:55 a work preservation so thank you for that question senator um in in terms of how do we help them our goal is to to create more programs that will see the restoration of the buildings uh down there we know that those a lot of the historic towns the buildings themselves have fallen into disrepair by neglect because there's a myriad of issues that are going on with them and and we We want to create a program that can grant some funding in there to restore the building. And if it's through a third party developer that the third party is able to recoup an investment. 2:18:48 But at the same time the family retains title and it retains and it gets some interest during that recoup period as well. We've seen this done in a couple other historic districts. And it's really about creating the mechanism legally for a third party to become involved in that. We also spend time, you know, our department with the EDA and talk about the tax credit benefits, the enterprise zone. of our historic districts fall into these multiple um districts where they're all applicable for these different types of things to take play or different types of tax incentive pride programs that can benefit them and i think that the eda has really pushed and they've had us included for the last several years when they go out and they're pushing the enterprise zone discussions and telling people about the benefits and where they need but if they don't have that minimum investment to put in on the front end then some of them feel like okay well i can't move forward and they and that's where we're trying to lower whatever that front end investment is um i i can't say with respect to the historic recovery program one of the things that happened um during this and And I certainly was not a big fan of it, but it's an award condition, is that the program itself is a reimbursement program primarily. 2:19:27 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 18 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery And so our historic areas are people who really do not have the funding to be able to take on a $50,000, $60,000, $70,000 to $100,000 project on their own. and so and they and they avoid bank financing and those types of things so what we are doing is we're working with nonprofit groups to be able to give the nonprofit group a set-aside like a million dollars to be able to then work with a number of applicants they can provide that upfront funding provide the receipts and then we qualify what the program requirements are in terms of reimbursement we're also partnering with the EDA because through their enterprise zone they have a master contractor and for repairs to non-structural things and so this is a great way for us to keep costs down that you can utilize the master contractor who has provided unit pricing to the EDA and he can fix historic shutters he can fix the scones and the windows he can pull some electrical and do those things the only thing that's not in his contract we're trying to work out what some of those details are so um it is a commission commissioner and I'm sorry I don't want to cut you off but I want to thank you for your responses but I just want to dive in on that point we the reimbursement programs and I'm glad you're moving in that direction because they're not gonna work so I'm glad you're moving that direction so when you're saying you're to be able to you're looking into providing them upfront funding that's something you've budgeted for are you able to use um any of the are you able to use any of the disaster recovery funds um for this in order to assist them or um and through the budget process are you going to be looking for funding in order to have these um projects funded we the eda has long advocated um and then also add that in the current current law number of the non-profits chart small businesses won't be able who get EDC benefits because it's spending from that. That's why I'm legislating to remove that. 2:21:08 And so I'm getting that from, I think, to drive home what you're saying is that the cost, that's something budgeted to the finance committee, the budget process. Yes, Senator. So of our, I believe we're gonna put like $5.9 million out from our historic recovery program for repairs. I believe that we're going to be somewhere around 4 million is going to go into the hands of a non-profit group or other entity that is going to be able to serve as the fiduciary while those repairs are taking place, and then once they collect the receipts from the contractor, then they provide that back, and then the department then replenishes that. So the reason why it's around $4 million is then, you know, we have 18 applications or 20 applications that are already currently just reimbursement, and I believe that about those, I believe 18 of them is actually qualified, so we won't need to give the money for the direct reimbursements to a nonprofit to serve as a fiduciary in that role. 2:23:16 Of course, as you know, I've been communicating with you over the docs, particularly, of course, as we know, we've heard a number of times in the Ponchi doc, their docs. Where are we, particularly with the tournament Ponchi's doc, the Callow's Bay Area, where are we with the doc? So we submitted, we actually went out and got estimates for the repairs. last year and all of the repair costs were over one over 50,000 so we had to release it for public bid we did actually send the scope of work the detailed scope of work to the Department of Property and Procurement and I'm just checking their website right now but if it is if the Gallows Bay dock is still still out for bid, it's not going to have much time remaining on it. Thank you very much, Commissioner, on that. 