 Pursuant to chapter 20 of the acts of 2021, this meeting will be conducted by a remote means. Members of the public who wish to access the meeting may do so in the following manner, by emailing Steve McCarthy at McCarthyS at emmersdma.gov that's M-C-C-A-R-T-H-Y-S at emmersdma.gov. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time by a technological means. In the event that we are unable to do so for reasons of economic hardship, and despite best efforts, we will post on the town website in audio or video recording, transcript, or other comprehensive record of proceedings as soon as possible after the meeting. And with that done, we'll call the meeting to order at 6.03 PM, let's take a roll call done. Here. Dylan. Here. Gaston. Here. Ellie. Here. And I am here. So we are called to order. The next thing to do is public comment. Is there anyone here for public comment? If you have a general, this is not specific public comments related to if your hearing is coming up later, but just a general public comment. And if you have public comment, please hit the button, the hand, raise your hand button down at the bottom of your screen. And seeing none, no public comment. We'll move on to our licenses. So we have some special short-term alcohol serving licenses up tonight. And Steve, would you like to introduce these? So these are three licenses for the UMass is doing some events at Garber Field. We do have Christopher Fisher, who is the coordinator for these events. And I can allow him to talk. Oh, super great. Thank you, Mr. Fisher. Would you like to let us know about these events? This is the La Crosse team. Yes, hello. Thanks for having me. So we have, athletics has requested that concessions, cells, alcohol, at the La Crosse games, specifically the dates that were furnished, not every game. And the, this would all be at Garber Field and all alcohol would be sold through the concessions setup that will currently be there selling food and soda and water and the rest of the items. Okay, great. Thank you. Does anyone have any questions for Mr. Fisher about these licenses? Yes, Doug. Just a couple of things. I think we granted a license like this last year for a few times. Was that the case? I'm just curious if you were involved. I can't recall. And so I'm sorry if you were and I forget. But through how it went last year and the other question is just, is it a single concession stand that would be selling or are there multiple locations? I just, I'm not familiar with the, with the particular setup at Garber. Sure. So last year, we did not. Last year, we actually didn't have concessions open. I think that in the 2020, 2021 season, there was talk about having this but everything shut down before we had any sort of chance. So we have not done any alcohol sales at this. I would consider this sort of an outdoor venue although it is gated and ticketed. So I don't have experience with it yet. And there is only one concession area within Garber field. It's a fairly small area. The fence is very close to the field itself. And then there's a set of bleachers on one side and we're to the side of the bleachers. Okay. Thank you. Yes, Doug. Nope, that's all. Hallie. When, I remember when we were talking about this years ago pre pandemic, I think the biggest concern I remember correctly at the board had was how do you mark people who've been served to prevent people from sneaking alcohol in or at least like designating like who's been actually sold alcohol and is drinking it. I think that if I remember correctly that was the biggest hiccup we came up with as the board of like ways that it could go south. And I did not have a chance to review your permit. Are you gonna stamp people over 21 who've been served or give a wristband or anything like that? Sure. So we do have a lot of experience now with Mullen Center and selling alcohol. So what we do is we tips certify our cash register or cash years. So everyone at the cash register is ID at the point of sale. They have to be 21. They have to not be visibly intoxicated if they've already been drinking. It's usually fairly apparent. We do not sell. It's not worth taking any chances. We don't wristband. We don't hand stamp things like that. It really doesn't physically stop anyone from passing the beverage. There's no one going through the stands checking for everyone drinking to have a stamp on their hand. And that would be a little obtrusive and probably we'd get in the way of enjoying the event if we did. So what we do is just our due diligence to make sure that alcohol is not sold to anyone under the age of 21 or anyone who shouldn't be buying more alcohol. We also limit where you can only purchase two units of alcohol per transaction, which sometimes throttles down the line because if one person wants to buy a round of eight beers for their four friends, we don't allow it. They have to actually make individual transactions. So just to the point that I think that you're asking, we try to make sure that nobody is hoarding or consuming or purchasing large volumes of alcohol at once. It's two per transaction period. All right. And then done. Just one question for, so ticket holders, this area is in a gated off area. You're not checking people's tickets. They have to have a ticket to be in the area in the first place. Am I correct about that? Yes, sir, that's correct. Okay, thank you. Thanks, done. Just to follow up on sort of monitoring after the point of sale. Obviously, are you just doing it? Well, two questions really. One is, is it just a visual inspection of ID or do you have like a card reader? Just curious about that. And then secondly, what kind of, just general presence, security wise, do you guys have that you have, I mean, separate from specifically like looking for something like an ID or a band, a wristband kind of thing, but just generally, what's your approach to the control and observation at the facility, what's your expectation of that? I mean, I don't think anybody's gonna get out of hand. I think it's a small opinion and that sort of thing. It's not just generally kind of thinking about what are you guys thinking about from a crowd control and monitoring circumstance and what's your approach to that with staff and kind of in and amongst the crowd? Sure, so the first question, we do not have a card reader. We do visually inspect IDs. The second question, again, we haven't done this yet. So when required, I know in the past, there have been green mountain security staff brought in for this type of event to run sort of the crowd control in case things get out of hand. If we think that this venue is small enough, then, I mean, UMPD is always a presence. They're always very close by if something does go wrong. But yeah, those might