 Great. You're all set. So good morning. I'm calling to order the February 2, 2022 meeting of the government's organization and legislation committee of the town council. Pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021, this meeting will be conducted via remote meetings. Members of the public are able to access the meeting in real time via Zoom or by telephone. And so we'll just do a quick sound check to make sure we can hear each other. I'll call your name if you could unmute and say you are here. Let us know you're here. Pat. I'm here. Mandy. Present. Jennifer. Present. Excellent. OK. So we're going to take the agenda a little bit out of order today to accommodate two sponsors that will be joining us, as well as I'd like to take a moment, just a couple of minutes, to review the purpose of our work here. And so Mandy, I should have asked you this in advance, but would or Athena, would you be so willing to bring up the FAQs, the GOL Frequently Asked Questions document? And do you want to get that or? OK. I'll do it. Just give me a second. Thank you. I think that's it. Great. Perfect. So this was in the packet. Hopefully everyone had an opportunity to take a look at it. I know two of our members here have already been on this committee previously, but for the benefit of us and the community, I just wanted to take a moment to review this. So the GOL, the purpose of our work is to review policy and documents for clarity, consistency, and actionability. And we do not discuss the substance, so to speak, unless the substance has something to do with clarity, consistency, and actionability. And oftentimes we'll invite sponsors to join us and we'll work in a consultative process with sponsors to review measures. Are there any questions or any discussion that we wanted to have before we move into our work today about our purpose, about clarity, consistency, or actionability? I would just say I found this document really helpful. Great. Yeah, I think it's a great document, too. And it's good to refer back to. For example, with one of the items on our agenda today, the solar moratorium, it was interesting to see how actionability means looking perhaps at a legal review to see if what we're looking at is actionable based on the Massachusetts general laws and whatnot. OK, you can bring that down if there aren't any. Pat, did you have a question about this? Concerned that Anika is not here. Has anybody tried to reach out to her this morning? I told her last night. I haven't heard back from her. So and I haven't heard from her this morning. OK, thank you. Yeah. All right. So let me just take a quick look at our participants to see if OK, we have one of our three. So Pat is a sponsor for the solar, as well as Anna Devlin-Gothier and Lynn, who will be joining us when she's available. So we're going to start today with our list of liaisons to town committees and review the information that was compiled that I compiled that we that are received from counselors. So Mandy, awesome. Thank you. So as you all had the chance to see, I sent out an email and asked folks to provide feedback on which town committees should or should not have liaisons. And then also to provide any other feedback or additional town committee recommendations. So this is a snapshot here of the counselor responses. And then we I'm going to actually have Mandy speak to committees where a TC committee chair unofficially serves as a liaison, which was her input. And then there were some additional committee recommendations that we'll want to look at and some additional thoughts. So I'm going to just open it up for some discussion. Mandy, if you want to jump in. Sure. I can start with those four in particular. Obviously, those were my thoughts on where I think based on what I've seen from TSO and prior chairs of TSO and what I've seen as myself as chair of CRC, there is regular contact between the chair of CRC and both the Affordable Housing Trust and the Planning Board because of the work we do at CRC in terms of for planning board in terms of organizing and coordinating hearings or not, right? Sometimes we don't hold them jointly, but coordinating schedules and things like that for not just zoning bylaws that need hearings, but zoning bylaws that are in process. And for the Affordable Housing Trust, we worked coordinated with them on housing policy and all and that still happens. And those conversations still happen on a somewhat regular basis. I would not say it's monthly or anything, but certainly the current Housing Trust Chair has no qualms about reaching out and working together and asking questions and all. And what I saw from TSO, I've never served on TSO, but TSO I know regularly touched the chair regularly touched base and asked DAAC and TAC for input into their decisions. And so that's why I sort of put like given what our liaison role is as a council, what the council has defined the liaison role to be, which is to work and help guide actions at a committee to get to the council or things like that or answer those questions or bring things to the committee that the council wants references on. I feel I personally felt like DAAC and TAC sort of already have that built into the chair's role at TSO similar to how the planning board and what has evolved is the Housing Trust sort of has. So that's why I put that down there. Any thoughts on that? Jennifer. Yeah, I just, I guess one question is because I'm comfortable with everything you said, Mandy, and I also wanted to clarify that if any member of the council wanted to sit in on a meeting of any of these committees, you can always do that. Yeah, just if you're interested. So then my question was, do like with the affordable housing trust ever feel that they were being slighted if we didn't have official liaison or any of the committees, would they feel like we were maybe not thinking their work was so important? I think that's a really good question. Something for us to think about. Go ahead, Mandy. I was gonna say that was definitely a question we discussed the first time we did liaisons is when you don't, when you pick a certain subset, what do the other committees think? But I don't know what the affordable housing trust say would think or what DAAC would think. But if in some sense the chairs of those committees or the vice chairs, I mean, this could be assigned to a vice chair are sort of unofficially acting as liaisons. One of our recommendations could just be to that sort of be the, that we recognize these close relationships. And so, GOL recommends that the council name, the chair or vice chair of X committee to be the liaison to X committee so that maybe there's a formal liaison but recognizing that it belongs within sort of that ex officio manner, it belongs within that committee structure or not that is an option. Yeah. And you wouldn't, the chairs, we don't want them to also feel that they have to attend every meeting because they certainly, their plates are full of their responsibilities. Yeah. Pat. Yeah. I've been trying to sort this through a little bit because right now it doesn't mean after things are decided, I'm the council liaison to disability access advisory committee and I feel like a liaison has a very limited role. So putting a TSO person as the liaison or an additional liaison doesn't make sense to me. What I would like to see is members of the disability access advisory committee advising or being able to participate in TSO as I guess as an informal member or because what I see is that committee is ignored a lot by DPW and different things when people are designing things and they have to fight to be heard. And so to me, just adding a silent liaison who's gonna answer questions or doesn't do what that particular committee needs which is being able to be integrated into some of these other committees and speak. And I haven't spoken to anybody on DACA about that, but it just, what's the point? So instead of me, and it's my favorite committee, so, but I can give it up, it has to be somebody from TSO, they still can't do anything. I mean, they can listen, they can take questions back but I don't see the advantage of it being a TSO person. I see more, I'm sorry, I'm being redundant but I see more advantage of members of DACA participating in TSO and in TAC as members. Literally sending a representative on a regular basis and I don't know how they would feel about that. That's kind of where I'm at right now in my thinking. Jennifer. Yeah, so I just have a question. Ken, the council committee, so TSO as a council committee, could it have another member from outside the council like from DACA or would they just be sitting in or could they actually be a member? Right, I just didn't know. I think it would be dependent on the charge and what the charge stated with respect to that. I don't know that there are any standing council committees, correct me if I'm wrong, that have non-counselors on them. Are there? Just finance. Just finance. Just finance. Okay, there's precedence. Non-voting community members, right, yeah. So that's a good, that's a good, I mean, you know, that's a good suggestion then Pat. Maybe that's, it could be similar to finance but it has people, members that aren't part of the council. Pat, what I'm hearing you say is that you feel this particular committee has not had the ear of certain departments or has not maybe- Or even committees, yeah. Or committees, okay. And so how do you see that in, you know, as compared to the others that are on this, where the chair unofficially serves as a liaison? Any comments on that? And Mandy, I see your hand is raised. Pat can answer that one first. No, go ahead, go ahead. No, I had a different comment completely not related to this, so. I mean, I'm sitting, I'm also the liaison to the housing trust right now. And I don't, again, I'm not sure I can see value in CRC and CRC represented, I guess. My response is we're narrowing things too much. There's something valuable about having a counselor who's not on CRC participating in as a liaison to the planning board. There may be a fit, and I'm not even saying no, I'm just trying to think this through now. Or, you know, why is it