2:24:33 And then I also want to say that a lot of the fishermen that I · fishermen, the individuals that I engage with, a lot of them · I mean, I know some did receive funds, but a lot of them · there are others who didn't. Are there any plans to further · even on the mitigation side? Or is there any plans to have another program where you can help support the farmers through any grant funding from fishermen any grant funding so senator we're almost I mean the the spend plans went in right now our cares Act is going to be the next round our cares one and two will be the next round of stimulus payments the application period is currently open and just yesterday we madam chair if I may just conclude um we extended the application period now from june 19th to july 1. um once once the execution of this cares act program as well as phase three of the disaster recovery fisheries disaster recovery program are it we will have x we will have uh we will have executed all of the direct dispermit disbursement programs that we have for fisher Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. 2:25:39 Your answers. Thank you. Senator Carrion. Good. Good afternoon to my colleagues. Good afternoon to the people of Virgin Islands and to the testifiers. Good afternoon to you, Commissioner. Before I begin, I would like to express my condolences to Dostoto Gutierrez. family uh today was the funeral of amanda reina who died uh last week at a hundred and a hundred years old with a few months so i've known her all my life and um yes one express my condol to the family also to the family uh for the passing of a mother and the rest of the family on the passing of their loved ones, and also the sad news of the passing of Mr. Dyer. It's been rough. 2:26:55 Sometimes you have all these funerals that just pile up, so we'll keep them in our prayers. Good afternoon, Commissioner. Good afternoon, sir. I have a few questions, let me first start by asking you, do we have any of our federal fund projects in jeopardy of losing to come to timelines, anyone in particular you're concerned about? Like of my disaster recovery funding? Yes, sir. 2:28:07 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 19 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery No, Senator. We're aware of all the timelines and where the eligibility lies for any extensions that we may need. So you have submitted extensions for any of the current projects? I believe our CARES Act 1 extension for the fisheries grant is currently under review. We had an on-site visit from NOAA in the first week of May where we discussed that. you're hopeful you're hopeful of that will be extended uh yes um they were very pleased with the layout of the program the partnership with the eda um they they actually had a chance to see the portal they had the chance to see some of the media since it had been released the week that they were there uh so they were very pleased and know that we're making progress and and um we're we're not we're not we're it was a precautionary move to ask for the extension i don't think it was uh fully necessary unless we know have to modify the spend plan and in some of the parameters for eligibility and if if the extension is approved which we are hopeful that it is what would that extension look like will be up to when uh i um i believe we talked about december um like we can't can't we're not gonna get any new people to come in like there's a fixed amount of people that can actually apply we're just trying to make sure that the persons that we want to distribute the funding to if we modify the eligibility requirements that it gives them time now to do the paperwork and get those together in order to apply but it'll be pretty much the the same process with the portal though that's you and commissioner uh with regards in that same line so what percentage of that population uh uh do you understand that is still missing from applying or being eligible i'd say 99.9 percent we only have five applications in right 2:28:44 now and that's both from the recreational charter community as well as the commercial fisher community And regards to marketing, do you feel comfortable with the work the department is doing in marketing and getting information out? I do. You can't turn on YouTube without getting a pop-up. They're print media, we're on the radio stations, we're broadcasting in English and Spanish. Every source of media, the EDA I think has done a wonderful job in pushing that. And then we are also holding our fisher registration meetings next week with the commercial fishers and then we're setting aside time to discuss the program as well during that pre-registration workshop. I would suggest for you to reach out also to the Spanish station Latino 91.9 FM with Jose Martinez Sr. I haven't heard an ad there or if you could send someone from your department to speak on the program. So Juan Cruz and Alfonso Garcia of my staff were on there this morning. Five minutes. I'm glad to hear that then. 2:30:55 Cause there's two. So there's another one that sometimes people confuse one with the other. Okay. There's one that reaches a larger Hispanic populations. And that's the one where I haven't heard it on. But also with regards to that, let me ask you is, Have you received additional funding to provide technical assistance? Do you think that's part of the problem is the application process? I mean, in our administrative costs, we actually cover the assistance for the Fishers in terms of having the applications for that. 2:32:10 We will provide direct assistance for them. No, I think that the issue really, Senator, being plain about it is its eligibility. This is a stimulus program and you have to be compliant with