be the only two options I can think of for us. Oh, just so is on events, when you don't have alcohol service, which would be all of them up to now. Do you have green mountain there as you sort of event security? I know, sir. Okay, so yeah, so I guess I just to follow up on that a little bit, I'm just trying to understand this for operationally. You know, you obviously have people there that are scanning the tickets as people come in. But outside of that, and then actually people at the concession stand is there's not a presence of staff in and amongst the crowd at that point. So no, certainly not our staff. And it is two different departments. So Athletics does the ticketing and grounds, facilities, maintenance. They may have people sort of working the crowd in some capacity or another, but from the food, money, alcohol, control standpoint, anything concessions wise, I do not. I don't have anyone in the crowd or any sort of security. And I have not seen at this specific venue or any of the outdoor concessions, I have not seen green mountain, yeah, overtly, but again, there may be one. There may be one with the ticket stand. Okay, yeah, I'm just curious. I mean, it might be a question for us to think about is whether or not we want to ask the athletic department what their sort of general security policy is, you know, sort of crowd control. If the food service folks are not doing that, and I'm saying they should or shouldn't or who should or shouldn't, I'm just sort of thinking about, you know, obviously if we don't sell it to somebody, you know, if the tip certifies gonna identify a lot of the folks that might be on their way to a state of intoxication that we're uncomfortable with, but once they sort of leave the concession area that's really, I'm sort of curious about what the university as a whole is thinking about kind of keeping an eye on folks. And that would be true. In some ways, I'm sort of curious about this, just independent of alcohol sales, sort of, you know, fans get unruly or do they have some presence in the athletic department? I presume would be the ones that are perhaps who we should ask about it. I guess the question I will follow up with, how much have you liaised with athletics? Did they kind of request this as an option of something that they'd like to have or was this, you know, sort of what brought this forward? I guess it's kind of what I'm thinking and may play into that sort of question of crowd control. It was requested. I think that the crowd is going to be light enough that in terms of money and income, it's really not, it's not anything that I would value. It's simply just so that folks can enjoy it. It's just a value add, you know, a lot of people like to have a beer with the game and it's a part of that sort of culture and atmosphere. But yeah, I'm certainly operationally confident that we can pull it off, but not enthusiastic about it as a revenue driving force for UMass, you know, La Crosse. Right, right. I think that's fine. I was just thinking about, well, you know, we tried to think about worst case scenarios. Sorry, that's kind of what we do. Makes sense, I understand. And so, you know, sort of just trying to get my head wrapped around sort of, you know, the request to you to sort of offer this as an option, which is not unheard of or surprising in some ways. And it's just sort of have the folks that made that request that they're sort of doing the large, the line share of the sort of, you know, ticket and crowd management, you know, are they prepared to sort of be a partner with you in keeping an eye on things? Yeah. I don't have any expectation on issues, you know. No, none at all. I think if that's what the board says, then I would simply charge that off to athletics. If you want to have alcohol sales at this event, then you hire two security guards or whatever it happens to be. And if they want to have it, then they can hire them. So I don't think that's unreasonable at all. I think they would do that. For me, I was mostly putting it as a sort of food for thought for my colleagues on the board to think about and as we consider the application, so. Sure. Questions? Anyone else? Gaston? No, I don't. I mean, I think Doug's questions are well taken. I mean, it doesn't sound like these are big affairs. I wonder if anything, if you might be able to give us a report back after the first time and just because we're doing something a little new from previous one day licenses, I don't know if that seems like a reasonable request to inform us. Yeah, absolutely. All right, thank you. I mean, Dylan, yes, go ahead. Yeah, I'm just looking at Garber Field, a couple of images that it's just two sets of stands on one side and then a grassy area to sit on the other side, am I correct about that? Well, that hill, they don't really allow people to sit there. So it's really just the two sets of bleachers. And I've never seen that field even at playoff games to the point where the bleachers don't hold the spectators. It's never been full that I've seen. And the police detail, how many officers is that? Once again, I'm not really sure if there's a standard police detail. I just know that if we call UMPD when there's an issue, their response time is very quick. Oh, I'm sorry. So there wasn't a plan for a police detail? I do not believe so. I was not going to hire a police detail. Okay, but there is the security detail you said? Again, not from our department. I was not going to hire a security detail. Okay, I just wondered just how do you guys handle, I don't know, maybe this was answered by Doug and I missed it. How do you guys handle unruly guests? He just said you call UMPD, he's one of the staff, but just watching will say something to him directly or just general procedure of alcohol or no alcohol? Kind of how's that handled? Well, I feel like I'm jinxing myself here actually. I don't like to do that. But I mean, so again, in the Mullen Center where we'll have, you know, 6,000 people or so, it hasn't really been an issue, at least not as it relates to alcohol. I mean, I've seen people, unfortunately with masks have to be escorted out, but so yeah, it hasn't been, it's new for us too, as I say, you know, you don't need security, from my standpoint, I don't need security to sell hot dog. So it's just never been something I've been asked to do. And I've never noticed a presence of security because I have never observed anyone being unruly. And you know, there's unsportsmanlike, but that's not, you know, again, I think someone from athletics would just go up and say, hey, you can't shout those words. So there is not a security presence that I've observed. And I think if that is a sticking point for the license, then I will hire one. Well, you know, I'll