 So this meeting is now being recorded and it will be uploaded to the town of Amherst YouTube channel probably within a week. So everything you say and do is now recorded for posterity. And thank you, Matt. Sorry to interrupt. No, no worries. We're very grateful that you're able to step in and help facilitate it the last minute. Okay, so this is the script that we read before virtual meetings. Pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021, this meeting is conducted via remote means. Members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so via Zoom. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort is made to ensure the public can access the proceedings in real time over Zoom. And then subsequent to this meeting, as Angela just said, we'll upload the recording to the town's YouTube channel and folks can watch there. And anybody who is in any trouble getting ahold of us can always email the co-chairs or the town liaison. So, hey, Cole. So we'll go around and do a little roll call and make sure everybody's got good audio. I'll just kind of go across the screen. Robin. Yes, I can hear. Arthur. Julian. Yes. Jenny. Yes, I'm here. Joy. And Cole. Yep. Okay. So I'm gonna, if I can share my screen, I was gonna put the agenda up and then we do have a couple of things, a couple of pieces of new business that, well, I'm not sure if I can do this actually. Well, I'll just say it out loud. So we do have a couple pieces of new business. So one, Angela has been so kind as to join us and help us facilitate a little conversation about where things are headed with the council. And then I know Robin has at least one, maybe two things that have come up recently that we want to speak to as well. So other than those items, though, we'll kind of go through the agenda that was posted before. And so I guess I would just start with minutes. Did anybody want to have any discussion about the minutes or otherwise make a motion to approve? Doesn't look like the minutes record me being there. But I was there and I seconded a motion in them. Okay. We will revise that. And I apologize. As you all know, I wound up trying to both chair and take minutes. So there probably are some other deficits in there too. In the absence of anything else, I'll motion to accept the minutes. Second that. Okay, great. I guess we would do quick little roll call vote. So Robin. Yes. Julian. Yes. Joy. Joy, can you hear me? Oh, I said yes. Sorry, my bad. And I'm also a yes. So we are unanimous on the minutes with an important revision. Okay. The next item is the Yusufa. I'm probably pronouncing his name wrong. There was a reimbursement request that came through. And I think I'll let Robin kind of lay out the issue. But I think we want to, yeah, I think we want the whole council to sort of talk about what's going on. Robin, you want to kind of talk us through it? Okay. So it's very Yusufa Siddi, I think it's how you spell his last name. Who was the African running? Yep. So for 2021, we approved a grant for 10 workshops for that 200 each. So I received, this is still on the reimbursement way of doing the grant. So I received something from him. I'm sure. Okay. So we dated it to 1122, but I received it early March with a note saying that he did a workshop. And it was at UMass. The original grant was for Amherst Public School workshops. And he said he did it at the end of November 30th, 2021 from Amherst Media. And as far as that, and he used to see his photos and email correspondence, his documentation, but he hasn't sent any. So it's one, I asked him to send me some documentation of that. And for this one workshop, he is charging us $1,000. So there's a few issues for me, which is when the workshops are 200 each and he did one. And the other is it wasn't the intended audience. And I'm not sure we've ever encountered this before. So he also sends his contract for 2022. And I feel pretty strongly that we would need to reinforce that the workshop, the workshops, if he does any workshops, they have to be for the intended audience. So the question is, do we even pay for the one workshop? Is there any discussion about paying the $1,000 to put down? Or it's for me there, isn't it? But so go ahead, Jenny, please. I was just clearing my throat. But yeah, this isn't exactly what we we granted for. But we also don't know if there was a hardship around COVID in the school. So we may need some backup explanation. Why there was only one workshop or if he has correspondence about trying to place the event in the schools and them not being able to do that. So I think we need a little bit more information. We didn't say. Matt, didn't you have some conversations with him earlier? Yeah, it's it's been an ongoing discussion. But you know, similar to to your concern around audience and number of presentations, you know, he to Jenny's point, he has made a lot of efforts at outreach or at least has kind of described a lot of outreach outreach efforts with the schools. And I do think that certainly last year, COVID played, you know, played a factor in getting himself scheduled. So I mean, one thought that I that I had would be to you know, formally ask him to make the request to you know, for this for this tweak to his grant. And then I think explain, you know, sort of the good thinking behind what the rate per performance would be. And you know, find a find a reasonable way to reimburse him for partial, you know, completion of the grant. But I think that would have to come to us as a request to make those make those revisions. The revision meeting, the intended audience or the revision meeting $1,000 of workshop. The intended audience. Usually we ask for a letter or something explaining why an event was going to be postponed or rescheduled or has changed for any reason. So I think we could ask him to do that in a formal way. That way we have some explanation why the grant funding is it will probably need to change too. But but because, you know, spanning 10 workshops for was it 10 workshops, he was and he yes, with with nothing set up with no letters of support. I mean, I was a little I wondered how he was going to do that many. But yeah. So I mean, we had been funding workshops around $300 or $400 each, depending on how long they were. I don't know if it was a, you know, an hour and a half or two hours. I mean, we just need some more information from him. But if he were to ask for a change, like we have asked others to do, we could go back and reconsider what the reimbursement was. And as Matt said, we negotiate something that's a little more reasonable for the one workshop that he did do. Julie. Hey, so I pulled the panel book from last year. And I feel like as we discussed this, we're perhaps modeling some of the grant requests from 2022 at the grant request from 2021. So there really was no in school part of this. So I'm just going to read aloud so we can kind of all get back on the same page. My program is a virtual online presentation of the traditional African music using core African heart drums, blah, blah, blah, each happening online, the audience participation would be encouraged by inviting them to use their own drum, for example, a five-gallon bucket. So, you know, without, he's noting here that it's difficult to go into the schools at these difficult times. But he believes strongly that music could get folks through. So the targeted audience students from elementary schools and high schools, but it was always intended to be virtual and online and accessible. So I'm a little confused why we have one event at UMass in person instead of a virtual event and why the virtual events couldn't happen. It wasn't virtual, I don't think. Well, he said you have your 2021 panel book. Oh, no, no, no, he said it was going to be virtual. The one that he did wasn't virtual. Yeah, yeah. So I just, I read it. I read it. Okay, yeah. So I just don't see why only one event could happen. That's all. He did say he'd be calling the schools to book the program and use social media, but he wasn't going into the schools and it was after school. So it's the kind of thing that easily could have come to parents and that email that has happenings in the community. That's all. For context, I get those all the time. If