 All right, we have three. I haven't heard from Tim or Lauren. I take it you're not on sugar level morning. No, it would be nice, but it would be. Oh, here's Tim. There's Tim. Oh, there's Lauren. Hi. Okay. Great. Fantastic. So pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021. And extended by governor Healy, this meeting of the board of health will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting made do so by following the instructions on the board of health posted agenda and via zoom or by posted telephone numbers available on our website. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted. But every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access proceedings in real time via technological means. We will post on the board of health. Website a recording of the proceedings as soon as technologically possible after the meeting. All approved minutes of the board of health meetings are also posted on our website. So I will now open the May 11th board of health meeting at 5. 32 with a roll call. So Lauren, I see you. First on line. Can you say here? Okay. Tim. Here. Remoa. Here. Maureen. Here. And Nancy. I got everybody. Didn't I? Okay. So the first. Item on our board of health meeting. Okay. So the first item on our agenda is to review the minutes from March 9th and then March 13th. So March 9th. Maureen, Lauren, and I were at the meeting and Tim was absent. So if anyone has any. Comments. I didn't see anything with that one that was, I thought was a problem. And I have a motion to accept the minutes. I can move to accept the minutes of the March meeting. I'll second. Okay. So all in favor. Premoa. Hi. Maureen. Hi. Lauren. And Nancy. Now we'll move to the. May. I mean, April 13 minutes. Well, there's a problem with who was here. Oh, right. Yes, because. Tim is not there. And he was there. Yeah. So that's one. Oh, someone has a. And it's confusing about Lauren here. She's on both not here and here. So. Oh yeah, Lauren was apps. Not there. That's right. And Tim was there. So that's one. Any other. I had. I didn't see anything else. One was on numbers. I had a comment. That I had asked for either a board of health. Or health department representative. To attend the July 18th resource fair. By the affordable housing trust. It's at Bangs community center. Because I will no longer be on. The board. And I will be going to the June meeting. Listening session. Focus group. And then. Under other topics. Where it says I reminded members that having more than three people on the board is important because two people are. Terms are expiring on the 30th of June. Anything else? Have a motion to. Accept the amended minutes. I'll move to accept the minutes amended as. Described. For April 13th. 2023. Oh, second. Okay. You're seconding it. Tim. Yep. Great. Okay. All in favor, Tim. Hi. Maureen. Hi. And Nancy. Hey. So. Comments. And during the public comment period. I as chair will recognize and Kyle will let people whose hands are raised. Members of the public to express their views. For up to two minutes. When called on, please identify yourself by stating your full name, preferred pronouns and residential address. The board of health will not engage in dialogue or comment on any manner. Raise during the public comment. I as chair will recognize and Kyle will let people whose hands are raised. And I will open it up to public comment. And I see two hands, three hands raised. I know that Heather Warner and Lisa Stevens. Good night. Our members of the Hampshire Franklin tobacco free community partnership. And they'd like to speak and possibly come back at another meeting. To talk more about their roles and their work. So if we want to let. Heather in. And then Lisa. So Kyle. Can you let Heather in? Yeah. In the process. Sorry. Okay. Great. Good evening, everybody. Thanks for having me. For a minute. I just. Just want to say. To thank Heather for coming and let people know. I have been aware of Heather's work. Since the 1990s. She wrote a wonderful. Paper in Holyoke. A report. Related to teen pregnancy. And now she's moved on to. Tobacco free. And I'm going to let you know. She's been working with youth since the 90s. And her work is amazing. So. Welcome, Heather. Thank you. I really appreciate that. Yeah. So. Yeah. So Heather Warner. My pronouns are she, her. I reside at 115 pine street in Florence. However, I also am a. I grew up in Amherst. I grew up in Amherst. I grew up in Amherst. I grew up in Amherst. I grew up in Amherst. I also am a, I grew up in Amherst. So that's, that's my hometown. And my family still lives in Amherst. So I'm very invested in the community. I am here today to talk a little bit about the. The nicotine. Tobacco free regulations in Amherst. And I know that there's. A lot of things that you have, that Amherst has been a leader in having strong. Tobacco free regulations. And, you know, this was important back in the 90s. Like you said, it was, you know, these types of local regulations are really what led the charge. In, you know, creating state laws that increased the age of use and. You know, you have regulations which are intended to reduce the outlet density of tobacco retailers by retiring licenses that don't get reapplied for. So I'm speaking out today because I know that there's, that one of the licenses for university drive was retired. And I know there's an effort to have that reinstated. So I'm just going to talk a little bit about why I feel like the regulation is important and, you know, that the intent behind it is really to continue to reduce the number of retailers. Let's see the, I feel like policy, like I said, is one of the most important ways that we can reduce the harms from tobacco use. You know, we've seen it over and over again in the history in Massachusetts and locally. There's also, you know, what one, a couple of things that we know about. About outlet density and the number of tobacco licenses is that when there, when there are more tobacco retailers, youth are more likely to experiment with smoking. When there's already smoke, we'll consume more cigarettes per day when they are, you know, surrounded by more nicotine outlets. And tobacco use rates are affected by where tobacco retailers are located and where they're concentrated. So oftentimes they're concentrated in areas where there's low income housing or people of color or young people, but when we think of university drive, we can think of UMass. So there's equity issues too related to, you know, the number of retailers and where they're located. I guess the only thing I also want to say, because I was looking at some of the notes and hearing about and looking in the paper and stuff about some of the comments from the last Board of Health meeting. And I know that there was some discussion about, you know, aged, you know, about whether or not an alcohol retailer was an adult only or 21 plus establishment. And I ended up calling Ralph Sacramento from the Alcohol Beverage Control Commission. And he let me know and pointed me to the website to indicate that there are no such licensed designations for alcohol, that anybody of any age can enter an alcohol establishment. Sometimes there might be a house rule, not to let somebody in who's under 21, but that's not a licensed type of license. And so I know that, you know, there's a lot of money involved in tobacco sales. And so there's a big effort to try to find get arounds in a local regulation or loopholes. And, you