 I don't think we'll go too far. I hope Karen joins because I think she may be the only one. Great. So the first item on our agenda is our agenda. Which currently has public forum. And then the references and that to leave the consultants work plan. I have not heard back from joy from the city attorney's office. On that item. I don't know if joy will be joining us today to give an update on that item. So I'm not. I don't. I just do not know what is going on with the contract. Anyway, I think we should still leave it for committee action. So I think we should leave it for committee action. So we'd love a motion on the agenda. Move to approve the agenda as presented. As their second. Seconded by commissioner. And any discussion. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed. That passes unanimously. The second item on our agenda. Is the public forum. We currently have five people as attendees. If. I know that Zoe signed up with. Shannon to speak. So Zoe, I will allow you to speak. First. Can you hear me? Yes, we can. Hi. My name is Zoe. I live in Ward four. I'm white. And I use they them pronouns. I just got home from work. Holdings are not going to be as perhaps as they normally are, but I'm here to speak out against the proposal of chief mirad. And the recommendation of the police commission to increase the number of officers on the Burlington police department. I, that just goes against the racial justice. Resolution was passed earlier last year. And I think that the problem isn't with the resolution. It's that there haven't been any concrete actions taken to. Find. Avenues and alternatives to policing, which is really important. Like Angela Davis said, abolition isn't. Constructive it's creative. So we can't. Like, I think we definitely need. Like the reduction in officers was necessary. And the problem isn't with that. It's that there haven't been any efforts to create something. To take the place of policing to better enrich and help the community in ways that are going to be more important, more helpful. Than the place have ever really been. And I think that. Trying to go back to the police. Just. The phrase, the nature of the resolution. It shows a fundamental lack of respect for the police. And I think that. I think that. I think that. The phrase, the nature of the resolution. It shows a fundamental lack of creativity and commitment to racial justice in the community. And so. As a public comment on. To the joint commission looking for alternative policing. I say that I do not support this. And I think that it is not a good idea. We need something other than enhanced police power in Burlington. So I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. I think that's a good idea. Thank you. Thank you, Zoe. That is the only person that's signed up to speak. If anyone else would like to speak, please just raise your hand. Seeing no one. I will. I think that's a good idea. I think that folks can still feel free to raise their hand or interact through the Q and A. Just want to remind folks to be respectful and directed to the chair. So with that turning to item three, starting with committee actions. Do we have Karen on yet? Yes, we do. I'm here. Great. Are you. Yeah, I have to be transparent. I had a full schedule this week and I neglected to write this meeting down. So I'm very sorry for being late and unprepared, but I did hear back from all three. We had quite a bit of a discussion about the consultancy that the joint committee had selected. And I feel confident and comfortable with moving forward. And that's a great idea. Great. The contract. Don't any commissioners have any questions for commissioner Derpy. This is Stephanie. Could I ask a question? Yeah. So I'm Stephanie and then treatment. So commissioner Derpy. You explored the issue of call volume experience. And out in the experience and analysis. Everyone get back to me and there, there was a concern the first reference the only person that had gotten back to me with in our last meeting did not have that experience. But the Philadelphia, the folks in Philadelphia and Albany. Both were able to speak on that item. Thank you. You're welcome. Karen, can you remind me. Were any of the references related to the work that has been done for the city previously. You know, I, I'm going to ask another, I'm going to ask a clarifying question on that. Were any of the references related to the work that was done previously was there. Had been involved with the Burlington police department. I was just recollecting that this was the, we picked the. The proposal that had our, this entity had done work for the city of Burlington in a completely different capacity. Right. Oh, so go ahead. Oh, I was just wondering if any of our references spoke to the previous work for the city. No, they did not. These were completely different. They had different work done and they were speaking specifically to their own police departments. One was the Philadelphia police department. The other was Albany. And I didn't, I did have one call, one additional call with the consultancy to clarify as we talked about last week, just to try and get things moving. And that's when I received the calls back, but I did not specifically speak to that person that's in