there's something going on, lots of folks are getting the word out to the community. And I mean, I strongly supported this. I thought as far as culture, this sounded super fun and like something kids would want to do. And it served diverse communities and but I am a bit frustrated in the execution. I don't understand the messaging that we're getting back. And it seemed like what we did grant was really doable. Cole. Yeah, I would just say I agree with asking for a formal change request. Because, you know, he proposed one thing and he did something different. That happens fairly often actually on this committee. It seems like just typically they ask first. So I would just go back to him and give a list of questions that we want answered in a letter. And we can go from his response. I don't really know if we have enough information to meet his request as it is. Robin. So I mean, what, yes, things change. But the attendant audience doesn't change like this that I'm aware of. Because this was for school kids. And I didn't support this as everyone knows because I didn't see how it's going to be. He didn't have anything set up. I mean, if it happened, I thought it'd be like phenomenal. But I just there was no support for it. There was no backup. There was nothing set up. And it didn't it didn't happen. And so I'm not sure of people saying we should actually pay more than 200 a workshop. Cool. I would just say, Robin, I think I agree with you. The intended audience change is a pretty big deal to me. I would just like to see why he thought of doing that. You know, give him a chance to explain, you know, this is valuable for this reason. And then once we get that, we could decide do we want to allow this change without any explanation from him. It's really hard to say. Well, I guess you need to do something and he wasn't able to set it up in schools. But I don't know, maybe this professor offered him, hey, come do a workshop. So I would, I'm going to say, I think what I hear the consensus is that more correspondence is needed with him. I like the idea of a form, you know, putting forward a formal request. I'm looking through I have a bunch of email change with various, you know, kind of various updates and things, you know, over the over the two years, you know, the two years, the two grand cycles, I'm going to suggest that whoever it does reach out to him for a formal application, you know, what do we call it? What do you call it? Call a formal change request. I don't know if that's the right word. Yeah, that's a big problem in the example. So what do they call it? I'm sorry. Intended audience. Oh, right. But more broadly speaking, like a change, you know, change in audience, you know, why did you only do one as opposed to 10, etc. You know, the rate, because ultimately, I think we're leaning towards reimbursing him at the rate that he was granted, but not for the full, you know, not for the full thing. So, so I would say whoever does reach out to him, we might want to think about printing a letter and putting it in the mail, and also potentially talking it through by phone or some other way because I do think that there may be some potential language or, you know, other cultural barriers that are getting in the way of some of the communication stuff going on here. And I want to be, you know, sensitive to that as well. So joy. I just wanted to basically throw my support behind that statement. I was wondering if there was actually even broader, you know, besides just emailing you as our other support, you know, again, this being my first year here, other support for people who to check in if they can't do something and things like that. Right. I mean, that's dovetails nicely into the accessibility conversation coming up soon. I think that's one of the big questions we'll be exploring. I don't know. I mean, we could have a motion to, you know, try to set the correspondence up. We could also just sort of agree that that further correspondence is needed and that a formal request isn't like a change request is needed. Should we develop a form? This might not be the only time this comes up. So it's standardized. It's a good idea. Did anybody want to volunteer to develop a form for a change request? Well, I'm kind of not on his side on this. So I'm not sure I'm the one who should be writing it, but I am a treasurer, probably am, or at least a draft of it. I'd be happy to work on that. And I think it just comes down to some of the, like, check boxes for the key criteria. That way, once they're checking off what they've changed, they've acknowledged that they've changed the audience, they've changed the date, that they've changed the number of events, you know, suddenly you're checking all the boxes. And then we would ask them to explain why each one of those checked boxes is changed. I think it can be pretty straightforward. And I'm not sure I have to coordinate with Cindy about the mechanism for sharing that, where it's appropriate to put it, all of that good stuff. But I'd be happy to draft something and everybody can then hash it out and make sure it's what we need. Thank you. I appreciate it. Branties can do, you know, if they have several workshops or several performances, they can do one and then bill us for it. You know, there is something on the form that's partial. I mean, that has done commonly. So for me, that's not the issue. The issue is change of completely change of audience from public school students to UMass students. And then, you know, the bill for the class of five workshops for one. So I think it's the point. Go ahead. With the change to the UMass students, you know, we do try to fund projects and are committed to funding projects that are open and accessible to the public. And in this case, I think one of the things that's perhaps really kind of getting to Robin is it doesn't meet our requirements that it be accessible to the public in this way. And there are ways to do that. If you had chosen to pick a spring day and do it in some common area outside and advertise it that way and it happened to be at UMass, that could have been open to the public. But it is a pretty big change. But again, everyone was just trying to do the pandemic. So I agree with Cole that he deserves a chance to put forth the reasoning and get something for his efforts that I'm sure is much needed funding for artists. So I would just make one minor tweak, which is I think that a form is a great idea and having a standardized practice is a great idea. I think that you could just reach out to him with some of these questions and develop a form. In other words, I hate to have to wait a whole another month plus before we get back to him about the process of requesting these changes. So I would say whatever kind of process you use in this correspondence is something we can all learn from and adopt and carry forward. But I think that's a good next step for Yusuf's question and I appreciate the work on it. In the interest of time, I'm going to suggest we move forward unless there's any more discussion on this one for now. So I put two somewhat deceptively short questions on the accessibility event item on our agenda. And truly, one of those two questions is pretty short. Just Charles Baldwin with MCC, who is their accessibility person, is available on the 27th or the 28th of April. And I think those are two of the dates that we had identified. So the easy question is, which of those two dates, if either what do we want to do with Charles? The more challenging question is, what are some of the things that are going to go into organizing and communicating this accessibility event? And I would just say, as I understood our last conversation to be that we want this to begin the conversation around accessibility, not to be the end all be all. This isn't the culminating event. This is a way to prompt a larger public dialogue. Because I think a lot of us went into this thinking we would do it in the fall. And I think we still probably are thinking we'll do the larger event in the fall where we might bring in several speakers and things like that. But I thought there was really good energy in our last meeting around the idea of just bumping things up in terms of how