know, I just would refer back to the intention behind these regulations, which is really to limit access to young people and to reduce the harms of tobacco. And the way the Board of Health is helping our community and Amherst to do that is by retiring licenses once they expire. So I really commend you in that effort and support you in that effort and hope that, you know, you're able to address the issue. Thank you so much. Thank you, Heather. Okay. Darcy Dumont has her hand raised. Oh, I was going to. Oh, when, oh. Oh, this is Lisa. Okay. Okay, Lisa. So, okay, you were led in already. Okay. So Lisa Stevens. Good night. Okay. Sorry. Thank you. Thank you. So my name is Lisa Stevens. Good night. I am the tobacco control director with the Massachusetts municipal association. For those of you who helped draft the regulations that are at discussion. I took over for DJ who retired almost about a year ago. Coming up with his one year anniversary of retirement. So, and I work with Cheryl Sabara. Through the MTCP, the Massachusetts tobacco control program to provide technical assistance to cities and town. And in enforcing and drafting and acting regulations around tobacco control. So I wanted to thank you guys all for the work that you're doing. And I know that there were some questions that were raised at the last meeting, and I just wanted to address some of the questions that I heard after, well, when watching the video as. Heather said one of the biggest things that there seem to be some confusion around is whether or not liquor stores were age restricted under the law, which would be the important thing. So establishment can choose to ID at the door, but they aren't required to do so. And that's what's the meaning of that non age restricted means in the regulations. And part of that is because. There is the exposure to products is one of the things you're trying to reduce. So. A five year old can't buy stuff in an adult only retail store, but we don't even really want them seeing the products in an adult only retail store because that exposure can increase their chances of trying to back out down the road. So you can't bring like your kid in with you to an adult only tobacco store, but you can bring your kid into a liquor store with you to pick up something. So that's kind of the difference there is that the IDing happens at the door, not just for sale. And the other thing I wanted to say is that the situation seems like in this particular incident is unique in the sense that of the way the transfer of the property happened. So that would be where you guys would make that decision. So. Because again, because of the way that the transfer happened, as opposed to where it's normally just a business to business transfer. And I'm happy to leave my information or providing my information. If you guys have any questions down the road about those decisions or. Kind of what is required under state law or what you can do locally. Thank you. Thank you very much. Darcy. Had her hand up. Hi, can you hear me? Yes. Hi, I won't take much of your time. Good evening. My name is Darcy Dumont and I live in district three. Thank you for taking my public comment on behalf of zero waste Amherst. I'm just here to give a, the board a little bit more of an update than what is in the CWA letter to the board. That was sent for today's meeting. First. I think you received an update on the survey. ZWA was requested to conduct regarding Amherst current hauler services with USA. Waste and recycling. They're the only company licensed to collect residential waste and Amherst. So people either need to use. The transfer station. Or USA. USA states it has approximately 30,000. Residential customers and Amherst. So in the survey, we found that USA is not attempting to reduce trash. At all via any pay as you throw system. It charges. People who get trash pick up every two weeks the same as those who get picked up every week. It charges only $2. Difference between trash cart sizes per month. Providing virtually no incentive to reduce trash. We confirm both our trash reduction and price. Sometimes my computer. Stop. Stop. Now I'm back on my, on my eyes. I'm sorry. I lost complete connection. For a minute. Is it okay to continue? Oh yes. But I disappeared. I think. Okay. Sorry. We confirm both our trash reduction and pricing. Data with USA. The main reason the survey was conducted was that USA prices have not been transparent to the public. We found that the average price is approximately $550 a year, including. The cost to 200 residents who, because they for some reason. Can't get their cart to the curb have to pay over $1,000 a year. We have a long list of. Supporting organizations from around town and now a list of over 80 folks who volunteered to help to do, do outreach for the program. If and when it launches. We fervently hope the town council will adopt the proposed by law. That we first brought to the board of health in October of 2021. And which is now in the town services and outreach committee. So that the board will be able to support. And we can get a request for proposals out this fall and start the program in January 2024. It would be hugely beneficial to the public health, the climate, and to residents pocketbooks to start reducing our waste in January. Rather than waiting yet another year. Thanks so much for your consideration. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Are there any other hands? Kyle, do you see any other hands up? I do not. Okay. Neither do I. Okay. So thank you, everybody for your comment. I have no idea what's going on. We can do that. Yeah, you're still here. Okay. I'm having more problems today. Okay. Sorry, everybody. So we're going on to all business. With chemical regulations with Tim. And Tim and I did a zoom. You can talk about it, Tim. Tim, are you there? He's muted. Okay. Got it. Okay. So. Our conversation started with two. Dr. Bekut was the person who was actually engaging, but he was busy. Recently, and he directed us to. To some resources in the executive office of environmental office, which is the state government. That is the office of technical assistance. So. I arranged a meeting with Carrie. Who is the director of that office and also Tiffany's score strong. Also has some background in health, public health. So we had a very detailed discussion Nancy joined. Join the conversation. They expressed what some sort of a. You know, the appreciation for what we are discussing, but also. They conveyed on what they can discuss and what they cannot. Because they are a state government. But. However. Discussion actually went through. The history of this. This particular. Regulation we had. And. And what we are looking for in terms of all the new contaminants, which, which have come in into the, into play in the new regulations. And also we discussed about what is the specifics. Specific type of a. Focus area we're going to have. And I think that's where the procurement side of things came up. And. So we had some. Excellent discussion about, you know, what are some of the different options and, and, and. They directed to. Someone Julia Wolf. Who is the director of environmental purchasing. So Julia sent. A nice list of resources. For environmentally preferred purchasing as well as products and services and. Some of the EPP policies. They have some website on that. And then there's also an order. Michigan has some. As a ecology center, which has developed purchasing