more valuable? I hear you Mandy saying, well, we work directly with them. But there, I don't know, sometimes an outside eye, outside of the trust and outside in this instance of CRC, I don't mean to keep picking on CRC. It just seems like it spreads the information in a certain way and given how limited the liaison role is currently, I don't see why it matters, why it matters that it has to be a member of CRC where it might be valuable, that is an outlaw, it's a counselor from finance who happens to be the affordable housing trust person or whatever. I don't know. Yeah, I think one of the things we're trying to balance here is capacity and efficiency and just sort of the overall commitments that we have as counselors. But I really hear your point, Pat, and I agree, I think there could be real benefit in that if there was a counselor who was especially, if there was a counselor who was interested in doing it. I don't think there's personally any reason not to have that be the case. But we, I think back to Jennifer's point about making sure that there's an equitable sort of spread of our energy as counselors to touch all of these town committees, especially, and I'm just thinking about this now, has it ever happened that the town committee was, or maybe the staff person or a chair of a town committee provided input about whether they felt like they wanted to have a liaison? Is that a process that has already happened? No. I think three years ago, we might have had a couple committees ask for it, but I don't remember who or what, but I feel like there might have been something, but it generally has been left up for the council, I think. One of the things we can think about is just a little bit more framework around what the role of liaison is, and then bringing awareness to town committees that may not even know it's an option to have a liaison. And we may not be able to provide a liaison for every town committee, but if there's a particular need, even if it's in a certain year or part of a year where a liaison would be really helpful, I'm thinking about the community safety working group and how in that case, a liaison probably would have been really helpful for them, but I'm not sure they even knew that a liaison was an option. So how do we sort of bridge that, Manny? Yeah, so an interesting discussion because it goes to why I actually raised my hand initially, which is I think we really have to figure out what the purpose of a liaison is, because what Pat said about DAAC doesn't need a liaison. What that requires is us considering, if DAAC needs to be in on those conversations and the way it's doing now by asking them for a comment is not necessarily the right way, then maybe we need to look at their involvement in the town council slightly differently by letting them designate a non-voting member to TSO or something, and then they might not need a liaison. If the work they're doing outside of what we're sending them, the council doesn't matter. I wanted to bring up like CPA. It's one of the most popular ones for saying liaison, but I still struggle with what does the liaison do because they have their own regulatory requirements. We get a report from them and we act on that report, but before that report comes, do they have any need to talk to us? Maybe not, right? And so do we need a liaison for something like that? And then I look at board of license commissioners, which is one that I wanna push for liaison because they are of this list where we had liaisons for all of these bodies. The board of license commissioners is the only one that I know of in the last three years that had an actual use for the liaison. And when I say that, what I mean by that is the liaison saw an action the board of license commissioners took in their regulatory role and said, you can't do that without town council action. You need the town council to give you some of that authority in terms of licensing lunch carts on public ways. They were trying to essentially allow the lunch carts to reserve a public way. And that's the reservation versus the license. And so the liaison saw that in the committee, brought that to the president's attention and the council acted to then give them that authority. And that's sort of what I see a liaison role as being very valuable for. And so I see it more as these regulatory bodies like the board of health that might be instituting board of health regulations but might want to do something that actually the council needs to give them authority to do or the council would need to do. And so I see a liaison as sort of being that eyes and ears of, oops, you can't do that without council action type thing and making sure all of that's done. And for many of these committees, a lot of them are advisory. And so maybe liaison is not necessarily the role we need a counselor for. Maybe it's more of like what Pat talked about in terms of non-voting members on council committees to bring that discussion directly to the council and maybe for some of these, there's neither of that's necessary. And then maybe for some of them, a liaison is absolutely necessary. The reparations assembly, I know Michelle, you and I have talked a lot about possibilities that relates directly to their work and how the council needs to be involved. The community safety working group at some point, ECAC that brought a full carp to us and we sat there going, what are we doing with this, right? Things like that that maybe they do. So I think maybe we're dealing with multiple different roles and have to define them separately and maybe make recommendations for different types of things now that we've been here three years and seen some of it. And for example, council on aging, I don't think the liaison ever reported about what the council on aging was doing in the last three years. And same with the recreation commission. So do we need to continue that relationship if the liaison never felt it necessary to report on anything from their meetings? Yeah, I really, I think you're making some really great points, Mandy. And I think we do need, I would recommend that we do try to define these various aspects of the way that we're interacting and engaging before we go ahead and decide yes or no or how it happens. I see Athena's hand is raised and then I'm gonna go to you, Pat and Jennifer. I was just reaching out to Lynn to say, because I didn't see a list of boards or committees that requested a liaison in the packet. And in the council rules, it says the presidential send a list of liaisons with a copy of this rule to all town multiple member bodies, the school committee library trustees after each annual reorganization and bodies without a current liaison may ask that council to assign one. And it sounds like that hasn't happened yet. So I think it might be worth considering waiting for some responses once that happens before a final decision is made. Yeah, thank you, Pat. Yeah, I don't have anything major to say, but I was one of the people who said no liaison for the African Heritage Assembly, but that's because Michelle, you're on it very specifically and you're now a council member and I want you to continue on that committee. So that was the only reason. I think that is a committee that does need connection to the council, but now we have it embedded naturally, which feels good. Absolutely, and I think based on the other responses, I think that there was a similar reasoning for why there are three nos on that one. Jennifer. Yes, I was gonna say we'll also just concur that since you're the chair of that assembly. But no, I think I don't know if it's this committee's role or the council or the president, but it would be helpful to define what the role of the liaisons are. Just maybe the fact that there hasn't been a report back from the liaison to the council of aging. From one night before when I first was elected and I was asking about the liaison roles, I was kind of told, well, it's just to kind of sit in and hear what's going on, but we might want to define it more than that. It is defined more than that. I don't know, Mandy, do you usually have this kind of stuff? But part of it is that you're relaying questions and concerns from the committee to the council and also sharing council information with the committee. But you do it in a neutral way. I mean, when it was originally designed, we were in the room and we weren't even supposed to sit at the table with the committee. So it really is this kind of neutral person. And you're not specifically supposed to take part in discussion unless you're asked by the committee. Or if you have it in the terms of the Board of License Commissures, and I believe that liaison was Alyssa which, thank God, because she knew what she was talking about. But then she could say, so it is defined somewhere. And it doesn't mean it doesn't need to be changed. I'm just saying. Hold it up. It's in our rules, it's 10.8. So it's now what's showing on the screen is what a liaison's role and what they can and can't do is according to the rules. It's very limited. So perhaps since we are set to look at the rules of procedure and review them that this is something that we want to do within that portion of our work, what I'm not clear about is, and we have some timelines. I think the rules of procedure, we have to report back. I have to pull up the date. I thought it was the 28th, but now I'm looking at my calendar. Would we have a town council meeting on the 28th? And he's got our calendar there. Yes, the council meetings on the 28th. Okay, so. On the 28th of February. Yeah, so I believe that we have to bring our recommendations for the rules of procedure back by that time. I was trying to get through the liaisons first so that we could, so that Lynn could make or however that works so that assignments could be made essentially so that those committees would begin sooner than later to have their liaison. So if we are, I'm hearing that we are in agreement that we should review the role of the liaison. And then also review the, or think about the possibility of including non-voting members on standing committees. So how, in terms of process, if somebody could help me