public the conversation is and just sort of getting more voices, frankly, more diverse and a broader range of voices to the table to even sort of think through this event. And I do, one last thing and then I'll turn it over. But I do have two lists, one from the FY21 grants and one from the FY22 grants of awardees who indicated interests in some kind of an accessibility round table. So as we think about communicating and organizing this April event, we know that we have a nucleus there and then of course we can message it out to our entire grantee list. But I would maybe customize a message to the people who said they were interested just to try to reel them into the discussion. And the other thing, the other caveat is I am traveling that I'm coming back that very weekend. So I'm cautious about over committing to too much shortly before the event and I just want to be upfront about that because I don't want to leave anybody hanging. And didn't we format it, though, that it was going to be somewhat casual? It's not going to be terribly structured. And Charles Baldwin's likely to take the lead. So I'm just saying I think you don't have to stress about it as long as you can show up. Then of course, I might be more comfortable winging it than the average Joe, but I think we're good just to have a discussion and facilitate it. But do let us know if your travels to let you. Is Charles going to facilitate this and see this, whatever we want to call it? Well, yeah, I mean, I only sent the one email that I copied a couple of you on was the only correspondence we've had. So it's very open-ended. He's, you know, he'll roll with the punches no matter how we kind of, you know, set things up. He's going to, I think he's going to be able to embrace, you know, embrace the format. I think, yeah, so I don't think he's made a commitment to being a keynote per se, but but I think he'd be comfortable, you know, taking the taking the mic for a good chunk of the time. I do have the email in front of me. He did say it could be him, but he has ideas about others, obviously getting snow projected outcomes from the round table would help. So I think it from that it seems like he's open to facilitating or moderating, right? And maybe if we can just talk about possible outcomes, we can just go back with him and say here are the outcomes that we're hoping for and we'll see, you know, do you have any thoughts? Could you take lead or would you prefer us to like structure it more? You know, since, since he would be the expert, I think if he's happy to take the lead, I'm happy to let him. And then we just then on our side, it just becomes zoom meeting and getting people in the door or in the room. Yeah. So Robin, please. So are we talking about getting other people from Amherst regular citizens, people who have special, you know, specific interests in the accessibility, other people in other cultural institutions around here? Or are we talking about and or are we talking about people from other local cultural councils or at least local local cultural councils or maybe not just local or? Yeah. I mean, I think it's an important question because, you know, we know we have a set of our grantees about 25 grantees over the two years who said, you know, yes, I'm me up. I'm interested. And that's maybe our most focused audience. So then I totally agree. I mean, other other town boards and other town, you know, agencies and institutions. And then I love the idea of, you know, expanding out to Northampton and South Hadley and, you know, looping in. So I think having that broad as broad as we want, but I think staying focused on our grantees as our as our most important audience makes sense to me, especially because a lot of these people were the ones who got on board with last year's, you know, the accessibility supports where we actually did fund, you know, direct services and things like that, too. So some of these folks have already put in quite a bit of investment into the idea. And I'd add the key sentiment from the last meeting was why hold off until the fall? You know, we can basically take this and springboard into something much more structured or even a series of things in the fall. But let's get started. I think Joy put that forth in particular. I really appreciated that that thought as far as, you know, we don't have to overdo it. We can get started. A lot of good ideas will come out of it and we can build on it. So let me bring us bringing us back to the simpler question, and then we'll have to jump back to the more I think the outcome. I do want to come back to your outcomes point, Joy. I think it really does hit the nail on the head, what Charles said. But the simpler question is, does anybody have a preference on those two dates? That was from 27th to 28th of April. No preference. Either is fine for me at the moment. But I have a preference for the 28th as well. 28th is better for me. All right. I think I'm free for both. So unless going once, going twice. And then, Joy, I'm wondering if you are actually, let me not do that. If anybody wants to volunteer to sort of reach back out to Charles and sort of help us foster that communication moving it along. You know, why don't we come back to that? I think outcomes is probably the more important thing for us to discuss right now. And for me personally, just because we set aside some funds within our larger, you know, grant picture, our larger allocation picture, for me, one of the important outcomes is that we do formulate, you know, start to formulate a vision for what we can do on a larger scale in the fall, you know. So I think that would be one thing is, you know, using this as just a place to foster dialogue. But also as a springboard towards, you know, a slightly more formal event, the bridge that does bring in some, you know, celebrity guests, so to speak. Oh, you had your hand up. I think that's a good thing to learn. What could the people that we're trying to serve, you know, the artists in this area, what could they get out of an event about the arts and accessibility. I'd also like to learn what we can do for artists to make our process more accessible and also to help them make their art more accessible. So learning about, you know, as a council, what can we do, but also more specifically, if we were to hold an event, what would they like to learn? That sort of thing. Great. Robin? Also, and this may be just stating it differently, to bring in artists and other people of culture who might need accessibility, accommodations, or even how do we reach those people to produce art, not just over having something or have signers, which is great, but also, you know, there's a lot, there's actually a lot of, there are a lot of disabled, you know, wheelchair dancers, there are a lot of people who are deaf, who are actually musicians, and there are organizations and as well as individuals. So how do we help someone even write the grant and do some sort of event that isn't just, you know, this straight whatever we've been doing event, and then we're going to make it more, you know, a little bit accessible for people? I'm not sure if I actually explained that well, but I'd like to reach out to other, to the communities that we were trying to serve, I guess, and to see if they want to produce culture. Yeah, and I think that's an idea, I mean, you've carried that idea forward before too, and I think it's important, you know, to have a more diverse, in all ways, but a more diverse, continually, you know, more diverse slate of actual grantees, I mean, you know, at a bottom line for the council, but more broadly too, a more diverse, so I think that's, and I do think that's a distinct outcome from, you know, also important from what Cole said. Yeah. So that's, I mean, that's three or four right there. That sounds pretty good to me in terms of sort of starting the conversation. Joy? Just a quick clarification and sorry if this seems obvious, but when we're talking about accessibility in this space, based on your comment from earlier as well, are we just talking about accessibility in terms of people with disabilities? Are we also talking about accessibility in terms of like people who don't know the language or who might need