Kathy Beyer, senior vice president at Evernorth, told the House committee on dental and housing on Jan. 13 that the housing nonprofit network is seeking $45,000,000 in new state investment for the 2027 budget and urged lawmakers to act to preserve recent progress on housing production.

Beyer said Evernorth has raised more than $1,600,000,000 in private equity over a 35‑year history to finance affordable housing in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, and that the organization celebrated five ribbon cuttings in 2025 that opened nearly 250 permanently affordable homes in partnership with groups such as Champlain Housing Trust and Downstreet.

The request for $45 million, Beyer said, is an advocacy priority of the state’s housing nonprofit network and is not currently included in the governor’s budget. “It comes from the housing nonprofit network around the state,” she said when asked whether the funding was in the governor’s proposal.

On construction costs, Beyer argued that policymakers should compare projects by cost per square foot (or cost per bedroom) rather than cost per unit because family-sized two‑ and three‑bedroom apartments increase square footage and therefore raise per‑unit figures even when square‑foot costs are lower. She gave an example where one 30‑unit building showed a construction cost around $287,000 per unit and contrasted a smaller building footprint (about 21,000 square feet) with a larger family‑unit building of roughly 33,000 square feet to illustrate the differences in math.

Beyer also urged the committee to support retaining the 2020 statewide energy code rather than moving immediately to the 2024 code, saying the newer code needed a fuller cost‑benefit analysis and that, as written, the 2024 changes “definitely was going to cost our housing more money.”

A central warning from Beyer concerned the federal Build America, Buy America (BABA) requirements. She said BABA was meant to bolster domestic manufacturing for infrastructure, but that after federal legislation redefined housing as infrastructure, the requirement now applies to some affordable housing projects using federal funds, creating procurement challenges. “In one building, we couldn't find doorstops. None of them are made in the United States,” she said, and added that she could not find domestically made BABA‑compliant heat pumps or elevators in some cases. Beyer asked the committee to consider sending a letter to Vermont’s congressional delegation seeking targeted language so BABA would apply to traditional infrastructure projects but not to affordable housing in a way that halts construction or inflates costs.

Beyer offered a set of operational and regulatory suggestions: revisiting how soil standards are adopted in the Brownfields program (she recommended a multidisciplinary panel rather than a single decisionmaker at the Department of Health), encouraging regional planning commissions to help 'coach' Development Review Board chairs during contentious local permitting hearings, and reviewing appeals procedures to reduce multi-stage appeals that can prolong project timelines. On appeals, Beyer said developers often sequence local permit and Act 250 filings to balance risk and cost and that experience on long projects has shown no single approach is guaranteed to speed outcomes.

Committee members asked for clarifications on funding sources; Beyer said the ribbon‑cutting projects she cited relied on the federal Low‑Income Housing Tax Credit and that BHIP/VHIP are more targeted to smaller renovation projects. When asked whether she could provide draft legislative language or a proposed letter on the BABA issue, she said she had draft language and could provide it to the committee.

The committee thanked Beyer for her testimony; no formal votes or bills were taken during the session. The committee paused for a brief break and then reviewed its practice for bill introductions and next steps for referrals to committee staff and legislative counsel.