pass that cost on to athletics. I'll let them know that that's requisite for the license and we'll bring someone in. I just, I'm not sure that it's not a big student crowd. It tends to be families of the players coming to see, you know, and it's not like, you know, visions of say a football, a tailgate party or something. There really is none of that. It's very mild, very tame. They're there for the game. So yeah, so I don't want like, I'm not trying to talk my way out of it, as I say, like if we need to have security there, we can have security there, but I'm not really, I don't have good answers for you because it's not something I've done or observed. Doug, and then how? Yeah, I think that the question really around security is one we need to post to the athletic department because I'm sure they have somebody because I just, you know, for any number of reasons they do regardless of concessions, whether it's concessions or not. So I think that's our thing. I think what we may want to do is if we have some concern, because I don't want to impose something on the license if, you know, it sort of doubles up an effort that's already being made. In other words, this may be something that athletics has thought about or it's got staff on hand that they feel like they can handle the circumstances and we may feel they can too. So we don't want to sort of make, you know, our applicant here sort of go to the trouble of figuring out, you know, some security thing that he's going to then charge the athletic department, you know, and the athletic department's going to come back to him and say, what are you doing? We've already got people, right? So what we may want to do or one suggestion I would have is that we, maybe if we approve these, you know, contingent upon some more information regarding security, like some, you know, just understanding of what the athletic department's doing, if they don't have anything. And so we may have to, you know, empower Steve as our liaison here to sort of get that answer about the athletic department and what their role, you know, what they're thinking is around security. And, you know, if, you know, if he feels like that's not sufficient then sort of impose upon them, you know, some level of getting some security officers on hand. But I don't know if we can do that all in sort of one motion where we sort of make it contingent upon the answer that the athletic department gives Steve. I guess we can word that somehow. Hallie, did you have a question? Thanks, Steph. We're just a comment for our group. Based on what I'm hearing, I'd be inclined to approve license knowing that UMass also wants this to succeed. And so if there are issues, I'm sure the police force will come and they can then change things for the future. I'm very curious to see how the events go. But I wouldn't want to make this too burdensome if this is not going to be a huge event. Thanks, Hallie. Dylan. The last thing I'll just say is I really don't care to impose any mandate that they have to have security. I think the worst case scenario of something like this would be somebody getting rowdy enough that any staff on the field will notice and can certainly interact with them. I was mostly just curious of what they had in mind, but I don't think we have to impose that they have security there. I'm fine approving these licenses just as they are. All right. What does everybody else, a guest on or Doug, do you have a different opinion about it? Or, cause I think for some of the other UMass short terms, do we ask for security? If it's... I mean, I like Doug's suggestion of, you know, Chris just following up to find out what, if anything, was contemplated by the other departments as a kind of an FYI for us to know. And then it looks like this first event, the first game is April 29th, is that right? It's April 2nd. Oh, April 2nd. Okay, April 2nd. I mean, I think it would be great if Chris could send Steve a note after the first event and then Steve can relate to us the information and maybe we would like to ask Chris to come back. But I think it's good to find out how this goes and keep it lean and, but know what's been contemplated as Doug was asking. Okay, so we have the sort of two parts where we want to approve yet would like to know if the UMass athletics department had anything kind of, and it was, had something envisioned as regards to security with this situation. Is that correct before we go into this? But at the same time, we'd like a report after the first one. Does that sound there? Is there some way, Doug, you would you? I'm going to offer a motion. I mean, so I'll actually do all three at once. It's like I moved to approve the three short term licenses for the Topic Campus Inc. at Garber Field for the second 16th and 29th of April with the request to get some feedback from the applicant as to how the first event went. I think I'll stop there. I think we can ask Steve in a non-motion way. We can ask Steve to just follow up with athletics because I'm sure they've got something in place and you can just report back to us what he points out. Okay, great. Thanks, Doug. Is everybody happy with that? Fantastic. All right, thank you, Dylan. You have a motion. Oh, yes, Steve, was that you? No, I was just saying I can do that and follow up with Mr. Fisher about what the security plan might be from athletics and forward that along to you. Okay, super. Thank you so much, Steve. We have a motion and a second. Any further discussion? Hearing none, we'll take a vote. Doug. Hi. Dylan. Hi. Hallie. Hi. Gaston. Hi. I vote aye, five to zero. The short-term alcohol serving licenses for Garber Field are approved. Thank you very much, Mr. Fisher, for coming in. We're really curious to hear how the first one went and best of luck. Thank you very much. I'll follow up with athletics and I'll get you guys a report afterwards. I appreciate it. Oh, super. Thank you. Take care. Who was the second on that motion? Oh, that was Dylan. Dylan, okay. Okay, so next up, our application by Farmer wineries for licenses to sell at a farmer's market. The first one is home fruit wine with, from Lori Perkins. And this is something we have done before. Is that correct, Steve? We did this last year for the farm market. Yeah, this has happened every year since we started doing this, I believe. So yeah, they do need this. So these are farmer wineries, much like the Amherst Farm Winery. They're licensed by the state. They get further licensing from the Department of Agriculture to serve at farmer's markets. And then the town local licensing authority just has to approve them for them to serve at their farmer's market. Okay. So this would be for the one on the town common. Okay, all right, great. Thank you. Hi, Lori. Hi. Hi, great. Welcome. So