for safer cities. Which is some sort of a document. That could be used. Julia. Also. Is open to talk. Further about. Me or anyone else. From the board. So. I haven't actually. Arrange that meeting. So that is the next step. We'll be actually having that. Meeting with. Julia. And see what type of resources. We could access to. And in terms of fine tuning. Our regulation. I found it very interesting. And they would come up to. To a certain point and then they'd say, well, we can't advise because of this government. They also mentioned that some towns are. Are looking at a bylaw related to PFAS. If I remember correctly. And I thought. The environmental purchasing would be very helpful. Probably to Jeremiah. The plant. And. Yeah. And, and I had some. Internet. It went pretty well. And I thought the environmental purchasing would be very helpful. Probably to Jeremiah. And so. It went pretty well, but I was picking up my grandson. So I was in the car from doing the meeting in the car. On my iPhone. And I found it very helpful. Tim. What do you, do other people have any questions for. Tim or I. I just wonder if you see a way to put this into sort of the structure of a regulation or guideline or whatever, you know, it seems a little bit of a difficult task. It is. Tim, I'm going to lean on you. So that's an excellent question. That's what we had been thinking about. Where do we both from here. We saw from. Jeremiah, you know, in terms of what the procurement policies are, they look like they're already doing purchasing of very green products and. Environmentally preferred products. So, so one way is this information, which I'm collecting from. From the procurement office might help with Jeremiah. But I think the problem is much broader than procurement, in my opinion. And, and, but the problem has multiple. I would say levels of governance, you know, you have the national state and then finally it comes down to your community. So some of these contaminants had been in the forefront of EPA. EPA has been developing some standards. For few of those. Be fast. So, in that sense. Regulation should go beyond procurement. It should, it should go to, you know, in terms of usage in everywhere, but that is probably. It's going to be much more complex in for a. More of health to actually develop, but one thing I'm thinking of is it might be better to develop this as guidelines. So that it can be used for more outreach. Education of the public. Rather than developing like as a regulation. I don't know that's my opinion. I like that that approach, Tim, because when we go back to the history of this regulation from 2000, 2001, it was really for purchasing. And so I think a guideline because no one's enforced this regulation, there's no way to enforce it. So I think that would be a good guideline. And then to keep looking at PFAS. And toxic chemicals more. I think that would be more a. On the. A bylaw rather than a board of health regulation. Because towns in Connecticut have done that related to PFAS and artificial turf. What are other people's thoughts? Can. Can the board of health make a bylaw or no. No, that's the town council. Okay. I think I'm on information overload with. With all the. Town meetings and all the other things. Bylaws town council. Is regulation. Okay. I just, I wanted to give my, my thoughts. Because. That did miss talking about. The tattooing. Regulations. And I think. That when it comes to the board of health, just my, my thought is, is whether it's guidelines or it's a regulation, we want. To. Not feel. Not, not make the public feel like we're. Trying to control their behavior, but wanting to protect the health of the public. So I would just suggest that any. Regulations or guidelines that we have. Are stated in a way that are clear and are. For example. Not just saying. I know I'm getting off a little topic about the tattoo, but. Not just saying what can. Be done, but also. What. What should not be done because if there is a. Public health issue, the board of health or the. The partner of health should be there for people to feel like they can. You know, come, come to, you know, for advice or. Help or assistance. And so I just, I just think that is something that we should keep in mind, you know, when writing regulations and not be afraid to state. That there are some that should. Should not be done. Thank you, Warren. Pramila, do you have any. Comments on this. Where, how we should. I was wondering the chemicals. I mean, is there a pressing concern right now? I'll be aware of, of. Any, any town office that's using. Not environmentally friendly materials or. No. Because you're relatively new on the board. What happened two years ago? I just went through all of our. Regulations. And I asked. Different board members to review, in pairs to review our oldest regulations to see if we needed to revise them or update them or change them. And toxic chemicals came up. Then when I went back to the history of it, it was brought up to the board of. And the board of health. But first to the town. It was the select board to have a bylaw on. Purchasing environmentally friendly. Cleaning and paper and whatnot products. And the town. Select board. Gave it to the board of health and the board of health. And then the. And then we've been working on this for two years and try and then PFAS came up and artificial turf came up. So we've been. Trying to figure out what to do with this existing regulation. Is that clarify things for you, Premola? Yes. But the regulations right now specify. I mean, I'm just wondering about the nature of the regulations. I'm sure I've looked at them at some point because you did have. Yes. And I don't have them in front of me. And I don't dare go to a split screen on my computer because I, I was losing. Connection. So I address that. Tim, you're muted. Yes. The, the regulations currently, I think we have a. Typically. On how we draft the regulations in terms of defining different things. But the final outcome is. It comes to. Not a very clear. Regulation in terms of what. I don't know if I can do, but it's suggesting actually saying. It's a precautionary principle type of an approach of. Don't, you know, if you're facing a use of this one, try to find the minimally toxic one or something like that, because we couldn't provide some sort of a clear. Yes or no type of a thing which can develop a regulation. So that's where I think it went. The whole regulation is private regulation needs to have something. And that's where I think we, I think we need to have some sort of a contrast in terms of what. We can do and we cannot do. Like a standard. And, and so. I think that's what I think we, we ended up actually saying, okay, we should talk to the. Procurement office, the fire department and everything. And that's where the discussions are emerging into state. And so I don't know if I answered your question. I wonder, was there some part of the discussion. That centered around whether these things were enforceable or not. If I recall, there was some discussion about that. Yes, I think. After writing, it went back to. I went back to in terms of actually engaging stakeholders. And that's where the enforcement came into who is going to actually impose this type of discussion came up, but what is the enforcement mechanism? There's a lot of ambiguity on, you know, lack of clarity in that. And so that's where we were trying to find some sort of a language or anything. And