federal, you have to be in compliance with government guidelines for a stimulus program and how we state what compliance is, is your filing of taxes. Being tax exempt doesn't mean you don't file taxes. It's everybody, every working individual's requirement to file if you gain income. The problem that we have is that if the income tax return is the primary method of determining eligibility and you have a large sector that does not file their returns, then you have a lower number of eligible applicants. So as I said, that's a staple of the federal government in these stimulus programs. I think during the stimulus payments, you saw a lot of people who are going out and filing returns with IRB at zero just to get their payments in. 2:32:45 So, but what we're trying to do is work with our federal partners and create some alternative avenues for justification. And if we're allowed to implement that, you know, it's gonna be a good discussion between them. But I mean, you know, like I said, federal government determines compliance with have you paid your taxes if not how do you expect the federal government to give you money if you don't pay your taxes you explore the idea of maybe partnering with sba or irb or other entities to really provide that type of support or outreach educational outreach to the fishermen and those in this business of the importance of doing business right yes so we're partnered with the EDA for this program the EDA has the farmers and fishers programs where they have gone and try to give information on having yours you know your sole proprietorship as a business and expanding upon that these are and and you know the EDA has done that they've actually had prior to the pandemic we were in person meeting with farmers and fishers and and speaking about the different programs and and assistance that's there to us to have your your sole proprietorship grown as a business uh they did a few programs uh during the pandemic on you know not not as i mean to continue to foster that um so i believe we have the right partner um they've been they've been 2:34:01 actively going to push the development of our farming and fishing industry as a larger sector of our economic growth uh that's particularly highlighted in the vision 2040 as well and and so um you know we've they've been doing a lot of outreach and and people just they i think if everybody really gravitates to what the programs that they're pushing and how they're telling folks to come along we can see some growth in in the economic sector under those two some good news 2:35:52 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 20 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery i'm glad to hear that effort that your department along with eda are doing to empower and assist uh this sector in our community which is so crucial that you mentioned in regards to the um virginia historical recovery program i know that you know i have some of the same concerns you realize that you had that were uh uh you have phase two providing technical support what can you maybe share what's the reasons that that the application, the applicants that be eligible. So I think that the primary, the two primary eligibility questions, maybe one is duplication of benefits, Senator. Like if you received any insurance payout or you covered, you can't come to this program and get a second payment for that. So that probably, well, that rendered some folks ineligible. The other part is you had to be actively, the structure had to be active. It had to either be living in it, it could have been a business, but something that supports there was some activity that were going on inside the structure prior to, and not just it was an abandoned structure, and then now, oh, I have an opportunity to get 200,000, I can go, it had to be an active structure in 2017 at the time of the storm. And then I think the last thing, which is when you're not in the historic district itself, you have to be contributing to the national historic site. And that's a little bit more complicated without being, you know, declared a site to be contributing to that. So I think those three kind of factors are what whittled down the number of the applications that were deemed eligible for us. I'm sure if I may, the last one. Go ahead. Appreciate you. Thank you. 2:37:10 Commissioner, I do have a concern in regards to our Fort Christian and Fort Frederick. Is there a plan to revitalize our Fort? And with that, I know there's the repair portion, restoration portion, but I'm talking about a marketing plan is a partnership with tourism, because we are rich in history and culture and we have the two forts, and I think they're not being used to their full potential. So what is the plan in that regard for our fort? Thank you for the question, Senator. So earlier I mentioned that DPNR is actually a subaward recipient of some U.S. EDA funding that was provided to our Department of Tourism around $500,000. 