 Good morning, everyone. We'll do a roll call. Oh, not a roll call vote, not quite yet. Commissioner Cameron. Good morning. I'm here. Commissioner O'Brien. Good morning. Good morning. I'm here. Great. And we'll get started as, as you can see, we are using virtual connectivity today in order to meet governor Baker issued an executive order at the beginning of the pandemic that has allowed us to meet in this fashion. Since March 14th, and we've done so successfully. Today is June 3rd. And it is public meeting number 346. We'll get started with them. The minutes. Commissioner O'Brien. In the packet today or the meeting minutes from March 25th. 2021. I would move that the commission approved the minutes subject to any needs for changes for typographical errors or other non material. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Any comments today? I, I did have one Todd. Page six at 2.43, 43. The last line. And I believe the whole section says the commissioners agreed with giving a penalty to MGM. And for a straw vote or a consensus, I think there was discussion, but I don't believe that we had a statement that the commissioners all agreed with giving the penalty to MGM. As you know, IEP issued that penalty pursuant to the statutory authority. Commissioners, do you recall that discussion? This would be on the MGM time. Yeah, so I recall some of us did voice agreement, but there was not the entire commission who did so. Right, I think it just- No, I expressed agreement with it, but there was no vote. Yeah. So either we can go back and look at the language if commissioners want to be on the record of having agreed, but I don't believe that there was any point that I asked that there was agreement. Mr. Zuniga? I'm remembering that discussion, perhaps for the sake of a minute, we could state that there was some agreement. I don't remember explicitly agreeing, as you point out, Chair, but I do remember some agreement. Oh, yes, yes. I just didn't want there to be a suggestion that I asked for a consensus. Right. You could just take the, and Carrie and I talked about this when we were going through the minutes about how to phrase it, and maybe the better way to do it is instead of the commissioners agreed, say several commissioners agreed, and then it doesn't apply the region unanimity. Well, or you could say several stated their agreement as opposed to, because there may have been agreement just not stated. That's right. That sounds appropriate enough. Okay. Several stated their agreement. Yeah, I just didn't want there to be a suggestion that there was a vote. Okay. Then the other one is much more technical, just a reminder on process on 307, 38. I'm careful about this with our going into executive session. I think it says that I, I might have said that the commission is going into executive session, and of course it does require a majority vote. So sometimes I say anticipate, so it would like to go into executive session, but either one would be fine, but that's just a net and a reminder for our process that it takes a majority vote for us to go into executive session always. Okay. Thanks. I'm also on that. So I second the motion with those settings. Thank you. Anything else commissioners? Okay. Commissioner Cameron. Aye. Commissioner O'Brien. Aye. Commissioner Zunica. Aye. And I felt yes, four to zero. Excellent job on those. Thank you. Okay. Item number three, administrative update. And it looks like Karen might be at one-on-one federal today. I am. I am in the office today. So for item three, A, I'm going to turn it over to Austin Bupus, our digital communications coordinator, to just give you an update on some of the things that the communications department has been doing, particularly during the last year in COVID. So I'll turn it over to Austin. We're looking forward to them. Thanks. Good morning, everyone. Good morning. I'm going to share my screen real quick for a presentation. Can you all see this? Yeah. Cool. All right. So yeah, just like Karen said, this is just a quick little update based on what's kind of been going on the last, I guess since March of 2020 at this point, however many months that's been at this point. So yeah, we'll just start off with the COVID-specific kind of like messaging and everything that we've been working on. We've kind of built this COVID-dedicated webpage on our website at massgaming.com slash COVID-19. It's kind of housed all of our, whether it's commission related updates, whether it's any advisories from CVC, the governor's office, anything like that. It's kind of been up there and it's all time stamped with when it was updated over the last 15 months or whatever it's been, 16 months. And we've also uploaded all of our open meetings that we've done using remote collaboration technology through HD meeting. That's, I think it's 55 open meetings from March 14th, that Saturday meeting that we had up until before this meeting. And then if you factor in some of the agenda setting meetings that we were uploading throughout the time, some of the horse racing committee, some subcommittee on community mitigation, all those meetings into some other, whether it's like a research page tour, we had 87 videos uploaded total in that time span. And actually our viewership on those videos has gone up 8% when comparing the same March to December time span from 2019 to 2020. And I think it's particularly impressive just because at the same time, it's all kind of cumulative. So the stuff in 2019, those views are just gonna keep going up in 2020, if anyone goes back through our meeting archives and looks for a meeting from June 3rd, 2020, whatever that might have been for June 3rd, 2019. So just a good rise there. And then if you kind of compare for timeline's sake, the nine and a half months before the pandemic to that same span afterwards with that March 14th deadline is that kind of in between views went up 10%. So good, good rise there on press releases. This is how we've been distributing a lot of our information whether it last week with COVID-19 related updates or if it's a staffing update promotion or anything like that. That's kind of how we get the messaging out there to media contacts. We distributed 61 press releases in 2020. 51 of those released from that, like I said, that March 14th date to the end of the calendar year. So far in 2021, we've distributed 25 as of the media advisory that went out for this meeting today. And those press releases get shared through our website. Depending on the content, they'll go out through emails and on social media platforms, whether it's our Facebook or LinkedIn or Twitter, anything like that. And then away from the press releases, we also do blog posts on certain MGC initiatives or efforts or anything like that. Those might be a little more related to maybe staff updates if there's a speaking engagement that goes on or one of our staff members does something notable or impressive. We put that out, whether it's a request for public comment. We've obviously had a lot of updates and a lot of good stuff come from the community mitigation fund. So we've done some kind of like grant recipient spotlights in the past. Our research agenda, we expanded that webpage during the pandemic. So we've put out a lot related to that. And obviously our responsible gaming efforts and everything with RGW, PGAM, everything like that. So lots going on there. We've put out 44 blog posts away from press release since the start of the pandemic. So a lot of good volume there. And then all of that content kind of gets funneled into our newsletters each month. And since the start of the pandemic, we've put out 14 of those. We just put out our May newsletter last week on Thursday. Those newsletters go out to a wide variety of people. Some people have signed up through our website. Some are just stakeholders, whether it's licensees or media members or any contact lists that we may have. And that kind of all bundles together into this list of more than 5,000 people that get our newsletters. And our average open rate for all these newsletters is anywhere from 15 to 20%. The May one already had like a 16% open rate, which is pretty good. And then click rate hovers right around 9%, which is pretty solid as well. And then our social media channels is kind of, I guess, fueled by all of that content that I just said. So the press releases all go out through there. Any meeting notifications like for today went out through social media. We do Facebook events. We do LinkedIn posts. And obviously we have our YouTube factored into that. And we also manage the Game Sense social channels alongside the Mass Council. So we kind of maintain those through Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. We put out stuff at least once every day, sometimes more if it's RGW or PGAM. We kind of promote the availability of Game Sense advisors, the 24-hour helpline, voluntary self-exclusion, everything like that. Anything we can put out there to kind of spread the good word that our research and responsible gaming division is doing and that the Mass Council is doing. And then last, but certainly not least, we have the website, which is a beast on its own, MassGaming.com, which, like I said, houses that COVID-specific web page. But that has a lot of information about the MGC. More as a whole, it has kind of like the background information about where we've kind of come from and what we're doing. It has information about each of the licensees, houses all of our kind of meeting notifications and all that good stuff. And then, like I said, blog posts, press releases. Anything that we produce goes on the website in kind of a timely fashion. And then we work with each department for whether it's weekly updates, monthly updates for specific documents, whether it's like a budget or a vendor list. And revenue, of course. So yeah, kind of a brief overview, but that's all I have. And I will open up to any questions, I guess. Thank you so much, Austin. Do any of the commissioners have any questions, comments, anything for Austin? The commissioners didn't get first. Thank you. Yeah, thank you. Austin, thank you for this good summary. I'm wondering if you have also noticed or tracked or can get back to us at a later time on trends relative to social media, especially in the context of this last year. Did you get a sense that we have seen more likes or retweets? Let's say for less compared to last year, are there particular topics that end out as more engagement with the public? Yeah, I would say, obviously, big updates like last week would get more engagement as far as retweets and stuff. But anything that's kind of staffing related will get good engagement on LinkedIn. We've seen kind of audience definitely rise on LinkedIn and Facebook. And Twitter is kind of a tougher one. I think it's a little more like it's like the WeWO wear and wear out kind of thing if people are following for a specific update, like last week or anything like that, that's notable. They might pop in for a follow, and then they might unfollow, and it might just be a net zero type thing on that front. But definitely some good engagement across the board on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, everything like that. Thank you. Well, I know that it requires hard work, continuous work to continue those trends. And I know that you guys work on that all the time. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner Cameron? Yes, I just wanted to comment, actually, on Austin's. You know, you presented it like this is very typical, and it's really not. I think our website and our other methods of communication are extraordinary. Our really top shelf on the higher end of, and I won't compare it to other state agencies, but any kind of a business. I think we really do a good job, and I know I've received comments about that. So I continue to be impressed. I learned something today. I really like the fact that you're tracking the number of clicks and the number of folks who open, whether it be a newsletter, so you really have a way, what's effective and what's not. So that is really commendable. And although you presented it in a way that was like, hey, this is what we do, it really, it's noteworthy, and it's impressive. So thank you, and the whole team, much, much appreciated. Thank you. Commissioner O'Brien? Just also, Pat Austin on the back, that he's been, although Sarah's been here to help, he's been a unit of one throughout the pandemic. And so in addition to making it seem like, well, this is what we do in the broader sense. He's done a lot on his own with Sarah helping him out as necessary, but I just think he deserves an extra pat on the back for acknowledging that the we is kind of a royal we in that circumstance. So I thank you, Austin, because I know you've done a lot of this as a work well. Thank you to Sarah as well for all of her help. It's been a busy year at this point. Right. Right. Right. Thank you to both of you. Well, Austin, today's presentation reflects your thoroughness, and we really appreciate you putting together the slides. And as Commissioner Cameron points out, all the metrics, it's really important for us to be able to see that. I know 9% click rate is, as you said, solid. So congratulations on that. No, Austin, you've gone through the transition of different leadership during this time as well. And I know that you have felt fully supported, of course, from Ryan Lane and Sarah. And in turn, they have fully appreciated the contribution you make. So we are appreciative of your work. We also know Austin and Sarah have worked very closely with all of the team. This really takes a cross-departmental effort. And from the revenue reports every month to, of course, working with IEB and Bruce Loretta during the pandemic and getting all those reports and working with HR when you're getting out new postings. So the communications department has been there every step of the way. And as Commissioner Cameron points out, you've done that, established that excellent process from the start. Our website really is an archive. And I know that people go there to really learn about the work that the commission has been doing from the start. So thanks. This is really fun, really good, a good report to start our day today. So thank you. Thank you guys. Yeah, super impressive, Austin. Thank you so much. And commissioners, for the next agenda items were ties into this. I really wanted to say a big thank you to Sarah Magazine. I know she's on here. I don't know if she has a camera on or not. But I wanted to just acknowledge that Sarah came in at a tough time. We had COVID. Elaine had left to go do her Bradford fellowship. So she came in for a contract here and came in and just really hit the ground running. She was seamless as far as execution of what needed to be done at the agency. And to you, Sarah, I just want to say personally, I really appreciated your expertise, your professionalism, and in particular, your savvy. So really, Kathy described her today before she came on board that she's a pro. And she really is. So I wanted to say thank you. Although we've never met in person because we've done all our meetings, the HD meeting. And I feel like I know you, I miss you. Going forward, Sarah will be working at her agency, doing what she does best. So I know she'll be very successful there. But I just wanted to say thank you, a big thank you on behalf of the team. Elaine will return on Monday. There will be an overlap for a week or at least a week. And we know where to find you, Sarah. But I really wanted to say thank you and just really appreciate it, all you've contributed to the whole team over the last year. So thank you, Ella, give Kathy first a chance to chime in because I know you're Kathy from before and give the commissioners a chance to chime in. But thank you, Sarah. Yeah, it's funny to me that our team hasn't met you in person, Sarah. But I'm hoping that that can be rectified. You know, perhaps there'll be an in-person celebration of some sort when we do get to return to the office and we'll make sure that you're on the invite list. Sarah probably was turning on her video as she was also managing her children's care, her children's school, her company and all of us. So there she is as Karen said, we were really fortuitous. I don't know if the team knows, but just by chance, I had a lunch with Sarah and I had a strong inkling that Elaine might become a Bradford fellow. And I happened to see, I just learned that Sarah might be in a transition time. So when in fact, Elaine did get the Bradford fellowship, we did make a call and it worked out for Sarah to come on and contract and it was seamless for us because as I said, you're such a pro. It's lucky enough to work with you in the past. Your reputation precedes you. You've had big, big roles and overnight stepped into this role, learning gaming, learning the language, picking up on all of the team's needs, the commissioner's needs and I had confidence that would all happen. You've been able to maintain the excellence of the communications department that Elaine built. You were very respectful of that and I wasn't surprised by that, Sarah, that you would honor Elaine's work, but you also made the work yours