extra support in writing a grant application or, you know, figuring out a digital zoom thing, because maybe that's the same, but maybe it's, I think it's a little bit different, so I want to understand that distinction. All of it, I think. I mean, we have talked about how it seems like there are some people who, you know, the grant is written in a certain way, in a certain form, and not everybody understands that. I mean, it's difficult enough for anyone to write a grant. So how do we make that more accessible to people? How do we make it that we're serving the grantees rather than they're trying to fit themselves into our little old, you know, developed in English types of applications? I mean, the town of Amherst now does have a more accessible grant, which is pretty new. Before that, they did have, supposedly at least, their accessibility was about different spoken languages, and that is definitely an issue. I'm sure. So I think it's all of it, and it's a lot. I mean, it's basically changing the culture. I mean, one piece of the puzzle is where this started for us as a council was pretty narrowly focused on disability accommodations, and in a lot of ways, that's a more straightforward set of services. So we set aside funds and we funded services. And so, you know, that happened. We did a lot of work on it last year. But I think it's been our constant hope that we can make things more accessible, language-wise, culture-wise, and lived experience. A lot of times we'll talk about grantee and say, I think this might be a first-time grant writer. And these are cultural grants. It's not necessarily folks who are sitting in a university setting and have access to that knowledge base or whatever you want to call it. So I think the broader we can keep, or the broader we can, in our messaging around this, the more broadly we define accessibility and diversity, the better we'll do. And I think we can, at least I feel confident that the disability group will always remain inside of that circle. But I think that, you know, the bigger we can make the circle, the better. And to Cole's point about things that we personally can do that are not a question of money, but more of, you know, structure, you know, trying to host more workshops, trying to be more available. I certainly have had a few, you know, fairly powerful experiences with folks on the phone or over Zoom, where, you know, you just tell it, people get overwhelmed by email chains and they get overwhelmed by the MCC website. And so, you know, talking stuff through with people is sometimes one good way to make things more accessible. So I think a broad brush is important here. So again, I don't know if we necessarily need a motion so much as a volunteer. To do what? To speak with Charles? Well, I think there's a couple of major tasks that sit in front of us here. There is, you know, just speaking with Charles or, you know, emailing to Charles and sort of laying out the outcomes and some of our ideas. There is truly developing, you know, developing some language that we can use in an email or, you know, other means of communication to, but language that we can use to describe what we're trying to do on the 28th of April, which is, you know, less than a month away. So, and again, I think we're comfortable being loose in terms of what this is, but it still does need to be, you know, kind of written and disseminated. So I guess those are the two big tasks. You know, asking Cindy to schedule a Zoom meeting with the town account, that's not a big deal. That's, you know, that's kind of par for the course with the council. Julie? There's one other task, which is the social media outreach, because we definitely want to get the word out. So also executing on social media, but also executing on whatever the email lists are that you were mentioning. Yeah. Joy? And then also, are we going to have a sign language interpreter for this? Yeah. Well, one thing we learned last year is it's not hard. I mean, there's no guarantee that somebody's going to be available, but it's not hard to actually put it in through the commission for the, for the deaf. So that is one piece of institutional knowledge we now have is that there's a, there's a pretty straightforward platform for doing it, especially in the Zoom era. But no, you're right. That's, that's a key point in terms of accessibility. I mean, on the one hand, Zoom is a nice, you know, it's the most convenient form for something like this. On the other hand, I, you know, I think that it just by definition creates a barrier for some folks who are not, you know, comfortable with the, with the format. But I don't, I don't think we really have an option to do it in person, you know, in this kind of timeframe. So, but I can definitely set up the ASL request. I'm happy to do that. I've done that for a bunch of stuff in the past. I can contact Charles, but it would be nice if somebody could give me the notes from the meeting as far as the outcomes and, you know, maybe he can help with some of the language on what we're doing unless someone wants to, to take point on that as well. No, thank you. He helped us with our language on the guidelines. So. Yeah, that's what I was about to say. We gave him something to respond to with the guidelines and he gave us tons of great notes on that too. So, right, I think, I think the important thing is just the willingness to get it started and start that back and forth. Okay, I'm, you know, I think we need to keep on moving, but I will say that I don't know, do folks should, are we thinking about trying to have another council meeting before the 28th? I mean, that seems, it seems ambitious to me, you know, that being said, if, if, if we need to have prep for the 28th, you know, I could see the argument for it as well. I guess personally, I'm going to suggest that we do at least, at least, you know, mark something as a placeholder that we can always cancel later. But I just, I worry about sort of, you know, two or three of us getting in touch with Charles, getting things rolling and then we feel getting overwhelmed by the decisions that need to be made or anything. I mean, how do others feel? I'd be happy to be persuaded otherwise. It's just, it just seems like it might be smart to have something on the books at least. I think having it in the holster would be good and then cancel if necessary. I mean, otherwise we just need again and what's the, what are we doing? I mean, I'm all for just going with things, but some things have to be a little bit more organized. As long as we have an outline, you know, and that it's agreed with Charles, you know, like, I think we can just go with it. You know, we set it up to not to be more of a discussion for this very point because several people felt that it was just too much going on to try to do something rather structured now. So I'd be fine to just, you know, go straight into the meeting as long as we have that communication clear with Charles. Well, I'm just trying to think about how his, you know, how he's going to experience the prep for all of this and such. I think, you know, I think that doing it over emails is probably fine with, you know, Joy. And if you want to pull in others, Joy, I'd be happy, you know, others to join that conversation or not. I think that's, I think that's fine. I mean, so I guess, are we thinking that ultimately this will be basically a roundtable that we are organizing, but really we're only, we as council members are only participants in it. We're not actually hosting the discussion. That's the impression that I got, that we basically hand their aims to Charles to do some moderation. And then we'd learn from people. And also, I mean, we can speak as well, but it's not like an event that we're hosting. Well, it is, but it's not, you know. That's the thing. I mean, I would, I would be, maybe Joy, maybe you should explore that with Charles, you know, see if, if, if he's comfortable with that idea, then I am, you know, I think we all are. I just, I want to make sure that it makes, that makes sense to him before we completely commit. Yeah, no, I'll go ahead, Joy. I'm sorry. No, I was just going to say, you know, this all depends on Charles also being able to, to put