is there anything else you'd like to say before we, I just want to say thank you for allowing us to participate in the Amherst Farmers Market the last few years. It is really great market and I think the town really appreciates it, brings in a lot of good patrons to the town. So we haven't had any problems there with COVID. We hadn't been able to serve tastings. And we're hoping that this year maybe we'll be able to do that. So I don't know if it's up to the actual market or are you people, whether we can do the tastings or the Board of Health? Oh, I don't know. Steve, do you know? Oh, Doug, you know? I was just going to say, I mean, we improve the license and then I think the Board of Health has the, probably the final say relative to the health questions, but we're going to, I think our approving this license allows for it. And then it's just, does that other board allow for it? So they'll make their decision, you know, when they get there. Okay, okay. But I think the license as it is right now would allow for it. So then I think that clears the way and for them to serve and have tastings, it's really just, you know, once the Board of Health makes a decision about an outdoor event like that in, you know, in April, May, June, et cetera. And it may change over the course of time, depending on what happens with the... Yeah, we know. Yeah, I think that's exactly right, Doug. It would just, this board could approve it and then it just be any pandemic restrictions the Board of Health might impose. Okay, super. Great. Does anyone have any questions for Lori about this license? Everything is the same as it was last year and the year before that. If not, yes, Dylan. And we'll approve the license. Fantastic. Thank you so much for the motion. Is there a second? A second. Thank you, Doug. We have a motion and a second. Is there any further discussion? Hearing none, we'll take a vote. Doug. Hi. Dylan. Hi. Allie. Gaston. Hi. And I vote aye, five to zero. The farmer winery license to sell it at a farmer's market for home fruit wine is proved. Thank you very much for coming in, Lori, and best wishes for the season. Thank you very much. Okay, so next up is Stony Brook Cider also for the farmer's market. And it is Michael LaMontagne. Hello. Michael, you are muted if you're having trouble speaking. Oh, he's muted. Mr. LaMontagne, you're muted. I wonder if he's there. Oh, maybe he's not there. There we are. Okay, hi. You're all here. Okay. Hi. Good evening, welcome. So your license is the, your license application for the new year for the farmer's market. Yes. Is there anything else? I've been at the farmer's market for five years. I'm a member of the committee for the Amherst Farmer's Market. I am tip certified. Okay. I am insured at the farmer's market for $1 million, $2 million. Okay. And I would like to attend again. Fantastic. Is there anything else we need to know, Steve? Any questions from Mr. LaMontagne? I have nothing else. Oh, no? No? All right. If there are no questions or comments, I'll entertain a motion to approve the license for student brick sider. So move. Thank you. Is there a second? Thank you. Thank you, Dylan. Motion in a second. Any further discussion? If not, we'll take a vote. Doug. Hi. Dylan. Hi. Hallie. Hi. Gaston. Gaston. He's on mute. Sorry, hi. Farmer. Farmer's quick. And I vote aye, five to zero. The license is approved. Thank you very much for coming in and best wishes for the summer and spring. Well, thank you. Thank you very much. Yep. Take care. You too. Okay. Great. So those are our licenses for the day. Discussion items. Jake's eggs follow up discussion on temporary closing. And they are both here. And just one quick question. The mover and seconder in the last, the last vote was Dylan and Doug again. Yes. Or was it Doug and Dylan? Moved it. Okay. Seconded. Thank you. All right. And monopoly. You're always welcome Gaston. Raise your hand. You know, they got, they got a Jeopardy hands. They're, I was going to say, they're the dream team. Yes. I'm looking out for Steve in the minutes, just keeping them simple. Being paced. All right. Okay. So we have Chris Ware from Jake's restaurant is here. Yes. Hello. Hi. How are you? Thank you so much for coming in. Of course. Of course. And I'm also here. This is Alex Walsh with Jake's restaurant as well. Right. Thank you so much for coming in. Thank you. Thanks for having us. So thanks for coming back and reporting on how things have been going and how have things been going? Well, we are still closed. It's, it's, you know, it's been going really well in our Northampton location because we were able to transfer all of our, the few staff we had in Amherst to Northampton over the winter. And it was really a really great like morale boost for everyone there to have a full staff once again. And so that's been great to see that kind of energy come back. So that leaves our Amherst location. It's been a, it's been a difficult, you know winter of contemplation certainly and certainly going through all the numbers with the beauty of tax season come the first of the year. So at this point, we are unable to reopen as Jake's restaurant as we were. We don't see that being financially viable for a number of reasons that we can go into if you require. However, we do see it that space being a viable business as a private event space and as a community gathering space. And cause we certainly don't want to give up on the area. We really like North Amherst. We like being in Amherst. We've made a lot of wonderful connections locally with other business owners and patrons in the town itself. And so, so basically we've been concocting sort of planning a new business plan and see if it can happen with our current level of licensing. Myself and Chris have spoken with Steve just a month ago when we kind of started to put the pieces together and so the timing kind of worked out as we said we would touch base around this time. So here we are. And I can give you, I can go in whatever direction you want me to as far as explanation. But I guess I'll kind of maybe let you ask some questions. Well, however you want to play it. Doug, and then Gaston. Well, I have just a couple of questions and I'm thinking about sort of the license that you currently hold. I certainly understand the constraints you guys are operating as far as even acquiring staff much less having people come in the door. But we're just having staff to be able to have the restaurant open much less than subsequently have a sufficient traffic to make it work. I know a lot of restaurants are struggling so we're sympathetic to that. As far as keeping it as an event space and thinking about a sort of license, the license is fairly broad and what it allows. And so that's