 Right behind us. All right, so pursuant to chapter 20 of the act of 2021. This meeting will be conducted via remote means members of the public who wish to access the meeting can do so by clicking on the live link to the zoom meeting that can be found on the public meeting calendar on the town of Amherst website or by dialing in by phone. The public is able to comment during the public comments segment of the posted agenda by raising their hand. This meeting is being recorded and will be posted to the town of. All right. And do we have. No, we don't have any attendees it looks like. You're now the host. Thanks everyone. Thanks for all your hard work. Thanks, Angela. So we've got everybody here and no members of the public right. Correct. Good evening everyone. Good evening. Happy New Year. Same to you. Yeah. Today is actually my birthday so I'm barely here. Birthday that is above and beyond on your birthday to my family is all waiting to celebrate it like I thought be there in an hour. Good incentive to run an efficient meeting. Yeah, absolutely. Yes. All right, let me actually get to. So did everybody get a chance to look at the meeting minutes. I had one comment. I just noticed that Harold Grinspoon's name. The spelling. It should be H A R O L D G R I N S P as in Peter. Oh, and no Grinspoon. Okay. Okay. Okay. And that's what you said, right? G R I N S P O O N. Okay. Okay. And are there any other. Corrections. Okay, I moved to approve the minutes with corrections noted. My second. All in favor say aye. I'll pose a nay. All right. Okay, so chair report. There's a few things. So I, I went in, like, because you've probably noticed that we haven't seen anything about this call for artists, right. For the making that we. Yeah. I went to town hall and I, and, oh yeah. And other news is that Maureen Pollock, who is our point on this project and our point person, essentially. Of the commission into the town hall, she has left. She's now working for, I believe the town of. Thank you. Oh boy. Yeah. So this is like a big mix up for. This is going to be handing it off to somebody else. The next, like Maureen to us has not been appointed yet. So we don't know who our point person in town. When that gets decided. I'll get notified. And I'll send an email out to you about that. So just one question on that. So did the call for artists. To get distributed by. The end of the year. There's more. But wait, there's more. I was at a yes or no. It sounds like an unfortunate. The very on point question, because that's exactly the question that I had when I went in. So I. I just buy happenstance happened to find Maureen, even though she doesn't work there anymore. She happened to be in the, in town hall. So I go in and I talked to her and she said that. The actual. Like Massachusetts. In the Boston guys. We're feeling too much of a time crunch on this. Because like after we approved it, then it went into the town for approval and then it has to go in back to them for like a final approval. And you mean by them. And so they're backed up. And they've extended it. So it looks. It's going to be extended probably like well into February. Before the, that call for artists actually hits the. It's the public. Okay. So we don't have to meet the deadline of January one, obviously. Correct. That's good news. Although I would like to get this kicked out the door so we can move on. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. I noticed that there was a job description. The town of Amherst was looking for a new planner. So I was curious about that. Yeah. Well, there was an article too. And I think either the bulletin or the Gazette I noticed. And. I was surprised to see that. Yeah. Moving on to Monty. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I must have missed that one. Yeah. I was very surprised when I saw it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But luckily there's this extension going on. So. Okay. It's been a breathing room. For this, this, um, handoff that's going to be happening to whoever the new person's going to be. Okay. I'm sorry. Did you say did they. Did they give a definite date for the extension of the deadline? No. No. Maureen didn't know what it was. And I don't think like she's been given a definitive answer. So do we have, we have a contact at Nifa. With whom she was. Working. No, I, I do not like, I've never. Like the, it was the chair before me that actually went into Boston for the training and all that stuff. So I've never. Been in contact with anyone. I've always just been in contact with Maureen who's been. Essentially like the shepherd of the project. Right. How can we find out what the deadline is then? If you look on the website, Robert, are you looking at the website right now? I wasn't. I'm on. I'm on the wrong computer. Check. See if there's anything written about it anywhere. And we don't yet know who in the town is going to be. Taking this. This on. Right. They're going to be looking at who's going to be replacing her. So. Like essentially it's been pushed like everything in. The town hall with this project is pushed until February. February. And so that leaves us. With our other. Project. Are we ready to think about that project right now? Please. I'm ready to myself to make sure I send the minutes for posting. Find any information about why this. This project. Okay. Thanks. We think that'd be on a press releases, right? It might be something that they sent to Maureen. Perhaps. I wish that I could get. Like actual. You know, direct information. So the, the previous chair of the commission. Who attended those trainings. And the. No. We talking bill. Yeah. Well, bill still wants to be part of the project in some way. But I. I'm not sure what it is. Like, I think that he. Wanting to be part of it like later on. As far as like. Like taking a look at the artists. Why don't we just call up bill and get whatever he's got that we can get. Yeah. He's pretty cool. Yeah. Yeah. He's cool. It's definitely cool. Like I. He never had like any, any hard copy stuff. As far as like, like, there was never any sort of like, you know, baton being passed on this project. I have a thumb drive. He can put all his computer files on if he wants to. He's never sent me anything on the computer. We need to ask him. Yeah. Yeah. I asked him, would you like me to do it? Okay. Yeah. It's like, I, I had a meeting with him and it was mostly just like talking about the stuff and there was never anything that was like any sort of. Like paperwork kind of stuff. Any kind of like hard copies. Any sort of online stuff. There was never any of that. I think it was all supposed to go through Maureen, but now Maureen is. Remind me what the official name of this project is. Making it public. Thank you. I just couldn't bring it to mind. I'll call him up tomorrow and now. Go over there with two beers and I'll come back with this stuff. I would even ask if, if he's, if he's amenable, you know, if he could attend a meeting and perhaps give us a bit of an orientation to what he learned at the training since I think most of us. Don't really have that. Yeah. We could all benefit from it. That would be helpful. Yeah. If possible. Yeah. Invite him. I don't know. You can ask maybe, maybe it'll require two beer. I can see that I'm public meeting. So let me ask, yeah. What if he can't come to the next meeting, but he wants to arrange a special meeting? Can we have a special meeting for that? I think so. Because it's. It's like stuff that it's, it would be considered like training, like kind of like that he went to, you know what I mean? Without any of us before. And I've asked him to come to a meeting. I think it was like