2:38:30 So our plan for that is to hire a company that specializes in the display of forts or museums. We're going to do a conceptual plan for exhibit development, have ideas for work directly with staff in terms of presenting through an audio visual an audio visual scenario and then we do a build-out we did the same thing for the visitor center at the East End Marine Park we started with a conceptual plan with what the different exhibits would look like we we then broke the cost of everything down into three phases we've paid for two out of three phases so we're looking to do something similar with both forts to get some design assistance put the conceptual plan together get some costs on there and then hire the company to do the professional audio and visual exhibits you know my my goal is that if you pick up a headset as you walk through the different exhibits you're able to do a self-guided tour when you walk through the forts looking forward to it Commissioner thank you madam chair thank you colleagues we had two rounds um do you have any burning questions before we conclude today's hearing i'll go from top to bottom senator johnson anything burning you're good senator blighton thank you thank you madam chair um commissioner let me ask um in respect to the community cleanup events i know you say i have 55k left um to distribute and most of it is going to be um 2:39:22 done during course week in september um the removal of uh derelict vessels at from bay the barge i said what would that mean in terms of um one that's done what does that mean for that area for folks coming so with boats so it it's kind of uh it's going to be a blessing and of course talk to me so the blessing will be that this blight on the south side of saint thomas will be removed after about 25 years now going on 30 actually um but what the department has experienced is every time we open up a space in the water removing a derelict vessel or some other obstruction somebody just moves right in with their vessel thinking that yeah okay it's It's now an open space and it's a free parking lot. So we struggle with that every time we move something in the water and then the public just comes in like, okay, something is here. So what can we do to prevent that moving forward? 2:41:20 I honestly don't know. For Crumb Bay, we, DPNR Property and Procurement, we've been in very close discussions about what we want to see for that area of Crumbay. Our goal is to, because right now all of the hillside is zone P public. What we would like to do is zone it W2, which is waterfront industrial, where we could have more of the repairs for vessels, those types of things. And then long term, big aspiration is for us to drive some sheet piles, backfill and create an extended bulkhead. And then now you can facilitate your marine repairs in an area that's designated for marine repairs. Crombay is not going to be a place where we're tossing a hand line in and looking to pull anything out just from the water quality itself. Nobody really wants to be down there. 2:42:25 So it's been used as an industrial area for decades. It's where the power plant is. Let's focus it on marine industrial. And then that way, we can have the recreational things going on in the Red Hook area. And then we pull the marine industrial down to the Crumbay area. Sounds like a plan. Cece, you just came up with another out-of-the-box idea, and it makes sense. And I look forward, again, to speaking with you on that. I see they come to fruition. Thank you so much Madam Chair for the time and thank you for your responses. You're welcome, Saida Joseph. 2:43:31 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 21 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery Thank you so much Madam Chair. I do have some final questions because I was hitting previously on those projects that you haven't started and I wanted to ask you about the St. John, your offices in St. John. How are we looking with that? Because I know you have two projects there and tell us what's your... What's your challenge? Because I know you're itching to start, but something is preventing you from getting that moving. Yeah, it's to finalize the cost estimate, Senator. Again, we have some numbers, and those numbers are from January, February 2020. 2:44:05 So we're not trying to use those at all. Public Works is assisting us in updating those numbers. And what is your timeframe to get those numbers? because we don't want to leave St. John behind. Tell us what your time frame is looking like. My time frame was yesterday. What's your partner agency's time frame looking like realistically? We're hoping that within 10 days or so we can finalize and then our goal is to have the project out for bid in July. 2:44:48 In July. Okay. Thank you so much, Madam Chair. That concludes my questions. Senator Carrion you're good. Yes. Okay. Okay so we're going to wrap up. 2:45:23 But quickly I probably missed this discussion on my sidebars. Let's go to the Division of Fish and Wildlife for your CARES Act projects. The 2.7 remaining to be spent by August 31st. Did we discuss that today? So, yes, we have. So, Senator Carrion asked about the period of performance. So, right now, the actual spend plan, CARES 1 and CARES 2 is running simultaneously right now. and so the this the the project itself will run in terms of the matter of weeks and then be divided up by the number of applicants the extension requests allows us to augment how we do eligibility criteria if they are if if we can get that confirmed from the the noah directly um and so we'll take advantage of a longer application period if we have to if we're eligible to switch the how the eligibility documentation is submitted um if we're not it it's not going to make a difference in terms of extending one month three months four months um you have to have you have to have the certain documentation in order to determine your qualifications so perfect and and you're seeing a struggle with documentation in this area yes so if we're seeing a struggling documentation in this area what's the um plan education outreach moving forward to get our fishermen commercial and recreational into So thank you for that question, Senator, because it's been a topic for the last week. I mean, one of the discussions is to go back to where we were, I guess, 10 or 15 years ago, where in order to obtain your fishing license renewal, as well as your business license from 2:45:52 dlca um you had to have your evidence of uh