possible. What I think what we'd like in regard to that is or at least I'm gonna express an opinion about this. Maybe it's not what the entire board likes. And I'm curious about is how often as you're planning this and thinking about event space and having things in that location, what is your expectation for language or workload? How many, a couple of days a week you expect to serve a place? What's your target? And I think we're thinking about it. I think our thoughts are relative to, we get a license that's available, I think seven days a week. And if you're only using one day a week is that how we wanna use up one of our quoted licenses? Right. I think we do or don't have a problem with it. I'm just saying we wanna, some context around what you're thinking about how often you'd have events or what you'd like to be the case. I mean, you're not there yet probably as far as scheduling, but curious. Yeah, absolutely. I think it's a great place to start and I appreciate that question. Yeah, so during this winter in this process of trying to sort this all out, I think the one thing that came to mind quite quickly of what we were really unable to, capitalize on as just a business in general was catering and was private events at the space due to our lack of robust staffing. And so that's where it kind of started. The amount of business that we've already turned down or have been unwilling to completely lock in because of the need for this conversation does tell us that we could very easily be looking at three, I would say three events, three to four events a week, most likely three. And these events in our mind and what the vast majority of them all are after wedding parties, wedding brunches, wedding receptions, so mostly wedding heavy, birthdays, retirement parties, and as such along those graduation parties as well. So kind of your standard issue, if you will, for private events that most restaurants are accustomed to. So we do see about three, possibly four during certain busy seasons, if you will, graduation season, traditional wedding seasons of the fall, holiday parties as well. We're really getting excited about being a possibility as we, yeah, just going back from our archive of emails from the past two years of all the parties we didn't take. So that, and so certainly the ebbs and flows of the different seasons for those particular events, but I would say three and then four be more realistic during those high seasons if that answers your question. Yeah, I think that's very helpful for us to understand the capacity you're trying to operate at, which starts to compare with, it's not the same as seven days a week, but it's pushing half the week on average that you're actively using the license. I think that's a, there's a number of restaurants I'm not sure, I've experienced this in town where restaurants which might have in the past been closed on a Monday, or not closed at all have closed on Monday and Tuesday. So there's a lot of places that have shifted down to a five day a week schedule. Certainly. The restaurant options. So, certainly, if you're at three or four that's getting kind of close to that. And so that's helpful for us. I think it's framing this and thinking about it. I have a question for Steve, are liaison a little bit regarding the license, the current license as it is now would be sufficient in an event space like that? There's not a separate license or specific license like that, because if it was just like a catering license that they get through the state, they couldn't have it at a fixed location like this. Is that correct? That's correct. And I believe I mentioned this when I had my conversation with them earlier, but yeah, the state's guidance on the hours of operation and keeping in accordance with those defined things are a bit unclear. I mean, I know there's lots of businesses we can think about around the state that have this kind of business model and have liquor licenses. The Red Barn at Hampshire College in our town used to have this. So I have no doubt that there'd be a way for it to be done. I'd have to speak to somebody in the ABCC about if there would be any tweaks needed, but I do believe that either with this license or with one day licenses, they'd absolutely be able to support this kind of business model. And I suspect that it would be like possible with this type of license as well. Okay, thanks. Doug and I know Gaston, do you still have something that, did you wanna say something first or? No, I was also trying to make sense of the license situation and yeah, I guess it's not the catering because of the fixed location. It's not the one day because it's too many. And so it almost seems like it's only really viable because we're not maxed out. Okay, thanks, Doug. Yeah, just another follow up for Chris and Alex a little bit about, I mean, I get the sense and maybe I'm reading between the lines that if possible, it sounds like you'd like to go back to operating restaurant if circumstances sort of progress in a way that allows for that, is that a fair and accurate statement of what you'd like to do? And if you could, how long do you think it'll take before you get to that place? Well, I don't know with what certainly I could say and I'm in the crystal, we're pretty on the same page that we will say, but this would be a new venture for us. We have done a lot catering in the past so that is not new and we have hosted events at the restaurant and that one in particular, but as it's main and only business model is it's sort of function that would be new. So I couldn't say with any real conviction that or certainty that we want to, that this would be a stopgap procedure. Certainly we know restaurants, full service restaurants, we know Jakes and that's very familiar. And if we were to say tomorrow, all of our staffing issues and other difficulties that we've had will go away, then certainly going back to what we know is usually the path of least resistance and that's usually a good thing. But I can't say anything with any guarantees, but if this does become a, I would say more sustainable, more profitable, healthier sort of business model that actually works for really everyone involved, the town, the restaurant, the space itself, the community, then I wouldn't stop at something that was working. So I wish I had some more clarity on that, but yeah, it's kind of, it is a new thing and I guess we're gonna have to see how that plays out. This is almost like those old banqueting halls you used to see, right? We'd run them and then they'd have everything would be there. I'm sorry, can you say that again? It's almost like those old banqueting hall used to see them. Yeah, precisely, yeah. Okay. Yeah, yeah, pretty much. And it just, it's kind of funny just about an hour before I got a text message from a wedding that we're supposed to do at a restaurant before the pandemic of like, hey, when are you guys open back up for, can we book our wedding again? So it was just kind of, yeah, that's just kind of just like a rental old banquet hall, if you will. Okay, all right. And North Amherst. Okay. Okay. Doug, what do you got? Just a follow up question on that front. Yep. Remind us if you would the capacity of the, in the sort of square footage that you have available in the space. Oh, I don't, Chris, you have happened to, I don't have the square footage off the top of my head, do you? On the floor, I believe it's about 1200 square feet on the floor. That sounds about right. Yes, because 2000 total, right? For the whole back of houses. Yeah. It was about five on the original application. I'm pretty certain. Yeah, I think it was 2000 total, 800 being in the back and 1200 in the front, that's right. And I think for capacity, it was 55. 