the state level or the theory. But it looks like I think. We probably are. The first one, we're trying to develop that. Is there a particular concern. Right now, I mean, other than you were reviewing the old regulations. Does PFAS come into this somehow. Or how. The way the regulation is written PFAS doesn't, it's my understanding PFAS does not come under this regulation. Is that correct, Tim? With your understanding of the existing regulation. So yeah, the existing regulation is essentially for dealing with some procurement of paper, I think. Unbleached paper and. Yes. Florian free paper or something like that. So it was there. And when we look at the concept of toxic. That's when I think the boat. I mean, we had been discussing on what type of, what are the toxic chemicals actually. And these are emerging contaminants, which are directly influential in public health. And so in the regulations, when we were at some sort of a revising, we looked at a lot of literature, more recent one, and then that's where PFAS came in. And then we looked at other. Nicotinoids. Other types of. Potential contaminant. I think. Which are. Probably a pesticides. All those things came into, you know, into be added into the regulation, but then we started to realize, you know, in terms of what is the. Difficult guidelines in terms of how, you know, there's multiple contaminants. Beyond what the federal government is doing on the state. The. Continue to. No, even PFAS is, is of. It's not a. You know, PFAS itself was something new. Even for the federal government and EPA is. Has been developing standards there. So I think wait and see. In terms of regulations. In terms of the federal government and the state government, definitely they'll, they'll be having. Standards developed. And those which are not covered in those two, I think probably the town can take on that level. But it's a very complex one. Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's, I'd say maybe five or six years ago, there was an issue brought up about the use of roundup. And we talked to buildings and grounds and the school of maintenance. And we found out that roundup is very, very infrequently used. And it was only used. On a patch of poison IV at. I think Mill River or graph park. I think it was just used once. To remove this poison IV to avoid children getting it. And so the town was not using. Roundup at all. Except in a very limited. Use. And that was maybe five or six years ago. We asked about that because it. It came up. So I like the idea of a guideline on. Procurement. Environmental purchasing versus a regulation. I don't know what other people think. And then the other part of that might be. Not just what the town is purchasing, but maybe educational things for the population. Of, you know, Amherst and. You know, just make. Awareness about you. You don't need to use the most. Toxic thing to get your, the job done. Most of the time, you know, you can get, but you can use things that are. Safer for the. For people and for the environment. Because it just does seem to be impossible to regulate. At our level. And the vagaries of PFAS and PFAS, I mean, they're like thousands of them. And even the federal government was only going to put limits on six. And. You know, whether you've used substitute a different one, it's not going to be any better. You know, it's, it's like, it sounds like whack-a-mole. Yes. You know, it's, I think it's beyond our scope. A little bit. To do that. And that was, I was leaning to, because. If we can't. Enforce a regulation. Then. It's beyond the scope of. What we, we and the health department can do. And when you look at that original one, it was. Pying, pouring free. Paper products. Which is a good thing. And they're better paper products that are, you know, be more recycled or as opposed to down the trees and. Right. So it was the idea that we would come up with. With a list of recommendations for various categories of things. And then maybe. Post them on the board website or. Tim, where would you like to go with that with a guideline? So. I think, I think Maureen was. Right in saying that the guidelines should not only focus on procurement. But it. Education is the key. That means it. This has to be a grassroots level. Awareness and. Adoption of. Some sort of a greener practices. So said that one. If you provide a guideline. I think we could go with that with a guideline. So. If you provide a guidelines, I think we could always. Make some sort of a list of things people can. I think we already have defined those lists, but I think. We can match it with some resources on where. People can actually go and get. Alternate products are. So this guidelines can also be a. Like a fact sheet or something which could also be used for. Educational purposes. Is that how the board would like to proceed with this? I think that makes sense. I think we really struggled with, you know, Jennifer asked, well, what do I do? You know, and how do we. You know, In force it or if some, if the. If someone needs something that might be the little less toxic than something else to how does she approve it? And that evaluate that. It just seemed very. Was she and hard to. Hard to do. Would anyone like to make a motion that we move to developing. Guidelines and education. For. Using less toxic products. How would you like to. Word that Tim, you've been working on this for two years now. I'll make a motion to. Revise the existing toxic chemical. Regulation to develop as a guideline. Or recommendation for. Alternate use of the chemicals. Alternate. Less toxic chemicals. I don't know. But someone like to second that. I can second that. Any further discussion. Okay. I'll move to voting. Maureen. Hi. Tim. Hi. Prima. Prima. Hi. I was muted. Sorry. Hi. Lauren. I think we lost Lauren. Yeah, I don't see her anymore. She said she was having trouble charging her phone. Yeah. So we lost Lauren and Nancy. And Lauren is. Absent for this phone. Okay. So thank you. Moving on. Moving on to body arts establishment regulation. We're even doing a Yeoman's job on that. I guess I wonder, do we want to start going through this bit by bit? I mean, this is, it's a lot. I don't know if people have had a chance to read it or they have thoughts about it or the direction. We might go on this. So have people had a chance to look at this at the revised. The, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the work with all of the edits and pieces in it. I've looked at it. Quickly. The one area that I had wanted to discuss was that the guest. Artist temporary permit was a 14 day. So. I think we have four permits per calendar year. That's what Northampton does. Yeah. And I just thought, well, 14 days at $25 starts getting expensive. Would we want to do a 30 day versus a 14 day? We talked with Stephen and when we spoke last time, we talked about 30 days. We talked about 30 days. We talked about 28 days or 30 days is the right number of days. But that can be. Maybe three of those through with a year. Yeah. And I thought 30 days because that's a month. Okay. 3031 days. And I think I'm trying to think about this a little bit. Cause you don't. You know, I, you know, you just think, well, that's like 90 days in a year, but you want. You know, I don't know if they are because that, that would just be an administrative nightmare. But I think the, the thought was, you know, it seems like the purpose, one of the purposes at least is for someone to. See