back in November, maybe, but he couldn't make it because in the evenings. He, he's got little kids. And there was like something, there's some sort of thing about like the little kids have, you know, like ballet lessons or something. Well, that's why I brought up a special meeting in case I needed to negotiate. Yeah. Like while the kids are at school, because like, remember, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, you know, we just always have our meetings during school hours. Yeah. He could probably meet during the day. Well, we could have a meeting instead of at night next time. We could have a good day, maybe. How does that work for everybody else? No. It's difficult. It would depend on the day and time. I'm sorry. It would depend on the day and time. Okay. Okay. Can I just, so I'm looking at the NIFA page about making it public 2023. I'm on a page and I'll send up with the, the URL and the chat and admit, do we have chat ability in this? No, because it's open meeting law. You know, this whole open meeting law. Anyway, so there in this, it's, it gives a list of the participating communities. And Amber's not on the list. Okay. That's not a good sign. Well, okay. 2023 MIP from Massachusetts municipalities, confirmed participants. This is what we're doing, right? This is us. Well, it might be under 2022 though. Isn't that when the award was made? Did they not show a 2022? Well, I guess I'll now I'll look, but I would. I wouldn't think they would already have the participants for this year. What do I know? I'll look. Right. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know. Maybe like a week into this year. I'll take a look. That is definitely alarming. Man, I wish Marine was here. You know, I think this has to be for next year. There has to be a page for 2022. I'll find it. I'll get back to you. Okay. Okay. So if you get a response. It does not violate the open meeting law. Just the, you know, just sending us a fact with no. Discussion about it. Okay. So you can just say we are listed on X. So we are not listed. Whatever the fact is, so that we will be able to think about it for the next meeting, or if Shona decides that she, we need to have something done sooner than that, she'll have that information. Okay. You can talk to Shona alone about it as long as Shona doesn't talk to, you know, a serial quorum. So if you want to talk to Shona, that is not a. Quorum, but if you talk to Shona, then Shona talks to me and I talked to Dara, then it loops. There's some contact information on here that we can reach out to these people about this particular project. And I, I'm going to go ahead and write this down. Okay. And there's three people here we can contact to ask questions about this. I mean, I think getting information from bill is really, is really valuable. But I also would love to hear it from the horse's mouth kind of. I would agree. So I'm going to. I found 2022 and we are listed. Thank you. I got very nervous. I've been chosen to participate. Amherst, Adelborough, Fitchburg, Lowell, Lynn, Nadek, New Bedford, Salem, and Watertown. Thank you very much. Sure. Oh, we don't need to. Okay. Hey. Yeah, it sounds like a lot of those other towns are like. Bigger towns than us. I feel like we're like the smallest town on that list. But we're better. Nice. But I wonder like if, you know, those other towns have. Have someone that's like in charge of the kinds of things that stays on and. I'm consistency in terms of project management. Yeah. Okay. So. Terry, you're going to lead the charge on making that contact. I will. Yeah. Okay. So I think I'm, what I'm going to do is just kind of reach out and ask for more information about this, this delay of this change of date. And then I want to get a response. I will share it with you. Is that okay to do? Yep. As long as you don't discuss it. Okay. Because it's a document that we're going to discuss for the next meeting. So you say here is a document to be used in the. Next meeting. Okay. So I will get information and I will share it with all of you via email and then we can talk about it next month. Is that good? Yeah. Okay. Thank you. All right. And okay, there's. There's the other project that's on our horizon. Did you guys want to talk about that? Are you guys ready to. Yes. Another was another project. Yeah. Projects. So. Last year, we got a grant for 2000 from the Amherst cultural council. For the, those. What do we call it? We want to call it like the boltwood walk gallery. It's, it's like, you know, you know, that parking lot that's kind of like by Johnny's tavern. Oh yeah. And like the structure there and there's like these windows. Right. And, you know, went last year we had an artist that had a temporary. Thing put in and we've got. A grant to do it again. And the way that we did it last time is we didn't do a full public call for artists instead we. Like everyone kind of picked an artist that they were interested in having there and then we all decided like, okay, this is the one that we want. And then that person. Did the installation. And I, you know, we could do that again, or we could do a full for artists. But we do have to use that $2,000 for this project. By the end of. This calendar year. Okay. So I'm sorry. Oh, that's, you can go ahead. I'll come back in. Oh, thanks. Just to clarify, this is the windows of the actual little, little building with the staircase that goes downstairs. Like, like six or eight windows. Those are big windows I noticed. So we. Am I looking at thinking of the wrong place? Yeah, you're thinking of the wrong place. I'm definitely going to the wrong place then. Okay. There's little windows that are like in the. That are in like the wall of this, like. You're in the entrance to an elevator and a staircase. Okay. All right. Into the parking garage. Okay. So if we do, we have like number and dimensions and all that. Yeah. I don't know. The walk and look at it. It's very small. They're very hard to see. Okay. It's not a very, very friendly kind of display in any way whatsoever. I can't imagine what would be more appealing for an artist to hear that. But it's the truth. So my question is, does it have to be a visual art? Oh, that was my question too. Sorry to step on your question. Are there any requirements on the base? That it has to be one thing or another Shona. There's no parameters like that. From the cultural council. Okay. And is the money earmark to go to certain parts of a project, something to the artists, something to the materials, whatever, anything like that. That's for us to decide. Okay. So, um, Okay. And so it's $2,000 and like how much we want to give it to the artist or how much we want to reserve for. Yeah. Like a. Like a opening sort of thing. Cause like in the past we did like. You know, the artist got like a certain amount and then we reserved like a couple of hundreds so that we could have like a little party for his opening. But we don't have to do that. Well, let's decide how we're going to find the artist first. Okay. I think a call for artists sounds. Sorry, Robert. Go ahead. Go ahead. I'll speak out to you. Okay. I'm going to say, um, it sounds like a call for artists would be useful, but, um, I'm still trying to figure out the description and how many windows there are. Six, four, two. More. Four. Like my memory says four. Four. Okay. I'm just trying to get like the scope and you said they're like, like not very big. Not very big. You're way too big. Yeah. Okay. Got it. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm just like, why don't you just take a walk back there or drive back there and take a quick peek at it. And then you'll see what the, what's the situation. You know, okay. Thanks. We're not going to, if we're going to consider other than visual artists, what other kind of artists are we going to consider all over? I think Robert was. I do have a comment and a question. So stepping back a little bit. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And way down at the bottom is plans for moving forward. And I'm wondering if it would be useful. I mean, given that it sounds like. We have all year to use this $2,000 and figure out what needs to be done with it. So it's not an urgent matter. I'm wondering if it would be useful to create. You know, a strategic plan as it were, you know, something that sort of holds together what we want to do as opposed to there being a lot of kind of one off projects. I think it would help. Perhaps. You know, give some, give some shape to, to our activities. And you know, there are a number of grants available from other foundations, but I think it would be helpful. I mean, I think it would be helpful for public art and I think if we, you know, created a clear idea of what we wanted to do in the next year, it would allow us to try to. Find funding, et cetera. And you know, maybe we. Determine it's a few projects as opposed to, you know, biting off a great deal. Obviously. Well busy with other things as well. And so. You know, because I've. I do know that I've seen some other arts councils, which are obviously a little more. Layered in terms of administrative support, et cetera. But, you know, they have either a mission statement or, or some kind of plan for the year that again, I think that might be helpful if we spend some time thinking about that. You're here. I agree. Yeah. And I think it's a great. It's a perfect. For also everyone to be thinking about like what kind of. Jobs that they want to take on in the. In the organization itself. Cause like I'm headed out the door essentially. So when, when are you. My plan was to leave in March. So like somebody would have to be chair. And, but then there's, you know, all. A treasurer would be excellent. Money. I guess I would volunteer for that given that. That's. What I do anyway. Almost nonexistent budget. I have great confidence. Yeah. And. Speaking of money. There's another thing that I need to talk to you guys about. Afterwards. And I wanted to talk to you guys about it last time, but then we got cut off on. When Maureen left because she wound up being the, the host. Remember that. Yeah. Yeah. So. She ended the meeting that she left town. So. I didn't think it was that embarrassing. So. Some people can't deal with that. I think that maybe proposing having a longer. A longer meeting for people interested in. This whole idea of a strategic plan. Coming up with a plan for the year is a very good idea. I would take more than an hour. You know, it would be. Yeah. Absolutely. I mean, it would be a process over a few meetings, I would say. Yeah. I would say. Yeah. I would love to help in that. If you're. If I can. I like there to be a plan. Yeah. A long range plan would be a good idea. Long range plans are good. I'm wondering if perhaps a start would be to try to gather a few from other. You know, municipal arts commissions, not that we, you know, I didn't know that we have to reinvent the wheel, but it might provide us with some good ideas. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I'm from Montague. Oh dear. I'm pretty sure I will ask, but I know I can get Arlington's because I work with Arlington as a contractor. They have a beautiful strategic plan and they, they went through a whole process. They were essentially what we're doing now, trying to figure out what their road is a few years ago. And so I will ask the chair if I can borrow that information. Yeah. I'll see what other municipalities are doing. So online to any of their websites and. About it if they have anything. So you. Hunting on your own, if you feel like it. You know, towns you're interested in or towns you think. Or in some way or another comparable to the resources Amherst has. So should we make that perhaps an agenda item for next meeting to. And so Jim, if we were to find documents from other towns that we wanted to share with. Each other. We can do that as long as we're not. As long as we don't say anything other than. Please see attached for discussion at next meeting. Yep. Yep. Okay. Okay. And also be thinking about sometime in the future, this percent for art situation is going to be coming up. And that's going to be like a really big deal. A huge thing. Yeah. So D is there a resource we can go to. Immediately to get an idea of how much money that's going to mean. That is entirely up to what project it's going to be attached to. And how much that project is. No, I know, but is, is there anything going on with it yet or anticipated? No, like everything's still in like a very. Like amorphous sort of. Stage as far as like the projects that. That we're going to have on the horizon for that. I was going to mention at some appropriate time that I think the biggest failing that there is about public art is failure to provide a budget for the public art committee. So I mean, how are you supposed to do anything without a budget? Well, you get grants. You do the work of getting the grants. That's how you get money. No one gives it to you. You got to fight for it. That's like every other organization you're fighting for money from the state. But the two percent thing that show is referred to. It's a half a percent. It's called percent for art because it was like originally going to be 1%, but then it got half a percent. Sorry. That's optimistic. So the point that I was trying to make is it is hard for us to plan if we don't know what money we have is. So I would put that kind of high on the list of trying to figure out where we can get money for things. That'd be a good thing to add to the strategic plan talk. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Who, regarding the percent for art, because I don't really know anything about that. Who, who is overseeing that? Is that through the town manager? What is, what's the mechanism? Yeah, when that kicks in, that would be a relationship between the town manager and the chair at that point and the treasurer. Like that would be, you know, there would be a lot of communications once that time comes. Cause like it is like a bylaw now that we get half a percent of a public project. And, but it's also like, you know, the, the art that's going to be there has to be part of that particular site. Like when they redo the elementary school, eventually we're going to get a half a percent for art. And it's going to be something that's going to be at that site of the school. Is there a document, is there a document where you can read the whole, like legal, legal document about this project? I don't know, go look and say probably, because I had a lot to do with it. Cause I was on that subcommittee or whatever you call it. That would be great. Cause see, like, I don't know anything more than. Most of us don't search. That would be great to get you read the whole thing. Okay. For a comprehensive discussion. Yeah. I probably won't find that, but I'll get the close thing I can. That'd be great. Okay. And by the way, I need, if we have documents presented the meeting, I had the difficulty with another organization because they put a doctor on a document on the PowerPoint. And then when I try to get a copy of it for the corporate records, I have gotten no response. So if you, if you get something on a. That's it in, in electronic form. Please. Send me a hard copy or at least the file so I can print a hard copy to put in the minutes. And then. Okay. Send change. Make it a PDF and send it. That would be. Yeah. Anything like that. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. PDF is fine. I know how to deal with it. Once I get it. All right. So, but circling back to the boltwood gallery. I don't want to push it off too much because it is amazing how the time just slips through your fingers. As far as like, you know, getting that call for artists out. And then. Like, well, first, like figuring out what we're going to do as we're going to get that call for artists. And then getting them. Installed. Well, how much would it cost us to have a call for artists? Roughly. I mean, is that free to just put it up on the town website? I'm assuming people will say not very much, but the first thing if we're having a call for artists, how much we're going to have to spend on it? Because it's coming out of our two grand. Yeah, I don't think we spent any money on it. We just don't spend any money for the call for art. Okay. Figure out what you want to, what you want to award. Right. Okay, that's good. So, just asking area newspapers to run it and put it on the Amherst town website and other, you know, digital. Okay. Websites and such. So now that was the idea. We're going to have a strategic plan of we want to do that before we do this call for art, we want to do it simultaneously. I suppose we could do it simultaneously. What do you think? Um, I guess I thought it would be possible that we could have. We could probably have a plan in place, I would guess in the next, you know, couple of months it's not going to be an incredibly extensive strategic plan for the year. And then that would still give us, you know, three quarters of the year to figure out. What sort of, what sort of art or event. We wanted to use the $2,000 for. Can we do a multi year, you know, kind of plan strategic plan. I just feel like that would be more constructive instead of it just being the one year and also, you know, coming up with some kind of mission statement. What are we trying to do in public art? What is our, what is our reasoning? What are we aiming toward? I think that would be really, those would be really useful questions for us to answer before we go ahead with a, you know, with a plan. Yes. Multi year that, that doesn't make sense. I guess. We are all in office. More than one year terms, right? Yeah. Yeah. I think 2025 is. Four of us put strategic plan is the only item on the next agenda for the next meeting. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's good. So would, would be, would we have some background material to help us be ready for that meeting? I'll, I know I'll collect some things. Yeah. I'll also look for some things and send them. So yeah, we have some things to discuss and some. And Shona, is there a mission statement already. For the commission that doesn't have to be used, but I think it would be very helpful for the next chair to be able to, like, If you guys all formulated this plan and then, um, You know, it would, it would help the next. The next chair be able to steer the ship with a little more. Right. Right. But it's not very brief. Yeah. Not like any sort of guidance that I think would be very helpful for the next chair to be able to, like, If you guys all formulated this plan and then, um, I think it would be very helpful for the next chair to be able to be able to steer the ship with a little more purpose. There's one sentence for this. The commission overview fosters a greater community awareness of the interaction with public art and through public art promotes cultural diversity and an improved quality of life for Amherst citizens. That's it. Yeah. It sounds very impressive. I think we can be set up a little though. But, but I'm in, um, to historical societies. So, um, So, um, So, um, So, um, I think in some of the other places, the mission statement is small and concise. And then there's a statement below it. That really, um, Explains what the mission statement is about, but that. That's just my, But maybe it's in some of the paperwork that Shona gave me. What's wrong with what you just said. I thought that was pretty good. It's a good overview, But it's a little. Short. So, um, I think the strategic plan would, would, would, you know, would go from there. This is how we accomplish this. Yeah. As somebody that spent my career reading a hundred page documents, I come to the conclusion that short is kind of good. I totally hear you. I think we could go maybe more than one sentence, but I totally. Somewhere in between a hundred pages and one sentence, I feel we could work with that. Yeah. I think that was helpful that you have a short thing, which you can change. And you have some more underneath it that. Gives you, gives people who read it an idea of what that is translated into action. Maybe you could divide it into subdivisions. Yeah. Okay. That's good. Okay. So I'm still a little panicked about the, um, the boltwood thing, but we're not going to. Does anyone want to like start like making a document for the call for artists? Well, we don't know what we want to do. I mean, you know, there was discussion, which I thought was very interesting about the possibility of not having it as visual art. Because it's such an unfriendly location for visual artists. I said, this makes sense. What else could we do? And we don't know. So, so I would suggest that we either figure that out right now. Or. But my question is, if we don't all, I'll know what it looks like. It's hard for us to talk about it. Yeah. If it's not friendly to visual arts, how, who is it going to be friendly to. Yeah, we need to have a field trip, um, to the spot. Um, I'm leaving. Um, Like next Thursday for like at least a month. So if, but I know that, um, That James has been there. So I've seen him there. He knows where it is. I know where it is. Can you just explain, can you explain again? Maybe, maybe another thing for us to do. Um, I'm going to try to get to the spot so that we can see what the space looks like. Cause I'm not exactly clear. Is it, is it the. Basically the elevator. That goes down to the lower level of the parking. It's, um, it's like the windows that are. Around the staircase kind of, but like not exactly like. Like the plate glass windows. It's like a glass box sort of situation. Behind the glass. And I'm just worried, like if I send everyone there individually, maybe they'll think it's something else and they won't realize that, Oh, no, it's actually this thing. That's like a past projects. Do we have any photos of past projects that we can look at to say, Oh, this is what it is. Um, A long, long time ago when it was first installed, they had. Palms in it by different citizens of Amherst. And you couldn't even read the poems because the glare on the glass. Made it impossible. Let's not do that. Arama thing. It's real important for you to see what it looks like. It's really important for you to see what it looks like. It's really important for you to be useful in there. So is it that little structure? You know, where the white. Yeah. It's in the middle of, it's in the middle of the over above ground parking lot. Okay. It's a little kiosk looking square building. I think. And the, and the. The blue windows will be real obvious to you if you just go walk by it. It's right across from where the white cut used to be. Like right up. Okay. Okay. I have. The last artist we had in there was actually fabulous. He had like all this like kinetic art that was in there. And it was like exciting. Code. Was his name Benjamin Cowden. Yes. Right. I just pulled it up. Was it. We have a documentation. It's on the website. It's on the public art commission announces inaugural exhibition at the