this together, because then we're leading completely on him at this point. So I'm happy to get in touch with him. If I could just CC either Matt or Julie or Robin or whoever wants to be involved, just so I have a second in case like I miss an email or, you know, we come up with something that you guys, since again, first time we're here, are like, no, that's not how we're going to do it. That would be great. But, you know, if, yeah, I'd be happy to hand the reins over to him and we just facilitate, like having the meeting, because again, it's, it's a matter of, I think getting him or another expert or somebody connected with the grantees, and that's really the conversation that needs to happen. Yeah, I'm almost imagining a message that says something like, you know, the ACC is pleased to present Charles Baldwin, inclusive inclusion and access program officer from MCC on a, you know, on a roundtable discussion of all matters relating to culture and accessibility, you know, and kind of speak him up. If, you know, if he's game, if he's game for it, I think that that sounds good. And I have to say the last time, you know, anytime he's interacted with us, he's been a natural and really comfortable talking with small and large groups. It's kind of what he does. So, you know, from, from those past experiences, it seems straightforward. Yeah. Okay. Well, I'm, unless, were you trying to make a comment, Jenny? I was just going to offer, we did have a, you know, a few of us who had met before around accessibility, and if it would be helpful for that handful of people, you know, I'm joy, if you find you need more, more help to offer that, that help to you, or pass the reins to us or something like that. So you don't feel like, you know, you're, you're, all of a sudden you and Charles are putting together this event, or if there's more questions, because we did have that group who was working on other accessibility issues last year. But of course, that's me offering the group up. So, but I would be willing to, to help if you need, need anything. Jenny, thanks for bringing that up. And to that, we'd have to be careful of quorum and too many people. So I wasn't in that group. I'm happy to be copied on any emails. But if we have to consolidate our numbers to make sure we don't have too many of us. Yeah. Yeah. Then yeah, it was a small folks who are working more closely on that who shouldn't be involved. Right. So I guess I'm offering myself up if you, you know, if you need help with something. Okay. Do you mind if you were the person then ICC? Not at all. And that way, you know, after this initial reach back out to Charles, if you want to offer any additional comments from, you know, the group, then we can, we can do that. Okay. That sounds good. Thank you. Thank you, Jenny. You're welcome. Enjoy as a first person, first time person last year working on the accessibility stuff a lot. I will say that Jenny was a great help to me as well as we, as we, and to all, I mean, everybody was, but, but you're, you have a good, a good partner there. Thank you, Matt. Okay. Well, this is, that's really exciting. And I'm, I'm, I think it's going to be a neat, a neat launch to our, to the accessibility work this year and a good, really the right thing to do, you know, and kind of lives our, our guideline was priorities, lives our priorities, you know, in the guidelines. So I want to move over to item five, which is the grants update. And this is more of a a general chance for Robin to kind of speak to where we are with the grant cycle for FY 22. Not to show people want to know the allocation, which is the money that MCC gives to the towns and cities for their local cultural councils has not come in. And the way they do that is they send a contract to the town, never in our case, it's usually Holly, who is the controller who deals with our account, you know, signs it off, sends it out, the money comes in, I'm not sure how long that takes. And then the contracts. So this year, there are contracts for each grantee. So then the contracts you get, you know, processing they've been sent their money. It should have gone out to us where you're not the only town who has not received a contract. But contracts have gone out to other towns. So I don't know what's going on. The person who sends them, I believe he's totally new. So after speaking with Holly, we decided I would pursue the MCC end of it. And this guy just has not done back to me from last week and from this week. So either tomorrow, or Thursday if I haven't heard back to him, I'm going to go above him. The person who told me that to call him and contact him. And I just asked him if it hadn't gone out, should we send it? It's clearly not alphabetical because Watertown has theirs and Amherst doesn't. So unless they're inverting it, I don't know if they all go out at once, but they should have received a contract right now. And we can't pay our grantees until we have the money. We can pay the reimbursement from 21, those who we extended, but we can't pay our 22. Even though the money will come in on the town since we had to, it's a different account. So most of almost all of the contracts have come in. Unfortunately, especially when we have accessibility, the little dairy festival in Delta Town, they have not sent the contract yet. Possibly, you know, we wondered how that was going to come off and maybe they, I don't know. And in the grant, which is the whole thing about the town and the name of the town, that did not happen the day that it was supposed to. And I have not been asked for an extension, but I would like to contact him about it. And the other ones are that Gabriel Gould has requested an extension of the Silver and the Arts Amherst Black Party at the Drake, the date we, because it was actually the cultural district and the council's rep to the district. And we had come up with April 23rd, so that we'd still have students, but we'd miss Eastern, which I believe is the next weekend. Something else is happening at the Drake. The Drake is definitely open. Gabriel gave me a tour and it's great. It's been amazing. So she's requested an extension, but apparently we have to, the board has to meet at the cultural district in order to approve the date. And the other one is that Dr. Chauvin's, the Kwanzaa celebration of Stephanie Hazel's didn't, at least I know Hazel's didn't open. I'm pretty sure the celebration didn't happen, but he sent me the contract for the payment for it, which it didn't happen, so we can't pay for it. I did email him asking him if he wants to request an extension of the date as well as to put in sort of a little, you know, on the side, if cases doesn't open, to be allowed to have it at a different Amherst venue. And I have not heard that from him. And maybe one or two others that haven't come in and all the rest are in. So I have a couple of questions, and thank you for this, for your other work. I have a couple of quick questions on this. So I think we do need to make a decision, right? The Drake, they did put in a formal request to get an extension on there. So that, we don't need to do it this second, but that will take a motion and a quick vote to approve that. So this is the, and everybody knows this is our first year of doing the direct granting model. And so it does create some more interesting situations that we, you know, we have to think through as they come along. So I heard you mentioned at least two, right? Where the event did not happen and the grantee sent us their contract. And technically what is supposed to happen is we get the contracts, we give the contracts to the town, and the town pays out. And so now we're in this position where somebody's event has passed. We know that it hasn't happened. They give us the contract. We have to make a decision. Do we pass that over to the town? Or do we, and I think what we have to do is something similar to what is going on with UCFA, right? Which is ask for clarification, you know, how formal that needs to be. I think depends on what the person wants to do or, you know, what's going on with the particulars of it. But to me, the two that you mentioned, the Andy Grant and then the Kwanzaa, you know, both of those, I think, Robin, you need