the consultancy, nor did anybody reference that work. Okay. Thanks. Great. Any other commissioners? Great. Then I guess I have one question, which is, do folks want before we move forward with them to do any, I guess following up on Cherine's question. If we wanted to seek out, if anybody is still with the city that is relevant to that and do that before it gets to the council. I don't know if that's something you wanted to do. Not necessarily to hold action here, but. That is a possibility. If that's something you wanted to do, sharing. To be honest, I'm perfectly comfortable. Proceeding on commissioner derpy's work. I trust her experience doing this in her work on this. So if her. If her recommendation after speaking with the references is that we proceed. I would have wanted to know more if there had been a discussion with anyone with our city, but. I'm ready to support moving forward. Great. And just want to make sure. Okay. Great. Then we'd welcome a motion on this or. I honestly don't remember the past motion that we had on this, but I think it was to move forward pending any. Reference recommendations. So I think the next motion would be if we wanted to make one would be just to ask the city attorney's office to. Get this on the schedule for the city council. Go ahead, Randall. Okay. I move that we ask the city attorney to move ahead with this to put it on city council, put it on city council. Great motion. Any second. That's a commissioner heart. Any discussion. I do have a question. Last time we did this with the first RFP. Was there a, did we have to. Did we have to take any additional steps at this point on the motion giving authority to someone? Yeah, I think one of the city departments has to sign off on this. I guess. Skylar or Kyle. If either of you has the. Knows if you want that to happen. In your department. Yeah. I'm sorry, I just feel like I'm getting caught up here. So I'm not exactly sure where everything should be heading and living. So I'm just trying to catch my bearings. Yeah, of course. Let me. Promote Teisha. So yeah, there's two contracts outstanding. One of them, your office is the. Is the. Kind of, I guess, holding office of the contract. Okay. Put it back everyone, which is different. It's the Burlington police department assessment. And so. So I think that the Burlington police department assessment is going to live in our department. Teisha is that correct? Yeah. Great. So, are you okay with that being a friendly and clean commissioner I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Sorry. Sorry. No, go ahead. I just want to mention. You just mentioned it, but I just want to mention again, because I just got a message. This is for the RFP for the assessment of the Burlington police department. When they chatted me. So this is, that's what the RFP were discussing. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I was in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed. That passes unanimously. With that, we'll move to item 3.02. Which is the Talitha consultancy work planning. Neither Talitha nor Joy is here. I assume we have not completed a plan B. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I just want to throw it back to the commission as we had two pretty high contenders. I'm certainly frustrated by the fact that we still don't have a contract. I don't know if other folks are feeling the same way. But. Wondering if there's a plan B that we want to make in terms of going back to. One of the other. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I would love a better understanding from the city attorney as to what the holdup might. I think it has to do with insurance, but. We definitely, there were two, if I recall our discussion, there were two, it would be great to go with our first choice, but. Right. I mean, this is a time sensitive issue. So. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. The city attorney early next week to get an understanding of. How it shouldn't take this long when, you know, we've been told what the issue is. It just didn't seem like something that would. Be taking this long. So, and I don't, you know, I don't, I'm not pinning the blame on either the city or the consultant. I have no idea what's going on, but. The city attorney decided to go with plan B. That makes sense to me, commissioner harp. And I just like wise I. It would be helpful to know whether. There's any expectation that the contract will be completed or if there's any understanding about how standard. Or how anticipated the delays were. I would. Prefer to have that information about that before trying to go to a plan, B, delays or how long the delays have to expected to continue or whether delays were anticipated. It's hard for me to speculate. Yeah. And I can give as much of an overview as I know, which is, um, it seemed to be that there was an insurance requirement to be insured with a Vermont insurer, I think is the exact requirement, which the consultancy felt wasn't applicable since the work that they'll be doing will be remote. And they didn't, they, it was just a standard clause, I think in our contracting that they felt wasn't applicable to them. And then there was some discussion back and forth with the city's insurer in