too and you brought different insights that were really important. And I know that Austin is a beneficiary of getting to see you work as well as having worked with Elaine. So for that, I'm thankful and really excited about what you're launching. It's going to be exciting for you and exciting for your family and we wish you the very, very best. I know that next week, you and Elaine will work together and I think that's actually going to be a treat for the two of you. So you'll hear about her year. You'll share with her your year and who would have ever guessed that it would be during a pandemic, but we're sure lucky that you were able to step up. Looking forward to seeing you in person too. Absolutely. Commissioners. I'll just pipe in and say really quickly, thank you, lots of fun to work with you all and you have a real pro in Austin. Yes. Keep that guy busy. Yes, we will. Commissioners. And she's gone. And she's back. Commissioners, Commissioner Cameron. Yeah, just a quick thank you. I think, Chair, you used the right term when you said seamless. That's what it felt like the last year, that we did not have to train someone, we did not have to worry about can this person interpret this properly and help us with any of our issues. I know I needed your assistance on just a couple of occasions, but it was important. And I felt really comfortable with the advice and I knew you are a true professional and it just made all of our lives easier for the last year because when you lose someone as talented as Elaine for the year, it could be, you never know what comes up with the gaming commission, right? We stopped using the term steady state a while ago because it just doesn't happen. So I just, just a real thank you. It just made all of our lives easier and the professional work that you do was really apparent to me. And I look forward to meeting you in person one of these days. So thanks again. Michelle Bryan. Sure, I guess I had my weeks off. I was thinking, it was a little in denial. I thought we had a couple more weeks before Sarah who was coming. So, again, the unit of two, they carried us through this whole thing and it was pretty remarkable and the continuity and the sameness that you guys talk about, I definitely felt. And bonding with Sarah too, over having kids walk in the middle of a screen, it's always nice to have somebody in the situation that you're in and doing her job as well as she did it. So I wish you luck, Sarah, with everything personal and professional. And yeah, I hope to meet you in person someday. And commissioners in again. Thank you. And the only problem with going last is that some of the great points have already been made. I echo everything that's been said, the seamlessness, your professionalism, your great instincts that we had with Elaine were really useful with you. You came at a particularly challenging time, and not that we have not had challenges in the past, but for obvious reasons, the inability to meet at the office and continue the work that we also seamlessly, in many ways have done, was aided by the likes of you and others. So thank you for all the great work. And I do also wanna look forward to the opportunity to meet in person and chat and whatnot. So thank you, Sarah. Okay, so the next item on the agenda is the on-site casino updates. So I'll turn that over to Loretta and Bruce. Okay, good morning. And we are really switching gears now. Yes. So it's been a little over a week since the commission rescinded its COVID related orders to the gaming establishments and, of course, the licensees that are still subject to the governor's orders and public health guidance. The gaming agents have been our eyes and ears on the properties, and I'm just gonna turn it right over to Assistant Director Ban to give you a summary of operations over the past week. Morning. My updates pretty much is where we stand at each casino. I will state that Jackie from Encore held true, and they did have a champagne toast at midnight that went over very well at Encore. Some people even commented it was more exciting than the grand opening. Encore, at this point, has 200 and table gains up with all Plexiglas removed. They have all their slot machines operating with no Plexiglas. Center bar is open. And the memoir will have it soft open on June 4th, and grand reopening on June 11th. Occupancy restrictions have been lifted and restored to building capacity. PPC is in the process of repairing and bringing games up as a 10. Plexiglas remains unchanged. The revolution bar is open on Friday and Saturday nights. Flutees remains closed. Temperature and facial scans have been removed from the entrances. Occupancy restrictions have been lifted and restored to building capacity. MGM, table gains Plexiglas has been removed. Soda stations are pending reopening. The casino entrances are still only two entrances and they're being kind of sent through the securities checkpoints. Smoking patios have been open. Slots are about 80% have been opened and do not have Plexiglas. They have a walkup bar is open seven days a week. Island bars open Friday and Saturdays and class bar is open during special events. Masks are about 50-50 when people come on the floor. And that's pretty much my report on the casinos. Everything seems to be going pretty well transition-wise. The casinos have been 100% cooperative. Everything's been going rather well. If I can add a note about outdoor plans, we are in communication with the licensees about their outdoor plans. And MGM in particular is doing its outdoor concert series where they have free concerts on Friday evening in their plaza area. As the summer progresses, they want to have a beer and wine available for sale and Nikesha, our licensing chief, is working with their compliance director on a special events license that could allow them to do that. So I just wanted to update you on that as well. Questions for Bruce and Nevada? No. No? Oh, can you show us again? Yeah, thanks, Bruce. And then, Loretta, for that update, I'm curious if you've noticed whether that 50-50 mask wearing cuts the same ratio between the public and employees. I know this could be totally anecdotal, but I wonder if there's more employees, let's say, that are without masks or with masks, or if that just seems like it's the same for both sets. It seems like most of the employees have been vaccinated. So I think there are a few employees still wearing masks on the floor. Matter of fact, PPCC is now going through a vaccine program where there are bonuses being added to the employees' paycheck for getting vaccinated as well. But at MGM and Encore, a high percentage of their employees have already been vaccinated. You don't see a lot of masks being worn by employees at this point. Right. So, Bruce, to follow up with Commissioner Zuniga's question, so when you said 50-50 mask wearing, was that for all three properties and really was that patrons then that you were speaking about? Yes. All three? Yes. It's my on scientific sampling, whenever I go to grocery stores, I've started to notice the same, a similar ratio, but I started to try to pay attention between whether there's a difference between employees and the public. And I haven't really seen much of a difference. I suspect there's also a comfort level because I've seen people that I know are vaccinated that prefer to continue to wear their masks, which is entirely better, prerogative and fun. Commissioner Cameron, Commissioner Brown, do you have questions? Commissioner Brown. Did they leave any plexiglass up? And if they did, is anyone using those or are they all gravitating to the other tables? At Encourt, they removed it all off the tables and the slots. MGM removed it off the tables. It seemed like when they were taking off the tables, the patrons almost helped them remove it off the tables. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a spandex, really, what can I say? Nope, they tried to walk off of the souvenir. Yeah, PPC hasn't removed any of their plexiglass at this point, but a lot of the machines have been placed in configurations that are kind of like rounded. So they still have that social distancing and stuff going on. So that's the way it is. Yep, okay, thank you. You're welcome. And you also mentioned that MGM has restored its smoking area. Yeah, and so is Encore on the outside, yeah. They're both outside, but patrons want that, unfortunately, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And then it appears that PPC is removing its plexiglass more slowly. Yeah, and bringing up their machines, they have a little bit of a staffing shortage in the slot areas. So they're slowly but surely bringing that back up. Great, excellent, thank you. Any, nothing further? Oh, so you're all set, Commissioner? Okay, good. Thank you, Loretta. Thank you, Bruce. Karen. Okay, so the next item on the agenda, just as a discussion for the commissioners to give me some feedback on what we should do with our COVID workspace guidelines. As you're aware, the DPH issued a revised mask advisory for the Commonwealth that was effective May 29th on this Saturday. As a result, the executive branch guidelines were updated for their employees. Generally, the executive branch indicated that for their staff who are fully vaccinated, they no longer need to wear a mask or wear masks or face coverings while in the workplace. Employees who are not fully vaccinated still must wear a mask or a face covering at all times except we're in a private office alone. Employees will not be required to submit proof of their vaccination status to forego use of a mask or face covering in the workplace. However, employees who are reporting to work at another organization's facility must comply with all policies and procedures related to use of masks, social distancing, et cetera from that facility. So that's the framework for what the executive branch is doing. Employees who are not fully vaccinated and are seeking an accommodation must meet with HR. These employees must have a mutually agreed upon accommodation prior to removing a mask or face covering in the workplace. So that's the setup for the executive branch. So we're looking to get some feedback from the commission on what we should do. We did have a meeting with our internal working group which included Commissioner Cameron, our general counsel, our deputy director, Loretta Lilios, and as well as Tricky Bander from HR and our CFO, Derek Lennon. So there are some options we can consider internally. We could follow the governor's guidance that is certainly the most consistent with what we've been doing all along and there is the backing of BPH on the science on that. We could also follow the licensees protocols. They've taken an initiative where they created incentives for employees to get their vaccines and submit proof. And so they are collecting information about the vaccine and whether their employees have been vaccinated and then employees who are not fully vaccinated or have chosen not to submit proof of vaccination status will still be required to wear masks while in the workplace. There's also a more conservative approach we could take. The HR department reached out to Northeast Human Resources Association members and the majority of responses they received were that they were slowly starting to return staff to the workplace and they will continue to require the use of masks or face coverings while moving around the office in the common areas regardless of vaccination status. They're not asking for proof of vaccines either voluntarily or as a mandate and they're continuing to monitor that. So we had an internal discussion on this. It's challenging because we wanna do the right thing and this is a transition period. I think the recommendation from the group is that we follow the governor's guidance. It seems to be the most logical piece. We've been doing that all along and that's what's going on with respect to state government across the state. However, we do recognize that individuals might have concerns. So we really would like that sort of safety valve where individuals who are concerned or maybe have some issues, they can contact HR and that we will or me or their supervisor and they'll get the word up and we'll work with them and we'll figure out some kind of solution so that folks feel comfortable. Right now the casinos are open, racing is open. So the folks that work at those properties are going to work on a daily basis. The Boston office, there's just a few people coming in and out. I'm here today. It was interesting to me today. The building has changed their policy. We got a notice yesterday. So when I came into the office, we didn't have to do the temperature check when you come in downstairs. You didn't have to have the best screen where you show that you're wearing a mask. There's very few people in the office. I expect that we can adjust how many people are in the office between now and September when the plan is to reopen the offices generally. So I'll open that up for also for any members of this working group, Rupert, Eric, Todd, Retta or Commissioner Cameron are tripped due to time in. My expectation is that there may be certain operational efficiencies. For example, we're learning that having one person at a time coming into the racing building might be a good thing. That's just operational. I will leave that to the discretion of, for example, the racing director, we may have learned some things. They may not necessarily be COVID protocols. They may actually just be operational. This actually works better. So individually, we may implement those, but that's generally where we are right now. The suggestion is that we also speak to the HR department and have them do a survey and check in with our employees and get some information back. And then we group in front of the commission with some of the feedback and see where we are in two weeks. What we've learned through this pandemic is that we have to be, the word is nimble, we have to be flexible, and we have to be able to adjust. And if this works, the system works great. If the commission wants to do something different, we can hold off for a little while, but that's sort of the beginning of the discussion here. And we certainly want to hear from our employees and see what their concerns are, and then that can inform any future decisions. That's kind of where we are near. I don't know, you know, I know Derek's on the call. I know Derek, if you have any other comments or any other pieces that I may have missed in this discussion so far. I think you covered the conversation pretty well. You summarized a longer discussion that we had pretty succinctly. And you know, it's not an easy call. That's why we're making a recommendation and hoping for some input. Commissioner Cameron, do you want to chime in your on the working group? Yes, I went into that meeting pretty open-minded about what our path forward should look like, but it was a very informed discussion and you know, conversation about other state agencies and conversations about some of our employees and how they were feeling. And I did come away at the end of that meeting believing we have been served well by the governor's directives based on public health, the science. And I continue to believe that that's the proper way for us to go moving forward. You know, some of the, as Director Wells mentioned some of the operational decisions which may have a dual purpose, right? They are operational, they're working really well, make an appointment in to the racing office, you know, get it done or wait until it's free. I think people are really liking that and I think it makes our employees feel safer not to have a long line inside a small building. So I think, you know, it was interesting to hear all of these conversations, but I agree with the recommendation that we continue to follow. But I also like the idea of a survey is important to know what our folks are thinking, you know, and take that into consideration as well. And, you know, the ability to contact HR if you have a specific concern, is there a way to work through that? That's an important piece as well. So really good teamwork and I'm in full agreement with the recommendation. And this is a sign that we also had Director Leipa in that group for special concerns with racing because it is a different entity. So she's also available with any questions with respect to racing. Commissioner Zinnico, Commissioner O'Brien, do you have questions for Karen and Commissioner Cameron? I'll go, since I'm muted first, I mean. It's a race. I raise you to be on mute. No, I just do agree on the recommendation as Commissioner Cameron is saying. I think it's pulled out. I think as well as Karen said, we need to be flexible. We cannot possibly, perhaps, anticipate every individual, you know, circumstances. Let's say I think that we would need to, I'd like to hear from our employees in the form of a survey. But I suspect we will also hear via HR from whoever may need a special accommodation for whatever reason, whether that's the particular situation at home or the comfort level relative to whatever the case may be. So with that in mind, I think the governor's guidelines provide a really good framework. I suspect that there