to sit on the, we need to sit on the contracts until we understand. Not signing off on this until we understand. Well, Andy did not ask for an extension. In fact, he posted something on Facebook about it. And I as a private citizen said, how do I access this? I'm interested in this. And he said sadly, it hasn't happened. I actually can't find that whole interaction. But I looked back at the, you know, the grand book and it didn't happen. I think it's a really important thing to happen. I mean, we talked a whole lot about this. This is the one about the name of the town and why and the history and what it means. And so I would like to contact him to ask him if he wants to ask for an extension. And the same thing with Delta Shabazz. So Andy did not submit any contact at all. Delta Shabazz submitted what it didn't happen. He may think it was more of a reimbursement issue that he's sending than a direct grant contract, something that didn't happen. I don't know. But I had tried to get a couple of messages to him saying, you know, asked him if he wants to request an extension next year because it's sponsored. So it can't just happen and all that. And so I hadn't heard from him. But I do know that Hazel's didn't open and I don't know if it will. Restaurants and notaries were difficult to get open, which is why I suggested, you know, he asked for the possibility of a different venue in Amish, though. So I just want to, okay, if I continue to contact him and Andy and also, I guess, we're a little fairy festival to see, you know, what they're doing. There was one other two. I have the list. Oh, get organized and you can't find anything. So those were all unfilled out. And yeah, Sean French Burns, I don't remember what this was, but it hasn't sent in. So Robin, I'm going to just pause for a quick second. And because I, you know, just in order to keep things moving, I know we do need to make a motion for sorry, for the Drake. So do we want to just make sure we get that order of business kind of taken care of? And then we're going to talk about just a general, I mean, it's just a general extension on the date, right? So we're not. And technically, you know, the grantee, we do expect them to do what they say they're going to do. But technically, if they do it within this this calendar year, it's not really a problem. You know, I mean, so I don't, I think, I think you would need formal approval to go beyond the year, you know, but anyway, I think if folks ask us for an extension request, we should, we should vote on it, you know, in a proper way. I can make a motion. I motion to extend the date for the Drake celebration of the arts for up to the end of this calendar year. Yeah. I'll second it. Looking forward to going, right? Yeah. So we want to just do a quick roll call. That was Jenny seconding. Yep. Robin. Yes. Arthur. Yes, sir. Joy. Yes. Cole. Yes. And I am a yes as well. So that passes unanimously. Thank you. Robin, you're already in touch with Gabriel, right? So you can let her know. Should that come from? I'll let her know. I can let her know. I mean, I'm the one who told her to ask for the extension. Yeah. Thank you. Excellent. These other questions, though, I think, you know, you're doing the right thing by just holding on the contracts and not sharing them with the town. And, you know, there is the setup of the whole contract is such that, you know, the person agrees to do their activity and then to submit a final report. And the the real account and I use a word accountability with very loose, you know, terms, but the real accountability is in that final report, you know, and so if somebody failed and that's the letter that we sent out to them, you know, is to that effect that if you don't submit the final report, then you will have to return the funds. And I think we gave them a two week deadline for that. I'm not I'm not disagreeing with the idea of sitting on the contracts, but I want to just be just be cautious about it because I think the argument could go both way. You know, the argument could be that the grantee has the whole year to expend the funds, you know, and the other side is no, you made an agreement to us to, you know, to do your thing on such and such a date. And I think we're in the right, you know, to to ask them for a new date. I think that's perfectly appropriate. But I just want to be sensitive to the fact that, you know, ultimately the accountability is in that final report. That makes sense. Right. Well, if with the cons of celebration, it's not that there wasn't a final report, so it didn't happen. So we can't pay for something that didn't happen. Yeah, I don't have the request. That's why I said, you know, do you want to ask for an extension to, you know, next year to 22? And, you know, I don't think that's a bad thing. And so I wanted to also ask Andy, if he wants an extension, see me not know that he get one. I think these are different than the earlier issue. Yes, yes. However, it is still seeking clarification. My only point is just seeking clarification. So Julie. Yeah, I think we probably spent enough time on it. But, you know, it is a difficult situation in that the longer it's taking to get the contract through no fault of our own, that suddenly the clock is ticking on people who had earlier dates. And I think to Matt's point, we end up treating certain people differently than other people. Other people are de facto kind of getting extension to the end of the year because they're scheduled in June. And, you know, when the money comes in, they get it and we have no control over it. And then we've got this discrete group here that had earlier dates. So we have control and we're used to kind of acting on those dates. So I think you're doing everything exactly right. But I do think we have to be sensitive that, you know, suddenly we are treating some people differently just because they had earlier dates. It's a nuance. And we're learning as we go through this first year of this process. So thank you so much for reaching out and working with everyone. The contracts were never approved before the end of the year into the next year. So I mean, it's a weird contract. It's a weird grant cycle where you start applying in October or the year of November. You don't know until like January, but you can apply for grants from the previous July or something through that time. No, you're not going to get paid for it until at least into the next calendar year. I mean, it's just in this year. Unfortunately, it's like last year, the money didn't come into like May. So, you know, it's COVID, I think things have changed. The schedule is definitely at least two weeks later because we started two weeks later. I don't know why some councils have received their contracts and therefore their money and some haven't even received the contracts. I would say smaller grant award amounts. We do have a hefty chunk. They definitely have smaller number and smaller amounts. I mean, like it's very significant and different. But I don't know. The contract should come out. The guy is new. It may be a new system. Some of us might have gotten lost, but they know we're not the only ones. Because I contacted other councils to see what was going on. Yeah, I'm really surprised to hear that. I mean, I was looking, I just looked back through my emails. February 16th, Mina said that she thought the contracts were out and anybody who didn't catch that, you know, Mina Kim was a great liaison to us for several years with MCC and she, you know, she's left as well. So I think it's safe to say there's probably some back end issues happening at MCC on this front too. But who knows. So Robin, thank you very much. And, you know, we'll just kind of stay in communication about, with the grantees, you know, as these, I think they're going to keep on coming in more and more people inquiring about the funds. Just forwarded to me. I've said this to many people, you know, anyone I've sent stuff out later, even if they haven't asked, I've said we don't have the money yet. So maybe, you know, a couple of weeks, but, you know, so don't expect it next week. Okay, so we do have a newer question. This is an item that Julie came to you. Do you want to kind of speak to