terms of, like, what, like what additional, if any, like smaller pressures of insurance would need to be made. And it felt like they were wrapping up the discussion, like a week and a half ago, I think. And so, and so it seems to keep being that we're almost wrapped up, but then it's not. And it is like, I do, there is also a lag time between me asking and getting answers back. So I don't know, like, I don't always know, um, in terms of like, it's like, that it's like, we should have it done by tomorrow. And then I'll write back two days later. And then two days later, I'll get a response. So I just don't, I'm not 100% sure where the like holdup is and on whose side it is. When is our next scheduled meeting? We do not have another meeting on the schedule as far as I know. And I don't think we've gotten an update since our last meeting, correct? I haven't seen an update come through on where this is. Zariah, have you? I have not. I have. It's not for your last of trying. Sorry. No, I was just gonna say, I'm happy to ask that we revisit the question at our next meeting if we haven't heard any more positive information, at least to revisit the question. If not, I mean, I'm not suggesting we go with our second choice in the next meeting, but that we open up the discussion if we haven't heard any more positive news by then. Okay. Um, yeah, I guess I don't necessarily want to schedule another meeting. That's a little bit like a non-meeting. I feel like that's what our last two meetings have been to some extent. I don't mind doing it. I guess I'm just wary of your time if folks are okay with that. But I'm afraid of scheduling the next meeting too far out, and then not having that option, especially, you know, we've got two city council meetings in a row coming up, which is, you know, a little bit helpful in terms of if we wanted to pivot, we could. And I guess without Joy here, I'm like hesitant to go much further. But I guess if, you know, Joy gets back to us, gets back to Shareen and I and says, because Shareen's just copied on the emails with, with the city attorney's office as well as the consultancy. And it doesn't feel like, I guess if it looks like gridlock, then I guess I would want to put us on a course sooner rather than later is my only and if we need to call a meeting to do that, then that's fine. And if folks feel comfortable that if there is a gridlock, just saying Shareen like authorizing Joy to at least authorizing us to like, move forward with trying to get the second consultancy, that would be my preference. But I'm happy to find whatever workaround makes sense. Go ahead, Randall. Yes, I'm happy to defer to people who have more insight into the process. If it seems as though things are bogging down to say things are bogging down, we need to go ahead and move on. I also think that, you know, we should have some positive momentum on this within I would say two weeks. So I'm happy to say that if we haven't heard anything within a week and a half, we should, we should, I think, certainly start to evaluate on their options. And whether that's calling a meeting or whether that's just, you know, empowering you guys to start making getting the ball of motion on the second choice and have to do either one of those. And my preference is to not have a meeting to just let you empower you to move ahead on that on that second choice. But certainly, I think within two weeks, we should, you know, this should be what this should be, we should have some movement on this. Great. So yeah, my timeline is, I just I really this contract I was really hoping would be started in December and now it's January 15. So I guess in terms of timeline, we have, I know that I think changing the who the recipient is would have to go through city council again. So we have a city council meeting. Our next city council meeting. Well, our next one is next Tuesday, but we won't get it on the agenda for that. But I think we could get it on the one for the 25th. As long as we put it on the agenda by next Tuesday. So I guess I would love the authority for Sherina and I to get together with the city attorney's office on that Tuesday. And then if it doesn't feel like we're moving forward, that we try to get it on the city council agenda to authorize this the other contract. So I think we also have to reach back out to the consultancy because they may have had some at least this is normal in contracts is the same as often this offer will expire in X number of days. I don't remember off hand if we have that, but can I say something? Oh, sorry, Randall and ensuring that's fine. I heard Stephanie was charming. But I was just going to say, I mean, if you'd like a motion to authorize to authorize you to do that and happen to make a motion, but I mean, I'm not sure whether it's necessary. If it's necessary, I'm happy to make a motion. Otherwise, I think you have the authority to do that. As the chair of the committee. Okay. And then was that true? And I wanted to say something or Stephanie, I couldn't does it make sense to actually put it on the agenda? If it's not needed. At the city council meeting, you could make a motion to take it off the agenda. Sorry, can you are you saying go ahead and move to try to get the city attorney to