if they're a good match for, or one of the, for the business. Or maybe if it's just someone who's. Well known or it's, you know, that would be able to come and work in, in the, in the town. For a period of time. So I was thinking of saying up to 30 days and. Up, up to three per year per person. Yeah, I like, I liked that better. Okay. Um, And the. I mean, there are a lot of small questions, but a big question is, I think it's on page nine. It's under the restrictions. And. Um, and I don't know if you want it. Cause our regulations had been quite restrictive in terms of. Piercing basically saying you could only pierce. What the eyebrow, ear, nipple, and nose. You know, you could only pierce the navel, lip, and tongue. Um, and all everything else wasn't allowed. Um, So, uh, You know, that's simple because then you, because you don't have to think of all the other things that you don't want to allow. But there was the list that I put in there. It's actually from Lowell. It's really the same thing that North Hampton has in terms of piercings. But it's, it was much easier to read in a, in a list type of, uh, organization. Um, And I think those, you know, I did a bunch of reading about different kinds of piercings. And I think that really covers a lot of the things that I saw that. Were not, not thought to be a good idea, even by piercers. There's like, I saw blogs and saying, you know, You know, You know, You know, There's a lot of things I would never do. And I don't think anybody should do. Um, You know, that was a personal thought, but. But it kind of encapsulated some of these. Same. Uh, Procedures. It does do it. It actually opens up things like branding and scarification, which we hadn't allowed before that's allowed. But it does seem like. Those were things that were described in a lot of other places. Um, and that's only on adult adults. I mean, we're still more limiting with. People with minors under 18 and even more so with. Uh, With people under the age of 14. And again, none of those age restrictions apply to just piercing of the ear lobes. So. Um, And the whole idea of, um, Adding an apprentice program. I think as Ed had mentioned last time, or at one point when we talked about this, They did approve an. Apprenticeship. Uh, in town, I guess maybe it was under. The variances or, um, Whatever. Um, But it's kind of. Uh, Makes it more official and has very specific. Uh, requirements, both. For the pre apprenticeship program and the actual training. Um, You know, The curriculum, so to speak. Um, And that. That kind of bounces back on to what the requirements of training are when, when you're make allowing a license for a body art practitioner. Because it. It raises the, that the amount of experience to be equivalent to what the apprenticeship was. I think it for piercing, It had been. Like two years and with the apprenticeship, Those are three, three years. Um, some of that involves just practicing under, uh, A trainer, you know, There's working and getting paid. But they're still under the guidance. Guidance of a trainer. So are you comfortable with everything? What are you? What would you like input from us? I've, I've read it. What would you like input from us on? Well, what do you think about the restrictions? Um, And. What do you think about what we are allowing and what we are disallowing? I guess that's a big piece of this. Um, From a health point of view, The restrictions make sense. Um, to me. I guess. Yeah. What we are allowing now is genital piercings. Which we did not before. Um, And. I don't think many other things, but, um, And then I have a lot of very small things like I actually reached out to Ed about, you know, some of the things about. The toilets, you know, Like, you know, I think one of these regulations from North Hampton was such that, you know, Actually a tattoo or piercing body art establishment has to have a toilet for private and. Client use. But if they're in like a mall pipe situation and there is another toilet that's available, they don't have to have a toilet. You know, so, um, you know, They're sort of really everything from nuts and bolts to. And the autoclave, um, Issue, you know, Like the regulations about the audit plate, which I also reached out to Ed about, I thought he might know more about that than I do. And, um, And if you use all disposable, then you don't need. Yes. Which I think we need to leap it in that it's there, but I think the trend. And maybe it's exclusive now that, that people use totally disposable things. Um, yeah. I know when I read the toilet on page 12 with toilet paper. No, it's like building things and like temperature of the water and a certain kind of valve and the plumbing. And, you know, it's, it's, um, The other question was whether high school diploma, I think we decided to let you know of that. Yes. Um, And again, Northampton and a lot of places specify the. Cost of the. Permit or a permit and licenses. Um, We didn't, it was always at a reasonable. I don't know. There's a statement in there. That it's at a, Reasonable fee. I guess we have a fee structure that's separate. Yes. So I need to change some texts there. The other thing is like the renewal policy. And I think we've done this with some other things. Instead of it's being renewed one year from the date. It was issued that it could be renewed at the end of the calendar. So it's less confusing. It's insightful. Yeah. And that was from Northampton. Um, Huh. You know. And one basic thing about, you know, sometimes the, Whether you're referring to the license for the body art practitioner or a permit. And my thought was, and I tell you, if other people think that's okay is like, I think a license applies to a person and, you know, that they have this permission via a license to do their craft or art or procedures. Um, and the permit is for the establishment. Cause I just wonder. And the problem is the state does not have a licensing procedure for body. Right. Because it's, it's, they just started allowing it. In the past. Right. So they don't. Yes. But manicurists need a license. I know. From the state. From the state. And, you know, I think the. I think, you know, You could really. There's one. Hard of this. Maybe you could read it now. And it's hard to take things out of context because. You don't know what's in the rest of the body. If you just do this, but. On the bottom of page 15. Section D. This is, I think it's from 2008. And it just seems. Weird to me in some ways, especially the part. I don't have page 15. I don't have D. I just have numbers. Maybe you have an old version. No, this is the one that you just sent out. I thought. Well, Communicable and blood-borne diseases. That's actually page 16. Oh, okay. Because I have. Okay. Okay. It's page 16. Oh, maybe something happened. Cause I, when I. Okay. Page 16. Yes. Yes. Just. Especially three. Those standards mentioned that the last, they don't not exist anymore. And I can't imagine that it isn't just a universal precautions. And I think is that in blue. I'm looking at a printed copy. It isn't. Yeah. And so that's from North Hampton. We did not have that. And. In our. In our regulations. So my thought was to not. Put that in. Yeah. But to keep it. The man was updating it. And also having guest artists. And then the apprentice. But as you know, it gets. Get into the weeds. And I think it. Added something to it. And I think that. Get into the weeds. And I think it. Added some additional things