portal gallery on boltwood plaza. And there's an article about it and how much you got and who. William Cason was chair of the. Public art commission. Right. And I think I'm not sure if there's pictures. Hold on. Yeah. So. Was it a lit up or electric in some way? Yes. Because there is electricity back there. Yeah, it shows pictures. Yeah. It shows pictures of how it looked or the pieces that were put in. But it doesn't show. Looking into the window. The little windows. Here it is. Yeah. It was reactive. Like when you went to it and it sense the motion of you, like it would. Start moving. It was cool. The pieces were called. One depleted horizon. The other one is a gathering. And chaotic. Progression. Yeah. But. But because his. It's cold. It's cold. It's cold. It's cold. It can get very cold. Like freezing. That's why the poem thing died. Like when the first time it got cold, those died. And then so he only showed his stuff until it got cold. And that's like something that we have to take in consideration. If we want to have something in there for a long time, it has to be something that can be okay being frozen. Or we can put heat in. Because it's power. So. So. That's going on. And I have just. One is we need to do this project and what are we going to do? And here's a really good idea. And then another one was we need to figure out what we want to do. So one possibility is do another project like the other one that we just already did. It worked really well. And get that going while we're doing this strategic plan. So. So I would say, let's decide whether we want to do this. Or we want to do something that we've already done. At boatwood because we know it'll work. Yeah. And. Like as. You know, the thing about the freezing. That's why we had him install in August last time. And so that he would have the whole autumn to have his show. And before. The freeze came in. So. Which shortens our timeframe if, you know, if we follow that same pattern. Do we want to continue this discussion? With the possibility of having a project of the type that we did before. While we're also doing the strategic plan. Or do we just want to say, this is interesting. We'll take it up again after we do this strategic plan. I feel like we need to address this now. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, I'm not like exactly right now, but like. You know, we need to keep moving forward with this. Cause like before we know it, it's going to be. Cause like we want to have enough time for the call for artists. If we're going to do the call for artist situation. And then get them installed. I think my preference would be to try to do. The plan first, because. If we then have some context in which to place this particular project, I think, you know, part of what I foresee as an aspect of the plan is also how to. Raise the profile of the commission's activities. And so. If we're going to have some marketing efforts around. The public art that is determined. As part of the plan. Then this project, you know, could fit in that context. And if we're then publicizing the variety of things that are in the offing, you know, this could be an aspect of it. I think to just. Start on it now without necessarily a clear idea and with. You know, resources behind it in terms of. You know, certainty or marketing. I don't know. I think there's still time. I understand what you're saying, Shoshana. That thing, you know, time slips away and it's very easy to lose track of timelines, but I think if we. You know, for Jim's suggestion next meeting. We really focus on a strategic plan. I think again, you know, I think a couple of meetings, we should be able to. Craft a plan that's, that's workable and realistic. For the next couple of years. And then, you know, we can actually then start. Implementing the idea. So. I agree with Robert. I don't want to be slapped Ash about projects. And I feel like. You know, being asked to just slap something together because you did it before. I don't really want to sign on to that because I don't have that history. So I'd like to have a little bit more of a plan. I've always been more of a ready aim fireman and ready fire. Amen. Not me. I like a plan. You're thinking about that. I have to have to parse that too. Ready fire aim. And being that you guys are the ones that are going to be moving forward with this project. I think your. Your opinions. On this matter holds more weight. So we could, we could vote that would get, you know, then we definitely know for sure, but. But I mean, I'm going to be like gone before. Any of this even really happened. So I don't even. Feel like I should go on it, you know. So I'm looking at like one, two, three, four people that suggested already that we should go do this strategic plan first. Okay. Then so the next agenda will just be strategic plan. And. Well, I'll study up on what that means. For the next time for the next meeting. I guess I would also add if we're creating the agenda for next time. Now I would also add any updates related to the making a public. We'll have an update. We'll have whatever I get and I'll share it with you, but we can also discuss that. So that should also go on the agenda. Yeah. Okay. All right. Update on making a public and. Working on these future plan. Yep. If I could have one more in them. So I think obviously succession planning is, is crucial here. So how is, what, what's the process for. The selection or is it an appointment of the chair? What was the other one. It was like. It was just like, Hey, be the chair. I'm leaving like, you know, Bill called me up and he's like, Hey, be the chair. I'm leaving. And I was like, really? So you get somebody, you go to a bar, you get them drunk. And then you get them to agree to be the chair. I think possibly it would be an election scenario. I don't know. I don't know. That's an alternative. Interested members would put forth their name and everyone would decide if that's a good idea. And there would be a vote. That probably sounds like the more legitimate way to do that. Although I'm a big fan of beers, you know. When are you leaving. March. And is that beginning or end? Well, I could stick around and do like the March meeting. I mean, I was like, I don't know. I just wanted to have somebody that was like, you know, already. Like geared up and ready to go. March will be your farewell meeting. We have to. Okay. Got it. So essentially effective April. We need a new chair. Okay. Is that a one year appointment or what does that usually look like? I don't know. It's just like Wild West really, I think like. I can't wait to get my beer ready. I can't wait for the day to come. I'm going to sit in town and. And shoot the old sheriff, you know, you know how it is. I. I have all this paper. If you didn't like my beer plan, then you're really going to hate the murder thing. Wow. I was saying to show that she gave me a bunch of paperwork. It seems like there's not a lot of continuity. There's a lot of records that are paper and not digital. And I have not had the time yet to go through these records. I think that will be interesting to see what, what happened in years past to see if there's minutes and et cetera. So. Yeah. Digitized. I can do it. If you give me the papers, I've got a scanner. It's very fast. Okay. Okay. And. Oh yeah. So other things that like, I'm going to have to have somebody do aside from the. So we've got like the. The, the chair. We've got the treasurer. We also have to have somebody take over social media. And then we have to have somebody do the same thing. Be the social media czar. We need a teenager. Yeah. You want to see if I can drag goon somebody from pioneer valley performing