55 or 65? Yeah. Yeah, seated, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All right, thanks. Yeah, I sort of asked that just to have a sense of sort of what kind of events are gonna fit. And that's, you know. Yeah, precisely. Small to medium size wedding party or like you say, a retirement event or a graduation event, that's sort of perfect for that because the difficulty with a larger space is it prices people out. So if you can take 100 or 200, that's often too big a space for somebody who wants a more private event or a smaller event. That's absolutely. Might fit nicely into the mix of businesses within town. So. Great. Yeah, certainly. Okay. Well, thanks. As anyone else have any of the questions for Chris or Alex? If not. Okay. Well, I guess, thank you so much for coming on in. Oh, yeah, certainly. Yeah, we're really, really glad to hear. We want to check in again or... Yeah, I think I do have a kind of question on that front is when do you guys expect some, you know, some moves to be made on this kind of, on this front? Yeah, great. I was hoping that would come up. So, yeah, certainly it was contention on our conversation this evening. We've been working on it pretty hard in the backgrounds. We're hoping to capitalize on the graduation season. So we are looking to get back to some requests that have already been made in the coming weeks. So I would say by mid-April to be hosting events in whatever capacity, you know, maybe unfold then. So in a by month, I guess. But I'll say in one month. Great. Oh, Gaston, go ahead. Thanks. One more question. I'm trying to look ahead and picture that you have a really successful 2022 with this event model. And it's going to be time for you to apply for your license renewal at the end of the year. And I'm just trying to get the board to think about whether how that renewal application could come in that we would be able to approve it for 23. In terms of, yeah, Doug, what are you thinking about that? The thing I'm thinking about is, you know, at that point, I want to have a full year of experience sort of working with it, but I think they'll have a much better sense of sort of days of operation and likely, you know, and so they can kind of give us an idea. So we, you know, they may wanna, you know, one of the things to state is uncomfortable with is having, you know, license from, you know, 10 a.m. to 2 a.m., seven days a week, and then you're only open like some small fraction of that, right? They sort of frown on that just as a, you know, if you read the regs, they kind of don't like that. But at the same time, we as a board, maybe okay with that if we feel like that gives them the like, you know, they're typically, you know, Friday, Saturday and Sunday brunch, you know, is when those three events happen a week and then an occasional Tuesday night or occasional, you know, we don't want to sort of, if we feel like that that's working for them and working for us as a community, I mean, we might be able to be okay with a license that covers more time than what they'll literally be open, but I think we wanna sort of hear about their experience pretty significantly at that point, kind of see, like I said, they won't have gone through the full season. They won't have done a winter holiday season so much by the time they come back to us, but they'll have done graduation, you know, weddings in June, weddings in the fall, you know, they'll probably have people trying to book time with them for the holidays and into the spring. So, you know, they may have a sense of, you know, where they are. So I think for us, that'll be what's critical to hear about. Yeah, go ahead. If I can follow, so I think what would be great is if you can kind of keep your records or thinking about providing a nice long exhibit that, you know, obviously you don't have to tell us any names, but gives us a very good picture about the business you did in 2022 so that we can find the right way of thinking about renewal that meets our responsibilities on the board. Yeah, absolutely. That's, yeah, I think touching back this fall would be really helpful for us too to kind of give it a rundown of our hopefully very accessible experiment in North Amherst. Yeah, and certainly on that point, you know, like we are so thankful for the town support, your support, understanding of our situation, not just ours, but all businesses in general. And so the more we communicate and work together, like it's been a really great process for us. So thank you very much for that. Sure, thank you. I think it's really exciting. I think it's gonna be really interesting to see how it happens this summer and into the fall. We want to touch base back again in, so licenses renew start up in like November, December. Do we want to meet again in October and other six months before that or? That sounds great. Yeah, just so we can hear how it's been going. Yeah, and kind of plan for what we're gonna do with license renewal. Absolutely, kind of saying. Okay, fantastic. Are there any other questions, Steve or anyone else? If not, okay. I'll be speaking to the town attorney on these issues later this week for something unrelated. So I will just pick his brain a little bit about what he thinks to me. I think what a lot of us are coming back to is just that defined hours regulation, which is a bit unclear, but I'll just try to see if there's any precedent when it regards to banquet halls and things like that. Okay. All right, that's great. Thank you, Steve. Anything else? Any other questions? Nope. Okay. I mean, just occurring to me, maybe you'll have to turn it into a private club or something. Well, we go by the guidance of the town. So we'll... Yeah, no, it's kind of a board joke. We had worked on private club regulation, so