about documentation of. You know. Oh, about record keeping and getting more. Somewhat more records, like a photo ID versus just. And also keeping it longer, like for five years instead of three years. And. The other question I thought I put out, I mean, I think it says it requires blood borne pathogen training. But it doesn't say how often. And I know for healthcare providers that. That settings each usually an annual event. And it's an annual event. And it's an annual event. And it's just blood borne pathogen. And I. And CPR and first aid are annual for. In our regulations. But I wonder if putting that as an annual. You know, it's usually kind of an online thing. Or. I don't know. There's their options from. Both. Or other. I can't remember who else or also from professional organizations, like there's a safe piercing. I've forgotten the a. There's a piercing and there's a tattooing. Professional organizations that have those kinds of. Supports for practitioner. And businesses. And then they just say, you know, I don't know what to say. I don't know what to say. Or I can't decide. And just say what, you know, just to make sure that it, it, it seems to fit together. And that I didn't. Miss something. I think that section D. Yeah, could use some work. I mean, I'm not even sure what the point of number two is. No, I know. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I'm not sure. Diagnosing somebody's. Yeah. Now, where did that come from? North Hampton. Yeah. I mean, so. That whole section might. Yeah. Go. It's just. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I mean, I'll read it. It doesn't do the regulations. As I recall, we don't specify. Testing requirements for practitioners. Right. No. Yeah, it doesn't make sense. No. And what would you do? You wouldn't. I mean. You would just do universal precautions. Right. Yeah. Right. So. Universal precautions. And the awareness of. Of CPR and what to do is important in case there's a. Ink or some kind of reaction. But. Yeah. You're not going to diagnose. I mean, that's not. Yeah, that doesn't make sense. I know. Maureen, I'm happy to, to go. My time is about to open up a little bit. So that's good. Yeah. I can do that. And I'm sorry that I haven't had a chance to really read. I know that's been not as easy time right now, but I guess the end of the school year. Things, things. But you got to get through reunions too. Right. Yeah. Yeah, maybe when you, if you can have a chance to go through it. Yeah. You can be in touch with me and we can. Put it on the July agenda. Right. And maybe we'll have something to vote on by then. I would like that. Okay. Oh, yeah. Yeah. June. Do you think June's too soon? Well, June. The students are presenting their community assessment. So that's going to take. Okay. A large. All right. It would be nice to have a little more. Time leeway. Right. Yeah. Because I don't know. We'll review it and it'll be on the July. Agenda hopefully for. Voting. Yeah. We have enough members. Okay. I have a quick question. Did any of the regulations have. Any mention of. Carrying insurance by these establishments. Well, one of the, one of the only regulation I saw was that part of the signage was to say that whether the establishment has. Malpractice insurance or not. So to let people know whether they do or not. I, I, I don't know how. I don't know how many practitioners or establishments do have. Malpractice insurance. I didn't see anything about that. I'm sure businesses are insured, like, you know, if somebody were to trip and fall, right? Or for theft or fire or. Whatever. But as far as. Practicing. There is such a thing as malpractice insurance for practitioners. But I don't know how, how common it is. But I think it was the idea was. I think that's from North Hampton. Gosh, I can't remember now, but it was to have as signage. Whether or not they had. I mean, this is for malpractice, right? Yeah. Someone. Yeah. Suze, right? For the doctor or whatever. Right. My. I mean, if there is any mishap, that's what I'm saying. If there was some sort of a. Any type of, because here we are dealing with. The body itself, you know, so I'm just curious. There are, there are appendices. There is. Some sort of a. Infection. By communicable disease, whatever it is, you know, but. No, I think probably there's no. Insurance for that. I mean, at malpractice, it'd be one thing, but. Possibility, but. An occurrence or complication. I think the thing is, disclosure that these things can happen and. A lot of it. A lot of prevention is described in the procedures of how you. Approach. Doing things cleanly and professionally and. All, but after care is a big thing for. For the outcome. Training on after cares pretty much. Emphasized in every part of the. Of the. Regulation and how the importance of that. And, and there is a disclosure. Disclosure. Requirement. Yeah. You have to sign an agreement. There's information that has to be given a. Before and there's a consent. To. Procedure. Yeah. Any other questions for Maureen? Okay. We'll be on the July agenda. Thank you, Maureen. Okay. Next is the tobacco license for six university drive. It was brought up. At our last meeting. And we looked at our. Regulations. Which clearly state that any permit not renewed either because a retailer no longer sells tobacco products because a retailer closes the retail business. It shall be returned to the Amherst board of health. And it shall be retired and that applicants who purchase or acquire an existing business that holds a valid tobacco products sales permit at the time of sale or acquisition of said business. Must apply within 60 days. And the license. The permit for six university drive. Had been retired. And the issue is. Keeping it retired versus not keeping it retired. And we have the information. I had. Jennifer and Kyle. Sent out the. Existing permits. And then. Attorney Evans sent an email and I contacted. Cheryl Sibara. Who then. Sent a letter to attorney Evans, which you had. And then we had Lisa Stevens. Good night. Also comment today on. Our regulations. And. The permit. So the issue is. Giving a permit or keeping it. Completely retired as it has been. Does anyone have any questions? Do you go over the timeline of things that I kind of got. Like when the business closed and that was retired and when the. Happened and. Jennifer did not give me that the business closed. I want to say two years ago. Oh, okay. Or 18 months to two years ago. When the permit was retired. Yes. It was not renewed. And then the. Business was purchased. I do not have the. Jennifer did not give me the date. Yeah, I might be part. Like December or something like that. Correct. I noted that our, our. Total number of our cap on per. The back of licenses. So. Was 18 and we're down to 14. They're only 14 listed. And what should be happening is every time one is retired, that number should come down. And I don't think. The. Record keeping has copied that. Because that was from 2000 and 20. And every time a. Permit. Retires. That number should be coming down. And I do remember the last time that the lawyer was. Advocating for the idea that. Because this is an adult only. We hadn't regulated this particular kind of business, but in fact. And so. Our, our regulations as we permit smoke sale of, of tobacco and nicotine products here in these adult only stores, which have a specific definition. And here in these. Non-adult only. And so there is no way to say. There are places where we. We can't sell anything else. I mean, we permitted these two settings and, and that, that's, that's how it's. Right. And adult only means no one under 21 can enter. There's someone at the door. And you can't sell anything else. And you can't sell anything else. So. It doesn't fit the definition. No. And you heard from. Lisa Stevens. Good night. That there is a reason for retiring and. Keeping these licenses retired. To. Decrease the access of tobacco to. Younger people and. According to research. The brain isn't fully developed until. 