will be, as I was saying earlier, some mask wearing, even for those who are already vaccinated. I think there's more acceptance, less stigma of all those things, being next to somebody or interacting or passing by with or without a mask. And that becomes a little bit more of a comfort level that each of us have with the situation around us, not just in the office, but the level of vaccination, vaccine hesitancy, et cetera. So I agree with the recommendation. I look forward to eventually seeing some people in the office whoever find that it's okay to go and the work allows them to. There is one other point of clarification, and they turn this over to Derek to clarify, because the issue of folks at the casinos, whether they're considered casino employee protocols or are protocol. So Derek, if you wanna just chime in and further explain that, I think that would be helpful. Yeah, this is a point of discussion for a little bit of time in the group. And we did go back and forth on this. So the governor's policy does state that if you're an employee going into another entity's workplace, you follow their rules. So that makes sense in most instances. However, in the casino, there are two rules, one for the public and one for the employees. So when we were looking at which rule should we follow, generally we're going to ask our employees to follow the rules for the public, because they're not casino employees, they're MGC employees, and asking that they don't receive an incentive like the casino employees do for self identifying. They don't interact as much as the casino employees do with the guests. So we came down on the lines of they should have the same benefits as a public when they go into those facilities. Now that's something we hope to hear some feedback on from the survey, because we did spend quite a bit of time discussing which one is the correct way to go. But that's one area of clarification and we wanted to make sure that people did understand that, you know, no one at their casino as far as the casino's HR or staff should be coming up to our employees and asking them if they've been vaccinated, if they don't have a mask on, because that goes directly against the governor's order which we're following, as well as how the public is treated there. So I have a question on that, Derek, without doing a side-by-side, without, I haven't done a side-by-side comparison, would you say that the rules for the public at the casinos, which really the rules for the public anywhere are less conservative than the rules that we're imposing on ourselves at our workplace? Or are they the same? No, they're pretty much the same. It's the honor system. It really is. There's nothing other than that. It would just be that there's no requirement to reveal your vaccination status and they're not gonna receive them, but there's no other difference, correct? Well, there's no other difference. However, in the governor's memo, he also said the staff should not be policing one another. So, you know, that's a big thing we wanna say. It is the honor system. There is a huge integrity part to our team, you know, that we're all about integrity and in our actions and how we carry ourselves both in the workplace as well as outside of the workplace. So that's a pretty serious thing. There is, under the frequently asked questions of the governor's notification to employees, how to handle if you think someone isn't complying with the order properly, you don't address them, you bring your concerns to HR. And then just like any other issue, HR will figure the best way to handle that, that way the employees are policing each other, so to speak. So can I make a suggestion then? It sounds as though we really want our, let's say the gaming agents because they're at the casinos and to not be subject to the casino employees rules, the governor's policy says if you're outside your workplace, you are in line with whatever is in place there. But it sounds as though if we say they have the, they operate in accordance with the public rules, we're giving up on some of the provisions that apply to employee status. Can we do like a combo there, Karen, rather than saying they operate like the public rules? Well, I mean, the way I'm looking at it is Derek point, it's an integrity issue. So for the employees, they have to, for example, an employee at Encore would have to show proof of vaccination. Oh, okay, so that's not the question. No, no, I think I'm just saying our rules is if the rules that are applied in 101 federal, we really want them to also apply to our employees who are on the gaming floor, the gaming agents. And if we say that because I think the governor's policy says, if you're outside of the workplace, you have to comply with the rules there and you've made a decision in public versus casino for the reasons that you just said, but we don't really want them to operate just like a member of the public because we really want them to also operate as the employee rules. So can we just say our rules apply there because they're more stringent than public rules because they have employee provisions there? Yeah, we can word that. So we didn't word it in the memo, right? Because it's a distinctive area. But yeah, we can come up with some further guidance that you're not subject to the rules. That you're not subject to the casinos, the employee's provisions. However, you are still subject to the exact and updated guidance. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That's helpful. Thank you. Absolutely. So an example of that maybe where the, Marianne asked me the other day, should we still be doing the survey for people that are coming into the Boston now for people coming into work? I think that's a good idea. And I think we should keep that. So that would be an example, I think of what Kathy's talking about, sort of some additional protections that we have in place that are not part of the governor's order. Is that what you're talking about, Kathy? Well, I think it was more of what Derek just pointed out in the governor's or if we follow the governor's framework, there are issues around, you know, how you treat each other as employees, right? We'd want that to carry over to the gaming agents. And if we only said that they're subject to the public's rule. Oh, I see what you're saying. You're giving up those employee-related provisions. So sorry, I'm not articulating it that well. No, I understand what you're saying. Yes, the communication to staff, there's a consensus with the commission here today, is who would parallel the governor's order, which is for employees versus the public. Yes, I hear what you're saying. Perfect, okay. Definitely get why they don't follow the casino employees. So it doesn't, I don't think we're expecting a vote today, but it sounds as though, Commissioner O'Brien, yeah. No, I just have a couple of questions or comments. One, I'm very curious about the employee survey because I do think that would answer questions for me. Yeah. There are no people who are on certain medications or in certain conditions where even getting vaccinated, they don't get their protections or they get maybe a 25% protection as opposed to 95. I have concerns about wanting to work in office where maybe nobody wouldn't, and I'm hoping if we have that kind of thing that we can accommodate people. Advice is the point, Owen. The other concern I have in terms of this, the gaming agents, et cetera, and this is where I thought you were gonna go, Kathy, when you asked the question too, which is it's one thing to say, behave like the public out on the floor, follow our rules back in our space to the extent that our people might be behind, yeah, back in the house. Do we ask them to comply with the licensee requirements in that regard? Or do we ask them to mask up? I mean, that's just something to think about whether we've gotten feedback from them in terms of it doesn't happen very often, but if for whatever reason, we have people back up house and at both borders and they're functioning in a different set of rules, I just want everybody comfortable with that. I mean, I think for the masking piece, nobody in our office who is not fully vaccinated should be walking around without a mask, period. So it doesn't matter whether or not they- But there was proof. No, but I mean, I'm saying, but there's a level of comfort at the licensees, some of them that their fellow employees, they know have provided proof. And so it is going to a level of faith when you're talking about arms. I realize maybe a de minimis interaction, but it's just something to think about in terms of whether it does cause any distress in terms of licensees. Any employee of ours could wear a mask and that doesn't necessarily mean you're not vaccinated or you have a medical issue or a religious issue. It just means you're wearing a mask. Yeah. No, I'm just saying whether there's somebody on the licensee employee side, back up house, may say that I don't really know. I know my coworkers have had proof. I'm going on faith on this one. So just something to be mindful of as we go forward. Right, right. Yeah. I think the one message that I'd suggest for folks as they, you know, as Troop D and Derek work with everyone coming back into the office, going to work at the casinos, at the racing divisions, no judgment. If you want to keep on wearing your mask, you keep on wearing your mask. And if you should, and we expect you to wear a mask if you're not fully vaccinated for your well-being of not just yourself, but for everyone. But there's no judgment. You know, and the great thing is that we've learned that asking is very, very effective. So, but it sounds like we have generally, Commissioner Cameron, thank you for your work on a group. Sounds like we have a consensus in terms of going with option number one, the governor's framework. And then everybody likes the idea of a survey. Do you think, I think in your memo, Karen, you recommended just two weeks. Do you want a little bit longer time? Well, we were, again, Troop D may want to chime in on this. I mean, we were thinking we'd give it a little time, you know, maybe a week, five to seven days to get, just sort of get, people get a sense of how that's operating. But we wanted enough time to process the information and get it back to the commission at the commission meeting on the 17th. So that's why we put in that intro. Do you think that's enough time or do you want to go to the, I guess it would be the first meeting in July? Do you want- Yeah, I guess my concern is I don't, because we haven't had the results yet, if there is some concern, we'd want the opportunity to bring it and bring it up and we may have to make some modifications to the policy. That's the only reason. So at least do an interim report back in two weeks. And then if you need more time to- Exactly. Survey further, you'll go further out. Does that, and Amike, you're agreeing? Right. Yeah, I was going to say that it's, I'm not a big fan of giving too much time for survey responses, even though you might merit it at a later time, depending on the response. And try to get as many responses in the short term as possible, which this timeframe would accomplish that, hopefully. Good. Okay. People have been very forthcoming with responding to these surveys and that's been good feedback for us throughout the last year and a half or so. And that's where we've been able to make some decisions on what staff is looking for. So if we don't have enough information in two weeks, we'll let you know and that we need more time or we'll let you know what suggestions that we have. Excellent. Especially if it's a survey, as I get the impression that there will be just a small set of questions, two, three open, one open and a question, et cetera. Great. Okay. So Derrick, I'll connect with you. We should send something out to the whole staff today, just updating them on this, learning them to the survey and indicating we'll regroup with the commission in two weeks and see where we are. All right. Very helpful. Now I appreciate the help on this. You know, we're in uncharted territory. So, you know, we're just, we're all trying to do the best that we can and do the right thing. And, you know, we're open to any comments or suggestions for the staff. And we will see how this works and update you on the next meeting. Really thoughtful work. Thank you. Oh, Dr. Mike Brown. Good morning. Good morning. I just wanted to make sure that we have, we do have racing this afternoon and we're okay to go ahead and start following the governor's guidelines for racing this afternoon. That would be my recommendation along the commission's fine with that. You know, the suggestion, the memo was, you know, whatever you decide, we'll do that effective immediately. It just may get a little time. Derrick and Tripp, you could help me drafting of something to send out, you know, during the course of the day today. But Alex, you could communicate that to your team. Yes. Thank you. All right, great. Good luck today, Dr. Lightbaum. Thank you. Okay, so that's all I have for the administrative update. So thank you all very much for the help. It's been an interesting ride. So we're making progress as we go. So I think it's a good sign that we're doing some of these positive things. Thank you. And thanks to Commissioner Cameron. All right, moving on to item number four. We've got the legal division. Oh, I'm sorry, Director Olioz. Yes, I have one comment. I just received an update. So kind of going back to three C on our onsite updates because we did address the nightclub at Encore in the updates and we did just receive word that they will not be having their soft opening this weekend. After all, apparently staffing issues is what was communicated to us, but the plan is to go live three nights next week. I don't have any further information at this point, but did want to update you that this weekend is apparently canceled for the nightclub. Okay, and we'll follow up. Yeah, it might want to just check in with Sarah on that in case the news caught that. They haven't held on for this update, so thank you. You know what, I think that we're going to, we are on time thanks to Marianne, but we're just going to take a five minute break and we'll come back to the legal division. Let's see. It is 11 o'clock, we'll come back at, 11 or two, we'll come back at 11, 10, thanks. Reconvening a public meeting number 346 and we'll do a real call, confirm we're all here. Commissioner Cameron. Yeah, I'm here. Commissioner O'Brien. Yep, I'm here. And Commissioner Zanaga. Here. Here, so we're all set to go, starting with item number four of our agenda today, legal division, good morning, General Counsel Grossman. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. Without further ado, I'd like to turn this presentation over to our in-house expert on the Public Records Law Associate General Counsel, Carrie Teresee, who has taken the lead on preparing this presentation. Thank you. Good morning, Madam Chair and commissioners. I'm just going to share my screen here. All right, did we get it? Sorry, I have a couple. I'm new to the two screens. Is the PowerPoint up for you? We can see it. Yes, we can see it. Okay, great. Okay, perfect. All right, so I'm going to present to you today an overview of the Public Records Law and how the legal department handles requests for public records in compliance with the law. So generally, the Public Records Law presumes that all records in the possession, custody, or control of a public agency are public documents and must be disclosed if requested unless they fall within a specific exemption or are protected by the attorney-client privilege. I'll get into those exemptions and the issue of attorney-client privilege in some later slides. It's important to remember that a public record within the meaning of the Public Records Law doesn't just mean a document. This could be written documents, photographs, videos, emails, text messages, voice mails, even databases, things like that. It's really just any records that's held by the agency. There are a number of exemptions to the Public Records Law and I've included here the ones that tend to apply the most often to records that are requested from the commission. There are more exemptions than on this slide. I'm just gonna hit some of the key ones here. So the statutory exemption applies to records that are specifically or by necessary implication exempted from disclosure by statute. So this would be where a specific statute expressly states that certain information is not a public record. This includes things like criminal offender record information and also includes information covered by the commission's nondisclosure agreements with its licensees. This is a topic that I'll get into in some more detail in a later slide as well. The privacy exemption applies to personnel and medical files or information and other materials or data relating to a specifically named individual the disclosure of which may constitute an unwarranted invasion of personal privacy. This exemption really has two prongs. The first one is related to personnel or medical info. This would include things like employment applications, performance evaluations, records related to discipline, related to promotions or terminations and would also include any health information pertaining to a particular individual that we might have in our possession. The information or document is not exempt, however, if the record doesn't permit identification of a particular individual. So there might be instances where we would be able to redact a document to remove any information that would identify the individual and then we could release it in a redacted form. It's really just dependent on what sort of information is in the document and we would handle that on a case-by-case basis. The second prong of the privacy exemption relates to records that implicate privacy interests. This one is a bit more subjective and requires a balancing of the public's right to know against the relevant privacy interests at stake. Factors to consider in determining whether this exemption might apply include whether disclosure would result in personal embarrassment to an individual of normal sensibilities. That's the term that the Secretary of State's office uses. Whether the materials contain intimate details of a highly personal nature and whether the same information is available from other sources. So information that might fall into this category could include things like marital status, the identity of fathers of children, medical conditions, welfare payments, alcohol, use of consumption, family issues or reputation. When we think about the privacy exemption, it's important to note as well that public employees have a diminished expectation of privacy in matters relating to their public employment. So the public would have greater access to information that relates to someone's public employment than to their private activities. So for example, we all know a public employee's salary is public record, but for example, the source or amount of private income generally wouldn't be a public record. The Deliberative Process Exemption applies to agency memoranda or letters relating to policy positions being developed by the agency, but does not apply to reasonably completed factual studies or reports on which the development of such policy positions has been or may be based. This exemption is intended to avoid the release of materials that could paint the deliberative process if prematurely disclosed. Its application is generally limited to recommendations on legal and policy matters found within an ongoing deliberative process that are included in agency memoranda or letters. So factual reports, which are reasonably complete would not fall within this exemption, but for example, a memorandum to the commission advising on the ongoing development of the potential policy position that the commission intends to take on a particular topic would fall within this exemption. In that instance, it would only be exempt as long as the deliberative process is ongoing and once that sort of policy position has been taken and becomes public, the exemption would no longer apply to these types of memoranda. The personal notes exemption is pretty straightforward. This one applies to notebooks and other materials prepared by a public employee which are personal to that employee and not maintained as part of the files of the agency. So whether you keep a physical notebook, you keep personal notes on your desktop and you just use Word or you take notes in software like OneNote or some other kind of software. As long as the notes are personal to you and you don't share them with other employees and you don't sort of put them into the agency files, those remain exempt from disclosure as well. The investigatory exemption applies to investigatory materials necessarily compiled out of the public view by law enforcement or other investigatory officials, the disclosure of which would probably so prejudice the possibility of effective law enforcement that such disclosure would not be in the public interest. This exemption is particularly relevant to the MGC in the context of IEB investigation given that the IEB is designated as a law enforcement agency under chapter 23K. And the intent here is to protect information that could compromise or compromise an investigation if disclosed, but it's not a blanket exemption. So to apply the exemption, you need to demonstrate a prejudice to investigative efforts. For example, information relating to an ongoing investigation could be withheld if disclosure could alert an individual or an entity being investigated of the activities of the investigative officials. Confidential investigative techniques could also be withheld indefinitely if disclosure were deemed to be prejudiced or prejudicial to future law enforcement activities. So in the context of the IEB, this might come up where it would apply to things like witness names or statements. And generally, this one, this is always reviewed on a case-by-case basis. All right, so we'll get a little bit into discussing non-disclosure agreements. And the commission has entered into non-disclosure agreements with its licensees to protect material or information that the licensee considers a trade secret or believed would be detrimental to the licensee if it were made public. Each of the NDAs has three main components. There's a section of recitals that really runs through the law that allows for these NDAs to exist. The second section lists the information and materials that are covered by the NDA. So this can be specific materials or information or it can be more broad categories of materials or information. So examples in our NDAs are things like board of director meeting minutes, daily revenue numbers, daily surveillance logs, system of internal controls, parts of incident reports that implicate surveillance or security and video recordings or photos obtained from the licensee security system. That's the second part of each NDA. The third part is really the contractual agreement between the parties. So as I mentioned earlier, material covered by the NDA, by an NDA between the commission and the licensee falls under the statutory exemption to the public records law and would therefore be exempt from disclosure. Section 21a7 of chapter 23k essentially says that any information or reports or parts thereof that are required to be filed or otherwise submitted to or obtained by the commission that contain material or information that the licensee considers a trade secret or believes would be detrimental to the licensee if it were made public, may be identified as confidential by the licensee and the licensee may request that the commission enter into an NDA agreeing not to release that specified material publicly. So that would be the statute that brings the statutory exemption into play and allows for the withholding of material covered by the NDA. In terms of the process as it relates to NDAs and public records requests, whenever we receive a public records request, we review that could potentially implicate any NDA. We review the relevant NDA to determine if their requested information falls within its scope. Generally we'll do this if we receive any sort of request that's for any material related to one of the licensee where we know it's something we might have received from them. So the legal team does meet regularly and one of the things that we speak about at each meeting is any pending public records request. So we always discuss any sort of tricky requests or responses and we always discuss any that may relate to an NDA. If it seems that responsive records would be covered by the NDA, we reach out to the licensee to put them on notice that we received the request. This gives them time to take any legal action that they might be necessary to quash the request if they so choose. Sometimes at this point, even if something is technically covered by the NDA the licensee may say that it's okay to release. We had this happen in a couple of years ago. We had received a request for surveillance footage from the licensee garages and we reached out to the licensee to notify them of the request. And ultimately they said that it was okay to release the footage despite the fact that it would technically be covered by the NDA. In terms of the actual response to the requester if they've requested documents or information that are covered by the NDA, we would withhold the document or if possible, we would redact the information that's protected by the NDA and give out the document in redacted form. A good example of this is incident reports. So parts of incident reports that implicate security or surveillance are covered by the NDA. Incident reports that come from the licensee system. So we do often receive requests for these and we're able to redact them so that no security or surveillance procedures are revealed and release them in that way. In these cases, we typically send the redacted document to the licensee before it's sent out to the requester so that they have an opportunity to raise any concerns that they might have so that our redactions haven't complied with the NDA. So I mentioned attorney-client privilege earlier as well. Sure, we're all familiar with this but in terms of the public records law, communications between government entities or agency staff and their counsel undertaken for the purpose of obtaining legal advice or assistance are protected under the ordinary rules of the attorney-client privilege and are exempt from disclosure under the public records law. This actually was not always the case or it wasn't as always so clear. There was an SJC case in 2007, public construction that made this explicitly clear that there is an attorney-client privilege under the public records law. So when we would hold records based on a claim attorney-client privilege, we do provide a privilege law which includes a detailed description of each record including the names of the author and recipient and the subject matter. This seems to, it tends to happen the most with emails so we would include, you know, sender recipient and the general subject line. All right, so it's hard to believe that this was four years ago now but the last time the public records law was updated was in 2017. So we thought we'd include just some of those key changes here. The changes of that time required agencies to designate a records access officer who would be responsible for generally coordinating responses to requests and reporting certain information to the secretary of state on an annual basis. So for the commission, that's me, I am our records access officer. There is a database into which we enter certain information about each request we receive and we're required to do this on an annual basis. This includes things like the subject matter of their request and whether their request was appealed. The 2017 changes also changed the required response time from 10 calendar days to 10 business days. I'll address this in a bit more detail in a later slide. Set new parameters for the assessment of fees and I'll discuss fees in a bit more detail later as well. They required certain information to be included in any response letter that's not immediately providing records or that's not providing records within that initial 10 business day response time. So I'll go into more detail about that as well. And required a privilege log for any documents withheld or redacted based on a claim of attorney client privilege, which I just discussed. Can I ask a quick question, Carrie? So that privilege log, is that only for attorney clients so that doesn't include any other claims of exemptions? It's just for attorney client privilege? It's just for attorney client privilege. When we apply other exemptions, we're supposed to identify generally what documents we're withholding and how we're applying the exemption, but it doesn't need to be in a log form or quite as specific as the attorney client privilege log. Thank you, I appreciate it. All right, so we'll get into the process a bit of actually responding to requests. We are required to respond to all public requests within 10 business days of receipt. There are different types of responses that what we might be providing in that time depending on how voluminous the request is or how easy it is to locate the records or things like that. So we might be able to provide all responsive records within the 10 business days and close out the request. We might be providing some records and withholding or redacting others. We might be providing some records and we might need guidance from the requester on narrowing the scope or understanding the scope of another portion of the request or we might not be providing any records within that 10 business day timeframe. So if records are produced and any documents are withheld or redacted, the response letter needs to specifically identify the information or documents that we've withheld and the applicable provisions. And as I mentioned before, if any documents are withheld or redacted based on a claim of attorney's client privilege, the log must be included with the response. All right, so if we're not providing records within the 10 business day window, I think there's a common misconception that the 10 business day response time window only requires that we communicate with the requester in some way, but that's really not the case. If we are not producing records within that 10 business day timeframe, there are a number of details that need to be included in the response letter that we send. So specifically we need to confirm receipt of the request. We need to identify any records that are not within our possession custody or control. And if possible, identify the agency or a municipality that may be in possession custody or control of those records. We need to identify any records that we intend to withhold and provide the reasons for such withholding, including specific exemptions. Now, it won't always be the case that we're able to specifically identify these records, particularly if their request is really voluminous and we haven't had a chance to look at everything, which would often be the case. But we do need to identify generally what records we anticipate that we would withhold or even the category of records that we would anticipate withholding. We need to identify any records that we intend to produce and provide a detailed statement describing why the magnitude or difficulty of their request unduly burdens the other responsibilities of the agency and therefore requires additional response time. So if we do need additional time to respond, we need to identify a reasonable timeframe in which we will produce the records thought and the timeframe needs to either be within 15 business days of the receipt of the request. So it's a little confusing with the timing, but we would be providing this letter within 10 days and then letting them know we needed an additional five business days to respond. Or we can have the requester agree to sort of an outside date to provide this response and I'll get into a little more detail about that in the later slide. We also need to include an itemized good faith estimate on any fees that may be charged. I'll get to fees in the next slide I think. And we always in every response include a statement informing the requester of their right to appeal. So in terms of fees, generally a reasonable fees may be charged to recover the cost of complying with a public records request. I'll sort of preface the slide by saying that we typically don't assess fees for smaller or more routine requests, but we might assess the fee if it's appropriate for very large requests that might unreasonably affect our ability to perform our other job functions if it's a very burdensome request. There are some parameters for charging fees. They may only be assessed if we responded to the request within that 10 business day initial timeframe. We may not charge a fee for the first four hours of searched segregation, redaction or reproduction time. And there's a cap of $25 per hour of what we may charge. Fees for segregation and redaction time may only be charged if that segregation and or redaction is quote unquote required by law or approved by the secretary of state through a fee petition. Segregation time just generally means the time used to review the records or determine what portions are subject to an exemption. So information that's required by law, I think seems to sort of be a term of art to be segregated or redacted, includes information found in statutes that explicitly indicate that certain records or information are not public information. So this would include things like Corey or domestic violence records. It has also been found that segregation and redaction under the attorney-client privilege is deemed to be required by law. There is a fee permitted for copies, we're permitted to charge five cents for single and double-sided black and white paper copies or printouts where the request is for materials that aren't susceptible to ordinary means of reproduction, actual costs of reproduction may be assessed. So it would be something like a flash drive or if we were ever required to produce an entire database we could see what the actual cost of reproduction would be. If segregation or redaction is not required by law and we'd still