it's on top of our mind, but thank you anyway. Just sharing where we are. Great. All right. Thanks so much. And we'll look forward to hearing from you in October. Okay, wonderful. Thank you all so much. I really appreciate this. We'll look at the meantime. Thank you. Yeah, definitely. Bye. Bye-bye. Well, that's kind of neat to get back here. So now we are moving on to... So that was Jake's eggs meeting time. We did that. Do we need to talk about this again or Steve? Left on the agenda in case there was any changes, but I think we are gonna be... Next was for the 4th, right? Yes, the 4th of April, that's what I had. Is that right? Does everybody have that? In the time, if you would be so kind to remind us. Oh, six o'clock? Are we still? We're still Monday. Is that correct? Still Mondays until we shipped it to... You had a date, we're shifting to Tuesdays. I mean, you know, if people like five, I could do it on the day that we're talking about if I'm open on that front myself. On Mondays? Or on this? On either Mondays or Tuesdays. I could do 5 p.m. If others would prefer, that would be fine with me. Monday, because Dylan, we switched. You switched your schedule, right? Yeah, but five is also good with me. Six is also good with me. I have a small preference, I guess, for five, but either one. Does anyone prefer five, Helen? Are you okay with five, Doug? As long as CJ is in town, I can do five if he's out of town and I have to get Greta from ballet at 5.30, but he's scheduled to be here the fourth. He's been gone for four weeks, but he's home now. Okay, oh, wow, that's long. Okay, we do like a consistent, it'd be nice to keep kind of consistent. So should we just say six? Keep it at five, and then for the most part, I can also just phone in while I'm in the car too. Okay, so... I was gonna say, I'm a most pro consistency more than anything. So I'd rather be consistent with six, then. Just to be clear, are we talking about the one Monday we have left or our regular Tuesday? I think we're talking about both of that. Does anyone have a problem with five on five in general, five Monday or Tuesday or Sunday? Which day's the dance class, Halle? Mondays. Mondays. So we only, that's only just one, we only have one Monday, right? Yes. So I mean, if Tuesday at five worked for everybody? Yes. Okay, great. All right, so we can do Monday at fourth at five, and then thereafter Tuesdays at five. All right, so that would be the Monday the fourth, and then Tuesday the 19th we'd be switching to Tuesdays. Yes. And both at five o'clock, okay. Yes. Aren't we meeting on the 26th, not the... Yes, we are meeting on the 26th. Thank you, Halle. That's correct. We'll have that circled because we couldn't on the 19th. Yes, April vacation. Right, because of April vacation. So it's the 26th and it's a Tuesday. And then we swing into May on Tuesdays at five. All right, super. Okay. So meeting time done and discussion item C, adult use marijuana regulations done. I don't have anything new for anybody. Okay. I think I was just to recap, I was going to reread through and see if there was anything I spotted in the legs. And I think the other piece of that is starting to put together the bylaw that they would have to pass to create a license. So I looked at that very briefly and didn't get anywhere really consistent of any substantial way. So I'll be in touch on that next time. Okay. Okay, great. Thank you. Any questions for Doug in the meantime? Not okay. Lunch cart regulations. As I told you yesterday, I have been in touch with many Joe Hanneke about the other half of parking space lunch cart Port of License Commissioner authority. And we can have just, we can now license stuff on the sidewalks but the TSO is still discussing it or going to be discussing the licensing on the park street parking. So that half of it has not been put on the agenda yet. I've written to Dorothy, Councilor Dorothy Pam who was on the TSO and she's going to get back to me with the date that that will be going on the agenda. And so that part is still outstanding and I'm still chipping away at the lunch cart regulations. And that's all I have. Does anyone have any questions? Nope. Okay. Thanks. Guidelines, regulations for liquor license decisions. Hallie. I gave them to Steve and he's meeting with Council this week. So hopefully we'll get feedback by next meeting or the meeting after that. Okay. And you sent Steve sent out a coffee to everybody that was attached. I included in the package just in case anybody wanted to see it. Okay. Great. Thank you so much. Any questions for Hallie? Okay. License fee comparison chart or comparison without chart. Yeah. No updates to report. Okay. All right. Thank you. All right. Topics not reasonably anticipated 48 hours prior to meeting. Are there any? I do have one today. Oh. So I was served with a subpoena or I suppose we all were in a sense, but it is for documents relating to lit for this broad array of things here. My understanding from speaking with the council is that this is relating to a personal injury case where two people got in some kind of altercation outside of lit after it closed and one of them broke his clavicle. And so lit has been also sued in this proceeding. So I will be complying with that. I think it is quite broad, especially for things all notices issued by the town. I mean, that would include everything from all those millions of COVID rulings we had in 2020 and everything. So I'll be speaking with council to try to see if we can get that to be a bit more manageable, but the deadline for that is May 29th, so or May 6th. So. Okay. So we'll either be supplying that or potentially going to be to post. We will see. Oh, okay, but this can not possibly have anything to do with the reason we pulled the license, right? My guess is that it's completely unrelated, but I would imagine that a revocation would probably be an interesting thing for a plaintiff's attorney in such a case. Okay, all right. So, but we have- And I can see our two lawyers nodding their heads. Well, I'm not sure either side might want to use it. I don't know. I wasn't there anymore. What are you talking about? Yeah. But we don't have to do anything. No, I will take care of that, but I just thought you might find that interesting and that's why I'm already going to be talking to a councilor this week. So I figured I would just roll our guidelines right in there. Okay, great. That is- I'm sorry you have that annoyance, Steve. Thank you, Steve. Hopefully you learned something interesting. I get a free trip down to the beautiful city of Holyoke. Can't be all that bad. All right. Okay, well, thanks for that. Are there any other topics not reasonably anticipated or anything else anyone wants to- Do we have any- There's