April 5, 2024 To: New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and New York State

If the Agencies count “investments” (presumably money invested in communities) as “benefits of spending” in addition to the actual benefits arising from the spending (on investments or otherwise), this could misrepresent the benefits accrued in DACs to the extent that the spending itself may not fully go to DACs, as noted in the preceding section. [...] Therefore, when the State agency calculates the overall benefits of spending accrued in DACs, the entity could include the five million dollar investment in the “overall benefits” denominator, but should only include a portion of the investment in the “benefits to DACs” numerator. [...] Recommended Changes to the Draft Guidance To clarify how State agencies, authorities, and entities should report benefits of spending, a revised version of the Draft Guidance should be made available for stakeholder comment, and the finalized guidance should incorporate the following changes compared to the Draft Guidance. [...] 6 Relatedly, the guidance should either clarify that co-benefits will be counted in the same manner as benefits or omit the term co-benefits to avoid the risk of insufficient attention to the benefits that are so labeled. [...] 26, 2024), Preproposal-Analysis-Webinar.pdf 8 Although the Agencies may prefer prompt implementation of the Benefits of Spending Provision, speedy issuance should not come at the expense of accurate accounting of overall benefits, benefits to DACs, and whether the 35% requirement in the Benefits of Spending Provision has.