like to assess the fee, we can submit a petition to assess the fee to the supervisor of records. This isn't something that we've done before so we don't have any practical examples but generally the way the process would work is that a fee petition would need to be submitted within 10 business days of receipt of the request. And it runs sort of concurrent with our obligation to respond to the request. So we would submit the fee petition but we would still need to send that initial 10 business day response letter. The supervisor of records may approve a petition to assess the fee for time spent segregating or redacting if the supervisor determines that the request is for a commercial purpose or if they determine that the fee represents an actual good faith representation by the agency to comply with the request. The fee is necessary such that the request could not have been prudently completed without the redaction or segregation and the amount of the fee is reasonable and not designed to limit deter or prevent access to requested public records. Carrie, just a reminder, the supervisor of records is at the set. Within the Secretary of State's office, yes. So once the determination on that petition is received the agency is required to respond to their request or within five business days. All right, so there's also a petition for an extension of time. I mentioned earlier that if we aren't able to provide records within 10 business days we can either let the requester know that we'd be providing records within 15 business days or we could propose a modified response date and have the requester agree to that. However, if the response can't be provided within those 15 business days and the requester doesn't agree to a response date beyond that timeframe we can petition the Secretary of State's office for an expansion of time within which to respond. This is also something that we have not had to use in practice but generally a petition must be submitted within 20 business days of receipt of the request or within 10 business days after receipt of a determination by the supervisor of records that the requested record constitutes a public record. So this would be, I suppose if we had challenged that something didn't need to be released or we had withheld and someone had appealed. Again, we have not used this in practice. We have used both other options where we've been able to respond within 15 business days and we do often communicate with a requester and agree to a modified response date if necessary. So if we are petitioning for an expansion of time a copy of that petition just needs to be provided to the requester. A requester who's denied access to any requested information may appeal to the supervisor of records within 90 days of the date of response. Ordinarily after they receive an appeal an attorney from the supervisor's office will reach out to the legal department see if we have any additional information to provide with respect to the appeal or to ask any questions that they might have. The supervisor's office must issue a determination on an appeal within 10 business days of receipt of the appeal. And the determination typically will either close out the matter it will note that the agency will be providing a supplemental response. This might be based on conversations that they've had with the legal department if we've agreed that there's additional information that we can provide or they might direct the agency to take some actions such as releasing certain documents or providing them in redacted form or even removing some redactions. If the custodian does not comply with an order the supervisor may notify the office of the attorney general for enforcement and a requester who's not pleased with the determination from the supervisor of records may obtain judicial review through an action in Superior Court. Notwithstanding this whole appeal process to the supervisor of records the requester is always entitled to file civil action to enforce the requirements of the public records law in Superior Court. All right, earlier this spring the supervisor of records proposed some changes to its public access regulations. There was a public hearing in early May. It didn't seem that they have been filed or published but I will keep an eye on that to see if they go into effect. There weren't really any substantial changes they're mostly clarification but I just thought that I would add them here to this presentation. Some of the key changes were that they clarify the computation of time throughout the regulations basically in terms of when a business day begins and ends. They set a deadline of February 1st for annual reporting requirements. This has to do with that database that I mentioned earlier in which we enter information related to each request that we receive. So there's a new deadline of February 1st each year when all of those need to be input from the previous year. They allow a records custodian to aggregate requests and to assess appropriate fees if the custodian believes that a requester has filed a series of requests for public records solely to avoid payment of fees. And they provide that the supervisor shall issue a written determination on petitions from a records custodian to be for petitions to assess fees or for extensions of time within five business days following receipt of the petition. So that is pretty much it. Does anyone have any questions? I did. Carrie, on slide seven when you talk about the timing of charging fees. It says that we would have to have responded to the requester within 10 business days to sort of preserve the right to charge a fee. Does that have to, does that response have to be the estimate or just any response under the statute would then be the placeholder that would then allow you to go and charge the fee? It has to be an estimate but it doesn't necessarily have to be the final amount. So if we underestimated or overestimated that would be okay. We just have to include an estimate. So within 10 business days if you go out and say, we can do it, how our reaction costs, et cetera, we estimate $100 first. Sorry, you're breaking up a little. It's a little bit boring. Are we still under that fee? If the person makes payments close to the end of that 15 business days from the data request are we seeing to produce within 15 business days? I think I lost the first part of your question. You broke up a little bit. So I'm just wondering if we assess the fee and payment is not received until close to 15 days after the data, the request, are we still held to that production date of 15 business days after the request? That's a good question. I think in practical terms, if we were assessing a fee, it's likely that we would also be agreeing to a modified response date because we would be assessing the fee because it's so complicated that we can't provide records within 15 business days. Thank you. Any other questions? Commissioner Sunica? You know, more a comment. Thank you for the overview, Carrie. I was just looking back at all the work that you've done here that the legal department has done. It makes me reflect with your presentation on how much time and effort goes into complying with these public records requests that we do get. I have been involved with the state as a state employee for many years before I came here and in this particular agency for many reasons, very large documents that have to be redacted only partially or only surgically. And a lot of interest in certain groups have resulted in over the years just a significant amount of time and effort that goes into complying with this law and these requests. Sometimes a couple of them really on the burden some category as you alluded to. But it mainly has fallen on the legal department mostly but specifically on you, Carrie, to conduct those requests. And I know they can be tedious but important in preserving both the law and the confidence of the public. And I'm glad that you help us do that. Excellent. Commissioner Cameron? Yes, thank you. Thank you for the presentation. First of all, it's always a good reminder of the specifics of the law. And it does remind me as well of how many voluminous amount of work that has had to be done over the years. I wondered if I understand at the beginning when we were new, there was a lot of interest and a lot of public records requests and then of course around a high profile investigation possibly. But of late, have the numbers decreased a bit or is there still a steady amount of requests for public records? I think it's fairly steady. It always rises when there's something of particular public interest. And we tend to get more media requests around those times but there are ebbs and blows but I think overall it's fairly steady. Occasionally we'll receive some really large ones that just are incredibly time consuming that sort of over complicate the rest of our job time. But in terms of the smaller ones, I think that's fairly steady how many we get generally. Thank you and thank you for your work. Excellent presentation, Carrie. And one that putting it on our website or be a document that shows really the care that you take with respect to the public records law. I think that this was a really important presentation. I'd asked Karen to work with the legal division to remind the entire team of the public records law. And as Enrique points out, really it's complexities and also the burden that falls on the legal department. I thought, Carrie, it was really important that you noted there's this general impression that as long as you get back and it used to be 10 calendar days, now it's 10 business days, when you get to it is when you get to it. And that can't be the case if we're going to be that agency of excellence that we are. And the law really provides a roadmap and the law really supports the requester. But with the right tone and the right engagement with the requester, when there is a more voluminous request, you can work with them to maybe help narrow the request so it doesn't become expensive and it becomes, as you know, a really important back and forth, a cooperative, collaborative, exchange and it actually builds relationships, particularly for those regular requesters. So there's an art to this compliance and it also involves not just the legal division, involves the entire team in helping to support you in responding. So I think it's a really important reminder that this is an important public service as a public agency, we have an obligation to comply with this law. So I appreciate the detail and it's just an excellent reminder for all of us to support your work and recognize that there are deadlines and those are meaningful deadlines. So thank you. Thank you. And Karen, I know that it was really helpful for you too. Now, you know, when the legal division gets these, there's a management issue to help support them. So together Karen and I were every once in a while looking ourselves at the Secretary of State's public records guide. This is a really nice, nice short document for us to look back at the highlights, so thank you. Oh, I think this is, as I'm looking through the PowerPoint, like this is a great document in our archives for the state agency that this is how you do it. Here's the snapshot, this is what you need to know, these are the high bullet points. So, Karen, I think you did a great job. Thank you very much. Thank you. You do want to go on to the NDA? Carrie or is that, are we tossing that back to Todd? No, I sure do want to, oh, actually, I'm sorry, NDA. I think, I was thinking you had said the next item. I think that we can certainly take additional questions on NDAs. I tried to sort of insert it into the public records presentation, but if you want to discuss it further or put into any questions you have on NDAs. Yeah, everybody had a chance to see that the agreement is available. Okay, excellent. So next on our list is Commissioner O'Brien and back to Carrie on the police reform bill. And first off, thank you for that work in coming up. This is really great work too. So Carrie's on double duty today. All right, so we'll switch gears quite a bit here. Okay, so in December of 2020, the governor signed chapter 253 of the acts of 2020 titled an act relative to justice, equity and accountability in law enforcement in the Commonwealth. Just to give you a little background on what this law is, establishes a new chapter 60 of the general laws and creates the Massachusetts peace officer standards and training commission. Largely, this new commission will be responsible for certifying all law enforcement agencies and law enforcement officers through a division of police certification. The statute defines law enforcement agency to include any state law enforcement agency and it defines law enforcement officer to include any officer of an agency. So this new commission will be responsible for promulgating regulations to implement and enforce statute, including determining whether an applicant has met the standards for certification, establishing minimum standards for internal agency review of complaints of officer involved injuries or deaths, establishing a physical and physiological fitness evaluation to ensure that officers can perform their essential duties and identifying patterns of unprofessional police conduct. So within the commission, as I mentioned, there'll be a division of police certification. The purpose of this division will be to establish uniform policies and standards for the certification of all law enforcement officers. The division jointly with the municipal police training committee will establish minimum certification standards for all officers that shall include but not be limited to such things as successful completion of the basic police training program approved by the MPTC, municipal police training committee, successful completion of a physical and physiological fitness evaluation approved by this new commission, passage of an exam approved by this new commission and possession of current First Aid and CPR certificates. So generally the reason we're even discussing this today is because under chapter 23K, the IEB is designated as a law enforcement agency. So a very strict reading of this new law might lead to the conclusion that this applies to all members of the IEB as law enforcement officers being officers of a law enforcement agency. However, when you look at the statute and its requirements in more detail, it really seems like an untenable reading. It may be that the more likely reading would be that the IEB is a law enforcement agency for the purposes of carrying out chapter 23K, but not necessarily a law enforcement agency as defined by chapter 60. In looking at the definition of law enforcement agency in this new chapter 60, the definition specifically calls out police departments within particular agencies, rather than those agencies as a whole, notably the University of Massachusetts Police Department, the Massachusetts Port Authority Police Department and the MBTA Police Department. In addition, you'll note that the division that's established to actually carry out the certification process for law enforcement officers is called the Division of Police Certification, specifically identifying police there. And the certification requirements for law enforcement officers are predominantly things that you would associate with police officer training and functions, such as completing the MPTC Basic Police Training Program, along with a written exam and a physical fitness exam. So of course, members of the state police who are assigned to the MGC do have those police functions and authority. Through the MGC's MOU with the state police, those members are assigned to the MGC but remain employees of the state police. So while they would clearly be law enforcement officers performing police functions, the requirements of chapter 60 would fall under the purview of state police for those state police officers assigned to the MGC. If this statute were to apply to the IEB as a whole and not just the state police assigned to the IEB, this would ultimately mean that all IEB personnel from our financial investigators to paralegals would be deemed law enforcement officers and would be required to complete MPTC Basic Police Training among other things and be certified by the Division of Police Certification. And of course it seems highly unlikely that that was the intent of this law. So the commissioners have been appointed to this new commission. They are working on staffing. So it seems likely that as they are staffed and begin promulgating regulations to implement and enforce the statute, we may receive some clarification regarding the certification requirements and process. However, it may be beneficial to proactively reach out and provide our commission's interpretation of this statute and perhaps seek some clarification on the MGC's role. If the IEB were deemed to be a law enforcement agency for purposes of this new chapter 60, there are just three actions that would require compliance by the end of the year. So I just wanna note those that by July 1st, we would be required to develop and implement a policy and procedure for law enforcement personnel to report abuse by other law