understand how that would, where that, would that recommendation come through GOL to the council? So that could, again, after conversation at GOL, just be a motion to the council to recommend the charge. Essentially, if we want certain things on certain things, we could propose the charge change at GOL. Okay. So if it's a change to the TSO charge, to add a DAAC member as a non-voting member, we could just propose that change. Okay. All right, I'm just gonna do a quick. So we have all of our sponsors here now for the solar. And it feels like the liaison discussion and the rules of procedure discussion are sort of coming together at this point. And so I'm going to recommend that we pause this discussion and then now move into our work with respect to the solar. Does anybody have an objection to doing that? Okay, great. So we have Pat here who is one of the sponsors and then we also have Anna Devlin-Gothier and Lynn Grismur who are the other two sponsors and they are in the attendees. I just would like to make it clear that we are not here to discuss the value of the moratorium and I just want to make that really clear here. So any questions that we have for Lynn or Anna or Pat will be in relation to whether it's clear, consistent and actionable. So we'll work really hard not to get off of that responsibility that we have here at GOL. So let me just, and also to say coming back to that FAQ that we looked at in the beginning of the meeting, we're working in consultation with the sponsors. So this is a process that the GOL goes through to invite sponsors for measures and to work in consultation. And we happen to have Pat here as a member, which is going to be one of the sponsors which is great. So let's, Mandy, do you want to bring it up and how do you feel about doing your wonderful work of editing on the spot for this? Not a problem. Great. Okay. Just a quick peek here. Great. So I'd like to also point out that this solar moratorium that's in front of us, article 16 has already gone through CRC. It's already gone through all of the processes that were required and had a hearing. It was unanimously recommended to be adopted to by the town council. And so here is the last step before it comes to the town council for its first reading. Hopefully you had a chance to look at the legal reviews that were in the packet. There was an earlier legal review that was done. And then there was a legal review that was completed immediately following CRC's recommendation. So what I'd like to do is start from the beginning and go through line by line to see if folks have any changes, edits, comments or questions. And I can start by saying I had some questions right starting with the second sentence. So I'm just going to read the edits that I have and then we can discuss whether or not whether or not there's some agreement here. So for me, I felt like it should say furthermore, the town has established rigorous climate goals to reduce its reliance on fossil fuels and recognize its need to do its part by permitting large scale, blah, blah, blah. And the reason for that is I felt like the hour was a little bit out of line with other language that I've looked at in these types of bylaws. So for me, this felt like it was more clear. I also felt like furthermore, it has established rigorous climate goals to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels and recognize the towns. It was like it didn't seem to be clear to me. So curious what folks think about these changes. And then it would be it, not it's, right? Second one. It needs to do its part. Establish rigorous climate. Recognizes its need. Oh, it's need, it's need. Yeah. I like the change. I think that's fine. I agree. Good catch, I think, actually. So any other changes in this or recommendations for these first couple of sentences? I have a question down at the last sentence of the first paragraph given we do not have any that I'm aware of projects that are in the pipeline here. Do we want to get rid of permitting that are in the permitting? No, we have Hickory Ridge. Oh, excuse me. Okay. Hickory Ridge has been permitted, but not fully. I don't think it's got its building permit. I think it just has its land use permit. So it's sort of still in the middle of its full permitting process. Right, perfect. Good. Anything else in the first paragraph? Great. So let's move to the second paragraph. I have some changes here if anyone else does and would like to go first. Keep going, kid. Okay. So the changes I have here are, however, we recognize that proposed project. So I'm not sure we need some of those projects. Proposed projects. So I recognize that proposed projects may involve extensive clear cutting of forests and clearing of ground vegetation. And then my only other two minor changes are I don't think we need located or close. So forests and clearing of ground vegetation to be in close, I think we can get rid of located and close. So it would be clearing of ground vegetation to be, hold on, no, I'm kidding. So clearing of ground vegetation to be in proximity, to be in proximity, like close as a redundancy. And I don't think we need located there. So, I don't know. I can deal with close removal, because you're right, there's a redundancy there, but somehow rather located, however we recognize it, some of the ground vegetation and in proximity to residential neighborhoods that depend on private. I still like located, but yeah, it could go. Mandy, are you suffering or? I like located, I guess it sounds, to me it just sounds a little vaguer just to say in close proximity or not even in close, just in proximity. Yeah, but that's what I was recommending, really simple in proximity, but I have no hard, I don't have any strong feelings. It was just to sort of clean it up, make it a little more succinct. Mandy, do you have a comment on this one? Not that's formed in my head at all. I'm still trying to digest it. I mean, I think either it could work. So, I'm actually more stuck with the and between clear cutting of forests and clear cutting of ground vegetation and wondering if that should be or, because it might be. Well, it says may involve. May involve, yeah. One place be clear cutting. There's a lot of and in that sentence. Yeah, I know George wouldn't like it, but he's not here. Which is why I just keep looking strangely at it. May involve, yeah. Oh, okay. We get rid of that. However, we recognize that proposed projects may involve extensive clear cutting of forest, comma, clearing of ground vegetation or be located in close proximity. Well, and or. And or. Yeah. Yeah. And or be located in proximity. I like that. That's good. That depends on private drinking. Yeah. Yeah. Maybe I'm just going to do a comma clearing of ground vegetation or be, I think, do you really need and or go ahead. I'll go with that grammatically. That's fine. Well, you can't, you could say and, but I don't know you're right, you're right. You're right. I think it's more proper to say both. Yeah. But hey, proper me. Come on. It was just going to say something and I'm going to hold back. Next paragraph. Yes. Next paragraph. Thank you, Mandy. Moving on. Okay. Let's see. Any questions, comments, recommend Asian. I have one. You're rivaling Mandy. I love it. I'm loving that it's not me. I'm not sure we need the words sufficient before time. So I'm in the second. Right here. Yeah. Something about that strikes me and I'm not exactly sure why, but it seems perfectly reasonable just to say we'll allow time. Yeah. Because who knows if it's sufficient. We've decided on a deadline. Yeah. Even word thinks it's not efficient to use those two words together. So this is really picky, but where it says right above, ground-mounted solar voltaic, does it have to say photo solar? Does photo go in there? Yes, it does. Just one word. Yeah. Solar photo voltaic. So this is going up one, two, three, five lines from the bottom end of that paragraph. No, up a couple more, Mandy. So that one should add there. Yeah. Good. Substantial regions of preferred location. How are you? Just before this, the photo. Yep. Substantial regions of preferred locations. Why does that bother me? It doesn't bother me. Let me just read through the sentence again. The town needs something. Yeah, it works. I would, it couldn't be in location. No, that's stupid. No, never mind. Oh, that's actually what I was thinking is does it need the word preferred? And locations of large scale. So if you got rid of substantial regions and left and preferred locations of, does that? Yeah, there's just. Because a preferred location could contain a small. Right, that's a good. Or a larger one on a different ground. Yes, I like that. Yeah. That sounds better. Yeah, that's better for sure. The word preferred has a ring to it in some sense. So that's what the use table does is preference locations. Okay, okay. Good. By determining whether it's a no, an SP, an SPR, a yes. Exactly. Perfect. Perfect. Back to the word solar voltaic. It's singular, right? So the third line from the bottom that, should there be no S? Yep. Really good. I don't have anything else in this particular paragraph. All right. So moving on temporary moratorium, in the final paragraph here, any comments or questions? There's again an S after solar voltaic. It should be right. So that brings up the question. In the first sentence, it's large and all above its large scale ground mountains, solar photovoltaic installations. And I don't know enough that when we switched to large scale ground mounted solar energy system, because we use that one twice. We should probably use the same one throughout. I just don't know whether there's a reason for that chain. And there could be, right? Cause this is. I'd have to defer to Anna or Lynn. I don't. I think I was just looking at the attendees. Yeah. If Anna or Lynn has an answer, please raise your hand and I'll go ahead and perfect. I mean, it was used here because I pulled it directly from the paragraph before for the exemption. So. Good. I think I'm able to. Okay. There we go. I'm assuming you can hear me. What you can't see is my huge computer nerd glasses that I'm wearing. So that's fine. Could you repeat the question? Yeah. So