it? Yeah, and it's perhaps going to be difficult to speak to it without Leah here. I'm glad that Cole's here. I was helping, I'm on the board over at Amherst Ballet. I was helping them with some outreach that they're doing for some urgent kind of emergency fundraising. And it occurred to me that, hey, maybe we could, they could put a snippet of, you know, 30, 60 seconds from the showcase into their video in the interest of time. And because the work was so nice, so it coordinated with Cole and Leah and Matt. And I was over at Amherst Media literally downloading the files. And Jim asked me if it would be possible for Amherst Media to start kind of presenting some of the work out of the showcase. And, you know, on the one hand, we have our own plans to officially launch that work. But, you know, on the other hand, the work is, you know, was ideally would have come out in the fall. And the sooner it gets out there, the more it benefits those artists and the community. So I don't know that we can come to any decision certainly without Leah, but we can certainly discuss and maybe come up with some provisional plan if Leah is amenable after we update her or something like that. I would turn it over to Matt and Cole certainly did so much work. You know, I just said I'd put the idea out there. Cole, do you want to? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think that's a fantastic idea. I would want to make sure that we know what they're going to do so we can inform the artists who we interviewed and, you know, whose work we took pictures of. And if they're going to show pictures of the work, I would want to check in with the artists and say, hey, can we do this? Because a couple of them were pretty protective of their of their works in progress. Which I understand. But otherwise, I think that's a fantastic idea. And I really like to see that material get used. Of course, I want to hear what Leah has to say at some point. But it's all good with me. Great. And I'm happy. I know you're quite busy and I know Leah is quite busy. So I'm happy to coordinate with Jim over there if we do decide to go forward and coordinate with artists, et cetera. So speaking to what Cole just said that the artist is this trademarked? It'd be copy written by people. You know, I have no idea about any of this. And then all you do is you put the little symbol on the bottom of it. So if people can't use it, they'll be trademarked because that's more of a brand dressing, but it's copy written. So if their original work show up in our video, there is copy written as if you're walking by them on the street or wherever their their copyright protected, no matter what the whole piece is also copyright protected. So to your point, there might be some release that we have to do that that assigns them like I think you license them or authorize them for certain types of usage, which is exactly what Cole was was saying. Begin with how would they use it? Where would they use it? You know, we could structure that under an agreement. They're probably used to having those agreements in Amherst Media. I bet they know a lot more about it than I do. I think if folks are amenable to the idea, just letting Amherst Media know, which they probably already do, but that they would need to get their own releases from the artists who are featured, that that is a good, I think it's a good, a good caution. Cole? Another thing I wanted to add that I forgot to say is that it would be nice if they use the material that we made that they put just a little, you know, two or three second thing saying this was from the Amherst Cultural Council, apply for grants yearly at their website. You know, that's why we did this, this whole thing, or at least one of the reasons, one of the big reasons. So that would be nice if they could do that. To do like a plug for, yeah. Can I ask a question? Of course. When you guys videotape them, did you ask them for a release for videotaping? So we didn't, they never signed anything, but we made sure to talk with each of them. You know, maybe we should have had them sign something, that would have been smart. Unfortunately, I've never done this before. We did ask them, we said, here's what we're going to be using this interview for, and then when it came time to film them working on art or showing their art, we said, here's what we're going to use this for. I know a couple of them said, we're pretty uncomfortable with some of their art. And so we talked it through what we were going to do. And they eventually said, yes, that's okay with me. But there was some art they wanted us to show, and some art they really didn't want to show up. So if we're going to change what we use that material for, I'd like to clear it with them somehow or sign a release or something. Yeah, I think that would be a really good idea. And if Amherst Media holds those video clips, I'm not really sure where all that lives. But if they have access to it, that they need to understand that we need to get that release before they put it out. Since it's not a finished work, is it just pieces? I mean, I don't know, do they have access to it now? I mean, I can speak to that as far as, I mean, I literally went and downloaded. So, yes, they have all of the work on their hard drives there. I think the fact that Jim politely asked indicates that he does respect, but he can't just use it. But yeah, I think he would know he would probably have a process for us and the artists as far as those releases and whatnot. But you know, he was just like, we're just sitting on it, we could do something. Yeah, yeah, nice and collaborative and, you know, it was a good energy kind of thing, like let's get it out there. You know, but yeah, the artists need to be in the loop on that in agreement. Yeah, if they're expecting it to come in a different format as a larger formatted piece, that's where it might get kind of touchy. And I really do think this is a perfect opportunity to reach out to them to get those releases. Because you could include both these smaller snippets. And you can also include the larger piece all in one fell swoop. And I don't think it's very complicated to write a short little release for them to sign or agree to. And Amherst Media might already have one. And they might, yeah, they might have something all set. Do we, do we need a provisional motion if Leah is in agreement with it that we'll go ahead? So I actually want to just ask a question first, because Amherst Media has kind of an amorphous grant with us for a fairly small amount of money. And I'm wondering if perhaps, you know, in the evolving nature of things like this, we already have sort of a partnership with them to some to some degree. I have not heard anything from them about how they're I mean, I think they asked for one amount and we've granted them a significantly smaller amount. So I'm curious if maybe, you know, there's there's a, there's already sort of an agreement set up with them to do some work with us. Not not obviously not with the showcase video footage, but you know, in a in a partnership of some sort. So that's just something to explore. And then what what I'm hearing is that really this is more of just connecting Amherst Media with Cole and Leah, and seeing if there is right a way to I mean, really they're just offering to play the showcase for it for us, aren't they? Cole? Unfortunately, Leah and I have some throughput issues. And so it's really tough to be a full time student edit this sort of thing I've noticed, especially when you have no experience with it. So I imagine that they wouldn't use the material that we've they wouldn't. So right now on the hard drive, there's basically three things. There's the interviews that we filmed. There's the B role of the artists. And then there's also the maybe 80% finished edited product. I imagine they wouldn't use the edited product. They don't want to go through and use the interviews and the B role I'd expect. And if they want to use the edited product, I would maybe say actually, we should wait on that. Just so we can finish it up and actually present it how we want to present it. And maybe once it's done, they can present that on Amherst Media, but I'm sure they can do a very good