2526. So exposure to. Tobacco use. Even in the early 20s. Means a. Usually a long, a long term. Addiction to nicotine. Versus if you start the older you start the greater the chances that you will not ever stop smoking. Or using a nicotine product, I should say. So is there a timeline for. A ruling on this or. We can. The, it is, we've been asked if we would allow this permit to go through. Even though it has been retired. And my feeling is that it's been retired and there's a reason for that. Retirement of our regulations and that unfortunately is it. So. What I need is. If anyone has any other comments, my, my belief is that. The permit is. Gone. It has been retired. And once it's retired, we don't let them. Yeah. Resurrected. Yes. Yes. I mean, our regulation is clear. Cheryl Sabara said our regulation is clear. If we were to grant this permit, we would have to give a variance or change our regulation. According to Cheryl Sabara. And. So do we vote on it or just. So we. So we need a motion. So we need a motion. Question, Tim. We have a, it's Kyle. We have Dick Evans, the attorney raised his hand. I'm not sure for allowing comments at this time. I just wanted to make you aware. The comment period was at the beginning. Or at the end. I don't know. We've eliminated this just at the beginning. Would the board like to hear from. The lawyer. Stephen Lambert had his hand up. Would the board like to hear from the lawyer. Dick Evans. For the owner. At this point, I didn't think that was our practices. It is, it's not our practice. Okay. So it's not our practice. Public comment is over. So. And we're not having a hearing or just voting on this permit. So I would like a motion. On the permit. Would you like me to make the motion. I was having trouble coming up with the right. Yeah. Yes. Because it says that. Any permit not renewed. Shall be returned to the board of health and shall be permanently retired. So it would be. That. The permit. For six university drive was not renewed. And it's been returned to the board of health. And it is permanently retired. How would we say that to follow the regulations and to. And not to restore the permit that was retired. By the previous owner. To adhere. To the. I'd have to get. Can I try. Yes. I make a motion that the. Or six university drive. Which was not renewed and returned. Not be. Renewed under the existing policy. Under the existing regulation regulations. I'll second that. Okay, so it's been moved and seconded to permanently retire and not renew the. Tobacco sales permit or the nicotine sales permit for. Six universities. Let me get the exact. Amherst board of health. Let me get the exact title of our regulation. The regulation is restricting youth access and exposure to tobacco and nicotine delivery products. So that's our regulations. So we'll put that in there. Okay. So we have a motion. It's been seconded. Maureen. We're voting now. No, we're voting now. I've been moved and seconded. Is there any further discussion? No. Okay. Okay. So now we're voting Maureen. I. Tim. I. I. I. I. I. I. Lauren. Lauren, are you there? Lauren says yes in the chat. Okay. Yes. And Nancy. Yes. Okay. So it's. Unanimous that that permit is retired. Thank you. Okay. Zero waste. Okay. So I'm going to read it from Darcy and you have received the letter that she would. And zero waste Amherst would like the board. To. Urge the town council to adopt the waste hauler proposal. As presented by zero waste. So that it can be implemented on January. That's a great question. Any discussion on this. This is the process of. This vote would be to encourage the. The town council. To adopt. The waste hauler proposal that was proposed by zero waste Amherst. We'll urge the town council to adopt the waste hauler proposal. This summer, so that it can be implemented by January 2024. That's what we're being asked. And the town council can make changes in that proposal. I mean, there's proposals about the. Yes. The. The. Pricing structure, the things that I didn't quite understand, honestly. Yes. You know, there are a lot of details that seem like. There needs. You know, that might. Bear some discussion or understanding better understanding. This is just asking the town council to act on. If it's been. Since 2021. Yeah. I mean, yes. So it's a. The delay is because of a lot of information is missing on economics. And so developing those some sort of economic data and everything was the one which was. And I'm still not clear on what the board is recommending. Is the board recommending to hasten this process? If town council is already. Using all the data and evidence to move forward or. Yeah. We're being asked just urge the town council to move on this. So that it can be implemented. By January 2024 instead of it. Sitting for another year. Like a recommendation. Right. Recommendation to move forward. Yes. Okay. So what are you asking to do is. I'm assuming. Tim, when you say the delay is missing information on the economics. Has the information been asked for. I mean, I'm. So who's collecting the information, I guess. I believe the town council has been having some sort of a. What is it special group or. What is it special group? To get information from the haulers. And they also. I don't know what, what, what, what, what was the process there. But the main question which came out in the last discussion was the economics of it. So adding this regulation is going to actually add to the cost of. Recycling. But it was unsure if it's going to reduce it or. You know, if it is going to reduce it, if it's going to reduce it or not. And that's where the town council, I believe. Had formed a. Committee or something. The court. The stuff at a daytime. I guess the question is, you know, if. If we're just asking. We're just recommending that they move on it. It seems reasonable to me, given that it's been two years in process. I think checking on the status might be a good option on where they are rather than developing a. No, is that our information packet I've read all this stuff about it and now I can't remember exactly who's doing what but I think you know that that that survey showed that then Darcy spoke to this that you know that people are paying like a average of $550 there's a lot much transparency. I don't know if the next step is kind of a request for proposals to the haulers or to see, I think we just you're right we don't know there's We don't know that part. And I think just the idea of trying to move it forward to get to the point where the town council can make a decision is a good idea. Because I think then it comes back to us to adjust our trash recycling kind of we have regulations in this area. So it's you know it's it's quite the process I guess the question is is it economically feasible and in many towns and cities that actually brought down the cost to have a single contract through the town as opposed to contracts for