in throughout the preamble and in this first sentence, we refer to them as large scale ground mounted solar photovoltaic installations. But in the second sentence, it's referred to as a large scale ground mounted solar energy system. Yeah. Okay. Give me one second. So what I'm looking up really quickly are the verbiage used by the department of energy. Yeah. Because I'd want to copy what they use. And they say solar energy systems, but hang on, stand by. Yeah. They use the phrasing solar energy systems throughout their document. Yep. Seeing large scale ground mounted solar energy. That's what I would say. The question then becomes, anytime we say solar photovoltaic installation, should we say solar energy system? So yeah. So here's the thing. That changes a little bit of the meaning here because there's photovoltaic and then there's solar thermal. And so it's fine if you change it, but you should know that that does have implications for what this applies to. In my mind, as a sponsor of this, I would support that because I think that it was a miss to say only photovoltaic at the beginning because there are large scale solar thermal installations. But that's something for you all to discuss is that that does change the implications of the temporary moratorium. Does it though, because if the use of the word energy system with a rated capacity of 250 kilowatt DC as defined by DOER, if that's the, you can't accept the application and when those words are in the energy system, moving that language back to all the other references might not actually change the implication of the moratorium. So in terms of what the words actually say on the prohibition right now versus what you just said of. Yeah. So are you saying that, okay, I just wanna make sure I'm confirming here. The only place we currently have solar energy systems is that where it shall not apply. Is that correct? So we have it in two places. At least. Oh, yeah. Nor shall they approve any. Yeah, I guess so it doesn't really. So it's, they shall not, you know, the accept applications or approvals for solar energy systems rated above 250 and then it shall not apply to those systems for installation. On impurity. Yeah, so I think it's fine. I mean, I think if you wanted to get really consistent and picky, it would be great to have it be consistently phrased as large scale, ground mounted solar energy systems throughout the document. However, like you said, I think it does suffice as is. I guess in my mind, it would lock it down a little bit more to have a really consistent language use throughout it. But I don't think, I mean, when KP law reviewed it, they said it was sufficient. So I don't think that it's really a big difference. I do see Lynn's hand is up. So if we could allow Lynn to speak. I don't see a big difference. And I also have to say that when you say energy systems, you address one of the other issues that has been brought up in this ongoing debate. And that is the issue of a battery storage, which would be part of the energy system. So in many ways, it's consistent to say energy systems. Thank you. So shall I go back and change anything that says photovoltaic installations to energy systems? I'm okay with that. Sponsors? It seems to as long as large scale, ground mounted solar energy systems includes photovoltaic installations, then I can go with it. And it seems to. And I just want to do a double check that that's accurate. Yeah. Is that something we might ask the town council, you know, after, you know, after we, if we make the change and just run it by him one more time. Anna, could you clarify for me again, whether there the photovoltaic installation is included in the energy systems definition? So we'll go with Anna. And then Lynn also has her hand up again. Yeah. So as defined by the department of energy, it says, do, do, do, do. Small, medium and large scale ground mounted and roof mounted solar energy. This is a sentence. This isn't a definition. Sorry. Solar energy systems, both photovoltaic and solar thermal. So they, they do wrap them all, wrap them both up under the, under that phrase. But they include rooftop. That's just, I'm sorry. I was, yeah, I was just giving an example of how they use the solar energy systems. That's a separate, it's a large scale. Because I don't want to. Yeah, we are, we are being specific about what we're talking about, but they do talk through solar energy systems as photovoltaic and thermal. Okay. And Lynn. Yeah, I would like to point out that the word photovoltaic is used in the actual title of the bylaw. So I would suggest that instead of going through and striking it throughout in the first paragraph, you say something like, you know, whatever the new words are that we're now using, energy systems, including. Yeah, what they are, including photovoltaic installations and thermal. And then from then on, you could use it. But I think the fact that it's in the title and to change that right now would be a little bit confusing for people. So it's my understanding that by moving to systems which were trying to consistently use the wording for the operative sentence in this bylaws, this one that's highlighted, the ZBA and planning board shall not accept nor shall they approve any application for a large scale ground mounted solar energy system with a rated capacity. So that's the operative sentence. That was not just photovoltaic. That was all, which means it would include a thermal system, both of them. And so what we're doing is essentially, it was already the broader one. It just referenced a less broad one, even though it applied to a broader one. And so clearing up and not mentioning just photovoltaic actually clears up that it's more than just photovoltaic systems it applies to because it applies to these thermal systems too that use solar panels. So it actually is a more clear thing. And so changing the title to be consistent with that would also be clearing up its applicability. Yeah, I agree with that. I just want, I mean, are we now getting into the area of geothermal and from every discussion I've been in, people feel that geothermal is a separate issue. And it needs to be a different bylaw than the eventual bylaw that will come out of this. I just don't know whether geothermal would be considered part of those energy systems. Hmm, and sorry, it's not, this is solar. Geothermal is not solar. Okay, then I'm fine with it. Thank you, I'm fine with it. Yeah, geothermal is underground, solar is sunshine. Thank you, Anna. And Mandy, to the best of your knowledge with respect to changing the name of an article after it's already gone through the processes that it's gone through, is do you see any problem with that? No. Okay. So I think I caught them all. In the correct systems or just system, singular or plural? I think it should be plural. No, it depends on how it's referenced. So I think I got them correct in each of them. Well, so. Let's go through, yeah. So are there any other, well, before I, what I'll do is I'll show no markup so that it can be seen clean, which is easier to read. But before I do that, does anyone else have any, I have one change now that I see this blue line under accept. I think the nor shall they approve needs commas around it. Shall not accept nor shall they approve any application. Yeah. If there aren't any other requested changes, I'll show this as a no markup. What is the line showing you and or be located in proximity? What is the edit that word is? Be in more concise language. All right, that's okay though. We talked about that one and Pat, you feel more comfortable leaving it in there. Okay. However, I can take it out. It's probably cleaner with being proximity. Yeah. Jennifer, are you, I know that you had a comment about that as well. Yeah, no, I'm okay. I didn't mind close, but I know it's redundant. So that's, I'm good. What are you thinking about? Well, no, I'm just playing with the word close. Let it go because there's a difference between being right at the site and being a mile away, which is, I don't know if you'd consider that proximity or not. Yeah, that's what, that's my thinking, frankly. Yeah. Yeah. I think. So I don't know. Is it grammatically correct to put an adjective in front of proximity? I know that would be an adverb then. Right. Yeah. That's fine. I think it's fine. Tell me what to do. I think because we're talking about being, I think we're talking about private drinking wells and septic systems. Right. Do we know what we're talking about being proximate too? So I don't think that we need to have close in there to recognize what we're trying to say. But I also understand what you're saying, Jennifer and Pat, that you can be proximate or you can be closely, but to me. That's fine. The other thing is when they're doing the bylaw, they will get into all this. Right. More details. Does Lynn have her hand up or is it left up? Let me check here. Thank you. Yes, Lynn does. Lynn, come on in. Yep. I lowered it. Oh, okay. Can we just go to the first paragraph? Do we have? We were still going to have the term ground-mounted large scale, ground-mounted solar. Oh, you do have it there. Wait. Yeah. Energy systems. We don't reference photovoltaic or thermals anywhere in here because I couldn't figure out where it's best to. This wasn't, I was thinking of Lynn's concern that since it's in the title of the bylaw, we, I, were we going to have it in the first paragraph? And then say, Jennifer, what do you, what do you mean when you say it's in the title of the, of the article? Cause we changed that as well. We're talking about permitting. Oh, I see. That's where Lynn, I apologize. I thought she wanted it in the first sentence, but she just changed it in the title. Okay. I stand corrected. That's. So if, if the sponsors still wanted a reference to both photovoltaic and thermal systems, the best place to put it is probably in this first sentence here. Yeah. Where it says the town here by adopts a temporary moratorium on the permitting and approval for the use of land for large scale ground-mounted solar energy systems. It would be probably then say, including photovoltaic and thermal systems, something like that. Is