art to join the committee. Because I got contact. I've got, I used to be pretty heavily involved there. As you know. I'm also an emmer's high school. And I think it would be ideal like we have one on the. Amherst public shade tree committee. And he has a ton of energy and is very enthusiastic. And it would be awesome to have that. I think Amherst high school is a better place to start because it's Amherst. Yeah. If somebody puts together. What I can present to the. Art department, I will, and we'll see who we can get. Okay. That'd be great. Who's going to put together the. Description. Like job description. I have a question about the commission itself. Yeah. We allowed to bring on volunteers who would not be obviously voting, but they would still participate in different ways. If we had somebody interested in getting like procuring grants, et cetera. That would be great. Yeah. Yeah. Is that something that you've done or the committee at the commission is it on the past? I'm not on this one, but I've seen it done on the shade tree committee. Okay. I've seen that in other town commission meetings that I've visited. We're not. Yeah. The people who are involved in the meeting are that's a lot of external people who are very interested in what's going on. And some people volunteered and. You know, I'm not sure if that would be helpful. Bringing in some more voices or is that something that you think would be helpful? Yeah, that sounds like, you know, Many hands make late work. Right. They just can't be. Like actual appointed member. And vote. Yeah, they would just, they would just be volunteers who want to be involved with public art. That's all. Yeah. Oh yeah. Also social media. Yeah. I could still use your guys's bios and a photo to go with your bio to have like a meet your. Your art commission. Didn't I do that? Yeah. You're the only one that did that. And I was. Social media. I haven't sent it into town hall yet. Cause I was thinking like, Oh, I'll just wait till everybody gets all their stuff in and then I'll send it to town hall so that I don't have to. You know, You know, I'm constantly having to come back and do it a bunch of times because I feel like somebody would get. Like left through the cracks on that one. Okay. So everybody get that in by next meeting. Right. Okay. Yeah, that would be great. Let's go back to this job description. If we really want to volunteer, we got it. Somebody needs to agree to. Draft up a job description. Who's doing it now? Nobody. Nobody. But what is it? I'm sorry. Maybe I didn't understand you. We have a Facebook presence, right? Do we have social media? I'm sorry. Yeah, we have a Facebook and we have an Instagram. We have more success. Then we do on our Facebook. And who is doing that now. Me. What could you write up just a tiny, tiny little, like list of what duties it would be. Yeah. That'd be great. There we go. Yeah. That would give you, you know, that's all you need. And that would help Michelle. Spread the word at the high school art department. That it might be a great opportunity for somebody to. Join our. You know, our. Mission. And it would be fine with me if you send it. To her. To her. Mickey. Without going through the formality of going through the meeting, I think just send it to her. Mickey Grimacky. Yeah. So unless somebody. Doesn't like that. No, that sounds great. It's efficient. Yeah. Yeah. But if. Don't get one of these high schoolers to do it, you know, you know, You know, You know, You know, You know, You know, Like someone that's here already. Well, I'm fine. If you can't find somebody, I'm, I do marketing. It's, I'm happy to help. Okay. But yeah, it would be a great position for a kid because it's good experience for them, but. I'm a marketing professional. So I do this. For pay. I can also do a WordPress website. If you want one. Okay. Don't answer that. Okay. Okay. But yeah, everybody needs to send their thing and then I'll put it on our social media. And then. All right. So, oh yeah. And town hall gallery update on that. Mikey, do you want to talk on that? Cause like Mikey's going to be our new town hall gallery manager. Okay. So I got the background information about. The town hall gallery from Amy Crawley who used to do it. And they did it in conjunction with art nights plus, but that's no longer. Right. So right now it's just. Finding artists and asking them to put their show up for two months. And right now we have Michelle. What's her last name. Diamond. Diamond her. Paintings are in the gallery for January and February. I will run it if anybody wants to help. That's great. I'd love to help. But the biggest thing that I'm looking for is artists to put up shows every for every two months. And in the past. Amy had them. They had them. They had them. Have a $100 donation that they had to do. And then 10% of whatever they sold. No, 20%. But since COVID, none of that has been enforced. And I don't know what we want to do about that. So this is an unpaid gallery. When I'm giving any artists any money. I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what they're doing up there. Displaced. And what I used. When I did mine was this photo text paper that I bought. It's an adhesive fabric. And I can put it on the wall. And then just peel it off. So I put all my. Catalog information. You know, underneath the painting. So that's what I've used, but everybody uses their own. So. I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what they're doing. I don't know what they're doing. Since. The town hall opened again, they have not been paying. So it's up to the commission. If we're going to put that back in. If we're going to have a contract. None of that has been enforced since COVID. Okay. So that's up to us as a. What we want to do. I don't want to charge artists to do that. Another question, please, Mikey. Is there a reason it has to be every two months? It seems like a lot of work for two months of exposure. Is there any. Absolutely. We can make a lot of changes. I would like to. Try to get more people involved in it. Get students involved, get their artwork up. We can do three months. Whatever we think, but I think that should be. After the strategic plan, I'm willing to take that on. And would love help. Some artists don't want it to be longer than two months because. That restricts that particular art being able to be used in. Those. They don't want to tie up their art for too long. But we should have it. We should have a limit of, or not a limit, but two months or. And up. If they want to keep it up longer, but I don't think that we should put it up for less than. Two months. That's just my feeling, but it's up to everybody. Yeah, I agree with you. Yeah. Well, you being the manager, you're the one that's going to have to deal with it. Yeah. Yep. And anybody that knows anybody are any artists, let me know. Just send me their information. I don't think we can do ceramic or sculptural. Because we don't have cases. We'd have to get cases from. No, they won't allow it. It's a fire. Only wall art. Only wall art. Okay. I hate to interrupt, but I have to get going. Happy birthday. Happy birthday. Thank you very much. Nice to see you all. I'll try to get some stuff sent out to you information about this. Why we have this grant. Standing, which is, I mean, great, but. Anyway, you'll see something in your email. I want to get that done. Okay. Thank you. Thank you very much. Nice to see you all. Thank you for your time. I looked up mission statements for public arts. And it's the mission statement is short and concise. And then below it is usually a vision statement. And we have that at both the Amherst history museum. And the Pelham historical. And I'm on both of those boards. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay. Okay. And the other thing, another big thing that. We've got a couple of big things. That. Okay. So. Poetic dialogue, right? The ep up continues. Somebody a while ago ripped down the Robert Frost and the poetic dialogue. And he's sitting in the DPW. And he, the artists, the. I'm gonna show you that. Like at his own expense, like. Fixed it from when he made the error. And that was like his error. So he was happy to do it. You know, even though it was at his own expense. But this being that it's vandalism. He could really use some money. And. We have a little bit of money. $600 for grounds fees. And the only receipt that we had sent to us from the DPW was for the sand and gravel. That was something around like 140. I can't, I don't have my computer anymore. So I can't actually access this particular receipt if somebody else could enter into our Google group and find this receipt and find out exactly how much it is. I propose that the what is left over from that $600 after we'd considered that receipt, we could give to Kamal Peters to fix the fixed rubber frost. I have a question. Yeah. So who owns this piece? Is this the town owner or just the artist owner? The town owner. And so if it's owned by the town, is it not insured in some way? It doesn't seem to be because. How's that possible? I have to imagine that everything the town owns is under the town insurance. Yeah. Yeah, and that usually covers vandalism. Yeah. Why isn't the town finance handling this issue? I don't know. I don't know, but like it's been it's been tossed. Like, I don't know, the can has been kicked around on this and because like the DPW is like, talk to Kamal about it. I talked to Kamal and then was like, you know, I'm talking to DPW and it's and like. I was hoping that the DPW would deal with it. And I think the problem is. We were asking it's probably they're thinking it's not coming out of my budget, it's not coming out of my budget. And I will bet you if we find out it's covered by insurance, all of a sudden the corporation level will go up. OK, I will make another round of. Of maybe you need to talk directly to the finance man, the time finance manager. Yeah, they would know. They should know they should. They're the person who would handle the insurance. But if it isn't covered and if we do have money, wouldn't it be good to call Amherst welding? And maybe have them welded in place? I kind of like the idea of the Robert Foss sculpture in the DBW office. That sounds like an art installation in itself to me. Yeah, I feel like, you know, if it's not covered by the town, then that is an issue to discuss. And I'm sorry, I missed the beginning of the meeting, but in our strategic plan, that's a good idea. Yeah. Yeah, who owns what? I don't think you have to go talk to the person. I think you can write them an email. With the fact that I didn't necessarily mean an in person conversation. Yeah, but I contact I don't think with an email with the facts in it. And the preferred way you want it resolved, suggested it's going to help directly instead of just kicking the can around. Yeah, I try that. And then emails seem more serious lots of times to people about money. Yeah, I guess they are. All right, so I'll see. About insurance. We might find out that the town has no insurance. That both. No, I know that would be unfortunate. That's not what the case. Who knows, I'd be willing to make a bet with some serious money. Yeah, I hope so. All right. And then also one other thing is the the Grinspoon that's in Kendrick Park. I talked to the Grinspoon people and because I was, you know, I was thinking about whether or not it will be there for the making it public situation, right? And they said that the contract is through May with us and that they can extend it if we want or they can take it down. It doesn't matter either way to them. So we can decide if we want to take it down in May or some time before the installation or leave it in there and have it as a piece that would also be, you know, being displayed as possibly a public piece. What do they need to know? When we decide there's no deadline, really, like they're they're very cat about it, like the because the. The the way it was done before, it was like it was just a temporary thing. And then it wound up just staying until it fell apart. And no actual like agreement was made. This time we've got an agreement that goes to pay. And then if we want to extend it, we can. So I'm thinking if we can get the strategic plan done expeditiously, I would rather decide that issue after we do it. But that means we have to really get on the ball and get the strategic plan done either in February or the early March. Where does this contract reside? It's with the town and a particular office. I've never seen this this contract. But Grinspoon, let me hang on just a minute. Trouble is I can't take notes and look for things on my computer at the same time. I'm not that good. It's probably with the town attorney, I would guess. I suspect it passed through my hands. Let me see. That would be public art mission Grinspoon. Let me see if I find it very quickly. I'm pretty. What would that be under the side that would be Kendrick part, right? Not so far. All right, quick search Grinspoon, but I guess we don't really need to get like totally to the bottom of this right now. I just wanted to get that that's the situation with that particular sculpture. OK. All right. Sorry about that. I can't do that quick just so that everybody's like, you know, knows what the deal is with that and does anybody have any other big things? That we need to talk about right now. Not me. Anybody. All right. And so, OK, I will, Robert, send you. Have you gotten into the Google group yet? Robert? No. What is what is the name of it? It's. It's like Amherst Public Art Commission at gmail.com. Like, that's our Google group. OK. I will get you. We need to like get you into that because in there is a spreadsheet that has been neglected that is. For the treasurer to have. OK, it has been updated in a while, but you will be interested to see that. And I actually have any funds at the moment. Yeah, right now we have three thousand five hundred eighty four dollars and twenty eight cents three thousand four hundred eighty five and twenty four. Seven twenty eight. It's three five eight four point two eight. Two thousand. That is for the the Boatwood Portal Gallery project. So two thousand of that we cannot touch. And. And is there any procedure for sort of how receipts and disbursements are handled? And yeah, there's like these little statements or also in our Google group, I have copies in our drive. You know, like our Google Drive and our Google documents. I have copies of those things so that you can access those like when you need to like request funds or something like that. So we're all in the group. You should be. Yeah, I tried to get in, but I couldn't get in. OK, we need to get you in. We need to get you and Robert and Dara. All of us. Yeah. Yeah, anyone who wants to get in should be able to get in. So can you can you send perhaps the link again? Had that been sent previously? Oh, I sent. Yeah, I sent you guys a like a link and a passcode, like a password. But it is it is weird because like the security settings are like really, really intense. And so when you go in, you actually have to text me and then because I'm going to be getting a text that says like some number or something. And then you put in that number on your side to show that you're actually. Oh, is that with Google Authenticator? You have to do that. I don't know what it's