individuals with the haulers. I cannot understand the structure of the pricing there. I mean, it almost looked like everyone would pay what would be considered the, you know, the transfer station fee level, and people and other, and then you could also contract to get pickup, it's curbside pickup, but I may misunderstand that completely so. Well, you know, I don't know that we need to understand that right now that's just going to say I mean it's not it's not a decision ultimately that we're making it to have to decide if we're in support of it. I think it makes sense to move to do what we can to assist in moving it along. I mean, the town council doesn't have to listen to our recommendation right right now. So what we're asked to do, and I can make a motion that the Board of Health asks the town council to adopt the zero waste, zero waste Amherst proposal. Wait a minute, wait a minute, well to act on adopting the act on adopting so we're asking the Board of Health. I'm asking the town council to act on adopting the waste hauler proposal that was brought forth by zero waste Amherst, so that it can be in this summer so that it can be implemented in January 2024. That's all. So, can we just make a motion on that. I'll make the motion. And that we're asking the town council to move forward. May have a second. I can second it. Okay. Any further discussion. Okay, so we're going to vote on it. Maureen. Yes. Premola. Yes. Lauren. Yes, she's in the chat. Yes, thank you. Tim. And Nancy. Okay, so it's unanimous. We are going to ask the town council to move forward on that. Thank you. New business. New business. I put this in. I just wanted to make people aware of two things that the, there are a lot of bills house bills on an act banning semi automatic firearms and act increasing penalties for illegal sale and possession of firearms and act to clarify the prosecution of illegal guns. And an act requiring live practice. On fire for firearm licensure and I just wanted you. And the Senate has an act to strengthen gun control. I just wanted to let you know that this this is going on on the state level because we did have Scott Livingston come talk to us about safety. So I just wanted to let you know that the other thing that's important for us as board of health members to know that they Senate in the house have they're called safety it's state action for public health excellence. In the House and the Senate have an act relative to accelerating improvements to the local regional public health system to address disparities and delivering of public health services. And this has been an ongoing process from the state starting in 2019 with the blueprint on public health excellence and grants moving for regionalization and sharing of public health services. And I just wanted you to be aware that these are going on in the state level. And that's the only reason anybody have any questions on those. And the other new businesses the board of health succession. Someone said there are applicants to be on the board, but my term expires and Lawrence expires on June 30, and you're going to need to have a new chair for July 1 or sooner. Someone wants to do it in June. So I don't know what your thoughts for Maureen Premois and Tim. I don't know the newbie so I don't think I'd be a brokerage. So Maureen, it's between you and Tim. Who's going to be chair either in June or definitely in July. Maureen. I have concerns about that in terms of what one I could bring to the table but also, even though I'm retired and I, you know, you guys are both working. You have a bunch of things that are going to be complicating my life in big chunks of this year. So you could be chair and then, if you can't be there you ask someone else to be the acting chair. Yeah. I wondered about a real rotation system or something like that. And I guess years ago it was supposed to be every year, it's supposed to be a different chair but somehow that never happens. Yeah. So is this something that gets voted on or it just gets. Well, you've got to decide for the July meeting. Yeah. And then also to keep, I keep asking Jen, but to make sure that the town proceeds to have two new people for July, because last year, it dragged on in premula you just came in with December correct. Yeah, even though I applied in August. Somehow, they, they dragged and dragged and dragged and I kept asking and then all of a sudden, I said, Oh, the interviews, can you do this tomorrow. Like, bam. So I'm, and we can just keep asking Jen, otherwise they'll just be three of you. And if someone is sick or something happens, you're not going to have a warm. Yeah. So, you know, I've been mentioning this for several meetings so Jen is very much aware of it and somehow the town processes go slow. I can say I'll be the chair for the July meeting. And then maybe we can talk about it again. You can decide to have co chairs and you can alternate you can, you can do whatever you want. Yeah, I would like to not be on my own with this because I, like I said I, especially for a chunk of time in the fall. I'm going to be out of town every week for at least a couple days. And so you can decide to say oh we're going to have co chairs. You can do that. Right. Or chair and yeah. There's no directors report there's no directors report topics not anticipated by the chair, 48 hours meeting. Somehow I slipped up. And we didn't have the community assessment under all business, but the students are going to be presenting the community assessment data at the June meeting. And it's going to be about a 45 minutes, about 30 minute presentation and 15 minutes for question and answer. Steve George has sent a letter requesting a ban on gas mowers in the town. And I think we should defer that to July or August steves away this month and I believe he's away in June. And I think until you have a full compliment of people on the board. You, you, you can't take that up. And then there's just something I want to throw out for us and you to think about. We do have a statement on racism and public health. There's been a lot of issue nationally and then locally and we don't have any information. It's all out and it's going out for review. But in the graphic, there's an issue on lesbian gay bisexual trans queer plus issues in the school system. And not going to take on the school system, but the board might want to think of putting out a statement on the American public health calls it sexual and gender minorities, but you might. The board might want to think of making a statement on sexual and gender minorities and public health in the upcoming year. I don't know if people have any comments on it, but I'm sure you're aware of the graph, the article in the graphic and it's made front page news and NPR news to there's an issue in the middle school but I, as I said, I, that's separate from, I think a statement on LGBTQ plus or you can put in parentheses sexual and gender minorities and public health. So that I just wanted to throw out. And so there's nothing else. I have a question. Yes. So are you writing the letter to house this letter being generated. The letter to the town council. Yes, I'll write it. I'll write it tomorrow morning. And any other comments questions. If not may have a motion to adjourn our next meeting is June 8. 530. And second. Okay, so it's been moved and seconded adjourn. Prima law. I. Marie. Tim. Lauren. Nancy. Okay, so thank you very much. And we'll see you on June 8. Bye bye.