i believe it's a schedule c or something like that that's that's been filed um you know i i think that i think that we want to make sure that people are eligible like if you have a business then i think that you uh even if it's a sole proprietorship Like you have an obligation to be consistent with the laws of the Virgin Islands if you're running a business. And then it particularly if you're asking for assistance financial assistance from the government to be there. So the idea the goal actually and I spoke with Commissioner Evangelista yesterday I spoke with director Lee yesterday they are all on board. But presenting at our pre registration workshops in advance of the registration period. I don't think we're gonna mandate anything for this year, but we really need to start to have the discussion on people being properly licensed, properly filing their taxes so that they aren't deemed ineligible. 2:48:00 We are making a lot of strides and putting a lot of effort into creating an alternate scenario in order to determine eligibility to accommodate, but we're still at the hands of NOAA. the remaining $2.7 million, do you see some of that going back, given the current climate? I think if we do not get to augment the eligibility on taxes being your way of demonstrating your loss of income, then yes, some of it will go back. Even on the business sector, for example, what they've demonstrated is that you have demonstrate a loss in specific months but their taxes reflect the entire year so they probably they did very well in november december but from march to june they were completely shut down so now we have to get other eligible documents that support the overall income from a monthly breakdown as well so your point of information santa blatant thank you thank you madam chair and And Commissioner, you're on point in terms of your focus with licensing, because I know earlier you spoke to the billing process, and you spoke about a contractor, but there are many skilled individuals who are experts in just tiling, or plumbing, or roofing, et cetera. And as you said, yeah, the homeowner have a right now to actually repair their home without going to a general contractor. But the key is licensing. Make sure they have their license for that trade or that skill set. So I just wanted to put on a record. I think that's very important to know. Thank you, Madam Chair. 2:49:13 Thank you for that. So we've concluded today. I think we've been able to really drill down into one agency and not pack the agenda where we're rushing through. And I'm not allowing time to probe. So I think we had a good day today. and I'll allow Director Williams-Octeline some time to give closer remarks. Thank you again, Madam Chair, for another well-structured and solid discussion on the recovery efforts. And I want to ensure that there's a number of challenges that we are facing regarding costs, regarding the requirements for prepping, the rising, the isolation of our bids that we're seeing, bid costs and the availability of the impact impacting our project schedules. We wanted to thank the Department of Planning and Natural Resources for their partnership and the work they're doing to ensure that all of these permits are received within a timely manner. 2:50:59 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 22 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery It's the federal consistency process done for all of the projects that actually turn dirt. So you can imagine that there's a lot of work that's going on. And I also want to just also take an opportunity to thank my team, the Office of Disaster Recovery, all of them who work hard day in day and make sure that we are keeping the recovery moving. and to this body again for the strong partnership that we're receiving because you know my my grandmother used to say the office is plenty but the workers are few and we it really takes all hands on deck to really keep this movement. 2:52:14 So thank you all again. Thank you director. Commissioner. Thank you senator. I'll start by just thanking my staff. i mean um in addition to all of the disaster recovery projects that we are outlining here again 70 of the department's funding is federal funds and grants and so they're co-managing all of those awards and tasks and i think they're doing an incredible job and making sure that tasks are being executed and we do not send back any funds at all um i think that the The level, the effort that is being placed, particularly on the regulatory divisions that have to do all of these NEPA checks for every single project in the territory. 2:52:57 You know, I think our projects listing on the ODR website is some 77 pages long, and my staff has to touch each and every single one of them for every single department. And I thank them for all of their efforts in creating, coming up with some of the processes and executing those things. And, you know, they're losing sleep. And I'm trying to get them additional assistance because I know some days we feel like if one person leaves, then we're in a whole lot of trouble. And we would be. I want to thank all the different departments for their partnership as well, including ODR keeping everybody on task and and creating the space for us to be able to work out what could be an issue and then we resolve those things in a timely manner and again to all the employees that are day in and day out just doing their job in order to make sure that St. Thomas, St. John, Water Island and St. Croix are the best places on earth so thank you all very much for today in the discussion thank you commissioner director we've received several calls from the public and you have a historic recovery program is that okay so we've received