called, but that's OK. What is your number to text you because I couldn't get in last time? OK, I'll email that to you. OK. Yeah, maybe if you can email all the information. E-mailing a password might give me kind of a chill. OK, it's not the it's not the password. Is it I thought it's just the site and then when we try to sign in, then is that when you're notified, Shoshana? And then you have to communicate the code to us when you put in the passcode. Then that's when I get notified that somebody is trying to get in. And then it gives me like an like you have to prompt an authentication code. And then it send it texts me and I can text it to you. You know, that's that's like two factor authentication like on some of the other. So once you put your I think what she's saying is once you put your passcode in, then it will ask you for a code that you get from. Yeah. Is there no way to invite other Google members in so you don't have to go through that? Not that. Like I wish there was, but I it's like I've found that it's even like that when I'm doing it myself, I'm like in on like a different computer or something. And I go in, I still have to do that thing. And it's very frustrating. But last there's this password company, I think it's last past or something like that. They just so you have your encrypted passwords and they store them online. They were all stolen. So if you want to make sure that somebody's not nosy around in your business, like maybe your bank account or something you care about the two factor people who are using two factor authentication would not be worried about the depth of their passwords and nearly as much as everybody else. That's the benefit. Do we are we required? Because by the time to use this, in other words, we couldn't create our own drop box to share documents. Could we be a drop box? We have to use the Google. No, it doesn't have to be the Google. The Google is just made so that like we could share things easily. Because before it was somebody's got like that box that Terry's talking about, it was all just in that box and having the Google group made it so that anybody could get in and like anybody like that was authorized could get in and access the forms that they needed or look at histories. You know, that sort of thing store photos. So all the history is there. OK, so it wouldn't make there should really be a way to set up the Google to make it easier to access. I think well, if you don't talk about the security is no reason you need two factor authentication. That's the only reason you have it is for security. Yeah, if we had like a good I.T. person to it, like, do we have access to anybody that would be good at that kind of thing? Because that's not me. Well, I mean, if I can get in it, I could look. I mean, I'm not an I.T. person, but I can look around and see what's possible. I've worked in Google Drive. OK. I mean, first you have to decide what level of security you want, don't you? Isn't it just the way Google is? No, I do not. I'm on Google Drive more than once with no double factor authentication required. Huh. Yeah, I don't know. All right, well, let's get is there someone in the town tech department who could support or be of assistance? What's that? Is there someone at the town in their tech department who could. Offer support, not like an official town like site. Oh, I see. OK. You know what I mean? If you I mean, we could do a zoom or something, you know, when you can share your I don't know if this problem for town meeting, law or whatever, though, but you could share your screen and we could just look in that you could go in the Google Drive, open it up and we can go to where the settings are and decide how to set up the settings. OK. Well, I think you have to figure. I mean, for me, I want to know if people think we can dispense with two factor authentication, which I strongly suspect we can. I suspect we can, too, because unless there is, you know, information in there with credit card information or that kind of thing, I don't think I don't think it's a problem. I think the stuff we handle is public documents anyway. So I would assume we wouldn't have social. I mean, would we have any W9s, though? Or would the town keep the, you know, in other words, if we're paying vendors or artists? Oh, yeah, right. That would have social security, but I don't know. Would we keep that? I wouldn't the town have those separately? We have blank ones like I've got the blank ones so that we could like print it out in there, but it's not ones that are filled out. Those go to the town. We never, right, right, right. So we wouldn't presumably have anything with anybody's social security number on it. No, that Google Drive. So I think the simpler, the better. Yeah. OK. But we have to have an understanding you don't put anything confidential there. Yeah. Yeah, because I mean, you certainly don't want every time one of us goes in that you've got a text and you have. Well, I think once somebody's like OK, then they can go in. And they want. No, I see. No, it doesn't work like that because the point is for each time that they want to make sure that Jim Barney was a real person, they want to make sure the person logging in is Jim Barnhill. And that I think if you log in from the same place, you can get back in. But if you log in from a new computer, you won't be able to get in. Right. Yeah, I must say, none of the two factor stuff that I'm doing works like that. But maybe. All right. You just kill two factor and just make it go away. All right, I'm going to. Actually, and this is complicated extra by the fact that I actually I don't have a computer right now, so I go in on my computer and like all the functionality is like very limited. So I'm guessing I won't even be able to go in and do like things that I can't see on my phone in the Google Drive. So I think because of this situation of me not having a computer right now is going to be me doing the tech round thing with Lori, get Lori in there and then Lori can get at it with a computer and make changes. What do you think of that, Lori? That's fine. OK. All right, can you email me at some point when you want to like set aside some time before next Thursday night? Because I'm leaving for a month and. I can. Are you available tomorrow? Let me check. What? What kind of? I have no concrete plans that can't be moved tomorrow. So at your at your convenience, how about 10 a.m. 10 a.m. OK. So will you email me or I'm going to email you my phone number. OK. And then and I can I can email you a like a zoom link. OK. And we can. And we can meet on soon. OK, yeah, we might even just be able to do it on texting because that's how I got Terry in. She just like said, OK, I'm going in now and then texted texted me that she was doing that and texted her the code that came in. Oh, right, because you don't have a computer. What's what's or I can just. Yeah, I just need the information how to try to get in. Yeah, no number to text you. Yeah, something that did happen with Laurie was that did have to check when she went in, she had to change the. So I have to look up actually what that past is, because it's not. Let me dig around and find that. OK. Shoshona, before you leave for your. Trip, will you be sending a doodle for the next meeting? Yes. Yes, yes. Thank you to me. Yeah. OK. All right. Does anybody have anything else right now that needs to dress? Are we good to go? All right, I move that we adjourn. Second second. So we're all set and I'll send out the doodle. I'll say we adjourned by the affirmation. OK, we need to open in the mind. All right, gang, I'll be in touch. OK, thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks. Bye. Bye.