put it on the city council agenda and then. But yeah, I think that's that would be my preference. Send your motion for that. Go ahead, Sherene. I just offered to follow up with joy, Eileen, and a consultant. I know we've got a holiday weekend, but I'm happy to send an email today saying this is urgent for Tuesday morning. Right. Okay, I'll do that after we are done today. Thank you. Go ahead, Randall. Can I just move that we asked to put this on the agenda for the city council meeting of the 25th and empower you to remove it from the city council agenda if necessary? I mean, if it's not necessary. Moved by Commissioner Hart. Second. Commissioner Gommash. Any discussion? Yeah, sorry. So are we saying that this is this is as to the number to it? Are we proposing that the num the the consultant that was second to Talitha is we would be proposing to get approval for them at that meeting on the 25th? Okay, so we'll just have to re familiarize ourselves with who that second one was. Yeah, and we'll have a meeting on Tuesday morning to confirm that. Any other discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. And that is it in terms of committee actions moving forward to other business. We I know that Sherene, you had a conversation in terms of equitable sharing. So I think we can put that on our next agenda. And then I guess, from my side, a little bit of an update on the the the charter change discussion, or police oversight discussion, I think it seems like right now, Perry Freeman and Mayor Murrow Weinberger are having conversations on what potential next steps could look like in terms of process. I think I'm I guess I will defer to what you all want to do with that. I know that we had some part of this commission. I'm happy to have that. And what we also had some some concerns in terms of what's on our plate and getting it all done. I know that this is something that the three of them along with Eileen are working on. I think if you all wanted to have it here in the commission for us to talk through if you wanted to have it just some police commission for you all to talk through it there. I think it's worth putting on a agenda. I don't know if this will be the body that reviews it. Although if that is what you all if you all want to do it, I think we can. But I don't I it sounds like there is another process that has been created that doesn't have the base here in the joint committee, at least. So that's kind of all I know about that. But happy to to do what the committee's pleasure is. Go ahead, Randall. Well, I mean, I was just going to say I think this committee was formed through the actions of city council. And so what this committee exists to do, I think is subject to the interests of city council, the people that formed the committee in the first place. So whether whether that discussion has a proper home in this committee or not, I think is more up to city council than it's up to this particular joint committee. You know, obviously, I think having some insight into you're having some input into what public safety safety apparatus looks like is something that the police commission has an interest in doing it in some capacity. But I don't think it needs necessarily happened in this joint committee. Other thoughts. Great. Then we'll leave that for now. We'll definitely have equitable sharing on our next agenda. And hopefully as well. The work, I mean, I'm hope still hoping I guess that'll be to a work session with Talitha just in terms of interest of time. Are there any other agenda items folks would like to see on the agenda? Then my next question would be when we would like to meet again. And usually I prefer to schedule these in person just because I think it's a little bit easier to coordinate. I guess in this case, I would want to know if we're trying to get another consultant on board or for continuing on with Talitha consultants, because I don't want us to have. I want us to have a productive next meeting. So are folks okay with leaving it open ended right now? Or would we prefer to schedule something and like to schedule two meetings in the hope that one of them will happen? What would you go ahead, Stephanie? I would just say let's wait and hear what happens with on Tuesday and then schedule it. Great. I appreciate that. Okay. Well, thank you for those decisions. Oh, and the last thing I wanted to acknowledge is just that Shannon will be leaving us as clerks. She sent a email to the whole commission, just noting that, you know, this ended up being more work and longer than she had expected. And just because of her duties as a mother, she's wary of spending all these evenings, not not, you know, fulfilling those responsibilities. So we're going to try to find a different clerk option and or I think if Audrey and I have to fill the gap in the interim, I think we can do that as well. So I just wanted to say thank you to Shannon. I think she's going to watch this back for the minutes. And yeah, let you all I guess articulate that. Thanks, Araya. Great. With that, I'd welcome a motion to adjourn. Move by Commissioner Hart, seconded by Commissioner Gamache. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? That passes unanimously. Thank you all so much and we'll be in touch.