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Senate committee hears H.935; sponsors say bill changes allowed uses of earlier public-safety funds while several House appropriations were cut
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Summary
Lawmakers and witnesses described H.935 as a technical, program-focused emergency-management bill that would repurpose previously appropriated public-safety communications funds and contains language for new programs; several appropriations (including a Ready Response food-and-water grant) were removed from the Senate budget and will be negotiated with the House.
The Senate Committee on Government Operations took up H.935 on April 21, hearing a fiscal briefing and sponsor testimony about changes to emergency-management programs and the reauthorization of previously appropriated communications funding.
Christopher of the Joint Fiscal Office told the committee the bill does not add new general-fund appropriations but changes allowable uses of money already set aside for public-safety communications. He said the House budget initially included a $500,000 appropriation for a Ready Response grant program to help nonprofits source and store shelf-stable food and bottled water, but "the senate budget construct does not have that" and the item will be a point of negotiation in a conference between the chambers.
Representative Lisa Hango (House Government Operations and Military Affairs Committee), the bill sponsor in the House, walked the Senate members through H.935 section by section. She said section 1 would establish the Ready Response grant program administered by the Division of Emergency Management to award nonprofit partners for sourcing, storing and distributing shelf-stable food and bottled water. Hango said the House asked for $1 million, that amount was amended to $500,000 in House appropriations, and that Senate appropriations later removed the funding.
Hango also described section 12 — the most complex part of the bill — which she said authorizes ongoing expenditure of previously appropriated funds to complete a multidisciplinary computer-aided dispatch system, extend software licensing, expand RapidSOS and GIS use, and advance land mobile radio design and initial build-out. She said the Public Safety Communications Task Force would remain in place through Feb. 15, 2027, and that the Department of Public Safety must report on spending on set dates through 2029.
The sponsor listed House-drafted appropriations that had been amended or removed along the appropriations path: roughly $70,163 for state emergency materials in multiple languages (including ASL), $720,000 for urban search-and-rescue (USAR) support with a noted base of about $580,000, $25,000 for technical rescue microgrants (removed by House appropriations), $450,000 for the Vermont Access Network (including $90,000 for community radio), and the Ready Response funding described above. Hango emphasized that some bill language remains in H.935 even when the money to implement it is not in the Senate budget.
Committee members pressed procedural and implementation questions. One member asked how Ready Response stockpiles would be managed; witnesses and the sponsor said nonprofit partners such as the Vermont Food Bank would rotate shelf-stable items through existing logistics and suggested regional staging to shorten transport times in an emergency. The Department of Public Safety and Emergency Management will be expected to provide written reports on expenditures and implementation at the dates specified in the bill.
The committee did not take any votes at the hearing; members repeatedly noted that appropriation decisions will be resolved in negotiations with House counterparts.
What happens next: H.935 remains subject to appropriations decisions and a conference between the Senate and House; the bill sets a notional effective date of July 1, 2026, and requires multiple DPS reports through 2029 before further spending decisions may be made.