where it could go. If the sponsors still want a reference somewhere. Is there a reference in the preamble to what we're talking about? Not in a spot. I mean, there are, but. I mean, somewhere it needs to be defined. That's all. Somewhere it needs to say what that, what an energy system it, according to the department of energy resources, what is a ground-mounted? What, what is this thing? And since there's more than one, I think we should somewhere have the definitions. And I would say do it in the, in as early as possible personally. In the preamble, yeah. I think so too. And then. So the preamble is not. Will disappear. In some sense, the preamble doesn't govern anything, which is why if you want it defined better, it should be under section A. Lynn, did you want to add to that? Not. I have no problem with doing that. I, I am hesitant to change the title of this at this point. I just want to mention from, from a standpoint of ongoing reference in all kinds of meeting documents, memos, et cetera. I just think it would be, somehow or another, you could even say formerly known as, so that people keep track of what it is. We could, if you want an extended title, you could just add energy systems comma, including photovoltaic installations. That works. Yeah, that's all right. Yeah. Mandy, could you just clarify? So you said in some ways the preamble doesn't govern anything. Can you, I think I understand what you're saying, but could you just clarify that for us? Yeah, so in essence, the preamble has no functional language to prohibit or allow anything, right? All of, all of the moratorium language that says what the town can or cannot do is in section A. It's all in here. So the pertinent language about what is being prohibited or not is all in section A. Okay. And have you ever seen a document like this include definitions in the beginning or would that be making this more clunky than we need? Well, so most bylaws include definitions. And so this one does it all in one paragraph instead of setting forth multiple sections of one, so, so if you look at zoning bylaws or any bylaws, there, there's a, you know, an outline structure. And so in many bylaws, section A is sometimes a purpose. It's normally not as long as this one, which is the, the preamble would essentially be labeled in many bylaws section A purpose, but purpose isn't really governing. It's just setting forth why section B might be definition, section C might be prohibition. That's where one of these sentences would go. Section D would be exceptions. The next sentence, section E would be effective period. You know, you can set it out into multiple different sections. The sponsors have chosen to set it out in one paragraph plus a preamble that's not labeled as a separate section. Would there be any benefit in saying for the purposes of this bylaw and then saying how we're using large-scale, ground-mounted solar energy system? Well, this sentence here does that. I mean, that, I'm gonna put it in yellow although I'll get rid of the yellow, does that. Large-scale ground-mounted solar energy system with a rated capacity of 250 or greater as defined by mass DOR. So it's using the mass DOR definition. So we haven't pulled that into the bylaw but that's the definition of a large-scale. That sentence includes the definition. Okay. Yeah, I was just thinking because we say it a lot of times before we get to that. And so is there, you know, is that clear, Pat? Go ahead. I don't think it needs to go in the preamble. I have to put it here. Pardon me? I did add photovoltaic and thermal systems into the first sentence of the- Right, yeah, yeah. I don't see Lynn or Anna's hand up so probably they are in agreement with you, Pat. So I'm just gonna make a motion then. Great. I'm going to move to declare, well, we need a new title now. Article 16, temporary moratorium on the permitting and approval of large-scale ground-mounted solar energy systems, including photovoltaic installations, clear, consistent and actionable as amended at GOL on February 2nd, 2022. Second, I would second, Tao. Great. What did you want to talk about? What was that? I was just gonna say, did I do that too soon? Did you have to- No, no, no, no. No, no, no. Any further discussion? Okay, then let's go to a vote starting with Mandy. Aye. Oh, Pat. Aye. Jennifer. Aye. And I am an aye. I also saw Mandy quickly raised her hand. We got so involved in this discussion that I forgot to mention, I wanted to mention something in the report with this, even though my vote is not changing, which is while I am still concerned about the validity, actionability of this, given the state MGL per the first attorney opinion, or I'm going with our attorney's opinion, obviously, because I'm voting this actionable, even though I have concerns that it might bring lawsuits. But our attorney has clearly said that they believe it's actionable and that the MGL is not there. And so that's not gonna prevent me from voting yes, but I still have concerns about the potential for lawsuits, should this be adopted, that the town will have to defend. But it doesn't- Yeah, I just like that to be noted. Sure. I'm obviously still declaring it actionable because that's what our attorney said it was. Right. Yeah, and for anybody here that's in the attendees that you could check the packet if you haven't seen, there are two legal opinions in there that we have used to help us determine that it was actionable, that it's actionable. Okay, so we are gonna thank our sponsors. You're welcome to stay, of course. Thank you for all the hard work on this and we will move on at this point and coming back to our discussion, let's go back to the liaisons and continue our discussion there. And I see that Lynn is still in here, so I'm not sure- I wasn't sure if she wanted to say anything about liaisons. Sure, yeah, go ahead. My apologies for not following the rules of procedure at least to date. I will contact chairs of committees today to see if any others would like to have liaisons. I think I'll be honest, I hesitate on that whole issue because we could end up with a lot more committees wanting liaisons than we have counselors who can manage all that. But I- And if there are ones three- I hear that. So more importantly, if I could see the list where we are right now, although Mandy Jo, you have a comment. Or at least- I do, I just have a request for you but I'll put the list up. Let me share that screen. So my request would be that maybe when you- I would email even those that have liaisons in the last ones, but maybe you request that if they were requesting a liaison, let them indicate why they want one. So that that gives, because we've said subject to availability in the rules, but that would give GOL an ability to make a better evaluation as to need. Does that make sense? It does make a lot of sense. And if you'll just send that to me, that'd be great. I'm looking at your list of- Can I just add to that? Given we may redefine or we are going to discuss what a liaison's role is, I would think if Lynn is going to ask chairs of town committees whether they want a liaison or not, they need to know what the role entails and why they may want it. And so I'm just wondering if I don't know how much we'll get through that discussion today, but maybe just waiting to send something until we have redefined or had that discussion. Mandy, do you have a comment on that? Well, we can't redefine it without two votes of the council because the definitions and the rules. So that would take months. Okay. A few months at least, right? But I guess that's why I was saying maybe it would be worth, instead of Lynn asking, because she has to send the rules, I think, with the request instead of just saying, do you want one or not? Saying, if you want one, please indicate your reasons for wanting one, because then if we're redefining roles or as Pat said about DAAC, we as GOL then have more information about, well, is a liaison more appropriate for what they want? Is it not? Would it serve their purposes? I think that gives us more information than just yes or no, we want one. As we talk about this discussion and have the discussion. So I might just suggest expanding the language to ask the chairs. What sort of interaction might be helpful for them with respect to the town council? So, because if we're asking, you know, indicate why you would want a liaison, but we're not really even sure what, you know, of course the rules of procedure will be there, but we want to have more feedback to guide us, right? So maybe asking a broader question as well, Lynn. I have no problem broadening the question. I'm trying to look in my charter because I believe that the charter speaks to the issue of liaisons. Jo, of course, is the expert on this. It does its section. I almost want to say 9.8, but it's not 9.8 because it's. I'm looking it up right now. It just, the charter just says, so it's 2.8. 10.8. 10.8, whatever it is. No, 10. 10 is the transition article. It's 2.90 point. Yeah. So it's, it basically says we can assign. Yeah. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It basically says the council's can assign liaisons or not. Right. And the definition of a liaison is a membership of the non-voting liaison to multiple member bodies. Right. And I'm sorry. The rule of procedure to find what a liaison is. Yeah, unless otherwise provided by inter municipal or regional agreement measure or general law, serve as town liaisons to any regional entity. It's almost 10 liaison. Okay. That's fine. I think it would be important for you to clarify whether you think there's going to be any change in the liaisons, but meantime, I'll listen to the rest of that discussion here and then come up with what I'm going to send something out because Mandy Joe's right if you're going to change anything about the liaison description it has to go to the council for two readings. Right. And Lynn, I don't think you were here yet when we started this discussion but I wasn't. Okay, so Pat had brought up a really good point about the disability access advisory committee, and the fact that that committee. Maybe doesn't get the ears of staff or other committees and so is there another way, like having somebody from that committee be a non voting member on TSO for example, as a way of having that engagement occur. There's something else that we were discussing early on. And that's why I was suggesting, expanding, you know, the question. Yeah, I, I hesitate in this meeting to express an opinion about that suggestion. Though I have one. And I understand, I understand the issue I'm not sure that's the solution. I think that's why we wanted to hear why committees might want liaisons right to help us with our conversation. Okay, so then is the understanding that I am going to go ahead and ask committee chairs, if they would like a liaison and tell me why. I still am having trouble with that given, you know, I guess I think we need to do that but if I was the chair of a town committee, and really had no idea, and I know you're going to send the rules of procedure with it but how can I tell you. I can tell you why, but if there might be other ways that would be better for me as the chair to feel engaged and have a connection with the council. I guess I, I, how would I, how would I know what those ways were are. I'm having, I'm, I think we're putting the cart before the horse. I really think we need to decide what we're capable of doing as counselors. Okay. I will just say to you, I have chaired two committees. I've had liaisons for both. It was fabulous to have them. And if I were chairing, I don't care what the committee was. And I got an email that said, would you like a liaison and tell me why I would write back. Yes, any connection to the town council is better than what I have now. Because every committee will say yes. And, or most, most committees will say yes, and I, we just don't have that capacity as counselors, at least I don't think we do that, not if you're going to be a good liaison, which means you're actually going to periodically go to meetings, and you're periodically talk with the chair of the committee, and you're going to report a council meetings. I mean there's how many committees in the town of Amherst 30. And I mean that means every one of us is going to be a liaison to at least two if not three committees. And it's not, I don't want to diminish what the gratitude I feel for what all of these people do. I just think we're opening up a door that maybe we can't, we don't have the capacity to fulfill. Which sort of brings us back to the purpose of the exercise seeking input from counselors and which committees they felt a liaison was necessary so I think we can continue that conversation. I personally, given the workload as a counselor that we already have. I, you know, one of the things I think that that I'd like to do is look at this through the equity lens and really try to understand, given the circumstances of the particular town committee in any given year, what committees could really benefit from having a counselor lays on and what committees are okay. And maybe next year that will change again, and there will be some work or something that's happening that committee that would benefit from. Pat, please. I have a health issue that can make early morning meetings problematics I'm going to leave for a few minutes and I'll be back I just wanted people to know. Thank you Pat. And does that that means we can't take any actions at this point. We still have a quorum still have a quorum three out of five of us okay good. And did you have anything else to add or any other questions. No, I'm just waiting for TSO to decide how they would like me to proceed. Okay. You mean us. I'm sorry gol. How would you like me to proceed. Thank you. Yeah, I will follow up with you after the meeting Lynn, once we've had more discussion about this. So, I would say this, this harkens back to the discussion we had three years ago on gol and three years ago at the council meeting what is a liaison who needs them and all and, and one of the things we came up with is in some of the things we thought about as a council was who brings stuff to the council. Right, because a lot of these committees are actually advisory to the manager now, not the council. And I know I said earlier about CPA, right. It's not, it brings stuff to the council but does it need a liaison because it's got strict rules, right, in some sense and they're strict things and and they're well established to go with Michelle's thing of what committees on an equity lens could maybe use one CPA is well established it's got its stuff. Does it really need a council liaison. Because it writes a memo and that we vote on its recommendations right does it need a liaison for that purpose. You know we at one point we considered the CDBG committee but the council has nothing to do with the CDBG committee at all, even though that grants a whole lot of money, it recommends stuff to the manager. And so, maybe part of what the reach out to the committees are in terms of why would you want one is also a request. You have our president use the time of that reach out and that communication to say, do you, who are you advisory to or maybe that's what we need to look at who do these committees advise, do they advise on council action or not. Or do they just advise a manager, or do they just advise a specific department that the council never acts on, you know in terms of because the select board, the select board have liaisons to everyone but they were the head executive, which is more important than what we are right and so, in sense the town committees were advising the select board, and now not all town committees are advising the council or doing stuff with that and so maybe that needs to be part of this email that is out and request about liaisons is sort of ask the chairs to describe their role and how it relates to the council, even how they see their role relating to the council to help us give some ourselves some information about, you know, whether they should have a liaison or not or some other role or all because, you know, I, I don't actually know. I don't think the recreation committee really ever brings anything to the council, they bring stuff to CPA probably, but do we ever really see anything specifically from them to the council they might they advise a department. And so maybe we just need more information that we need to get from the committees themselves and that might require a lot of reading but Mandy Joe. We actually have. It's now dated the document the Doug slaughter put together that describes all of the committees that existed as we transition to the town council. I would prefer rather than going to committees to start with the town manager and say, which of these committees, do you think would be useful. I think that's a stop along the way, if you will. And the reason is that let me take the recreation committee and I'm not picking on a committee for any reason, except as an example. The recreation committee. Sure, it revised it advises the rec department, but they also come to us for budget items. And so they may feel that having a liaison gives them, you know, a step up on budget. And I just don't. I want to be careful how we open the store for all the reasons I've already stated. I appreciate that. For me, I feel like I need to understand more about these committees before I we went through this exercise, and I have some X's marked there myself. But this discussion has helped me to see that I don't fully understand how these committees, who they advise how they interact. I think Lin's point is excellent about their creation committee there's only one X on that here, but that Lin's point is is right about the budget so I would like to hear some additional work that I could prepare for this committee that would help us to understand more thoroughly what's happening and Mandy to your point about asking the chairs would a chair actually know, sort of conceptually but like, would they, would they, you know, be able to, would they know all of the, the potential implications of things and I mean, maybe it's best to start with the manager. Yeah, as Lynn said, you know, I obviously differ on the record and then not to pick on the recreation committee but the budget requests go to the manager they don't go to the town council, and the manager forwards them on to the council you know every department has budget requests the recreation commission advises the recreation department, who makes budget requests to the town manager so do they do they get a, you know, you know, we could we could debate this forever but we vote on the manager's budget not on the recreation commission's requests to the manager per se. Sort of thing. So, or, or, or the, you know, we vote on we actually vote on the CPAs requests right or their recommendations but the Board of Health has budget requests the HR a has budget requests but they go through the manager. It's a different system of government so I may be starting with the manager and getting his input as to which committees he feels are, you know, his, his, the executives committees that that advise the executive versus advise both versus advise the council would be a good start. May I suggest that Michelle that you and I have that conversation with the town manager. And we bring that back to the committee. Okay, that sounds good. Thank you Lynn. Yeah that's great and yeah. So with that being said I did want to make sure we got down to these initial thought or, excuse me additional thoughts that one council person brought forward. If we could quickly take a look at those. Also the new committee recommendations that were added. I'll make a note about the campus and community coalition the CCC. This is sort of been informally lays on I think George Ryan was attending meetings. I've started to attend meetings. In this cycle here and so we want to talk about whether we want to formalize that so that actually anybody any counselor who was interested in that could put their name in the hat for that and and have it be more of an official and formal lays on roll. Jennifer. Yeah, because I think that so when we were, you know, all the counselors have been, at least, I think all of them are at least the new counselors have been meeting with