a few calls commending not to admonish the hold on coming to you center Johnson the state the historic recovery program and miss black it for the work that she's doing and the state preservation office as well so i think it's only fair that i give commendations to their work because the public is noticing what they're doing senator johnson points of personal privilege thank you very much madam chair i would like to utilize this time of personal privilege to 2:53:52 So extend a happy, happy, happy birthday to Mr. Abraham Hewitt, who made a hundred today. And I asked him to post one of the pictures. He served in the military and the Navy. Today is his hundredth year. I met Mr. Abraham some time back. He's the uncle of Falk Governor Mack. But I can remember two years ago going up by his own Sal Amo. And when I started Sal Amo, I asked Uncle Abe, who drives Sal Amo? he tell me he drives the lamo so at 98 he was still caught in his yard but at 100 i can say to you that he is still driving around doing everything for himself going to the store to the grocery doing everything for himself and you know god have really blessed that he would climb up in rattan with um 100 years of uncle if we have one more picture with uncle abe that i would like to share they had a little party for him all last week that hat that he has on his nephew gave him that and when he saw that hat he was so shocked he was so happy because he had lost his last military hat in one of the storms but they gave him a replica of a ship i can't tell you the name of the ship right now but it's one of the ships that was born from harbor when he saw that ship his mind is so soon he explained to us when that ship was bought by the kamikaze and it made it back to america and went back to war and he served on that ship when he went back to war he is very soft in his mind memories of his time in the military when he served and he was explaining all of that without missing a beat so i want to wish uncle a happy happy centennial birthday and all the best i hope i sure can reach that age and do it 2:55:51 thank you very much madam chief thank you and happy birthday to uncle abe um those are national treasures to live to see 100 years old i had a deal with my grandfather that will go to 100 but he went to 98 instead so i mean it's just commendable to see um when our our seniors reach that age, and just the wealth of knowledge that they possess, they just walk in history books that must be cherished. So happy birthday to Mr. Abraham Hewitt. And as we conclude today, we want to offer condolences to Commissioner Anthony Thomas and the person of his father. That funeral is tomorrow, and condolences to one of our own stenographer, Ms. Trish Celie Trisha Celie and a person of her mom who's also the sister of Celestina White former Senator White and that funeral is tomorrow as well so what we're seeing also is a change in of the guards in our territory and it's incumbent upon us to take up the mantle and continue serving so we want to sincerely offer our condolences we're in hurricane season it has begun so I want to urge the public to prepare and prepare properly and not at the 11th hour because I believe that we will have a good season of nothing but if we do have something let's let's be able to withstand that I want to thank central staff today especially our media division they do our yeoman's task they are our unsung heroes that we batter so much but we want to publicly thank them for the work that they do because everything that's happening here begins with our media division. Thank you to our stenographers as well 2:57:43 Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 23 of 24 Legislature USVI · | Committee on Disaster Recovery who battled between trying to understand what we're saying, talking and everything else. So thank you to our stenographers and thank you to all who have made it possible. Thank you to my colleagues as well for attending today. and lastly if I may end on a quote and it says it takes no compromise to give people their rights it takes no money to respect the individual it takes no political deal to give people freedom it takes no survey to remove repression and to be yourself is truly a revolutionary act So to all of my LGBTQ people, happy Pride Month, and the Committee on Disaster Recovery and Infrastructure is hereby adjourned. 2:59:39 Thank you. We'll be right back. You 3:00:49 People named in this transcript SUSPECTED, and a finding aid only. Names were matched by machine against the spellings used across all 426 of our transcripts, and the title is the one used in the room. Being named here is NOT evidence that a person attended or spoke · only that the name was said. Speech recognition mishears names, so a spelling may be wrong even where no alternative is offered. 7x Senator Genevieve R. Whitaker heard in this transcript as: Whitaker 4x Senator Samuel Carrion heard in this transcript as: Carrion 3x Senator Carla Joseph the surname alone also matches: Clifford Joseph; Karla J. Joseph heard in this transcript as: Joseph 2x Senator Franklin D. Johnson heard in this transcript as: Johnson 2x Commissioner Jean-Pierre Oriel heard in this transcript as: Oriol 2x Senator Marvin A. Blighton heard in this transcript as: Blighton 2x Senator Marvin Blyden heard in this transcript as: Blyden 2x Senator Myron Jackson heard in this transcript as: Jackson 2x Senator Novelle Francis heard in this transcript as: Francis 1x Senator Athneil 'Bobby' Thomas heard in this transcript as: Anthony Thomas Machine transcript · UNVERIFIED. Verify every quotation against the recording. Speakers are not identified. VI Update · usvipublicrecords.com · public record, no rights asserted (CC0 1.0) 24 of 24