enforcement personnel without fear of retaliation or actual retaliation. So sort of setting aside this law enforcement personnel term, we do have a policy already in place for reporting any misconduct. And we're discussing that with HR as well. And then the other two requirements are some reporting requirements that would fall in September and December. So I think I'm not sure if commissioner had anything, excuse me, commissioner O'Brien had anything else she wanted to add before we sort of open it up to questions or discussions. No, okay, I think you did a really good job. I mean, it was a dense statute to work through and see what parts would be pertinent to IEB and then putting the analysis in of, well, what does that mean on the ground in terms of law enforcement officers? And I think that the interpretation of sort of the narrow applicability to IEB where the reporting requirements and the certification requirements would really fall under state police. I mean, the MOU makes it clear that the state police officers are not our employees. They are still employees of the state police who clearly fall within the statute. And to Carrie's point about the status of the commission, it may be that a short letter that somebody says, you know, our understanding looking at the statutes so that as they crack their CMR to go forward with clarity of key decisions, they have an understanding of how we function. Thank you. And thank you again for looking at this commissioner O'Brien bringing Carrie's expertise into play. As I had mentioned, I received a call from an attorney in town who had noticed the language in our statute. So I appreciate the fact that colleagues outside of our agency are thinking of us. And thank you for looking at this. Commissioner Cameron, what are your thoughts? Yes, thank you. I was very interested in this presentation as well. And excellent work. I think that our interpretation is correct. IEB is a law enforcement agency, but when the word officers, it's no different than a police department and a modern day police department has many, many more non sworn members of that agency that are not sworn and would not have to go through the basic training and the other requirements. So I see it as a very good analogy. I like the idea of a letter just to clarify because I think it'll put on their radar screen. I know they don't have staff yet, but it'll put on their radar screen that this needs to be addressed probably through a regulation, just so everyone has a clear understanding of exactly who the requirements are intended for. And that is those are the sworn officers of every law enforcement agency. So I think that is a good idea for us to be proactive, but I do appreciate the research and the presentation. So thank you to the committee. Commissioner Zinica. No, thank you. Great presentation, Kerry. And I'm glad that, you know, Eileen and others are thinking about and have studied this new statute to see how it applies to us. One, just maybe one comment that may be obvious to those in with law enforcement background, but not others like us, like me. Is it fair to say that even if these were to apply to the state police people, let's say, of the IEB, this new law, that there's already quite a bit of training that is already happening, that this new commission is going to then come and modify perhaps, but not necessarily review. Is that a fair statement? I'm going to have Karen. Yeah, it looks like she's leaning in. Yeah, just, you know, especially from days at IEABS. So the state police do their own academy training, which is similar to the MPTC certified training, but that is for municipal officers. So state police have a very intensive training for onboarding of new troopers. And then they also have continual in-service training throughout the year and throughout all of the in sworn officers' careers. So there's always training and it runs again from firearms training to inclusive bias training to user force training. I mean, it's quite extensive and they're always being trained and updated, even, you know, new things in the law, things like that. So our officers at the IEB are required to comply with all the training for MSP proper. Thank you. Okay, well, I do recommend a letter and I would be inclined to probably say less than more in the letter, really to be respectful to allow this commission to get off the ground. Judge Hinkel is the chair and I know that they will be putting their staff in place, as Carrie mentioned. I think what might be helped, but the reason why a letter makes sense is to let this commission know that we've taken a look and we've identified this issue and that, you know, right now based on our analysis and I don't think we necessarily have to detail the analysis. We don't believe that we have an obligation but we certainly would want to know otherwise. I think it's a courtesy to let them know we're thinking of them and that we're making sure that if we have any obligation that we want to be compliant. And then I think they'll get to work in a way that you on Mika and Gail remember when you were starting off. So kind of a courtesy letter and I know that we'll get it just right. Commissioners, do you agree? Yes. Okay, good. Good. Excellent, that's really helpful. We can check that off the list, Commissioner O'Brien. I appreciate it very much. Okay, moving back to item number five then. And now we should have Director Lilius and there's Kate. Good, I'm doing a little good afternoon. We just shifted. Director Lilius, do you want to get started? Sure, Attorney Hartigan has a qualifier for the Plain Ridge Park Casino license to present to you today the results of the investigative findings on the suitability background review for your consideration on a determination of suitability. I'll turn it right over to Kate. Thank you. Good afternoon indeed, 1202 here. I do have Chair and Commissioners of Corporate Qualifier for your consideration, Ms. Marla Kaplowitz, a qualifier for Plain Ridge Park as an independent director on the Board of Directors for Penn National Gaming Incorporated. Penn National Gaming Incorporated, as you know, is the parent company of Massachusetts category two casino licensee, Plainville Gaming and Redevelopment, otherwise known as Plain Ridge Park Casino. Ms. Kaplowitz has submitted all of the required forms and complied with all of the IAB's requests for supplemental and updated information. The IAB was able to conduct its complete protocol for suitability for casino qualifiers and confirmed financial stability and integrity, reviewed litigation history, searched criminal history, verified that no prohibited political contributions were made in Massachusetts and also conducted checks of open source and law enforcement databases. The team of investigators assigned to investigate Ms. Kaplowitz were Trooper Thomas Roger of the Massachusetts State Police Gaming Enforcement Unit and financial investigator Faye Zhu and both of them are joining us on the call today. Should you have any questions about the investigation? The investigation commenced with an interview on April 20th, 2021 of Ms. Kaplowitz. She was interviewed using virtual technology and both Trooper Roger and financial investigators over on the call and noted that Ms. Kaplowitz was cooperative in forthcoming all aspects of this investigation. During the interview, she provided personal history regarding her education and career path, letting investigators know that she attended the University of California at Santa Barbara and graduated in 1987 with a Bachelor of Arts degree in sociology. Further review of her employment history revealed that Ms. Kaplowitz began her career in communications at MediaVest, where she specialized in communication planning and she was there from January, 1999 to the February of 2011. Ms. Kaplowitz then moved to MEC Global where she served as Chief Executive Officer of North America for that company from March of 2011 to April, 2017. In May of 2017, Ms. Kaplowitz began serving as President and Chief Executive Officer of the American Association of Advertising Agencies, more commonly known as 4A's. Ms. Kaplowitz remains in this position as she takes on her role on the Board of Directors for Penn National. As an Independent Director on the Board of Directors at Penn National, Ms. Kaplowitz's duty is to share responsibilities to the shareholders. Also overseeing property rights to industry rules and regulations. Specifically, Ms. Kaplowitz sits on the Compensation Committee and also on the Compliance Committee. The Compensation Committee of this Board is responsible for reviewing and recommending to the Board of Directors the fees and other compensation for non-employee directors involved with Penn National. And her role on the Compliance Committee will involve Ms. Kaplowitz receiving reports on compliance matters directly from the company's Vice President and Chief Compliance Officer. These matters could include any violations of PNGI's Code of Conduct, ensuring full and accurate reporting in the company's filings with the SEC, and also compliance with all applicable laws and jurisdictions where PNGI is doing business. It's noted at this point, Ms. Kaplowitz does not currently hold any gaming licenses. However, she stated during her interview that she has applied for numerous gaming licenses in jurisdictions where PNGI does business. These are all currently pending regulatory approval. At this point, Ms. Kaplowitz has demonstrated to the IAB by clear and convincing evidence that she is suitable. And the IAB recommends that the commission vote to find her suitable as a qualified for Plain Ridge Park. I do have the investigative team available for any questions. Happy to field any questions at this point. And then if there are none, we would need to vote on this. Thank you. Thank you, Kate. And thank you to Trooper Roger and Fay for their work in support of this suitability report and investigation. Commissioner Cameron. Thank you. You know, our last several have been squeaky clean applicants for our consideration. So I have no questions. I'd love to talk to the investigative team, but there are no questions of note here because their work was well done and this qualifier is beyond approach in my estimation. Thank you. Commissioner O'Brien, Commissioner Zuniga? Commissioner O'Brien? Okay, Commissioner Zuniga is all set. Commissioner O'Brien? No, I'm all set. Okay. Madam Chair, I'm happy to make a motion. Sure, I'm just going to make one observation. I did confirm with Kate that she does have a lot of memberships of boards, but this is the single public company. I feel that she will have absolutely the bandwidth to serve on the board and very excited to see Penn National adding another woman to their board as an independent director. So, Commissioner Cameron? I move that the commission issue a positive determination of suitability to Ms. Marla Kaplowitz in her capacity as an independent director to the board of directors to Penn National Gaming Inc. Second. Excellent. Further comments? Okay, Commissioner Cameron? Aye. Commissioner O'Brien? Aye. Commissioner Zuniga? Aye. And I vote yes. Again, our rapid decision-making does not reflect all the work that we now goes into these investigations and the reports. We thank you, Kate, Juba-Roger, and Fay for the work and also to the qualifier. Looks like Massachusetts is taking the lead. So, thank you very much. Thank you. Okay. Now we're, and Director Lillios, thanks, you're all set, Loretta. Okay, excellent. Thank you. Okay, moving on then to item number six. Derek, good morning. Good morning. There you are. Today we have budget discussion, future vote later in the month. Correct. Good afternoon, Madam Chair and commissioners. I'm joined today by Agnes Bolier and Douglas O'Donnell, and we are here to present to you the fiscal year 2022 budget proposal. Are you seeing the memo that was in the packet? Yes, thank you. So I'll have that up just for reference when I move to, when I reference tables in the discussion. As a brief overview, we're making the following budget recommendations for the fiscal year 2022 budget. For the game and control fund, budget of 33.0 million, which includes 27.12 million in regulatory costs and approximately 5.9 million in statutorily required costs. This item would also fund 94 FTEs and approximately three contract positions. The racing budget is 2.65 million in regulatory costs and an additional 209,000 for indirect costs and funds approximately eight FTEs. Community mitigation fund budget is 274,500 and includes approximately two FTEs. And the research and responsible gaming program funded at 6.49 million, which includes three FTEs and is wholly funded by the public health trust fund. The table on page two of the memorandum summarizes this information and represents an operational budget of $42.65 million, 107 FTEs and three contract positions. This is a reminder. There are two components to the gaming control fund. The expanded gaming act required the fund to fund both the regulatory operations of the MGC as well as included some provisions requiring licensees to pay for the costs of other state agencies. In FY22, statutorily required costs of other agencies are approximately 5.9 million and are for the attorney general's office, the ABCC or otherwise known as the Alcoholic Fever to Control Commission and Commonwealth indirect costs. The statutory requirement as well as the amount for each entity is broken out on page two of the memorandum. Looking at comparing FY21 to FY22, the MGC is currently approved FY21 budget for the gaming control fund. And just as a reminder, FY21 currently approved budget includes the initially proposed budget as well as the first three quarters revisions that we've gone through. And that number is 32.9 million. We are recommending an FY22 budget of 33.02 million, which is a approximate 0.36% increase or 36 basis points over the approved FY21 budget. The FY22 33.02 million recommendation as stated before includes both regulatory and statutory costs. The regulatory costs funded by the gaming control fund decreased by approximately 1.13% from 27.43 million in 2021 to 27.12 million in FY22, while the statutory required costs increased by 7.79% from 5.47 million in FY21 to 5.9 million in FY22. The table on page three of memorandum outlines the major spending increases and decreases for the gaming control fund. A particular note, and I know this print is small, so I apologize, it does look better in person than it probably shows on the screen. But a particular note is the increase in payroll. We're moving forward with some of the backfills that we've held off on for the last year plus. And we've also included for the first time since FY20 costs for cost of living adjustments as well as adjustments to salaries if there are any equity issues that are identified throughout the year. We've also restored travel to approximately 50% of the FY20 funding levels. As you recall, we dropped that really low. I think it was less than 30% of the FY20 levels in FY21. The consultant services item is showing a large decrease and that's due mainly to independent monitor costs only being budgeted and incurred at the time that we get their bills. We're in FY21, we have three quarters of those costs already included as well as we fund the litigation at the bare minimum as required by our insurance policy of 400,000 when I think the budget for this year is up at 700,000. Not, I think, I know it's up at 700,000. The IT non payroll budget item is also decreasing and that's related to the one-time costs of moving to the cloud being backed out in FY22. Direct costs are budgeted at 10% of AACC and HHU. The attorney general's item is slightly increasing as well but it is still one that we took a $100,000 decrease to this item, a projected decrease in the third quarter. So, to look at the comparison and the increase is slightly off but to note, it's still well below the $3 million ceiling set by the legislation. The alcohol beverage control commission is remaining constant at 75,000. Moving on to the racing item, we're seeing a 6.65% increase going from 2.68 million in FY21. Let me slide down to that. Sorry about that. Here we are. We're seeing a 6.65 increase going from 2.68 million in FY21 to 2.86 million in FY22. However, if you look at the racing division, the 3,000 item, they're staying pretty constant. Not much of a change, they're a 1.23% increase. However, the allocated salaries by backfilling positions that have been vacant for a year and some of the hires under the IT department in future years, that's where you see the majority of the increase that's being reflected there. So, it's the allocated salaries and building our base back up to operational status from where we were in FY21. Community Mitigation Fund will continue to be, it's the second year of cost for subrecipient monitoring, 205 CMR 135.05, which we passed earlier this year, allows us to do this. And that's staying pretty constant with a slight decrease of approximately 6,000 in FY22. So, we're still trying to be very responsible as the local Community Mitigation Advisory Council has asked us to be. And well under the 10% that is allowed to be charged there. The Research and Responsible Gaming