Frank. Frank Tony Morales and Nancy Bethony. And so I expressed interest in, you know, wanting to attend as many meetings as I could at the CCC whether, you know, just as a resident or as a counselor. Yeah, yeah, I mean, I think that's the kind of committee where and I think Dorothy will probably try and go to meetings to so just to say we might want to have an official representative but that's because it's not a typical town committee, maybe one that counselors from districts to whom their work really impacts might choose to attend as well. And we should I am not sure those meetings given they're not official town committees. I don't know how it works with respect to the public but we should we can find out and see how that because I agree with you I think that if they're especially in districts where there's impact there. That makes a lot of sense. Is there a precedent. So, if it's not a town committee. How does that Mandy had actually come. There isn't a precedent and I don't think the CCC actually has a formal committee membership and I think that's part of it. The last council talked a little bit about the CCC but there wasn't a formal membership for us to be able to as a council go and say hey add a counselor to that formal membership right, which is why you know I might not have been the only one that brought it up but why I said you know maybe it's a liaison role or some sort of designation informally or formally from the council but since there's no formal membership that the council says you know we really need counselors at this meeting. So let's formalize sort of that from the council perspective of who should be there or XY or Z to get the council involved in that. It doesn't have to be designated a liaison but but you know we don't. There's no formal membership basically so we can't force ourselves there but I believe they're open meetings and so if the council wants to designate and say hey X counselors. Now go to those meetings and let us know what's happened that that might be a wise thing to do from the council perspective. Right that's why he, they could just say come to the meetings because there's no set membership. Right yeah but there is, for example like I've received now three separate emails with an agenda the zoom link to attend, you know, so I'm sort of on that mailing list. So I want to make sure that we have a more formal process for including other counselors that could be that would be involved in that. So I see your hand. Yeah, I, I don't think what I have to say is particularly important but it keeps coming up as a counselor I can attend any meeting of any committee formal or informal town or council committee. I think we need to formalize that because it's a different kind of participation. I am participating as an individual. I am not sitting in. I'm, I'm in the audience. If I want to give public comment I'm giving it from myself, and somehow or other I feel like we're making this a lot more complicated than maybe it needs to be. That's kind of what I'm sitting with right now not sure but that's. And we had some additional thoughts here. So this is along the lines of what we were, what we were talking about. Yeah, we were talking about that earlier. Yeah. Okay, good. I just discovered all of the input that I received. And it sounds like we're going to start by having a conversation with Paul, and then coming back to this. So if there aren't any other questions, comments, or discussion on this matter, then we can move to the next matter on our agenda. Can I just bring up one thing. Please. Yeah, because I'm on DACA. And so I'm going to go back and say hey you know we had this conversation and I'm wondering whether you are interested in having representatives on other committees, like TSO or something like that so that might be something that all all of us might want to check in with our committees the current ones we have right now to see if they would like to do that kind of change where they actually participate they send a representative even if they're on voting. I don't know. Lynn. Do I have my hand up. Yeah, I do. I couldn't buy down. I should have taken it down, although I do have an opinion on this. I think that that would be a change in our rules. And before we open it to one committee to say, would you like to have a representative on TSO, it probably should be brought to the council. No, I was thinking only as a getting gathering some information on not saying hey go do this but is this something that you would even consider. And then, you know, because if there's no, if none of them want to do it, then we don't have to bring it to the council but if there is a committee or more than one that's saying, well I really would like to have a representative on account on TSO, then it seems worth bringing forward to the council. No, no, just different. Andy. So I, I would with some hesitation support Pat's rules is Pat's thoughts, as long as it's not brought forth as a council is even thinking of it or this or it'll happen if you want it. Because Pat and I have had a lot of experience, particularly with the Human Rights Commission as we've been writing bylaws. But also with the Board of License Commission and something else I was talking to one of the representatives with of saying, oh, we can just add this experience or this, this thing on to them, they'll be fine with it. But then when we actually talk to them they're like, no, we don't want that that's out of our wheelhouse we don't you know, we've had a lot of that experience where we've thought as counselors that that would be a perfect solution to something we were looking for. And then when you talk to them, they say, not on your life basically. So getting some information preliminarily on on a committee. Pat has been the liaison to it. And so getting a little bit of information from one specific committee that might give us some information regarding other committees, even though you'd have to ask each one separately, might inform our conversation. Because you know if they come back and say we don't have the time for that we're happy with the memos we're sending. That's a lot of information given how that committee has worked with the TSO, the last couple years so I don't object to gaining that information as long as the understanding during that conversation is this is, this is hasn't even been discussed by the council, they may shoot it down no matter what you say and you can't be offended if they do type thing you know like, we're trying to help our communications. Yeah, exactly and it seems to me that it may even trigger one member saying hey you know I don't need to be formal but I realized maybe I should be attending. One of us should be attending that meeting to listen and to see the places where we have something that this committee needs to bring up to that. I don't know. Jennifer. No just. I know Tracy Zafian from TA tack often goes to the TSO committees. You know so she's providing a liaison just, you know, by the fact that she regularly attends TSO. Yeah. I have an understanding that a chair of a town committee would be aware of the standing committee that they are sort of interacting that that is, you know, linked to them, because people get elected chairs. We're all volunteers here I guess is what I'm trying to say. And we don't necessarily, I wouldn't, I wouldn't assume that a chair would necessarily know for sure. So maybe there's also a call here for bringing some more awareness somehow and education to the town committee chairs in particular, to really help them to understand. Lynn. Oh, okay. Lynn you're not muted just so you know, if I think you just I think, okay. And so that's that's just a thought that I have and I also want to come back to the equity lens piece again to say, I do support what Pat is suggesting to sort of informally try to gauge, you know, for our purposes to help direct our conversation. But I do know an impact experience with, you know, members of town committees speak to each other I mean we're we all live in this community together. And so it's really important that one town committee doesn't feel like they're getting asked by a counselor, something that another town committee, because it doesn't have a liaison or because that person isn't in this room today. And that person isn't asking, and so I do have that concern. I am more about sort of standardizing those things so that there feels to be a fair process in place. All right. Are we ready to move on. Does Anna have her hand up. Potentially let's see here. Thank you. Yes, I don't know. If you need a comment, if you need me to do a public comment on that last item so I'll wait till public comment. Most logical to wait till public comment. Excellent. And so it is 1042 and very in mind that we do have to open it up for public comment. I'm actually okay with doing public comment right now, and then seeing what time we have left. Okay, perfect. So I just will read this briefly public comments on matters within the jurisdiction of the GL. I'm sorry, I'm reading off of let me start over. Public comments on matters within the jurisdiction of the GL residents are welcome to express their views for one to three minutes at the discretion of the GL chair based upon the number of people who want to speak. The GL will not engage in a dialogue or comment on a matter raised during public comment to participate in public comment right now please raise your hand and I see we have Anna Devlin got here who would like to give public comment. Thanks. So, in reflecting on your last conversation about liaisons. And I'm, I'm speaking just from my limited experience on TSO, something to consider is that and I'm going to give an example and please crosswalk this to the larger situation. Tracy is an amazing chair for tack, and there's no process right now for when or how she should give input there's no standardized process and so it was even mentioned that like, oh, you know if tack has updates they can give them a public comment but public comment is pretty limited right sometimes there's a time limit. And if it's a relevant committee, sometimes they're going to need to go for more than three minutes right if we're asking for updates. So, and we want to be able to discuss what they say. I would just consider or I would encourage you all to consider what the process is for, you know, I don't know if it needs to be formalized as a liaison to a committee but really clarifying for the chairs of our council committees how they should be engaging with these relevant advisory groups right so and providing guidance on that so it's consistent and and fair for those for those relevant companies. Thank you. Anna, can I ask a follow up question to that to make sure I understood what you said, are you are you saying that we should speak with standing chair, so standing chairs of committees or, or are you saying, go ahead. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I so much coffee this morning. We should. What I'd love to see is, is something for from GL around recommendations for incorporating advice from relevant committees to standing town committees. Does that make sense so the direction is flowing from like tack to TSO. Yeah, that's what I thought you know, yeah, yeah. Okay. Good. Thank you. Is there any other public comment. Okay, seeing none. One, something I feel is really important for us to establish and, of course, and Nika is not here but I would like for us. Was it your understanding that we established this as a regular meeting time at our last meeting. It was. Okay, good. Okay, then let's begin our discussion on the rules of procedure. And Mandy, would you mind bringing those up. I had a question about regular meeting time which is, it would be very helpful to have a calendar. So we can put them in because it's not always every other week depending on whether you're aiming for every other week or whether aiming for twice a month. So for us to be able to establish and plan for the next so many times so that we know and so that the public knows these are the years meetings for GL. And so maybe if we could have that calendar for the next meeting, which I'm assuming is the 16th but again we don't have an actual calendar. Exactly. A lot of work for a chair I understand it's a lot of work for a chair but I know that calendar is always helpful to more than just the committee members themselves. Absolutely. And I actually think that was what I was trying to ask not whether we had had a day in time but whether we had a calendar. So, yes, I will put together a calendar and the 16th. I don't have, I don't have anything in front of me right now to determine if there was some conflict with that for some reason townwide that we would need to know about but for now, that will be our next meeting date. It's 9am on Wednesday, February 16, and I will put together a calendar and I think it's okay for me to send that in advance. Like I don't have to wait until it can be in the packet. Perfect. It can be put in the packet. The committees generally vote on it but it's, it's part of the packet. So, it can just go with that. Okay, great. What did you want me to bring up. So, I guess my next question is, are we trying to end at 11 and if so, should we just skip the rules. My feeling is we should skip the rules because I'd like to do a quick preview of agenda for the future agenda. I think it's clear that the rules of procedure has to be the first thing that we focus on in our next meeting and just help me with timing there if. So, if it needs to be brought to the February 28 meeting per the original referral, and we do this on the 16th, then I would. Get through it, there would be a motion and then that report would go to Lynn. Lynn and Athena. I think that's the 23rd or 24th for posting in the packet. So, so that report back could be we're still working on it and we've got recommendations for XYZ rules but not ABC rules, and we're going to bring them together we want to bring them as one so that we're not doing rules at five or six meetings of the council. But if we don't finish on the 16th, the report can just be an update on where we are. Excellent. Okay, perfect. Okay, so yeah let's, we'll come back to that so we know that's going to be on our agenda. I will note that I don't believe Athena correct me if I'm wrong that we don't have any minutes to approve today. We don't. I'm sorry we don't have minutes today. I'll have both sets for you before the 16th. Perfect. Thank you. So next agenda preview. I took, I took this from Mandy, and just really appreciate the way that Mandy includes sort of future things at the bottom of her agendas and it was a really helpful organization process for me to so. So at the bottom of our agenda there are potential future agenda items, one that I want to bring to the forefront is a counselor has asked that we review the standing committee structure. So that that's a request and I put it at the top of potential future agenda items and just want to see if there are any comments or questions about that. So who we're supposed to do per the rules or the charter yearly anyway. Actually, yes. Okay. Maybe. I thought I saw yearly apparently the liaisons are yearly. I can't remember whether we threw in the committee, the council committees yearly or not. Okay. Well, we'll plan to add that to our agenda. I have also added an item that I would like for us to consider and it may not be immediately but I would like us to work on developing an equity lens review process. So right now here in this committee, we review things. We look at clarity consistency and action ability. I would like actually for us to develop a process that all committees can use to review matters through an equity lens. I, I don't know if it was appropriate for me as the chair of this committee to bring that or if I have to talk to somebody else first about that. So I'm totally open to, to following the right process for that. But that's something I would like to do. Yes, Mandy. I think that's a good idea. I think we should think about. I think it's one that's not so much of a problem. I mentioned it with multiple reviews, right? But I know. Councilor Devon Gautier. During, I don't know whether it was a CRC recommendation process recommending for planning board or ZBA or whether it was geo wells recommendations for finance committee appointments, but I think it was councilor Devon Gautier before she got elected, you know, to create a more equity lens using thinking equity on that a much broader term than than sometimes equity is used but but creating more processes. And so, I would be thrilled if GL came up with that that then CRC could then just sort of adopt for its reviews. But but then, you know, these other things. Yeah, it's, we're still forming those processes so I think it's a great topic for potentially March when we get through some of these other things that are supposed to be done yearly, on sort of an annual basis to start talking about, I think would be great. I wonder if something like this shouldn't be part of the retreat where we're looking because I think it's an critically important issue. I agree. Okay, good. Well, we can talk to Lynn about that and I think there are lots of models by the way so we don't have to reinvent the wheel by any means I looked into it and there are lots of things that we can look at to help us and support us in that. And then I also had a review of the proclamation list Mandy is that an annual that's something that we would want to do annually is to review the proclamation list. And the proclamation list is just for the in some senses for the chairs help of knowing for scheduling purposes, what are we going to need for February what are we going to need for March what annual sort of proclamations. What are we going to be expecting. And then if you've got them known you can go to Lynn and say have you gotten this one yet or or if we know it comes from Jennifer moistened at the DEI officer that HRC. You can go to her and say, do you have a new one, you know, it's time for us to do that so there might be a couple of February ones, ones we need to deal with in February for March, I'm not sure. Yes, I think oh actually I think the first one was the child abuse awareness proclamation, which needs to be done in March, by March 21 Lynn sent that one over and then I did speak with Lynn about adding. There is a counselor or counselors who would like to work on the Jewish American Heritage Month proclamation which is new. And so Lynn has given me the process in terms of how that would come to fruition. Pat, did you want to. Yeah, and what I realized the other day was that we missed Holocaust remembrance day, and I contacted Jennifer. And I said that I would be willing to work on that for next year to write it, but that that really needs to go in the list. Okay, okay. There was. Yeah, that's well, I'll actually just share something with you offline about about that. Yeah. Okay, are there any other agenda items that I should be adding for next week or for the following week that other than the items that we reviewed Oh, is it okay to move into announcements quickly while we're having this discussion. I did touch base with Paul about the bylaws that were reviewed that that were referred to Paul, and he is working on that so we'll have some information about that in forthcoming. Great. I just want to thank Michelle you're doing a great job. Come in and charity. Thank you. Thank you so much I really appreciate that and I appreciate all the support that you've all given me in doing this so thank you. Yeah, well thank you for taking it on. Really. It's, it's good. It's good. I was helpful to know that we can report back at a due date I was wondering about that because some things like when you hold a hearing it's very specific when it has to be like that. We regularly as counts as council committees don't make the deadlines the council sets so it's regularly just a we're still working on it report. Yeah, that is really helpful. Although I'm sure Lynn wants us to get it moving and so at least the liaison piece I was feeling that. Okay, so if there are no other agenda items to be added I do not have any items that haven't been anticipated. And so if we are good to go, we can end our meeting at 1057 a.m. Thank you all very much. Thank you. Thanks. Bye bye.