job. You know, video editors that they are with the interviews and the B role. Well, however, I will say that if you're at 80% and you have professionals sort of on hand, professionals may help you get from 80 to like 120%. You know, I mean, they may they may take what you've done and help fully realize your vision. So I would I would suggest that just that somebody connects Jim with Colin Leah and and just see if you know, see what's what's possible there because I don't I don't think we have a clear definition of what they're looking to use. Do we know I think I can again, you're busy as students. He approached me. I can continue to facilitate the conversation and clarify some stuff. Quick question with the B role, is there some of that art that artists don't want shown on the B role, potentially? No, we didn't end up filming anything that they didn't want shown. Oh, good. Okay. And then the the other thing, Matt is Jim put in a grant request for 2500, of which we only granted 10% of that 250. So whatever conversation I have with him, I'll have to be clear with him that there's no more money for this. We did another donation that that got us access to using kind of as a nonprofit out of the 2021 admin funds. I think it was admin doesn't matter. And then another 250, but you know, I could tell you Jim would have liked to have the 2500. But, you know, our duties at the cultural council, we had to spread that money out to the larger community. So he'll just need to be aware that the funds that are out there it at least until 2023. A very important thing to be clear about. Yeah. So but thank you for bringing it. I mean, I think I do think there's potential for, you know, some great synergy to get the, you know, get things kind of to the to the end point, would you call it throughput to put it through, you know, so that's, that's awesome. So it's 720. And we try to keep our meetings at 90 minutes if we can. And I want is probably not enough time, Angela, to really get a rich conversation going. But I do kind of want to turn things over to Angela and see what we can do in the next 10 minutes or so and see where that puts us. If that works for folks. So I am aware of your time limits and I will be very brief. And I just want to say thank you everyone for your time and your energy on the cultural council. It is amazing to see how passionate you all are. And it's also humbling for me to see the scope of your work and all of the things that are on your list of things to do and the plate of things to do. So I have three questions and we don't need to hit them all today. I do want answers to number two, but my three questions are number one. It's great for bodies like this every now and again, to do a temperature reading or to take your temperature. So on your upcoming agenda, I'm going to recommend to both Julian and to Matt that you talk a little bit about your meeting time, the day that you meet, and make sure that everyone's on board with that. And so the other thing I want you to kind of talk about at a later date is the pace of play or the pace of the meeting and then the structure of the meeting. And have a good vibrant discussion about airtime. I feel like people feel, I've sensed that people feel like they can speak freely in these meetings, but if you are at a point and many groups do this where they need meeting norms, that's something that you should discuss. My second question is who's going to stay and who's going to go. So as I look, and this is part of my job as Paul's executive assistant, as I look at your list, I see one, two, three, four, five, six people and kudos to our students who are 18 years of age and younger who have been parts of your group. But like Arthur Perrow, are you ending your term in June and not seeking reappointment? Hi, I will be ending my term in June and not seeking reappointment. Yes. Thank you for your service. And so I know Leah in Sydney and and yes, are not here. But Jennifer Lind, are you seeking reappointment in June? No, I'm six years, so I'm officially off. Well, let me say thank you for your service. You're very welcome. It was my pleasure. And Cole, I was here in the office the day you interviewed. It was pre COVID. I loved meeting you. I hear that you're graduating from Amherst College this spring. Congratulations. So you will be terming off in June as well. Yes, I will have to resign come June. I've heard lovely things about your participation, and I enjoy reading everything you write. So keep up the great work. We're all very proud of you. Thank you. And Julianne, would you like to be reappointed at the end of June? Yes. Okay. All right. So I thank you for answering my questions. Number two. And number three is kind of what can we do better? So in the town of Amherst, we really recommend a structure of a chair, a vice chair, and a secretary treasure. Many groups like this group are doing rotating secretary duties so that they go through their membership lists alphabetically. And if you're absent, then the next time you show up, guess what? It's your turn. So it's just some things to think about as you restructure and as your membership kind of rolls over and we get some fresh faces. Again, let me say thank you for your effort. And it's nice to be with you this evening. So thank you. Thank you. Thanks for being with us. John. Thank you, Angela. And also thank you for stepping in as facilitator in addition to guest. So we appreciate about that. Okay. So I think, I mean, we covered a lot there and there is a lot of shades of gray with the grantees, but I think we're in a good place in terms of the dialogue. Unless anybody has any other new business that we haven't touched on, I think we should adjourn. Next meeting. Next meeting. Thank you. So and actually, was that decision made? I mean, are we definitely not going to pencil something in before the accessibility roundtable? I personally think it's too much. Okay. Any other? So that would be our next meeting then? Yeah. At the date? Yeah, but we, you know, I don't actually know that that would be an open, I mean, I'm not even sure that would be a technically an ACC meeting. You know, it's an event and we probably have business that needs to be discussed just with the grant cycle where it is. So I would suggest having a meeting soon after that, but not before we also have, you know, several religious holidays before that spring break, you know, there's, it's going to be hard to get a quorum together for that. So maybe we shoot for early May, first week of May. I think that's a good idea. So Cindy is only available, I believe it's Tuesday, Wednesdays. I struggle to know when I'm available. I think we have enough time to address this in email at this point to set a date for the first week of May. It's, it's a lot. I just want to be, it is a lot to try to do it over email. I'm not going to, you know, I mean, could we, could we tentatively say May 3rd, Tuesday, May 3rd? Tuesday would work better for me than Wednesday. Sure. Oh, good. And in terms of meeting a different time than early evening, like, like Angela suggested, I mean, I think that's, that's probably a longer discussion to have, but I think it's something we should not lose track of. Um, but can we tentatively say Tuesday to the 3rd, and then we can, you know, if needs to change, it can change? Yes. I don't hear anyone opposing that. Thanks, Cole. Thanks, everybody. Go ahead. Just if someone can either email me or remind me of the outcomes that I'm going to be presenting to Charles, that would be great. I was on Jenny's notes, right? A lot of that's been in Jenny's notes. You know what? I wasn't there. I totally missed the meeting and I don't know what they are. So today, today. Oh, from today. Oh, yeah. No, you, I'm, they'll be done. I'll send them out today because I've been writing them the whole time. So Jenny's really good about getting the notes out within a day or two of the meeting itself. So yes, Joy, that's, that's a great question. We'll definitely have those. I have the email to Charles ready. I'm just waiting to plug the outcomes in. Awesome. You work fast as well. Thank you. PCP does. Really appreciate everybody. Take care. Thank you guys. Thanks, Angela. Bye. Bye, Angela.