a lot of construction in town or new places coming up. Are there any in the pipeline? So there's Coronation Cafe and the Oyster Bar and a couple other. We do have, yes, provisions that has filed their application to take over the cousin's license. I'm still reviewing that, but that should be coming up. The, we do have provisions, I believe, is getting close to submitting. I was there for a construction meeting last week and they are at work. So that should be forthcoming at some point. I guess they related, but slightly different topic, not reasonably anticipated is also that I did hear word that the, there may be some changes at the state level regarding not for these temporary outdoor dining areas extending that temporary authority and not requiring a full alteration of premises, which is good news. So we probably won't get those applications, but I do believe we'll get provisions. Oyster Bar is, I don't know exactly where they are, but they have been in contact with us and I did get some inquiries for something at the Old Town Tavern site. I don't know if that's gonna come through or not, but. Whatever happened to protocol? They kind of, you said they started file, like getting those stuff together for a license and then it never. They did submit an application last summer and then they had a couple of issues with it and I let them know about the issues and they chose to withdraw. So I don't know what really happened there, but. Oh, I have to ask for my son, the vegan bakery. Yes. That is, I believe they're underway. I haven't been as involved with that as it doesn't have liquor, but I believe they are either close to or open. Okay. Where is that going in? Where the Henian formerly was. Oh, okay. Did we need the CV for that? Convictual? Yeah, they will need a Convictual. Well, I guess if they're doing all off-premises items, they wouldn't need one. And I believe that's what their focus is because they won't be serving anything for. I know Henian needed to have one because they serve coffee, but I think they might just be doing strictly off-premises type of thing. Right. So no, no dining in the facility, only grab and go. It would be a bit tight. Yeah. Okay. The thing I was wondering, Steve, I drove past to where the, remember the old lumberyard restaurant? Yes. And I could have sworn I said, it said Waffle something on the top. Wheelhouse. Wheelhouse. Wheelhouse. Wheelhouse. Wheelhouse. Catering kitchen. Oh, that's the, is that a catering kitchen? Okay. Maybe I was just hungry. I don't know. I was, but there hadn't been a sign up there. And I was driving back fast and I thought, oh, Waffles. No, okay. That would be nice. Nevermind. All right. You said you used to be a catering kitchen, Hallie? Is that the case? No, if they're open still or not, but they'd been using that for catering. Okay. Yeah, last time I heard they were in there, but. Okay. I just thought. I tried to get them to do something last summer. And I think I, or they were doing grab and go meals. I forget, but they weren't. Okay. Let's do something. Okay. All right. All right. So no more topics, recently anticipated review of minutes. Thank you, Steve, for the minutes from February. Chippin' away a little bit. Does anyone have a chance to at least go through the minutes a little bit? Or want to take a few minutes and look through them now and see if there's anything you have questions about? It's a very short meeting. I took a quick look. I don't, I didn't see anything that wasn't accurate. Okay. Obviously we, we had a couple of licenses we wanted to get through, which is why we had a brief meeting like that. So. Okay. Anybody else? If not, I will entertain a motion to approve the minutes. To move. All right. Thank you. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Dylan. Any further discussion? Bring none. Little take a vote. Doug. Hi. Dylan. Hi. Gaston. Hi. Allie. Hi. And I vote, I five to zero the minutes for, is it February 2nd? Eight. February 8th are approved. Okay. And we're at adjournment. So if no one else has anything else, I will entertain a motion to adjourn. Before we go, I actually just want to ask Steve two quick questions. One, well, what'd you hear about? What's going into OTT? I haven't heard anything about it. I got an inquiry from three recent UMass graduates who had moved to Southeast, but wanted to keep in touch with the Amherst area. And they were considering opening a bar in there, but that was a couple of weeks ago and I haven't heard back from them. So I don't know if they are continuing to pursue that plan. And a second question is any updates? Have you heard anything about how much longer we're all going to be remote for? That's a great question. That's something we've been, I've been discussing with a couple of the people on my floor last week. I don't think there is any answer yet. One more question. Any news on the Drake? They are building out. I think, I know they made a couple changes to their floor plan, which the ABCC approves. They are getting fairly close, I think. I think they were shooting for April. So they will have to get in. I was actually just about to email Gabrielle after this meeting to remind her to get her common Vic and live entertainment applications in across my mind as well. Cool, okay. What about Hazel's kitchen? Because I know that we approved that back in. They opened. They are open. Kind of. They had some serious flaws with the fire alarm system. And so there was a couple of events they had where they had to hire a private, I think they were private events they were already engaged for. And so they had to hire a fire watch, which is they had a couple of firefighters on a deployment there. Oh no. If the fire alarms broke and they have to physically watch for a fire. So I think they did that a couple of times. And I think it's still trying to be fixed. Okay. I think that it was something like the, if the alarm goes off in the basement, the rest of the building doesn't go off. And I think if it goes off upstairs, it shuts off the gas for the building too. So they better hope that the upstairs neighbors are burning incense or anything. Yeah, right. Okay, that's too bad. Okay, anything else? If not, is there a motion to adjourn? The move. All right. Thank you, Doug. Is there a second? Second. Thank you, Dylan. Pick a roll call out, Doug. Hi. Dylan. Hi. Hallie. Hi. Testum. Hi. And I vote aye. That is five to zero. We are adjourned at seven, oh, six PM. And we'll see everybody here on the, April, April. Good. We were changing the Monday time to five as well, right? Yes, Monday, April, Monday, April 4th at five o'clock. Okay. Very good. A little earlier. All right. And then the 26th, yeah. And then the 26th, right. All right. Thanks everybody. Bye. Bye.