Office, which is wholly funded from the Public Health Trust Fund is seeing an increase of approximately 40%. However, that number can be very misleading if you just look at bottom line numbers. In FY20, the Research and Responsible Gaming Program was funded at $6.2 million and received a 26% cut down to 4.6 million in FY21. The majority of those cuts came to the research program as well as the game sense program. In FY22, the increase is mainly attributed to the follow-up of the baseline research study and restoring some of the cuts to the game sense program. I know that I ran through those numbers pretty quickly, but it's pretty comprehensive in the package. We do still have some exposures included in our budget and we'll be tracking those in FY22. As noted earlier, we've funded the minimum required by our insurance policy for litigation costs and the legal budget. MSP Overtime is still funded at the FY21 levels, which are the same levels that we had in FY20. So we'll be tracking that. I think they've done an excellent job of managing that, but I think it's an aspirational number and it's one of those areas that we may anticipate some increases in the future. One area I wanna really point out, we promised to our licensees in 2015 that if we got our central monitoring system, we would keep our gaming agent numbers at 30, approximately 10 per facility. For the first time, we're hitting that number. We've reduced our gaming agent FTE count from 38 FTs to 33 and that includes the director, the deputy director and the compliance manager within that division. So there are 30 agents in supervising and senior supervising agents total out at the facilities. So I really wanna point out a big piece of the gaming agent team meeting that promise. I know we intentionally staffed higher during opening to deal with some of the transition and some of the attrition that we've experienced, but we're gonna settle into this, see how it works and then report back to the commission if this number is right and how we're doing with those reductions in staffing. One other area we've cut our travel and training budget to approximately 50% of the FY20 pre-pandemic funding level. One point to note, we met with the licensees in late April. The two bottom bullet to a part of their request to us. Can we look at staffing, can we look at training? We had restored our travel budget to 100% of pre-pandemic levels and they asked us if we could reduce that a little lower. So we're gonna track those areas. As well as the gaming agent numbers and see how we do coming out of the gates with those. But we'll report back to the commission on a quarterly basis, how that's working out and we'll be working hand in hand with Bruce, especially on the FTEs and see the supervisors how we're doing with the gaming agent division. The last piece to update you is the assessment and timing of payments. Chapter 23K, section 56A through C, as well as 205CMR121 defines how we will fund our operations for the gaming control fund. There's a $600 per machine fee for every slot machine that's open as of July 1. That fee combined with any additional fees, which are mainly from licensing of primary vendors, secondary vendors, and employees, as well as non-gaming vendors, are added up and then subtracted from our operational budget for the gaming control fund and that determines an assessment. That assessment is split to our licensees as their percentage of gaming positions of the total pool of gaming positions in Massachusetts. While the formula is laid out pretty straightforward, maybe not my explanation of it, but the formula is pretty straightforward, projecting the number of slot machines in gaming positions as of July 1 is not straightforward this year. Therefore, we've asked our licensees for best estimate, which is included on the table on page 8 of the memorandum so that we can get a bill out for slot fees and so that we can get a bill out for assessments because as you're aware, we have to refund any monies that aren't used at the end of the year for the gaming control fund and then get monies in to start our operations. Derek, can I just ask on that point? Absolutely. When did they submit these estimates? Did they submit it with the full occupancy in mind, right? Yes, they did submit it with the full occupancy in mind, but they also submitted it with the idea of working with our teams to add tables back, remove plexiglass as Bruce was explaining earlier, get pieces onto the floor, get them up through our CMS. So this actually reflects the numbers they have as of the end of May. So I think it's June 1. These tied out with the report I saw coming from the gaming agents division. Okay, good, thanks. And as they work through, you know, what we have committed to them is as of July 1, we'll get a new number, revise this sheet, and come back to them with an updated assessment. This just allows us to get the first assessment and the first slot fee out to them. Thanks. I forgot to ask you that the other day. Thank you. And then for the timing of payments, and over the last year plus, we've been doing a monthly billing to our licensees for the assessment as well as a slot fee. We are recommending going back to an annual billing for the slot fee and a quarterly billing for the public health trust fund and assessment to the gaming control fund. We, this is just a presentation. We'll take any questions, comments at this point. Not looking for a vote. Do you mind putting it back to the full screen, please? Thanks. And, and Derek and Agnes, thank you. I don't know if I saw Agnes, but I saw Derek. Derek Doug. There you are. Good. Good afternoon. And there's Agnes. Good afternoon. Questions. Commissioner Zinica, you want to go first? Sure. No. Thank you, Derek, for that. Good summary. And thank you for the. For the, for the memo that, that does a, in my opinion, a really good job at. Providing all the important items relative to our historical friends. As Derek mentioned, this budget mostly restores some of the trends that we have prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. I think. The research and responsible gaming is a great example of. Where we wear, you know, a year ago, when we made the decision to postpone the, the follow-up to the general population survey, which was a big ticket item because of the reality of the casino closures and that it made little sense, let's say, given the research goals, as well as in consideration of, you know, the reality of, of, of decreased revenues as a way to mitigate, you know, the assessment of our disease. And that translates to other areas that Derek already touched on the cost of doing adjustment, et cetera. And as in, as before these strikes, what I think is a good balance between all of those priorities that allows us now to resume operations in many ways, just like the casinos continue to resume operations. And be able to respond accordingly. So I think it strikes a really good balance. As Derek alluded, we always consult with licensees. They have a good feedback and a good process in which they all understand more than anything else, what our intentions are, what the, the costs are, what the dynamics are in terms of fund allocations. And I think that's also a very important process that works for everybody. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Again, a very thoughtful budget discussion. I did benefit from, you know, having a discussion previous to this meeting to understand some of the details and have questions answered. But I thought the team did a good job in a trying time of making sure that we had the time to give it their best estimate in some cases. I also want to credit the game agents who really, we said when we, we did those initial numbers, whether it be state police staffing or gaming agent staffing, this would be revisited. And we would really, you know, staff according to needs. And I do credit the team for understanding. I think that's a really positive step. And I just, I thought it was a thoughtful presentation. And I just thank the team again for, for their willingness to listen. One of the things I learned in my previous discussion was. That. There were a couple of concerns that the licensees had, not many, but a couple, and that our team was responsive to that. And a couple of things were tweaked because of that very healthy discussion between our budget team and the, and the licensees. So I credit them for that too. That is an important step. And listening. And if there is a way to, to tweak something that, that makes some sense. I credit them for, for doing that as well. So thank you. Commissioner Brian. Thank you, Madam chair. I also found the briefing very helpful in this. And one of the things, particularly the slots number in terms of it is. I did. You know, to try to get as far down they were. And I know that they're lower. And so we'll, you know, we'll see what happens as we reopen. I know they're maybe regaging their whole business plan based on the experience of the last year. Every night I answered in the briefing. I, you know, Derek, you brought up most of it in the presentation today. So as always, just really great work from Doug and Agnes and, and Derek and everybody else that was involved. So thank you. Thank you. Yeah, I, I generally a very thoughtful, very thorough report and Derek, thank you for, for meeting with me. I have a, another question that I think I didn't ask at our briefing, the 10% cap. Is that in our regulation for the community mitigation fund? Is that where that is in terms of our admin costs? You're nodding your head. Yes. Okay. That's right. Thanks. And to commissioner Cameron's point, the licensees in Derek and Derek's team do meet. And, and, and you know, Derek makes much of this budget process is very, very public and transparent. And you know, this is our, again, evidence of it today. And the, the licensees know that we're discussing this in public. They may be even joining us today. But this is after many meetings that Derek and team has hold, holds with the licensees. So thank you. I know that they've also mentioned the indirect costs and Karen, I did ask Derek to keep that on the list of to-dos that we should revisit the indirect costs issue and whether we're, we might be paying a proportionately, a disproportionally high amount and something for us to navigate with the administration on that. And then finally, Karen, I'm, I'm doing much better than an earlier discussion where I, I think I said, is there a slush fund? I'm not going to use that term. I'm not going to use that term today, but I did want to point out that I asked Derek to make sure that this. Budget will include the flexibility that you would need in the event of returning to our return to work policy for any additional IT costs and refit buildouts, anything that you want to do as you and your the working group contemplates the September return to work. And Derek has assured me you will have that flexibility. I wanted you to know that I was thinking of those costs. It's hard to really anticipate, but in light of the overall budget, Derek feels it's very reasonable that we'll be able to have that and find those, those dollars. So with that, I, all of my questions are answered again. Just thank you for the earlier briefing and all the good work. Okay. Thank you. And then, you know, I, I have to do my regular thank you to, and I'm not, I have to. I have to really thank Doug, Agnes, Noelle, troop D Karen, and every single manager and staff person that the MVC, you know, five or six years ago, we had this initiative to have each, each division on their budget. And they really do own their budgets. And I've got to see it on a monthly basis where I sit down with them because Agnes has, has taken the, the retirement option and only is with us two days. But I get to meet with the managers now when each one of them really understands their budget to the penny and building a budget every year is a lot easier when people understand what membership they're doing, what printing costs they have. I mean, down, down to the most minute details. So I really have to give a lot of credit to, to the personnel here at the agency for owning their budgets, engaging in this and the tone for management. I mean, Karen and Enrique sitting in on every single meeting, Kathy, you taking the briefing, each commissioner taking a private briefing, you know, before this presentation, it's, it really shows the attention. So it makes, makes doing this enjoyable and very worthwhile. So just a kudos to everyone on the team. And then what we're going to do is put this out for public comment, come back to you in two weeks and with any adjustments you may have after you've had a chance to digest a little more or any comments coming back from the public that makes sense. After we've reviewed them with you. Take a vote for approved budget. Excellent. So commissioners, you're all set for today. I'll set for this to go to public comment. Okay. Derek God and thank you. I know that you're, you are so good at thanking your team, but you also just described the paradigm that really works. And it's really due to your vision and leadership. So thank you so much. You keep us accountable. There we go. Now, number, we're moving on to item number seven. Chief Delaney, you got a phone call during our meeting. But we only heard hello. So good, good, good afternoon. We're moving on to. Community affairs divisions report first on workforce applications. Correct. Yes. Thank you, madam chair and commissioners. So for your consideration today, we have two amendments to the recently approved work. Workforce grants. So as you may recall, the commission approved the two 2021 workforce grants for $350,000 each. Since the target spending for this category was 800,000. The commission agreed to have us go back to the applicants to see if they could expand their proposed programs. To incorporate an additional 50,000 in spending. And they were able to expand their programs to incorporate these additional funds. So in essence, in both of the amendments, they didn't propose any new categories of spending. They really just proposed to increase, you know, the number of people receiving training in the various categories that they had already proposed to us under their original grant applications. So the review team review this and we are recommending approving these amendments. So this would increase the value of the Holyoke community college grant from 350,000 to 400,000. And also the mass higher Metro North grant from 350,000 to 400,000. So at this point, I'm going to turn it over to Crystal Howard. So she can provide just a little bit of additional detail. For you on how that money is going to be exactly going to be spent. And then after that, we will open it up for any questions. As stated, we did reach out to the grantees just to see how they may propose to spend the funding and they each came in with proposals that expand capacity. So with Holyoke, that means that the $50,000 would go directly to culinary funding. They're looking to expand the culinary funding given that it ties in directly to the needs at this moment and what they had stated in their initial application. They also intend to subcontract with two local CBOs to provide more diverse outreach, which was a pretty great addition to this. And the other programming would include some marketing funding. For the mass higher lead proposal, they've just chosen to expand the existing capacity for each of their, the network for the career advisors. That's going to be about $8,000 per career advisor, which actually increases capacity to about 20% of reach to individuals. And that funding that programming as a reminder is services through yes, a well, any ability to advise people to reach other needs for assistance and the career advising in general, which is the initial programming that we've been funding for a few years. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions about each proposal? Questions for Crystal or Joe. Commissioners. Yeah, I had one question and I, and I believe when I read, read the information provided to us that there is a need for these additional, the additional training in both cases, correct? I mean, there. There are jobs. There is a need for those particular skill sets. Exactly. There is a really low threshold for funding right now across the state for workforce in general. There is also the fact that we have just reopened and now we can rehire. This timing is perfect. But the grantees prior to that were saying that these were meeting their needs. And so in general, they've revised each program just a little bit to reach the entire community. And that can mean, you know, the casinos and their pipeline as we've served in the past, but culinary need in general for on the HCC side and just to reiterate, while it's not explicitly stated in the mass hire program, they also can refer to culinary services. And hospitality in general, which right now in articles across the state and country, you're seeing that the greatest need and the real challenge is refilling these hospitality jobs. So yeah, this funding will definitely be utilized well in passages. Important question. Commissioner Cameron. Yeah, thank you. I certainly agree with the team that this is worthwhile spending and a worthwhile adjustment to a decision we already made. Commissioner O'Brien. Are you leaning in? No, I agree. I think. And I came back with, you know, very particularized focused. Request for the 50,000. I think it's entirely appropriate. Commissioner Seneca. I'm on board with the recommendation as well. I think. What a year, what a difference a year makes. Now we are with the quote unquote, good problem of. Of seeing perhaps more efforts having to be. Spent on attracting people because of open position. At the casinos, which is true for many other hospitality. Others in the hospitality industry. I would be interested perhaps as a, as a data collection exercise for later. As I know, the people that we grant money, they, they closely collect a lot of data in this regard. To see if we then see some increase in the rate. At which. Some of these grants. Result in actual hires. At the casinos. We typically. Accepted the notion that, you know, there is not a one for one or not necessarily a direct correlation. It's important to fund. The funnel that eventually. It's going to translate into. Workers at the casinos. But they're not exclusive. They're not exclusive. So. I'd be interested to learn at a future time. If any of these efforts, given these. We openings. Resulted in a different in terms of that rate. Of hiring, but, but I know you spend a lot of time. Crystal and Jill and others. Sort of thinking about this. I'd be interested into seeing whether that. You know, changes or stays. We do collect data on actual hires and salaries. And. We've been able to get specific information when we ask about where they're going. And we can certainly make sure that. This purpose. Shows us differentials from last year. In the year before to this year. I think that's, that's not a hard. Thank you. Excellent. Chris. Thank you. Thank you for the report. And Joe, I do think that this process worked out well. You, you, you had the vision of perhaps increasing this. And it gives us confidence that they, they had the need as commissioner Cameron points out. So thank you. I think that worked really well. Yeah. I'm glad, you know, I mean, again, we have the money available. And with the casinos reopening and the need being there. And we're hearing all about the difficulties in filling hospitality positions. It certainly seems to make sense for us to. Get as much money out to these folks as we can. Yeah. I agree. Thank you. And I'm glad that. That you saw that. This year. And we're sort of prompted us to go through this process. So thank you. Katie, we do need though. I think we'll do two separate votes. Perhaps that's the best process. Okay. Do I have a motion? Well, I'm sure I'll be happy to move that the commission approve. The award of an additional $50,000. To hold your community college. For the workforce development grant from the community mitigation fund. To fund an additional cohort of culinary students as described in the memo of the, in the commissioners packet. And as the commissioners. And the commission staff. Authorize to execute a grant instrument. And then we're reading this award. In accordance with two or five CMR. 153. Oh, Oh, Second. Questions. Commissioner Cameron. I. Commissioner O'Brien. I. Commissioner Zuniga. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I. Commissioner Zuniga. I. And I vote yes. Four zero. Thank you. Vivian. And then. Madam chair. I'm happy to move again that. Or move. That the commission approve. The award of an additional $50,000 to mass hire Metro North from the community mitigation fund. To expand the originally approved services provided through the local career advisor network. As described in the memo. In the commissioner's packet. As discussed here today. And that the commission staff be authorized to execute a grant. Commemorating this award in accordance with two or five CMR. 153. Oh, Second. Thank you. Questions. Commissioner Cameron. Hi. Commissioner Brian. Hi. Commissioner Zuniga. Hi. Yes. Four zero. Thanks. And thank you to Joe and to Crystal. Excellent market. It's exciting. Really. Yes. The commissioners have suggested. And crystal. Thank you. We said in meetings with them, it's rare. They get more money. They're not used to hearing that. So there were. Grilled for the opportunity. So thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Good. Good work. All right. Then. Joe, you're going to give us. Now your summary on. On the. Community. Yes. Yeah. So next up we have for you a summary of the 2021. Community mitigation fund. And just before we jump into that. Since this is our final. Our last hurrah with the 2021. Community mitigation fund. I did again want to thank the review team for all of their hard work throughout the winter and the spring. And completing these reviews in a. You know, timely and professional manner. So thanks. Go out to. In no specific order. Mary Thurlow. Kate Hartigan. Carrie. Teresy. Tonya Perez. Jill Griffin. Crystal Howard. Teresa Fiori. And of course, Enrique was on our team this year as well. And was also very valuable. His input. And also, as you know, we modified our approach. To reviewing and approving our applications for this year. This first started with. Outreach sessions that we did in January. In December and January, which were very well attended by our host and surrounding communities. And it continued through the four separate meetings. And now the fifth meeting today of with the commission. To review. And approve the application. You know, while there was certainly a couple of hiccups in the process. Overall, I was really happy with that. I felt it was sort of much smoother than it had been in years past. I think spreading out the workload. And to help everybody a little bit. From the review team members to the commission staff and. And everyone else. And the commissioners themselves. So again, I was, I was real happy with that. And certainly we will try to incorporate any lessons learned. We had from our process this year into our process next year. And you know, continue to try to make improvements. So now in your packet, you have a memo that has a summary of the community mitigation fund for 2021. And it presents the data in a bunch of different ways. So you can look at. Look at projects in sort of different fashions, but for starters, our 2021, our targeted spending was 12 and a half million dollars with. Six million going to each region, region A and region B. And $500,000 for the category two facility. So on February 1st, we received 28 grant applications, totaling approximately $5.6 million. But now both the number of applications and the dollar value were down from 2020, which could be due, you know, to a number of reasons, which we've discussed a little bit in the past, including COVID. This will be a topic of discussion with the commission. And the local community mitigation advisory committees. And the subcommittee on community mitigation. And the G pack and others. In the coming months to see if, you know, we think these are real trends or is this sort of a one-off thing or, you know, are there opportunities to, to make this more attractive to our, to our grantees, you know, to apply for funds. So we're going to continue to work on that. So again, the memo presents the data in several different ways. So we're going to continue to work on that. So again, the memo presents the data in several different ways. So that you can see where the funds are going and how the funds are split between the regions. So in total, we awarded 25 grants with a value of $4.85 million. So the grants that were not awarded were primarily due to the lack of a nexus to the casino. And of course, we discussed these at, at some length during, during the approval process. There were also several applications where the requested dollar value was reduced in the final award to ensure that the grant was being proportional to the impact associated with a casino. Now in your packet, the first chart shows the breakdown of the grants by category and total. The second chart shows the breakdown by region and category. And that gives you both what the applications were and how much the awards were. And then lastly, we go a little bit more in-depth into each category. Showing the individual applicants with a brief project description, how much money they requested and how much money they were awarded. So that gives you a bunch of different ways to look at how, you know, what the end results were. We are still preparing a compilation of all of the memos that we presented from April through till now. And we will send those to the commission when, when they're complete. But really no further action needs to be taken on that item. That's just, that will just be a, really an FYI. You've seen all the information you reviewed it. And this will just be a compilation of that. You know, Mary and Tanya have been working on that now. And we'll get that to the commission when it's, when. So with that, I'll open it up for any questions that you might have regarding this wrap up. Commissioner Zunica, do you want to go first? Sure. And thank you. I would, I'd like to speak a little bit from experience here, having gone through these, through these a year more on hand as part of the review team. And I'd like to just offer some, some thoughts. I think it was, it's a great process. I had a sense of that from before, of course, but when you get to see up close, you get to understand a little bit more about some of the intricacies of the projects of the requests of the dynamics at the local level, and especially of all the hard work that the review team puts into the evaluation of these projects for not just the relationship to the casino, but as Joe mentioned just a minute ago for the proportionality of what is a good grant amount relative to the impact that is being presented. So, perhaps for future, future years, and this comes from a suggestion you made earlier, chair, we could rotate this commission could rotate the participation of commissioners to get that deeper appreciation as I'm mentioning, especially as we come out of a process like this and start to formulate future guidelines, which I think are critical to managing the program in an efficient way. You know, another thing that I would mention is from a personal perspective, just how much the local officials appreciate all the work that the review team does with their questions and their review. That's true for everybody, but I think it's especially true for Joe, Mary and Tanya in coordinating these meetings and understanding their concerns, their requests and follow-up questions. So that's also an important part of the process and one that's worth mentioning here publicly. So I think we have good questions for us to consider as we normally do later in the year for future guidelines. I think we are seeing perhaps a little bit some constraints that we may need to rethink as we think of larger construction projects. But again, we have plenty of time to think about that. And just to follow up on the appreciation that some of the local officials have towards the work that is done, I am not quite sure that much of the public in those host and surrounding communities really understand all those efforts and it might be incumbent upon us to try to communicate or try to be more proactive towards that communication of where those dollars come from, for example, that fund the projects that make a difference locally. But again, these are all topics that we can address in future guidelines. And I think as I mentioned, I'm really happy to have been involved in it and underscore how much work the review team puts into this effort. Thank you. Commissioner Cameron or O'Brien. Commissioner Cameron. I just had a big thank you. It is apparent how much work goes into this. I can't even remember a time when I asked a question in a briefing where the team hadn't thoroughly thought it out and had the answer for whatever I was asking. So it really is apparent to me that the team considers everything and really one of the things I love about what the team does is go back and try to assist those who are requesting monies from this fund with their application. There may have been a deficiency and I know they do some training as well. So it's not just, this isn't good enough. You can't have the money or, you know, we're only going to give you partial because you didn't explain something well enough. They really make the attempt to go back and assist with those who are requesting. So I have always appreciated that work by the team and just just a big thank you. This is another year where it really is apparent how much work goes in and and it's appreciated. Thank you. And it makes it makes it. I feel very confident in, in the recommendations and in approving things because I know how thought out it is and how much you struggle if you have to say no. I do understand that as well. So big thank you to everybody. Excellent. Sure, Brian. Just echo. What's already been said in terms of the work and the thought process. I've had the same experience when I asked questions about what you thought about X. They always have, and they come back and say, we did, and this is the response that we got, et cetera. And in particular this year, I think Crystal's comment about, you know, coming out of this and that this money is probably more impactful this year than in years past, given the financial situations that a lot of municipalities find themselves in right now. So. Because it doesn't make clear when it gets to us. Thank you very much. Yeah, I too want to commend you Joe and your team, but particularly you Joe for coming in during a difficult year with the pandemic, you came in with your own vision as a new leader of this effort. And you came in some suggested changes. You've tried different approaches. You mentioned hiccups. Well, I don't know what you're talking about. I don't think any of us observed hiccups. So, you know, I just want to, I want to take the time to credit you. And then of course your entire team and that includes, of course, Mary and Tanya. So, you, you said a great tone for the year. And you made it really seamless for us. I do think. For next year, you know, commissioners in the government reminded me that I thought that perhaps it might be an opportunity either for new commissioner who will be appointed to maybe join in with commissioners in the guy, or perhaps we rotate in another commissioner. It is an excellent way to really get to know the, the, the expanse of the commission's work and the depth of the commission's work internally. You've got a great team. So I think the entire review team, and I think all the communities who contributed, and I do encourage you to continue with the brown brad back trainings and even maybe allowing a few of the communities to speak about their experience with the application process because it could be very relatable for the other communities who may have not been awarded this year a grant but want to resubmit next year. So the outreach is so important and you're so good at it. So thank you. We love this. This is, it's really an easy part of our job. And I think it's a great way to, I must say to, to support the communities and, and address any, any impacts. And I do know we'll be looking at the guidelines and thinking about those going forward. So that's next on your list, but thank you. And thanks for the wrap up today. Well, thank you everyone for your kind words. It's truly appreciated. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And of course, if other commissioners want to participate, all are welcome at the community mitigation fund. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we'll do it in somewhat of an organized fashion. So you don't get too overwhelmed. I teased with that. I could tell that you got a phone call and I laughed because it would be typical Joe to, to make sure not to miss somebody's call. And continue your work right. We appreciate everyone's efforts and everyone's responsiveness to. The, the communities. Thank you. That I think is the end of our formal. Items today. Commissioners, do you have any update that you want to share? I see a no, no, no, no. Executive director Wells, how are you feeling? Feeling pretty good. I think everything went well today. Okay, great. So no other. Item that we need to address unexpectedly. Okay. Well, to the entire team for staying on. I know I see. Noelle and, and Jacqueline. Who support Derek's good work. Thank you for all of the work. Behind the scenes. And I see a lot of other names. Thank you to the entire team. And a particular thanks to our communications team. Goodbye to a formal goodbye to Sarah will be speaking with her next week in our own capacities and then. Welcoming Elaine back and particular thanks to Austin, who. And to Vivian, who makes sure that. These meetings are taken care of. So. With that. I need a motion to adjourn. I moved to adjourn. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you commissioner. No for the comments commissioner Cameron. Hi. Commissioner O'Brien. Hi. Commissioner Zuniga. Hi. Yes. Have a great day, everyone. Thanks for all the excellent work. Thank you, everyone.